Only 25 items missing from Iraqi museum?

[John Corn]

I saw this about a week ago but didn't post it as it was not on the internet where I had heard it.

Seems alot of the pieces in the museum were copies, and that the people who ran the museum was expecting looting and put most things away.

Link (http://www2.ocregister.com/ocrweb/ocr/article.do?id=37168&section=NEWS&subsection=AMERICA_AT_WAR&year=2003&month=5&day=1)
Col. Matthew F. Bogdanos, a Marine reservist who is investigating the looting and is stationed at the museum, said he had been given a list by museum officials of 29 artifacts that were definitely missing. Since then, four items - ivory objects from the eighth century B.C. - had been traced.
Another case of doom and gloom not quite what it seemed?

[lee635]

Well, the article continues to say that this is a preliminary list and no one knows for sure yet. Remember these people still don't have stable power and clean water and we expect them to know how many antiquities were looted? This will take months.

"The difficulty in determining what is missing is compounded by the lack of a master list of the museum's collection. Although inventories survive, they were compiled department by department and not computerized."