Okay, *why*, when I select all and choose "copy as plain text" does the thing insert equals signs and "20"s all over the place?! Julie Krueger ========Original Message======== Subj: [lit-ideas] Iraq explosives Date: 10/29/04 1:32:11 PM Central Daylight Time From: _JimKandJulieB@xxxxxxxx (mailto:JimKandJulieB@xxxxxxx) To: _lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx (mailto:lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx) Sent on: Click here: AOL News - TV Video May Show Missing Explosives =20 http://aolsvc.news.aol.com/news/article.adp?id=3D20041029044209990014 Bush can't say Hussein smuggled them out before our attack anymore.... hop= e=20 enough people get wind of this news to make a difference. <<TV Video May Show Missing Explosives =20 WASHINGTON (Oct. 29) - Videotape shot by a Minnesota television crew =20 traveling with U.S. troops in Iraq when they first opened the bunkers at the= =20 Al-Qaqaa munitions base nine days after the fall of Saddam Hussein shows wha= t =20 appeared to be high explosives still in barrels and bearing the markings of=20= the =20 International Atomic Energy Agency. AP Soldier with 101st Airborne examines contents of a barrel in bunker at=20 Al-Qaqaa facility April 18, 2003. Watch: An Explosive Discovery Broadband Only: New Evidence Found =20 The video taken by KSTP of St. Paul on April 18, 2003, could reinforce =20 suggestions that tons of explosives missing from a munitions installation in= Iraq=20 were looted after the U.S. invasion and occupation of Iraq. The video was =20 broadcast nationally Thursday on ABC. =20 "The photographs are consistent with what I know of Al-Qaqaa," David A. Kay= ,=20 a former American official who directed the hunt in Iraq for unconventional=20= =20 weapons and visited the site, told The New York Times. "The damning thing is= =20 the seals. The Iraqis didn't use seals on anything. So I'm absolutely sure=20 that's an IAEA seal." =20 The question of what happened to the tons of explosives has become a major =20 issue in the closing days of the presidential campaign. =20 =20 Talk About It =20 =B7 Chat | Post Messages =20 Democrat John Kerry says the missing explosives - powerful enough to =20 demolish a building, bring down a jetliner or set off a nuclear weapon - are= another=20 example of the Bush administration's poor planning and incompetence in =20 handling the war in Iraq. President Bush says the explosives were possibly =20= removed=20 by Saddam's forces before the invasion. =20 Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld entered the debate Thursday, suggestin= g=20 the 377 tons of explosives were taken away before U.S. forces arrived,=20 saying any large effort to loot the material afterward would have been dete= cted. =20 "We would have seen anything like that," he said in one of two radio =20 interviews he gave at the Pentagon. "The idea it was suddenly looted and mov= ed out,=20 all of these tons of equipment, I think is at least debatable." =20 The Pentagon also declassified and released a single image, taken by =20 reconnaissance aircraft or satellite just days before the war, showing two =20= trucks=20 outside one of the dozens of storage bunkers at the Al-Qaqaa munitions base= . =20 =20 More on This Story =20 =B7 Soldier Describes Removing Explosives =20 The particular bunker is not one known to have contained any of the missing= =20 explosives, and Pentagon spokesman Larry Di Rita said the image only shows=20 that there was some Iraqi activity at the base when it was taken, on March=20= 17.=20 Di Rita said the image says nothing about what happened to the explosives. =20 Rumsfeld, in one radio interview, also cast doubt on the suggestion of one =20 of his subordinates that Russian forces assisted the Iraqis in removing the= m. =20 John Shaw, the deputy U.S. undersecretary of defense for international =20 technology security, suggested to The Washington Times in an interview that=20= the =20 Russians may have been involved, prompting an angry denial from Moscow. =20 Rumsfeld said, "I have no information on that at all, and cannot validate =20 that even slightly." =20 But at issue is whether the weapons were moved before or after U.S. forces =20 occupied that region of the country in early April. No one has been able to=20= =20 provide conclusive evidence either way, although Iraqi officials blamed it o= n =20 poor U.S. security after Baghdad fell. =20 The Pentagon has said it's looking into the matter, and officials note that=20= =20 400,000 tons of recovered Iraqi munitions have either been destroyed or are=20= =20 slated to be destroyed.>> Julie Krueger =20 ------------------------------------------------------------------ To change your Lit-Ideas settings (subscribe/unsub, vacation on/off, digest on/off), visit www.andreas.com/faq-lit-ideas.html ------------------------------------------------------------------ To change your Lit-Ideas settings (subscribe/unsub, vacation on/off, digest on/off), visit www.andreas.com/faq-lit-ideas.html