On 25 October 2004,the New York Times ran a front-page story: "Huge Cache of Explosives Vanished From Site in Iraq." The Times warned readers that "380 tons of powerful conventional explosives - used to demolish buildings, make missile warheads and detonate nuclear weapons - are missing from one of Iraq's most sensitive former military installations." They didn't even mention that more than 400,000 tons of explosives and munitions have been secured by Coalition forces in Iraq. Other so-called "mainstream" media outlets joined this seeming devastating attack on President Bush. Senator Kerry seized on the accusation that the President was responsible for "losing" 380 tons of dangerous HMX and RDX explosives, which the Times was quick to point out "could produce bombs strong enough to shatter airplanes or tear apart buildings."

And it's missing! And it's all Bush's fault! Desperate for any attack on the President that might stick, the Kerry campaign rushed out a press release attacking him. "[T]his administration failed to guard those stockpiles – where nearly 380 tons of highly explosive weapons were kept. Today we learned that these explosives are missing, unaccounted for and could be in the hands of terrorists," the Kerry team trumpeted. "Terrorists could use this material to kill our troops and our people, blow up airplanes and level buildings." Kerry went on to accuse President Bush of "unbelievable incompetence" over the missing explosives, using the theme in speeches and even a TV ad... all produced within hours. Kerry doesn't seem to realise that he's actually accusing the troops of incompetence by this attack... not that he would stop it if he did.

Suddenly, these missing weapons are the centerpiece of Kerry's attack strategy, as reported by -- what else? -- the New York Times. "Iraq Explosives Become Issue in Campaign," the Times announced in a brilliant example of the media making, not reporting, the news. Kerry continued his attack in campaign speeches. "This is one of the great blunders of Iraq, one of the great blunders of this administration. The incredible incompetence of this president and his administration has put our troops at risk and put our country at greater risk than we ought to be." John Edwards came out of whatever spider-hole he's been hiding in the last few weeks to say, "It is reckless and irresponsible to fail to protect and safeguard one of the largest weapons sites in the country." The Times story continued, "Mr. Kerry's surrogates, from his adviser Joe Lockhart to Madeleine K. Albright, the former secretary of state, were deployed on the airwaves to repeat the case, describing in detail how many car bombs, larger explosions or nuclear triggers could be fabricated from the high explosives." Nuclear triggers? But I thought Saddam had nothing capable of being used to make WMDs! Somehow, I must have been mishearing every Liberal on Earth for the last year and a half. Suddenly they're claiming that Saddam had stockpiles of dangerous materials that could be used by terrorists to attack America, possibly with nuclear weapons! It's the biggest flip-flop in history!

The rest of the story gets even more entertaining, as the plot thickens.

According to the LA Times, the CBS show "60 Minutes" was planning to run the missing explosives story on Sunday 31 October, less than two days before the election. 60 Minutes executive producer Jeff Fager said, "our plan was to run the story on [Oct.] 31, but it became clear that it wouldn't hold, so the decision was made for the Times to run it." This "news" story was planned to break hours before the election, specifically in order to influence the vote. But that's not all! According to the New York Sun, Mohammed El Baradei, head of the UN's International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), was the person who focused attention on the missing explosives by addressing the issue in a letter to the UN Security Council last week. It's almost impossible to imagine that Mr. El Baradei would be unaware of the impact of an accusation made a week before such a tight election. The Bush administration has already stated that they would not support him for another term as head of the IAEA, which he announced he was seeking just a week before sending the letter. Even a four-year-old child could connect the dots between El Baradei and the UN, the NY Times and CBS, and John Kerry -- who has made his intentions to center his foreign policy (should he be elected) around increasing the power of the UN abundantly clear.

However, like the last CBS story intended to destroy President Bush -- the now-infamous National Guard story based on forged documents -- this one turns out to be false as well. The explosives that Kerry, the media and the UN accuse President Bush of losing were already gone when US troops first arrived on the scene. Melissa Fleming, a spokeswoman for the IAEA, reported that the bunkers at Al-Qaqaa were tagged and sealed on 15 March, five days before the war began. Elements of the 3rd Infantry Division arrived on 4 April, nearly three weeks after the bunkers were sealed. The troops checked out the site and found conventional weapons, but no high explosives, Army officials told NBC News. CBS News reported a fairly thorough search of the al-Qaqaa site by the 3rd ID, which found "thousands of boxes of white powder, nerve agent antidote and Arabic documents on how to engage in chemical warfare." No report mentioned finding UN-tagged explosives. They left the next day.

Six days later, the 2nd Brigade of the 101st Airborne arrived, with an embedded NBC reporter named Lai Ling Jew, and also saw no sign of the IAEA-marked explosives during a 24-hour stay, although no more than a cursory patrol of the site was conducted. After that, the dozens of trucks needed to move 380 tons of explosives would have been noticeable on roads full of Coalition vehicles, to say the least. It would have taken truck convoys... like those the Iraq Survey Group confirmed were moving into Syria right before the war in Iraq began. Hmm.

If this is really the best line the Democrats can come up with, they need another four years of practice.

UPDATE: 27 Oct 2004 - It appears that not only were the explosives from al-Qaqaa moved into Syria before the war began, but they were "almost certainly" moved by the Russian military, according to John A. Shaw, the deputy undersecretary of defense for international technology security.