Baghdad N-bomb possible in months

LONDON - Iraq could build a nuclear bomb within months if it obtained fissile material from abroad, a leading independent think-tank said last night.

John Chipman, director of the International Institute for Strategic Studies, told BBC radio that if President Saddam Hussein acquired enriched uranium with foreign aid, Iraq could put a nuclear warhead on a missile capable of hitting Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Israel, Turkey, Jordan and Iran within a year.

"They were always aiming to be able to arm their ballistic missiles with a nuclear weapon so it would be just a question of working on the physics for a number of months, maybe a year, to be able to marry the warhead to a ballistic missile," Chipman said, before the release of an institute study on Iraq's suspected weapons of mass destruction.

The institute report comes amid fierce debate about a possible United States-led war to oust Saddam. British officials said that Prime Minister Tony Blair had seen the report.

Chipman said Saddam's use of chemical weapons in the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq war suggested he was building up his stockpiles so he had "an instrument of last resort".

Iraq had retained important stockpiles of both chemical and biological weapons from stocks built up before the 1991 Gulf War and the 7 1/2- year United Nations weapons inspection regime.

He said Iraq's civilian infrastructure could be diverted to create new stocks of chemical and biological weapons in weeks or months but its ability to use them in battle was limited.

"[Iraq's] ballistic missiles have impact fuses, which means that much of the agent would be destroyed on impact. So they would be important as a terror weapon but they would not be militarily all that significant in battle."

In Australia, Prime Minister John Howard has confirmed that Saddam had replaced Osama bin Laden as Australia's key target, reflecting the hardening priorities of the United States and Britain.

Although reversing earlier belligerency at the weekend and urging President George W. Bush to seek UN approval for any military strike against Iraq, Howard made it clear yesterday that there would be limits to the new appeal to the Security Council.

Howard also left open the door to Australian participation in any US-led action.

US Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage told the Sydney Morning Herald that if Washington decided to attack Iraq, Australia would be asked to commit forces.

Howard said no decision had been reached.

"What I can say in general terms is that if Australia is ever asked to be involved in any kind of military action ... we would only ever decide to be involved if it were in our national interest to do so," he said.

"And we would obviously only be involved to the extent of our military capacity. We're not going to overstretch ourselves ... "

Howard's remarks follow increasing domestic concern at Canberra's earlier rhetoric against Iraq.

They suggest a change in tactics, followed also by the US and Britain, allowing Baghdad and the UN a final chance to find a diplomatic solution and agree to unfettered access to Iraq by UN weapons inspectors.

If Saddam continued to refuse to abide by UN requirements the US, with Britain and Australia, could then push for an ultimatum.

As Bush prepared for what is expected to be a hard-line address to the UN on Friday following Thursday's September 11 memorials, Howard indicated this would be Saddam's last chance.

He said that reasonable people would "sit up and think maybe we should do something about it" if the world sat by and did nothing about Iraq's refusal to abide by UN obligations to allow inspectors to oversee the destruction of weapons of mass destruction.

Earlier yesterday, Scott Ritter, a former UN arms inspector who rejects US charges that Baghdad is developing weapons of mass destruction, said in Baghdad that it would be a "historical mistake" for Washington to attack Iraq.

Ritter, a US national, who was a member of the UN body in charge of dismantling Iraq's weapons, urged Baghdad to let UN weapons inspectors return.

- AUSTRALIA CORRESPONDENT, REUTERS

Further reading:
Feature: War with Iraq

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