Iraqi nuke story debunking thread.
By Moe Lane Posted in User Blogs — Comments (2) / Email this page » / Leave a comment »
Might as well get started on it: there is an unauthenticated story (via UPI and the Washington Times - yes, you start to see the problem) reporting that three actual 'missiles with nuclear heads' have been found in Iraq. Bo confirmation - of course - and this story hasn't yet been picked up by AP or Reuters.
Not an active nuclear program, not weapons'-grade uranium or plutonium; actual nukes. While not impossible - we're not entirely certain about the whereabouts of all of the former Soviet Union's nuclear arsenal, after all - it's, ah, just a touch unlikely, particularly as I can imagine that you just can't go out and buy nukes without some paperwork, no matter how illegal the transaction - and if the Bush administration had such paperwork and refrained from publicizing it absent hard proof, well, I'm impressed by their nigh-inhuman self-control.
Probably best to start testing this story to destruction.
But thanks to the Command Post and California Yankee for noting this.
At Brothers Judd for the Iraqi Interior Ministry calling this "stupid."
I read it on Drudge about at around 9:15am EDT. I figured it had to be false, but, have been surfing for additional backup. Reuters is carrying a story, by the way, quoting someone in the Iraqi government describing the story as "stupid". This would be one of the biggest stories in a long, long, time, were it true, and I can't imagine it wouldn't help Bush. But then again, some would inevitably (and perhaps quite justifiably) raise questions about whether the long delay in finding them points to the possibility that we didn't manage to find all of them in time to keep them out of the wrong hands...