Themes of the Book

The book has two themes based on my direct participation as Chairman of the Design Authority in Iraq's Atomic Organization (1987-1992).

The first theme focuses on Iraq's engineering capacity to design and build the Al-Atheer nuclear facilities, without any prior experience in this field and with no foreign assistance. Al Atheer was principally involved in the nuclear weaponization program and functioned as a materials research center. Al Atheer was the Iraqi equivalent to Los Alamos, a research and development project that produced the first US atomic bombs in 1946. All other Iraqi nuclear facilities were designed and built by the Russians, French, Italians, Yugoslavs, and Brazilians.

The second theme is about successfully implementing a passive defence plan (camouflage) for the Al Atheer facilities through 42 days of air raids during the Second Gulf War in 1991. US intelligence and satellite surveillance deemed Al Atheer facilities to be associated with other (non-nuclear) industrial programs. Al Atheer was discovered through United Nations inspection missions after eight months of ceasefire.