Scott McClellan was asked this morning for the White House’s reaction to the fact that 377 tons of deadly explosives went missing from the Al Qaqaa facility after the administration ignored requests to secure the site. True to form, he tried to accentuate the positive.
White House spokesman Scott McClellan played down the threat posed by explosives missing from the Al Qaqaa military installation. He said there was no threat of nuclear proliferation, and preferred to concentrate on weapons destroyed, not those lost.
“We have destroyed more than 243,000 munitions,” he said. “We’ve secured another nearly 163,000 that will be destroyed.”
This won’t do. McClellan is confident that this is not a nuclear proliferation threat, but let’s not forget that the explosives the administration chose not to secure are used to “detonate nuclear weapons.” It’s why the International Atomic Energy Agency cared about Al Qaqaa in the first place.
Second, the “look at all the other munitions we’ve destroyed” defense is almost laughably inane. This facility had 377 tons of deadly explosives. The bomb that took down Pan Am Flight 103 over Scotland used less than one pound of this same explosive — and there were 760,000 pounds at Al Qaqaa. I’m delighted that we’ve secured some 409,000 munitions, but it doesn’t come close to answering the relevant question. Indeed, it suggests the White House can’t think of an answer to that question.
One anonymous administration official came up with something that’s almost, but not quite, as hilarious in explaining why this scandal has been kept secret.
The discovery was not made public sooner because standard intelligence practice is not to let the enemy know such information, the official said.
Umm, isn’t the enemy the one who took the 377 tons of explosives? Hasn’t the enemy already been using these explosives as part of the daily attacks on U.S. troops? Isn’t it safe to assume they already know about the munitions that are already in their possession?
Anyone who supports Bush because they think he’s keeping them safe just isn’t paying attention.