A History Lesson on the Arming of Iraq

And lest we forget history and just in case we were concerned that America was responsible for the arming of Iraq, a fellow scribbled out back in 2002 summary of the Iraqi armory during GW I. From what I can tell, the majority of the weapons procured before 1990 originated from Soviet block.

These sorts of information tidbits continue to solidify the belief that the French, German and Russian opposition to trade sancations and military action against Saddam was for the euros and rubles.

I did a search on the web and found an interesting history of the Iraqi nuclear weaponization program that was started in the "early 1970s". To get to a workable bomb, a key scientist named Khidhir Hamza wrote in 1998 that "the manipulation of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) was key" to the Iraqi nuclear weaponization.

According to Hamza, the Iraqi weapons program involved:

The diversion of a reactor built by the French
Use of a fuel manufacturing facility built by the Italians
The training of 400 Iraqi scientists in France and Italy
German nationals involved in efforts to refine bomb grade nuclear material

The scientist concludes that the IAEA of 1990 was woefully inadequate to police nuclear proliferation and concludes on a the IAEA's ability to adapt:

But if the old IAEA safeguards culture prevails, the new system will not be a match for a determined and untiring Saddam or other proliferators.

It is beyond me how people during the 1970s didn't understand the ramifications of the answers to the question: "Why would the second most oil rich nation in the world need a nuclear program?".

He ends with this quote (remember, this was written in 1998):

The nuclear weapons group is still in place; the expertise is still there; and Saddam Hussein and his colleagues are well practiced in the arts of deception.

What more needs to be said about the effectiveness of weapons inspections? Inspections without teeth are the security blanket of fools: you feel warm, but it is nothing but a placebo.