Cyanide Salt Block Found in Iraq

Fox News ^ | Tuesday, February 03, 2004 | Fox News

[grimalkin]

WASHINGTON

[El Gato]

Maybe pointed directly at the UN building? Or somewhere in France, Germany, or Russia.

Or at Viacom (CBS, MTV, etc) , Disney (ABC et), MSNBC, ClearChannel (A good chunk of the radio statiosn), or TIMEWARNERCNN(AOL,Time, WarnerBro's etc), headquarters. That might get their attention.

[cake_crumb]

"David Kay also mentioned (I forgot where, but someone on FNC mentioned it) that Iraq was cooking up RICIN till the day the US troops rolled in."

Yep. Coalition troops found evidence of that before Kay's team arrived. In addition, Kay also stated that Iraq had "no large stockpiles" of WMD and that it definitely had an active WMD program. That's a far cry from "no WMD"...though this cyanide salt block will probably turn out to be another false alarm.

[cake_crumb]

"True, but the fact that they found it in one of Abu Musab Zarqawi's safehouses makes this a significant story."

Yes, that is significant...but the anti-war crowd will concentrate on what cyanide is used for besides killing people and not where it was found. They'll conclude it does not constitute a WMD, though it does. It's dual use. In fact, castor beans are dual use. What have I been telling everyone since we went into Iraq?

[unspun]

Eat it, Rats. Especially you, Howie.

No, don't eat the cyanide, dummies, just your words.

[Dr. Frank fan]

Nothing less then a fully loaded missle with an active Nuclear warhead pointed at Isreal would shut down the news media about our failure to find MASSIVE amounts of WMD.

Israel? Nobody cares about Israel. It would need to be pointed at and capable of hitting the continental US. Otherwise (in your hypothetical) the lefty complaint would just be "why did we fight a war to protect Israel"....

[pickemuphere]

The potentially lethal compound was located in what was believed to be the safe house of Abu Musab Zarqawi (search), a poisons specialist described by some U.S. intelligence officials as having been a key link between deposed Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein and the Al Qaeda (search) terror network.

Quite a sentence... It's like, "The Subjunctive Tense Gone Wild."

My guess is that we when actually find WMD's, there will be no mistaking that fact: the evidence will speak for itself.

[aruanan]

Cyanide Salt Block Found in Iraq

For suicidal cows?

[Stultis]

I'm thinkin' there will be lots of WMD's found, oh, about late October, 2004.....LOL.

Actually the line that Saddam was a paper-tiger -- either bluffing that he had WMD, or even better, duped by his own scientists and program managers into thinking he did -- while it may not be best for Dubya politically, may be best for deflating whatever lingering hero status Saddam retains among the fist shakers on the "arab street".

Since Bush is more focused on winning the war on terror than covering his own ass, he may not be too disturbed about this. Who knows: the cowboy might even have the gonads to quietly destroy any WMD they did find at this point!

[Mr. K]

I went to buy a salt lick for the deer in my back yard and I asked the old timer at the store how long those things last, and he goes "I dunno- how much ya gonna lick it"

I bet he waits around all day for people to ask him that.

[gogipper]

Long post but documents that the Nazi's used Cyanide gas as a WMD..... Of course Liberals would say that it was used on very small groups.

---

As early as the first years after the end of World War II single publications began to appear in which the authors attempted to "whitewash" the Hitlerite regime and to call various signs of its cruelties into question. But it was not till the fifties that the trend may be defined as "historical revisionism" arose and started developing; its supporters claim that the history of the World War II has been fabricated for the purposes of anti-German propaganda. According to their statements there was no Holocaust, i. e. no mass extermination of Jews and in that case the Auschwitz-Birkenau Concentration Camp could not have been an extermination camp -- it was only a "common" forced labour camp and no gas chambers existed in it.

Historical revisionism is now put forward by members of various nations, who already have their own scientific circles, own publications and also use the mass media for their purposes. Up to 1988, the "revisionists"1 most frequently manipulated historical sources or simply denied the facts. Then, after the appearance of the so-called Leuchter Report (2), their tactics changed distinctly. The above-mentioned Report, worked out on the basis of a study of the ruins and remains of the crematoria and gas chambers at Auschwitz-Birkenau, has been considered by them to be specific evidence in support of their allegations and evidence of judicial validity at that, since it was commissioned by the court of law in Toronto (Canada). F. Leuchter, living in Boston, worked on the design and construction of gas chambers still in use to execute the death penalty in some States of the USA. This is considered to give him authority to take the role of expert as regards gas chamber issues. In this connection Leuchter came to Poland on 25 February 1988 and stayed here for 5 days, visiting the camps at Auschwitz-Birkenau and at Majdanek. In his report based on this inspection he states that "he found no evidence that any of the facilities that are usually alleged to have been gas chambers were actually used as such". Moreover, he claims that these facilities "could not be used as gas chambers for killing people" (Item 4000 of the Report).

Leuchter tried to confirm his conclusions with the help of chemical analysis. For this purpose he took samples of material fragments from the chamber ruins to subject them to an analysis for hydrogen cyanide, the essential component of Zyklon B, used -- acc. to the testimony of witnesses -- to gas the victims. He took 30 samples altogether from all the five structures used formerly as gas chambers. At laboratory analyses performed in the USA the presence of cyanide ions at concentrations of 1.1 to 7.9 mg/kg of material examined was found in 14 samples. He also took one sample from the delousing building at Birkenau, which he treated as a "control sample", and in which cyanides were found to be present at a concentration of 1060 mg kg of material.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~``
Long post but documents that the Nazi's used Cyanide gas as a WMD..... Of course Liberals would say that it was used on very small groups not 'mass' destruction.

[Political Junkie Too]

From the San Francisco Chronicle, May 6, 1995 - New Tokyo Gas Attack:

Another toxic gas incident at a crowded Tokyo train station sent four people to the hospital last night.

Police and workers at Shinjuku Station found two plastic bags -- one containing sodium cyanide and the other diluted sulfuric acid -- aflame on the floor of a men's room. The fire was doused before the fumes could combine to make the deadly gas hydrogen cyanide.

A station official said four workers were briefly hospitalized for sore throats and other minor respiratory ailments. Service on one subway line was briefly halted and some shops shut down temporarily.

The incident could have become a disaster. Shinjuku is a popular shopping and entertainment district and the location of Tokyo's City Hall. More than 1 million people pass daily through the station, which serves both subways and trains.

Kyodo News Service reported that the ingredients found in the rest room, if properly combined, could have produced enough hydrogen cyanide to kill more than 10,000 people.

On March 20, 12 people were killed and 5,500 others were sickened by the nerve gas sarin on Tokyo's subways. Suspicion for that attack has fallen on the cult group Aum Shinri Kyo.

March 24, 1995 - Japan Cops Find Chemical Cache At Cult Hideout - Ingredients for nerve gas

Police said two chemicals seized in the raids were sodium fluoride and phosphorus trichloride, ingredients of sarin.

Police said there were huge amounts of other highly dangerous chemicals such as cyanide compounds, packed in heavy-duty paper, some of which were ripped open.

[Species8472]

From: Hydrogen Cyanide, Dupont Publication 7-83:

HISTORY
As long as 80 years ago it was recognized that hydrocyanic acid could be useful in pest control but it took half this time to popularize the method. Deficiencies and disadvantages had first of all to be eliminated from the method of application. First this had been done in such a way that hydrocyanic acid was no more developed on the spot by mixing cyanide salts and acid, but this process already took place in the factory: The so-called pot method was replaced by liquid hydrocyanic acid. The few deficiencies of this procedure were removed in the early twenties by the ZYKLON method: One added liquid HCN to a carrier substance, thus simplifying handling whilst all favourable properties of liquid HCN were maintained. At the same time, danger to the operator was reduced to a minimum. Hydrocyanic acid in the form of ZYKLON B can be safely stored for considerable periods and under all climatic conditions, any quantity of gas can be easily measured, quickly and cleanly released. Any residures are completely harmless.

[TruthShallSetYouFree]

The dems will probably say it is the remains of Lot's wife.

[TruthShallSetYouFree]

Is it possible that this was used in some gas chambers, in the manner of the Nazis? Hitler was Saddam's idol. I wonder if any of those bodies in the mass graves they've uncovered have cyanide in their systems.

[TruthShallSetYouFree]

I thought it turned out that those tested negative for mustard gas?

Maybe Kerry can test them for ketchup.

[TruthShallSetYouFree]

taking out Saddam was A Good Thing™.

Is that you, Martha? Are you out on bail?

[TruthShallSetYouFree]

I think the problem is who has the "cyanide." Zarqawi is not reasonable

You make a good point. A bottle of Champagne is nothing but a bottle of Champagne. However, if you crack open someone's skull with it, one of the charges will involve possession and use of a weapon. Ditto a baseball bat or a carving knife, when employed in an illegal manner.

[Attention Surplus Disorder]

It's certainly possible. We all know Saddam gassed the Kurds in northern Iraq and most people strongly suspect he had chemical weapons of various types. The Kurds appear to have been the victims of nerve/blister agents (mustard gas, VX, sarin and the like) vs. suffocation/respiratory disruption agents (cyanide)

Cyanide-type poisoning is, I would imagine, far more effective in an enclosed space. Out in the open, nerve agents are far more lethal. The mass-dead of Iraq are probably not from from any specific group or even era. They could have been chemical guinea pigs and/or deliberate killings. Among them are likely to be Iranian POWs and suspected opponents of Saddam's regime. The guy had 35 years to kill pretty much anyone he wanted to, it would seem.

IMO the most likely explanation for the mass graves is plain old AK-47 rounds, of which there appears to have been no shortage whatsoever, since we are still finding them by the truckload.

[GretchenEE]

Need to reprise this:

i'm thinkin that the US is going to find oodles of wmd while the "What happened to wmd intelligence?" commission is studying the problem.