I have written several times about the issue of the mobile laboratories in Iraq and the subsequent conventional wisdom that they served as hydrogen generators for weather balloons instead of WMD production facilities. In April, I pointed out that the hydrogen theory came as a minority opinion within the CIA/DIA teams that reviewed the two labs captured by the Coalition. One month later, Joseph Shahda translated a key memo showing that the Iraqis spent $33 million on the mobile labs in September 2002, while America decided to take military action against the Iraqis, and that the same agency that controlled Iraq's WMD programs (the Military Industrialization Committee) arranged to purchase these facilities.

One key point (besides the memo) that undermines the argument for a civil hydrogen production facility is the ease in which the Iraqis could already produce and store hydrogen. Oil refining creates hydrogen in fairly large quantities as a normal byproduct. If the Iraqis wanted hydrogen for weather balloons, they could have simply pumped it into tanks and used normal trucks to transport it where needed. Now we have another argument against the hydrogen production explanation.

A CQ reader with a doctorate in physical chemistry from the University of Minnesota and with over sixteen years of experience in weapons and materiel laboratory work in the military has written a paper on why the hydrogen lab explanation cannot possibly explain the existence and the engineering of these mobile laboratories. Preferring anonymity for professional reasons, "ChemicalConsultant" has allowed me access to a condensed version of an analysis that he has sent to Joby Warrick at the Washington Post, Reps. Curt Weldon and Jane Harman, and former CIA director John Deutsch, now at MIT -- none of whom have responded to ChemicalConsultant or addressed these concerns.

I will put ChemicalConsultant's CV, stripped of any personal identification, in the extended entry below. Over the next three days I will post his analysis of the physics of hydrogen production and why that explanation makes no sense whatsoever. At the end, I will interview ChemicalConsultant and post the transcript.

Curriculum Vitae

I am a retired physical chemist with 31 years of industrial chemical experience in the characterization of silica based materials and the development of new siliceous products and applications. In the course of my career I have authored 17 peer reviewed papers, been an inventor of 5 patents, chaired technical symposia and reviewed, for technical journals, the submitted papers of other scientists.

1977-1999

Senior Research Fellow 1990 to 1999.
Manager, Analysis, Characterization and Testing Department 1985 to 1990.
Supervisor, Materials Evaluation Section 1977 to 1985.

Significant accomplishments:
• Implemented a long term project which provided fundamental technical understanding of largest volume product line, soluble silicates. Results included technical papers, patents and a licensing agreement with a customer.
• Interfaced with corporate sales and marketing personnel and their customers to provide technical support to corporate sales and growth goals.
• Implemented the application of state of the art chemical instrumentation to support corporate research projects in soluble silicates, zeolites, silica particulates and microspherical glass beads.
• Evaluated the performance of subordinates and supported their professional growth.
• Implemented a laboratory data base management system that improved communication of analytical results to project chemist.
• Received the first R&D Achievement Award for Technical Excellence.

1968 - 1977

Senior Chemist 1973 to 1977.
Chemist 1968 to 1973.

Significant accomplishments:
• Implemented the application of state of the art chemical instrumentation to support corporate research projects in zeolites, petroleum refining catalysts, adsorbents and industrial chemical catalysts.
• Interfaced with corporate sales and marketing personnel and their customers to provide technical support to corporate sales and growth goals.
• Published and presented papers on materials described above.

Military Experience

Retired as a Lieutenant Colonel, USAF Reserve, June 1986.
Assignments:
Hq, AF Systems Command (5 years)
Hq, Air Force Materials Laboratory (12 years)

Active Duty:
Hq, Air Force Weapons Laboratory (2 years)
Hq, Ogden Air Materiel Area (1 year)

EDUCATION:
Ph.D. in Physical Chemistry, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN
B.S. in Chemistry, University of Rochester, Rochester, NY

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» A new look at Saddam's mobile labs from Pro Cynic
Captain's Quarters is in the midst of a analysis of Saddam's mobile weapons labs. You remember those suspicious-looking trucks that Colin Powell described as mobile weapon's labls before the UN but that liberals poo-poohed as merely for the manufacture... [Read More]

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» Mobile Labs Could Not Have Produced Hydrogen As Described from Cabal of Doom
Over at Captain's Quarters there's a multi-part post about those discredited mobile labs that were cited by Colin Powell at the UN in the run-up to the war. The media tells us they were for making hydrogen, an expert... [Read More]

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