KHIDHIR HAMZA

The helter-skelter looting was rank evidence that Iraq expected to
be evicted. What Saddam still worried about, however, was the cap-
ture of Baghdad and his personal vulnerability. For him, there was
no escape. Where could he go?

Accordingly, he ordered General al-Saadi to organize a two-
pronged defense. The first was to load chemical and biological war-
heads onto Iraqi missiles, in the event Allied troops stormed through
the gates of Baghdad. But the second, and ultimately more relevant
prong was to bury thousands of chemical and biological weapons in
southern Iraq, at Basra, Nasiriyah, Simawa, Diwaniyah, and Hilla,
the likely routes of the Allied invasion. His thinking was that the
Allies, following U.S. tactical doctrine, would blow up the bunkers
as they advanced, releasing plumes of invisible gas into the prevail-
ing winds and ultimately onto themselves. Any depots the Allies
missed could be blown up by retreating Republican Guard units.
The invaders literally wouldn't know what hit them, until it was too
late-maybe weeks or months after the conflict ended. The pattern
of contamination would be so disparate, the symptoms so amor-
phous, the sources of illness couldn't be easily confirmed.

"Iraq would be hell to the invaders, win or lose, Saddam gambled. A corollary benefit was that the chemical shower would decimate the despised Shia in the south, whom he concluded were of little concern to the Allies, given their potential role as troops for Iran. In any event, if chemical residues were eventually detected, the Americans would have only themselves to blame. And the West would tie itself in knots over an appropriate retaliation. Washington, Saddam reasoned, had no stomach for carrying our retaliation in kind.

On the night of January 16, 1991, Iraq's top nuclear officials met
for a candle-lit dinner at Le Soufotel, a French restaurant in down-
town Baghdad. The dinner was to celebrate my new good fortune
at being assigned away from AE.

The gathering was official self-delusion at its worst. The Allied
air campaign was scheduled to kick off in four hours, yet many
Iraqi officials were still in denial, despite weeks of repeated warn-
ings from Washington.

"It's all a bluff," a colleague uttered, drawing agreeable guffaws around the table. "These guys have no stomach for a land war.

SADDAM'S BOMBMAKER

in other cancer rates. The pediatric wards, meanwhile, were becoming a nightmare, as a growing number of mothers just walked out after giving birth to deformed babies. Most of them were Shiites from the contaminated zones.

Gulf War Syndrome was well known to everybody in İraq, but Saddam remained silent. In this he had a secret ally-the U.S. Pentagon, which continued to deny that there was proof of a war-based disease despite growing evidence to the contrary. But evidence soon leaked of Allied forces blowing up chemical dumps during the war, and of the U.S.government's efforts to suppress repeated reports of contamination by units during the conflict.

The conspiracy of silence has remained to this day. Saddam has no interest in confessing his use of chemical and biological weapons, nor does Washington, which would be confronted by an outraged people to do something about it-and Saddam-if the deliberate contamination became known. Both sides have suppressed the real causes of Gulf War Syndrome because it has been convenient for both. Saddam blames the sickness on malnutrition and drug shortages caused by the embargo, and Washington blames it on...nothing.

After the war, officials like me were prohibited from visiting Baghdad hotels or other public places frequented by UNSCOM inspectors. The regime figured, rightly, that we'd be tempted to contact a foreigner and run.

My friend Ahmed Numan had a chilling experience with one of the inspectors. U.S.-educated and fluent in English, Ahmed was assigned to the Iraqi team that dealt with UNSCOM. His attitude was friendly but careful, especially with the Americans, who often quizzed him on why he didn't return to the United States. One day one of them pressed a scrap of paper into his hand with his name and telephone number on it. Numan tucked it discreetly into his pocket and went home. At midnight, a security officer knocked on his door.

"Where is the paper?" he asked. Numan didn't even consider bluffing. He turned around, walked back into his house, retrieved the scrap of paper, and handed it over to the security man. It was a warning, he knew. A lot of questions and trouble would follow. Many others had run. Jaffar's cook had disappeared with his

Mrs. MALONEY. And he raises really an alarming statement, and I would like to just quote from his statement here. He says, "the Gulf war syndrome was well known to everyone in Iraq, but Saddam remained silent. In this he had a secret ally, the U.S. Pentagon, which continued to deny that there was proof of a war-based disaster-war-based disease despite growing evidence to the contrary. But evidence soon leaked of allied forces blowing up chemical dumps during the war and of the U.S. Government efforts to suppress repeated efforts of reports of the contamination of our troops."

He also on page 244 talks about Saddam's effort to put biological or that he did put, according to him, biological and chemical weapons into missiles that he was going to fire on the U.S. military if they went into Baghdad, but that he had a more sinister plan in that he buried chemical and biological weapons in southern Iraq, knowing that the tactics of the U.S. military would be to blow up the bunkers; therefore, they would release the contaminated material, they would not even know that they were affected, and that they would then be laden with chemical and biological disease from these terrible weapons.

I'd like to ask you if you, No. 1, have read the book; No. 2, your comments on what Saddam's bomb maker, Mr. Hamza, who has defected to the West and I understand is working with our military and has been very outspoken against Saddam in hearings, publicly and so forth.

Dr. WINKENWERDER. I have not read the book, Congressman. I have heard of the book. And by all accounts, it is a-from what I understand, is a reliable piece of information.

Mrs. MALONEY. Are you aware that our troops were exposed to these biological weapons? The allegation that he makes that our Pentagon knows, that Saddam knows, that people in Iraq know that our troops were exposed to these terrible chemicals in the Gulf war?

Dr. WINKENWERDER. Well, from all the information that I've been presented during my tenure, no one has ever indicated to me that there is any knowledge of an acute exposure or the exhibiting of symptoms that would suggest an acute exposure to chemical or nerve agents during that conflict.

Mr. SHAYS. Would the gentlelady yield? I'll make sure she gets additional time.

Mrs. MALONEY. Sure.

Dr. WINKENWERDER. That is a separate question, an acute exposure, someone who is acutely ill, than the issue of whether there were low levels of exposure

Mrs. MALONEY. Were there low levels of exposure?

Dr. WINKENWERDER. Well, that is what the whole Khamisiyah incident is about.

Mr. SHAYS. This is very important, and I don't want-since this is testimony under oath, I do want to make sure. There are really two issues, but one issue is sites. The only one that the Department of Defense has acknowledged is Khamisiyah. So I would love it if you would ask the question of whether there were other sites, and then get into this other shoe. But I want to make

Mrs. MALONEY. Were there other sites besides Khamisiyah where they were exposed to chemical weapons?

Dr. WINKENWERDER. Not to my knowledge.

Dr. Kilpatrick.

Dr. KILPATRICK. I can answer that. In looking at

Mr. SHAYS. A little closer to the mic, Doctor.

Dr. KILPATRICK. In looking at the air war campaign, it's very clear that at his storage sites at Al Muthanna and Mahamadia there were releases of chemical agents. In one location we have no indication there were American troops in the area where that plume would have gone, and the other area there were possibly up to 70 Special Forces people in that area, but there were no coalition forces or American forces in that area.

Then Khamisiyah is the third area, and that's been widely publicized and put out, and certainly we've identified the 101,000 American forces who were in that hazard area that was determined.

Mrs. MALONEY. Well, Mr. Hamza alleges that Iraqis were likewise exposed, and women gave birth to deformed children. People died of cancer early. People had Parkinson's-like neurological problems. And he blamed it all on malnutrition, according to this professor, and he likewise said that the same symptoms or he alleges are now in the troops who regrettably were exposed to these terrible chemicals in the war.

If you have any other information, if you could get back to the chairman on it, on how many troops we think were exposed, where they were exposed and what chemicals-what chemicals do we think they were exposed to? Do you have an idea of what the chemicals were or biological weapon they were exposed to? Do you have an idea what it was?

Dr. WINKENWERDER. Yes.

And Dr. Kilpatrick.

Dr. KILPATRICK. In all three areas, sarin-cyclosarin were the agents that we were concerned about. As far as biological agents, we don't have any indication that American troops were exposed to biological agents. We do know that bombs and rockets filled with biological agents were found by the United Nations Special Commission, but we have no indication that they were ever launched against Americans.

Mrs. MALONEY. Excuse me. Go ahead, Mr. Chairman. My time is up. I'd like to continue with this questioning.

Mr. SHAYS. Why don't you ask the next question, and then we'll

Mrs. MALONEY. If you have another question.

Mr. SHAYS. I just want to say to you that it's a little unsettling to me, because we've had so many instances-DOD has insisted that the only place that our troops were exposed was at Khamisiyah, and now we're hearing that we had other troops that were nearby. So I'm not sure whether I should consider this new information or old information, but it is a little unsettling to me, because either way it's new to me. And so I want to be clear that you have said that-there were two other sites. I want you to say what those sites were, and I want you to be very clear as to what

level of the amount of chemicals we think were onsite and compare them to Khamisiyah.

Dr. KILPATRICK. Those reports we released in the last 2 years, and I can get you specific details. Al Muthanna is one site, and Mahamadia is the other site. These were large production storage sites in Iraq near Baghdad, and they were damaged during the air war. We don't know exactly which day, because the bombing runs in each of those sites were over some 17 days. We don't know whether the release was at one time or over multiple periods of time. The determination of the hazard area assumed a release of all agent at one time, and the amount of agent is information that we receive from CIA, and they have recently released a report to give that amount. We can provide that to you.

Mr. SHAYS. Well, I understand we have the GAO looking at this, but the plume modeling-but one thing I want to ask you would be then how many American troops do you think-first off, it's unsettling no matter what humanity was there, but how many Americans do you think were at

Dr. KILPATRICK. At Al Muthanna, we don't believe there were any Americans in the area. At Mahamadia, we believe that there were up to 70 Special Forces, and we have identified them and notified them.

Mr. SHAYS. And have you notified the VA?

Dr. KILPATRICK. And that's been done also, yes.

Mr. SHAYS. OK. I thank the gentlelady for asking those questions.

Mrs. MALONEY. Mr. Chairman, could I followup with other sites that

Mr. SHAYS. Yes. Why don't we do that real quick.

Mrs. MALONEY. They mentioned that they had it really as a war strategy, burying these chemicals knowing we might bomb them. The symptoms would not arise until weeks, months later. They would not know where it came from.

But he mentions that they were buried, thousands of chemical weapons in southern Iraq at Basra, Nasiriyah, Simawa, Diwaniyah, and Hilla, the likely routes of the allied invasion. And he says that that's what they did, and that we walked into that trap.

Dr. WINKENWERDER. I think you can conclude that this provides a good window into the twisted mind of Saddam Hussein. Mr. SHAYS. But is that an answer that is a yes?

Dr. WINKENWERDER. We will take that information for the record, and certainly

Dr. KILPATRICK. And I have no information at this time to be able to comment positively or negatively. I have no knowledge that in fact is true.

Mrs. MALONEY. Just very briefly, for years, literally, the Pentagon denied that they were exposed to chemical weapons, and he says that in the book. Why did we do that when we knew that they were exposed? And when did we acknowledge in the timeframe that they were exposed to chemical weapons?

Dr. WINKENWERDER. Let me just say this. I cannot speak for those who had my responsibility or were associated with those re