• Military

• WMD Menu                           

• Introduction
• Systems
• Facilities
• Agencies
• Operations
• Countries
• Hot Documents
• News
• Reports
• Policy
• Budget
• Congress
• Links

• Intelligence
• Homeland Security
• Space

DoD News Briefing

.................

Q: Do you have a status report on Iraq before we go into this sort of blackout period as far as the U.S. is concerned, on any of its troop movements, any of its air defense activities, any aspect of its ground?

A: I guess I should break that question down into three topics. The first is, in Iraq itself we continue to see them organize their air defense systems in a way that apparently has three goals. The first is to protect strategic or key sites such as presidential palaces; weapons of mass destruction facilities; or other key military and operational facilities.

The second is they still appear to be organizing their SA-2 long-range missiles in a way that would position them to perhaps be able to shoot down a U-2 flying over Central Iraq for UNSCOM, but we have seen no attempt to do that, and indeed the threatening rhetoric that they used back in early November has ceased. And they are no longer making the threatening rhetoric about the U-2 flights.

Three, we continue to see them moving around other missile systems in their air defense system in a way that makes it appear as if they're trying to set up ambushes for the planes flying over Southern Iraq below the 33rd Parallel as part of Operation SOUTHERN WATCH. But there have been no threats or attempts to ambush any of these fighters recently, but we do see the movements of their air defense systems in ways that appear to position them to do that.

So that's the air defense situation.

Many of their ground forces continue to remain dispersed, which we think is for defensive reasons, and of course the dispersal makes it more difficult for them to operate in an offensive way if they are spread out with their equipment.

The second point deals with UNSCOM. UNSCOM is continuing with its inspections. There was an inspection of a semi-sensitive site, an agricultural facility, yesterday. They did get into the facility; they checked out computers and other things in the facility. There was some delay, but they did get into the facility.

The U-2 flights have been continuing. There was one a day or two ago which spent about four hours over Central Iraq. It did what it was supposed to do and came back. It was unchallenged, as I said.

You should check this with UNSCOM, but I believe there will be an interruption in the inspections for awhile over the holidays.

The third action, the third part of this is, of course, the disposition of our forces in the Gulf. There are approximately 29,800 soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines on patrol in the Gulf as we speak -- two carrier battle groups. There's been no change in the disposition of those forces. I guess the Air Expeditionary Force came out several days ago, not the Air Expeditionary Force, the INTRINSIC ACTION force, the Army troops operating in Kuwait, but they've been replaced by some Marines who are doing some exercises in the area.

We should all think of these men and women in uniform over the holiday season. There are 106,000 American military personnel deployed today and through the holiday season. This is an unusual year in that it's one of the three times every century that Hanukkah, Christmas, and the beginning of Ramadan occur all in the same week. So it's the three major monotheistic religions celebrating some of their holiest days all pretty much at the same time. Ramadan, of course, begins December 30th or 31st and lasts for a month. So it's a time to think about these men and women serving our country away from home.

Q: Do you know if overflights or inspections will take place during Ramadan?

A: That's something you'd have to ask UNSCOM, but my belief is yes, that there will be some overflights, and presumably some inspections as well during Ramadan.

Q: The President laid out some goals for getting out of Bosnia. What are the goals for getting out of Haiti?

A: Well, we're pretty much out of Haiti. There is a small group of mainly engineering troops down there now, maybe 400 people. They are doing some construction projects and other work for the Haitian people. They've worked on schools, they've worked on roads. These forces rotate in and out. It's been good training for the forces, and it's also helped provide an element of stability in Haiti.

The number of forces there can go up or down, depending on the size of the exercises they're undertaking at the time, but I wouldn't anticipate that we'd get much above or below the current level for awhile.

Q: On Iran's weapons program, there were two published reports in the "Bird" this morning. One quotes Israeli intelligence sources as saying that Iran is closer than previously thought to having a workable bomb; and the other article, the thrust of it, was that they're making progress on ballistic missiles which might deliver such a weapon with help from the Russians. Can you enlighten us any more on that?

A: I can't comment on the specifics of those reports, because I don't comment on intelligence reports and certainly not on Israeli intelligence reports. But it is true that Iran is working on four programs that are worrisome to us and should be worrisome to all countries in the area. These programs are nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons programs, and also the development of longer range missiles.

These programs have been the concern of this government at the absolutely highest levels. President Clinton has discussed them with President Yeltsin; Vice President Gore has discussed them with Prime Minister Chernomyrdin; State Department Ambassador Frank Wisner, who's been visiting Russia on a semi-regular basis to discuss the missile program. As you know, President Clinton and President Jiang Zemin reached an agreement dealing with Chinese supply of materials to the Iranian nuclear program when President Jiang was here. So we are working very hard to contain these programs. We think they are menacing and potentially dangerous programs. We share the Israeli view in that respect. But I can't get into the specifics.

You probably...just to close up on this unless you have another question, but we did put out a report last month, the Proliferation, Threat and Response report, which provided considerable detail about the Iranian weapons of mass destruction programs.

Q: Is this a time of increased concern, or you've been concerned with it right along. Is this in recent days, recent weeks, is there increased concern?

A: No. I think there's been a consistent concern over a period of time, and it's something we continue to watch very closely, and something we continue to discourage through dealings with other countries such as China and Russia, and quite frankly, our European allies as well.

Q: Have you had success in trying to discourage the Russians, in particular, from dealing with Iran on ballistic missiles?

A: I can't comment on details on that one, because I haven't followed it closely enough. I think in general, we believe we have had success in two areas -- alerting other countries to the problem, and to what role their dealings with Iran can play in accentuating the problem; and two, getting them to cut back on certain types of exports. The Russians are members of the Missile Technology Control Regime. They have said they want to adhere to that regime. The government of Russia has said they are not in violation with that regime. One of the problems we have is whether there are freelance sales or shipments taking place by former government entities or by individuals in the government who may be engaged in trying to help Iran, and the government of Russia has said that they will do their best to try to stop that if that's taking place.

I think we feel that we are getting a good response from the countries with which we're dealing on this topic. Does that mean we've been able to shut off flows of technology? No. Not yet. That's a difficult thing to do, but we're working on it.

As I said, this is a matter of real concern and real focus at the highest level of this government and it's something that we continue to keep working on.

.......................