[Senate Hearing 106-735]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
S. Hrg. 106-735
SADDAM'S IRAQ: SANCTIONS AND U.S. POLICY
=======================================================================
HEARING
BEFORE THE
SUBCOMMITTEE ON NEAR EASTERN AND
SOUTH ASIAN AFFAIRS
OF THE
COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN RELATIONS
UNITED STATES SENATE
ONE HUNDRED SIXTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
__________
MARCH 22, 2000
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Foreign Relations
Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.access.gpo.gov/congress/
senate
U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE
67-659 CC WASHINGTON : 2000
COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN RELATIONS
JESSE HELMS, North Carolina, Chairman
RICHARD G. LUGAR, Indiana JOSEPH R. BIDEN, Jr., Delaware
CHUCK HAGEL, Nebraska PAUL S. SARBANES, Maryland
GORDON H. SMITH, Oregon CHRISTOPHER J. DODD, Connecticut
ROD GRAMS, Minnesota JOHN F. KERRY, Massachusetts
SAM BROWNBACK, Kansas RUSSELL D. FEINGOLD, Wisconsin
CRAIG THOMAS, Wyoming PAUL D. WELLSTONE, Minnesota
JOHN ASHCROFT, Missouri BARBARA BOXER, California
BILL FRIST, Tennessee ROBERT G. TORRICELLI, New Jersey
LINCOLN D. CHAFEE, Rhode Island
Stephen E. Biegun, Staff Director
Edwin K. Hall, Minority Staff Director
------
SUBCOMMITTEE ON NEAR EASTERN AND SOUTH ASIAN AFFAIRS
SAM BROWNBACK, Kansas, Chairman
JOHN ASHCROFT, Missouri PAUL D. WELLSTONE, Minnesota
GORDON H. SMITH, Oregon ROBERT G. TORRICELLI, New Jersey
ROD GRAMS, Minnesota PAUL S. SARBANES, Maryland
CRAIG THOMAS, Wyoming CHRISTOPHER J. DODD, Connecticut
(ii)
C O N T E N T S
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Page
Duelfer, Charles, former deputy executive chairman, UNSCOM, New
York, NY....................................................... 64
Prepared statement........................................... 65
Leventhal, Paul, president, Nuclear Control Institute,
Washington, DC................................................. 32
Prepared statement (includes the following attachments)...... 35
``Iraq's Nuclear Weapons Program: Unresolved Issues''...... 40
``NCI Warns That Saddam May Have Active Nuclear Weapons
Program''................................................ 41
``Iraq and the Bomb: The Nuclear Threat Continues''........ 42
Letter to Mohamed ElBaradei, Director General, IAEA, dated
June 24, 1998............................................ 52
Letters to the Editor, the Washington Post, June 22, 1998,
entitled, ``Unanswered Questions in Iraq''............... 53
Fax letter to Mr. Paul Leventhal, Nuclear Control Institute
from Mohamed ElBaradei, Director General, IAEA, dated
June 25, 1998............................................ 54
Abstracts from the Fourth Consolidated Six-Monthly Progress
Report of the Director General of the IAEA, October 8,
1997..................................................... 55
Abstracts from the Fifth Consolidated Six-Monthly Progress
Report of the Director General of the IAEA, April 9, 1998 57
Letter to Mohamed ElBaradei, Director General, IAEA, dated
July 1, 1998............................................. 58
``State Department Discloses It Is Pursuing Reports of
Iraqi Nuclear Bomb Components,'' news release dated May
3, 1998.................................................. 59
Letter to President Clinton, dated November 19, 1998 (with
attached correspondence)................................. 60
Milhollin, Gary, director, Wisconsin Project on Nuclear Arms
Control, Washington, DC........................................ 23
Prepared statement........................................... 25
Article from The New Yorker, December 13, 1999, entitled,
``Dept. of Mass Destruction--Saddam's Nuclear Shopping
Spree''.................................................... 29
Chart from the New York Times Week in Review, December 20,
1998, entitled, ``What the Inspectors Can't Find and Why
They Can't Find It''....................................... 30
Walker, Hon. Edward S., Assistant Secretary of State for Near
Eastern Affairs, Department of State........................... 3
Prepared statement........................................... 7
Wellstone, Hon. Paul, U.S. Senator from Minnesota, prepared
statement...................................................... 15
(iii)
SADDAM'S IRAQ: SANCTIONS AND U.S. POLICY
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WEDNESDAY, MARCH 22, 2000
U.S. Senate,
Subcommittee on Near Eastern
and South Asian Affairs,
Committee on Foreign Relations,
Washington, DC.
The subcommittee met at 10:22 a.m., in room SD-419, Dirksen
Senate Office Building, Hon. Sam Brownback (chairman of the
subcommittee) presiding.
Present: Senators Brownback, Biden and Wellstone.
Senator Brownback. The hearing will be called to order.
Thank you all for joining us today. Ambassador Walker, in
particular, I want to thank you for being here. This will be
your first appearance in front of the committee since your
confirmation hearing. So, I am delighted to have you here.
Senator Wellstone will be joining us. He has another
meeting but will be joining us in the hearing. I hope some
other members will as well.
Before we get started, I hope, Ambassador Walker, that you
have a chance and will take the opportunity to address a broad
range of issues, although the hearing today is about Iraq. If I
had my druthers, we would be discussing a wide range of issues
here today and not just the question of Iraq, particularly
issues like what is taking place in the peace process,
specifically the discussions regarding the Syrian track.
Congress, I would note to you, clearly wants to be
consulted before any agreement is reached that will involve
significant U.S. dollars and/or the use of U.S. troops or
observers in any sort of peace agreement. This is something
that the Congress wants to know about before any fait accompli
occurs.
Also, I hope you feel free to take the opportunity to
discuss sanctions concessions on Iran, potentially on Libya.
But today's hearing is about Iraq, and we will stay to that
topic, but feel free to comment on these others because they
are very pressing issues of interest and concern.
It has long been my belief that policy toward Iraq should
be really a rather simple matter. One, Iraq must be disarmed
completely. Two, failing total disarmament, Saddam Hussein
should be removed from power. This administration has embraced
to, a greater or lesser degree, both of these goals, and in
both cases, I wonder really if the administration has lost
sight of its objectives.
On the question of disarmament, there have been no weapons
inspectors in Iraq for well over a year. We have no idea what
Saddam is up to. We can be pretty sure it is not good for us.
In order to get inspectors back in, the United States has
agreed to water down the inspection regime and weaken the
sanctions regime. And even those concessions have not bought
compliance from Saddam.
Now, to an observer, the situation is not too complicated.
At the end of 1998, the United States launched a military
operation against Iraq because Saddam was not cooperating with
UNSCOM. A year later UNSCOM was disbanded by the Security
Council with the help of the United States, and a kinder,
gentler commission was created. Now, what changed? Not Saddam,
that is for sure. What changed was the U.S.'s position and
resolve.
The administration seems to be listening to those who blame
sanctions for the suffering of the Iraqi people. We signed on
to the U.N. Security Council Resolution 1284 which lifted any
ceiling on Iraqi oil exports. Saddam now has more oil flowing
than he did before the Gulf war and at a much better price I
might add. In spite of that, we have agreed to soften the
inspections regime and the sanctions regime, which to my mind
will help neither the people of Iraq nor U.S. interests.
Now, I hope it is abundantly clear at this point in time
that Saddam Hussein is the enemy of the Iraqi people. As well,
he is an adversary of ours and of the United Nations. Let us
face up to that fact once and for all. For the sake of the
Iraqi people and for the interests of the American people and
our allies, Saddam should be removed. It really is as simple as
that.
I look forward to your statement. Ambassador Walker, I
appreciate your expertise. I have appreciated the friendship
and being able to work with you. I have to say, though, in my
observation of what we are doing toward Iraq right now, it
reminds me of the NCAA tournament and somebody ahead in the
game, or even behind in the game, and sitting on the ball. We
just are not pressing the issue forward at all. At all. I see
nothing observable that we want to change regimes in Iraq
anytime during the Clinton administration, that we are going to
press for a different disarmament regime in Iraq anytime during
the Clinton administration. It is as if we are just kind of
running out the clock and we are behind in the game, which does
not make much sense to do.
So, I hope you can persuade me differently, but my
observation of this is not very hopeful. And I have not seen
the implementation of the Iraq Liberation Act to any degree of
which the Congress intended for that act to be implemented and
pressed forward. This is a broad-based concern in the Congress,
particularly in the Senate. It is a bipartisan concern. Senator
Kerrey from Nebraska and I talk often about this issue of
concern about what is taking place in Iraq and the signal that
we have sent to our allies who are neighbors with Iraq in the
region that, look, Saddam is just going to be there. Deal with
it. I do not think that is the right signal for us to be
sending to them, nor one that we should be sitting on our hands
letting the clock run out on this administration in our policy
of dealing toward Iraq.
So, hopefully you can tell me that there are more and
better things that are on the horizon that are going to be
happening dealing with Iraq and some of these other issues that
we discussed at the outset. I look forward to your testimony.
But we have been joined by the ranking member of the
committee. I am delighted to have him here and present. Senator
Biden, the floor is yours.
Senator Biden. Thank you. Mr. Ambassador, if you have the
answer to the chairman's questions, you will win the Nobel
Peace Prize. We have to get you an answer in the administration
too. What is the Congress willing to do?
I recall having a meeting with the newly organized and--how
could I say--unified Iraqi opposition leadership that met in
the United States, and all of us sat there with them. We were
interested, a bunch of us--I do not know--8, 10, 12 Senators
and talked about how we had to do more. I raised the following
question.
I said, if we go ahead and implement the Iraqi Liberation
Act with funding available to us and these folks who constitute
the opposition--and they are varied in their backgrounds--if
they begin to move and they are pinned down--I asked this
particular leader of the group, who I will not mention now
because it was a private meeting, I said, look out at each of
these Senators. Ask how many are willing to vote to send
American troops if you are pinned down. I said, I commit to you
I will. I did not notice another hand raised in that meeting.
Not one other hand.
So, it seems to me that we have a big problem. Saddam is
the problem. Saddam is in place. Saddam is not going anywhere
unless we do something relatively drastic. It is clear our
allies are not prepared to do anything drastic. As a matter of
fact, it is clear, on the part of the French and others, they
would rather essentially normalize the relationship. So, we
have got a big problem.
And any insight you can give us as to why we are not doing
more--I too am confused as to what we seem to be in the
administration--you seem to be taking the position which is
essentially if you cannot fight them, join them. That is, our
friends who say that the problem is the sanctions. I do not
agree with that.
So, at any rate, I am anxious to hear your testimony, and I
hope that we can generate enough backbone here in the Congress,
as well as enough leadership in the administration, to come up
with a consensus policy as to what we should do.
Senator Brownback. And I am willing to work on that. I do
note in that meeting, the Iraq opposition was not asking for
U.S. troops. They were asking for us to implement that act----
Senator Biden. No. That is right. They were not.
Senator Brownback [continuing]. And press forward with its
implementation which, it strikes me, has been very slow to
come. Now, maybe you have a different report for us today,
Ambassador Walker, and I hope that is the case.
The floor is yours.
STATEMENT OF HON. EDWARD S. WALKER, ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF
STATE FOR NEAR EASTERN AFFAIRS, DEPARTMENT OF STATE,
WASHINGTON, DC
Ambassador Walker. Mr. Chairman, thank you very much,
Senator. Very nice to be here. I really do appreciate the
opportunity to testify before the subcommittee and particularly
as my first opportunity, Senator, since you were the one who
chaired my confirmation hearing.
A couple of points on the items that you mentioned before.
I think we are going to be in a much better position to talk
about the Syrian track of the peace process after Sunday and
after the meeting of the President with President Assad.
Hopefully, we will have an opportunity to consult after that.
Clearly, the President understands and the Secretary
understands fully the importance of having congressional
consultations prior to the kinds of commitments that are being
talked about. We have not reached the point yet where this has
been pinned down. We will be shortly doing that, and at that
point it is my expectation that we will begin consultations on
the Hill.
The Iran subject is a complex one and I think would be
better taken up in a forum in which we had more time to discuss
it.
Senator Brownback. I would be happy to provide that at a
time when you can come back. I would enjoy and would appreciate
your presentation of it today, but we will get a time where you
are available and we will discuss it thoroughly.
Ambassador Walker. Because it is a complex situation and we
do not want to have misinterpretation of what we have done
through the Secretary's statement. So, I think it is important
to have that conversation.
I do welcome the opportunity to mention the Libya
situation. It is very important that people understand that
what we are doing with sending a consular delegation to Libya
is strictly a consular matter. There are only two countries in
the world where the United States passport is not authorized.
One is Iraq and one is Libya. We have business interests in
Libya. It is our intent to see if it is safe for Americans, and
that is the sole purpose of the consular visit. If it is safe,
then the Secretary will have to make a decision whether or not
to authorize U.S. passports. That decision has not been made
yet.
This has no relationship to subsequent steps. There are no
subsequent steps in mind. We have a series of requirements of
Libya that have been put down by the United Nations Security
Council. We are adhering to those requirements relating to
cooperation with the trial authorities, the Scottish
authorities, relating to support for terrorism and relating to
compensation for the families of the victims. There is no
change in that policy, and we will continue along those lines.
So, I want to make sure that people understand that this is
not a move to take Libya off the terrorist list or to change
any of the sanctions that have been imposed by the Security
Council.
Now, if I may, Senator, I would like to read a statement,
and then I welcome the question and answer period when we can
clarify some of the items that you have discussed already.
Iraq, under Saddam Hussein, remains dangerous, unrecon-
structed, and defiant. Saddam's record makes clear that he will
remain a threat to regional peace and security as long as he
remains in power. That is why the United States is committed to
containing Saddam Hussein as long as he remains in power. But
we are also committed to helping alleviate the suffering of the
Iraqi people and to supporting Iraqis who seek a new government
and a better future for Iraq.
We contain Saddam through U.N. sanctions which deny him the
resources needed to reconstitute weapons of mass destruction,
by enforcing no-fly zones in the north and south, and by
maintaining a military presence in the region and a readiness
to use force if necessary.
An effective disarmament and monitoring regime inside Iraq
would strengthen containment by further limiting Iraq's efforts
to rearm. Resolution 1284 reaffirms that Iraq has not fulfilled
its obligations under previous Security Council resolutions to
declare and destroy its weapons of mass destruction. The
resolution establishes a new arms control organization, the
United Nations Monitoring, Inspection and Verification
Commission, or UNMOVIC, to replace UNSCOM. UNMOVIC retains
UNSCOM's broad mandate and authorities. It has the right to
conduct intrusive inspections into Iraq's past weapons of mass
destruction programs, as well as to monitor and to prevent
future developments of weapons of mass destruction. It has the
right to immediate, unconditional, and unrestricted access to
any and all sites, records, and facilities.
The United Nations is moving ahead with implementation of
the Resolution 1284. The Secretary General has appointed Hans
Blix of Sweden, a former director general of the International
Atomic Energy Agency, as executive chairman of UNMOVIC, and he
took up his duties on March 1. We have met several times with
Dr. Blix since his appointment, and he has made clear that he
is committed to putting in place a robust, technically
proficient body which will accept nothing less than full Iraqi
cooperation.
Sanctions are the most critical element of containment. In
the absence of the sanctions regime and a comprehensive
international system of controls, Saddam Hussein would have
sole control over Iraq's oil revenues, estimated at $20 billion
over the coming year. In the absence of comprehensive
international controls, even if a military embargo remained in
place, it is inevitable that Saddam would once again threaten
the region and ignore the needs of the Iraqi people.
But it is also essential that we address the humanitarian
needs of the Iraqi people. Not only is it right for the
international community to do all it can to assist the Iraqi
people who are the pawns of Saddam Hussein, but doing so
minimizes the risk of sanctions erosion and alleviates
international pressures to ease or lift the controls which keep
Iraq's revenue out of the hands of Saddam Hussein.
U.N. sanctions have never targeted the Iraqi people and
have never limited the important food and medicine for the
Iraqi people. In fact, it was the United States that pressed
for the creation of the first oil-for-food program adopted in
1991. Baghdad rejected this program, and it was not until 1996
that it finally accepted oil-for-food.
Since the first oil-for-food supplies arrived in Iraq in
1997, the program has brought tremendous improvements in living
conditions. Iraqi per capita intake has risen from 1,300
calories before the program began to over 2,000 calories now
provided by a U.N. ration basket which is augmented by locally
grown produce.
Food imports are now at about prewar levels. In the year
before the program began, Iraq imported about $50 million worth
of medicines. Since the program began, more than $1 billion
worth have been approved. Ninety percent of essential drug
needs in hospitals are now being met. Over a billion dollars
worth of goods for the water, sanitation, electrical, and
agricultural sectors have been approved.
Saddam Hussein, however, has abused the program to the
detriment of the Iraqi people in an attempt to get sanctions
lifted without compliance. The Secretary General reported
earlier this month that Iraq has still not implemented the
supplementary feeding programs recommended for years by the
United Nations for malnourished children under 5 and for school
children.
To get the clearest picture of the oil-for-food program and
its potential, it is helpful to compare its operation in
northern Iraq where the United Nations controls distribution
and in southern and central Iraq where Saddam controls the
distribution of goods. A UNICEF report on child mortality in
Iraq conducted last year revealed a disturbing rise in child
mortality rates, more than double pre-war levels, in south and
central Iraq, the parts of the country controlled by Saddam
Hussein. But the report also revealed that child mortality
rates in northern Iraq had dropped below pre-war levels. These
numbers show that oil-for-food can work to meet the needs of
the Iraqi people if the government can be prevented from
interfering or can be compelled to manage the program
efficiently with that priority in mind.
Even with the successes of the oil-for-food program, more
can and should be done. That is why the U.S. supported
Resolution 1284, adopted by the Security Council on December
17, which introduces further enhancements of the oil-for-food
program. The resolution permits Iraq to sell as much oil as
needed to meet humanitarian needs of the Iraqi people. I would
interject at this point that every dollar that is sold in that
program is controlled by the United Nations. It does not go to
Saddam Hussein.
We do not believe there should be any limit on the funds
spent on the Iraqi people. As it has in the past, the U.N. will
continue to monitor the program to ensure that the regime
spends these revenues only on humanitarian projects. The
resolution also streamlines the contract approval process to
facilitate the supply of legitimate goods and authorizes the
use of oil-for-food funds to purchase local goods, such as
wheat, to provide a boost to Iraq's agricultural sector.
For our part, we are examining our own national procedures
for reviewing oil-for-food contracts to ensure that they are
optimized to meet our priorities; that is, maximizing
assistance to the Iraqi people while denying the regime access
to goods it could use to reconstitute its weapons of mass
destruction programs.
At the same time as we work in the United Nations to
strengthen containment, we continue to support Iraqis who are
supporting the removal of the current Baghdad regime and its
replacement by a new government in Baghdad under which Iraq can
resume its rightful place in the Arab and international
communities. We continually tell the Iraqis that they alone
must be the ones to determine the future of Iraq. We will
assist them as we can, but we will not--indeed, should not--be
the ones to decide who will be the next leader of Iraq.
Using congressionally appropriated funds, the State
Department and the INC will sign an initial grant worth over a
quarter a million dollars this week. The grant will enable the
Iraqi National Congress [INC] to continue its efforts to reach
out to constituents and to establish the infrastructure
necessary to accomplish its objectives and to take advantage of
other congressionally mandated programs.
As a government, we are also stepping up our efforts to
gather evidence to support the indictment of the top Iraqi
leadership for crimes against humanity, genocide, and war
crimes. We are gathering evidence from U.S. Government files
and we are supporting the work of NGO's that make important
contributions to this effort. We expect the Iraqi opposition to
make a major contribution to the campaign to bring the Baghdad
regime to justice.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I welcome any questions that you
may have.
[The prepared statement of Ambassador Walker follows:]
Prepared Statement of Hon. Edward S. Walker, Jr.
Mr. Chairman: I am pleased to appear before you today to discuss
U.S. policy towards Iraq, a key foreign policy issue.
Iraq under Saddam Hussein remains dangerous, unreconstructed and
defiant. Saddam's record makes clear that he will remain a threat to
regional peace and security as long as he remains in power. He will not
relinquish what remains of his WMD arsenal. He will not live in peace
with his neighbors. He will not cease the repression of the Iraqi
people. The regime of Saddam Hussein can not be rehabilitated or
reintegrated as a responsible member of the community of nations.
Experience makes this conclusion manifest. That is why the United
States is committed to containing Saddam Hussein as long as he remains
in power. But at the same time, we are also committed to working to
alleviate the suffering of the Iraqi people who are forced to live
under a regime they did not choose and do not want, and to supporting
Iraqis who seek a new government and a better future for Iraq.
The first two elements of our poiicy, containment and the effort to
alleviate conditions for the Iraqi people were strengthened
considerably by the Security Council's adoption of resolution 1284 in
December of last year. Let me begin by reviewing the elements of
containment.
We contain Saddam through UN sanctions which deny him the resources
needed to reconstitute weapons of mass destruction, by enforcing no-fly
zones in the North and South, and by maintaining a military presence in
the region and a readiness to use force if necessary.
We have enforced a no-fly zone over northern Iraq since 1991, and
over southern Iraq since 1992. These zones were established to prevent
Saddam Hussein from using his air force against the civilian
populations of these areas, as he has done so brutally in the past. We
have been highly successful in this effort. The zones also provide
critical buffer zones to detect any Iraqi troop movements north or
south. Iraqi propaganda denounces the no-fly zones as a pretext for
ongoing military action against Iraqi forces, a charge which some
others have repeated. Let me just state, once again, that the no-fly
zones are protective, not offensive, in nature. Since December 1998,
following Operation Desert Fox, Saddam Hussein has mounted a sustained
challenge to our patrols. Iraqi forces have violated the no-fly zones
over 600 times in 1999. Our forces are fully prepared and authorized to
defend themselves and we have responded to these challenges with
strikes on Iraq's integrated air defense system. Saddam Hussein will
not deter us from our commitment to maintaining these zones which are a
key element of containment.
An effective disarmament and monitoring regime inside Iraq would
strengthen containment by further limiting Iraq's efforts to rearm. In
the absence of inspectors on the ground, we must rely on national
technical means which cannot provide the same level of assurance as
monitoring on the ground. Resolution 1284 re-affirms that Iraq has not
fulfilled its obligations under previous Security Council resolutions
to declare and destroy its WMD. The resolution establishes a new arms-
control organization, the UN Monitoring, Inspection and Verification
Commission, or UNMOVIC, to replace UNSCOM. UNMOVIC retains UNSCOM's
broad mandate and authorities. It has the right to conduct intrusive
inspections into Iraq's past WMD programs, as well as to monitor to
prevent future development of WMD. It has the right to immediate,
unconditional and unrestricted access to any and all sites, records and
facilities.
The UN is moving ahead with implementation of the resolution 1284.
The Secretary General has appointed Hans Blix of Sweden, former
Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency, as
Executive Chairman of UNMOVIC, and he took up his duties on March 1. We
have met several times with Dr. Blix since his appointment, and he has
made clear that he is committed to putting in place a robust,
technically-proficient body which will accept nothing less than full
Iraqi cooperation. He has had extensive experience with the
deceitfulness of Saddam's regime and the lengths it goes to in order to
preserve its WMD programs.
The Secretary General, in consultation with Dr. Blix and Security
Council members, has also named a 16-member College of Commissioners
for UNMOVIC to provide advice and guidance to the Executive Chairman.
They represent a technically expert group. Assistant Secretary for Non-
Proliferation Affairs, Robert Einhorn, has been appointed as a
Commissioner. Like UNSCOM's College of Commissioners, we expect that
they will meet periodically so that Dr. Blix can draw on their
collective expertise. Dr. Blix is now embarked on drawing up an
organizational plan for UNMOVIC which is scheduled to be completed by
April 15.
If weapons inspectors are allowed back into Iraq, the next step is
for UNMOVIC and the IAEA to draw up the key remaining disarmament tasks
to be completed by Iraq. If Iraq fulfills these tasks, and cooperates
with weapons inspectors for 120 days after reinforced monitoring is
fully operational, the Council could act to suspend sanctions
temporarily, provided appropriate financial controls are in place, and
bearing in mind the humanitarian purposes of the Council's decisions.
The embargo on military imports would remain in place, and dual-use
items would continue to require prior approval. If Iraqi cooperation
ceased, sanctions would be re-imposed automatically. Renewal of the
suspension would require a positive Council decision every 120 days.
The condition for lifting sanctions on Iraq--full compliance with
UN Security Council resolutions--remains unchanged.
Containment has been strengthened by the adoption of the
resolution. All members of the Security Council--even the four that
abstained from the resolution--are committed to implementing the
resolution, pressing Iraq to accept inspectors, and maintaining
sanctions until Iraq complies with the terms of the resolution.
Sanctions are the most critical element of containment. In the
absence of the sanctions regime and a comprehensive international
system of controls, Saddam Hussein would have sole control over Iraq's
oil revenues--estimated at $20 billion over the coming year--to spend
on priorities of his regime, whether it be to rebuild his WMD capacity,
produce chemical or biological weapons, bolster his oppressive security
apparatus, or to build opulent palaces. In the absence of comprehensive
international controls--even if a military embargo remained in place--
it is inevitable that Saddam would once again threaten the region and
ignore the needs of the Iraqi people.
As long as sanctions remain in place, it is essential that we
address the humanitarian needs of the Iraqi people. An effective oil-
for-food program, which provides the Iraqi people with basic civilian
and humanitarian goods while denying the regime access to the most
dangerous dual-use goods, serves both humanitarian interests and
regional security. Not only is it right for the international community
to do all it can to assist the Iraqi people who are the pawns of Saddam
Hussein, but doing so minimizes the risk of sanctions erosion and
alleviates international pressure to ease or lift the controls which
keep Iraq's revenue out of the hands of Saddam Hussein.
UN sanctions have never targeted the Iraqi people and have never
limited the import of food and medicine for the Iraqi people. In fact,
the United States was an original sponsor of the first oil-for-food
program, adopted in 1991. Tragically, Baghdad rejected this program and
it was not until 1996 that it finally accepted oil-for-food. Since the
first oil-for-food supplies arrived in Iraq in 1997, the program has
brought tremendous improvements in living conditions. Iraqi per capita
intake has risen from 1,300 calories before the program began to over
2,000 calories now provided by a UN ration basket which is augmented by
locally-grown produce. Food imports are now at about prewar levels. In
the year before the program began, Iraq imported about $50 million
worth of medicines. Since the program began, more than $1 billion worth
have been approved. Ninety percent of essential drug needs in hospitals
are now being met. Over a billion dollars worth of goods for the water,
sanitation, electrical and agricultural sectors have been approved.
Saddam Hussein however, has abused the program to the detriment of
the Iraqi people, in an attempt to get sanctions lifted without
compliance. Since the first delivery of oil-for-food supplies in March
1997, the government of Iraq has failed to work with UN authorities to
maximize the benefit to the Iraqi population. The needs of the most
vulnerable groups, including children and the elderly, have been of
particular concern. The Secretary General reported earlier this month
that Iraq has still not implemented the supplementary feeding programs,
recommended for years by the UN, for malnourished children under five
and for school children. These programs have been very successful in
the North, where oil-for-food is administered by the UN. By contrast,
vaccination levels in Baghdad-controlled areas are worse than they were
in 1994. Ordering remains slow and erratic, and the distribution of
goods after they reach Iraq continues to be a problem. A major reason
for this suffering is Saddam's cynical manipulation.
To get the clearest picture of the oil-for-food program and its
potential, it is helpful to compare its operation in northern Iraq,
where the UN controls distribution, and in southern and central Iraq,
where Saddam controls the distribution of goods. A UNICEF report on
child mortality in Iraq conducted last year revealed a disturbing rise
in child mortality rates--more than double pre-war levels--in south/
central Iraq, the parts of the country controlled by Saddam Hussein.
But the report also revealed that child mortality rates in northern
Iraq, where the UN controls distribution of the oil-for-food program,
had dropped below pre-war levels. What these numbers show is that oil-
for-food can work to meet the needs of the Iraqi people if the
government can be prevented from interfering, or can be compelled to
manage the program efficiently with that priority in mind.
Publicity surrounding the release of this survey last year led
Baghdad to finally place orders for nutritional supplements--something
the UN had long advocated. Early last year, the Secretary General
reported that there were $275 million worth of medicines sitting in
Iraqi warehouses undistributed. As a result of the publicity generated
by this report, stockpiles were eventually reduced. We hope that the
Secretary-General's latest report will generate pressure on the regime
to introduce supplementary feeding programs, improve distribution of
supplies and rationalize the Government's ordering.
Even with the successes of the oil-for-food program, more can and
should be done. That is why the U.S. supported resolution 1284, adopted
by the Security Council on December 17, which introduces further
enhancements of the oil-for-food program. The resolution permits Iraq
to sell as much oil as needed to meet the humanitarian needs of the
Iraqi people. We do not believe there should be any limit on the funds
spent on the Iraqi people. As it has in the past, the UN will continue
to monitor the program to ensure that the regime spends these revenues
only on humanitarian projects. The resolution also streamlines the
contract approval process to facilitate the supply of legitimate goods,
and authorizes the use of oil-for-food funds to purchase local goods,
such as wheat, to provide a boost to Iraq's agricultural sector.
For our part, we are examining our own national procedures for
reviewing oil-for-food contracts, to ensure that they are optimized to
meet our priorities: maximizing assistance to the Iraqi people while
denying the regime access to goods it could use to reconstitute its WMD
programs. The United States has been criticized by many for the numbers
of holds we have placed on oil-for-food contracts. We recognize that
some of this criticism reflects humanitarian concern, and we are
reviewing our procedures with this concern in mind. However, we must
also be objective, as well as compassionate, in assessing the big
picture.
The regime of Saddam Hussein has used chemical weapons against its
own people and its neighbors, it has developed biological weapons and
had an active nuclear program. It has obstructed weapons inspectors for
nine years in an effort to conceal these programs. This regime has the
expertise and the will to produce weapons of mass destruction. We can
not hand it the goods it needs to turn those intentions into reality.
Particularly in the absence of weapons inspectors, we will continue to
hold on dual-use goods which can be used in WMD development.
At the same time, it is critical that we do all we can to ensure
that the Iraqi people receive the goods they need. Not only is it right
for the international community to do all it can to assist the Iraqi
people who are the pawns of Saddam Hussein, but doing so minimizes the
risk of sanctions erosion and alleviates international pressure to ease
or lift sanction in the absence of Iraqi compliance with UN Security
Council resolutions.
At the same time as we work in the UN to strengthen containment, we
continue to support Iraqis who are supporting the removal of the
current Baghdad regime and its replacement by a new government in
Baghdad under which Iraq can resume its rightful place in the Arab and
international communities. We continually tell the Iraqis that they
alone must be the ones to determine the future of Iraq; we will assist
them as we can, but we will not, indeed should not, be the ones to
decide who will be the next leader of Iraq.
Using funds appropriated by Congress, free Iraqis held a broad-
based National Assembly in New York in October. At the conference, the
Iraqi National Congress elected a new leadership. Frank Ricciardone has
been working intensively with them to channel fresh U.S. support to the
Iraqi opposition as they identify and plan specific operational goals
and activities:
Developing and broadcasting a vision for the restoration of
civil society in Iraq and for Iraq's reintegration as a
responsible member of the international community.
Building the case for the prosecution of Saddam Hussein and
key members of the regime for war crimes and crimes against
humanity;
Channeling training, information and material support, under
the Iraq Liberation Act, to the forces of change inside Iraq.
Channeling humanitarian assistance to Iraqis in need, in the
face of Baghdad's obstruction and monitoring Saddam Hussein's
performance in providing for the basic needs of the Iraqi
people.
Building stronger ties to and between the internal
resistance and with regional states.
Using congressionally appropriated funds, the State Department and
the INC will sign an initial grant worth over a quarter of a million
dollars this week. The grant will enable the INC to continue its
efforts to reach out to constituents and to establish the
infrastructure necessary to accomplish its objectives and to take
advantage of other congressionally mandated programs.
In particular, we hope and expect that the INC will soon have the
organization and staffing needed to take full advantage of training and
material support that we will be ready to provide under the Iraq
Liberation Act. As you know, four INC members were invited to
participate in a first military training course under the ILA in
November at Hurlburt Air Force Base. The Iraqis participated side by
side with colleagues from other Arab countries for the first time in
many years. Now, the Defense Department is preparing a more extensive
list of training options for free Iraqis. We anticipate that by late
spring, many more Iraqis will be in line for training enjoyed by other
allied and friendly officers in areas related to logistics, civil
reconstruction, management, and public relations.
Another important area the INC will be working on is providing
humanitarian assistance to Iraqis inside Iraq. This is an important
area that dovetails with our own national goals and we look forward to
working with them on it. The INC would develop an infrastructure to
deliver critically needed humanitarian goods to segments of the Iraqi
population that Saddam Hussein has ignored.
As a government, we are also stepping up our efforts to gather
evidence to support the indictment of the top Iraqi leadership for
crimes against humanity, genocide and war crimes. We are gathering
evidence from U.S. Government files. We are also supporting the work of
NGOs that make important contributions to this effort. We have already
provided $2 million in congressionally appropriated funds to four
separate but related activities: making captured Iraqi documents
available on the Internet; gathering videotape and imagery of Iraqi
crimes against humanity; gathering witness statements to justify
indictments of top Iraqi officials and helping to generate the
international public on the crimes committed by the Baghdad regime. We
expect the Iraqi Opposition to make a major contribution to the
campaign to bring the Baghdad regime to justice.
This heightened attention by NGO's to crimes of the Iraqi
leadership has already borne fruit, as we saw by the precipitous
departure of an Iraqi regime leader from Austria last September and
with Tariq Aziz' decision shortly thereafter not to participate in a
forum in Italy. We have increased our diplomatic activity on the issue,
discussing the possibilities of a UN tribunal or committee of experts
with other UN members and ensuring that documents in U.S. control are
available for use in any eventual legal action.
I cannot predict with any certainty when this brutal regime will be
gone. But by maintaining sanctions, enforcing the no-fly zones,
committing to use force if Saddam Hussein crosses our red lines, and
supporting the opposition, we increase the pressure on the regime and
we contain the threat it poses to the region and the Iraqi people.
I welcome any questions you may have.
Senator Brownback. Do you expect Saddam Hussein to be in
power at the end of the Clinton administration?
Ambassador Walker. I would say that we cannot predict what
will happen in Iraq. The probabilities would lead in the
direction that he would still be in power by the end of the
administration. That does not mean that we cannot use the
intervening time to buildup the capabilities of those who would
seek to remove him.
Senator Brownback. You stated this week you signed a
contract with the INC for a quarter million dollars. Your total
authorization in that program I believe is around $97 million.
Ambassador Walker. That is in the draw-down authority. This
is the ESF moneys that the quarter million will come out, and
the total authority there is, I believe, $10 million, of which
$2 million goes to the war crimes effort and $8 million goes to
the INC.
Now, we have a general outline of the program that the INC
will be putting forward to us. They will use this quarter of a
million to help establish their offices and to get a complete
program to us. But we have outlined the general elements of the
program.
Senator Brownback. How much money has the Clinton
administration used this fiscal year to support the INC?
Ambassador Walker. In support of the INC, there was money
devoted to a supporting agency, and I do not have the figures
on that, Senator. I do not know exactly how much went to the
subcontractor which was helping them develop the meetings that
we had in New York and so on. I will have to get you those
figures.
[The following information was subsequently supplied:]
Over the course of 1999, as Iraqi opposition leaders greatly
increased their efforts to strengthen opposition unity and political
activity, the USG supported their efforts through grants and contracts
with a conference planning contractor and with a public advocacy firm.
The conference planner not only made all arrangements for the series of
organizational and political meetings the INC conducted, but also
organized their deliberations at the UN General Assembly and their
subsequent National Assembly meeting in New York, the first such
assembly of Iraqis since 1992. The conference planner also provided
office space and office support in London for the INC's activities.
Final figures for these support activities are still under review. The
contractor has, in many cases, been able to negotiate significant
savings against anticipated costs. We understand the total for all
support costs during 1999 will be approximately $3 million.
Separately, the INC has now been awarded a grant for $267,784 in
Economic Support Funds to set up its own headquarters structure and
undertake various organizational and public advocacy tasks. We expect
that this will be only the first of many proposals the INC will submit
to support a program of transition toward democracy in Iraq.
Senator Brownback. Is that the primary expense that you
have had is the support of the meeting in New York?
Ambassador Walker. Well, and working with the INC to make
them grant worthy so that we could move on to direct programs
with the INC, yes.
Senator Brownback. Has any money been authorized to be used
by the INC within Iraq?
Ambassador Walker. At this point there has been no program
developed for use within Iraq. That is the whole purpose of the
quarter of a million and the program that we will be
developing. In the course of that program, we hope to, over the
course of the next year, help the INC develop its capabilities
so that it can, one, establish an office in London and offices
in the region; two, take care of its internal security
procedures so that it can operate in Iraq safely; three,
monitor the oil-for-food distribution program; four, establish
a distribution network for humanitarian supplies; five, collect
war crimes evidence; six, establish a Free Iraqi information
program, television, radio, magazines, which would reach inside
Iraq and also be available outside Iraq; and finally, collect
such other information as might be useful.
This is an immediate program that we hope will be able to
help the INC develop its infrastructure and establish the
foundation that could be then used for other things later on.
Senator Brownback. And you do not mention lethal assistance
to the INC in that listing. Is that correct?
Ambassador Walker. I do not mention lethal assistance, nor
am I discounting the possibility in the future. But it has been
our experience that with several unfortunate situations in 1991
and 1996, that you need to have the foundation solidly built in
order to move forward in any campaign that would have a hope of
unseating Saddam Hussein.
Senator Brownback. Any notions of how much time it will
take to build that solid foundation? You have had the
authorization and the approval from Congress for--what--a year
and a half, 2 years now with the INC?
Ambassador Walker. Right.
Senator Brownback. It looks like you have not even got the
footings.
Ambassador Walker. Well, actually a lot has been done,
Senator. It is not easy to set up a new organization from the
ground up and to make it credit worthy or grant worthy in the
U.S. Governmental terminology. We have a number of requirements
of transparency, contracting capabilities, and so on that have
to be met under congressional guidance that take time for any
organization to develop. When I was Ambassador in Egypt, we
tried to get several NGO's grant worthy under the AID programs
and found that it was extremely difficult to do so, and it took
time.
Now, the very process of doing this, however, assists them
in developing their infrastructure, their capabilities so that
they will be able, our expectation and hope is, to move quicker
with our help in trying to develop the kind of program that I
have outlined here before you.
Senator Brownback. Mr. Ambassador, it strikes me that what
is taking place is the thing that a number of us feared and
that is that Saddam--and the administration is in complicity
with this--is just waiting you out, that there is not a serious
effort on the part of the administration to remove Saddam from
power, that we have lost our inspection regime within Iraq.
There has not been a serious inspection regime in place for a
year within Iraq. And everybody is virtually satisfied with
that situation presently and that there is no serious effort
within the administration to do anything differently, to find a
different group than the INC if you do not think that they can
do that, to find a different means to really get at Saddam, to
find a different sort of inspection regime. And all along, the
clock is ticking and the rest of the world and others are
starting to reengage Saddam.
Ambassador Walker. Right.
Senator Brownback. So, at the end of the day, we are left
with him still in power, still in Baghdad, more oil revenues
flowing than he had even prior to the war, and our neighbors
and our allies in the region saying, well, we did not think you
were going to get rid of him, and I guess we will just have to
deal with him. I do not know how one comes to a different
conclusion than that, given what is in play today.
Ambassador Walker. Mr. Chairman, I can see the point. I can
tell you that we believe that we have been successful for 9
years in keeping this man under containment, that he has been
unsuccessful in reestablishing the capability to threaten his
neighbors, and it is our objective, very serious objective, to
both strengthen the controls in that area, the sanctions, as
well as to work with the INC and others in order to build the
kind of a structure they would need to actually do something
about Saddam Hussein.
Now, when I say that we are trying to strengthen the
controls, I am talking about working to limit the flow of
smuggling, the outflow of oil that is not coming under the U.N.
control but is being smuggled out of Iraq and which does put
hard currency in his pocket. Because, as I said before, the key
here is to keep control over his money, as far as the sanctions
go. So, that is an effort that we are engaging in now. We hope
that we will be able to limit this loophole or this flow.
In the meantime, I had a meeting yesterday with Akhman
Shalabi. We have an agreed proposal or an agreed agenda for
work in the future. We are serious about it. We admit that it
will take some time to put it together. But it is not our
objective or our interest to see a slaphappy or a slapdash kind
of program put together that costs people's lives. These are
serious people, Mr. Chairman. They care about Iraq. They want
to do something about it, and we want to help them do it.
Senator Brownback. I know they are serious people. I have
met with them as well. But it seems as if what you are
presenting is that we are going to keep Saddam under house
arrest and then he continues to buildup stronger, and we are
really not building his opposition up.
I want to visit some other questions, but we will go ahead.
Senator Biden. I have no questions.
Senator Brownback. Senator Wellstone.
Senator Wellstone. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Let me ask your
indulgence and the indulgence of Senator Biden. I had a
Veterans Affairs Committee hearing, and I have some questions.
But I thought in the first 5 minutes, if I could, or several
minutes, I would like to lay out my framework, if that is OK. I
rarely do this, but it is kind of a semi-formal statement. Then
I will have some questions.
By the way, I know this is one of the toughest foreign
policy challenges that we have. Let me just say that right away
to you, Mr. Walker. I do not quarrel with anyone who believes
that Saddam's leadership is a real threat to our interests, to
the region, and frankly, maybe even more than anything, to
those most directly affected, which is the Iraqi people
themselves.
The subject matter today is sanctions and U.S. policy. This
is an issue that I have raised before, and I would like to zero
in on it, which is the unintended but devastating--
devastating--impact of these sanctions on the Iraqi people.
Last week, the Secretary General of the United Nations
delivered a report to the Security Council assessing Iraq's
humanitarian needs and saying that the U.N.'s efforts to ease
the suffering of 20 million people in the country ``has
suffered considerably'' as a result of the ``holds'' placed by
the United States and Britain on contracts in the oil-for-food
program, something I would like to talk to you about.
Saddam Hussein is also criticized in the report for
spending too little money from oil sales on food for the
population. No question about it.
The point is this. While Saddam has proven indifferent to
Iraq's people, I do not think we can be similarly indifferent.
I strongly believe that the administration should take some
steps to better reconcile the enforcement of our disarmament
objectives in Iraq with our obligation to minimize the harm to
innocent Iraqi civilians and to ensure their most basic rights.
Now, the Secretary General's recent report to the Security
Council--I know what you have said in your testimony, but just
a little bit of contradictory testimony. The Security Council's
own report last year on the deteriorating humanitarian
situation, the comprehensive UNICEF survey on child health--
some of this is devastating to read--and other relief agencies
that are out in the field, the International Committee of the
Red Cross, have all made it clear that a public health
emergency exists in many areas of the country and that efforts
under the oil-for-food program to alleviate these conditions
have been woefully inadequate.
I think it is critical that we do something to address this
public health emergency, and I think this requires restoring
Iraq's civilian economic infrastructure--I did not say
military--in order to bring child mortality rates and other
public health indicators back as close as possible to the
levels that existed before the embargo. So, let me just mention
three initiatives, and I want to get your reaction.
First, that the Security Council and the Sanctions
Committee push to implement immediately the recommendations of
the report of the Council's humanitarian panel last March. In
particular, I think what was important there was the
preapproval of humanitarian items. I think that is critically
important. Otherwise, this drags on and on and on. I would like
to see that process expedited.
Second, to take all necessary steps to persuade the
Security Council and the Sanctions Committee to take more
seriously its obligation to monitor the humanitarian impact of
the sanctions, especially on those people that are most
vulnerable, and I have in mind the children and the elderly. We
have made a commitment to do so. The Security Council and the
Sanctions Committee ought to live up to that.
Then finally, to press the Security Council to establish an
international criminal tribunal, which is mandated to
investigate, indict, and prosecute Iraqi leaders and former
officials against whom credible evidence exists of war crimes
against humanity and genocide. That to me is the kind of
targeted sanctions that make a great deal of sense, that go
after the people who should be held accountable, as opposed to
innocent people who are paying the price.
Now, finally, I just want to say that I want us to make
every effort to continue and even tighten where possible the
restrictions and prohibitions on military imports to Iraq. I do
not want to see any relaxation at all.
But it really troubles me what the effect of these
sanctions have been on innocent people. I have looked at these
reports. I think they are devastating. Our quarrel is not with
the Iraqi people. The President has said that. The State
Department has said that. I agree but I think the policy has
had a devastating impact on these Iraqis who bear no
responsibilities for the policies that we are trying to
sanction and change.
So, I would argue, and I conclude this way, that under the
U.N. Charter and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights not
to destroy or undermine the right of people to not be hungry
and have basic standards of health, we have got to do a much
better job of balancing our legitimate nonproliferation
concerns and those that I think represent a humanitarian
commitment to the people there. I have a set of questions about
what we are going to do about this humanitarian situation that
I want to put to you in the next round.
I have become, over the last year, more and more uneasy. I
have read these reports. I have had people who have gone to
Iraq come back. There are all sorts of other arguments that it
is further radicalizing the people. It is not undermining any
support for him at all. I just think we need to reevaluate
this, and I will put a set of questions to you on that.
[The prepared statement of Senator Wellstone follows:]
Prepared Statement of Senator Paul Wellstone
Thank you for holding this hearing, Mr. Chairman. I also want to
welcome our first panel's witness, Ambassador Walker.
I wanted to be here this morning because I have said it before and
I will say it again, Iraq is one of the toughest foreign policy
challenges which falls within this subcommittee's purview. Saddam
Hussein's leadership continues to pose a threat to our interests, our
allies in the region, and especially to those most directly affected--
the Iraqi people themselves.
Mr. Chairman, the subject of today's hearing is ``Saddam's Iraq:
Sanctions and U.S. Policy.'' That title zeroes in on an issue that I
have raised before and would like to bring up here again: the
unintended but devastating impact of these sanctions on the Iraqi
people. Last week the Secretary General of the United Nations, Kofi
Annan, delivered a report to the UN Security Council assessing Iraq's
humanitarian needs and saying that the UN's efforts to ease the
suffering of the 20 million people in that country ``has suffered
considerably'' as a result of the ``holds'' placed by the United States
and Britain on contracts in the oil-for-food program.
Saddam Hussein is also criticized in the report for spending too
little of the money from oil sales on food for the population. While
Saddam has proven to be indifferent to the suffering of Iraq's people,
we cannot afford to be similarly indifferent. I strongly believe that
the administration should take urgent steps to better reconcile
enforcement of its disarmament objectives in Iraq with its obligation
to minimize harm to innocent Iraqi civilians and to ensure protection
of their most basic rights.
The Secretary General's recent report to the Security Council; the
Security Council's own report last year on the deteriorating
humanitarian situation; the comprehensive UNICEF survey on child
health; and reports from other relief agencies in the field, including
the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC)--all make clear
that a public health emergency persists in many areas of the country,
and that efforts under the oil-for-food program to alleviate these
conditions have been woefully inadequate. I believe it is critical that
we do what we can now to address directly this public health emergency.
This requires restoring Iraq's civilian economic infrastructure in
order to bring child mortality rates and other public health indicators
back as close as possible to the levels that existed prior to the
embargo. With this in mind, I strongly urge the administration to take
the following initiatives:
First, in the Security Council and the Sanctions Committee, push to
implement immediately the recommendations of the report of the
Council's humanitarian panel last March. I realize that many of these
recommendations, such as preapproval of humanitarian items, are in
Resolution 1284, but they are conditioned on further steps by the
Council or the Committee. In this respect I am pleased to note that the
Sanctions Committee has begun the pre-approval process for humanitarian
items and urge the administration to ensure that these measures are
implemented without further delay.
Second, take all necessary steps to persuade the Security Council
and its Sanctions Committee to take more seriously its acknowledged
obligation to monitor the humanitarian impact of the sanctions,
especially on vulnerable sectors of the population such as children and
the elderly. Greater transparency in the deliberations and decisions of
the Sanctions Committee is also needed.
Third, press the Security Council to establish an international
criminal tribunal mandated to investigate, indict, and prosecute Iraqi
leaders and former officials against whom credible evidence exists of
war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide. This represents the
kind of targeted sanction that should be directed against those
responsible for those Iraqi policies we want to change.
Finally, while we should make every effort to continue and even
tighten where possible the strict prohibitions on military imports into
Iraq, I believe it is time to relax and restructure the economic
embargo. Such a restructuring would permit import of a broader range of
non-military goods in order to allow the revival of the civilian
economy. I do not believe the current approach is justifiable, or even
sustainable, and urge the administration to work with its Security
Council partners to establish a new regime. Some variation of a
proposal made recently by Human Rights Watch, which would make Iraqi
imports liable to inspection at all major ports of entry, seems to me
worthy of consideration.
I realize there is no fail-safe means of containing Iraq's
proliferation threat, or ensuring compliance with relevant Security
Council obligations. There is no painless or cost-free way of
addressing the Iraq government's unwillingness to abide by its
disarmament commitments. The point is that the pain and cost should not
continue to be borne primarily by millions of ordinary innocent Iraqis.
The State Department, and the President, have both repeatedly said that
our quarrel is not with the Iraqi people. I agree. But regrettably our
Iraq policy has too often had its most devastating impact on those
Iraqis who bear no responsibility for the policies that we are trying
to sanction, and change. We have an obligation, under the UN Charter
and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, not to destroy or
undermine the right of a people to an adequate standard of living,
freedom from hunger, and the highest attainable standards of health.
For this reason, I urge you to consider these recommendations, which
try to strike a better balance between legitimate non-proliferation
concerns and those involving our humanitarian obligations to the people
of Iraq--and which may even be more effective in securing Iraq's
eventual compliance than the current arrangement.
Senator Brownback. Senator Biden.
Senator Biden. I have one question. The inspection regime
is a pale shadow of what it was initially. We supported it I
assume because there was not much of an alternative. What
impact has our support for supporting the alternative--the
1284--not alternative to it, not that there was one. Maybe you
can speak to that as well. But what impact has that had on our
ability to maintain what sanctions remain on Saddam, any unity
in that? Is there any correlation or connection between the
administration's decision to vote for 1284 and sanctions?
Ambassador Walker. Senator, there is a correlation in the
sense if we can get monitors on the ground, it is a heck of a
lot easier to ensure that the sanctions are working properly
and that the items that are going into Iraq are going through
the U.N. and national systems and are being controlled.
One of the problems we have, in the absence of having
monitors on the ground, is that there is seepage in the system
and there is smuggling going on. A monitoring agency would be
extremely helpful in trying to limit this.
The 1284 calls for a replacement organization for UNSCOM,
UNMOVIC. It has the same authorities of inspection, a no-knock
inspection concept, and ability under the parameters
established by the Security Council in the resolution to do
what UNSCOM did.
Now, Hans Blix is in the process of putting together
procedures that will implement that. As everybody knows,
procedures have a lot to do with the effectiveness of an
organization. We have had a number of conversations with Blix.
We believe he is moving in the right direction. We want to see
the results of his consultations and his decisions, and he will
be reporting shortly to the Secretary General. We will be able
to evaluate at that time whether the procedures are everything
that we think they should be.
There is nothing in the resolution that takes away the
authorities available to the previous organization.
So, if Iraq accepts this inspection regime, I think we will
be far ahead of the game.
With regard to the sanctions themselves, 1284 does not
change the sanctions regime.
Senator Biden. No, I know that. My point is--let us get
right to it. Had we voted the other way, what would have
happened in terms of the maintenance of sanctions? Was there
any deal? Was there any tradeoff here implicit that if you did
not support what is 1284, which is not as robust--it has all
the same verbiage, but you and I both know it is not nearly as
robust as UNSCOM was. Was it anticipated that that would allow
us to maintain support for the sanctions? Or had we not
supported it, did we conclude it would make it more difficult
to maintain consensus on sanctions?
Ambassador Walker. I do not see the linkage there, Senator.
I think the linkage comes in the question that Senator
Wellstone raised. Where we are having a problem in maintaining
the sanctions regime and we are having erosion is in the
perception that it is sanctions that is responsible for the
problems that the Iraqi people face. That is a perception that
is widely held throughout the entire region. That is much more
of a problem for us, and it is an unwarranted assumption.
Senator Biden. I understand. I guess maybe that is what is
wrong with the U.N. We do not think about things.
It seems to me, having been up there recently, that you
have a real problem maintaining sanctions. I assume you all
were--were I in that position, I would be conniving enough to
hope that I would come up with an inspection policy that was
not as good as before, but a hell of a lot better than anything
we have, anticipating he will not go along with it. And if he
does go along with it initially, he will breach it again, which
then gives us the moral credibility to argue that this guy is a
bad guy. He is showing it time and again, and he is making
weapons of mass destruction. He is trying to hide from us, and
you cannot lift sanctions.
I realize there is no direct relationship, but I do not
know why the hell you guys in the State Department do not speak
English. I do not know why you do not speak frankly. But I am
not going to try to help you anymore. You are on your own.
Ambassador Walker. Senator, I think your conclusions are
probably well placed. They are accurate. There is a very strong
likelihood he will not accept this system. I would argue that
if he did accept it, that he would be at a very severe
disadvantage trying to reconstruct his weapons of mass
destruction program and we would be ahead of the game.
Senator Biden. I agree with that.
Ambassador Walker. So, either way, I think there are
advantages that can be derived from this.
Senator Biden. My closing question is this. If the Security
Council members try to weaken 1284, in an attempt to gain his
acquiescence, will the administration permit and vote for
further compromises, or will it hold firm to the text as it now
stands?
Ambassador Walker. Senator, the position that we took
before was a weak sanctions inspection regime is worse than no
inspection regime, and I believe that we would take the same
position now.
Senator Biden. That means we would not----
Ambassador Walker. We would not support it.
Senator Biden. Thank you very much.
Senator Brownback. Well, let me ask some questions along
this line because I am very troubled about where we are with
this. One of the main reasons UNSCOM had any successes at all,
it seems to me, was its willingness to go to the mat, to be
very confrontational and very direct and go where Saddam did
not want them to go. Now we have got Mr. Blix, the new head of
UNMOVIC, who has said he would like to work more cooperatively
with Iraq.
Now, really, is it the administration's view that UNMOVIC
can conduct effective inspections if cooperation with Saddam is
a primary goal of inspections?
Ambassador Walker. Senator, I do not think that if you are
in a position where you are required to cooperate with Saddam
that you are going to have an effective system. I think there
has to be tension in that relationship for it to work.
Otherwise, Saddam would simply walk away from any inspection
regime. But we have yet to see what this regime will look like,
how it will be structured or, for that matter, how Hans Blix
will organize and run it.
It can be effective under the terms of the Security Council
resolution. It can be effective. From our initial discussions
with Blix, we think that he has the intention to make it
effective. To say that he can do that by simply caving in to
Saddam Hussein is not true. He cannot do that. It cannot be
effective under those terms. So, yes, there has to be a
confrontational aspect to this inspection regime.
Senator Brownback. Well, Saddam Hussein has shown time and
time again that he is going to confront and he is going to try
to confuse and misdirect and not comply. Period.
Ambassador Walker. Then we get in the situation, Mr.
Chairman, that Senator Biden was talking about. First he has to
accept the regime, which is not clear at this point.
Senator Brownback. Let us say that we do and we confront.
And one of the reasons we justified Operation Desert Fox was by
saying that Iraq was not complying with U.N. weapons
inspections. Are we going to be willing to use military action
to force Iraq to allow inspectors to return?
Ambassador Walker. Senator, I am not able to make a
decision like that and I am not able to tell you one way or
another what the military actions the United States might or
might not be under those circumstances. It is certainly one of
our options.
Senator Brownback. Is it not even a probability, I mean, in
the 70 to 80 percent range, that if we go to another
inspections regime and we have any confrontational nature of it
at all, we are going to be placed in the situation of having to
determine to use military force to force Saddam to comply
because of his past actions? We know that this is what he is
going to do. You know, in all probability, you are going to
face that the decision that you have to make that
recommendation within the administration. Is that not part of
the premise of what you are going into this with?
Ambassador Walker. We are aware that there may be occasions
in which we would want to consider the possibility of military
force, and we have established certain red lines of his
behavior. If he attacks the Kurds, for example, or if he
rebuilds his weapons of mass destruction program, or if he
attacks our forces, those are red lines.
Senator Brownback. What if he does not comply with
inspections?
Ambassador Walker. If he does not comply with inspections,
I simply have to say that again I do not have the authority to
tell you whether or not we would use military force. That is a
Presidential authority. It would depend on the situation at the
time and on the recommendations of various elements of the U.S.
Government. I do not exclude the possibility. That is all I can
tell you.
Senator Brownback. We have established the other red lines:
attacking the Kurds, U.S. forces. We can establish the red line
of not complying with inspections.
Ambassador Walker. It has not been established by the
administration one way or another at this point. We do not have
an inspection regime in place. When we get an inspection regime
in place, we can make a decision as to whether this is
something that would require--all I can point to is our past
action under the circumstances.
Senator Brownback. Well, I would hope we would establish it
as a red line.
Now, how long are we giving Saddam to accept this UNMOVIC
inspection regime?
Ambassador Walker. Well, I believe that Blix will have to
report to the Secretary General within the next 2 weeks. After
that, the clock starts ticking. There is no specific time set
for acceptance or non-acceptance. In the past, Saddam Hussein
has taken several years to accept things, such as the oil-for-
food program. This will be a process that we will just simply
have to see how it works out.
Senator Brownback. Will we at least establish a time line
that it be during this administration?
Ambassador Walker. I cannot say that.
Senator Brownback. Senator Wellstone, do you have other
questions?
Senator Wellstone. Mr. Ambassador, Secretary Walker, you
have got a number of different perspectives here that you are
dealing with. I want to go back to the statement I made and put
some questions to you.
I do not think there is an argument about Saddam Hussein
and his cruelty, nor is there an argument about his failure to
cooperate with any kind of arms control regime. Where there is
an argument is, therefore, we can go ahead with these
sanctions, which I think have had a brutal impact on innocent
people, and we can somehow claim some high moral ground. I do
not see how we can.
Now, you have argued that this is a perception which you
said was unwarranted. But from the Secretary General's report,
to the Security Council's report, to the UNICEF survey on child
health, to other relief agencies in the field, including the
International Committee of the Red Cross, that is not what
those reports say. They do not say it is a perception.
I would like to request of you. You have tried to make the
case that we basically have restored Iraq's civilian
infrastructure by way of child mortality rates or other public
health indicators, that it is getting back to where it was
before the embargo. I would like to know where the evidence
comes from. Did you say that?
Ambassador Walker. No, I did not say that, Senator.
Senator Wellstone. Well, if you did not, then I----
Ambassador Walker. Let me correct the record.
Senator Wellstone. Why would you say that this is a
perception that is unwarranted?
Ambassador Walker. Let me correct that record. What I am
talking about is the perception that the United States is
responsible for this is unwarranted.
Senator Wellstone. OK.
Ambassador Walker. We have been in favor of the oil-for-
food program. We established it in the first place. It was
Saddam Hussein who did not take advantage of it.
Senator Wellstone. So, you are not quarreling with these
reports.
Ambassador Walker. Absolutely not. We are appalled by these
reports.
Senator Wellstone. Now, how would you respond to Kofi
Annan's report which says that part of the reason that the
U.N.'s effort to ease the suffering ``has suffered
considerably'' as a result of the ``holds'' placed by the
United States and Britain on the contracts in the oil-for-food
program?
Ambassador Walker. Let me start by saying that this is an
unacceptable situation, the situation of the Iraqi people. The
sanctions are not designed to come at their expense. They are
designed to come at Saddam Hussein's expense.
Senator Wellstone. But they are not at his expense. He is
doing fine.
Ambassador Walker. No, no. I agree. Therefore, we have to
do two things.
First, we have to implement Resolution 1284 which, first of
all, takes the cap off of the oil exports, keeps the money
under control, but it takes the cap off so that there will be
more resources available to provide for the well-being of the
Iraqi people.
Second, 1284----
Senator Wellstone. Can I interrupt you? On 1284, would this
mean that there would be a preapproval process?
Ambassador Walker. Yes.
Senator Wellstone. You would be in favor of that.
Ambassador Walker. Resolution 1284 already has in it the
expansion of lists of preapproved items. That list is being
drawn up now by negotiation, and we expect it to be completed
very shortly. That will mean that many more items will be
preapproved for automatic shipment to Iraq. It will not include
dual-use items, obviously, but it will cover some of the most
difficult situations.
Also, according to the Secretary General, the Iraqi oil
industry requires additional resources and spare parts in order
just to maintain itself. We agree with that position and we
will be supporting the expansion of the number in items for
spare parts and so on for the oil industry.
We are also examining our own procedures. We are increasing
the number of staff that is available for reviewing those items
which may be dual-use so that we can speed up the process.
Resolution 1284 calls for a 2-day turnaround time. We do not
meet that yet. We want to do that.
We are also looking at the nature of our own holds and
where they make sense and where we can speed the decisions and
the determinations up. In some cases, we simply do not have the
amount of information we need. There is major contract hold now
on an important electrical project which the Russians have, but
we have not gotten the cooperation from the company yet getting
the information there.
So, it is a complicated situation, but it is one we are
very much aware of and trying to do our best to ensure that
these sanctions hit Saddam where it hurts and they do not hit
the people of Iraq.
Senator Wellstone. Well, I really am glad that we are
undergoing this internal review because I think that again the
impact of this has been just brutal and devastating on a lot of
innocent people. I do not see him suffering, and I think this
makes a great deal of sense. I think we all need to speak more
about this. I am convinced that we must and I want to as a
Senator.
Once this program list is completed, is it going to be
implemented immediately, or is it going to be conditioned upon
Iraq's approval of 1284?
Ambassador Walker. No. There is no Iraqi role in this. Once
it is completed, the Sanctions Committee has agreed, then it
goes into effect immediately.
Senator Wellstone. I thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Senator Brownback. Mr. Ambassador, thank you for coming. I
do want to emphasize that we have a number of topics that I
would like to discuss at a future hearing with you, with the
administration's lifting of a series of sanctions on Iran to
its perspective on Libya. I have to tell you I read about
those, and it looks like we have got a quid but no quo policy
just of lifting these for hope of things to come, but nothing
there of concrete. I hope we can have a thorough discussion of
those.
I want to, once again, say to the administration, do not
bring to us an Israel/Syria track discussion conclusion without
pre-discussion of this with the Congress. If it is going to
involve substantial sums of money from this country, use of our
personnel or troops, weapons systems, observation systems, we
need to know and we need to be talking about this thoroughly
before any sort of agreement fait accompli is presented. We all
want peace, but if you are asking us or just presenting us a
final agreement, particularly some of the discussion of expense
that I have heard, some of the discussion of personnel, we want
to know about this much further in advance before some
agreement is struck. I hope at some time we can have you up to
talk about that as well. But we will certainly get you here on
Iran and on Libya in the near future.
Thank you, if I could say too, for patience in our
questioning. A number of us have sharp thoughts and a great
deal of frustration on dealing with Iraq, and I appreciate the
manner in which you handled the questions that we put in front
of you.
Senator Biden. Mr. Chairman, may I have 10 seconds or 30
seconds?
I would like to mildly demur in the statement the chairman
just made about what you have to bring to us first. If by that
we mean you should be consulting us privately and letting us
know what the outlines of an agreement may be, that I agree
with completely. And to the best of my knowledge, you have been
doing that. You have been doing that with me anyway, and I
suspect you have been doing that with other people.
If you mean that you have to present to us first the
outlines of what the final deal would be and what part we would
be willing to play before you get agreement between the
Israelis and, in this case, the Syrians, then I think that is
totally impractical. I do not know how you would do that. I do
not know how that can be done.
We will have, obviously, a vigorous debate on, if the
outlines as have been set to me, are roughly what is agreed to,
hopefully, by Israel as part of an Israeli/Syrian agreement,
which is not done yet, but if that were to be done and the
outline of our participation, as has been sketched out to me
and others, then it will. It will get my support, but I am sure
it will get vigorous debate.
But I want to make it clear I do not think you should be
coming to the Congress ahead of time with the detail before in
this incredibly delicate process of playing the third party
role of trying to bring two folks together who have not spoken
to each other for a long, long time. But again, I think it
would be wise to inform the chairman--you probably have
already--if you have not, of the general outlines of what you
think it may look like. But I just want to make sure I am on
the record as to understanding what I mean by what your
consultation is.
Senator Brownback. Well, and I appreciate that. I have not
received any of the consultations as to what the outline is to
be. What I have been reading in the press, my source of
information on this, talks about some very large, substantial
sums of money that would be within the power of the purse of
this body that I think we need to be having a lot of discussion
about.
Senator Biden. Mr. Chairman, I may be wrong, but I think
the leadership of your party has been consulted, the senior
members have. I may be mistaken.
Ambassador Walker. Mr. Chairman, we take your advice
seriously, and I will convey it back to the Department. I
believe that we will be in a position to consult privately in a
very, very short period of time.
Senator Brownback. Again, thank you for your manner and
thank you for your dedication. You have done a wonderful job as
a public servant. We may not agree on some topics as they come
up, but I certainly do not doubt your heart nor your ability as
I have seen it as an ambassador and as I see it now. We will
continue the vigorous discussion. Thank you very much.
Ambassador Walker. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
Senator Brownback. The second panel is Mr. Gary Milhollin.
He is the director of the Wisconsin Project on Nuclear Arms
Control. Mr. Paul Leventhal, president, Nuclear Control
Institute in Washington, DC, and the final panel member, Mr.
Charles Duelfer, former deputy executive chairman of UNSCOM out
of New York. We will have the panelists seated and we will ask
you to make your presentations in the order that we announced.
Gentlemen, we can accept your full transcript into the
record. If you can make your presentations within a 5 minute or
so area so that we could have plenty of time, ample time for
questions, I think that would be the best to go by. So, we will
run a 5-minute clock here to give you some idea. We will take
ahead of time all of your full statements in the record, so we
will have those as well.
Mr. Milhollin.
STATEMENT OF GARY MILHOLLIN, DIRECTOR, WISCONSIN PROJECT ON
NUCLEAR ARMS CONTROL, WASHINGTON, DC
Mr. Milhollin. Thank you very much.
Senator Brownback. Thank you for being here today.
Mr. Milhollin. I am pleased to testify before this
distinguished subcommittee on Iraq.
I would like to submit three items for the record. I have
already given them to your staff.
The first one is an article I recently published in the New
Yorker magazine detailing Iraq's use of the oil-for-food
program to buy components that can trigger a nuclear weapon.
The second is a table that my organization prepared after
the inspectors left Iraq in 1998. It lists what remains
unaccounted for in Saddam Hussein's mass destruction weapons
programs. I can show you copies of it. It is a full page in the
New York Times Week in Review section.
The other thing I would like to submit for the record is a
chart \1\ that my organization did back in 1993, also in the
New York Times Week in Review, which showed Saddam's
procurement network, and I will refer to it in my testimony.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\1\ The chart referred to entitled, ``Who Armed Iraq? Answers the
West Didn't Want to Hear,'' July 18, 1993, would be illegible, because
of its size, if reproduced in this hearing format. The chart is
retained in the committee's files and could possibly be viewed by
accessing the New York Times Website.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Senator Brownback. Those will be accepted in the record,
without objection.
Mr. Milhollin. As has already been stated, a year has now
passed since inspectors have been in Iraq, and the question I
think the world is looking at is what is going on. In many
ways, we are back in the situation we were in before the Gulf
war. I remember myself--I am beginning to feel old--I was
tracking centrifuge components into Iraq before the Gulf war
and testified many times before Congress on what Iraq had in
the early 1990's. I find myself back here doing it again, and
without inspectors, we are back in the same mode of discovery.
That is, we are looking at procurement efforts. We are using
national technical means. We are debriefing defectors trying to
put the puzzle together. The longer we do not have inspectors,
the more difficult the puzzle is going to be.
I discovered recently that Saddam Hussein has been shopping
for nuclear weapon components in Europe. In 1998, he tried to
buy the special electronic switches that are used to detonate
nuclear weapons. He ordered them as medical equipment. He
ordered six machines that pulverize kidney stones inside human
bodies and ordered 120 switches as spare parts. He ordered them
from Germany, which turned the order over to the French, who
denied the sale. The United States encouraged those governments
to deny the sale privately.
Unfortunately, when the contract went to the U.N. and was
referred to our people here for review, we did not catch it and
so we did not block it. Therefore, it went through the
Sanctions Committee.
I am told by Siemens, the German company that got the
order, that Iraq only got eight switches. The State Department
seems to think Iraq got a few more than that.
I am also told by the Sanctions Committee people that they
are looking at the machines to see whether the Iraqis are
pulverizing kidney stones or whether they are up to something
else.
I think this episode shows that Saddam Hussein is still
deadly serious about getting weapons of mass destruction. The
procurement network, that I so laboriously tracked back in the
early 1990's, has not gone away. Many of those firms are still
there. The U.N. inspectors never figured out the procurement
network completely, despite a lot of valiant effort.
So, it is there. We still have to contend with it, and the
only barrier we have is the U.N. Sanctions Committee. That
committee has to oversee billions of dollars worth of stuff,
and it is inevitable that some things are going to get through.
As we have just heard, there is a lot of criticism about
contracts that the United States holds up. I personally think
that we ought to err on the side of prudence, and when we think
there is a dual-use item or something that can be used for the
wrong thing, we should hold up the contract and just take the
consequences.
Saddam Hussein is closer to the bomb than most people
think. The U.N. inspectors believe he has a bomb design that
works and that only lacks the high enriched uranium to fuel it.
Also the U.N. inspectors believe it is small enough to go on a
Scud.
The main recent development that we should be aware of in
the procurement area is that now not all contracts will go
through the Sanctions Committee. There will be categories of
humanitarian and oil goods that nobody will check. That means
that unscrupulous companies around the world could send Iraq
things that will be useful for arms under the rubric of
humanitarian goods and there will not be any way to know where
these things have gone. Nobody is going to be checking the
labels of all this equipment that is going to go as an
exception to the Sanctions Committee review.
When you combine that with the increased oil revenues that
Iraq is receiving, you can see that there is going to be a lot
of pressure on the system and it is inevitable that things will
go through that should not go through. Since we do not have
inspectors in the country on the ground checking on what is
coming in, we are essentially losing control over the
procurement issue. Because of the increase in revenues, because
of the loopholes in the Sanctions Committee, and because of the
volume of goods, we are just not going to be able to stop
things that are going to be useful for arms.
Whether the new inspection system works is going to depend
to a great extent on Mr. Blix. He has said that he will run a
regime that is less confrontational. He does not seem inclined
to keep the previous UNSCOM inspectors. He has, I think, an
unsuccessful record in Iraq at the IAEA. The Iraqis ran a very
large, aggressive nuclear weapon program before the war that
his inspectors did not detect, and after the war, his agency
was ready to close the books on the Iraqi nuclear program long
before they understood it.
So, I think we can say that Mr. Blix has a rather--well,
does not have a record that inspires great confidence in Iraq.
He is not, I think, as effective as Rolf Ekeus would have been.
Mr. Ekeus was our candidate. We, for some reason, caved on his
candidacy in favor of Mr. Blix. They are both Swedish
diplomats. The reason the Russians and the French wanted Mr.
Blix was because they perceived he would be easier on Iraq. It
is hard for me to see why our Government would have simply
agreed to let the Russians and the French have their way on
that appointment since there were really no objective reasons
why Mr. Ekeus was not suitable.
The table in the 1998 New York Times that I have submitted
lists the many things that Iraq still seems to be hiding in
nuclear, chemical, biological, and the missile areas. I will
not go over them here, but it is clear that if you just look at
the numbers of things that Iraq is still hiding, it is apparent
that the potential Iraq has for making all of these weapons is
intact. In fact, we know that the Iraqis have not disbanded
their weapon development teams. They have moved them from one
site to another as a group, and there seems to be no intention
whatsoever of giving up mass weapon destruction objectives.
The most recent press reports say that Iraq is rebuilding.
It has rebuilt many of the sites we bombed, and our present
policy really cannot prevent that. That is, we do not have a
mechanism for preventing Saddam from rebuilding these sites or
from developing all of these weapons in secret.
I would say that we are also losing the public debate on
the effect of the sanctions. We are not aggressively promoting
America's point of view in the world about who is responsible
for the suffering of the Iraqi people. The other side is
winning this public debate, and that is the fault of our
Government. We should be more aggressive in persuading other
countries that Saddam is the culprit and not the sanctions.
I would be happy to answer questions from the committee. I
do not want to exceed my 5 minutes. I hope I have not. Thank
you very much.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Milhollin follows:]
Prepared Statement of Gary Milhollin
I am pleased to appear before this distinguished subcommittee to
discuss the situation in Iraq. I direct the Wisconsin Project on
Nuclear Arms Control, a research project here in Washington that is
devoted to tracking and slowing the spread of nuclear weapons.
I will begin by describing a recent Iraqi procurement attempt, and
then try to assess the inspection system created under U.N. Resolution
1284. I will also try to provide an overview of the threat posed by
Iraq to international security.
I would like to submit three items for the record. The first is an
article I recently published in the New Yorker detailing Iraq's use of
the oil-for-food program to buy components that can trigger nuclear
weapons. The second is a table my organization prepared after the
inspectors left Iraq in 1998, which lists what remains unaccounted for
in Iraq's mass destruction weapon programs. The third is a chart on
Saddam Hussein's procurement network that my organization prepared a
few years ago but which is still relevant to the issues we face today.
what has saddam hussein been doing recently?
More than one year has passed since U.N. inspectors left Iraq, and
the world is wondering what Saddam Hussein is up to. The short answer
is: he has been shopping for A-bomb components in Europe. Iraq is
allowed to import medical equipment as an exception to the U.N.
embargo, so in 1998 Iraq ordered a half-dozen ``lithotripter''
machines, ostensibly to rid its citizens of kidney stones, which the
lithotripter pulverizes inside the body without surgery.
But each machine requires a high-precision electronic switch that
has a second use: it triggers atomic bombs. Iraq wanted to buy 120
extra switches as ``spare parts.'' Iraq placed the order with the
Siemens company in Germany, which supplied the machines but forwarded
the switches order to its supplier, Thomson-C.S.F., a French military-
electronics company. The French government promptly barred the sale.
Stephen Cooney, a Siemens spokesman, claims that Siemens provided only
eight switches, one in each machine and two spares. Sources at the
United Nations and in the U.S. government believe that the number
supplied is higher.
The lesson from this episode is that Iraq is still trying to import
what it needs to fuel its nuclear weapon program.
And Iraq is closer to getting the bomb than most people think. The
U.N. inspectors have learned that Iraq's first bomb design, which
weighed a ton and was a full meter in diameter, has been replaced by a
smaller, more efficient model. From discussions with the Iraqis, the
inspectors deduced that the new design weighs only about 600 kilograms
and measures only 600 to 650 millimeters in diameter. That makes it
small enough to fit on a 680 millimeter Scud-type missile. The
inspectors believe that Iraq may still have nine Scuds hidden
somewhere.
The inspectors have also determined that Iraq's bomb design will
work. Iraq has mastered the key technique of creating an implosive
shock wave, which squeezes a bomb's nuclear material enough to trigger
a chain reaction. The inspectors have learned that the new Iraqi design
also uses a ``flying tamper,'' a refinement that ``hammers'' the
nuclear material to squeeze it even harder, so bombs can be made
smaller without diminishing their explosive force.
How did Iraq progress so far so quickly? The inspectors found an
Iraqi document describing an offer of design help from an agent of
Pakistan. Iraq says it didn't accept the offer, but the inspectors
think it did. Pakistan's latest design also uses a flying tamper.
Regardless of how the Iraqis managed to do it, Saddam Hussein now
possesses an efficient nuclear bomb design. The only thing he lacks is
enough weapon-grade uranium to fuel it--about sixteen kilograms per
warhead.
resolution 1284 and the new inspection system
The lithotripter episode exposes one of the key weaknesses of the
U.N. oil-for-food program. While its humanitarian objectives are
laudable, the truth is that oil-for-food is really ``oil-for-arms'' as
viewed from the Iraqi side. Iraq has been allowed to purchase
humanitarian items such as medical equipment with money earned from oil
exports so long as the funds were administered by the U.N. sanctions
committee. But Iraq was able to disguise its purchase of the nuclear
weapon triggers as medical equipment and the sanctions committee
approved the export. The sale was restricted only by the national
export controls applied by the supplier countries.
Under U.N. Resolution 1284, the sanctions committee loophole will
now be expanded. The resolution lifts the ceiling on Iraqi oil exports,
and it authorizes the committee to draw up lists of items including
food, medical equipment, medical supplies, and agricultural equipment
that will not have to go through the sanctions committee for approval.
In January, the U.N. Secretary General was able to report that these
lists had already been drawn up. In addition, the resolution sets up a
group of experts charged with speedily approving contracts for parts
and equipment necessary to enable Iraq to increase its oil exports.
The result of the liberalization is this: Iraqi oil revenues will
rise, large quantities of goods will be imported without U.N. approval,
and the sheer volume will overwhelm the tracking system that is
currently in place, even if monitors do return to Iraq. Iraq is now
slated to receive $3.5 billion in authorized imports in the current
phase of the oil-for-food plan, more than any small committee can keep
tabs on.
Our chart in the New York Times, Week in Review from 1993 gives a
good idea of who Iraq's suppliers were before the Gulf War. Most of
these companies still exist, and Iraq still wants to buy what they
produce. The pie chart illustrates the scope of the problem. U.N.
inspectors never managed to fully expose or eradicate this procurement
network, despite valiant efforts. There is every reason to think that
this network is swinging back into action in the absence of
inspections.
Resolution 1284 also promises in paragraph 33 the early lifting of
sanctions if Iraq cooperates with U.N. inspectors for 120 days on the
monitoring and disarmament tasks specified in the inspectors' work
programs. Gone is the requirement for full disarmament. Instead there
is the ``checklist'' approach that Iraq has been urging for years. The
U.N. inspectors must provide Iraq with a list of things to do, and Iraq
need only show some progress toward doing them in order to suspend the
existing embargo. Iraq will not have to answer all the remaining
questions about its weapon programs; it will only have to show that it
``has cooperated in all respects'' with the work program. What it means
to ``cooperate in all respects'' is not defined by the resolution. It
is clear, however, that ``cooperation'' does not mean ``achieving
disarmament.''
Another weakness of the new resolution is its silence on who the
new inspectors will be. The resolution never addressed the question
whether former UNSCOM inspectors would serve in the new inspection
body, called the U.N. Monitoring, Verification and Inspection
Commission (UNMOVIC). In January, Dr. Hans Blix was chosen to head
UNMOVIC. After assuming his post earlier this month, Dr. Blix said that
he would demand ``unrestricted access'' to Iraqi sites but would not
``humiliate'' Iraqi leaders with a procession of surprise inspections.
He made it clear that the new agency would seek a more cordial
relationship with Iraq. Dr. Blix also noted that he would rely on
former UNSCOM inspectors in a transition period, but made no promise to
give them permanent posts. Lastly, he said that the new inspectors
would have to be full-time employees of the United Nations, rather than
come on loan from their governments.
The United States should keep the pressure on Mr. Blix to retain
the former UNSCOM inspectors on staff. These dedicated men and women
not only undertook personal risk to carry out a hazardous duty, but in
the process they developed a body of knowledge and experience that will
be lacking in a new group of inspectors. Losing the UNSCOM inspectors
will mean losing their invaluable familiarity with Iraq's weapon
programs. The former inspectors should not be thrown over the side just
to please Saddam Hussein.
Dr. Blix has a checkered history in Iraq. While Dr. Blix was head
of the International Atomic Energy Agency, Iraq ran an ambitious
nuclear weapon program under his inspectors' very noses. This activity
included a breach of the international safeguards obligations that his
agency was supposed to be enforcing. And after the Gulf War, Iraq was
nearly given a clean nuclear bill of health by his timid inspectors in
1991. The IAEA and Dr. Blix were saved from humiliation only by an
Iraqi defector, who provided the lead that caused the discovery of
Iraq's giant uranium enrichment program. The record shows that Dr.
Blix's agency made repeated errors in Iraq, and meekly relied on Iraqi
disclosures when more assertiveness was clearly called for. Unless Dr.
Blix is more effective at UNMOVIC than he was at the IAEA, the
inspectors--whoever they will be--are unlikely to find anything in
Iraq.
threat and response
Present U.S. efforts won't stop the Iraqi bomb. American jets are
patrolling Iraq's no-fly zones and blowing up its air defenses, but
these pinpricks won't hinder bomb-making at secret sites. The Iraqis
have learned the art of camouflage very well. The United States and
Britain are also trying to maintain the international trade embargo,
but it is eroding because key countries don't support it and there are
no inspectors to check on what comes into Iraqi ports. The United
States has threatened to overthrow Saddam, but this threat is viewed as
empty in the absence of a credible means to carry it out.
In effect, the world is reverting to the position it was in before
the Gulf War. With no inspectors inside Iraq, Western intelligence
agencies must try to sniff out Saddam Hussein's purchases from abroad,
and to divine what his hidden arms factories are making with them. That
method failed in the 1980's. Western intelligence never discovered the
key component of Iraq's nuclear manufacturing effort: a string of giant
magnets that would have turned out critical masses of bomb fuel by 1995
if Saddam had not invaded Kuwait.
The world can ill afford another such debacle. An Iraqi bomb, or
even the imminent threat of one, removes any hope of coaxing Iran off
the nuclear weapon path. With Saddam building bombs next door, Iran can
only speed up its drive for weapons of mass destruction. And once Iraq
and Iran are able to target Israel with nuclear warheads, how can
Israel feel secure enough to make the concessions necessary for peace
in the Middle East?
The best chance of containing Saddam is still the same: to disarm
him. And the best way to do that is to unite the U.N. Security Council
behind meaningful inspections. But international cooperation in dealing
with Iraq has practically ceased, despite the negotiation of Resolution
1284.
The cost of paralysis could be high. It is only a matter of time
until Iraq's bomb factories start producing again, if they haven't
already. The U.N. inspectors believe that Iraq is withholding drawings
showing the latest stage of its nuclear weapon design, blueprints of
individual nuclear weapon components, and drawings showing how to mate
Iraq's nuclear warhead with a missile. Iraq claims that these things
either do not exist or are no longer in its possession. In addition,
Iraq has failed to turn over documents revealing how far it got in
developing centrifuges to process uranium to weapon-grade, and has
failed to provide 170 technical reports it received showing how to
produce and operate the centrifuges. Iraq claims that all these
documents were secretly destroyed. Nor has Iraq accounted for materials
and equipment belonging to its most advanced nuclear weapon design
team.
And the nuclear threat is not the only worry. Iraq is also hiding
key parts of its chemical weapon program. Iraq has refused to account
for at least 3.9 tons of VX, the deadliest form of nerve gas, and at
least 600 tons of ingredients to make it. Iraq produced the gas but
claims it was of low quality and that all of the ingredients to make it
were either destroyed or consumed during production attempts. Also
missing are up to 3,000 tons of other poison gas agents that Iraq
admitted producing but said were used, destroyed or thrown away, and
several hundred additional tons of agents the Iraqis could have
produced with the 4,000 tons of missing ingredients they admit they had
at their disposal. Iraq also admits producing or possessing 500 bombs
with parachutes to deliver gas or germ payloads, roughly 550 artillery
shells filled with mustard gas, 107,500 casings prepared for various
chemical munitions, and 31,658 filled and empty chemical munitions--all
of which Iraq claims to have destroyed or lost, a fact which inspectors
have been unable to verify. Many key records are also missing. These
include an Iraqi Air Force document showing how much poison gas was
used against Iran, and thus how much Iraq had left after the Iran-Iraq
war, as well as ``cookbooks'' showing how Iraq operated its poison gas
plants.
The uncertainties surrounding Iraq's biological weapon program are
greatest of all. The total amount of germ agent Iraq produced (anthrax,
botulinum, gas gangrene, aflatoxin) has never been revealed to the
inspectors, who know only that Iraq's production capacity far exceeded
what it admitted producing. Iraq has simply alleged that its production
facilities were not run at full capacity, a claim directly contradicted
by its all-out drive to mass-produce germ warfare agents. Inspectors
believe that Iraq retains at least 157 aerial bombs and 25 missile
warheads filled with germ agents, retains spraying equipment to deliver
germ agents by helicopter, and possessed enough growth media to
generate three or four times the amount of anthrax it admits producing.
Iraq either claims that these items were destroyed unilaterally, claims
they were used for civilian purposes or simply refuses to explain what
happened to them. Nor can inspectors account for the results of a known
project to deliver germ agents by drop tanks or account for much of the
equipment Iraq used to produce germ agents. Finally, Iraq contends that
many essential records of its biological weapon program, such as log
books of materials purchased, lists of imported ingredients, and lists
of stored ingredients, simply ``cannot be found.''
Iraq also retains some of its delivery capability. Up to nine
ballistic missiles, plus imported guidance components, remain
unaccounted for. Iraq claims they were all secretly destroyed, but
their remains were not found in the sites where Iraq claimed it dumped
them. In addition, the inspectors cannot account for up to 150 tons of
missile production materials, or for Iraq's stockpile of liquid rocket
fuel. Because Iraq has been allowed to produce short-range missiles
(less than 150 kilometers in range) under U.N. monitoring, it has
manufacturing capability that it can convert to longer-range missiles
now that monitoring has ceased.
Saddam Hussein has not been idle since December 1998. U.S.
officials have been cited in the media as saying satellite photographs
and U.S. intelligence reports have shown that Iraq has in the last year
rebuilt many of the 100 military and industrial sites damaged or
destroyed by American and British air strikes in December 1998. Of
those targets, 12 were reportedly missile factories or industrial sites
involved in Iraq's weapons of mass destruction programs, at which
officials said significant reconstruction had been seen--including the
Al Taji missile complex.
For the moment, our government seems content to live with inaction.
The present U.S. policy is to isolate Saddam diplomatically, maintain
the existing trade sanctions, and give at least some help to Iraqi
opposition forces--a strategy known as ``containment plus.''
Unless U.S. foreign policy makers once again place a high priority
on disarming Iraq and lead the international community in that
direction, Saddam Hussein will achieve his mass destruction weapon
aspirations in the relatively short-term. Despite a seven-year
international effort to rid Iraq of these weapons, Iraq today retains a
great potential for producing them. Experts have estimated that Iraq
could resume manufacture of chemical and biological agents within
months of a decision to do so. Similarly, Iraq could probably assemble
a nuclear weapon within weeks of importing the fissile material
necessary to fuel it. Five years is a reasonable estimate if Iraq
itself is obliged to produce the fissile material. By refusing to
cooperate with U.N. inspectors, and by foregoing billions of dollars in
oil revenue rather than choosing to disarm, Iraq has shown that
building mass destruction weapons remains one of its primary goals.
Therefore, the United States should revisit its own Iraq policy before
it is too late.
______
[From The New Yorker, ``The Talk of the Town,'' Dec. 13, 1999]
Dept. of Mass Destruction
saddam's nuclear shopping spree.
Ever since the United Nations weapons inspectors were shut out of
Iraq, a year ago, the world has been left to wonder what Saddam Hussein
is up to. Well, now it can be told: he has been secretly trying to
transform his desert dictatorship into a world-class center for the
treatment of kidney stones.
Or so it would seem, to judge from his latest purchases on the
international medical-equipment market. Although Iraq remains under a
strict United Nations embargo, the embargo does not cover medical
supplies. Last year, the Iraqi government ordered half a dozen
lithotripters, which are state-of-the-art machines for getting rid of
kidney stones. (The word ``lithotripter'' comes from the Greek for
``stone breaker.'') A lithotripter uses a shock wave to pulverize these
painful objects without surgery. Machines like the ones Iraq bought
require a high-precision electronic switch that triggers a powerful
burst of electricity. In addition to the lithotripters, Iraq wanted to
buy a hundred and twenty extra switches. That is at least a hundred
more than the machines would ever need.
Iraq's strange hankering for this particular ``spare part'' becomes
less mysterious when one reflects that the switch in question has
another use: it can trigger an atomic bomb. According to a
knowledgeable U.N. inspector, each bomb of the type that Iraq is tying
to build requires thirty-two switches. Thus, a hundred of them would
outfit three bombs. It is hardly a coincidence that, as the former U.N.
inspector Scott Ritter testified at a Senate hearing last year, the
inspectors had ``intelligence information which indicates that
components necessary for three nuclear weapons exist'' in Iraq. Saddam
Hussein has been shopping for what he needs to make sure they work.
Iraq went to Siemens, the German electronics giant, to place the
order. Before the Gulf War, Iraq acquired Siemens computers and other
equipment useful for processing uranium to nuclear-weapons grade, and
the company provided electrical equipment for one of Iraq's main
missile sites. (Siemens has denied helping Iraq advance its nuclear
program.) In this instance, Siemens forwarded the switches order to its
supplier, Thomson-C.S.F., a French military-electronics company. The
French government promptly barred the sale. Stephen Cooney, a Siemens
spokesman, refuses to say whether Siemens nevertheless filled the
switch order, or even whether the order was placed. If Siemens made the
deal, Iraq got a powerful nuclear boost.
The Clinton Administration has been relatively quiet on Iraq
lately. Although it maintains that it remains suspicious of Saddam, it
claims to have no specific evidence that he has resumed his efforts to
build weapons of mass destruction. The kidney-stone affair suggests
otherwise.
The U.N. inspectors have learned that Iraq's first bomb design,
which weighed a ton and was just over a yard in diameter, has been
replaced by a smaller, more efficient model. The inspectors have
deduced that the new design weighs only about one thousand three
hundred pounds and measures about twenty-five inches in diameter. That
makes it small enough to fit on a Scud-type missile. The inspectors
believe that Iraq may still have nine such missiles hidden somewhere.
The inspectors have also concluded that Iraq's bomb design will
work. Iraq, they believe, has mastered the key technique of creating an
implosive shock wave, which squeezes a bomb's nuclear material enough
to trigger a chain reaction. The new design also uses a ``flying
tamper,'' a refinement that ``hammers'' the nuclear material to squeeze
it even harder, so bombs can be made smaller without diminishing their
explosive force.
How did Iraq progress so far so quickly? The inspectors found an
Iraqi document describing an offer of design help--in exchange for
money--from an agent of Pakistan. Iraq says it didn't accept the offer,
but the inspectors think it did. Pakistan's latest design also uses a
flying tamper. Regardless of how the Iraqis managed to do it, Saddam
Hussein now possesses an efficient nuclear-bomb design. And, if he did
succeed in getting hold of the necessary switches, then the only thing
he lacks is enough weapons-grade uranium to fuel the warheads.
The fuel, unfortunately, is getting easier to find. United States
officials report that on May 29th Bulgaria seized approximately a third
of an ounce of weapons-grade uranium at its border. The hot cargo,
accompanied by documents in Russian, was concealed in a lead container
in a pump stowed in a car. A third of an ounce is not enough for a bomb
(Iraq's design, for example, needs thirty-five pounds), but this
seizure and others like it show that weapons-grade fuel is beginning to
circulate in the black market. Unless the U.N. Security Council can
agree on a plan to reinstate meaningful inspections, Saddam may be able
to complete his nuclear shopping sooner rather than later.--Gary
Milhollin
______
[From the New York Times, ``Week in Review,'' Dec. 20, 1998]
What the Inspectors Can't Find and Why They Can't Find It
Arms inspectors have been trying for seven years to verify that
Iraq has kept its promise to destroy its chemical, nuclear and
biological warfare capacity, but say many pieces of the puzzle are
still unaccounted for. This table was compiled by the Wisconsin Project
on Nuclear Arms Control, a research group based in Washington that
tracks the spread of weapons of mass destruction. The authors, Gary
Milhollin and Kelly Nugent, based their work principally on reports
from the United Nations Special Commission and the International Atomic
Energy Agency, and statements by Richard Butler, the commission's chief
inspector.
POISON GAS
Unaccounted for in Iraq: How Inspectors What Iraq Said:
Know:
At least 3.9 tons of VX nerve Iraq admits The gas was low
gas. producing this quality and the
amount in 1988 effort to make it
and 1990. failed.
VX nerve gas put into warheads.. U.S. and French The evidence was
tests found planted.
traces of nerve
gas on warhead
remnants.
About 600 tons of ingredients Out of 805 tons on Everything was
for VX gas. hand, only 191 destroyed or
could be verified consumed in
as destroyed. production.
Up to 3,000 tons of other poison Iraq admits They were used,
gas agents. producing agents thrown away or
in the 1980's. destroyed by U.S.
bombs during the
1991 gulf war.
Several hundred additional tons Iraq had enough All poison gas
of poison gas agents that Iraq ingredients to production has
may have produced. make more poison been declared.
gas than it
admits producing.
4,000 tons of ingredients to Iraq admits No records of what
make poison gas. importing or happened to them
producing them. are available.
500 bombs with parachutes to Iraq admits They were secretly
deliver gas or germ payloads. producing them. destroyed.
About 550 artillery shells Iraq admits they They were lost
filled with mustard gas. existed. shortly after the
gulf war.
107,500 casings for chemical Iraq admits No records are
arms. producing or available.
importing them.
31,658 filled and empty chemical Iraq admits They were thrown
munitions. producing or away, destroyed
importing them. secretly or
destroyed by U.S.
bombs.
An Iraqi Air Force document A U.N. inspector Inspectors might
showing how much poison gas was held the document be able to see
used against Iran, and thus how briefly in her it, but only in
much Iraq has left. hands before Iraq the presence of
confiscated it. the Secretary
Generals personal
envoy.
The results of a project to make Iraq admits it ran There are no
binary artillery shells for such a project records or
sarin nerve gas. and made physical traces
experimental of the program.
shells.
Production procedures for making Such proceedures No documents
poison gas. are needed for containing these
large-scale procedures can be
production. found.
Documents showing the overall Inspectors No such documents
size of the chemical weapons determined that can be found.
program. specific
documents are
still missing.
GERM WARFARE AGENTS
Unaccounted for in Iraq: How Inspectors What Iraq Says:
Know:
At least 157 aerial bombs filled Iraq admits They were secretly
with germ agents. filling this many. destroyed.
At least 25 missile warheads Iraq admits They were secretly
containing germ agents producing them. destroyed.
(anthrax, aflotoxin and
botulinum).
Excess germ warfare agent....... Iraq admits The excess was
producing more of secretly
the agent than destroyed.
was used to fill
munitions.
Spraying equipment to deliver Iraq admits it Iraq refuses to
germ agents by helicopter. tested such explain what
equipment. happened to it.
The results of a project to Iraq admits the Everything has
deliver germ agents by drop project existed, been accounted
tanks. but inspectors for.
cannot verify
Iraq's account.
Growth media to produce three or U.N. inspectors Either the
four times the amount of discovered that material was not
anthrax Iraq admits producing. this much was imported or it
imported. went to a
civilian lab.
Equipment to produce germ agents Iraq provided an Everything has
incomplete been accounted
inventory. for.
Program to dry germ agents so Inspectors saw a No such program
they are easier to store and document existed.
use. revealing the
program's
existence.
Log book showing purchases for Inspectors saw the The book cannot be
the germ warfare program. log book in 1995. found.
List of imported ingredients for Iraq admits the The document
germ agents. document exists. cannot be found.
List of ingredients for germ Iraq admits the The document
agents stored at Iraq's main document exists. cannot be found.
germ facility.
The total amount of germ agents Production Iraq did not use
Iraq produced (anthrax, capacity far full capacity.
botulinum, gas gangrene, exceeds the
aflatoxin). amount Iraq
admits producing.
NUCLEAR WEAPONS
Unaccounted for in Iraq: How Inspectors What Iraq Says:
Know:
Components for three to four Intelligence Such weapons do
implosion-type nuclear weapons, gathered by the not exist.
lacking only uranium fuel. former U.N.
inspector Scott
Ritter.
Drawings showing the latest Inspectors Cannot explain why
stage of Iraq's nuclear weapon determined the the drawings are
design. drawings must missing.
exist.
Design drawings of individual Other drawings Iraq no longer has
nuclear weapon components, show that these these drawings.
including the precise drawings exist.
dimensions of explosive lenses.
Drawings of how to mate a Other drawings Iraq no longer has
nuclear warhead to a missile. show that these these drawings.
drawings exist.
Documents detailing cooperation The cooperation No response.
among various Iraqi nuclear must have
weapon and missile groups. generated a paper
trail.
Documents revealing how far Iraq Iraq tested one or The documents were
got in developing centrifuges two prototypes. secretly
to process uranium to weapons destroyed.
grade.
170 technical reports explaining Iraq admits a The documents were
how to produce and operate German supplier secretly
these centrifuges. provided them, destroyed.
and a few were
found.
Materials and equipment Inspectors have Iraq has provided
belonging to Iraq's most determined that everything it can
advanced nuclear weapon design important items find.
team. are still missing.
Materials and equipment Inspectors have Iraq has provided
belonging to Iraq's most determined that everything it can
advanced nuclear weapon design important items find.
team. are still missing.
Materials and equipment Inspectors have Iraq has provided
belonging to the group trying determined that everything it can
to process uranium to nuclear important items find.
weapons grade. are still missing.
The name and whereabouts of a Inspectors were Inspectors should
foreign national who offered to informed that the consult an Iraqi
help Iraq's nuclear program. offer was made. expatriate who
might provide a
lead. (They did;
it was a dead
end.)
Documents proving Iraq's claim Inspectors No records can be
that it abandoned its secret determined that found.
nuclear-bomb program. such a step must
have been
recorded.
BALLISTIC MISSILES
Unaccounted for: How Inspectors What Iraq Says:
Know:
Seven, locally-produced Iraq admits it had They were secretly
ballistic missiles. them. destroyed in
1991.
Two operational missiles that Iraq admits it had They were secretly
Iraq imported. them. destroyed in
1991.
Components for missile guidance Iraq supplied an They were secretly
that Iraq imported. inventory but it destroyed.
was incomplete.
Up to 150 tons of material for Iraq admits it had It was secretly
missile production. it; destruction melted or dumped
could not be into rivers and
verified. canals.
Liquid fuel for long-range Iraq admits it had It was secretly
missiles. them. destroyed and
will not be
discussed
further.
Up to 50 Scud-type missile Iraq admits it had They were secretly
warheads, presumably for high them. destroyed.
exposives.
Drawings showing how to put Iraq needed such All available
together a Scud missile. drawings to drawings were
produce these provided.
missiles.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Senator Brownback. Thank you very much. I appreciate your
being here to testify.
Mr. Leventhal, thank you for joining us today.
STATEMENT OF PAUL LEVENTHAL, PRESIDENT, NUCLEAR CONTROL
INSTITUTE, WASHINGTON, DC
Mr. Leventhal. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate your
invitation to testify before the subcommittee today. Our
research director, Steven Dolley, participated in the
preparation of this testimony.
I too have a number of items that I would like to submit
for the record as part of my testimony. They include an article
that Mr. Dolley and I wrote for the Outlook section of the
Washington Post, end of 1998, comparing the UNSCOM inspections
with the IAEA inspections in Iraq and pointing out that the
UNSCOM formula was one that held Iraq accountable and did not
accept a lack of evidence, an absence of evidence as evidence
of absence while the IAEA took a very different tack, most of
the time under Mr. Blix' leadership.
We also want to submit for the record a detailed analysis
of what we believe still remains unaccounted for in Iraq in the
way of nuclear weapons components, technology designs that have
not been accounted for, and which the IAEA has not insisted be
accounted for in terms of giving Iraq a clean bill of health or
at least enough to allow Iraq supporters in the Security
Council to say that the nuclear file should be closed and that
sanctions should at least be partially lifted.
The other items we wish to submit for the record are
exchange of correspondence we had with the current director
general of IAEA, Mr. ElBaradei, on these unresolved issues,
unanswered questions, as well as an exchange of correspondence
with the State Department following the letter that we sent to
President Clinton on these matters.
Senator Brownback. They will be accepted in the record,
without objection.
Mr. Leventhal. Most of my testimony focuses on the nuclear
program in Iraq because we feel that this has been neglected
and misperceived largely because of IAEA determinations that
all matters relevant to the nuclear weapons program have been
destroyed, removed, or rendered harmless. We feel that this is
an incorrect conclusion.
We distinguish between the facilities which were uncovered
right after the Gulf war that were subsequently destroyed or
put under monitoring. We compare that with what may be a very
small, but dangerous remnant of the Iraqi nuclear weapons
program, specifically the components that they were known to
have been making, particularly the explosive lenses for the
purpose of compressing the uranium core of a nuclear bomb. We
believe that the IAEA at one point was misled by possibly
fraudulent or forged documents suggesting to the IAEA that back
in 1991 the Iraqis were not as far along with the development
of that technology as others believed them to have been.
My testimony focuses on the role of Mr. Blix and the impact
that will have on the new inspection agency, UNMOVIC, as the
successor to UNSCOM. We have in Resolution 1284 something that
we did not have before, which was a statement of Security
Council intention to lift sanctions if 120 days after a work
program has been established by the IAEA and UNMOVIC, the heads
of those two agencies make a determination that Iraq has
cooperated in all respects. We think, as Mr. Milhollin
indicated, that Mr. Blix may not be well suited for the kind of
confrontational approach that Ambassador Walker himself
indicated is necessary.
We detail at some length the kinds of mistakes that the
IAEA made going back almost 20 years prior to the startup of
the Osirak reactor which Israel bombed in 1981 before it became
operational, specifically because the IAEA had negotiated a
safeguards arrangement with Iraq which would not have been
adequate to detect the clandestine production of plutonium. An
IAEA inspector, Mr. Roger Richter, who subsequently became a
member of our board, resigned in protest from the IAEA to point
out that Israel was perhaps justified in bombing that facility
because of the weakness of the safeguards regime.
Then leading up to the Gulf war, I testified before
Congress that Iraq could well be within weeks of acquiring
nuclear weapons because of the safeguarded, bomb grade, highly
enriched uranium it had in its civilian program, courtesy of
Russian and French exporters, which could have been diverted in
between inspections. The IAEA denied such a possibility, as did
senior officials in the U.S. State Department, by the way, but
this was later confirmed when Saddam's son-in-law----
Senator Biden. What year was this? Excuse me. What year was
this you are talking about?
Mr. Leventhal. This was in 1990.
Senator Biden. In 1990. That is what I thought. Thank you.
Mr. Leventhal. Before the Armed Services Committee, I
submitted testimony suggesting that Iraq could be, at that
time, within weeks----
Senator Biden. In 1990 the State Department denied it as
well.
Mr. Leventhal. That is right. It was not seen as credible
that they would actually violate safeguards as a member of the
NPT.
Senator Biden. Thank you for the clarification.
Mr. Leventhal. In fact, when Saddam's son-in-law defected
in 1995, he had been the head of what was disclosed to be a
crash program where they actually had begun to saw off the ends
of the fuel rods to remove the highly enriched uranium for the
purpose of attempting to make at least one weapon, possibly two
within the 6-month period between IAEA inspections.
So, we have a situation today where Iraq has not been
cooperative to say the least, where the IAEA has been prepared,
after several attempts to try to elicit information--once that
information is not forthcoming, they acknowledge discrepancies
but they come to conclusions suggesting that everything, in
fact, has been destroyed, removed, or rendered harmless, and
that Iraq has no significant nuclear capabilities left.
Because of the procurement activities described by Mr.
Milhollin, because of the fact that Iraq's 200 nuclear Ph.D.'s
are still there or are believed to be there--some of them may
actually be traveling now, but the fact is that the entire
human infrastructure of Iraq's nuclear weapons program has
remained in place and the question is are there components--as
Scott Ritter testified, they were being transported around the
country at that time in an attempt to conceal them from the
UNSCOM inspectors--if there is a basis, if there is a
substantial basis to believe that those kinds of activities
have taken place, that the weapons components have not been
destroyed--and surely no evidence of their destruction, either
documentary or material, has been presented to the IAEA--then
one has to assume that things are on a knife's edge, that if
Iraq is capable of clandestinely producing highly enriched
uranium through a small centrifuge cascade or, perhaps more
likely, attempting to smuggle plutonium or highly enriched
uranium into the country from Russia or from safeguarded
civilian facilities throughout the world which have IAEA
safeguards attached to them, which are not very effective in an
adversarial situation--in other words, a determined effort to
remove material could well end up in Iraq. And the IAEA has
acknowledged that they would have little chance of detecting
the smuggling into Iraq of the kilogram quantities of either of
those fissile materials which would be enough for several
nuclear weapons.
Now, our position is that it is important to hold Mr. Blix
accountable. I would even suggest that this committee invite
Mr. Blix to come and explain how he is going to operate and how
differently he is going to operate as the head of UNMOVIC than
he did as the head of the IAEA. I think it is important to try
to pin him down and to make it clear to him that the Congress
is not interested in a report 120 days after an inspection
process has been put in place, that we have had full
cooperation from the Iraqis, we have not been able to find
anything, and therefore there is no basis for maintaining
sanctions. I think a ``shot across the bow'' at this point in
time, as UNMOVIC is being formed, would be all to the good.
In our conclusions, we have basically three conclusions in
our testimony.
The IAEA should be directed to provide UNMOVIC and the
College of Commissioners that has been formed a complete
inventory of all nuclear bomb components, designs, and models
for which there is documentation or intelligence but which the
agency cannot account for.
And the Security Council should insist that all elements
listed in this inventory be produced by Iraq or otherwise
accounted for prior to any consideration of closing the nuclear
file and lifting sanctions. This indeed was UNSCOM's approach
with regard to missiles and chemical and biological weapons,
and it should be the IAEA's approach to nuclear weapons as
well. I am particularly concerned because Mr. Blix is now the
head of UNMOVIC, and therefore it might reinforce the kind of
cooperative approach that the IAEA has been taking in the past,
a nonconfrontational approach.
UNMOVIC and the Security Council should make sure that the
IAEA diligently and completely pursues all unanswered
questions, and if the agency proves itself unable to do so,
responsibility for nuclear inspections should be transferred to
the Security Council which has the enforcement authority needed
to follow through.
Finally, Dr. Blix should now pledge he will conduct
business differently than he did at the IAEA and will not allow
the absence of evidence to be viewed as evidence of absence of
weapons of mass destruction.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Leventhal follows:]
Prepared Statement of Paul Leventhal
introduction
Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for your invitation to testify before the
subcommittee today on U.S. sanctions policy toward Iraq. Steven Dolley,
research director of the Nuclear Control Institute, participated in the
preparation of this testimony.
I will focus primarily on issues related to the nuclear inspections
that have been conducted in Iraq under the terms of U.N. Security
Council Resolution (UNSCR) 687, the Gulf War cease-fire. From April
1991 until Iraq evicted all U.N. inspectors in December 1998, the
International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) was responsible for
conducting nuclear inspections in Iraq, with technical and intelligence
support provided by the U.N. Special Commission on Iraq (UNSCOM). Under
paragraph 3 of UNSCR 1284--the December 1999 resolution that
establishes the UN Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission
(UNMOVIC), the successor agency to UNSCOM--the IAEA ``will maintain
this role with the assistance and cooperation of UNMOVIC,'' when and if
inspectors return to Iraq.
Over the last few years, public concern about Iraq's weapons of
mass destruction has focused primarily on Saddam's chemical, biological
and missile capabilities. This perception in large measure results from
the IAEA's finding that ``Iraq's known nuclear assets have been
destroyed, removed or rendered harmless.'' This is not, in fact, the
case. While it is true that Iraq's known nuclear facilities have been
destroyed or were placed under monitoring (prior to December 1998),
important questions about Iraq's nuclear-weapons program remain
unanswered. Key nuclear-bomb components and weapons designs that were
known to exist were never surrendered by Iraq to UN inspectors.
Indeed, the threat from Iraq's nuclear capability could be greater
than its chemical, biological and missile efforts. Vital elements of
Iraq's nuclear-weapons program remain in place today. Over 200 nuclear
PhDs continue their work on unknown projects, with no supervision by UN
inspectors for more than a year. Iraq operates a worldwide network to
procure foreign technology, and most trucks entering Iraq from Turkey
are not even stopped for inspection.
Little is known about Iraq's efforts to enrich uranium for bombs
using centrifuges, and the possibility remains that a small centrifuge
cascade for this purpose is hidden somewhere in Iraq. Iraq was
permitted by the IAEA to retain possession of 1.7 metric tons of
uranium enriched to 2.6% U-235, as well as some 13 tons of natural
uranium stocks. This uranium, if used as feed material for centrifuges,
could produce over 115 kilograms of bomb-grade highly enriched uranium,
enough to make at least four nuclear bombs. Although the IAEA recently
conducted a routine investigation to confirm that these uranium stocks
had not been removed, such inspections are required only once a year,
raising the possibility that Iraq could seek to enrich these materials
to weapons grade between inspections.
The greatest danger is that Iraq will acquire, or has already
acquired, fissile material on the black market. The IAEA has
acknowledged ``very little confidence'' it would be able to detect the
smuggling of the kilogram quantities of plutonium or highly enriched
uranium needed to make a few bombs. Given that Iraq has already
developed the other components for nuclear weapons, the situation is on
a knife's edge. If Iraq obtains fissile material, it would be at most a
few months--perhaps as little as weeks or days--away from possessing
nuclear bombs.
There is an eerie familiarity to all this. Prior to the Gulf War,
Saddam Hussein used the threat of chemical and biological weapons to
deflect attention away from a hidden nuclear threat. ``I swear to
God,'' he proclaimed in March 1990, ``we will let our fire eat half of
Israel if it tries to wage anything against Iraq. We don't need an
atomic bomb, because we have binary chemicals.'' Policymakers must not
allow themselves to be distracted again from denying Saddam his
ultimate prize: nuclear weapons.
Iraq's current position is that it will not permit weapons
inspections to resume unless and until economic sanctions are
completely lifted. If Saddam allows nuclear inspections in Iraq to
resume at some point in the future, I am concerned that Iraqi
dissembling and obstructionism will again wear down the IAEA, that the
Agency will be willing to accept less than complete disclosure by Iraq,
and that certification of Iraqi compliance by the IAEA will once again
be used by Iraq's supporters in the Security Council as the basis for
attempting to close the nuclear file and for at least a partial lifting
of sanctions.
I will examine some important unanswered questions about Iraq's
nuclear program; explore why the IAEA has proven unable to conduct
thorough nuclear inspections in Iraq; and discuss the impact of the
appointment of Dr. Hans Blix, former Director-General of the IAEA, on
UNMOVIC, of which he is now Executive Chairman.
iraq's nuclear-bomb program: important questions remain unanswered
Since 1991, U.S. policy has been consistent in requiring Iraq to
cooperate fully with U.N. inspections. On November 15, 1998, prior to
Operation Desert Fox, President Clinton declared that ``Iraq must
resolve all outstanding issues raised by UNSCOM and the IAEA,''
including giving inspectors ``unfettered access'' to all sites and
``turn[ing] over all relevant documents.'' [emphasis added] State
Department spokesman James Foley recently reaffirmed this policy.
When you look at the range of foreign policy challenges we
face, you've got to put that [Iraq's WMD capability] at the
very top, especially when you consider a number of factors,
including past use of chemical weapons by Iraq; the massive
chemical, biological and nuclear weapons programs unearthed or
uncovered by UNSCOM during its years of activity; and, indeed,
the continuing cleanup activity, improvements at some of the
sites that are capable of producing such weapons. We see no
reason for giving Saddam Hussein the benefit of the doubt. We
have to remain extraordinarily vigilant on this, and we will.
Of course, our preferred way of dealing with this problem is to
get the inspectors back and doing their job. [State Department
Press Briefing, February 1, 2000]
Significant issues regarding Saddam's nuclear-weapons program
remain unresolved. A number of these issues were raised by the IAEA in
its October 1997 consolidated inspection report, but were never
resolved in subsequent IAEA reports. A summary of these issues,
prepared by Steven Dolley, Nuclear Control Institute's research
director, is attached to this testimony, as is Mr. Dolley's full
report, for inclusion in the hearing record. In June 1998, NCI raised
these unresolved issues in a letter to IAEA Director-General ElBaradei.
In his reply, ElBaradei assured us in general terms of the IAEA's
vigilance, but explicitly refused to address the specific issues we
raised. This correspondence with ElBaradei is also submitted for the
hearing record, as is an exchange of correspondence between the Nuclear
Control Institute and the State Department on these unresolved issues.
The IAEA apparently believes that the burden of proof is on the
inspectors, not on Iraq, and demonstrates an almost naive confidence in
an absence of evidence to contradict unsubstantiated Iraqi claims.
ElBaradei acknowledged ``a few outstanding questions and concerns'' but
insisted that these provided no impediment to switching from
investigative inspections to less intrusive environmental monitoring
because ``the Agency has no evidence that Iraq is actually withholding
information in these areas.'' The unfortunate result of the IAEA's
accommodation of Iraq, in sharp contrast to UNSCOM's confrontational
approach, is the widespread perception that Iraq's chemical, biological
and missile capabilities constitute the only remaining threat.
Before Iraq put a halt to all weapons inspections in December 1998,
the IAEA had failed to get Iraq to resolve these outstanding issues--
and yet helped to make the case in the U.N. Security Council for
closing the nuclear file by declaring that ``Iraq's known nuclear
weapons assets have been destroyed, removed or rendered harmless,'' as
IAEA Director General Mohammed ElBaradei reported to the Security
Council on October 13, 1998. This language directly tracks the terms of
compliance required of Iraq in UNSCR 687 in order for economic
sanctions to be lifted.
Although there is evidence that Iraq manufactured and tested a
number of nuclear-weapon components, including the high-explosive
``lenses'' needed to compress the uranium core and trigger a nuclear
explosion, none of these components, or evidence of their destruction,
have been surrendered to IAEA inspectors. In January 1999, Gary Dillon,
then head of the IAEA Action Team, asserted that documents newly
provided by the Iraqis demonstrated that there had not been as
significant progress in developing explosive lenses as earlier evidence
had indicated. Dillon claimed that a January 1991 progress report by
Iraqi scientists, provided by Iraq to the IAEA in 1998, showed that no
final decisions had been made on key lens design issues. However,
Dillon admitted that forensic analysis conducted by IAEA to determine
the authenticity of the Iraqi document had proven ``uncertain.'' Thus,
the ``new'' Iraqi document may well have been a forgery, and the
question of the existence of complete sets of weapons components is far
from resolved.
Nor has Iraq provided the IAEA with its bomb design or a scale
model, despite repeated requests. Iraq also has refused IAEA requests
for full details of its foreign nuclear-procurement activities and for
an official government order terminating work on its nuclear weapons
program. Meanwhile, to the best of our knowledge, Saddam's nuclear team
of more than 200 PhDs remains on hand. Even before December 1998, the
IAEA acknowledged that these scientists are not closely monitored and
increasingly difficult to track.
Ambassador Rolf Ekeus, former head of UNSCOM, suggested in June
1997 that UNSCOM suspected that Iraq was still hiding nuclear
components.
. . . Iraq produced components, so to say, elements for the
nuclear warhead. Where are the remnants of that? They can't
evaporate. And there, Iraq's explanation is that (they) melted
away. And we are still very skeptical about that. We feel that
Iraq is still trying to protect them. . . . We know that they
have existed. But we doubt they have been destroyed. But we are
searching. [Remarks at the Carnegie Endowment for International
Peace, June 10, 1997]
These questions are not merely of historical interest, but directly
affect Iraq's current ability to produce nuclear weapons. The prudent
assumption for the IAEA should be that Iraq's nuclear weaponization
program continues, and that Iraq may now lack only the fissile
material. Even the possibility that Iraq has already procured this
material cannot be ruled out because of the serious nuclear-security
lapses in the former Soviet Union and the abundance of such material in
inadequately safeguarded civilian nuclear programs worldwide.
The ominous implications of missing components and surplus
scientists were revealed by Scott Ritter after he resigned in August
1998 as head of UNSCOM's Concealment Investigation Unit. Ritter said,
in testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, that UNSCOM
``had received sensitive information of some credibility, which
indicated that Iraq had the components to assemble three implosion-type
[nuclear] devices, minus the fissile material.'' If Iraq procured a
small amount of plutonium or highly enriched uranium, he testified, it
could have operable nuclear weapons in a matter of ``days or weeks.''
The IAEA promptly disputed the validity of Ritter's information.
IAEA Director General Mohammed ElBaradei reported to the U.N. Security
Council on October 13, 1998 that ``all available, credible information
. . . provides no indication that Iraq has assembled nuclear weapons
with or without fissile cores,'' adding that ``Iraq's known nuclear
weapons related assets have been destroyed, removed or rendered
harmless.''
iaea nuclear inspections in iraq: a cultural problem
As noted, there were sharp differences between UNSCOM and the IAEA
on how to conduct inspections. UNSCOM was more confrontational,
refusing to accept Iraqi obfuscations and demanding evidence of
destroyed weapons--what former UNSCOM chief Rolf Ekeus once called
``the arms-control equivalent of war.'' The IAEA has been more
accommodating, giving Iraqi nuclear officials the benefit of the doubt
when they failed to provide evidence that all nuclear weapons
components have been destroyed and all prohibited activities
terminated. Ekeus has acknowledged ``a certain culture problem''
resulting from UNSCOM's ``more aggressive approach, and the IAEA's more
cooperative approach.'' As noted, the result is a widespread and
dangerous perception that Iraq's nuclear threat is history, while Iraq
is generally perceived to be concealing other weapons of mass
destruction because UNSCOM consistently refused to accept unverified
claims of their elimination.
Iraq learned early on that it could conceal a nuclear weapons
program by cooperating with the IAEA. Khidhir Hamza, a senior Iraqi
scientist who defected to the United States in 1994, wrote in the
Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists that Saddam Hussein approved a
deception-by-cooperation scheme in 1974. ``Iraq was careful to avoid
raising IAEA suspicions; an elaborate strategy was gradually developed
to deceive and manipulate the agency,'' Hamza said.
The strategy worked. Iraq, as a signer of the 1968 Nuclear Non-
Proliferation Treaty, was subject to IAEA inspections on all nuclear
facilities. But IAEA's inspectors had failed to detect the Iraqi-style
``Manhattan Project,'' which was discovered after the Gulf War by IAEA
teams at sites identified by UNSCOM.
The IAEA's track record of missing evidence of Iraq's nuclear
weapons program predates the Gulf War. In 1981, Israeli air strikes
destroyed Iraq's nearly complete Osirak research reactor because Tel
Aviv feared Iraq's plutonium-production capacity if the plant was
allowed to start up. After the attack, IAEA inspector Roger Richter
resigned from the agency to defend Israel's action. He had helped
negotiate the IAEA's ``safeguards'' arrangement for the reactor and
later told Congress that the agency had failed to win sufficient access
to detect plutonium production for weapons.
In August 1990, only weeks after Iraq invaded Kuwait, IAEA
safeguards director Jon Jennekens praised Iraqi cooperation with the
IAEA as ``exemplary,'' and said Iraq's nuclear experts ``have made
every effort to demonstrate that Iraq is a solid citizen'' under the
Non-Proliferation Treaty.
In 1991, after the Gulf War, the U.N. awarded the nuclear-
inspection portfolio in Iraq to the IAEA rather than UNSCOM, following
a concerted lobbying campaign by the IAEA, supported by the United
States and France. The principal argument was political: With only a
few years remaining before the Non-Proliferation Treaty had to be
extended, it would be extremely damaging for the treaty's survival if
the agency were downgraded in any way.
Its turf battle won, the IAEA continued to see things Iraq's way.
In September 1992, after destruction of the nuclear-weapons plants
found in the war's aftermath, Mauricio Zifferero, head of the IAEA's
``Action Team'' in Iraq, declared Iraq's nuclear program to be ``at
zero now . . . totally dormant.'' Zifferero explained that the Iraqis
``have stated many times to us that they have decided at the higher
political levels to stop these activities. This we have verified.''
But it eventually became clear that Iraq had concealed evidence of
its continuing nuclear bomb program. In 1995, Saddam Hussein's son-in-
law, Gen. Hussein Kamel, fled to Jordan and revealed that he had led a
``crash program'' just before the Gulf War to build a crude nuclear
weapon out of IAEA-safeguarded, civilian nuclear fuel, as well as a
program after the war to refine the design of nuclear warheads to fit
Scud missiles. Iraqi officials insisted that Kamel's work was
unauthorized, and they led IAEA officials to a large cache of documents
at Kamel's farm that, the Iraqis said, proved Kamel had directed the
projects without their knowledge.
But the Kamel revelations refuted an IAEA claim, made by then-
Director General Hans Blix in 1993, that ``the Iraqis never touched the
nuclear highly enriched uranium which was under our safeguards.'' In
fact, they had cut the ends off of some fuel rods and were preparing to
remove the material from French- and Russian-supplied research reactors
for use in weapons when the allied bombing campaign interrupted the
project. The IAEA accepted a technically flawed claim by Iraqi
officials that the bomb project would have been delayed by the need to
further enrich the bomb-grade fuel for use in weapons, but defector
Hamza later made clear that Iraq could have made direct use of the
material in a bomb within a few months.
hans blix and the new inspection regime
Given the urgency of finding out whether Iraq is secretly
rebuilding nuclear, chemical and biological weapons, or the missiles
for delivering them, it is ironic that the United Nations' new chief
inspector in Iraq is Hans Blix, who headed the IAEA from 1982 to 1998.
He was in charge when the IAEA totally missed Saddam Hussein's nuclear
weapons program before the Gulf War and accepted unsubstantiated Iraqi
disarmament claims after the war. The United States originally
supported Ambassador Ekeus to head up UNMOVIC, but fell in line behind
Dr. Blix after France and Russia, Iraq's original nuclear suppliers,
opposed Ekeus with strong backing from China and Iraq. Given his
record, it is fair to ask how good a job Dr. Blix can be expected to
do.
Dr. Blix's 16-year record at the IAEA offers mixed signals. He was
an intelligent manager and skillful diplomat, but often failed to stand
up to national nuclear interests in the agency's Board of Governors.
The Board always had statutory authority to impose far more intrusive
inspections on national nuclear programs than it did, but Dr. Blix did
not urge the Board to do so until after the humiliation of Iraq's
hidden nuclear-weapons program. An improved IAEA safeguards system for
which Dr. Blix takes credit, in place since 1997, is still far from
universal or foolproof.
In 1987, Dr. Blix failed to blow the whistle when North Korea
refused to enter into an inspection agreement with the IAEA within the
required 18-month period after North Korea ratified the NPT in 1985.
The Soviet Union had prevailed on the United States in the Board of
Governors not to make an issue of it, and Dr. Blix followed suit. North
Korea did not permit nuclear inspections until 1992, by which time U.S.
intelligence agencies concluded that the North Koreans had begun
extracting plutonium for weapons from its uninspected plants. The high
marks Dr. Blix received for his agency's subsequent inspections in
North Korea were, in fact, attributable to technical assistance
received from U.S. and other nuclear weapons experts.
Under pressure from the IAEA board, Dr. Blix also failed to draw
attention to large measurement uncertainties in commercial plutonium
processing plants which make it impossible for IAEA inspectors to
determine with confidence that none of this fuel is being siphoned off
for nuclear weapons. At first he refused to acknowledge what U.S.
weapons designers had told the IAEA--that plutonium separated in, these
plants from the spent fuel of electrical generating nuclear reactors
could be made into weapons. Dr. Blix's pliant stance on plutonium has
made possible a commercial industry that already has processed more
plutonium for civilian fuel than the superpowers have produced for
weapons.
As I have detailed in my testimony, the IAEA under Dr. Blix's
tenure was forced to backtrack on rosy conclusions about Iraq's nuclear
program. Dr. Blix brings to his new post considerable managerial and
diplomatic skills, but a flawed record on Iraq. His reluctance to stand
up to the IAEA Board of Governors also raises questions as to whether
he will be able to withstand strong pressures from within the Security
Council to give Iraq a clean bill of health and lift economic
sanctions.
conclusion
Given past differences between the IAEA and UNSCOM, the IAEA should
be directed to provide UNMOVIC and the College of Commissioners with a
complete inventory of all nuclear-bomb components, designs and models
for which there is documentation or intelligence but which the agency
cannot account for. The Security Council should insist that all
elements listed in this inventory be produced by Iraq or otherwise
accounted for prior to any consideration of ``closing the nuclear
file.'' This was UNSCOM's approach with regard to missiles and chemical
and biological weapons, and it should be the IAEA's approach to nuclear
weapons, as well. The burden of proof should be on Iraq, not on the
inspectors. The United States should continue to oppose closing the
Iraqi nuclear file and the lifting of economic sanctions until all
outstanding questions on Iraq's nuclear-weapons program are resolved.
UNMOVIC and the Security Council should make sure that the IAEA
diligently and completely pursues all unanswered questions. If the
Agency proves unable to do so, responsibility for nuclear inspections
should be transferred to the Security Council, which has the
enforcement authority needed to follow through.
Finally, Dr. Blix should now pledge he will conduct business
differently than he did at the IAEA, and will not allow the absence of
evidence to be viewed as evidence of absence of weapons of mass
destruction in Iraq. This is particularly important given the provision
(paragraph 33) of UNSCR 1284, expressing the Security Council's
intention to lift economic sanctions if the heads of both UNMOVIC and
the IAEA certify that Iraq ``has cooperated in all respects'' with the
two agencies for a period of 120 days after monitoring and verification
programs have been reestablished.
[Attachments.]
[Attachment 1]
Iraq's Nuclear Weapons Program: Unresolved Issues
Steven Dolley--Nuclear Control Institute--May 12, 1998
Supporting documentation, including citations from IAEA inspection
reports, is located on the NCI website at http://www.nci.org/nci/
iraq511.htm
Weapons Design
Many important weapons-design drawings and reports are still
missing.
The status of R&D on advanced weapons designs (boosted,
thermonuclear) remains unclear.
Documentation of research on explosive lenses remains
incomplete. Some key design drawings are still missing.
The extent of outside assistance offered to or received by
Iraq, including a reported offer of an actual nuclear weapon
design, remains unresolved.
Centrifuge R&D
Almost all centrifuge design documents and drawings are
missing.
Information is incomplete and drawings are missing related
to Iraq's super-critical centritge R&D program.
Significant inconsistencies exist between Iraqi and foreign
testimony on the amount of foreign assistance and components
provided to the centrifuge program.
Missing Components and Equipment
Not all ``Group 4'' nuclear weaponization equipment has been
located or accounted for.
Some uranium-conversion components remain unaccounted for.
A plutonium-beryllium neutron source, potentially useful as
a neutron initiator for a nuclear bomb, is still missing.
Uranium Stocks and Enrichment Program
Large stockpiles of natural uranium remain in Iraq.
Historical uranium MUF's for Iraq's uranium conversion and
enrichment are large. Over three tons of uranium remains
unaccounted for.
The credibility of low (20%) historical capacity for EMTS
(calutron) uranium enrichment reported by Iraq is open to
question.
Iraqi Reporting to the IAEA
The completeness of Iraq's FFCD (Full, Final and Complete
Declaration) is questionable. No information is publicly
available on this report.
The completeness of Iraq's report on the technical
achievements of its weaponization program is unknown. No
information is publicly available on this report.
Many documents seized by Iraq during the ``parking lot
stand-off'' in September 1991 were never returned to the IAEA
and remain unaccounted for, including key centrifuge documents.
It is not publicly known whether all the documents from the
Haider House cache have been translated and fully analyzed.
Iraqi Concealment Activities
Iraq now officially denies that a governmental committee to
minimize impact of NPT violations ever existed, even though
Iraq itself first revealed the committee to the IAEA.
Reports on Iraqi nuclear team's interactions with IAEA
inspectors are incomplete.
It is not publicly known whether Iraq's report on their
post-war concealment activities has been completed and
reviewed.
Iraq has not enacted a criminal law to punish violations of
UN resolutions.
Post-war Nuclear Program Activities
Conversion of former weapons program facilities has not been
fully documented.
Documentation of ongoing activities at former weapons
facilities remains incomplete.
Information is inconsistent on the date of termination of
weapons activity at the Al Atheer weapons facility.
No evidence of any Iraqi decree to halt the nuclear weapons
program.
Extent of Iraq's post-war foreign procurement network has
not been documented.
______
[Attachment 2]
NCI Warns That Saddam May Have Active Nuclear Weapons Program
Washington.--The Nuclear Control Institute (NCI) warned today that
contrary to the widespread belief that Iraq's nuclear weapons program
no longer poses an immediate threat, evidence collected by United
Nations inspectors in fact points to an active, advanced program that
poses a clear and present danger.
``Any diplomatic solution to avert another war in Iraq should not
bargain away nuclear inspections as the price of winning Saddam's
cooperation with UN inspections of suspected ballistic missile,
chemical and biological weapons sites,'' said NCI President Paul
Leventhal. France, Russia and China have pressed such a proposal.
``Nor should UN inspectors from the Vienna-based International
Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) be permitted to curtail their
investigations because of `diminishing returns' and switch to less
aggressive monitoring efforts,'' Leventhal said. ``Instead of cutting
back, the IAEA should be re-doubling its efforts.''
In 1990, just prior to the Gulf War, NCI had warned that Iraq might
be only weeks away from having a bomb because it could divert bomb-
grade uranium fuel from its civilian research reactors between visits
by IAEA inspectors. NCI's warning went unheeded at the time, only to be
proven correct when Saddam's son-in-law defected in 1995 and disclosed
he had ordered a ``crash program'' to produce a bomb by this means
until allied bombing halted the effort.
``It should be remembered,'' Leventhal said, ``that in 1990 Saddam
successfully engaged in a grand deception to draw the world's attention
away from his nuclear program by drawing attention to his chemical and
biological weapons. After the Gulf War, a vast Iraqi Manhattan Project
was unearthed, and most of it has been destroyed. Today, we must be
concerned that Saddam is again trying to divert attention from a small
but deadly remnant of his nuclear program--the actual weapons
components that never have been found and his scientists who remain in
place.''
In support of NCI's current concerns about Iraq's nuclear threat,
the Institute held a press conference to release a report, ``Iraq and
the Bomb: The Nuclear Threat Continues,'' prepared by NCI Research
Director Steven Dolley. The NCI report finds that the IAEA's own
detailed reporting to the UN Security Council should raise concerns
that Iraqi nuclear scientists have continued to advance their earlier
work on nuclear weapons and to lie about their activities to UN
inspectors.
The NCI report cites IAEA documents to show that Iraq's nuclear
scientists are still in place, that key nuclear-weapon components
remain unaccounted for, that major gaps still exist in the information
Iraq has provided about its post-war nuclear weapon design work, and
that the clandestine procurement program for nuclear equipment and
materials has continued.
According to the report, ``After examining the evidence, it is
prudent to assume that there is a small, well-concealed nuclear weapons
program in Iraq, possibly with fully developed components suitable for
rapid assembly into one or more workable weapons if the requisite
fissile material (highly enriched uranium or plutonium) were acquired.
If Iraq has been able to smuggle in the needed material from, say,
Russia or another former Soviet Republic without being detected, the
nuclear threat could be quite real and even eclipse the CBW threat.''
The report also noted major gaps in information available to UN
inspectors about Iraq's program to enrich uranium to weapons grade with
centrifuges, and concluded it was possible, albeit less likely, that
Iraq has succeeded in concealing a small plant for producing its own
bomb material.
``The danger of Iraq having nuclear weapons or being very close to
having them is still quite real,'' Leventhal said. ``Nuclear weapons
remains Saddam's number one prize. Whether war or diplomacy is used to
solve the crisis over inspections, the United States and its allies
must make elimination Saddam's nuclear capability our number one
strategic objective.''
The NCI report, and the most recent IAEA documents, can be
downloaded from NCI's website: http://www.nci.org/nci/sadb.htm
______
Iraq and the Bomb: the Nuclear Threat Continues
(Steven Dolley, Research Director, Nuclear Control Institute)
February 19, 1998
nuclear inspections in iraq: time to ``close the nuclear file''?
As the United States prepares to resume bombing of Iraq because of
Iraq's continuing ballistic-missile and chemical-biological weapons
(CBW) programs, pressure is building to close the book on the United
Nation's investigation of Iraq's nuclear weapons program. This pressure
was catalyzed by the International Atomic Energy Agency's (IAEA's)
October 1997 report to the Security Council, which concluded that there
were no remaining ``significant discrepancies'' between the IAEA Action
Team's findings during nearly seven years of inspections and Iraq's
most recent ``full, final and complete declaration'' of its nuclear
program.
At the same time, IAEA stated that it could not guarantee the
completeness of this declaration, because ``[s]ome uncertainty is
inevitable in any country-wide technical verification process which
aims to prove the absence of readily concealable objects or activities.
The extent to which such uncertainty is acceptable is a policy
judgment.'' \1\ [emphasis added]
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\1\ IAEA, Fourth Consolidated Report of the Director General of the
International Atomic Energy Agency under Paragraph 16 of Security
Council Resolution 1051 (1996), October 8, 1997 [hereafter ``S/1997/
779''], pp. 21-22.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
IAEA reported that, though it was not excluding the option of
further inspections if new information were received, IAEA's
``activities regarding the investigations of Iraq's clandestine nuclear
programme have reached a point of diminishing returns and the IAEA is
focusing most of its resources on the implementation and technical
strengthening of its plan for the ongoing monitoring and verification
of Iraq's compliance with its obligations under the relevant Security
Council resolutions.'' \2\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\2\ S/1997/779, p. 22.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Based on these IAEA statements, Russia, China, and France are
urging the U.N. Special Commission on Iraq (UNSCOM) and the IAEA to
``close the nuclear file'' on the investigation of Iraq's
``historical'' nuclear weapons program.\3\ Under the terms of
Resolution 687, the cease-fire resolution ending the Gulf War, IAEA is
charged, ``through the Secretary-General, with the assistance and
cooperation of the Special Commission,'' with the mission of conducting
``immediate on-site inspection of Iraq's nuclear capabilities based on
Iraq's declarations and the designation of any additional locations by
the Special Commission . . .'' \4\ In practice, UNSCOM has taken
responsibility for assessing intelligence and other information
pointing to new locations for inspections, while IAEA has carried out
those inspections and monitored declared facilities and equipment.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\3\ John Goshko, ``3 Powers at U.N. Disagree on Iraq's Nuclear
Status,'' Washington Post, January 23, 1998. p. A34.
\4\ U.N. Security Council Resolution 687 (adopted April 8, 1991),
paragraph 13.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Russia and China now want UNSCOM to certify, as a first step toward
lifting international sanctions, that Iraq is in compliance with
Resolution 687's requirement that all elements of Iraq's nuclear-
weapons program have been removed, destroyed or rendered harmless. The
IAEA mission then would shift to ongoing monitoring and verification
(``OMV''), relying primarily on periodic routine inspections of
declared facilities and equipment, remote monitoring of Iraqi
facilities, and environmental sampling designed to detect prohibited
activities, such as uranium enrichment.
However, after a January 22 briefing by UNSCOM head Richard Butler,
United States Ambassador to the United Nations Bill Richardson stated
that ``We don't see any reason to close the nuclear file because there
are significant gaps in our judgment. There are still patterns of
concealment, insufficient information provided by Iraq and generally a
lack of cooperation.'' \5\ Nonetheless, most reporting and analysis of
the current Iraqi threat focuses on CBW and missiles.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\5\ Quoted in Robert Reid ``U.N.-Iraq,'' AP wire service story,
January 22, 1998.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
The popular perception being conveyed in the news media is that the
Iraqi nuclear threat is a thing of the past.\6\ Although the missile
and CBW threats are quite real, there is no basis to conclude that the
nuclear threat is any less urgent, given the likelihood of a small,
concealed weaponization program that could be rapidly activated by the
acquisition of relatively small amounts of fissile materials--highly
enriched uranium or plutonium.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\6\ For example, a recent article cited unnamed ``Western
analysts'' to support the claim that Iraq's ``nuclear program has been
proved to be dismantled.'' Daniel Pearl, ``A Primer on the Weapons-
Inspection Snag in Iraq,'' Wall Street Journal, February 11, 1998, p.
A19. In another article, a chart on ``Deadly Technologies,'' detailing
``verifiable weapon capabilities in selected Mideast countries,'' lists
Iraq in the chemical, biological, and advanced missile technology
categories, but not in the ``developing or existing nuclear'' category.
Neil King, ``Iraq is One of Many With a Doomsday Arsenal,'' Wall Street
Journal, February 18, 1998, p. A14.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
It is difficult to reconcile IAEA's desire to move from
investigative inspections to a long-term monitoring posture with its
conclusion in the same report that several sets of important issues
regarding the Iraqi nuclear-weapons program remain unresolved,
including:
the extent of Iraq's post-war nuclear procurement system;
the sources and nature of outside assistance;
a written report promised by Iraq but not yet provided to
the IAEA, summarizing progress made toward acquiring the bomb;
the true role of General Kamel, Saddam's son-in-law and
former head of Iraq's nuclear program, who the Iraqis claim
acted alone to conceal a large cache of nuclear-program
documentation at his farmhouse, prior to his defection in 1995;
and
the purpose of an Iraqi government committee established
after the Gulf War to ``reduce the effect of NPT violation to
the minimum.'' \7\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\7\ S/1997/779, p. 20, paragraph 75.
An IAEA technical team that visited Iraq in December 1997 failed to
achieve satisfactory resolution of any of these issues, nor did UNSCOM
head Richard Butler during his visit to Baghdad in January 1998.\8\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\8\ IAEA, ``Appendix: Report on the International Atomic Energy
Agency technical team visit to Iraq, 19 to 21 December 1997,'' S/1998/
38, January 15, 1998; UNSCOM, ``Report on the Visit to Baghdad from 19
January to 21 January 1998 by the Executive Chairman of the Special
Commission Established by the Security Council under Paragraph 9(b)(I)
of Security Council Resolution 687 (1991),'' S/1998/58, January 22,
1998.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Also troubling was the public confirmation in June 1997 by outgoing
UNSCOM head Rolf Ekeus that Iraq had produced nuclear-weapon components
and that they have never been found; nor has the claimed destruction of
them ever been verified.
Iraq produced components, so to say, elements for the nuclear
warhead. Where are the remnants of that? They can't evaporate .
. . We feel that Iraq is still trying to protect them. And that
is part of our . . . efforts . . .
to find these remnants. They may not exist. We know that they
have existed. But we doubt they have been destroyed. But we are
searching.\9\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\9\ Rolf Ekeus, statement at the Carnegie Endowment for
International Peace, June 10, 1997, quoted in ``Could Iraq Build an
Atomic Bomb Today If It Were Able to Buy Fissile Material?'', Nuclear
Control Institute. November 26, 1997.
This paper assesses what has been learned about Iraq's nuclear-
weapons program over the course of nearly seven years of IAEA
inspections, considers the outstanding questions that remain to be
answered, and evaluates the danger that Iraq retains a weaponization
program and could produce nuclear weapons in short order.
what we do know about iraq's nuclear weapons program
1. Iraq produced a workable design for a nuclear weapon
Iraq claims to have begun its weaponization research in 1987, and
by the start of the Gulf War had completed a fifth revision of a
detailed design for an implosion-type bomb fueled by highly enriched
uranium (HEU). In September 1991, IAEA inspectors seized Iraqi
weaponization documents, including a 1990 progress report on bomb-
design work by Group 4 of ``PC-3,'' Iraq's code name for the
weaponization division of its Manhattan Project.
A U.N. official who examined the Iraqi design work in 1992 said he
was sure that a bomb built to their specifications would work.\10\
Weaponization work proceeded well beyond the design stage. Iraq was
developing a 32-point electronic firing system to trigger the bomb.
Extensive tests of high-explosive lenses were carried out, some of them
using depleted uranium as a non-fissile dummy core.\11\ Iraqi
scientists also did test castings of small-scale natural uranium
spheres as research toward developing the bomb's spherical, highly
enriched uranium core. Iraqi nuclear scientists claimed they dissolved
the products of these experiments in acid to prevent their examination
by inspectors.\12\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\10\ Quoted in Gary Milhollin, ``Building Saddam Hussein's Bomb,''
New York Times Magazine, March 8, 1992, p. 33.
\11\ Glenn Zorpette, ``How Iraq Reverse-Engineered the Bomb,'' IEEE
Spectrum, April 1992, p. 23.
\12\ S/1997/779, p. 30.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
David Kay, former head of the IAEA Action Team in Iraq, concluded
that such non-nuclear experimentation might eliminate the need for a
full-scale nuclear explosive test.
The Iraqis had already validated their design work by testing
various weapons components. . . . As long as you are not
interested in developing the latest cutting edge multi-stage
fusion device, it is no longer necessary to test weapons by
taking a bomb out and setting it off. Weapons are tested at the
component level, with inert material, and with computers.\13\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\13\ David Kay, ``Iraqi Inspections: Lessons Learned,'' Eye on
Supply, Winter 1993, p. 89.
In fact, Kay found that many of the computer codes used by the Iraqis
in their weapon-design work were publicly available and ``much, much
better'' than codes used by U.S. and British weapons designers in the
1960s.\14\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\14\ Ibid.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Another, simpler weapon-design option--a gun-type assembly--was
also available to Iraq, though it was not the main focus of their
research. The gun design fires one piece of HEU into another to create
a critical mass. According to Kay, it ``is an easy design that almost
anyone could do with a little thought and reading . . .'' Kay concluded
that the Iraqis already knew enough to make an effective gun-type
weapon, and even possessed tungsten-carbide piping suitable for
manufacture of such a bomb.\15\ This design is so straightforward that
Manhattan Project scientists did not test it before it was used to
destroy Hiroshima.\16\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\15\ David Kay, quoted in Zorpette, 1992, op cit., p. 65.
\16\ The July 1945 ``Trinity'' test at Los Alamos used the more
complicated implosion design, and the fissile material was plutonium.
This design was used in the ``Fat Man'' bomb that destroyed Nagasaki.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
A report prepared by five former U.S. nuclear weapons designers
concluded that a technically skilled team of terrorists could construct
a crude but workable nuclear bomb if they acquired access to plutonium
or HEU. The report estimated that the team's preparation, prior to its
acquisition of fissile material, would require ``a considerable number
of weeks (or, more probably, months) . . .,'' \17\ casting significant
doubt on estimates that Iraq was several years away from completion of
a workable nuclear weapon design.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\17\ J. Carson Mark, et al., ``Can Terrorists Build Nuclear
Weapons?,'' in Preventing Nuclear Terrorism, Report and Papers of the
International Task Force on Prevention of Nuclear Terrorism, Ed. Paul
Leventhal & Yonah Alexander, 1987, p. 59.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Iraq had also made significant progress on the fabrication of key
nuclear-weapon components. IAEA inspectors discovered that Iraq had
fabricated high-explosive lenses and the molds to manufacture them,
electronic firing systems, test castings of uranium bomb cores, and
various neutron-initiator devices.\18\ With the exception of a few
crude neutron initiators, no weapons components have been located.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\18\ S/1997/779, pp. 56-62.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
2. Iraq began to divert its safeguarded HEU to a nuclear-weapons
``crash program''
In August 1995, a strange series of events led to a major
breakthrough in documenting Iraq's weapons of mass destruction. General
Hussein Kamel, a son-in-law of Saddam Hussein and former head of the
nuclear-weapons program, defected and was debriefed by the United
Nations. He revealed many secrets of the Iraqi nuclear program,
including previously unknown orders he had issued to prepare to divert
Iraq's safeguarded HEU research reactor fuel into a crash weaponization
program in late 1990. Kamel later returned to Iraq and was promptly
murdered.
U.N. inspectors were taken by Iraqi officials to General Kamel's
farmhouse, where they were shown an enormous cache of documentation
related to Iraq's weapons of mass destruction program. Iraqi officials
insisted that General Kamel had been solely responsible for concealing
this and other information from UNSCOM and the IAEA. Since 1995, the
Iraqis have repeatedly characterized Kamel as the rogue head of a
covert weapons program, the details of which he had concealed from the
Iraqi leadership.
During two IAEA inspections in late 1995, Iraqi officials revealed
further details of the crash program, which had been established in
August 1990. The Iraqis planned to dissolve their research reactor fuel
elements at a secret facility at the Tuwaitha site in order to separate
the weapons-usable HEU. In January 1991, the facility was complete.
Iraq later acknowledged that the technicians had begun cutting off the
ends of fuel elements and were awaiting authorization from General
Kamel to commence HEU separation when Gulf War bombing seriously
damaged the facility. The HEU recovery equipment was covertly moved to
another, secret nuclear facility at Tarmiya.
Significantly, the IAEA found that the most recent documents
surrendered by Iraq on the crash program were dated June 1991, which
``might indicate that the `crash programme' was not abandoned until it
became evident to Iraq that the reactor fuel was to be removed from the
country (the first shipment took place in November 1991).'' \19\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\19\ S/1997/779, p. 53.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
In late 1990, the Nuclear Control Institute had warned of the
possibility of a crash Iraqi program to divert its safeguarded civilian
nuclear fuel for use in weapons--ironically, about three months after
the Iraqi leadership decided to proceed down this path.\20\ Concerns
about Iraq's safeguarded HEU stocks were dismissed at the time by many
analysts, who estimated that Iraq was up to 15 years away from the
bomb.\21\ In a study prepared for NCI in May 1991, Dr. J. Carson Mark,
former head of the theoretical division at the Los Alamos National
Laboratory concluded that, if Iraq had used only its declared,
safeguarded HEU, fabrication of two ``metal implosion systems'' each
with a yield ``in the kiloton range would probably be possible.'' \22\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\20\ Paul Leventhal, ``Is Iraq Evading the Nuclear Police?,'' New
York Times, December 28, 1990, op-ed page. See also ``Present
Assessments Understate Iraq's Nuclear Weapons Potential,'' Statement of
Paul Leventhal, Nuclear Control Institute, presented to the Senate
Armed Services Committee. November 30, 1990.
\21\ ``How Long to Saddam's Bomb? Some Experts Say . . .,''
Proliferation Watch, Volume 1, Number 5, November/December 1990, p. 19.
A chart shows twenty different estimates of how long it would take Iraq
to acquire a ``nuclear device'' or ``nuclear weapon.'' The estimate by
NCI of less than six months was the shortest.
The Bush Administration attempted to walk a fine line on the issue
of Iraqi nuclear weapons. On the one hand, they tried to drum up
support for Operation Desert Storm by emphasizing Iraq's nuclear-
weapons aspirations. However, they did not want to undercut domestic
support for sending U.S. forces into harm's way by suggesting that Iraq
might be able to attack these troops with nuclear bombs. As a result,
administration officials downplayed the risk of a ``crude bomb'' made
from diverted HEU, but contended that the risk of Iraq acquiring
nuclear weapons within one to five years was significant. Patrick
Tyler, ``Specialists See Iraq Unlikely to Build A-Bomb in Near
Future,'' Washington Post, November 8, 1990, p. A62.
\22\ Dr. J. Carson Mark, ``Some Remarks on Iraq's Possible Nuclear
Weapon Capability in Light of Some of the Known Facts Concerning
Nuclear Weapons,'' Nuclear Control Institute, May 16, 1991, p. 27.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Prior to the Gulf War, the IAEA was particularly cavalier about the
Iraqi HEU risk. In August 1990, only weeks after the invasion of
Kuwait, IAEA safeguards director Jon Jennekens praised Iraq's
cooperation with IAEA as ``exemplary,'' and said ``the IAEA is not
concerned that, if Iraq were to be put under great military or
diplomatic pressure, the Iraqi leadership would seize its store of HEU
and build a nuclear device. `Such a calculation doesn't make practical
sense,' Jennekens said.'' Jennekens extolled Iraq's nuclear experts,
who, he said, ``have made every effort to demonstrate that Iraq is a
solid citizen'' under the NPT.\23\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\23\ Quoted in Mark Hibbs & Ann Maclachlan, ``No Bomb-Quantity of
HEU in Iraq, IAEA Safeguards Report Indicates,'' Nuclear Fuel, August
20, 1990, p. 8.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Even as late as 1993, IAEA Director-General Hans Blix made a point
of emphasizing that
the Iraqis never touched the nuclear highly-enriched uranium
which was under our safeguards, which in some ways indicate
also that the safeguard had an effect. Had they touched
anything--(inaudible)--immediately discovered, and these would
have been reported, and they would have evoked a governmental
opinion and governmental action. They didn't want to do that.
So they never touched the material which was under safeguard .
. .\24\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\24\ Hans Blix, press conference at the National Press Club,
Washington, DC, May 20, 1993, transcript, p. 8.
NCI asked Blix to retract his statement because Iraq had been found
to have secretly moved the HEU in January 1991 and not reported its
location to IAEA for several months, in violation of its safeguards
agreement. Moreover, the Iraqis had cut the ends off some HEU fuel
elements--in preparation, as Iraq later admitted,\25\ for HEU recovery
operations. The IAEA refused to back down on this point until after
General Kamel's 1995 revelation of the crash program.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\25\ S/1997/779, p. 50.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
At the time that the crash program was discovered, Iraq claimed
that it had planned to build a 50-centrifuge cascade to re-enrich the
80% enriched HEU of Russian origin, but had barely begun construction
by January 1991. The IAEA, in public statements, used this claim to
support its argument that the crash program would not have achieved its
goals by April 1991, when the next IAEA inspection had been scheduled
to take place.\26\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\26\ IAEA Statement, ``Expanded Response to the Points Raised in
the IHT Article `Who Says Iraq Isn't Making a Bomb,' Leventhal and
Lyman, 2 November 1995,'' November 16, 1995. This statement was
apparently written by Gary Dillon, now the head of the IAEA Action
Team.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
However, Iraq's claim was puzzling because there was sufficient HEU
in the fresh 80% enriched and lightly irradiated 93% enriched fuel for
a single weapon, and Iraq would have gained very little by further
enriching the 13.7 kg of fresh 80% enriched fuel. Dr. Edwin Lyman,
NCI's scientific director, analyzed the crash program and calculated
that re-enrichment would not have been necessary at all, because ``23.3
kg of 93% equivalent HEU would be available with relatively simple
chemical processing . . .'' \27\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\27\ Dr. Edwin S. Lyman, ``Iraq: How Close to a Nuclear Weapon?,''
Nuclear Control Institute, November 14, 1995, p. 4. See also Paul
Leventhal and Edwin Lyman, ``Who Says Iraq Isn't Making a Bomb?,''
International Herald Tribune, November 2, 1995, op-ed page.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
The IAEA now appears to agree that re-enrichment of the fresh 80%
enriched fuel would not have been necessary for the crash program to
succeed, stating in the October 1997 report that Iraq ``more
logically'' would have re-enriched only the HEU from the irradiated 80%
enriched and 36% enriched fuel, not that recovered from the fresh fuel;
and that re-enrichment would have reduced the time required to produce
``a second weapon,'' suggesting that sufficient HEU for a first weapon
could have been recovered without re-enrichment.\28\ Once direct-use
material such as HEU is available, the ``conversion time'' required to
make it into nuclear-weapons components is estimated by IAEA to be on
the ``order of weeks (1-3)'' in the case of oxide, and on the ``order
of days (7-10)'' in the case of metal.\29\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\28\ S/1997/779, p. 3.
\29\ International Atomic Energy Agency, IAEA Safeguards Glossary:
1987 Edition, 1987, p. 24, Table II.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
3. Iraq's clandestine nuclear procurement network continued to operate
after the Gulf War
Iraq continues to import dual-use technologies with nuclear
relevance. As of April 1997, according to IAEA,
Iraq is still able to import technological equipment, recent
examples of which include a plasma spray machine, a general
purpose CNC milling machine and personal computer components
having 1996-generation microprocessors. These items were
imported through trans-shipment, via neighbouring countries,
thus avoiding the identification of Iraq as the end-user.\30\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\30\ IAEA, Third Consolidated Report of the Director General of the
International Atomic Energy Agency under Paragraph 16 of U.N.SC
Resolution 1051 (1996), S/1997/297, April 11, 1997, p. 4.
Resolution 687 does not prohibit dual-use technology imports by
Iraq, provided they are declared and subject to monitoring by IAEA. The
IAEA has found that Iraq continues to engage in deceptive procurement
practices, apparently in violation of the laws of various exporting
nations, but the IAEA does not name the nations in the report.
Iraq promised IAEA that it would provide a written description of
its post-war procurement system, but thus far has failed to do so.\31\
In a November 24 briefing for the Security Council, IAEA downplays the
matter, reporting that ``[t]he information so far provided by Iraq is
incomplete, but the provision of the missing information should be a
simple administrative matter. This is not a matter of major
significance.'' \32\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\31\ S/1997/779, p. 20.
\32\ IAEA, ``Notes of the International Atomic Energy Agency
Briefing to the Security Council on 24 November 1997,'' S/1997/950.
December 3, 1997, p. 6.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Iraq received at least some outside offers of nuclear weapons
assistance after the end of the Gulf War. The material obtained by IAEA
at General Kamel's farmhouse documents the participation of Mukhabarat,
the Iraqi intelligence service, in international procurement
operations. The Iraqis initially denied, and then attempted to
minimize, Mukhabarat's role in procurement.
IAEA reported that ``[t]he Mukhabarat files also contained some
information regarding unsolicited offers of assistance to Iraq's
clandestine nuclear programme that were judged [by the Iraqis] to
warrant further investigation.'' IAEA requested information on ``all
significant offers of assistance to its clandestine nuclear
programme.'' A series of lame excuses followed: ``Subsequent
discussions on this topic were usually met with statements . . . that
the person responsible for that file was various `on vacation' or `on
sick leave' or otherwise unavailable. When the matter was addressed
during the July 1997 visit, by the technical team, the team was advised
that, for no apparent reasons, the file had been destroyed.''
Eventually Iraq provided IAEA with correspondence indicating ``that
the Mukhabarat were confident that the source of the information [the
unsolicited offer of assistance] was valid and worth pursuing'' and
that the Iraqi Atomic Energy Commission (IAEC) requested that
Mukhabarat ``endeavour to obtain samples from the source.'' \33\ The
IAEA report does not say whether the correspondence or other evidence
indicates what these ``samples'' were, or whether they were obtained by
Mukhabarat from the source.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\33\ S/1997/950, pp. 4-5. The IAEA report does not give the dates
of this exchange of correspondence, nor does it specify whether the
exchange occurred before or after the Gulf War.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
An even more troubling incident that occurred in October 1990 was
discussed during the IAEA technical team's visit to Iraq in late
December 1997. A ``foreign national'' (name and nationality not
revealed in the IAEA report) offered to provide ``nuclear weapon design
drawings'' as well as technical and procurement assistance. The Iraqis
claimed that they did not follow up on this or any other offers of
outside assistance after the Gulf War because they feared sting
operations. IAEA said it had found no evidence to contradict these
claims or to provide a basis for further investigation of them.\34\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\34\ IAEA ``Report on the International Atomic Energy Agency
Technical Team Visit to Iraq, 19 to 21 December 1997,'' S/1998/38,
January 15, 1998, p. 4 & p. 7.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
4. Iraq had made progress on a ballistic-missile delivery system for a
nuclear warhead
The Iraqis planned to deliver their nuclear weapon by means of a
Scud missile modified to increase its range and payload. Former UNSCOM
head Rolf Ekeus pointed out that Iraq's long-range missile program ``is
a fundamentally nuclear program . . . definitely not for conventional
explosives,'' with the goal of using missiles to deliver chemical and
biological weapons as ``secondary'' to the nuclear mission.\35\ But
delivery-system R&D apparently lagged behind warhead-design work, and
it is not clear that the main barrier of payload weight had been
overcome by the time of the Gulf War.\36\ Since the war, Iraqi long-
range missile R&D, and covert procurement of missile parts has
continued, in violation of Resolution 687.\37\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\35\ Rolf Ekeus, quoted in ``Could Iraq Build an Atomic Bomb Today
. . .,'' op cit.
\36\ During the crash program, Iraq concluded that the weight of
the nuclear payload had to be reduced to less than one ton if it was to
be delivered successfully by the Al Abid satellite launch rocket then
under development. S/1997/779. p. 60.
\37\ Jeffrey Smith, ``Iraq Buying Missile Parts Covertly,''
Washington Post, October 14, 1995, p. A1; ``Jordan Seizes Missile Parts
Meant for Shipment to Iraq,'' Washington Post, December 8, 1995, p.
A44.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
It is important to note that nuclear weapons can be delivered by
numerous means, with missiles being the most technically difficult
modality. A study by the U.S. Office of Technology Assessment concluded
that
Delivery vehicles may be based on very simple or very complex
technologies. Under the appropriate circumstances, for
instance, trucks, small boats, civil aircraft, larger cargo
planes, or ships could be used to deliver or threaten to
deliver at least a few weapons to nearby or more distant
targets. Any organization that can smuggle large quantities of
illegal drugs could probably also deliver weapons of mass
destruction via similar means, and the source of the delivery
might not be known. Such low technology means might be chosen
even if higher technology alternatives existed.\38\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\38\ U.S. Office of Technology Assessment (OTA), Technologies
Underlying Weapons of Mass Destruction, December 1993, p. 197.
A recent review of Iraq's nuclear program suggests that Hussein
``might have considered trying to get such a [nuclear] bomb to Israel,
possibly by boat, for detonation in the roadstead of Haifa Harbour.
This is a premise that is circulating in present-day Beirut and is
thought to have originally been debated by Iranian Pasdaran
terrorists.'' \39\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\39\ Al J. Ventor, ``How Saddam Almost Built His Bomb,'' Jane's
Intelligence Review, December 1997.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
what we don't know about iraq's nuclear weapons program
1. Weapons design documentation
In June 1997, Rolf Ekeus, then the chief executive officer of
UNSCOM, stated that
The problem is maybe in that we [UNSCOM] by nature are
suspicious concerning the weapon design. It is clear that the
Iraqi specialists managed to acquire a considerable
understanding of weapons design, warhead design. And there are
those of our specialists inside the Commission who insist that
there we have a major problem--namely that if Iraq would one
way or the other manage to buy somewhere outside especially HEU
in enough quantities it would be possible for Iraq to work to
create a viable weapon. I'm now talking implosion technology. .
. .\40\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\40\ Rolf Ekeus, quoted in ``Could Iraq Build an Atomic Bomb Today
. . .'', op cit.
The IAEA's ability to put together the pieces of the Iraqi nuclear
puzzle is hampered by Iraq's refusal to provide IAEA with a
comprehensive report on progress achieved in the nuclear weapons
program. According to the IAEA, only one ``significant weaponization
report [was] directly obtained and retained in the custody [of] an IAEA
inspection team,'' and much documentation on weaponization is still
missing. For example, an Iraqi computer print-out of former PC-3
equipment doesn't include listings of Group 4 weaponization, or
centrifuge program, equipment and materials.
The Iraqis also make the dubious claim that they cannot locate any
additional documents on weaponization--for instance, the main register
of nuclear-weapon design drawings.\41\ According to David Kay, ``it's
like your dog chewed your homework excuse. This doesn't happen in a
nuclear weapons program. It tells you they're still trying to hide
something.'' Kay emphasized that locating and analyzing the final Iraqi
weapon design is critical to discovering how close Iraq got to the
bomb.\42\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\41\ S/1997/779, pp. 8-10.
\42\ David Kay, quoted in ``Investigation shows that it's possible
that Saddam Hussein is close to having a nuclear weapon,'' NBC Nightly
News, December 4, 1997, NBC News Transcripts.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
2. Nuclear weapons components
As noted above, no Iraqi nuclear-weapon components (except basic
neutron initiators) have ever been located. This does not mean that no
such components were ever fabricated. Iraq has admitted that it
fabricated explosive lenses, neutron initiators, test firing systems,
and dummy uranium cores. As Rolf Ekeus stated last year, UNSCOM
believes that there are more components to be found.\43\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\43\ Rolf Ekeus, presentation at the Carnegie Endowment, June 1997,
op cit.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
In November 1997, U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright stated
that, regarding inspections in Iraq, ``[t]here are four categories of
weapons of mass destruction that concern us. In the nuclear field that
file is the closest to being closed. But we are concerned there are
still some components there.'' \44\ [emphasis added]
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\44\ Madeleine Albright, CBS ``Face the Nation,'' Host, Bob
Schieffer, November 9, 1997, CBS transcript, p. 4. Secretary Albright
did not elaborate on her comment, so it is not clear what she meant by
the term ``components.''
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
According to a recent trade press report,\45\ IAEA was informed in
1995, after the seizure of documents at General Kamel's farmhouse, that
in late 1990, Iraq had constructed a full-scale model of its nuclear
bomb design, fabricated to scale using metal components. The report
cites ``sources inside the Iraqi nuclear program but not directly
involved in key aspects of the weaponization effort,'' and says that
IAEA and UNSCOM hold radically opinions about the significance of the
model. IAEA reportedly believes that Iraq is still three to four years
away from acquiring the ability to manufacture an effective nuclear
weapon, whereas UNSCOM believes Iraq could build a bomb in less than a
year.\46\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\45\ Mark Hibbs, ``IAEA and UNSCOM Puzzled Over Iraqi Mockup of
Nuclear Bomb,'' Nucleonics Week, February 12, 1998, p. 16.
\46\ Ibid. Hibbs reported that IAEA based its assessment on advice
from U.S. nuclear-weapons experts, whereas UNSCOM relied on non-U.S.
experts. Robert Kelley, a U.S. expert who did advise IAEA, contends
that, due to ``internal bickering and jockeying for status'' within the
weapons program, Iraq was ``technologically at least five years away''
from acquiring nuclear weapons after the Gulf War. ``Former Inspector
says Iraq Had No Nukes,'' United Press wire service story, December 5,
1997.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Gary Dillon, head of the IAEA Action Team, acknowledged that an
Iraqi informant had claimed such a model existed, ``but it was a claim
without any basis for follow-up.'' IAEA has found no evidence to
support the existence of such a model, and has not discussed the matter
with UNSCOM, according to Dillon.\47\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\47\ Gary Dillon, IAEA Action Team, personal communication with
Paul Leventhal, February 13, 1998.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
IAEA has examined Iraqi documents indicating ``that a signficant
decision had been taken regarding the dimensions of the explosive lens
of choice,'' \48\ but providing no indication of development of other
weapon components. Iraq rejected an IAEA suggestion ``that this
decision [on an explosive lens] strongly indicated that similar
decisions had been taking regarding the design of the weapon
internals.'' \49\ Thus, Iraq admitted the lens decision, but denied
that such decisions had been made about any other components. Even
after receiving the information about a full-scale model weapon, the
IAEA reported it ``has no information that contradicts Iraq's statement
that it had never identified nuclear-weapon design options beyond those
preliminary concepts . . .'' \50\ If it was constructed, the scale
model provides a basis for further challenging Iraq's claim to have
made only minimal progress on weapons design.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\48\ S/1998/38, p. 6.
\49\ Ibid.
\50\ Ibid.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
3. Centrifuges
For all their evasiveness, the Iraqis have been perhaps the least
forthcoming on the matter of centrifuges. IAEA reported that, as of
October 1997, Iraq has made available almost no documentation on its
centrifuge uranium enrichment program. Only a few of the centrifuge
drawings that Iraq obtained from German technical experts have been
made available to IAEA by Iraq, and they ``contain only minor
details.'' IAEA concluded that it could not rule out the possibility
that centrifuge components and documentation are still being withheld
by Iraq.\51\ Nor has IAEA been able to dismiss conclusively the
possibility that a pilot centrifuge cascade existed (or still exists)
undetected somewhere in Iraq.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\51\ S/1997/779, pp. 39-41.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Some important centrifuge documentation may have briefly been in
IAEA custody at one point in 1991. Former inspector David Kay wrote
that one in four of the documents seized by Iraqis from IAEA inspectors
on September 22, 1991, the day before the notorious parking lot
standoff, were never returned. Based on hurried initial assessments
before the material was repossessed by the Iraqis, the inspectors
concluded that the documents probably discussed key aspects of
centrifuge program.\52\ It should be noted that IAEA has not recovered
any documents from Iraq dealing with ``super-critical'' centrifuges,
despite admissions from German centrifuge experts that they provided
Iraq with design information on such centrifuges.\53\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\52\ Quoted in Zorpette, 1992, op cit., p. 63.
\53\ S/1997/779, p. 40.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Concerns about Iraq's progress on centrifuge enrichment are
magnified by the IAEA's inability to account for over a ton of uranium
from projects at the Tuwaitha nuclear research facility.\54\ If Iraq
has managed to conceal ton quantities of uranium from the IAEA, it
could retain a substantial amount of feedstock to reactivate its
centrifuge program.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\54\ S/1997/779, Table 1.1, p. 34.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
4. The international procurement network
Even after seven years of IAEA investigations, almost no
information on Iraqi procurement has been publicly released, making it
impossible to judge how much IAEA has discovered and how much remains
undisclosed by Iraq. As former UNSCOM chief Rolf Ekeus recounted,
When our inspectors found machines, equipment and weapons
components that had been imported by Iraq, it became necessary
for UNSCOM to approach the relevant supplier companies to
investigate the complete extent of their dealings with Iraq.
Most of the companies were reluctant to talk to our
investigators, and only insistent requests to respective
governments for support could give us direct, or sometimes
indirect, access to the company. For that reason, assurances of
protection from public exposure had to be given in order to
encourage the companies and their governments to accept our
investigation of their dealings with Iraqi authorities.\55\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\55\ Rolf Ekeus, ``Ambassador Rolf Ekeus: Leaving Behind the UNSCOM
Legacy in Iraq,'' Arms Control Today, June/July 1997, p. 5.
Given the increasing difficulty of locating key documents as time
passes, it is unlikely that a complete picture of Iraq's pre-war
procurement network will ever emerge.\56\ Even more troubling, as noted
above, Iraq's international procurement network is known to have
continued operation after end of the Gulf War. UNSCOM and IAEA are
tasked to fully account for, and assist the Security Council in
shutting down, any ongoing procurement of prohibited materials and
technology. But information on continuing procurements is still far
from complete.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\56\ There is some reason to believe that IAEA discovered the
``mother lode'' of procurement documents in the summer of 1991, but
were forced to relinquish them to the Iraqis. On August 24, 1991, IAEA
inspectors ``came upon a room lined with bookshelves that held the
secrets they were looking for: a series of three-ring binders
containing key foreign suppliers' catalogues, each painstakingly
translated into Arabic; copies of correspondence with those suppliers;
and records detailing purchasing history for virtually every piece of
major equipment in the bomb program.'' The Iraqis would not allow the
inspectors to remove these documents. Later, while the inspectors were
outside the facility, they saw smoke rising from the building's stacks,
suggesting that documents were being burned. Jeffrey Smith & Glenn
Frankel, ``Saddam's Nuclear-Weapons Dream: A Lingering Nightmare,''
Washington Post, October 13, 1991, pp. A1. A44-45.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
iraqi nuclear breakout: a clear and present danger
In assessing the nuclear threat from Iraq, it is important to
underscore that the human infrastructure of Iraq's nuclear-weapons
program remains in place. As David Kay put it, ``I don't think the
program by any means is dead. The heart of a program is not equipment.
The heart of a program is scientific and technical information and
knowledge. The same 10 to 15,000 people that worked on the program
before the war are still working.'' \57\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\57\ David Kay, quoted by NBC Nightly News, op cit.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Iraq's nuclear team was not disbanded, and the nuclear scientists
``are essentially prisoners'' of Saddam's regime.\58\ These scientists
are interviewed periodically by IAEA, but the IAEA does not keep the
scientists under surveillance.\59\ It remains unclear how closely their
movements and their work are monitored by intelligence agencies.
According to Paul Stokes, a deputy leader of the IAEA Action Team,
there is significant evidence from defectors and other intelligence
sources that these scientists continue their work at undeclared sites
in Iraq.\60\ Iraqi nuclear scientists often taunt the inspectors. One
looked a U.N. inspector in the eye and said, ``We are waiting for you
to leave.'' \61\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\58\ David Albright, Institute for Science and International
Security, quoted in Mark Hibbs, ``France Expected to Help Russia
Terminate IAEA Investigation in Iraq,'' NuclearFuel, January 12, 1998,
p. 4.
\59\ Gary Dillon, head of the IAEA Action Team, personal
communication with Paul Leventhal, February 13, 1998.
\60\ Ventor, 1997, op cit.
\61\ Quoted in Milhollin, 1992, p. 30.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
A major concern is that Iraq is capable of building a workable
nuclear bomb if the requisite nuclear material could be obtained.
Despite some differences with UNSCOM over weaponization, IAEA concluded
its October 1997 report by noting that ``Iraqi programme documentation
records substantial progress in many important areas of nuclear weapon
development, making it prudent to assume that Iraq has developed the
capability to design and fabricate a basic fission weapon, based on
implosion technology and fueled by highly enriched uranium.'' \62\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\62\ S/1997/779, pp. 61-62.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
As a result, preventing Iraq from acquiring plutonium or highly
enriched uranium is given as a top priority by the IAEA: ``Iraq's
direct acquisition of weapons-usable nuclear material or nuclear
weapon-related technology . . . will continue to be a matter of major
concern to IAEA, and high priority will continue to be given to the
investigation of any indication of such acquisition.'' \63\ But the
IAEA all but concedes its inability to detect the presence of smuggled
fissile material inside Iraq: ``Iraq's direct acquisition of weapon-
usable nuclear material would also present a severe technical challenge
to the OMV [ongoing monitoring and verification] measures and great
reliance must be placed on international controls.'' \64\
Unfortunately, international controls on fissile materials are far from
adequate, and national controls in Russia and other former republics of
the Soviet Union, are extremely weak. With some 294 tons of separated
plutonium and some 20 tons of highly enriched uranium projected to be
in civilian commerce in the year 2000,\65\ relying on the NPT and IAEA
safeguards as the primary means of preventing Iraq from getting the
bomb is a dangerous gamble--one that failed in 1990.\66\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\63\ S/1998/38, p. 8.
\64\ S/1997/779, p. 22.
\65\ David Albright, Frans Berkhout, & William Walker, Plutonium
and Highly Enriched Uranium 1996: World Inventories, Capabilities and
Policies, 1997, Table 6.8, p. 184, and p. 253. See also ``The Plutonium
Threat,'' Nuclear Control Institute, March 1997.
\66\ As noted Iraq had begun to divert safeguarded HEU, and then
proceeded to hide it, without the IAEA's knowledge, in direct violation
of IAEA safeguards. For an analysis of specific problems with the IAEA
safeguards system, see Paul Leventhal, ``IAEA Safeguards Shortcomings--
A Critique,'' Nuclear Control Institute, September 12, 1994. and Marvin
Miller, ``Are IAEA Safeguards on Plutonium Bulk-Handling Facilities
Effective?,'' Nuclear Control Institute, August 1990.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Another option for Iraq would be to reconstitute its covert uranium
enrichment program based on centrifuge technology. There is evidence
that, since the end of the Gulf War, Iraq has attempted to acquire
hydrofluoric acid, used to convert natural uranium into uranium
hexafluoride for enrichment.\67\ Based on performance achieved by the
Iraqis with their prototype centrifuge, IAEA conservatively estimated
that the potential output of a 1,000 centrifuge cascade would be about
ten kilograms of weapons-grade highly enriched uranium annually. Had
construction been completed, Iraq's Al Furat centrifuge manufacture
facility would have been capable of manufacturing up to five thousand
centrifuges a year, enough to supply an enrichment facility that could
produce fifty kilograms of HEU per year.\68\ IAEA has started to
implement its OMV program, but it is by no means certain that the IAEA
could detect a small, well-hidden centrifuge facility. Former IAEA
Action Team inspectors Jay Davis and David Kay concluded that,
``[b]ecause of the centrifuges' small size, cascades of even 1000 or
more--enough to produce material for several bombs a year--are
relatively easily concealed.'' \69\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\67\ Ventor, 1997, op cit.
\68\ S/1997/779, pp. 41-42.
\69\ Davis & Kaye, 1992, op cit., p. 25.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
conclusions and recommendations
After examining the evidence, it is prudent to assume that there is
a small, well-concealed nuclear weapons program in Iraq, possibly with
fully developed components suitable for rapid assembly into one or more
workable weapons if the requisite fissile material (highly enriched
uranium or plutonium) were acquired. If Iraq has been able to smuggle
in the needed material from, say, Russia or another former Soviet
republic without being detected, the nuclear threat could be quite real
and even eclipse the CBW threat.
As a P-5 member of the Security Council, the United States should
provide a counterweight against pressure by Russia on UNSCOM to close
the nuclear file, and on the IAEA Action Team to limit its
investigation. Nor should the halting of nuclear inspections be seized
upon as an acceptable last-minute compromise by those anxious to find a
diplomatic solution to avert U.S. military strikes against Iraq.
The IAEA has had a bad track record when it comes to Iraq, and
should be extra cautious about suspending its investigation. In
September 1992, the late Mauricio Zifferero, then head of the IAEA
Action Team, said that Iraqi nuclear program ``is at zero now,'' and
that the Iraqis ``have stated many times to us that they have decided
at the higher political level to stop these activities. This we have
verified. We're completing our investigation of the program and find no
evidence of the program being continued.'' \70\ Zifferero further
claimed that the Iraqi nuclear weapon program ``is totally dormant.''
\71\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\70\ ``Iraqi Nuclear Program `at Zero,' U.N. Aide Says,''
Washington Post, September 3, 1992, p. A39.
\71\ Caryle Murphy, ``Long-Term Monitoring Seen for Iraq,''
Washington Post, September 8, 1992, p. A16.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Even in its most recent reports, IAEA seems to place an almost
naive confidence in the absence of evidence contradicting
unsubstantiated Iraqi claims. When doubt exists, the presumption should
be that investigation and active inspection need to continue. The
number of significant discoveries since Zifferero's overconfident 1992
declaration should lead us to greet IAEA statements that inspections
have reached a point of ``diminishing returns'' with skepticism.
The unclear division of nuclear responsibilities between IAEA and
UNSCOM has resulted in tension and disagreement. After leaving UNSCOM,
Rolf Ekeus mentioned that there ``was also a certain culture problem
with our [UNSCOM's] more aggressive approach, and the IAEA has a more
cooperative approach . . .'' \72\ Better coordination and consultation
between the two agencies will be required if the remaining questions
about Iraq's nuclear weapons program are to be answered.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\72\ Rolf Ekeus, remarks at the Carnegie Endowment, June 1997, op
cit.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
One historical note relevant to the current crisis comes from David
Kay, who wrote that Hussein ``used the chemical weapon threat mainly as
a distraction for Israeli intelligence, to draw them away from the
nuclear program. So we need to be looking at the whole picture.'' \73\
We cannot dismiss the possibility that Saddam Hussein might be pursuing
a similar diversionary strategy today with his CBW and missile shell
game.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\73\ David Kay, 1993, op cit., p. 98.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Another series of air strikes, or even a prolonged bombing
campaign, are unlikely to destroy all of Iraq's capability to produce
and use weapons of mass destruction. The United States seems prepared
to use military force to force Iraqi acquiescence in meaningful
inspections, including access to presidential sites. Such acquiescence
should include full and complete resolution of the five unresolved
nuclear-program issue areas specified by IAEA and noted above. Saddam
Hussein would be likely to read the closing of the nuclear file as a
sign of weakness on the part of the United Nations, making
reconstitution of his nuclear weapons program all the more likely and
making resolution of questions related to missiles and CBW more
difficult.
U.N. inspectors must also keep close track of Iraq's dual-use
technology base. IAEA has set up a process to deal with Iraqi requests
to release or relocate dual-use equipment from the nuclear program, or
to change use of monitored buildings. So far, 27 out of 29 such
requests have been approved. Once released to the Iraqis, subsequent
inspection of these technologies and buildings is uncertain at best;
IAEA requires only that monitoring occur ``at a frequency commensurate
with their significance.'' \74\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\74\ S/1997/779, p. 11.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Finally, tighter controls must be implemented across the board on
commerce in plutonium and highly enriched uranium. When he stepped down
as UNSCOM chief last year, Ambassador Rolf Ekeus warned that ``[t]he
present nuclear threat from Iraq is, in my judgment, linked to the
possible import by Baghdad of highly enriched uranium (HEU). . . . The
lack of HEU, together with the effective brake that has been applied to
the country's missile programs, constitute the real bottleneck for Iraq
for the acquisition of a nuclear weapon.'' \75\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\75\ Quoted in ``Ambassador Rolf Ekeus: Leaving Behind the UNSCOM
Legacy in Iraq,'' Arms Control Today, June/July 1997, p. 4.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Unless nuclear nations stop producing materials by the ton that can
be used by the pound to build nuclear bombs, the risk of diversion to
the nuclear-weapon program of Saddam Hussein, and of other would-be
nuclear powers, will remain high.
______
[Attachment 3]
Nuclear Control Institute,
1000 Connecticut Ave., NW, Suite 804,
Washington, DC, June 24, 1998.
Mohamed ElBaradei,
Director-General,
International Atomic Energy Agency,
Vienna, Austria.
Dear Director-General ElBaradei: We are writing to convey our
letter to the editor, published in the Washington Post on June 22, in
response to your June 1 op-ed article, ``Iraq's Nuclear File: Still
Open.'' The letter expresses our concern that the IAEA's proposed shift
to more passive environmental monitoring is premature until a number of
outstanding questions about Iraq's nuclear weapons program--originally
raised by the IAEA in the fourth consolidated report (S/1997/779,8
October 1997)--are answered first.
We wish to underscore our proposal that you direct IAEA Iraq Action
Team Director Gary Dillon to address each of these questions in his
July report to the Security Council.
These unresolved issues are not merely historical artifacts of a
``past program,'' as you suggest in your article, but directly concern
whether Saddam Hussein's regime could produce nuclear weapons today.
Among the most significant are the following:
1. Though Iraq is known to have manufactured and tested a
number of nuclear-weapon components, none have been surrendered
to IAEA inspectors.
2. Iraq has never provided the IAEA with its bomb design and
related research, despite repeated requests.
3. The IAEA is no longer pursuing an intelligence report that
Iraq fabricated a full-scale bomb model, or ``mock-up,'' and
the Agency did not even bother to share this information with
UNSCOM, according to what Mr. Dillon related to NCI on this
matter.
4. Iraq continued to received outside assistance, and to
procure technology for its nuclear program, after the Gulf War.
The extent to which those activities continue today remains
unclear.
5. Iraq has not provided proof that it issued orders to
terminate its nuclear weapons program, a matter specifically
referenced by the Security Council in May.
The IAEA's fifth consolidated report (S/1998/312,9 April 1998) is
distressing in that it fails to address most of these issues and
concludes that Iraq's most recent accounting of its nuclear program is
``full, final and complete.''
The discovery this week by UNSCOM inspectors of evidence that Iraq
weaponized shells with VX nerve gas, despite Iraq's repeated insistence
that it had never done so, demonstrates that Iraq continues to
misrepresent the extent of its efforts to produce and conceal weapons
of mass destruction. In the face of such evidence, and given the long
history of Iraq's concealment, obstructionism and misrepresentation
with regard to its nuclear program, the IAEA should not take Iraq at
its word, even when there is no immediate evidence to the contrary.
In May, the Security Council stated that all questions and concerns
about Iraq's nuclear program must be resolved before the IAEA can
switch to an ongoing monitoring and verification posture. The Agency's
credibility is at stake in pursuing this difficult assignment in a
manner that protects global security and strengthens the international
nuclear non-proliferation regime.
Thank you for your attention to this urgent matter. We would
welcome the opportunity to discuss these issues with you.
Sincerely,
Paul Leventhal, President.
Steven Dolley, Research Director.
[Enclosures.]
[From the Washington Post, June 22, 1998]
letters to the editor
Unanswered Questions in Iraq
It is reassuring to hear from Mohammed ElBaradei, director general
of the International Atomic Energy Agency [IAEA], that his agency
doesn't want to ``close the nuclear file'' on Iraq [``Iraq's Nuclear
File: Still Open,'' op-ed, June 1]. Nonetheless, Mr. ElBaradei wants to
change the IAEA's posture in Iraq from investigative inspections to
primarily passive environmental monitoring, thereby making it easier
for Iraqi scientists to conceal what the IAEA is looking for. Any such
move is premature until a number of outstanding questions about the
Iraqi ``Manhattan Project,'' raised by the IAEA itself in a report last
October, are resolved.
For example, Iraq never surrendered its bomb-design documents. Iraq
has admitted fabrication of nuclear-bomb components for testing but
never turned them over (contrary to Mr. ElBaradei's claim that the IAEA
has neutralized ``all weapon-related items that came to knowledge'').
The equipment used to make these components has not been accounted for
fully. Iraq has imported such equipment since the Gulf war, but
continues to withhold details about its postwar procurement network.
How can we accept Mr. ElBaradei's statement that the IAEA has
``neutralized'' Iraq's bomb program if the IAEA still does not know all
of Iraq's foreign suppliers?
Mr. ElBaradei refers to scientists and engineers who ``worked'' in
Iraq's clandestine nuclear program even though they all remain in Iraq
and, by the IAEA's admission, are difficult to monitor as they are
transferred to the ``private sector'' (whatever that means in Iraq). He
acknowledges the ``technical challenge'' to IAEA monitoring if Iraq
were to acquire weapons-usable nuclear material from abroad--politesse
for admitting that these scientists could construct a workable nuclear
bomb undetected if they acquired plutonium or bomb-grade uranium on the
black market. This warning was contained in the IAEA's report to the
Security Council last October, but was oddly-absent from the most
recent report, which reinforced the call by China, France and Russia to
close the Iraqi nuclear file.
At U.S. insistence, the Security Council in May made the right
decision that all unanswered questions about Iraq's nuclear program
must be resolved before any shift from inspections to monitoring takes
place. Mr. ElBaradei should ask the IAEA board of governors to support
the Security Council's postion and to direct the leader of the IAEA
Action Team in Iraq, Gary Dillon, to make finding answers to the
unresolved questions his top priority.
Steven Dolley,
Paul Leventhal,
Washington.
______
International Atomic Energy Agency,
The Director General,
Sent by fax: 25 June 1998.
Mr. Paul Leventhal,
President,
Nuclear Control Institute,
1000 Connecticut Ave., NW, Suite 804,
Washington, DC.
Dear Mr. Leventhal:
Thank you for your fax of June 24 1998. As you might have presumed
I had already seen your ``letter to the editor'' in the Washington Post
and had, together with Mr. Garry Dillon, considered your concerns.
Firstly, you should be aware that in the context of its
verification activities the IAEA does not take any member state ``at
its word''. Verification is based on evidence and not upon trust and
nowhere is that principle more vigorously applied than in Iraq. The
IAEA has never accepted Iraq's declarations at face value and has
always sought verification through, for example, Iraqi documentation,
supplier state information and as necessary excavation of burial sites
involved in Iraq's unilateral destruction activities.
Secondly, your reference to ``more passive environmental
monitoring'' is incorrect. The IAEA's ongoing monitoring and
verification (OMV) activities in Iraq are far from passive. They are
very wide-ranging, are highly intrusive and benefit from the same
unlimited rights of access that are associated with our ``disarmament''
activities in Iraq. OMV employs all of the technologies used in the
disarmament activities and wide-area environmental monitoring is but
one of those technologies. Implementation of the OMV not only addresses
the obvious need to monitor Iraq's use of its known assets but also
gives at least equal stress to the vital need to continue to search
actively for clandestine assets through the follow-up of available
information, the pre-emptive inspection of hitherto un-inspected sites
and through a comprehensive wide-area monitoring programme. The risk
from Iraq lies not in the past, but in the present and the future.
Protection from such risks is the function of OMV.
Thirdly, the IAEA's fifth consolidated progress report did not
conclude that ``Iraq's most recent accounting of its nuclear programme
is `full, final and complete.' '' The progress report simply records
that Iraq had satisfactorily completed the purely editorial task of
producing a consolidated version of its FFCD which incorporated into
one document all of the additions and revisions that had been made to
Iraq's September 1996 version of the declaration resulting from its
discussions with the IAEA Action Team. However, paragraph 79 of the
IAEA's fourth consolidated progress report did contain the following
statement.
``There are no indications of significant discrepancies between the
technically coherent picture which has evolved of Iraq's past programme
and the information contained in Iraq's FFCD-F issued on 7 September
1996 as supplemented by the written revisions and additions provided by
Iraq since that time. However, taking into account the possibility,
albeit remote, of undetected duplicate facilities or the existence of
anomalous activities or facilities outside this technically coherent
picture, no absolute assurances can be given with regard to the
completeness of Iraq's FFCD. Some uncertainty is inevitable in any
country-wide technical verification process which aims to prove the
absence of readily concealable objects or activities. The extent to
which such uncertainty is acceptable is a policy judgement.''
I do not propose to address the five specific points that you
raised save to say that some of them remain to be ``work in progress''
and are already scheduled to be raised again when Mr. Dillon meets with
the Iraqi counterpart in Baghdad next week.
In conclusion, please be assured that the IAEA is not unaware of
your fundamental concerns as evidenced by the attached abstracts from
our October 1997 and April 1998 progress reports to the Security
Council.
Yours sincerely,
Mohamed ElBaradei.
______
Abstracts From the Fourth Consolidated Six-Monthly Progress Report of
the Director General of the IAEA--S/1997/779 dated 8 October 1997
the scope and status of iraq's clandestine nuclear programme
71. The results of the IAEA's on-site inspection of Iraq's nuclear
capabilities have, over time produced a picture of a very well funded
programme aimed at the indigenous development and exploitation of
technologies for the production of weapons-usable nuclear material and
the development and production of nuclear weapons, with a target date
of 1991 for the first weapon.
72. The programme, which is described in greater detail in
Attachment 1 to this report, comprised:
indigenous production and overt and covert procurement of
natural uranium compounds, in this regard:
All known indigenous facilities capable of production of amounts of
uranium compounds useful to a reconstituted nuclear programme
have been destroyed along with their principal equipment.
All known procured uranium compounds are in the custody of the
IAEA.
All known practically recoverable amounts of indigenously produced
uranium compounds are in the custody of the IAEA.
industrial-scale facilities for the production of pure
uranium compounds suitable for fuel fabrication or isotopic
enrichment. In this regard:
All known facilities for the industrial-scale production of pure
uranium compounds suitable for fuel fabrication or isotopic
enrichment have been destroyed, along with their principal
equipment.
research and development of the full range of enrichment
technologies culminating in the industrial-scale exploitation
of EMIS and substantial progress towards similar exploitation
of gas centrifuge enrichment technology. In this regard:
All known single-use equipment used in the research and development
of enrichment technologies has been destroyed, removed or
rendered harmless.
All known dual-use equipment used in the research and development
of enrichment technologies is subjected to ongoing monitoring
and verification.
All known facilities and equipment for the enrichment of uranium
through EMIS technologies have been destroyed along with their
principal equipment.
design and feasibility studies for an indigenous plutonium
production reactor. In this regard:
IAEA inspections have revealed no indications that Iraq's plans for
an indigenous plutonium production reactor proceeded beyond a
feasibility study.
research and development of irradiated fuel reprocessing
technology. In this regard:
The facility used for research and development of irradiated fuel
reprocessing technology was destroyed in the bombardment of
Tuwaitha and the process-dedicated equipment has been destroyed
or rendered harmless.
research and development of weaponisation capabilities for
implosion-based nuclear weapons. In this regard:
The principal buildings of the Al Atheer nuclear weapons
development and production plant have been destroyed and all
known purpose-specific equipment has been destroyed, removed or
rendered harmless.
a ``crash programme'' aimed at diverting safeguarded
research reactor fuel and recovering the HEU for use in a
nuclear weapon. In this regard:
The entire inventory of research reactor fuel was verified and
accounted for by the IAEA and maintained under IAEA custody
until it was removed from Iraq.
summary
77. Although certain documentary evidence is missing and some gaps
in knowledge remain, the following can be stated with regard to Iraq's
clandestine programme:
There are no indications to suggest that Iraq was successful
in its attempt to produce nuclear weapons. Iraq's explanation
of its progress towards the finalisation of a workable design
for its nuclear weapons is considered to be consistent with the
resources and time scale indicated by the available programme
documentation. Hcwever, no documentation or other evidence is
available to show the actual status of the weapon design when
the programme was interrupted.
Iraq was at, or close to, the threshold of success in such
areas as the production of HEU through the EMIS process, the
production and pilot cascading of single-cylinder subcritical
gas centrifuge machines, and the fabrication of the explosive
package for a nuclear weapon.
There are no indications to suggest that Iraq had produced
more that a few grams of weapons-usable nuclear material (HEU
or separated plutonium) through its indigenous processes, all
of which has been removed from Iraq.
There are no indications that Iraq otherwise acquired
weapons-usable nuclear material.
All of the safeguarded research reactor fuel, including the
HEU fuel that Iraq had planned to divert to its ``crash
programmes,'' was verified and fully accounted for by the IAEA
and removed from Iraq.
There are no indications that there remains in Iraq any
physical capability for the production of amounts of weapons-
usable nuclear material of any practical significance.
78. Iraq's description of its development of the single-cylinder
sub-critical gas centrifuge appears to be consistent with the resources
and time scale indicated by the available documentation and the status
of the related facilities. Although little documentation is available,
it is clear that Iraq had intentions to exploit the information in its
possession regarding multi-cylinder super-critical centrifuge machines.
It will be necessary to gain access to Iraq's foreign source of
information in order to have the opportunity to verify Iraq's
explanation that only limited exploratory design work had been
undertaken.
79. There are no indications of significant discrepancies between
the technically coherent picture which has evolved of Iraq's past
programme and the information contained in Iraq's FFCD-F issued on 7
September 1996 as supplemented by the written revisions and additions
provided by Iraq since that time. However, taking into account the
possibility, albeit remote, of undetected duplicate facilities or the
existence of anomalous activities or facilities outside this
technically coherent picture, no absolute assurances can be given with
regard to the completeness of Iraq's FFCD. Some uncertainty is
inevitable in any country-wide technical verification process which
aims to prove the absence of readily concealable objects or activities.
The extent to which such uncertainty is acceptable is a policy
judgement.
80. Most of the IAEA activities involving the destruction, removal
and rendering harmless of the components of Iraq's nuclear weapons
programme which to date have been revealed and destroyed, were
completed by the end of 1992 (See Attachment 3). Since that time, only
a relatively small number of items of proscribed equipment and
materials have been identified and disposed of, most of which were
handed over to the IAEA by Iraq since the events of August 1995. While
no indications of the presence of further proscribed equipment or
materials in Iraq have been found, the IAEA, despite its extensive
inspection activities, cannot, for the reasons described in the
previous paragraph, provide absolute assurance of the absence of
readily concealable items, such as components of centrifuge machines or
copies of weapons-related documentation.
81. The IAEA's ongoing monitoring and verification (OMV) plan was
phased-in during the period from November 1992 to August 1994, at which
time it was considered to be operational. Taking into account the
extensive technological expertise developed by Iraq in the course of
its clandestine nuclear programme the OMV plan is predicated on the
assumption that Iraq retains the capability to exploit, for nuclear
weapons purposes, any [relevant] materials or technology to which it
may gain access in the future.
82. Implementation of the OMV plan has not resulted in the
detection of any indications of ongoing proscribed activities or the
presence in Iraq of proscribed equipment or materials, apart from the
items referred to in paragraph 80 above. It should be recognised,
however, that OMV measures cannot guarantee detection of readily
concealable or disguisable proscribed activities, such as computer-
based weaponisation studies or small-scale centrifuge cascade
development. Iraq's direct acquisition of weapons-usable nuclear
material would also present a severe technical challenge to the OMV
measures and great reliance must be placed on international controls.
83. As indicated in the foregoing, the IAEA's activities regarding
the investigation of Iraq's clandestine nuclear programme have reached
a point of diminishing returns and the IAEA is focusing most of its
resources on the implementation and technical strengthening of its plan
for the ongoing monitoring and verification of Iraq's compliance with
its obligations under the relevant Security Council resolutions. The
IAEA is not ``closing the books'' on its investigation of Iraq's
clandestine nuclear programme and will continue to exercise its right
to investigate any aspect of Iraq's clandestine nuclear programme, in
particular, through the follow-up of any new information developed by
the IAEA or provided by Member States and assessed by the IAEA to
warrant further investigation, and to destroy, remove or render
harmless any proscribed items discovered through such investigations.
______
Abstracts From the Fifth Consolidated Six-Monthly Progress Report of
the Director General of the IAEA--S/1998/312 Dated 9 April 1998
19. The December 1997 discussions resulted in: the provision by
Iraq of information regarding its post-war procurement procedures;
Iraq's assistance in the identification of the foreign principals
involved in the offer of assistance to Iraq's clandestine nuclear
programme under assessment by the IAEA; Iraq's statement that it had no
objection to the IAEA's use of fixed-wing aircraft for technical
monitoring purposes; Iraq's undertaking to attempt to locate the
reports of its Nuclear Team referred to in paragraph 18 above; Iraq's
agreement to produce a summary of the technical achievements of its
clandestine nuclear programme; and Iraq's agreement to issue a
consolidated version of its FFCD.
20. At the same time, the Iraqi counterpart reaffirmed: that
following the Gulf War, the late Lt. General Hussein Kamel had taken
actions related to Iraq's clandestine nuclear programme that were
independent, unauthorised and without the knowledge of the Government
of Iraq; that Iraq had not followed up any offers of assistance to its
clandestine nuclear programme other than the declared foreign
assistance to its centrifuge programme; and that the so-called ``high
Governmental Committee'', initially described by the Iraqi counterpart
to have been established in June 1991 and headed by Deputy Prime
Minister Tariq Aziz, had not, in fact, been an established entity. As
previously reported the IAEA has no independently verifiable
information through which to confirm or confute the above statements.
27. The Leader of the IAEA Iraq Action Team met with Deputy Prime
Minister Tariq Aziz and took the opportunity to explain that the IAEA's
interest in the so-called ``high Governmental Committee'' and the
actions attributed to the late Lt. General Hussein Kamel, centred on
the IAEA's attempt to locate documentary evidence supporting Iraq's
declaration that it had abandoned its clandestine nuclear programme. It
was further explained that the IAEA had hoped to locate an Iraqi
Government decree formally abandoning the programme but had been
advised that no such decree existed. The matter was followed up in a
written request to Mr. Tariq Aziz to determine whether any official
Iraqi document existed to record a Government-level decision to abandon
the clandestine nuclear programme.
28. The opportunity was also taken to explain that a shift of focus
to ongoing monitoring and verification activities would not result in a
non-intrusive inspection regime. It was made clear that the technical
activities employed by the IAEA in its inspections of Iraq's
clandestine nuclear programme were essentially the same as those
employed in the IAEA's OMV activities. . . .
36. As previously reported, the IAEA is focusing most of its
resources on the implementation and strengthening of the technical
content of its activities under the OMV Plan. The IAEA will, however,
continue to exercise its right to investigate any aspect of Iraq's
clandestine nuclear programme, in particular, through the follow up of
any new information developed by the IAEA or provided by Member States
and to destroy, remove or render harmless any prohibited items
discovered through such investigations.
______
Nuclear Control Institute,
1000 Connecticut Ave., NW, Suite 804,
Washington, DC, July 1, 1998.
Mohamed ElBaradei,
Director General,
International Atomic Energy Agency,
Vienna, Austria.
Dear Director General ElBaradei:
Thank you for your prompt reply to our letter of June 24. We
appreciate your personal commitment to addressing outstanding issues
regarding Iraq's nuclear weapons program.
We certainly agree with the Agency's statement in the October 1997
consolidated report that ``[s]ome uncertainty is inevitable in any
country-wide technical verification process which aims to prove the
absence of readily concealable objects or activities.'' We welcome your
emphasis of this point in your Washington Post article, and expect,
therefore, that the Agency will resume highlighting such uncertainties
(especially the significance if Iraq were to acquire weapons-usable
nuclear material) in its reports and public statements on Iraq, in
order to avoid the misleading impression of a ``clean bill of health.''
You emphasized in your letter that ``the IAEA does not take any
member state `at its word.' '' It is unfortunate, therefore, that there
are several instances in the Agency's inspection reports where Iraq's
claims on important issues--such as missing reports and components--are
left unchallenged ``in the absence of contrary evidence.'' We submit
that the Agency should persist in challenging and investigating all
such claims, even when it lacks immediate leads.
Of course, we are aware that the Agency retains inspection rights
under the terms of the ongoing monitoring and verification (OMV) plan.
Our concern is that, if the Agency certifies the requirements of
Resolution 687 have been met, such inspections will be difficult if not
impossible to implement. It is prudent to assume that Saddam Hussein's
only interest in permitting nuclear and other U.N. inspections is the
prospect that economic sanctions will be lifted. If and when sanctions
are removed, Iraqi cooperation is likely to evaporate, leaving
remaining questions about the nuclear-weapons program unresolved and
making it easier for Iraq to reconstitute this program.
The five unanswered questions about Iraq's nuclear-weapon program
enumerated in our letter are significant and have direct relevence to
Iraq's near-term ability to make nuclear weapons. Therefore, all should
be answered or highlighted as being unanswered in Mr. Dillon's
forthcoming report. Assuming Iraq possesses a workable design and
components, it would need only a few kilograms of plutonium or highly
enriched uranium to ``go nuclear.''
We do not agree with the Agency's view that the acceptability of
uncertainty on these issues is a ``policy judgement.'' Given the
gravity of the danger if Iraq were to possess nuclear weapons, we urge
that Mr. Dillon be directed to identify all outstanding issues and
elaborate on their significance to this danger in the Agency's next
status report to the Security Council in July.
Thank you for your continuing attention to these urgent matters. We
hope we might have the opportunity to meet with you and Mr. Dillon to
discuss these concerns when you next visit the United States.
Sincerely,
Paul Leventhal, President.
Steven Dolley, Research Director.
______
[Attachment 4]
Nuclear Control Institute,
1000 Connecticut Ave. NW, Suite 804,
Washington, DC, May 3, 1999.
For Immediate Release
Contact: Steven Dolley
State Department Discloses It Is Pursuing Reports of Iraqi Nuclear-Bomb
Components
In an exchange of correspondence released today by the Nuclear
Control Institute (NCI), the U.S. State Department disclosed that it
was ``engaged'' with United Nations inspection agencies in
investigating intelligence reports that Iraq possesses complete sets of
nuclear-bomb components, minus the fissile material. In its response,
NCI criticized the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) for
minimizing Iraq's weaponization progress based upon highly questionable
Iraqi documents that may well be forgeries.
In a letter to NCI, John Barker, deputy assistant secretary for
nonproliferation controls at the State Department, stated that ``the
IAEA has highlighted the lack of information about weaponization as one
of the areas where it has continuing uncertainties and where there is a
lack of complete and verifiable information.'' The U.S. Government,
Barker emphasized, maintains its ``firm position that there can be no
consideration of lifting UN sanctions on Iraq until Iraq fully complies
with its obligations.'' Barker also characterized intelligence reports
that Iraq possesses three complete sets of nuclear-bomb components,
lacking only fissile material, as ``unconfirmed'' but ``serious
allegations, and we have engaged UNSCOM and the IAEA to follow up on
them.''
In NCI's reply, Paul Leventhal and Steven Dolley, NCI's president
and research director, praised State's commitment to investigate
weaponization, but criticized the IAEA's failure to follow up. ``We
cannot agree with your suggestion that the IAEA currently shares the
U.S. Government's concern about unresolved weaponization issues,'' they
wrote. ``Since early 1998, the Agency has been largely silent on this
matter. On those rare occasions when the weaponization issue is raised
in IAEA reports, it is mentioned only briefly, and only in the context
of downplaying their significance.''
Of particular concern to NCI is the IAEA's failure to refute
intelligence reports about Iraq's efforts to conceal complete sets of
bomb components, first made public last September by former UNSCOM
chief inspector Scott Ritter. IAEA Director-General ElBaradei reported
to the Security Council on October 13, 1998 that ``all available,
credible information . . . provides no indication that Iraq has
assembled nuclear weapons with or without fissile cores.'' That same
report offered a sweeping assurance that ``Iraq's known nuclear weapons
related assets have been destroyed, removed or rendered harmless.''
In their letter, Leventhal and Dolley pointed out that IAEA
attempts to dismiss this intelligence rely on dubious evidence. They
recounted a meeting this winter at which an IAEA official responsible
for inspections in Iraq ``asserted that new documents provided by the
Iraqis demonstrated that their progress on the development of explosive
lenses had not been as significant as earlier evidence had suggested.
However, when questioned, the official admitted that forensic tests to
determine the authenticity of these new documents had proven
`uncertain.' Thus, the new Iraqi documents may well be forgeries, and
the question of the existence of complete sets of weapons components is
far from resolved. Nonetheless, the IAEA is ready to move on to a
monitoring posture.''
Leventhal and Dolley proposed that the Security Council direct the
IAEA to account for the destruction of ``all nuclear-bomb components,
designs and models'' before revising sanctions or moving to an ongoing
monitoring and verification (OMV) posture. They warned in their letter
that although the Department's objective for future monitoring
activities is ``to `retain all the authorities, privileges, and
immunities of current disarmament inspections,' the Iraqis will regard
a shift to OMV differently, and the result will be a weakening, if not
evisceration, of the inspection regime.''
The text of the two letters and other information on Iraq's nuclear
weapons program are available on NCI's website, ``Saddam and the
Bomb,'' at http://www.nci.org/sadb.htm
Nuclear Control Institute,
1000 Connecticut Ave., NW, Suite 804,
Washington, DC, November 19, 1998.
William Jefferson Clinton,
President,
The White House,
1600 Pennsylvania Ave., NW,
Washington, DC.
Dear Mr. President:
We are writing with regard to serious, outstanding questions about
Iraq's nuclear weapons program. In your November 15 statement,
announcing the settlement that secured the return of the U.N. Special
Commission (UNSCOM) and International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA)
inspectors, you declared that ``Iraq must resolve all outstanding
issues raised by UNSCOM and the IAEA,'' including giving inspectors
``unfettered access'' to all sites and ``turn[ing] over all relevant
documents.''
We are concerned that the IAEA has failed to get Iraq to resolve
all outstanding issues and yet helps to make the case in the U.N.
Security Council for ``closing the nuclear file'' by declaring that
``Iraq's known nuclear weapons assets have been destroyed, removed or
rendered harmless,'' as IAEA Director General Mohammed ElBaradei
reported to the Security Council on October 13.
The IAEA apparently believes that the burden of proof is on the
inspectors, not on Iraq, and demonstrates an almost naive confidence in
an absence of evidence to contradict unsubstantiated Iraqi claims.
ElBaradei acknowledged ``a few outstanding questions and concerns'' but
insisted that these provided no impediment to switching from
investigative inspections to less intrusive monitoring because ``the
Agency has no evidence that Iraq is actually withholding information in
these areas.''
The unfortunate result of the IAEA's accommodation of Iraq, in
sharp contrast to UNSCOM's confrontational approach, is the widespread
perception that Iraq's chemical, biological and missile capabilities
constitute the only remaining threat. This is a dangerous
misperception, especially in light of the recent revelation by U.S.
Marine Major (Ret.) Scott Ritter, former head of UNSCOM's Concealment
Investigation Unit, that UNSCOM had credible information indicating
that ``Iraq had the components to assemble three implosion-type
(nuclear) devices, minus the fissile material.'' If Iraq were to
procure a small amount of plutonium or highly enriched uranium, Ritter
told a Congressional hearing, Iraq could have operable nuclear weapons
in a matter of ``days or weeks.'' U.S. government intelligence
officials have been quoted as regarding Ritter's information as
``plausible but uncorroborated.''
Significant issues regarding Saddam's nuclear-weapons program
remain unresolved. A number of these issues were raised by the IAEA in
its October 1997 consolidated inspection report, but were never
resolved in subsequent IAEA reports. A summary of these issues,
prepared by the Nuclear Control Institute, is attached. In June, we
raised our concerns in a letter IAEA Director-General ElBaradei. In his
reply, he assured us in general terms of the IAEA's vigilance, but he
explicitly refused to address the specific questions we raised. A copy
of our correspondence with ElBaradei is also attached.
It is now clear that Iraq undertook a ``crash program'' to develop
a large, crude bomb and had begun preparations to remove bomb-grade
uranium from IAEA-safeguarded, civilian fuel rods for use in weapons
when the allied bombing campaign of the Gulf War halted the project.
After the Gulf War, Iraq continued work on a smaller, more advanced
weapon that could be delivered by Scud missiles and on developing
components for it.
Although there is evidence that Iraq manufactured and tested a
number of components, including the high-explosive ``lenses'' needed to
compress the uranium core to trigger a nuclear explosion, none of these
components or evidence of their destruction have been surrendered to
IAEA inspectors. Nor has Iraq provided the IAEA with its bomb design or
a scale model, despite repeated requests. Iraq also has refused IAEA
requests for full details of its foreign nuclear-procurement activities
and for an official government order terminating work on its nuclear
weapons program. Meanwhile, Saddam's nuclear team of more than 200
Ph.Ds remains on hand. The IAEA acknowledges they are not closely
monitored and increasingly difficult to track as the scientists are
supposedly being transferred back to the ``private sector.''
Under these circumstances, the IAEA should be directed by the U.N.
Security Council to provide a complete inventory of all nuclear-bomb
components, designs and models for which there is documentation or
intelligence but which the agency cannot account for. The United
States, as the current President of the Security Council, should insist
that all elements listed in this inventory be produced by Iraq or
otherwise accounted for prior to any consideration of ``closing the
nuclear file.'' This has been UNSCOM's approach with regard missiles
and chemical and biological weapons, and it should be the IAEA's
approach to nuclear weapons, as well. The burden of proof should be on
Iraq, not on the inspectors.
We also urge a complete assessment by the U.S. intelligence
community of information obtained by Major Ritter on Iraqi concealment
of nuclear-weapons components. He has said this intelligence was
provided by a ``northern European'' government from three Iraqi
defectors, one of whom was privy to high-level discussions of
concealment activities by Saddam's hitherto unknown Special Security
Organization, an elite unit assigned to protect him and his weapons of
mass destruction. Ritter considered the information solid because it
corresponded with details of how this unit was trucking missile and
other weapon components from one depot to another, which he had
obtained from independent sources. Through the use of U-2 imaging,
Ritter was able to pinpoint the locations of five of seven buildings
from rough outlines of the structures provided by one of the defectors.
Rolf Ekeus, former head of UNSCOM, suggested in June 1997 that
UNSCOM suspected that Iraq was hiding nuclear components.
. . . Iraq produced components, so to say, elements for the
nuclear warhead. Where are the remnants of that? They can't
evaporate. And there, Iraq's explanation is that (they) melted
away. And we are still very skeptical about that. We feel that
Iraq is still trying to protect them. . . . We know that they
have existed. But we doubt they have been destroyed. But we are
searching. [Remarks at the Carnegie Endowment for International
Peace, June 10, 1997]
These questions are not merely of historical interest, but directly
affect Iraq's current ability to produce nuclear weapons. The prudent
assumption for the IAEA should be that Iraq's nuclear weaponization
program continues, and that Iraq may now lack only the fissile
material. Even the possibility that Iraq has already procured this
material cannot be ruled out because of the serious nuclear-security
lapses in the former Soviet Union and the abundance of such material in
inadequately safeguarded civilian nuclear programs worldwide.
We believe that the threat of an Iraqi nuclear breakout remains
real. We strongly urge you to commit the United States to oppose the
closing of the Iraqi nuclear file and the lifting of economic sanctions
until all outstanding questions on Iraq's nuclear-weapons program are
resolved. We appreciate your attention to this important matter.
Sincerely,
Paul Leventhal, President.
Steven Dolley, Research Director.
[Attachments.]
U.S. Department of State,
Washington, DC, April 6, 1999.
Paul Leventhal, President,
Steven Dolley, Research Director,
Nuclear Control Institute,
1000 Connecticut Ave., NW, Suite 804,
Washington, DC.
Dear Mr. Leventhal and Mr. Dolley:
Thank you for your November 19, 1998 letter to the President
expressing your concerns regarding Iraq's nuclear weapons program.
Ensuring Iraqi compliance with all UN Security Council Resolutions is a
top priority for the United States. Currently, Iraq's illegal refusal
to comply with its clear obligations under UNSCRs are preventing UNSCOM
and IAEA inspectors from inspecting WMD-related sites in Iraq, or from
carrying out other parts of their mandate. We and our international
partners are determined to see those inspections resumed, effectively
and unconditionally. On January 30, 1999 the Security Council agreed to
set up panels to assess three critical aspects of the Iraq situation:
disarmament; humanitarian concerns; and issues relating to Kuwait. We
support this undertaking, while maintaining our firm position that
there can be no consideration of lifting UN sanctions on Iraq until
Iraq fully complies with its obligations.
On nuclear issues, we agree with IAEA Director General ElBaradei's
observation in his February 8, 1999 report to the UNSC President that
there are ``no indications that Iraq had retained the physical
capability (facilities and hardware) to be able to produce weapon-
usable nuclear material in amounts of any practical significance . . .
[but that] `no indication' of prohibited items or activities was not
the same as their `non existence.' '' We and the IAEA also agree that
there are still unanswered questions in several areas of Iraq's nuclear
weapons program, including: lack of information about external
assistance, lack of technical documentation, and Iraq's stated
inability to provide documentation showing the timing and modalities of
the abandonment of its nuclear weapons program. The IAEA has
highlighted the lack of information about weaponization as one of
several areas where it has continuing uncertainties and where there is
a lack of complete and verifiable information.
UNSC Resolution 715 requires the establishment of an Ongoing
Monitoring and Verification regime (OMV) to ensure that Iraq cannot
ever reconstitute its WMD capability. There is no such thing as
``closing the nuclear file.'' That's an Iraqi term, introduced into the
diplomatic dialogue in an effort to obscure the obvious fact that any
future OMV regime put in place after the conclusion of the
``disarmament phase'' of inspections would still need to retain all the
authorities, privileges, and immunities of current disarmament
inspections. Iraq is also required to pass legislation outlawing
activities prohibited by UNSCR 687, such as building or procuring WMD.
Iraq has acknowledged its responsibility in this regard under the
IAEA's OMV plan, but has not yet taken the steps necessary to enact
these laws.
Regarding allegations about Iraq's nuclear program by Mr. Ritter,
we have evaluated his claims but we cannot corroborate allegations that
Iraq possesses the components for three nuclear weapons minus the
fissile material. These are serious allegations and we have engaged
UNSCOM and the IAEA to follow up on them.
U.S. policy on Iraq is to ensure Iraqi compliance with all relevant
UN Security Council resolutions, including the elimination of Iraq's
weapons of mass destruction, to contain Iraq and prevent it from
threatening its neighbors, and to work for the day when a new Iraqi
government rejoins the family of nations as a responsible and law-
abiding member.
Sincerely,
John Barker,
Deputy Assistant Secretary for
Nonproliferation Controls.
Nuclear Control Institute,
1000 Connecticut Ave., NW, Suite 804,
Washington, DC, April 30, 1999.
John Barker,
Deputy Assistant Secretary for Nonproliferation Controls,
U.S. Department of State,
Washington, DC.
Dear Mr. Barker:
Thank you for your letter of April 6, in response to our November
19, 1998 letter to the President regarding Iraq's nuclear weapons
program.
We were gratified to hear that the United States will insist upon
maintaining sanctions ``until Iraq fully complies with its
obligations.'' We believe that such compliance must include complete
resolution of outstanding questions regarding the nuclear program.
However, proposals now being discussed in the Security Council move
prematurely to an ongoing monitoring and verification (OMV) posture,
and to removal of most sanctions. U.S. leadership is needed to hold the
line on inspections as well as sanctions if Iraq is to be prevented
from reconstituting its WMD programs. Even if the stated objective of
OMV is ``to retain all the authorities, privileges and immunities of
current disarmament inspections,'' the Iraqis will regard a shift to
OMV differently, and the result will be a weakening, if not
evisceration, of the inspection regime.
We were also interested to learn that the State Department has
``engaged UNSCOM and the IAEA to follow up on'' Scott Ritter's
intelligence information regarding the existence of complete sets of
nuclear-bomb components in Iraq. The controversy surrounding Major
Ritter's resignation has overshadowed his valuable contributions to the
disarmament of Iraq, and the continued importance of unmasking the
concealment mechanisms used by Iraq to retain its WMD and related
technologies. We ask that you keep us informed of the progress of your
follow-up with UNSCOM and the IAEA.
Your letter stated that ``the IAEA has highlighted the lack of
information about weaponization as one of several areas where it has
continuing uncertainties and where there is a lack of complete and
verifiable information.'' We agree that vital information on Iraq's
progress in weaponization is sorely lacking. An NCI study released last
year (a copy of which is enclosed) highlights several unanswered
questions about Iraq's nuclear bomb program, most of which remain
unresolved today.
Of particular concern, Iraq failed to provide credible evidence to
the IAEA of the destruction of nuclear-weapons components Iraq had
previously manufactured, including the high-explosive ``lenses'' needed
to compress a uranium or plutonium core to trigger a nuclear explosion.
Nor has Iraq provided IAEA inspectors with its bomb design or a scale
model, despite repeated requests. The IAEA itself raised these issues
in its October 1997 consolidated report on inspections in Iraq. [S/
1997/779, 8 October 1997]
We cannot agree with your suggestion that the IAEA currently shares
the U.S. Government's concern about unresolved weaponization issues.
Since early 1998, the Agency has been largely silent on this matter. On
those rare occasions when the weaponization issue is raised in IAEA
reports, it is mentioned only briefly, and only in the context of
downplaying their significance.
For example, the IAEA's October 1998 report--its most recent
published discussion of the weaponization issue--acknowledged in
passing ``Iraq's stated inability to provide relevant engineering
design drawings of the nuclear weapon and its principal components, or
details of models,'' but then dismissed these concerns in a sweeping
conclusion that ``the uncertainties resulting from the above questions
and concerns would not, of themselves, prevent the full implementation
of the IAEA OMV plan.'' [S/1998/927, 7 October 1998] Further, these
outstanding issues contradict the blanket assurances issued by IAEA
Director-General ElBaradei on October 13, 1998, that ``Iraq's known
nuclear weapons related assets have been destroyed, removed or rendered
harmless.''
The IAEA's apparent lack of concern has also been reflected in
discussions NCI has had with an Agency official responsible for
inspections in Iraq. In January 1999, we informed him that NCI had
compiled a two-page list of unresolved nuclear issues. His reply: ``If
you use a bigger typeface, you'll have three pages.'' He expressed no
interest in following up on these issues.
In another meeting early this year, the same official asserted that
new documents provided by the Iraqis demonstrated that their progress
on the development of explosive lenses had not been as significant as
earlier evidence had suggested. However, when questioned, the official
admitted that forensic tests to determine the authenticity of these new
documents had proven ``inconclusive.'' Thus, the new Iraqi documents
may well be forgeries, and the question of the existence of complete
sets of weapons components is far from resolved. Nonetheless, the IAEA
is ready to move on to a monitoring posture.
In an interview aired April 27 on PBS' documentary program
``Frontline,'' Dr. Khidir Hamza, head of the Iraqi weaponization
program until his defection in 1994, stated that, if Iraq were to
acquire plutonium or highly enriched uranium, it could have nuclear
bombs in two to six months. This illustrates, contrary to the IAEA's
perspective, that the question of weaponization is much more than a
point of historical curiosity.
Resolution of weaponization issues should be a top priority of U.S.
Government policy regarding inspections in Iraq. NCI recommends that,
prior to any revision of the inspection or sanctions regimes, the
Security Council direct the IAEA to provide a definitive report,
including a complete inventory of all nuclear-bomb components, designs
and models for which there is documentation or intelligence but which
the agency cannot account for. The Security Council should insist that
all items listed in this inventory be turned over by Iraq, or their
destruction be documented, prior to any consideration of switching to
OMV. All documents should be shown by forensic examination to be
authentic. This has been the U.N. Special Commission (UNSCOM) approach
with regard to missiles and chemical and biological weapons.
We thank you for your attention to this important matter, and would
welcome the opportunity to discuss these issues with you further.
Sincerely,
Paul Leventhal, President.
Steven Dolley, Research Director.
Senator Brownback. Thank you and thank you for the specific
recommendations. I do think it is a good point about the
recommendation to Dr. Blix now to--we are watching and we need
to have a robust, aggressive inspection regime system in place.
Mr. Charles Duelfer, the former deputy executive chairman
of UNSCOM, we are very pleased to be able to have you here in
the committee.
STATEMENT OF CHARLES DUELFER, FORMER DEPUTY EXECUTIVE CHAIRMAN,
UNSCOM, NEW YORK, NY
Mr. Duelfer. Well, thank you very much, Mr. Chairman,
Senator, for the invitation to appear. I have had several years
of experience working with UNSCOM both in Iraq at the low
levels, high levels, mid levels, as well as in the Council and
in various capitals. The highlight of the experience I think
has been working with some of the experts who have been my
colleagues from around the world, and they are first-rate. I
just wanted to mention that.
At the end of the day, however, UNSCOM was really only
partially successful. We pressed as hard as we could to achieve
what was a very categorical mandate, which is full disarmament
and a monitoring system which will be able to provide
assurances to the world community that Iraq is not
reconstituting the systems.
As you can imagine, over the years I have formed a few
opinions about the work and the circumstances under which we
have had to operate. Some of them are presentable, some of them
are not. But let me make a few points.
The first is that this is not arms control we are talking
about. In some sloppy conversations, people will compare what
UNSCOM has been doing with arms control. It is not. It is
forced, coercive disarmament. In arms control, generally you
have a multiple of parties who are engaged in a process which
they have agreed to, which they have agreed is in their own
national interests. This is a circumstance that UNSCOM is in
where a war was fought and the obligation was levied upon Iraq
to get rid of these weapons. But Iraq, as we have learned,
steadfastly does not agree that that is in its national
interest.
My second point is just that, that what we have learned is
just how important these capabilities are seen by the regime in
Iraq. The experience has been that they saved them, in a sense,
in the war with Iran, a combination of long-range missiles and
chemical weapons. They used, by our accounting, over 100,000
chemical munitions in the war with Iran. And Iraq argues, not
without merit, that in the second Gulf war, the fact that they
had these weapons affected the outcome. From the Iraqi
perspective, they observed that Baghdad was not occupied and
they could attribute some of that by their own internal logic
to the possession of these weapons. So, the message, which is
not a happy one for nonproliferation advocates, is that there
is utility to these weapons. So, you have to create some kind
of disincentive, an enormous disincentive, to cause somebody to
get rid of them.
The third point I want to make is that UNSCOM, or any
organization which is charged with this responsibility, does
not have any of its own authority, power in Iraq. All of its
authority and power is derivative of the Security Council.
Unless the Security Council is united, forceful, and strong,
whatever organization and whoever leads it is not going to be
able to do much in Iraq. And let me tell you it is pretty
lonely out there when you look back over your shoulder and
everybody is looking in the opposite direction.
The fourth point is that since 1990 the consensus that
existed in the Council on the disarmament issue with respect to
Iraq has tended to decay. It has not been a straight path, but
it has tended to decay. This I think is factual degradation.
Other issues have come up. There is concern about sanctions.
There is concern about oil prices. There are internal domestic
politics among a number of nations. What you have is a
situation where there is a collective against a single, very
dedicated, unitary actor. And the dynamics are such that it
kind of favors a single, very dedicated, unitary actor. Iraq's
statements, Iraq's positions have been absolutely consistent
from 1991 onward. The Council, I dare say, has not been quite
as consistent.
So, I would just like to emphasize that whatever the new
organization, new chairman can do is going to be vitally
dependent upon the Security Council. He can do no more than the
Security Council will forcefully back up and Iraq will permit.
That was true for UNSCOM and it will be true for UNMOVIC and
Dr. Blix. So far, to this point in time, the Security Council
has not been able to find the right mix of carrots and sticks
to enforce this element of its resolutions.
Finally, I want to make a comment about the long-term
prospects for credible monitoring. Some comment has been made
about the down side of having a partially effective or an
ineffective monitoring system, and I agree with that. We have
done some studying internally during the time that we were out
of Iraq on what would be required, and what is required to
credibly monitor, according to a performance criteria which
says that the new chairman or any chairman should be in a
position that, if Iraq cooperates with the system, he can make
a judgment without Iraqi compliance. In other words, if he
spends 6 months collecting data and Iraq fully cooperates, then
he can make a judgment that Iraq is in major aspects complying,
which is very different from having a system which simply says,
well, during the last 6 months or the last period, we detected
no evidence of violation.
But if you are to do the former, which we had thought was
what was required, it requires a very extensive system, more
extensive than what UNSCOM was able to deploy, with immediate
access in all instances. That is going to be very tough to
measure up to, and the prospects of either Iraq agreeing to
that and the Security Council enforcing that I dare say in my
opinion are dubious.
So, I think focusing the issue strictly on the new
organization and strictly on the new chairman is to let the
Security Council off the hook in a sense. Dr. Blix and the
organization will do what they want. If Dr. Blix is receiving
from all members of the Council guidance and suggestions, look,
when you get into Iraq, you have got to be tough, you have got
to go to all these national security organizations, you have
got to inspect them, you have got to make sure that any of
these logical places where Iraq would retain these weapons are
clear, then I think you have got one set of circumstances. But
I am not sure he is getting that message.
Thank you very much.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Duelfer follows:]
Prepared Statement of Charles Duelfer
I am grateful for the opportunity to appear before this Committee
and discuss the disarmament issues surrounding Iraq.
I served as Deputy Executive Chairman of the UN Special Commission
on Iraq from 1993 until I resigned effective 1 March 2000. During the
period from July 1999 to the arrival of Dr. Hans Blix as the new
Chairman of the successor body to UNSCOM, I was the acting Chairman. I
had the pleasure of working with both former Chairmen Rolf Ekeus and
Richard Butler as well as some extraordinarily talented experts from
around the world. We attempted, in Iraq, to achieve the disarmament and
monitoring objectives established for UNSCOM by the Security Council.
It was a fascinating experience--sometimes rewarding, often
frustrating, and ultimately, incomplete. As you might imagine, I have
formed some opinions about this endeavor, which, now that UNSCOM is a
discrete historical experience may be appropriate to share.
UNSCOM was formed in 1991 as part of the cease-fire resolution
ending the Gulf War. The Security Council linked lifting of the oil
embargo then in place on Iraq to strict disarmament and monitoring
obligations. I wish to emphasize that this is not an arms control
arrangement entered into by states party to an agreement they judge in
their national interest. Iraq was forced into this position. The
disarmament was to be coercive with UNSCOM and the IAEA to verify
Iraq's full compliance. What has become apparent over the years is that
Iraq considers some weapons of mass destruction (WMD) capability to be
vital to its national security. While UNSCOM and the IAEA had some
important success in reducing Iraq's WMD capabilities--despite Iraq's
obstructions and concealment efforts, ultimately, the carrots and
sticks which the Security Council applied were not commensurate with
the task of causing full compliance by Iraq.
Over time, a number of factors contributed to a diminished focus on
the disarmament and monitoring aspects of the relationship with Iraq.
The key problem is that the strong consensus amongst Security Council
members to impose the embargo and sanctions in 1990 when Iraq invaded
Kuwait has progressively diminished. There are many reasons for this
including:
At the time of the imposition of the embargo and sanctions,
expectations were that the regime would not long endure. It did
and so did sanctions with a progressively greater impact on the
civilian population.
As progress was made in disarmament, some members of the
Council measured the increasing impact of sanctions against the
uncertainty of what WMD remained.
The national objectives and priorities of individual Council
members have naturally tended to diverge over time.
Concerns about a double standard were expressed,
particularly after nuclear tests in India and Pakistan.
Internal Council politics and bilateral relations.
Other factors contributed as well to this trend, but the key point
is that a single dedicated unitary actor, Iraq, has a certain advantage
in facing a coalition which will naturally have shifting priorities and
objectives amongst its members.
UNSCOM found itself between Iraq and the Security Council with a
strict and categorical mandate. It was tasked to verify that all the
proscribed weapons and capabilities were gone and conduct full
effective monitoring to assure no reconstitution of those capabilities.
Impatience on the part of the Council grew and manifested itself in
many ways--none helpful to UNSCOM. Political and military actions
resulted in the withdrawal of UNSCOM from Iraq in December 1998. A year
later, the Council, following an initiative of the United Kingdom,
voted to replace UNSCOM with a new body.
There has not been any UN inspection work going on in Iraq since
December 1998. A question that is often asked is, ``What do you think
Iraq has been doing in the interim?'' Before addressing this, it is
important to recall that before UNSCOM withdrew, it reported that it
was unable to perform its mandated tasks under the conditions which
Iraq permitted it to operate. The United States and United Kingdom
conducted military operations after UNSCOM reported that the level of
cooperation offered by Iraq was not sufficient to accomplish what the
Security Council required. In other words, when we had inspectors in
Iraq, we did not know fully what Iraq was up to.
During the period since UNSCOM withdrew, its experts continued to
study the data in its archives and continued to receive some limited
new information. Nothing would indicate that Iraq has undergone any
radical change of heart with respect to WMD capabilities. I can not say
definitively that Iraq has a residual missile force with chemical or
biological warheads. I can not say definitively that Iraq has retained
concealed production capability for Chemical and Biological agent. Nor
can I say definitively that there is ongoing research and development
in these areas.
I can say definitively that nothing has changed the assessments in
UNSCOM reports to the Security Council about the incomplete accounts
provided by Iraq in each of these areas. Moreover, the limited
information that UNSCOM continued to obtain, raised more not fewer,
questions about Iraq's compliance. Given Iraq's past performance, their
clearly stated objectives and extant capabilities, even a moderately
prudent defense planner would have to assume such WMD capabilities
exist in Iraq today.
The future for the new organization, the UN Monitoring,
Verification and Inspection Commission (UNMOVIC), is unclear. The
resolution creating UNMOVIC and its tasks was adopted with four
abstentions. Clearly some key members of the Council had reservations.
Dr. Hans Blix has courageously accepted the challenge of leading this
new organization. His task will not be easy as Iraq will perceive that
the Security Council's unity on this issue is tenuous at best and thus
may act with increased defiance. The path to this new resolution
detoured around some big issues and there was strong debate about the
relationship between disarmament, monitoring, sanctions, and control of
Iraqi oil receipts.
What is clear, however, is that UNMOVIC and Dr. Blix will not be
able to achieve any more than what the Security Council strongly and
unanimously supports and which Iraq permits. The degree to which all
(or, indeed, any) members of the Security Council encourage Dr. Blix to
conduct intrusive and rigorous inspection work is uncertain. If he did,
prospects for early confrontation with Iraq would be high and the
Council would rapidly have to deal with yet another wrenching debate.
There is another side of the equation. From Iraq's perspective,
what are the carrots and sticks intended to prod them into accepting
the full implementation of rigorous disarmament and monitoring work?
The greatest incentive for Iraq is the prospect of sanctions being
lifted and gaining control over their own oil revenues. While it could
be argued that the suspension of sanctions might be agreed in the
Council, Iraq's own control of its revenues remains an unlikely
prospect. On the disincentive side, Iraq certainly perceives that it is
highly unlikely that the Council would support military action. Nor is
it likely to believe that the United States would unilaterally conduct
a major military campaign on its own if Iraq simply continues its
status quo refusal to cooperate and comply.
Lastly, I wish to make a point on full compliance. UNSCOM attempted
extensive and intrusive disarmament and monitoring inspections. Yet, it
still could not verify the absence of prohibited WMD programs in Iraq.
During the period since UNSCOM's withdrawal from Iraq, study was given
to the requirements for a more effective monitoring system with a
specific performance criterion. This was a system sufficient to allow a
Chairman to make a credible judgment about Iraqi compliance with the
Council mandates--not simply report that no evidence of violations had
been detected. The later could be done with a minimal system and could
well allow Iraq to cooperate but not comply resulting in a dangerous
outcome of virtual disarmament and monitoring.
A few important points were evident from the UNSCOM work. One is
that a very extensive and intrusive system with strict requirements for
immediate access to all sites is essential. Second, Iraq must cooperate
fully, consistently, and immediately in all ways. Thirdly, if Iraq does
not cooperate fully, then the Security Council must interpret non-
cooperation as non-compliance and have the will to act accordingly. The
Security Council cannot divide over UNMOVIC's conclusions or second
guess its decisions on inspection targets.
Unfortunately, the experience of UNSCOM does not suggest that the
Security Council will sustain the strong unified will necessary to
allow its subsidiary disarmament organ to achieve the strict mandate.
Ultimately, it was much easier to change UNSCOM than Iraq. Perhaps it
simply is asking too much for an international body with evolving
priorities and interests to ensure the long term coercive disarmament
of a nation that clearly has contrary incentives. Historically, the
most proximate comparison to the UNSCOM experience, in my view, was the
disarmament mechanism of the Versailles treaty. The so-called Inter-
Alllied Control Commissions persisted for seven years, but ultimately
ceased work in Germany having only been partially and temporarily
successful.
Senator Brownback. Thank you. I think that is a very good
thought, that the Security Council is going to determine a lot
of what takes place.
Mr. Duelfer, given the meanderings of the Security Council
on weapons inspections or their lack of desire for
confrontation with Iraq, do you think we really have any chance
of an effective inspection regime under this new organization?
Mr. Duelfer. Frankly, no. The process leading up to this
new resolution was one where many members of the Council were
arguing over various elements of it, and I think Iraq got a
clear message, that there is not strong consensus in the
Council on this. Iraq is serious. They play for keeps. They can
detect weakness, and if they do not believe that the Council is
serious, they are not going to comply.
The question from the other perspective is what is in it
for the Iraqis. If you are in Baghdad trying to decide, well,
should I let all these inspectors come marching around my
country, poking around all of the organizations we consider
very sensitive, what is in it for me? Well, not much from their
perspective. So, frankly, I am not optimistic that a serious
and effective monitoring system is likely to happen.
Senator Brownback. Do we know from the internal discussions
in the Security Council that there is this sort of advice to
Dr. Blix going on right now about do not be too confrontational
or do be confrontational? Do we know what sort of discussions
are taking place?
Mr. Duelfer. I am certainly not in a position to know or,
in fact, to comment on that. That is something between Dr. Blix
and the Security Council. I think they have their own private
communications.
Senator Brownback. Are any signals being sent out from
anybody on the Security Council in the discussions?
Mr. Duelfer. I think the public comments which have been
made by various ambassadors have not been of a nature that they
are encouraging a more intrusive system. They are looking more
at the other side of the equation, how they can encourage Iraq
to cooperate.
Senator Brownback. Mr. Leventhal--or Mr. Milhollin, if you
care to comment--if the United States is not strongly committed
to a clear, aggressive, robust inspection regime, is it likely
that one will occur?
Mr. Leventhal. I think not and I think the fact that Mr.
Blix' principal sponsors on the Security Council were the
Russians and the French and that they had strongly opposed
Ambassador Ekeus' nomination, which the U.S. had supported,
bodes ill, which is one of the reasons I thought it might be a
useful exercise to try to bring Mr. Blix to Washington and at
least let him know what the congressional sentiment is.
It may well be that the administration feels that the risk
of further military confrontation is simply not worth it in
response to the inevitable refusal by Saddam to cooperate. So,
our administration seems to be ratcheting down while what is
really needed is a ratcheting up, particularly since there have
been no inspections now for more than a year.
Senator Brownback. Mr. Milhollin, any comment on that?
Mr. Milhollin. I was particularly struck by Senator Biden's
question, which I consider to be an excellent question; that
is, if we agree to this--I think we have to be honest--watered
down inspection system, what are we getting for it? Are we at
least getting other countries' promises to abide by the embargo
in their own domestic export decisions?
My impression is that we are not getting anything. We have
conceded on the question of whether Blix or Ekeus should be the
executive chairman, and we have conceded on the standards in
the new resolution. And we are losing the overall public debate
on whether the sanctions are morally justified. It just seems
to me that we do not have a clear game plan. We do not have a
comprehensive view of where we want things to go, and we do not
have a strategy for getting there. We just seem to be reacting
to events and then caving in when the pressure gets too great
on one issue or the next.
For me, this is a very disturbing thing, and I wish our
Government were more dedicated and more effective in this area,
and I think if we continue on this path, we will just see a
slow diminution of interest here and we will see less influence
in the Security Council and we will see, if not a precipitous,
at least a gradual erosion of the embargo. More stuff will be
going in. We will pick it up now and then. We will complain
about it, but nobody will really care. And the exporters will
all get the message that nobody really cares. And so, it will
all just pretty much fizzle out. That is what I am worried
about.
Senator Brownback. Senator Biden.
Senator Biden. What would you do?
Mr. Milhollin. Well, I think at a minimum we could try to
win the public debate on the validity of the embargo. That is,
we seem to be conceding that the suffering of the Iraqi people
is the fault of the embargo.
Senator Biden. Why do you say that? How do you reach that
conclusion?
Mr. Milhollin. Well, I do not see the United States coming
out and saying, look----
Senator Biden. Every time the Secretary speaks, every time
the President speaks they say that.
Mr. Milhollin. But where are the specific examples? Where
is the data? Where is the evidence? I see the statements, yes.
I see the statements.
Senator Biden. I do not disagree with anything any of you
said except none of you have a damn solution. You do not have
any idea of what you are talking as to what to do from here.
You are right in the criticism. I think the criticism is dead
right. We made a fundamental mistake that everybody
underestimated when George Bush stopped us going into Baghdad.
One of the things no one figured was that it would be read as a
conclusion that possession of or the possibility of possessing
nuclear weapons would hold off the giant. And that is the
reason why he did not occupy Baghdad is because we had these
weapons, thereby emboldening them to hang onto them closer. So,
a fundamental mistake. It is easy to Monday morning quarterback
now and say it, but a fundamental mistake made. And we continue
to make mistakes as we go along.
But the bottom line to me is how do you hold this together.
You say, for example, Mr. Leventhal, that we seem to conclude a
further military confrontation is not worth it. How the hell do
you draw that conclusion? If you conclude that, there is not a
consensus in America or the Congress or the President can come
and go unilaterally into Iraq, you are right.
But you make basically irresponsible statements in a very
responsible presentation. Every factual thing you have said--I
cannot think of a single factual point you have made that I
have disagreed with.
Now you are sitting there and here you go. Vote around the
Security Council. They turned down our guy. OK. You do not have
the votes for our guy. You have got to have enough votes to get
this done. Now what we do is we nix Blix. No pun intended. I am
not attempting to be humorous here. We say no, we are not going
with Blix. Now we have no inspection regime. None. We do not
get any vote for any inspection regime.
My question is, is that better than none?
Mr. Milhollin. That is better.
Senator Biden. Well, let us just say that. So, it would be
better not to have anything. Is that what you are saying?
Mr. Leventhal. Well, I think the U.S. Government feels that
right now.
Senator Biden. What do you feel? I can figure out what they
figure out, but what do you think? What do you think is better?
Mr. Leventhal. Well, I think that at the very least, since
this new process is underway, that the sort of requirements
that we laid out in our conclusion here be actually done.
Senator Biden. No, no. That is not my question. My question
is--it comes time to vote. You think Blix is weak. I think he
is weak. We are in agreement. Now you are sitting there with
the Ambassador to the United Nations, recommend. He turns to
you, recommend. How do I vote? How do you vote?
Mr. Leventhal. I would ask Blix to----
Senator Biden. Oh, Blix, come on. You know no matter what
Blix says, this man here is right. Come on. Let us stop kidding
each other. We are all grown-ups here. If the Security Council
is not willing to go to the mat and if our allies are not
willing to suit up again and go in and go to Baghdad, we are
just playing games. You know it and I know it. And you are
playing a game here with me, with all due respect.
How do you vote?
Mr. Leventhal. I just wanted to clarify what I stated was
an observation that the U.S. Government apparently was not
prepared at this point in time to risk military intervention
over the issue of inspections, and I think Ambassador Walker's
testimony where he said the red line did not include
cooperation with inspections supports that.
What I stated in my conclusion is that the best way to
proceed at this point is to hold Blix and the IAEA accountable
for a very detailed report on what is still outstanding as
unanswered questions and what are the answers to those
questions.
Senator Biden. By the way, the IAEA, when Blix was doing
it, did not have nearly the authority allegedly available here.
Do you support the new protocol for the IAEA?
Mr. Leventhal. The new inspection protocol?
Senator Biden. Yes. Do you support that?
Mr. Leventhal. It is clearly an advance but it is by no
means foolproof.
Senator Biden. I did not say it was. You are sounding like
a State Department guy. Come on.
Mr. Leventhal. I support any improvement in this regard.
Senator Biden. Do you support the increase? Do you support
the change in the protocol, increasing inspection regimes?
Which most of my conservative friends in Congress do not
support, by the way.
Mr. Leventhal. Are you speaking of Iraq now?
Senator Biden. I am speaking of IAEA.
Mr. Leventhal. Right and its general upgrading of----
Senator Biden. Yes, 93 plus 2.
Mr. Leventhal. The lessons learned from Iraq.
Senator Biden. Yes.
Mr. Leventhal. Understand, Senator, that is a voluntary
undertaking on the part of member states of the IAEA and it is
by no means assured that it will be universally applied.
Senator Biden. I am not saying that. I am asking you would
you like to see it universally applied? Would you like to see
it part of the IAEA's authority?
Mr. Leventhal. I would like to see the IAEA go a lot
further in terms of inspections by pointing out that the
ability to safeguard facilities that process plutonium and
highly enriched uranium is limited and can be defeated in an
adversarial situation. I would like to see the IAEA provide
support for putting an end to commerce in fissile materials
that could end up some day in Iraq or Iran on a smuggling
basis. So, my feeling about the IAEA upgrade in inspections is
that it does not get to the heart of the problem, which is the
inability of the Agency to effectively account for tons of
fissile material that are being introduced into civilian
commerce and subject to possible diversion and theft.
Senator Biden. And you think it should be able to. Right?
Mr. Leventhal. Absolutely.
Senator Biden. Now, you are a very wise observer of this
place. Do you think that we could get that through here? Do you
think we could get that passed here?
Mr. Leventhal. Well, I did the initial work on the Nuclear
Non-Proliferation Act, so I have a sense of what is possible
and what is not possible legislatively. I think the most
important thing is to expose the vulnerabilities----
Senator Biden. Now, come on. Answer my question, please. Do
you think that it is possible to amend the treaty along the
lines you suggested and get it passed here in the U.S. Senate?
What do you think?
Mr. Leventhal. Well, our position is that the Non-
Proliferation Treaty already makes possible the outlawing of
commerce in plutonium and highly enriched uranium. What is
lacking is the political will.
Senator Biden. You really should have a job at the State
Department, sir. I am an admirer of yours. I think what you say
is good. You are just as duplicitous as they are, though, in
not answering the questions.
Mr. Milhollin, do you have an answer?
Mr. Milhollin. Yes.
Senator Biden. What do you think?
Mr. Milhollin. I would be happy to answer your question
straightforwardly, at least according to your definition. I
think I would have voted against Blix. I think it is
intolerable that two of our, quote, friends, the Russians and
the French, would object to one Swedish diplomat and then not
object to another one and expect us to go along with it----
Senator Biden. But you know they are not our friends in
this. Come on.
Mr. Milhollin. Well, that is true, they are not our
friends.
But there is no objective basis for----
Senator Biden. I agree there is not. There never is.
Mr. Milhollin. So, I would have just said no.
Senator Biden. Just said no and no inspection. Right? I am
not disagreeing with you. I want to know.
Mr. Milhollin. No inspections--a Potemkin inspection system
is more dangerous than no inspection----
Senator Biden. I am not disagreeing with you. I just want
to know.
Mr. Milhollin. And I would have insisted on having a Ekeus.
Senator Biden. Right. You would have insisted on a Ekeus
and you would have not gotten Ekeus. There is no possibility
you would have gotten Ekeus. There is no indication anything in
past is prologue. There is no indication you would ever be
given Ekeus. In foreign policy decisions made by governments on
the Security Council, it never is based upon a Ekeus to be
made. It is based upon national self-interest. Their self-
interest, they view, is different than ours. They would vote
no.
I tend to agree with you. No inspection would be better
than this one. But that is all I am trying to get you to say.
Mr. Milhollin. That is the position I would have taken.
Senator Biden. Good.
Mr. Milhollin. I also think that the 93 plus 2 is good. I
applaud the IAEA's slow steps toward a more aggressive
inspection regime.
One thing the IAEA could do is--and it has the authority to
do--is simply unilaterally disclose the amounts of fissile
material that it is safeguarding everywhere in the world. If it
had done that in Iraq, we would have discovered that there were
bomb quantities of material being safeguarded there. Nobody
knew that until the war started. The IAEA did not disclose it
because there was less than a bomb quantity at each different
material balance location. So, even though you had enough in
the country to make a bomb, the fact that it was spread across
several different places made it unnecessary for the IAEA to go
there every 3 weeks to find out whether it was still where it
was supposed to be.
Senator Biden. Got you.
Mr. Milhollin. So, there is a lot they could do on their
own.
Senator Biden. Gentlemen, I truly appreciate your input on
this. I do not mean to be argumentative with you. The part that
bothers me about all of this is that what we all pretend is
there is an answer. You guys have no more of an answer than
that table is going to get up and fly. We have cited the
problem. Now what do we do?
Senator Brownback. I am hearing something different from
them than you are then, Senator Biden. I think there is a lot
of agreement that is here, but what I hear them saying is that
if the United States does not show resolve and clear resolve
and intensity on this--and perhaps maybe the most troubling
thing that has come out today is Ambassador Walker's statement
that there is not a bright line on the weapons inspection issue
because the United States is going to have to show that sort of
intensity if we are going to have a weapons inspection system
because otherwise it really will be a pretend type of system.
It is incumbent upon us, I think, in the Congress to say we do
want something that is clear that we will do and let us
establish that line if we are going to have a weapons
inspection system.
And then Blix is it, whether we want him or not. He is it.
Now let us say that the United States will back it up and let
us buck him up.
Senator Biden. Well, Mr. Chairman, I really do not----
Senator Brownback. That is a good part of, I think, the
solution.
Senator Biden. By the way, I think you are right. I do not
disagree with that. But my experience, after 28 years doing
this, is big nations cannot bluff. Big nations cannot bluff.
I am ready to introduce a resolution with you that if they,
in fact, refuse the inspections, you and I will introduce a
resolution calling for the use of force by the United States of
America if we have to do it alone to go after Saddam Hussein.
Senator Brownback. I think that is a good notion.
Senator Biden. Good, because absent that, the rest of this
is malarkey, guys. You know it and I know it. Stop playing your
intellectual games.
Senator Brownback. Mr. Duelfer, what do you think of that,
of the U.S. Congress speaking that way?
Mr. Duelfer. I do not want to be accused of opining above
my pay grade.
Senator Biden. You are much smarter than that in my
observation.
Mr. Duelfer. What is the objective here? Is it disarmament,
forced disarmament? It is not arms control. I separate myself
from these two gentlemen----
Senator Brownback. I agree. It is forced disarmament is
what we have been after all along.
Mr. Duelfer. But I think one of the issues is, are we now
engaged in something which is merely a tactic? In which case,
UNMOVIC, Blix, and all are just part of a larger process where
somebody has got their eye on the ball and it is not the
disarmament ball. It is something else. I think that that is in
fact the process we are engaged in right now.
But nevertheless, we have chosen to play this game out in
the Security Council as a stadium. I am not sure that is a
great stadium to play in, frankly, from what I have seen. But
nevertheless, if you do that, you accept a lot of constraints.
You have got a lot constraints because these characters all
have different national objectives. What I am trying to say is
over time the consensus on disarmament, forced disarmament, in
Iraq is--you know, they are not with the United States. I do
not know where the United States is. I feel I know more about
the Iraqi policy than I do about the American policy, frankly.
Senator Brownback. My concern is I am not sure where we are
either on it. Perhaps that is where something of a statement
through Congress and to the President might help at least
clarify that point over which we have some control and is a
better stadium to play in.
Gentlemen, thank you all for joining us today.
Senator Biden. Thanks a lot, fellows.
Senator Brownback. I appreciate very much your input.
The hearing is adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 12:07 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.]
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