The first signs of this secret program began transpiring in 2003 when the Russian Foreign Ministry inadvertently revealed that a Russian-Syrian agreement had been signed for the delivery of a nuclear power plant in an undisclosed Syrian location. In 2004, Syrian President Bashar Assad made a point to say that Syria would not dispose of its WMD program until Israel would do the same. He added, "Since some of my country is occupied,

Syria can legitimately use all the necessary means to liberate its territories." Unsurprisingly enough, the German magazine Der Spiegel revealed in March 2004 that Swedish authorities and the CIA were investigating a very likely Syrian nuclear program secretly developed in Homs in the Northern part of the country. Also in July 2004, investigators looking into the Pakistani nuclear network of A.Q. Khan pointed that Syria may have procured centrifuges capable of enriching uranium to produce a bomb. This fact was confirmed in May 2006 in a declassified report to the U.S. Congress on the acquisition of technology relating to weapons of mass destruction. Syria got also help from the Saddam Hussein regime before the 2003 war, keep in mind that Syria's economy was very dependent on Iraq's trade and especially oil smuggling revenues. As journalist Con Coughlin from the Sunday Telegraph affirmed in a September 2004 article: 12 Iraqi nuclear scientists who were transferred to Syria and given new identities before the war, were on their way to Iran to help assist their Iranian counterparts in building a nuclear weapon. Coughlin added, "The results of the research would then be shared with Syria."

But what really broke the camel's back was a recent report from the very well informed Kuwaiti daily newspaper Al Seyassah. It quoted European intelligence sources as saying that "Syria has an advanced nuclear program" in a secret site located in the province of Al Hassaka, close to the Turkish and Iraqi borders. British sources quoted by the paper believe that "it is President Assad's brother, colonel Maher Assad, and his cousin Rami Makhlouf, who supervise the program." This program is based on the Iraqi material that Saddam Hussein's two sons shipped to Syria before and during the war against Iraq. This explains, according to the daily newspaper, why international investigative teams found no proof of the program.

Furthermore, the British sources in Brussels affirm "Iranian nuclear experts contribute to the Syrian program along with 60 Iraqi experts who had taken refuge in Syria since 2003 and experts from the ex-Soviet republics." British intelligence also confirm that this information is validated by their German counterparts, who was well established historically in the countries close to the ex- communist block, including Syria. Europeans fear that by focusing solely on the Iranian nuclear program, one might facilitate a much quieter joint Iranian-Syrian program of uranium enrichment in Hassaka. Also, the geographical choice of the nuclear site is very meaningful. Indeed, because it is located in an area with a Kurdish majority, the program evades suspicions, and also striking against these installations will initially touch the Kurdish community who has historically sided with the West against the Baathists regime of Baghdad and Damascus.

In light of all these facts, it is not surprising that Syria might actually turn out to be Plan B for the mullahs' regime in Tehran. In fact this is quite a smart strategy: while the world community is focusing on Iran, Syria is without any attention moving on its own program. Knowing the close links between Tehran and Damascus sealed by a very important defense agreement signed over the summer and the fact that Syria would do anything to please its benefactor, Syria's getting the bomb would be exactly like Iran getting it. Al-Seyassah reported on Dec. 13, 2006 that top Syrian leaders were preparing their exile to Iran by having transferred $3 Billion to the Iranian central Bank.

Need we say more?

--

Olivier Guitta, an adjunct fellow at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies and a foreign affairs and counterterrorism consultant, is the founder of the newsletter The Croissant (www.thecroissant.com).