Well yesterday the news story that exploded all over (pun intended) the news and airwaves was the story was out there for awhile, but the NYC times really blew it up. Here is the Jist:
"The Iraqi interim government has warned the United States and international nuclear inspectors that nearly 380 tons of powerful conventional explosives - used to demolish buildings, make missile warheads and detonate nuclear weapons - are missing from one of Iraq's most sensitive former military installations.
The huge facility, called Al Qaqaa, was supposed to be under American military control but is now a no man's land, still picked over by looters as recently as Sunday. United Nations weapons inspectors had monitored the explosives for many years, but White House and Pentagon officials acknowledge that the explosives vanished sometime after the American-led invasion last year."
Anyway, come to find out on NBC news last night that their embeded reporters were with US troops when they got to the building. They said the weapons were gone already. Now you would think that the NYC times would. I don't follow up on the story. Shed light on the new facts brought to the table. Sadly, they didn't and suprisingly almost every other paper I picked up totally ignored the paper. Air America's Al Franklin acted as if the story didn't exist. He was still just slamming them for not protecting the weapons.
Before, you start saying, hey man stop watching Fox News, and listening to Rush. Let me make a pre-emptive strike on those shots that could be thrown at me. First off I listen to Air America between 12-3 if I can. Unless I am listening to 610 that is. Secondly, I wanted to write this last night when the story broke, and predict how the media would burry it. But, I thought I was over-reacting. So, I slept on it.
So, yeah it would seem the weapons were gone already when the troops got there. I expecte Drew on TERMINUS. To say listen we were excited about this..but its turning out to not be a slam dunk for Kerry. However, he goes on an slams Bush anyway. Doesn't mention anything about NBC in the entire report.
Okay, so the timeline might be made up. But why not ask. Why if this is such an important story was CBS planning to sit on it till the day before the election? Could it be that there would be no time to spin or even get the truth out there? Ask Micheal Moore likes to say.."What was going on here?".
I don't know. However would it have killed the NYC times or other medias to mention. Hey NBC said something makes the story that we drilled into your brains for a long time..well a completely different story. I figured papers and media outlets would draw lines in the sand for this election, however I didn't think that objective journalism would dislove like sugar in un-sweatened tea.
Drew ponders what happened. I don't claim to have all the answers, but if Iraqis could loot and take it there with "not enough" soliders around to stop them. I am sure they would have no problems with no one around moving it getting ready for that war an all.
Also, please when will the general public just admit that the NYC times is just the Fox News of the left?
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5 comments:
Keith, what new facts are there? When the embedded repoters got to the depot with the troops the explosives were gone. Why were they gone? Because people took them. They were taken because they were left unguarded. They were left unguarded because the Bush administration decided to not post guards there. If they posted guards there when they were first told about the explosives depot, they would not have been stolen and used to kill our troops. This is another example of the Bush administration dropping the ball when it comes to time sensitive intelligence.
Also it is the NY Times.
J
Also, if Bush hadn't demanded a war with Iraq in the first place (for reasons he no longer holds to), those explosives wouldn't have been left out in the open for others to take and sell to militant Anti-american groups over there...
And since I'm just catching up on the blogs here, I don't think Nader's a worthwhile cause anymore Ke-- i mean Tucker. I voted Nader last time, but this time around he's made himself into more of a joke than a respectable candidate. There'll NEVER be a perfect candidate, because those kinds of people just don't make it in politics, so you'll ALWAYS have to settle for one side or the other. Bush had the ultimate chance to be a 2-term president during a dangerous time in America, but he wasted it in Iraq. I wouldn't want to hang out with Kerry, but we need a change of face in the white house. So until Tucker runs for president, I'm voting Kerry.
-SH
I didn't mention the NBCNews report in my post on the subject. That is true. But I did link to an article which debunked your interpreation of that story. I did that yesterday in my article that followed up my original Monday post. I don't blame you for missing it, because it was easy to miss, but I do want to set the record straight.
I also want to correct J's comment above. When the 101st Airborne was there on 4/10/03, they did not search the facilities, and therefore could not possibly know whether or not the explosives were there at that time. The Iraqi government is adamant that the explosives were taken after the fall of Baghdad, but they may have an axe to grind.
We have to conclude, so far, that the explosives were definitely there before the war started, and we knew it, and that they disappeared sometime after we invaded. Whether the explosives were taken during the war or after the war, it's a pretty bad situation, and it reflects pretty poorly on the White House's pre-war planning.
Amen Brother!
Okay, but why not even mention this at all?
Seems mighty strange. It depends on a few things. They could still have been there when we actual invaision of Iraq happened. Some articles were written to make seem as though it just happened. The way I took the report was they could not have protected the site, because they weren't that far into Iraq yet. I would love to hear from the people who got there first.
The truth is that we couldn't even debate this at all, if that part wasn't reported. The NBC news report certainly makes more understandable time line.
Who is this SH fellow? Did some one just hit the wrong keys or is that another reader lurking? If you are a new reader welcome.
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