UK Press Coverage of Iraq Dossier

What has he got? London Review of Books ... The IISS assessment is an exemplary piece of work. It is clearly written and contains a full history both of the Iraqi programmes and of the UN inspectors' work in demolishing them. On the nuclear side ... it has an authoritative account of the Iraqi programme before and during the Gulf War which should be essential reading for anyone interested in the effectiveness or otherwise of nuclear safeguards. It also contains an account of the 'Crash' programme that Kamel...
Iraq: Is it about oil? BBC Online The Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister Tariq Aziz says that the threats against Iraq are really about oil. "The aim of the American policies is the oil in the Gulf" is how he puts it. Iraq is second only to Saudi Arabia in its oil reserves. According to the respected Platts Guide, it has proven reserves of 112 billion barrels, mostly in southern Iraq. Platts quoted the senior deputy Oil Minister, Taha Hmud, as saying in May 2002 that Iraq's reserves could amount to 300 billion...
Saddam shops for arms Sunday Telegraph The threat of invasion is spurring Iraq into a military shopping spree in an attempt to strengthen Saddam Hussein's hand before a United States-led military attack on his regime. US intelligence reports have indicated a series of contacts between Iraqi officials and underground arms networks across the world since President George W. Bush made it clear that the goal of his administration was regime change in Baghdad. Last week, the United Nations Security Council began debating...
A question of timing Sunday Times Apart from the predictable response by Saddam Hussein's underlings, there has been overwhelming support for the Iraq strategy set out by George Bush in his speech to the United Nations General Assembly last week. The proposal of setting a deadline for allowing the arms inspectors back into Iraq is backed by 95% of British people in our poll today. A vast majority - eight out of ten - also believe that if Saddam refuses or obstructs the inspectors, force could legitimately be used...
Let's have an explanation Independent on Sunday In the countdown to war, the focus shifts to the United Nations. This is progress of sorts. Last month, it appeared as if the divided US administration was heading for the worst option of all, a unilateral strike against Iraq with only Britain lending a helping hand. The more pragmatic figures around George Bush have prevailed in the short term, convincing him that he should appear to take the UN seriously. Whether the frantic diplomatic activity this weekend reflects a...
Confronting Iraq Economist TO HEAR his many critics tell it, George Bush had serious charges to answer this week before the United Nations court of international opinion. The leader of the free world stands accused of threatening to disrupt international law and order. America's insistence that Iraq be stripped of its illicit weapons of mass destruction, as a matter of urgency, by force if necessary, is anyway surely a ruse, since Mr Bush has publicly admitted his aim is to topple the regime of Saddam Hussein....
Iraq's arsenal Economist Perhaps The IISS's assessment Nuclear/radiological • Does not possess facilities to produce fissile material in sufficient amounts for nuclear weapons.• Would require at least several years and extensive foreign assistance to build such fissile material production facilities.• Could probably assemble nuclear weapons within months if fissile material from foreign sources were obtained.• Current interest in radiological weapons unknown. Could divert domestic...
Two last chances on Iraq Financial Times President George W. Bush this week in effect issued two ultimatums: one to Saddam Hussein and the other to the United Nations. Mr Bush told the UN General Assembly on Thursday the Security Council had failed in its obligation to enforce the dis-armament of Iraq, as much as the Baghdad regime had refused to meet its obligations by serially flouting council resolutions. The international authority that arose out of the ruins of the second world war and the wreckage of the League...
Iraq's bid for nuclear technology BBC News Left to its own devices, Iraq could take many years to acquire a nuclear bomb. Years of work and a wealth of human expertise are all very well, but without fissile material and an array of sophisticated equipment, they don't make a bomb. According to the International Institute for Strategic Affairs, Iraq "may have completed the necessary preparations to build a nuclear weapon", but simply lacks the highly enriched uranium (HEU) needed to do it. "Iraq could produce a...
UK hails new weapons report BBC News Downing Street has described a report by an independent think-tank on Iraq's military threat as highly significant and a very serious piece of work. The International Institute of Strategic Studies - the IISS - has, in effect produced a dossier using all the available information on Saddam Hussein's nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons capabilities, and his ability to deliver such weapons against his enemies. The assessment -- by the International Institute for Strategic Studies...
Papers split over Iraq action BBC News Unsurprisingly, the UK's papers are divided over the findings of Monday's report by defence experts on Iraq's weapons of mass destruction. While the Daily Express warns of "Anthrax Threat on our Streets", the Daily Mirror declares that the document "proves nothing". The Daily Star reckons that most of the report is based on guesswork and explodes the myth that Saddam is close to developing a nuclear bomb. The debate over whether the findings are enough to justify...
The Main Findings Daily Telegraph Nuclear and radiological weapons Iraq retains the know-how to assemble a nuclear bomb but does not have the required fissile material. It would take "several years and foreign assistance" for its scientists to be able to enrich uranium on their own. If Iraq could buy or steal fissile material, it could make a workable bomb more quickly, possibly within months. Iraqi scientists may have carried out tests on components of a nuclear device to perfect the design to a point...
Saddam 'ready to use bio-weapons' Daily Telegraph Saddam Hussein is ready to use his chemical and biological weapons as a last resort to stop American and British forces from toppling his regime, a leading think-tank said yesterday. Faced with the threat of invasion, the Iraqi dictator has probably already issued orders for the production of his weapons of mass destruction to be stepped up and has deployed them to military units defending Baghdad. However, the London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies said that...
Iraq bioweapons are threat Financial Times Iraq could kill thousands of civilians in neighbouring countries by firing missiles armed with biological weapons, according to an assessment of its weapons of mass destruction capability published on Monday. The International Institute for Strategic Studies, a London-based think-tank, says Iraq's ability to produce and deliver weapons of mass destruction (WMD) is "severely diminished" by comparison with the period just before the 1991 Gulf war. But the report, likely...
Weapons and Diplomacy Financial Times Iraq used chemical weapons extensively against Iran during the 1980s, causing 40,000 to 80,000 casualties, and also killed up to 6,000 of its own Kurdish population. By 1988 it "had developed the largest and most advanced chemical weapons programme in the Middle East", the IISS report said. It developed weapons containing the nerve agents sarin and cyclosarin, including aerial bombs, 155m artillery shells, and warheads for delivery on extended-range Scud missiles. VX...
Deadly Agents Difficult to Defend Against Financial Times Iraq's biological weapons programme, under way since the 1970s, was uncovered just seven years ago following a defection. Considerable uncertainty remains about Iraq's capability, the International Institute for Strategic Studies says. The programme produced anthrax, botulinum toxin, ricin, clostridium perfringens (gas gangrene), aflatoxin and wheat smut. Iraq also acquired the materials to produce other agents, and "by July 1990 Iraq had added viruses and genetic...
Demands for better proof on Iraqi arms Guardian Senior backbench MPs served notice on Tony Blair last night that he must produce better evidence - and inform parliament - about the dangers posed by Saddam Hussein if he is to convince them of the case for military action. They were responding to a dossier published by the respected International Institute of Strategic Studies (IISS) which, by its own admission, contained little new evidence but prompted headlines claiming that Iraq was "within months" of possessing nuclear...
Threat of war: The Iraqi threat Guardian IISS report 80-page dossier details Iraqi capabilities War, sanctions and UN weapons inspections have reversed and retarded - but not eliminated - Iraq's nuclear, biological and chemical weapons, and long-range missile capacities, the International Institute for Strategic Studies concludes in yesterday's report. The 80-page dossier, drawn mainly from the experience of UN weapons inspectors, provides as much ammunition for opponents of a military attack on the country as for those...
Saddam Weaker Now Than Before Gulf War Independent THE REPORT by the International Institute for Strategic Studies is being promoted by the hawks in Washington and their supporters in Whitehall as providing "proof" that Saddam Hussein is just months away from launching a nuclear bomb. That is the way is has been presented in some quarters of the media. But an examination of the report shows that, in fact, Iraq is far weaker in weapons of mass destruction and every other military field than it was in 1991 before the Gulf...
Saddam 'several years' from building nuclear Independent It would take Iraq "at least several years" to produce fissile material to build a nuclear weapon, defence analysts warned today. But Saddam Hussein has also stockpiled "perhaps thousands of litres of anthrax" and is capable of resuming biological weapons production in just a few weeks. The International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) reported today that he probably has a few hundred tonnes of chemical nerve agents, according to a new assessment of Iraq's...