Did U.S. intelligence analysts actually “replicate” the mobile biological weapons laboratories that were supposedly deployed by Saddam Hussein, as stated in the Silberman-Robb Commission report?
Arms control expert Milton Leitenberg of the University of Maryland posed this question earlier this year.
Based on his own investigations, he has now concluded that there was no such replication of the supposed mobile BW labs.
“No mock-up containing the pieces of equipment shown in the drawings appears to have been produced, and no biological agent or simulant was produced.”
“Apparently the drawings [used in Secretary Powell’s 2003 UN presentation] were all that was ever prepared.”
“These self-conceived and self-imagined illustrations were all the ‘evidence’ that the United States government had to give to Secretary of State Powell to place before the United Nations and the world to support the claim that Iraq had mobile biological weapon production platforms…,” Dr. Leitenberg wrote.
See “Further Information Regarding US Government Attribution of a Mobile Biological Production Capacity by Iraq” by Milton Leitenberg, August 2006.
January brought a jolt of game-changing national political events and government funding brinksmanship. If Washington, D.C.’s new year resolution was for less drama in 2026, it’s failed already.
We’re launching a national series of digital service retrospectives to capture hard-won lessons, surface what worked, be clear-eyed about what didn’t, and bring digital service experts together to imagine next-generation models for digital government.
How DOE can emerge from political upheaval achieve the real-world change needed to address the interlocking crises of energy affordability, U.S. competitiveness, and climate change.
As Congress begins the FY27 appropriations process this month, congress members should turn their eyes towards rebuilding DOE’s programs and strengthening U.S. energy innovation and reindustrialization.