Iraq's Missile Program: The Smoking Gun Is Really A Rocket Engine

How Hans "Inspector Clouseau" Blix Misses The Obvious ROPMA Editorial Staff February 22nd, 2003

Much has been written and published about Iraq's Missile Program, and the debate around how far Iraq's Al-Samoud missle rages on.  Anyone who's followed with interest the Useless Nations debate on how far Iraq's missiles are allowed to fly, has been seriously misled by Hans Blix and in fact our own U.S. Government.  The focus has been on the missile and not on the engine which is where it should be.  It is the rocket engine technology that has been developed by North Korea that is in play in Iraq, and ironically it is here we see the logical reason why President Bush last year labeled Iran, Iraq & North Korea "The Axis of Evil."

It has been with great interest that yours truly has been following and researching the "Axis of Evil" as Iran, Iraq & North Korea have been come to be known as over the last year.  Of particular interest has been the sharing of Nuclear Program Technology and Rocket Engine Technology. 

In order to understand why we here at ROPMA.Net are focusing on the engine, one must have a basic understanding of the shared missile technology between Iran, Iraq & North Korea.  Let's start with the basics.

The platform for the Axis of Evil's missile technology comes from the original Russian SCUD missile.  The SCUD was a staple of the former Soviet Union/Russian military and was extensively used in regional conflicts such as Chechnya.  The SCUD has long been thought to be a "regional only" type of weapon due to its limited range - typically 150 kilometers (93 miles.)

As Communist states are likely to do, Russia shared the SCUD missile with its allies, North Korea and Iraq back in the 80's.  North Korea quickly adopted the SCUD as its missile development platform as the SCUD was relatively small, easily transportable and was developed on a technology platform designed  to be upgraded.  The SCUD missile had one small problem: it's guidance systems weren't very reliable and the SCUD had a tendency to drift off target.  We saw evidence of this during Desert Storm, where SCUD missiles thankfully frequently landed outside of highly populated areas, often  missing their targets.

But North Korea is an industrious nation.  The adoption of the SCUD missile happened quickly.  North Korea quickly re-designed, engineered and tested improvements to the guidance system of the SCUD.  At the same time, North Korea imported rocket technology from fellow Communist country, China.  This rocket technology was adapted to fit the SCUD platform, transforming the SCUD from a simple single-stage rocket to a two-stage rocket with double the original range.  These two improvements allowed North Korea to deploy SCUD missile technology (now re-named the TaePong) north of the DMZ and threaten its neighbor South Korea.  North Korea now had what it wanted: the means to threaten Seoul.

About 1988 towards the end of the Iraq/Iran war, Iraq acquired extended range rocket engines designed for the SCUD missile.  These SA-2 engines dramatically increased the range of the SCUD missile.  As we see in a published report in 1988 from The Commission to Assess the Ballistic Missile Threat to the United States :

On December 8, 1989, Iraq again surprised the analytic and U.S. policy community by claiming to have tested a rocket--the al-'Abid (Worshipper)--capable of carrying a satellite into orbit. The al-'Abid consisted of a booster stage of five clustered Scud-B rocket motors, a second stage consisting of a Scud-B rocket motor, and a third stage consisting of a modified SA-2 missile.

The total weight of the rocket was 48 tons. However, despite Iraq's claims of a successful test, the test flight of reportedly was unsuccessful.  There was no evidence that the separation of the first stage ever took place, or that the second stage motor was ignited. If the launch was intended to test only the first stage clustered motor, then the test might have been considered successful. According to Carus and Bermudez, Iraq's ability to develop a clustered motor (first stage) was an "impressive technical achievement." 17

A second announcement that day claimed Iraq had produced two different missiles with a 2,000 km (1250 mile) range, called the Tammuz 1 (July, month of the Ba'th revolution and Saddam's 1979 takeover). The Tammuz 1 reportedly had an extended range Scud-B booster and a modified SA-2 second stage.

So what does 1988 have to do with today? After all, America destroyed those weapons during Desert Storm, didn't they?  Not necessarily.  Most of these missiles were never found.  In fact, the missiles found by Hans Blix and his Inspector Clouseau's  in January were only the "tip of the iceberg" as Blix himself called it. 

In Jane's Defense Weekly dated February 14th, Blix Reports:

Blix also confirmed that the two declared variants of the Al Samoud surface- to-surface missile were capable of exceeding the 150km range restriction imposed by the UN. In an October 2002 report the UK Government stated that the range of Al Samoud had been increased to 200km.  

The Al Samoud is a liquid propellant missile with a 500mm diameter. However, in a December report to the UN Security Council Blix said that Iraq had declared a variant with a 760mm diameter.

The 760mm diameter Al-Samoud's distance as reported, puts Iraq's missile program in violation of U.N. Resolution 687 (passed in 1991 under the terms of Surrender for Iraq) and all subsequent resolutions, including 1441 passed in November of 2002.

But this gets worse - much worse. 

Later on in the same Jane's Defense Weekly article, Blix Reports:

Above we noted that the SA-2 rocket engine could achieve a range of 1,250 miles on a 48 ton rocket.  In fact, back in 1988 Iraq already had a SCUD-B missile (a predecessor to the Al-Samoud missile) capable of flying 1,250 miles!

So what does this mean?  It means Iraq is lying and deceiving as usual.  And Hans "Inspector Clouseau" Blix is falling for it.

On Saturday Feb. 22nd, Iraq "demonstrated" the capabilities of the Al-Samoud missile by firing one into its western desert.  The problem is, the missile that Iraq test-fired for Hans Blix's benefit did not have an SA-2 engine!!  The "test" itself was designed to have the Al-Samoud fly under 93 miles to satisfy U.N. (Useless Nations) weapons inspectors.  Apparently, Iraq succeeded in this deception.

Global Security.Org has published extensively on the Al-Samoud missile.  Quoting Global Security:

Iraq has continued to work on the two SRBM systems with ranges of less than 150 km authorized by the United Nations: the liquid-propellant Al-Samoud, and the solid-propellant Ababil-100. The Al-Samoud is essentially a scaled-down Scud, and the program allows Baghdad to develop technological improvements that could be applied to a longer range missile program. According to the CIA, the Al- Samoud missile, as designed, is capable of exceeding the UN-permitted 150-km- range restriction with a potential operational range of about 180 kilometers. Once economic sanctions against Iraq are lifted, Baghdad probably will begin converting these efforts into longer range missile systems, unless restricted by future UN monitoring.

But Iraq hasn't waited for UN Sanctions to be lifted, and between 1988 and November 2002 U.N. weapons inspectors were persona-non-grata in Iraq.   In Jane's Defense Weekly dated February 14th 2002, Hans Blix reports that Iraq admitted to importing 380 SA-2 Engines.  Were these SA-2 Engines to be modified to fit the Al-Samoud?  YES!  Iraq demonstrated it had the capability to retro-fit the SA-2 to the SCUD Missile Platform (of which the Al-Samoud is a descendant) back in 1988!

In September 2002, the British Dossier on Iraq's Weapons of Mass Destruction estimated that Iraq possessed the experience and technology necessary to develop chemical & biological warheads for the Al-Samoud ballistic missile.  In fact, British MI-5 intelligence estimated that at least 50 chemical warheads had been produced for deployment in the Al-Samoud platform.  (Remember the missile warheads found in January 2002 that were being tested for Chemical weapons?  Iraq *does* have the technology.)

So what does all this mean at the end of the day?  It's quite simple really, and if Hans Blix would ever pull his head out of his ass he'd know it too:

• Iraq possesses a missile platform capable of housing Chemical, Biological & Nuclear weapons warheads in the Al-Samoud.  (A SCUD missile descendant)

• Iraq possesses more than 380 SA-2 Rocket Engines, capable of propelling a 48 ton missile 1,250 miles.   That's far enough to reach southern Europe/France.

• Iraq possesses the intelligence and demonstrated know-how to couple the SA-2 Rocket Engine to the SCUD missile platform

• By coupling the Al-Samoud, the SA-2 Rocket Engine and Chemical/Biological weapons warheads, Iraq has the ability to become a global threat very quickly.

Early on, we spoke about North Korea's adoption of the SCUD missile platform and the development of the SA-2 rocket engine.  The SA-2 Rocket Engine is capable of three and four stage configurations.  It is this configuration that North Korea has developed in the Taepong-2 four-stage missile which is capable of hitting the West Coast, more than 4,000 miles from North Korea.

Is it within the realm of possibility that North Korea would share (or sell) three and four stage rocket engines with its Axis of Evil partner, Iraq?  Based on past history, the answer is an unequivocal YES.

And that, makes Iraq a global threat.

Wake up Hans.  Here's your smoking gun.

Sources:

Global Security.Org - The Al-Samoud Missle:

UN Experts Find Iraq's Al- Samoud Missle Exceeds Permissible Ban

Janes Defense Weekly

Commission to Assess the Ballistic Missile Threat to the United States