@@ America's crying wolf over 'nukes' @@
Arash
January 24, 2004
Crying wolf over North Korean 'nukes'
Dr. James Gordon Prather
Nuclear Weapons Physicist
gpra...@worldnetdaily.com
The neocons have got us into a terrible mess in Iraq - and may be about to
get us in an even worse mess in Iran - because they are convinced that
Mohamed ElBaradei, director general of the International Atomic Energy
Agency, wouldn't know a nuke if he saw one.
Last year, ElBaradei assured the U.N. Security Council that IAEA inspectors
had exhaustively searched Iraq - investigating every tip our "intelligence"
provided them - and could find no "indication" of a nuke program or even an
attempt to reconstruct a uranium-enrichment program.
Had the IAEA found some evidence of a reconstituted uranium-enrichment
program, it is conceivable that the Security Council might have applied some
additional sanctions on Iraq.
But they wouldn't have authorized Operation Iraqi Freedom.
However, the neocons hope you jumped to the conclusion that anytime we
find - in a Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty signatory - evidence of a
previously unreported uranium-enrichment program, we get to bomb the
gee-whiz out of them.
But what about the Democratic People's Republic of Korea? The DPRK withdrew
from the NPT last year in anticipation of our ignoring ElBaradei and
invading Iraq, anyway.
Last week, Sig Hecker - former director of Los Alamos National Laboratory -
was a member of a U.S. delegation that visited the "nuclear complex" at
Yongbyon and was shown what the Koreans have been referring to as their
"nuclear deterrent."
Almost without exception, the neocons and their media sycophants have
interpreted "nuclear deterrent" to mean that the DPRK has a nuke stockpile,
ready to launch via ballistic missile against us or to give to terrorists.
Now, if anyone knows a nuke when he sees one, it's Sig. So, here are
excerpts from Sig's report to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee:
During follow-up discussions with Ambassador Li and Vice Minister Kim in
Pyongyang, they stressed that the DPRK now has a "nuclear deterrent" and
that U.S. actions have caused them to strengthen their deterrent - both in
quality and in quantity. Ambassador Li inquired if what I had seen at
Yongbyon convinced me that they had this deterrent.
I explained to both of them that there is nothing that we saw at the
Yongbyon Nuclear Scientific Research Center that would allow me to assess
whether or not the DPRK possessed a nuclear deterrent if that meant a
nuclear device or nuclear weapon.
I explained that I view a "deterrent" to have at least three components:
1) the ability to make plutonium metal, 2) the ability to design and build a
nuclear device, and 3) the ability to integrate the nuclear device into a
delivery system.
What we saw at Yongbyon was that they apparently have the capability to do
the first. However, I saw nothing and talked to no one that allowed me to
assess whether or not they have the ability to design a nuclear device.
So much for the DPRK "nuke stockpile." Well, how about the DPRK "uranium
enrichment" program?
In the Foreign Ministry, we discussed the contentious issue of DPRK's
supposed admission on Oct. 4, 2002, to having a clandestine highly enriched
uranium (HEU) program in violation of the letter and spirit of the 1994
Agreed Framework.
According to Sig, U.S. delegation member Jack Pritchard, formerly the U.S.
special envoy for DPRK negotiations, made this statement:
The key issue is the intelligence that makes the United States believe
that the DPRK has an HEU program. In the U.S., there is the widespread view
that the complete, verifiable resolution of this HEU issue is now mandatory.
This is a practical issue, and there must be a multilateral discussion to
resolve it.
Now, you're probably wondering what "intelligence" Pritchard is talking
about, since the CIA admits it hasn't got the foggiest notion where the HEU
facilities might be.
Vice Minister Kim Gye Gwan immediately responded that the DPRK has no HEU
program; no facilities, no equipment or any scientists dedicated to it, and
has never claimed to have one, stating that there must have been a
misunderstanding of what the Koreans had said at that meeting.
Their 5 Mwe Plutonium-producing reactor had been restarted and the 8000
"spent" fuel elements have been removed from their storage pool. The
plutonium contained therein has probably been recovered, some of it having
been transformed into metal.
But, no "nukes" and no "HEU."
So what?
Well, it appears the Koreans have not deliberately lied about what they have
done or what they haven't done, and that our "intelligence" for DPRK is no
better than it was for Iraq.
* Physicist James Gordon Prather has served as a policy implementing
official for national security-related technical matters in the Federal
Energy Agency, the Energy Research and Development Administration, the
Department of Energy, the Office of the Secretary of Defense and the
Department of the Army. Dr. Prather also served as legislative assistant for
national security affairs to U.S. Sen. Henry Bellmon, R-Okla. -- ranking
member of the Senate Budget Committee and member of the Senate Energy
Committee and Appropriations Committee. Dr. Prather had earlier worked as a
nuclear weapons physicist at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in
California and Sandia National Laboratory in New Mexico.
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/archives.asp?AUTHOR_ID=35