[Peace-discuss] elusive non existent wmd's

[Dlind49 at aol.com]

Pentagon to Increase Team on Weapons Hunt
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

 
Filed at 2:54 a.m. ET

WASHINGTON (AP) -- About 2,000 more experts are being sent to Iraq to help 
look for banned weapons as well as regime leaders, terrorists and more.

The team is more than triple the size of the force now searching for weapons 
and larger than was previously described. It will be headed by a two-star 
general in defense intelligence, the Pentagon said Wednesday.

The Defense Department also confirmed it is investigating what officials said 
may be the most promising discovery so far -- a trailer truck they say could 
turn out to be the first mobile biological lab recovered since the start of 
the war to disarm the government of Saddam Hussein.

The Bush administration alleged that Iraq had chemical, biological and 
nuclear weapons programs and said the main reason for the war was to destroy 
them. Despite weeks of searches at more than 100 sites, officials have 
reported finding nothing conclusive so far.

Although Pentagon officials suggested some Iraqi units were armed with 
chemical weapons just days before the war, none were found when those units 
were overrun. Officials said again Wednesday at a Pentagon news conference 
that finding the ``smoking gun'' will take time.

Asked if prewar intelligence was flawed, Defense Intelligence Agency Director 
Vice Adm. Lowell Jacoby said it was far too soon to tell.

``This is piecing together a major jigsaw puzzle, and we are only just 
beginning ... to work the puzzle,'' Jacoby said.

Maj. Gen. Keith Dayton of DIA will head the new group being sent to Iraq, 
called the Iraq Survey Group.

Consisting of some 1,300 military and civilian experts in computers, 
intelligence, weapons, demolition and other matters, the group also will have 
former U.N. weapons inspectors and 800 support personnel. They are joining 
600 military and civilian experts from the armed forces, FBI, CIA, Defense 
Threat Reduction Agency and elsewhere who are already hunting for chemical, 
biological and nuclear weapons programs.

Only half of the new group will devote itself to weapons. The others will be 
looking for and analyzing information on regime leaders, terrorists, war 
crimes, the former Iraqi intelligence service, atrocities and prisoners of 
war, Defense Undersecretary Stephen Cambone said.

Officials had previously said about 1,000 more were going to search for 
weapons, but never talked about the extra people for the other searches.

The Pentagon has said the United States may prosecute some figures for war 
crimes, and that soldiers are gathering information that can be used for the 
Iraqis to prosecute people who committed atrocities over the decades of 
Saddam's rule.

Cambone said the prewar lists of important sites to visit was about 1,000, 
including some 600 that related to weapons.

An additional 400 sites have been identified through Iraqi tips, documents 
and other leads since the war started.

Still, the searchers in Iraq have only explored 110 sites so far, Cambone 
said, 70 from the prewar list and 40 that emerged with new intelligence since 
the major fighting ended.

Officials said the suspected biological lab was being tested by American 
forces in Iraq. The trailer matches the description of such laboratories 
given by various sources, including a defector who says he helped operate one.

Cambone said initial tests have been done on the trailer, which was taken 
into custody April 19 at a Kurdish checkpoint in northern Iraq. No biological 
agents have been found so far, but officials believe the trailer was washed 
with a caustic chemical to wipe away evidence. They said they may need to 
dismantle it to get to hard-to-reach surfaces.

The trailer, painted in a military color scheme, was found on a transporter 
normally used for tanks. It contains a fermenter and a system to capture 
exhaust gases, which an Iraqi defector said were parts of Iraq's mobile labs, 
Cambone said.

``While some of the equipment on the trailer could have been used for 
purposes other than biological weapons agent production, U.S. and U.K. 
technical experts have concluded that the unit does not appear to perform any 
function beyond what the defector said it was for, which is the production of 
biological agents,'' Cambone said.