Iraqi Air Force Official Explains About The Missing WMDs

Okay, he was only the #2 man in Saddam Hussein's air force, so perhaps he's just blowing smoke. Or perhaps it is because he has a new book out. But isn't it odd that this news story quoting Georges Sada and an Israeli general saying the same thing--is being ignored by the mainstream media? I mean, even if both these guys are lying, it's still news, unless you can prove them wrong:

The man who served as the no. 2 official in Saddam Hussein's air force says Iraq moved weapons of mass destruction into Syria before the war by loading the weapons into civilian aircraft in which the passenger seats were removed.

The Iraqi general, Georges Sada, makes the charges in a new book, "Saddam's Secrets," released this week. He detailed the transfers in an interview yesterday with The New York Sun.

"There are weapons of mass destruction gone out from Iraq to Syria, and they must be found and returned to safe hands," Mr. Sada said. "I am confident they were taken over."

Mr. Sada's comments come just more than a month after Israel's top general during Operation Iraqi Freedom, Moshe Yaalon, told the Sun that Saddam "transferred the chemical agents from Iraq to Syria."

He gives detail about when and how, telling how Iraqi Air Force pilots told him the details of moving materials onto airliners including "yellow barrels with skull and crossbones on each barrel."  The article goes on to quote a number of people that vouch for Sada's integrity, and points out that Sada is putting his life, and his family's life at risk with this:

Short of discovering the weapons in Syria, those seeking to validate Mr. Sada's claim independently will face difficulty. His book contains a foreword by a retired U.S. Air Force colonel, David Eberly, who was a prisoner of war in Iraq during the first Gulf War and who vouches for Mr. Sada, who once held him captive, as "an honest and honorable man."

...

Mr. Sada acknowledged that the disclosures about transfers of weapons of mass destruction are "a very delicate issue." He said he was afraid for his family. "I am sure the terrorists will not like it. The Saddamists will not like it," he said.

The American left won't like it either, but their notion of retaliation is failing to invite you to their next wine and cheese party.

As I have pointed out previously, Jordan confiscated 20 tons of chemical agents from al-Qaeda operatives planning to use them in an attack in the Jordanian capital. This report tells us that Jordan's government says the chemical agents were driven in from Syria--and that one of the agents, VX, was beyond Syria's ability to make--but Iraq had made VX in the past. This article from May 2, 2004 quotes an Israeli general:

Israel's military chief told an Israeli newspaper there is "no doubt" that Iraq possessed both chemical weapons and the means to deliver them. In the first two days of the war, the United States -- acting on tips from Israeli intelligence -- destroyed the aircraft Saddam had prepared to carry chemical munitions, Lt. Gen. Moshe Yaalon said. The munitions themselves were buried, or transferred to other countries.

"We very clearly saw that something crossed into Syria," he said.

"We have six or seven credible reports of Iraqi weapons being moved into Syria before the war," a senior administration official told Kenneth Timmerman of Insight magazine.

A Syrian intelligence officer, in letters smuggled to an anti-regime activist in Paris, identified three sites in Syria where Iraqi WMD are being stored, Timmerman said. The sites were the same as those identified earlier by a Syrian journalist who defected to Europe.

You are not going to hear about this on NPR, PBS, CBS, ABC, or NBC. I even doubt that you will hear it on Fox. You aren't going to read it in your daily newspaper. Why? If not for Michelle Malkin, I wouldn't have known.