Uncovered in Iraq...Buried WMD

[Mooseman684]

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The Iraqi jet, an advanced Russian MiG-25 Foxbat, was found buried in the sand after an informant tipped off U.S . troops.

The MiG was dug out of a massive sand dune near the Al Taqqadum airfield by U.S. Air Force recovery teams. The MiG was reportedly one of over two dozen Iraqi jets buried in the sand, like hidden treasure, waiting to be recovered at a later date. Contrary to what some in the major media have reported, not all the jets found were from the Gulf War era. The Russian-made MiG-25 Foxbat being recovered by U.S.Air Force troops in the photos is an advanced reconnaissance version never before seen in the West and is equipped with sophisticated electronic warfare devices.

U.S. Air Force recovery teams had to use large earth-moving equipment to uncover the MiG, which is over 70 feet long and weighs nearly 25 tons.

The Foxbat is known to be one of Iraq 's top jet fighters. The advanced electronic reconnaissance version found by the U.S. Air Force is currently in service with the Russian air force. The MiG is capable of flying at speeds of over 2,000 miles an hour, or three times the speed of sound , and at altitudes of over 75,000 feet.

The recovery of the advanced MiG fighter is considered to be an intelligence coup by the U.S. Air Force.. The Foxbat may also be equipped with advanced Russian- and French-made electronics that were sold to Iraq during the 1990s in violation of a U..N. ban on arms sales to Baghdad .

The buried aircraft at Al Taqqadum were covered in camouflage netting, sealed and, in many cases, had their wings removed before being buried more than 10 feet beneath the Iraqi desert.

X Marks the Spot

The discovery of the buried Iraqi jet fighters illustrates the problem faced by ! U.S. inspection teams searching Iraq for weapons of mass destruction. Iraq is larger in size than California, and the massive deserts south and west of Baghdad were used by Saddam Hussein to hide weapons during the first Gulf war.

U.S. intelligence sources have already uncovered several mass grave burial sites in the open deserts with an estimated 10,000 dead hidden there. In addition, Iraq previously hid SCUD missiles, chemical weapons and biological warheads by burying them under the desert sand.

U.N. inspe ction teams found the weapons in the early 1990s after detailed information of the exact locations was obtained.

Top U.S. weapons inspector Dr. David Kay is known to favor human intelligence as the primary means to find Iraq 's hidden treasure trove of weapons and secrets.

While there are rumors of Iraqi chemical and biological weapons being shipped to nearby Syria , the weapons may very well still remain inside Iraq buried under the vast desert wastelands.

Some critics of the Bush administration have claimed that the inability of U.S. forces to uncover weapons of mass destruction is proof that the president misled the nation into the war with Iraq .

However, in recent days the critics have fallen silent as word quietly leaked from Iraq that major discoveries have already been made and are now being documented completely. Bush administration officials are keeping any such discoveries secret for the moment.

[Pred]

First, link? Second, change the title of this thread as it's very misleading. There were no WMD's found in Iraq, yet your trying to lead people in to believing there were. They found a jet, and? Next...

[texnmidwest]

Saddam was not a stupid man. Sick, yes, but not stupid. I feel sure that we will be finding things of "interest" for a long time. I just hope our young men and women don't have to die to find them.

[Pred]

Originally Posted by texnmidwest

Saddam was not a stupid man. Sick, yes, but not stupid. I feel sure that we will be finding things of "interest" for a long time. I just hope our young men and women don't have to die to find them.

I HOPE I don't have to go to work tomorrow, but we both know that I do.

[baldeagle48]

I still think we were mislead and it was just saddam b.s.ing us all.A buied jet doesnt prove much too me.Just another way to justify his war.They may be buried in the desert and they may not.Thats not positive proof like we were told they had.

[Dennis]

Wait, we did find cemical weapons in Iraq, just not nuclear. But the anti american Americans who want a anti american president will not accept that news.
The same as when Bush landed on the Aircraft carrier and announced Mission accomplished it was imperative that the anti american Americans NOT accept that we had won the war. this has then kept the enemy motivated to keep resisting and "extend" the "war".

It is kinda simple isnt it.

When ya Cant accept loosing an election then just destroy the country so you can come in later and fix it....
yea... thats the democrat way.

[nathangdad]

A Foxbat is a fantastic aircraft but it is not a weapon of mass destruction.

Hello to Pred. Did you get out of your job? I hope so as you seemed somewhat attached to a one way relationship with you doing all the giving and none of the getting. I can understand you feelings of responsibility but they are just using you.

Well, in reply to another poster all I can say is only the walking brain dead would bury something of this sophistication in the sand. Desert sand has a way of getting around just about any insulation (I was raised in the West Texas desert). Who could possibly put it back in flying order (one question) without attracting everyone from our military to CNN (second question)? It is an interesting techno find to be sent back to America for analysis. Saddam's defeated and disbursed military just could not restore it, arm it, and attack anything.

[troy2000]

Originally Posted by Dennis

Wait, we did find cemical weapons in Iraq, just not nuclear. But the anti american Americans who want a anti american president will not accept that news.
The same as when Bush landed on the Aircraft carrier and announced Mission accomplished it was imperative that the anti american Americans NOT accept that we had won the war. this has then kept the enemy motivated to keep resisting and "extend" the "war".
It is kinda simple isnt it.
When ya Cant accept loosing an election then just destroy the country so you can come in later and fix it....
yea... thats the democrat way.

If we won the war, why are we still dying at a greater rate than we were before they put the banner up?

I believe Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld totally screwed the pooch: first by invading Iraq to begin with, and secondly by not listening to the professionals who tried to tell them how to do it right.

I'm also a Democrat. Now, would you like to come tell me personally I'm anti-American, simply because I believe you voted for a dangerously incompetent fool?

[lefty o]

agreed, a mig is no WMD, but i think we all know they do exist in iraq.

[Mooseman684]

I guess that because The radar was replaced with a more powerful pulse-Doppler version based on the MiG-23's radar; it had a greater range and could better pick out targets at low altitude. The nose was slightly lengthened to accommodate this radar. Infrared passive tracking facilities were added as were current-generation radios and avionics, including an IFF system. Most usefully the MiG-25PD could now carry short range missiles - four of the AA-8 Aphid air-to-air missiles as well as two long range AA-6 missiles.
Enough firepower to Sink a Carrier or destroy a Nuclear power Plant or even Deliver Chemical weapons...
I would say WMD is an Operative word...

[Cyrano]

Moose, I respectfully disagree with your conclusions.

The recon fighter that is being unearthed will be of great interest to the folks out at Edwards Air Force Base. I have no doubt the Skunk Works will want to take it to pieces and see what it has that's new and different. After it's put back together again, the folks over at Flight Test will want to test the daylights out of it to establish what it can do.

But even if this version of the Foxbat has the capability of carrying ship-busters and gas-tipped rockets, it is still only an airplane. It may be capable of carrying a WMD, but it is still just an airplane. You are making a lot of soup from one onion. The mere fact the bird appears capable of carrying a WMD does not mean there are post-Gulf War era WMDs for it to carry.

All this buried, mothballed airplane proves is that Saddam did not expect to be captured, tried and hanged for his crimes against humanity. He expected to be able to wait out the occupation, staying in hiding until the Alliance gave up on/got bored with occupying a sectarian war zone and left; then come out from under his rock and take over again, probably by coup. This Foxbat might have been one of the aces up his sleeve. There are probably more of them hidden away in the desert. Control of the air is important in any war situation these days; it's difficult to impossible to accomplish your objectives without it.

But as things stand now, we still haven't seen the weapons of mass destruction, be they nuclear, biological or chemical, that George W. Bush presented as his rationale for launching a preemptive war halfway around the planet in a religious, political and cultural snakepit we Americans don't even begin to comprehend. The few bits of equipment that might qualify as WMDs that did turn up early on in the occupation were all of pre-Gulf War vintage. If memory serves, some of the gas shells that were found were even of 1980s American manufacture that Saddam's regime bought from us! If and when a stock of NBC weapons that can be definitely identified as having been made after the weapons embargo ever does turn up - or even some which were hidden in the desert for future recovery that are of Gulf War vintage - I will beg your pardon. At the moment, however, I do not believe I owe you an apology for my disagreement.

[troy2000]

Originally Posted by Mooseman684

I guess that because The radar was replaced with a more powerful pulse-Doppler version based on the MiG-23's radar; it had a greater range and could better pick out targets at low altitude. The nose was slightly lengthened to accommodate this radar. Infrared passive tracking facilities were added as were current-generation radios and avionics, including an IFF system. Most usefully the MiG-25PD could now carry short range missiles - four of the AA-8 Aphid air-to-air missiles as well as two long range AA-6 missiles.
Enough firepower to Sink a Carrier or destroy a Nuclear power Plant or even Deliver Chemical weapons...
I would say WMD is an Operative word...

It's an impressive find, Rich. I'm glad they found it, and it'll probably teach us a lot about Russian weapons, radar and guidance systems. Thanks for posting the info and the pics.

But if a jet fighter is a WMD, damn near every country in the world has WMD's. So what was the big deal about Saddam having them too?

When Bush took us to war, the term "weapons of mass destruction" as he used it very clearly meant nuclear, chemical and/or biological weapons, not fighter jets. Remember? We couldn't afford to let the smoking gun turn out to be a mushroom cloud?

[Zen900]

Originally Posted by baldeagle48

I still think we were mislead and it was just saddam b.s.ing us all.A buied jet doesnt prove much too me.Just another way to justify his war.They may be buried in the desert and they may not.Thats not positive proof like we were told they had.

Would you have done anything in response to 9-11? Anything at all? We ignored many terrorist acts during the 90s and this just emboldened islam. We had to oppose islam in a major way to show that America is not just a bunch of spoiled liberals afraid to stand up for themselves.

[Mooseman684]

You guys forget that some of our OWN politicians call our Semi -auto "assault weapons" Weapons of Mass Destruction....
So WMD is a relevant Term in reality...So , Don't shoot the messenger !!!

[.22guy]

Would the plane be any good after being buried like that? Seems like it would take a lot of work to get it back to flying/fighting condition.

[Zen900]

The liberals and jihadists are very upset the US attacked Iraq. They thought the US military had been subdued by them.

[troy2000]

Originally Posted by Zen900

Would you have done anything in response to 9-11? Anything at all? We ignored many terrorist acts during the 90s and this just emboldened islam. We had to oppose islam in a major way to show that America is not just a bunch of spoiled liberals afraid to stand up for themselves.

That makes about as much sense as saying we should've attacked China after Pearl Harbor. Does it really take a liberal to tell the difference between a country that attacked us, and one that just has a lot of oil and happens to be full of Muslims?

We'd have made our point better by actually getting the people who attacked us, instead of sidetracking into another country entirely and taking out one of the few secular, non-religious leaders in the Muslim world. Instead, Bin Laden is still running loose. What do you think that says about us?

And this crap of lumping "liberals" in with the jihadists is getting old, Zen. No one has ever explained to me just why liberals would want to destroy the country, considering we and our children live here too...

Anyone who calls me a traitor and says I hate America doesn't understand my beliefs, his own beliefs, or those of the people who founded this country and didn't want blind loyalty to whoever happens to be in charge.

[Coeloptera]

Originally Posted by .22guy

Would the plane be any good after being buried like that? Seems like it would take a lot of work to get it back to flying/fighting condition.

Oh, I don't doubt that it would, but there are two things in favour of it. First, the climate there is very dry, so corrosion and salt deposits are unlikely to form on or in the plane itself. Next, being buried for a comparatively short time, the sand wouldn't have much chance to actually abrade and damage any sensitive systems.

Now, of course, very nearly the entire aircraft will have to be disassembled, the sand cleaned out, all the fluids replaced (likely all drained before storage), all the electronics tested, and the airframe checked for any damage before they'd even consider testing its systems, let alone flight testing the whole thing.

But a great find, nonetheless.

And yes, I feel compelled to address people flinging "liberal" accusations around again.

Why, of course these mysterious and apparently powerful "libs" want to turn our nation over to Muslim extremists. Why, it should be obvious to everyone that there are literally millions of full-bore traitors to the US living within its borders who are working tirelessly to destroy our way of life and render us all little more than slaves or corpses.

I think they also have an alliance with the Gnomes of Zurich and the Illuminati.

Seriously, even the most hard-core Bush supporter must realize by now that both parties want little to do with him and his numerous missteps. It is not giving comfort to the enemy to point out that the POTUS made a colossal mistake and is doing next to nothing to get the guy who actually masterminded the attack on us while trying to settle an old grudge.

Zen...you're off base. We look even worse than before because we did exactly the wrong thing. We hit the wrong country (most of the hijackers were Saudis, okay? Saudis.) and, while Hussein was not a good guy, he had nothing to do with 9/11.

I'm going to say that again. Hussein and Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11. Nothing. It was a secular nation and Al Quaeda couldn't have been happier we wrecked it.

Wrong country, wrong guy executed, and finding one jet buried in the sand sure doesn't make up for the parade of heinous mistakes that have been made since that day.

I won't even get into the assaults on our freedoms that they wanted our own government to do.

Face it. We've messed up big time and likely have lost this one. We're powerful, not perfect. There's a difference.

- Coeloptera

[jerry]

you guys are fussi'n over somehting that happened several years ago.

[troy2000]

It's still happening, Jerry...