The French Connection.

[UDawg]

The French Connection
By WILLIAM SAFIRE


WASHINGTON

France, China and Syria all have a common reason for keeping American and British troops out of Iraq: the three nations may not want the world to discover that their nationals have been illicitly supplying Saddam Hussein with materials used in building long-range surface-to-surface missiles.

We're not talking about short-range Al Samoud 2 missiles, which Saddam is ostentatiously destroying to help his protectors avert an invasion, nor his old mobile Scuds. The delivery system for mass destruction warheads requires a much more sophisticated propulsion system and fuels.

If you were running the Iraqi ballistic missiles project, where in the world would you go to buy the chemical that is among the best binders for solid propellant?

Answer: to 116 DaWu Road in Zibo, a city in the Shandong Province of China, where a company named Qilu Chemicals is a leading producer of a transparent liquid rubber named hydroxy terminated polybutadiene, familiarly known in the advanced-rocket trade as HTPB.

But you wouldn't want the word "chemicals" to appear anywhere on the purchase because that might alert inspectors enforcing sanctions, so you employ a couple of cutouts. One is an import-export company with which Qilu Chemicals often does business.

To be twice removed from the source, you would turn to CIS Paris, a Parisian broker that is active in dealings of many kinds with Baghdad. Its director is familiar with the order but denies being the agent.

A shipment of 20 tons of HTPB, whose sale to Iraq is forbidden by U.N. resolutions and the oil-for-food agreement, left China in August 2002 in a 40-foot container. It arrived in the Syrian port of Tartus (fortified by the Knights Templar in 1183, and the Mediterranean terminus for an Iraqi oil pipeline today) and was received there by a trading company that was an intermediary for the Iraqi missile industry, the end user. The HTPB was then trucked across Syria to Iraq.

Syria has no sophisticated missile-building program. What rocket weaponry it has comes off the shelf (and usually on credit) from Russia, so it therefore has no use for HTPB. But cash-starved Syria is the conduit for missile supplies to cash-flush Saddam, as this shipment demonstrates. We will have to wait until after the war to find out how much other weaponry, for what huge fees, Saddam has stored in currently un-inspectable Syrian warehouses.

The French connection — brokering the deal among the Chinese producer, the Syrian land transporter and the Iraqi buyer — is no great secret to the world's arms merchants. French intelligence has long been aware of it. The requirement for a French export license as well as U.N. sanctions approval may have been averted by disguising it as a direct offshore sale from China to Syria.

I'm also told that a contract was signed last April in Paris for five tons of 99 percent unsymmetric dimethylhydrazine, another advanced missile fuel, which is produced by France's Société Nationale des Poudre et Explosifs. In addition, Iraqi attempts to buy an oxidizer for solid propellant missiles, ammonium perchlorate, were successful, at least on paper. Both chemicals, like HTPB, require explicit approval by the U.N. Sanctions Committee before they can be sold to Iraq.

Perhaps a few intrepid members of the Chirac Adoration Society, formerly known as the French media, will ask France's lax export-control authorities about these shipments. U.N. inspectors looking at Iraq's El Sirat trading company might try to follow its affiliate, the Gudia Bureau, to dealings in Paris.

Is this account what journalists call a "keeper," one held back for publication at a critical moment, made more newsworthy by the Security Council debate? No; I've been poking around for only about a week, starting with data originating from an Arab source, not from the C.I.A. (Anti-Kurdish analysts at Langley have it in for me for embarrassing them for 18 months on Al Qaeda's ties to Saddam, especially in the terrorist Ansar enclave in Iraqi Kurdistan.)

This detail about the France-China-Syria-Iraq propellant collaboration makes for dull reading, but reveals some of the motivation behind the campaign of those nations to suppress the truth. The truth, however, will out

[UDawg]

I hope you guys understand that I am not mad at the French for their opposition to the US. I am mad because of their sleezy intanglement with Iraq. Rarely do I throw out flame bate charges just out of ignorance. That is not to say I am ingorant. :D Still I hope at the end of this road France gets booted out of NATO and suffers greatly from their arrogant postures. This country is a has been for 200 years.

[1stFlight]

I have to say I doubt this for the following reasons

1. If they had been shipping these things to Iraq, Mr. Blix would have noticed by now.

2. Even if he hasn't noticed by now, France's push for continued inspections, and for "hundreds" more inspectors would be horribly counterproductive if I wanted to hide an illegal long range weapons program

3. And it's not like you can test fire a long range missle and have no one notice. Even underground there's considerable acostic signs. Not to mention where do you dump the exhaust.

4. Lastly, the state of our (America's) Intelligence services information in Iraq has been more than pitiful! Every accusation thus far has turned out to be unsubstantiated, or an outright lie.

Is it possible, certainly, but I fail to see how France would benifit from selling weapons to Iraq. Future sales certainly, but current ones, highly unlikely.

[UDawg]

Originally posted by 1stFlight
I have to say I doubt this for the following reasons

1. If they had been shipping these things to Iraq, Mr. Blix would have noticed by now.

2. Even if he hasn't noticed by now, France's push for continued inspections, and for "hundreds" more inspectors would be horribly counterproductive if I wanted to hide an illegal long range weapons program

3. And it's not like you can test fire a long range missle and have no one notice. Even underground there's considerable acostic signs. Not to mention where do you dump the exhaust.

4. Lastly, the state of our (America's) Intelligence services information in Iraq has been more than pitiful! Every accusation thus far has turned out to be unsubstantiated, or an outright lie.

Is it possible, certainly, but I fail to see how France would benifit from selling weapons to Iraq. Future sales certainly, but current ones, highly unlikely.


*sigh*

So you are saying that William Safire is making this up out of whole cloth? He is hardly an obscure op-ed writer and his paper is hardly unknown. :rolleyes:

1. Hans Blix hasn't found anything. It was all information that the CIA gave him. He even said that.

2. You are wrong about the US's claim to weapons of mass distruction. The unmaned drone was listed by Colin Powel at the UN in his much talked about speech, or did you miss that.
Now we know he has the drone. It was in Blix's report.

3. It does benifit France to help because it all leads to bigger contracts.

Please 1stFlight I know your are smart. You can put up a good argument but know you are just turning a blind eye to the mass amount of evidence out there. You need to let go of your hate of conservatives and the Bush administration and be open to the fact that this is real and a real threat to us.

:afro:

[1stFlight]

Okay so in your 1st point you admit I'm right, okay I can deal with that.

That drone was at best a model plane, I posted a bit on that in my "This is Getting Silly" post. If those are the kind of weapons of mass destruction we're getting ready to wage war over, the R/C model industry must be scared sh!tless.

Again I highly doubt that France would do this simply because once it was found out and published to the UN, we'd swing a lot of votes our way. We've yet to do this, and we're past the,"show your cards" point.

Thanks for the compliement, but untill Mr. Blix (the closest unbiased source) finds something viable. I can't put my faith in Intel services that up to this point have been a miserable failure. Btw, I actually don't know who William Safire is, where is he published?

Edit: So what would Russia's stake in this be? They too are threathening to veto.

Originally posted by UDawg71
*sigh*

So you are saying that William Safire is making this up out of whole cloth? He is hardly an obscure op-ed writer and his paper is hardly unknown. :rolleyes:

1. Hans Blix hasn't found anything. It was all information that the CIA gave him. He even said that.

2. You are wrong about the US's claim to weapons of mass distruction. The unmaned drone was listed by Colin Powel at the UN in his much talked about speech, or did you miss that.
Now we know he has the drone. It was in Blix's report.

3. It does benifit France to help because it all leads to bigger contracts.

Please 1stFlight I know your are smart. You can put up a good argument but know you are just turning a blind eye to the mass amount of evidence out there. You need to let go of your hate of conservatives and the Bush administration and be open to the fact that this is real and a real threat to us.

:afro:

[DaveW]

Originally posted by 1stFlight
I have to say I doubt this for the following reasons

1. If they had been shipping these things to Iraq, Mr. Blix would have noticed by now.



Hahah... Blix couldn't find his nose if it weren't attached to his face.

[UDawg]

Originally posted by DaveW
Hahah... Blix couldn't find his nose if it weren't attached to his face.

Of course he can't find it. The French forien minister's @ss is on it.

[UDawg]

This link is the general op-ed writers page.
http://www.nytimes.com/pages/opinion/columns/index.html

This one is William Safire's biography.
http://www.nytimes.com/ref/opinion/SAFIRE-BIO.html

I am sorry I did not realize I didn't put in the source.
It is the New York Times I got this article from and that is whom William Safire writes for.

Oh BTW he is Jewish. :eek:
Does that hurt his credability?;) :p

[1stFlight]

I can't say I agree, I think if given the chance Saddam would have Blix strung up on a rack long ago.

Now, this just in from CNN, turns out Iraq purchased GPS jammers from (get this) North Korea. These Russian made devices are designed to throw off satelite guided munitions. How's that for a strange turn of events?


Originally posted by UDawg71
Of course he can't find it. The French forien minister's @ss is on it.

[UDawg]

Originally posted by 1stFlight
Okay so in your 1st point you admit I'm right, okay I can deal with that.


I should have read this all the way.

You know what I meant. You said Hans Blix would have noticed it. My point is that Blix hans't found anything at all. I was the CIA that provided all his information that lead to the discoveries that we have now.

As far as North Korea. grrrr! They really make me boil. He is a total fruitcake, oh yeah completely out of his gord. That being said, you can not just attack a rogue country that has nuclear weapons. I'm sure you would agree to this. N. Korea is my example of why we need to take Saddam out, so he doesn't become the nuclear monkey on our backs. We can take Saddam out now but N. korea we have to dance around because of the threat they pose to S. Korea, Japan and us. It is much more sensible to take Saddam out and deal with N. Korea with in the near future than to go after N. Korea now and let Saddam build up to N. Korea's threat level. I'm sure you would agree with that.

[1stFlight]

Actually, the information the CIA has provided so far has been called "garbage" (http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2003/01/18/iraq/main537096.shtml) by the inspectors. The discoveries made so far belong to the inspectors themselves and strangely to Saddam's regime, they've been awefully cooperative lately

The catch with taking Saddam out before he gets nuclear weapons. Is like saying I'd better be taxed in case I become rich one day. Although I'm sure the IRS is thinking of ways to do this but at this junction it's unlikely. Just like Saddam's nuke program. You can't hide uranium, or the devices needed to refine it, or even the purchases of materials needed to make said devices.

On that point the U.N. has said that the info provided about Iraq's purchase of Uranium from Niger, was a forgery (http://abcnews.go.com/sections/GMA/2020/GMA030310Iraq_weapons_evidence.html). I wonder who would have had reason to make that up?

Yes I can agree that we shouldn't let Saddam gain nukes, as he would pose as grave a threat as NK, the only major difference here is that Saddam is contained. He's not going anywhere. So as I see it, there's no reason to put our troops in harms way, or sacrifice the Iraqi in the way.

Strangely, Saddam has far more to gain by disarming than hiding anything. Think about it
If he disarms, and proves it, he gets to..

1) Make Bush look like a fool (thereby, increasing his clout in the Arab world)
2) Say he stood up to the American/Zionist regime (see reason in part 1)
3) Increase our isolation, and not his.. go figure
4) Be legally freed of sanctions

All in all, Mr. Bush may have forced the issue, but he's the one who credibility is on the line. Strange how the world works, eh?

Originally posted by UDawg71
I should have read this all the way.

You know what I meant. You said Hans Blix would have noticed it. My point is that Blix hans't found anything at all. I was the CIA that provided all his information that lead to the discoveries that we have now.

As far as North Korea. grrrr! They really make me boil. He is a total fruitcake, oh yeah completely out of his gord. That being said, you can not just attack a rogue country that has nuclear weapons. I'm sure you would agree to this. N. Korea is my example of why we need to take Saddam out, so he doesn't become the nuclear monkey on our backs. We can take Saddam out now but N. korea we have to dance around because of the threat they pose to S. Korea, Japan and us. It is much more sensible to take Saddam out and deal with N. Korea with in the near future than to go after N. Korea now and let Saddam build up to N. Korea's threat level. I'm sure you would agree with that.

[1stFlight]

Unfortunately, yes for me it does. It's like asking a member of the KKK to be objective about some aspect of Black culture. It's not very likely, you'd get an objective response. (extreme I know, but it makes the point) I've always found the Jewish double-citizenship a major issue. It calls for a deeper examination of their motives. I believe our forefathers are rolling in the graves knowing that we have people in our upper-echelons of government, who's first loyality isn't to this country.

Maybe I sound horrible for saying that, but I'm an American first, and everybody else is second after that.

Originally posted by UDawg71
This link is the general op-ed writers page.
http://www.nytimes.com/pages/opinion/columns/index.html

This one is William Safire's biography.
http://www.nytimes.com/ref/opinion/SAFIRE-BIO.html

I am sorry I did not realize I didn't put in the source.
It is the New York Times I got this article from and that is whom William Safire writes for.

Oh BTW he is Jewish. :eek:
Does that hurt his credability?;) :p

[LORD-eX-Bu]

Originally posted by 1stFlight
I can't say I agree, I think if given the chance Saddam would have Blix strung up on a rack long ago.

Now, this just in from CNN, turns out Iraq purchased GPS jammers from (get this) North Korea. These Russian made devices are designed to throw off satelite guided munitions. How's that for a strange turn of events?

when were these things purchased? I remember hearing about them months ago and I think I even mentioned it here but it was just dismissed as propoganda:D

EDIT: I am not origionally from this country, you can be sure however that my love for this country is second to none:D

[UDawg]

Originally posted by [eNv]-LORD-eX-Bu
when were these things purchased? I remember hearing about them months ago and I think I even mentioned it here but it was just dismissed as propoganda:D

EDIT: I am not origionally from this country, you can be sure however that my love for this country is second to none:D

That is my point. This information isn't really hidden. You just need to dig a little to get it. We are talking about a paper trail. Psysical evidence of the transactions. Yet people still try to say it is just propaganda.

I also am reconsidering my question about you sounding like an anti-semite. You discounted this writers opinion because he is Jewish. That is not a reasonable position to discredit an article. This facination with a Jewish conspiracy is just sad. I do now know more of the unrational anti war position you have 1stFlight. It is just as I thougt. It has little to do with national secrity (which should be first) and more to do with idealogical abstractions which can never be obtained or are not based in reality at all.

[legion88]

Originally posted by UDawg71
I should have read this all the way.

You know what I meant. You said Hans Blix would have noticed it. My point is that Blix hans't found anything at all. I was the CIA that provided all his information that lead to the discoveries that we have now.

As far as North Korea. grrrr! They really make me boil. He is a total fruitcake, oh yeah completely out of his gord. That being said, you can not just attack a rogue country that has nuclear weapons. I'm sure you would agree to this. N. Korea is my example of why we need to take Saddam out, so he doesn't become the nuclear monkey on our backs. We can take Saddam out now but N. korea we have to dance around because of the threat they pose to S. Korea, Japan and us. It is much more sensible to take Saddam out and deal with N. Korea with in the near future than to go after N. Korea now and let Saddam build up to N. Korea's threat level. I'm sure you would agree with that.

Why would Saddam Hussein use nuclear weapons against his neighbors? Hussein has a history of looking out for #1 and there's no indication that he's going senile anytime soon. Having a nuclear wasteland nearby is not healthy for him.

There is this obvious 'make Saddam look as evil as possible' thing going on. Shows extreme stupidity. It shows extreme stupidity not because of the story itself but the willingness of certain individuals to believe the story without (a) evidence and (b) going against what they already know.

Let us take, for instance, the story about Saddam supporting al-Qaeda. When Iraq invaded Kuwait, Osama bin Laden the leader and founder of al-Qaeda was rallying support to fight against Saddam. He even sent a message to the Saudi royal family requesting that they let him use his mujahadiin fighters he acquired while fighting the Soviets in the 80s. Where's the evidence to show that these two group's relationship has healed?

And why would Saddam Hussein, a dictator, want to supply weapons to a group that (a) he doesn't control and (b) knows full well that this group can turn on him, given its past history?

Saddam runs a secular nation, which goes completely against al-Qaeda's philosophy as well as the philosophy of their idelogical allies, Saudi Arabia.

We already know where this "gassing his own people" come from. He gassed a bunch of rebel-controlled towns who supported Iran during the Iran/Iraq war. Those rebels were the Kurds, who also started other rebellions in other countries, mainly Turkey. Everytime the use of chemical weapons comes up, certain people find it convenient to ignore why those weapons were used.

Suppose Hussein decided to fire bomb the rebel town of Halabja and thus burning not only the town to the ground but the people, too. Would that have been better?

The "tyrant" Hussein provides more freedom for his own people than the allies we call Saudi Arabia.

And we already know that Saudi Arabia provides "educational" material for recruits interested in blowing themselves up to kill people.

When Iraq invaded Iran, U.S. sold arms to help Iraq. These include helicopters for instance. When Iraq invaded Kuwait--a country they had border disputes for a while, the message was that Iraq might go after Saudi Arabia next.

Why are we protecting a known terrorist-supporting country called Saudi Arabia? Why are we sending American troops to protect a country that not only supplied the philosophy but the personnel as well to blow up 3,000 American citizens in New York and D.C.?

Perhaps one should look for the Saudi Arabia connection. Someone, connect the dots for me.

[1stFlight]

Reconsider all you'd like, it won't change anything. I didn't discount it, I basically said, he'd have motive for being biased. So I'd prefer a more neutral source.

As for conspiracy, there's no proof of that either. It's just very suspicious. Then again we're about to fight a war based on suspicions aren't we?

Originally posted by UDawg71
That is my point. This information isn't really hidden. You just need to dig a little to get it. We are talking about a paper trail. Psysical evidence of the transactions. Yet people still try to say it is just propaganda.

I also am reconsidering my question about you sounding like an anti-semite. You discounted this writers opinion because he is Jewish. That is not a reasonable position to discredit an article. This facination with a Jewish conspiracy is just sad. I do now know more of the unrational anti war position you have 1stFlight. It is just as I thougt. It has little to do with national secrity (which should be first) and more to do with idealogical abstractions which can never be obtained or are not based in reality at all.

[LORD-eX-Bu]

Originally posted by legion88
Why are we protecting a known terrorist-supporting country called Saudi Arabia? Why are we sending American troops to protect a country that not only supplied the philosophy but the personnel as well to blow up 3,000 American citizens in New York and D.C.?

Perhaps one should look for the Saudi Arabia connection. Someone, connect the dots for me.

I've been wanting to point something out like that but it wouldn't really serve any purpose since I don't have any evidence or sources to back it up. There is one thing tho, I don't know if it is true or not, but I've heard that Osama Bin Laden is looking to ice the Saudi Royal family. If he were to do that, I don't know if I would cheer, but I certainly wouldn't be mad at him for doing so. I have never supported the Saudis one bit. I am not supporting Osama either, but heck, if he is gonna do it, why stop him, just something less that our guys would eventually have to do;)