Iraq: Weapons Of Mass Destruction Found?
Alcapwn
"War is the science of destruction" - John Abbot Join Date: 2003-06-21 Member: 17590Members
"War is the science of destruction" - John Abbot Join Date: 2003-06-21 Member: 17590Members
in Discussions
<div class="IPBDescription">Sarin-nerve gas and mustard gas found!</div> <a href='http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,120137,00.html' target='_blank'>clicky</a>
and for the lazy a breif excerpt:
"BAGHDAD, Iraq — A roadside bomb containing sarin nerve agent (search) recently exploded near a U.S. military convoy, the U.S. military said Monday.
Bush administration officials told Fox News that mustard gas (search) was also recently discovered.
Two people were treated for "minor exposure" after the sarin incident but no serious injuries were reported. Soldiers transporting the shell for inspection suffered symptoms consistent with low-level chemical exposure, which is what led to the discovery, a U.S. official told Fox News.
"The Iraqi Survey Group confirmed today that a 155-millimeter artillery round containing sarin nerve agent had been found," Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt (search), the chief military spokesman in Iraq, told reporters in Baghdad. "The round had been rigged as an IED (improvised explosive device) which was discovered by a U.S. force convoy."
The round detonated before it would be rendered inoperable, Kimmitt said, which caused a "very small dispersal of agent."
However, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said the results were from a field test, which can be imperfect, and said more analysis was needed. If confirmed, it would be the first finding of a banned weapon upon which the United States based its case for war. "
Lil while down:
"Iraqi Scientist: You Will Find More
Gazi George, a former Iraqi nuclear scientist under Saddam's regime, told Fox News he believes many similar weapons stockpiled by the former regime were either buried underground or transported to Syria. He noted that the airport where the device was detonated is on the way to Baghdad from the Syrian border.
George said the finding likely will be the first in a series of discoveries of such weapons.
"Saddam is the type who will not store those materials in a military warehouse. He's gonna store them either underground, or, as I said, lots of them have gone west to Syria and are being brought back with the insurgencies," George told Fox News. "It is difficult to look in areas that are not obvious to the military's eyes.
"I'm sure they're going to find more once time passes," he continued, saying one year is not enough for the survey group or the military to find the weapons.
Saddam, when he was in power, had declared that he did in fact possess mustard-gas filled artilleries but none that included sarin.
"I think what we found today, the sarin in some ways, although it's a nerve gas, it's a lucky situation sarin detonated in the way it did ... it's not as dangerous as the cocktails Saddam used to make, mixing blister" agents with other gases and substances, George said.
Officials: Discovery Is 'Significant'
U.S. officials told Fox News that the shell discovery is a "significant" event.
Artillery shells of the 155-mm size are as big as it gets when it comes to the ordnance lobbed by infantry-based artillery units. The 155 howitzer can launch high capacity shells over several miles; current models used by the United States can fire shells as far as 14 miles. One official told Fox News that a conventional 155-mm shell could hold as much as "two to five" liters of sarin, which is capable of killing thousands of people under the right conditions in highly populated areas.
The Iraqis were very capable of producing such shells in the 1980s but it's not as clear that they continued after the first Gulf War.
In 1995, Japan's Aum Shinrikyo (search) cult unleashed sarin gas in Tokyo's subways, killing 12 people and sickening thousands. In February of this year, Japanese courts convicted the cult's former leader, Shoko Asahara, and sentence him to be executed.
Developed in the mid-1930s by Nazi scientists, a single drop of sarin can cause quick, agonizing choking death. There are no known instances of the Nazis actually using the gas.
Nerve gases work by inhibiting key enzymes in the nervous system, blocking their transmission. Small exposures can be treated with antidotes, if administered quickly.
Antidotes to nerve gases similar to sarin are so effective that top poison gas researchers predict they eventually will cease to be a war threat"
<!--emo&:0--><img src='http://www.natural-selection.org/forums/html//emoticons/wow.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='wow.gif' /><!--endemo-->
and for the lazy a breif excerpt:
"BAGHDAD, Iraq — A roadside bomb containing sarin nerve agent (search) recently exploded near a U.S. military convoy, the U.S. military said Monday.
Bush administration officials told Fox News that mustard gas (search) was also recently discovered.
Two people were treated for "minor exposure" after the sarin incident but no serious injuries were reported. Soldiers transporting the shell for inspection suffered symptoms consistent with low-level chemical exposure, which is what led to the discovery, a U.S. official told Fox News.
"The Iraqi Survey Group confirmed today that a 155-millimeter artillery round containing sarin nerve agent had been found," Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt (search), the chief military spokesman in Iraq, told reporters in Baghdad. "The round had been rigged as an IED (improvised explosive device) which was discovered by a U.S. force convoy."
The round detonated before it would be rendered inoperable, Kimmitt said, which caused a "very small dispersal of agent."
However, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said the results were from a field test, which can be imperfect, and said more analysis was needed. If confirmed, it would be the first finding of a banned weapon upon which the United States based its case for war. "
Lil while down:
"Iraqi Scientist: You Will Find More
Gazi George, a former Iraqi nuclear scientist under Saddam's regime, told Fox News he believes many similar weapons stockpiled by the former regime were either buried underground or transported to Syria. He noted that the airport where the device was detonated is on the way to Baghdad from the Syrian border.
George said the finding likely will be the first in a series of discoveries of such weapons.
"Saddam is the type who will not store those materials in a military warehouse. He's gonna store them either underground, or, as I said, lots of them have gone west to Syria and are being brought back with the insurgencies," George told Fox News. "It is difficult to look in areas that are not obvious to the military's eyes.
"I'm sure they're going to find more once time passes," he continued, saying one year is not enough for the survey group or the military to find the weapons.
Saddam, when he was in power, had declared that he did in fact possess mustard-gas filled artilleries but none that included sarin.
"I think what we found today, the sarin in some ways, although it's a nerve gas, it's a lucky situation sarin detonated in the way it did ... it's not as dangerous as the cocktails Saddam used to make, mixing blister" agents with other gases and substances, George said.
Officials: Discovery Is 'Significant'
U.S. officials told Fox News that the shell discovery is a "significant" event.
Artillery shells of the 155-mm size are as big as it gets when it comes to the ordnance lobbed by infantry-based artillery units. The 155 howitzer can launch high capacity shells over several miles; current models used by the United States can fire shells as far as 14 miles. One official told Fox News that a conventional 155-mm shell could hold as much as "two to five" liters of sarin, which is capable of killing thousands of people under the right conditions in highly populated areas.
The Iraqis were very capable of producing such shells in the 1980s but it's not as clear that they continued after the first Gulf War.
In 1995, Japan's Aum Shinrikyo (search) cult unleashed sarin gas in Tokyo's subways, killing 12 people and sickening thousands. In February of this year, Japanese courts convicted the cult's former leader, Shoko Asahara, and sentence him to be executed.
Developed in the mid-1930s by Nazi scientists, a single drop of sarin can cause quick, agonizing choking death. There are no known instances of the Nazis actually using the gas.
Nerve gases work by inhibiting key enzymes in the nervous system, blocking their transmission. Small exposures can be treated with antidotes, if administered quickly.
Antidotes to nerve gases similar to sarin are so effective that top poison gas researchers predict they eventually will cease to be a war threat"
<!--emo&:0--><img src='http://www.natural-selection.org/forums/html//emoticons/wow.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='wow.gif' /><!--endemo-->
Comments
who said that?
bingo
thats funny i dont see that it only has to do with nuclear weapons...
EDIT-infact, in almost every one its says chemical agents.
Do you think Plutonium or other nucliar agents are the only thing that cause "mass destruction"
<!--QuoteBegin--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin--> The New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Third Edition. 2002.
<b>weapons of mass destruction</b>
Weapons that can produce devastating results when delivered in a single strike. They include nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons.
<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
lol
and btw caboose's post number is 1337....heh you should ask the mods to permanetely keep your number at that.
and is now 1377 which means he either posted 50 posts (!) or you messed up <!--emo&:)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/smile.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='smile.gif' /><!--endemo-->
oh, and it can't be kept at a fixed number.
Mass destruction.. I hear mass (which means lots) and destruction (which means... well destroy)
It seems bio or chem attacks on well placed targets can do this quite easily... In fact, it's probably a bigger threat than nukes. It's easier to carry a few germs in whatever and cultivate on-target before the strike rather than bringing in some uranium or whatever nukes need.
Gas has to be somewhere in between I'd say
A) these were produced when we knew Iraq had such shells stockpiled.
B) its very likely that the insurgents that used this shell as a IED had no idea it containted sarin, most likely was looted/stolen/found and used in such a manner.
Think about the severity of the fighting, and the lengths at which the insurgents have gone to kill as many people as possible, even sacraficing their own lifes to do so. If these shells were known about, or in any way readily available, they would be used in mass quantities, not a singular, old round, on the roadside. Finding 2 rounds in two different areas of a country known to once have held such munitions is not of any true grave importance as the media shows it to be, finding 200 in a stockpile would be.
[edit] Just to clarrify, we have no reason to believe anything this administration says about any WMDs right now. They have had all the time and every reason in the world to fabricate such items, we have been lied to/given misinformation about this before, and frankly most of us never trustedt GW anyways, that's why MOST of us didn't vote for him.
im not saying either way, what I am saying tho, is that so far this is just trumped up BS on the adminstrations side. Im about as shocked about finding one aging round with sarin, and another with mustard gas as I would be if they found another mine in Bosnia. Its tragic, its dangerous, but its hardly "A Stockpile of WMD's". Like I said, its not as though they have found 2000 rounds, in a kept and military fashion.
I'm sure they did go right to Fox. <!--emo&:p--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/tounge.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='tounge.gif' /><!--endemo-->
hooray for electoral colleges, the one thing that still haxes meh brain <!--emo&:p--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/tounge.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='tounge.gif' /><!--endemo-->
What is the precise use of electoral colleges and what's the use of the popular vote if it doesnt play a decisive role?
<span style='color:white'>Admins note: Keep discussions of the electoral college / Bushs re-election in the designated threads.</span>
hooray for electoral colleges, the one thing that still haxes meh brain <!--emo&:p--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/tounge.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='tounge.gif' /><!--endemo-->
What is the precise use of electoral colleges and what's the use of the popular vote if it doesnt play a decisive role? <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
The electoral college was put in place by the founding fathers because they considered the common man simply too stupid to have an important say in directly choosing their own leader. True story. The popular vote is merely a "guideline" for the members of the electoral college.
<span style='color:white'>Admins note: Keep discussions of the electoral college / Bushs re-election in the designated threads.</span>
<!--QuoteBegin--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin-->Weapons of Mass Destruction refers to nuclear weapons, not nerve agents. <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Weapons of mass destruction refers to nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons (NBC). All three would force US soldiers to wear their MOPP gear (chem suits, gas masks, etc).
Nerve agents and mustard gas are some examples of chemical weapons. Using mustard gas on the kurds was cited as one of the examples of saddams use of weapons of mass destruction.
A few posts over at tank-net summed it up for me best:
<!--QuoteBegin--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin-->I'll stand by my initial statement. One old binary shell is not a WMD program. It isn't even an effective IED (for reasons that have been pointed out).
The US stepped on its crank on this one, and one shell found isn't going to change that.
As far as the WMD issue goes, it was merely an excuse to eliminate Saddam (who needed to go, just for other reasons). Everyone thought there were weapons in Iraq, and Saddam gave us no reason to doubt that he had an active program. He did have a full fledged WMD program at one time, and had used them at every opportunity against his neighbors. He had been evasive and secretive with any and all inspections, and had shown he could not be trusted.
It was a huge embarrassment to the US when none were found. I knew it was going to turn out shaky when the US started taking reporters to farms and showing 'chemical weapons stockpiles' (it was obvious to even myself that this was just a farm's pesticide stockpile). Since then its gotten even more absurd. There was a childrens story about situations like this involving an emperor and a set of fine clothing. At this point I'm pretty sure nothing of significance will be found, and I'm not willing to be part of the continuing charade that goes on as we 'search' the country for them.
Who cares. I support removing Saddam, WMD or not. He was a scumbag, and he tried picking a fight with the US for 10 years. He got what he deserved, and things are better with him out of power (although the old statement of "people tend to get the leaders that they deserve" is certainly true in the case of Iraq). <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
<!--QuoteBegin--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin-->If there is one lesson learned in OIF, it is that it is a bad idea to jump to conclusions based on fragmentary evidence when you have a strong preconceived notion of what it reality, which means that it is easy to interpret ambiguous evidence as support for the preconceived notion.
I agree with what Scott said.
<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
<!--QuoteBegin--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin-->So do I. Instead of having near orgasmic I told you sos, we need to:
make sure the troops and civilians are protected,
find out if this was an old leftover or part of larger cache of WMD, and,
make sure they don't get used again.<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Barring conspiricy theorys, the recent find implies one of two things:
1) The weapon is part of a larger stockpile, and the insurgents didn't know it was a chemical weapon when making the IED out of it. Not recognizing that the round is different is unusual, because traditionally chemical weapons are clearly marked differently than conventional high explosives. Either it was painted like a conventional weapon on purpose (to hide them?) or it was indeed marked differently and they simply didn't understand what the markings ment.
2) The weapon was one of the few remnants of a destroyed stockpile that slipped through the cracks and there aren't many others like it.
We can assume what we want, but it doesn't make it correct.
Please keep the personal attacks down.
[edit]As for my opinion, I agree with the popular consensus that this does just not sway opinions into any direction. I'm sorry, but the administrations claims have been by far too bloated ("Truckloads of Anthrax", anyone? "First strike capability within 45 minutes", anyone?) to change my opinion based on two rounds, whether planted or not.
The Blix inspection produces by far more severe cases and was still distances from any kind of 'smoking gun proof'. It is one of the ironies of this war that the inspectors that were essentially called incompetent by the Coalition produced more evidence than their free-roaming Coalition counterparts have been able to come up with so far.[/edit]
If these WMDs are viable, you guys just got owned.
<span style='color:white'>Admins note: Keep discussions of the electoral college / Bushs re-election in the designated threads. </span>
I don't see how my post isn't relevant to the thread. In any lengths of knowledge of politics, the WMD find has by far the largest impact on this coming election year, and if Bush's statements are proven to be true, Kerry as an anti-war democrat is going to have to fight on an anti-terrorism platform which would stand at a gigantic disadvantage due to Bush's experience.
I mean, if we can't talk about the reprecussions of this find, what else is there to talk about ?
Barely anybody, on any side, doubted that there would be leftovers of the weapons Hussein undoubtely housed at one point - and in the interest of the avoidance of mud-flinging, I won't link to the TV screencaps of the man who sold them shaking hands with this evil dicator.
The claim of the Bush and Blair administration was that there were <i>substantional stockpiles</i> as well as production facilities, in other words, fresh such weaponry in quantities large enough to wage a full-scale war (which then happened, with not <i>one</i> piece of biological or chemical agent being used by the Iraqi army). I'm sure there are WMD in Iraq, and I'm sure that more will be found, but I'm even more sure that these two claims, or any other set of conditions leading to Hussein having been a serious non-conventional threat to any of his neighbours, and much less a country of the Western World, won't ever be met.
[edit]Or to quote Hans Blix: "There can be leftovers, but that's something completely different from stockpiles." (Re-translated from <a href='http://www.spiegel.de/politik/ausland/0,1518,300260,00.html' target='_blank'>Der Spiegel</a>)[/edit]
Not a big fan of the debate styles in this forum (Discussions), so this will be my last post in this thread. I don't like it when these threads get moved here.
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Read what Nem said. He expected that remnants of Saddam's old WMDs would be found, not that brand new WMDs and production facilities would be found. The war was waged because we were told Saddam was a threat to western nations and that he could unleash large quantities of WMDs against us, WMDs that he was actively producing and stockpiling.
Sorry, but an old artillery shell from the 1980's does not qualify as either a stockpile, a production facility or a threat. Claiming that this shell is proof that Saddam possessed threatening WMD's is like finding an old canister of Zyklon B gas in Germany and claiming that the German government is producing WMDs, or unearthing an unexploded mustard gas artillery round in France and saying that France is producing chemical weapons.
I disagree that Saddam had to go, mainly because I've failed to see any evidence that the man was a threat, and I've always disagreed with the pretext used for war as the evidence of Saddam having WMDs was shaky at best (and has now been showed to be mostly incorrect). Take that as you will; I did not oppose the war because the reigning Conservative party here in Australia supported it.
You are aware that sarin has an effective shelf life of (at best) about five years, correct?
Odds of ownage are not in your favor.
It's not like you can't just bury weapons, the dude has seriously had what? 11 some odd years of dodging UN weapons inspectors to practice. Even if you actually believe he never had the weapons, he's still ALWAYS been shifty around the weapons inspectors.
Jesus freaking christ. Some people won't ever be happy. They claim they'll be happy when they see one of these weapons, but that won't happen until it lands on your doorstep....
*Knock* *Knock*.... BOOM
And then you still won't be happy..... "How could they let this happen?".... whaaaaa..... whaaaaaaa...... WHAAAAAAAAAAAA
And to AYB, if we didn't follow the electoral college system, JFK would have never been president, it would have been Nixon instead, chew on that one for a while.
It's not like you can't just bury weapons, the dude has seriously had what? 11 some odd years of dodging UN weapons inspectors to practice. Even if you actually believe he never had the weapons, he's still ALWAYS been shifty around the weapons inspectors.
Jesus freaking christ. Some people won't ever be happy. They claim they'll be happy when they see one of these weapons, but that won't happen until it lands on your doorstep....<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
We have NEVER said that Saddam never had weapons; it's a well documented fact that prior to the first Gulf War Saddam had an extensive WMD program, and he used them on several occassions. What we were never convinced about was that Saddam still had stockpiles of WMDs, that he still had production facilities.
Like I said above, the detonation of a single 1980's era sarin gas shell is no more an indication of Saddam having WMDs than a 1916 era mustard gas shell being found in France is indicative of a German chemical weapons program.
Yes, you can bury weapons, but it it much, much easier to hide a single man in the ground than it is to hide thousands of litres of anthrax and factory-scale production facilities. You say it's bizzare that we think it's so strange that these weapons havn't been found; I say it's inconcieveable that despite the Coalition being in control of Iraq for over a YEAR, and with over 70% of Iraq's former head government officials in jail, no production facilities have been found, no warehouses filled with WMDs, no stockpiles, not even any paperwork indicating that any such programs or stockpiles existed. You simply cannot hide all that stuff without some kind of trail, someone knowing where they are.
When will the WMD believers concede defeat? When will you finally admit that there is no evidence, no stockpiles, no factories? 2 years of occupation? 5? 10? 20?
he more we rape and pillage the better the odds are of an angry little man in sandals detonating a 10 megaton device right in our hypothetical pants