You have commented 339 times on Rantburg.

Your Name
Your e-mail (optional)
Website (optional)
My Original Nic        Pic-a-Nic        Sorry. Comments have been closed on this article.
Bold Italic Underline Strike Bullet Blockquote Small Big Link Squish Foto Photo
Submit your comments on this article
Syria-Lebanon-Iran
N. Koreans Taped At Syrian Reactor
2008-04-24
See the other story below for more. This story is the WaPo spin.
A video taken inside a secret Syrian facility last summer convinced the Israeli government and the Bush administration that North Korea was helping to construct a reactor similar to one that produces plutonium for North Korea's nuclear arsenal, according to senior U.S. officials who said it would be shared with lawmakers today.

The officials said the video of the remote site, code-named Al Kibar by the Syrians, shows North Koreans inside. It played a pivotal role in Israel's decision to bomb the facility late at night last Sept. 6, a move that was publicly denounced by Damascus but not by Washington.
Since we now recognize the need for an Osirak style raid ...
Sources familiar with the video say it also shows that the Syrian reactor core's design is the same as that of the North Korean reactor at Yongbyon, including a virtually identical configuration and number of holes for fuel rods. It shows "remarkable resemblances inside and out to Yongbyon," a U.S. intelligence official said. A nuclear weapons specialist called the video "very, very damning."

Nuclear weapons analysts and U.S. officials predicted that CIA Director Michael V. Hayden's planned disclosures to Capitol Hill could simplify complicate U.S. efforts to improve relations with North Korea as a way to stop its nuclear weapons program. They come as factions inside the administration and in Congress have been battling over the merits of a nuclear-related deal with North Korea.

Syrian Ambassador Imad Moustapha yesterday angrily denounced the U.S. and Israeli assertions. "If they show a video, remember that the U.S. went to the U.N. Security Council and displayed evidence and images about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. I hope the American people will not be as gullible this time around," he said.

U.S. officials said that Israel shared the video with the United States before the Sept. 6 bombing, after Bush administration officials expressed skepticism last spring that the facility, visible by satellite since 2001, was a nuclear reactor built with North Korea's assistance.

But beginning today, intelligence officials will tell members of the House and Senate intelligence, armed services and foreign relations committees that the Syrian facility was not yet fully operational and that there was no uranium for the reactor and no indication of fuel capability, according to U.S. officials and intelligence sources.

David Albright, president of Institute for Science and International Security (ISIS) and a former U.N. weapons inspector, said the absence of such evidence warrants skepticism that the reactor was part of an active weapons program. "The United States and Israel have not identified any Syrian plutonium separation facilities or nuclear weaponization facilities," he said. "The lack of any such facilities gives little confidence that the reactor is part of an active nuclear weapons program. The apparent lack of fuel, either imported or indigenously produced, also is curious and lowers confidence that Syria has a nuclear weapons program."
Sure, and why would the Syrians and Norks put all this time into a facility when they hadn't identified their own separation facility and weapons facilities? Just liked tossing money around? Mr. Albright is an idiot: the Israelis uncovered one part of the total package and, rather than wait to uncover the whole schmeer (right around the time things might go 'boom'), decided to act.
U.S. intelligence officials will also tell the lawmakers that the site Syria has built at Al Kibar is not for a reactor. "The successful engagement of North Korea in the six-party talks means that it was unlikely to have supplied Syria with such facilities or nuclear materials after the reactor site was destroyed," Albright said. "Indeed, there is little, if any, evidence that cooperation between Syria and North Korea extended beyond the date of the destruction of the reactor."

The timing of the congressional briefing is nonetheless awkward for the Bush administration's diplomatic initiative to persuade North Korea to abandon its nuclear program and permanently disable the reactor at Yongbyon. The CIA's hand was forced, officials said, because influential lawmakers had threatened to cut off funding for the U.S. diplomatic effort unless they received a full account of what the administration knew.

Also, the terms of a tentative U.S.-North Korean deal require that North Korean officials acknowledge U.S. evidence about its help with the Syrian program, and so the disclosures to Congress are meant to preempt what North Korea may eventually say.

Following talks with the South Korean president last weekend, President Bush said that it was premature to make a judgment about whether North Korea was willing to follow through with a commitment to publicly declare its nuclear-related programs, materials and facilities.

Washington and Pyongyang still differ over what should be included in that declaration, a State Department official said. Sung Kim, the State Department director of the Office of Korean Affairs, is in Pyongyang for discussions about the contents.

Syria's top envoy to Washington said the CIA briefings were meant to undermine diplomatic efforts with North Korea, not to confront Syria. Why, Moustapha said, are "they repeating the same lies and fabrications when they were planning to attack Iraq? The reason is simple: It's about North Korea, not Syria. The neoconservative elements are having the upper hand."

He added, "We do not want to plan to acquire nuclear technology as we understand the reality of this world and have seen what the U.S. did to Iraq even when it did not have a nuclear program. So we are not going to give them a pretext to attack Syria."

The facility at issue used to include a tall, boxy structure that once housed a gas-graphite reactor, and was located seven miles north of the desert village of At Tibnah in the Dayr az Zawr region, 90 miles from the Iraqi border, according to photographs released by the ISIS, a nonprofit research group.
Posted by:Steve White

#6  I hope someone's keeping track of the weenies that are denying, lying, and politicizing what the Israeli government and others are cleary proving to the world. Those people need to "not have their contract renewed" - for breathing. "Intelligence Officials" that try to distort reality to save their own a$$es need to hang - preferably from the Anacostia River bridge, where everybody in Washington can see the bodies.
Posted by: Old Patriot   2008-04-24 20:24  

#5  hope the NK scientists were inside when it went Kaboom

We can only hope it was that target rich.
Posted by: DarthVader   2008-04-24 13:14  

#4  hope the NK scientists were inside when it went Kaboom
Posted by: Frank G   2008-04-24 10:15  

#3  Forgot to add WORLDNEWS/TOPIX > NORTH KOREA'S NUCLEAR LINKS TO SYRIA.
Posted by: JosephMendiola   2008-04-24 03:26  

#2  ION NOKOR, WORLDNEWS > IHT.com - ENDING NORTH KOREA'S NUCLEAR PROGRAM?

Artcile - Thanx to POTUS Dubya's questionable decisionmaking/thinking, NORTH KOREA SINCE 2001 COVERTLY ADDED TO ITS PLUTONIUM NUCMAT STOCKPILES AND NOW HAD ENUFF TO DEV EIGHT OR MORE NUCLEAR BOMBS, as opposed to 1-2 only back in 2001???

ALso on WORLDNEWS [paraph] > PLUTONIUM ON THE EUPHRATES, + BUSH CLEVELY BOXES OVER US-ROK ALLIANCE/ BUSH DECISION TO KEEP US TROOP LEVELS IN SOUTH KOREA CONSTANT HAS SERIOUS IMPLICATIONS THROUGHOUT ASIA.

*TOPIX > DOES NORTH KOREA HAVE PLUTONIUM WARHEADS/BOMBS? + MORTH KOREA'S PLUTONIUM: HAS THE US, WEST FAILED TO STOP PROLIFERATION FOREVER?
Posted by: JosephMendiola   2008-04-24 03:25  

#1  The Israelis took video inside the Syrian nuclear facility? Flying robots the size of flies, or suborning people who ought not be subornable? Or, Special Forces who really are ghosts, able to wander at will without being seen. (Sleep well, Bilal and Hafiz! The Mossadniks camped under your bed will keep you safe... until they leave, anyway.) Whichever, very impressive indeed.
Posted by: trailing wife    2008-04-24 03:02  

00:00