The Inspections Maze | csmonitor.com

Despite the admission that it had produced biological toxins, Iraq continued to maintain that it had not filled any warheads.

A month later, the story changed.

Hussein Kamel, one of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein's sons-in-law, defected in August and met with UNSCOM inspectors. Though he didn't provide inspectors with any additional information on Al Hakam, he confirmed all the evidence. More important, he revealed additional information on Iraq's chemical, nuclear, and missile programs, much of which UNSCOM had considered destroyed.

Following Mr. Kamel's defection, Iraq admitted to having an offensive biological weapons program. But, Iraqi officials contended, they had destroyed these weapons themselves in 1991.

Inspectors weren't buying it. "They kept growth media, they kept the scientists in place at Al Hakam. So what obliteration of the BW [biological weapons] program is that?" says one UN inspector.

Kamel's information led inspectors to ramp up their search for bioweapons, as well as act on the new information about Iraq's other programs for weapons of mass destruction. Victor Mizin, an UNSCOM inspector in 1994 and 1995 and currently a diplomat in residence with the Center for Nonproliferation Studies, says that Russia felt betrayed after Iraq's admission.

"They made Russians to look quite stupid, because Russia was ... supporting them vigorously, saying to everyone, 'Well, there's no biological weapons in Iraq,' " he says. "Suddenly when it was revealed, they let us down a little bit."

The head of Iraq's weapons programs, Hussein Kamel, defected in 1996. Shortly after, he returned to Iraq and was killed. AP/FILE

Intimidation of inspectors
Iraqi government thugs, known as "minders," followed the inspectors and at times intimidated them. Spertzel recalls some harrowing times on the road. Inspectors drove themselves in a convoy of UN vehicles, which was invariably followed out of Baghdad by a couple of minders in another vehicle. "They would try to force their way into the convoy," Spertzel says. "They were so close you probably couldn't put a piece a paper between your car and their car at times." Other inspection teams had guns drawn on them, says Spertzel.

The level of harassment from the Iraqis became one clue as to the sensitivity of a site, according to Spertzel.

In the face of resistance, UNSCOM had its own methods of pushing back. When inspectors arrived at one site, they were forced to wait for permission to enter. After a couple of hours, inspectors made a show of setting up their satellite phone to call headquarters in New York. Afraid of being seen as obstructing the inspection process, the Iraqis suddenly allowed the inspection team in.