Gold Star Mom: Iraq Had WMDs

A Gold Star mom who lost her son in Iraq said Sunday that there was enough evidence that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction to justify going to war against Saddam Hussein.

"I have no concern about there being weapons of mass destruction of some regard there, that were going to be used against Americans," Rhonda Winfield told "Fox News Sunday."

Mrs. Winfield was responding to fellow Gold Star mother Barbara Porchia, who insisted during the same segment that there were no WMDs in Iraq.
"I have seen photos of entire fighter jets buried in the sand", Mrs. Winfield countered. "I have seen pictures of entire caches of weapons that just my son's unit would uncover."

Mrs. Winfield, who lost her son, Lance Corporal Jason Redifer, in January 2005, was referring to the July 2003 discovery by U.S. Marines of more than 30 still-functional fighter aircraft buried beneath the sands of Baghdad.

Her comments show that at least some families of troops serving in Iraq do not accept the widespread misconception that Saddam had no weapons of mass destruction before the U.S. attacked in March 2003.

Among the WMD evidence discounted by the press [and almost never noted by the Bush administration]:


500 tons of yellow cake uranium stored at Saddam's al Tuwaitha nuclear weapons development facility, which was secured by U.S. troops after the invasion.

1.8 tons of partially enriched uranium discovered at al Tuwaitha, which was removed by the U.S. Energy Department in June 2004 amidst warnings it could be used to produce a dirty bomb.

Centrifuge parts and blueprints hidden by one of Saddam's top nuclear scientists, who told U.S. interrogators that he was ordered to keep the bombmaking tools ready to resume production at a moment's notice.

Satellite photos from 2002 that showed new construction at al Tuwaitha, which had been largely destroyed in U.S. bombing raids during the first Gulf War and Operation Desert Fox.

The discovery of nearly two dozen artillery shells loaded with Sarin and mustard gas, which was reported in June 2004 by Iraq Survey Group chief Charles Duelfer.
"I know why my son went there," Mrs. Winfield told Fox. "They watched those towers fall and they knew that the liberties that we have were something that they believed were worth fighting for."