Senators Were Told Iraqi Weapons Could Hit U.S.
Nelson said claim made during classified briefing
By John McCarthy
FLORIDA TODAY
U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson said Monday the Bush administration last year
told him and other senators that Iraq not only had weapons of mass
destruction, but they had the means to deliver them to East Coast
cities.
Nelson, D-Tallahassee, said about 75 senators got that news during a
classified briefing before last October's congressional vote
authorizing the use of force to remove Saddam Hussein from power.
Nelson voted in favor of using military force.
Nelson said he couldn't reveal who in the administration gave the
briefing.
The White House directed questions about the matter to the Department
of Defense. Defense officials had no comment on Nelson's claim.
Nelson said the senators were told Iraq had both biological and
chemical weapons, notably anthrax, and it could deliver them to cities
along the Eastern seaboard via unmanned aerial vehicles, commonly
known as drones.
"They have not found anything that resembles an UAV that has that
capability," Nelson said.
Nelson delivered the news during a half-hour conference call with
reporters Monday afternoon. The senator, who is on a seven-nation
trade mission to South America, was calling from an airport in
Santiago, Chile.
"That's news," said John Pike, director of GlobalSecurity.org, a
Washington, D.C.-area military and intelligence think tank. "I had not
heard that that was the assessment of the intelligence community. I
had not heard that the Congress had been briefed on this."
Since the late 1990s, there have been several reports that Iraq was
converting a fleet of Czechoslovakian jet fighters into UAVs, as well
as testing smaller drones. And in a speech in Cincinnati last October,
Bush mentioned the vehicles. "We're concerned that Iraq is exploring
ways of using these UAVs for missions targeting the United States,"
the president said.
Nelson, though, said the administration told senators Iraq had gone
beyond exploring and developed the means of hitting the U.S. with
weapons of mass destruction.
Nelson wouldn't say what the original source of the intelligence was,
but said it contradicted other intelligence reports senators had
received. He said he wants to find out why there was so much
disagreement about the weapons. "If that is an intelligence failure .
.. . we better find that out so we don't have an intelligence failure
in the future."
Pike said any UAVs Iraq might have had would have had a range of only
several hundred kilometers, enough to hit targets in the Middle East
but not the United States. To hit targets on the East Coast, such
drones would have to be launched from a ship in Atlantic. He said it
wasn't out of the question for Iraq to have secretly acquired a tramp
steamer from which such vehicles could have been launched.
"The notion that someone could launch a missile from a ship off our
shores has been on Rummy's mind for years," Pike said, referring to
Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld.
Sen. Bob Graham, who voted against using military force in Iraq,
didn't return phone calls concerning the briefing. Spokespersons for
Reps. Dave Weldon and Tom Feeney said neither congressman could say if
they had received similar briefings since they don't comment on
classified information.
http://www.floridatoday.com/!NEWSROOM/localstoryN1216NELSON.htm
.
|
