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Journalism of Courage
Thousands of shoulder-fired missiles—the kind that could be used to shoot down aircraft—are missing in Iraq, and their disappearance has prompted US military and intelligence analysts to increase their estimate of the number of such weapons that may be at large, administration officials said yesterday.
Some US analysts figure that as many as 4,000 surface-to-air missiles once under the control of Saddam Hussein’s government remain unaccounted for.
But a senior Defence official said yesterday that military intelligence analysts are having difficulty estimating how many portable missiles may have vanished and how many of those may be in working order and therefore a threat to US and other aircraft. Still, other officials said the threat that the Iraqi missiles could be used to target military or civilian aircraft remains a very real one.
US officials fear the missiles were among the items taken by groups willing to sell them on the black market to terrorist groups. —LAT-WP
