Posted on 05/20/2004 11:47:27 AM PDT by Steven W.
First, the shell was announced by BG Kimmitt, the CPA military spokesman, and he was reporting an announcement by the Iraq Survey Group (ISG). During the press conference, he said ... that the round was an old binary shell, and described its function - two components contained within the shell that are mixed by the action of firing the shell, and that since the shell wasn't fired, but used in an IED, the mixing was not complete, only a small amount of sarin was produced, and a couple of soldiers (EOD) were affected. Field testing showed sarin, and not said by BG Kimmitt but later reported, higher level testing confirmed it.
This is a significant announcement, yes, because it is a chemical round, but more importantly, because of the technology it uses. That is the use of cells or canisters of separate components that mix in flight to create the sarin. This is big news because the Iraqis were not known to have this technology prior to the Gulf War. Yes, they had sarin. And yes, they did use binary chemicals (and a note, here, on something I missed before - the Iraqis never declared binary artillery shells, but UNSCOM did find some in 1996), but as this interview with Scott Ritter - yes, that Scott Ritter - conducted in 2000 shows that the technology was crude - it was not "mix in flight":
BRG: They were also using very crude binary munitions.
Ritter: They called them “binary,” but what that meant was that they had a warhead full of isopropyl alcohol and at the last second they mixed in the difluor. [32]
BRG: “Mix-in-flight.”
Ritter: It’s not even “mix-in-flight.” They mix it before they launch. [33] At the Muthana State Establishment, which was responsible for developing Iraq’s chemical weapons, whenever they would mix these things Iraqi workers would get up there and then pour the agent in and stir the Sarin by hand in the warhead. Invariably there’s an accident and you’ve got guys writhing, convulsing and dying because of the nerve agent. The Iraqis killed more of their own people loading the chemical agent into the warhead than they did with the warheads themselves.
The Iraqis didn't use binary because it was safer, obviously. They did it because of shelf life. As I understand it, Iraq had a problem with their production that made their sarin ineffective after 3 weeks. So they used this crude binary so it wouldn't sit and degrade. If this was a unitary sarin round from pre-Gulf War days, it wouldn't have had any effect on the soldiers.
In short, this type of artillery shell is one that the Iraqis never declared, and the UN inspection teams on the ground never discovered. It introduces something entirely new into the WMD story of Iraq. Here is the nub - this type of weapon has never been found in or attributed to Iraq before, where did this one come from? This isn't quite an airplane in King Tut's tomb, but it is highly significant. Was it produced in Iraq right under the noses of the inspection regime? Was it purchased from outside in violation of UN sanctions? Did it come in from some outside country after the fall of Hussein? I don't know the answer to those questions, but whatever the answer, it changes the narrative of the WMD story in Iraq.
Or it should. While this has gotten a lot of notice in the blogosphere, there is nothing moving in the mainstream media. Why is that? Some of the reason is that the mainstream media quite obviously are uninterested in changing the narrative. That the LA Times fabricates the assignment of the production of this weapon to the 1980's is a sign of that - BG Kimmitt never said it, yet the LA Times writes that he did. This is having the desired effect, in the comments over at Washington Monthly's blog (Kevin Drum's deal), some one writes "General Kimmitt claimed that the ordinance was of Gulf War vintage, meaning that the bomb had to be at least 13 years old." No, he didn't say that at all about the ordnance (ahem). So how did that notion get in this guy's head? I'm guessing from reading a story in the LA Times or the like that has decided not to spin this one, but to simply print untruths. Noone ever goes back to check the primary sources, right?
(Excerpt) Read more at overpressure.com ...
Good research!
And possibly North Korea...
Supplier: Sahib Abd Amir Haddad
Exporting Country:
Company/Individual: Sahib Abd Amir Haddad
Also Known As: Sahib Al-Haddad or Sahib Abd Al Amir al-Haddad
Program: Military, possibly chemical
Date Occurred: late 1990s, 2000
Activity Memo: Iraqi-born citizen of the United States; media reports, citing American and European law-enforcement officials, name him as a key middleman for Saddam Hussein in illegal weapons purchases; reportedly according to American and European law-enforcement officials, has attempted to buy weapons and equipment for Iraq since 2000, including rockets, machine guns and parts for Iraq's Russian-made MIG jets; reportedly arrested in November 2002 in Bulgaria and awaiting extradition to Germany, where he is charged with conspiring in th elate 1990s with two Germany men to purchase equipment for Iraq for the manufacture of a giant "supergun" cannon capable of firing chemical, biological or nuclear weapons up to 35 miles; according to Germany prosecutors, Haddad is the chief suspect in the affair; he received directions and a list of goods to procure from Iraq and took delivery of the goods in Jordan; the Germans involved, Bernd Schompeter and Willi Heinz Ribbeck, were convicted on January 31, 2003 of breaking German arms export laws and violating the U.N. embargo for their role in the affair; Haddad reportedly ran a commodities firm, Al-Haddad Brothers Enterprises, which supplied 60 tons of precursor chemical for the making of sarin gas, according to disclosure statements filed by the Iraqi government with the United Nations after the Persian Gulf war; a shipment of 1,100 pounds of potassium fluoride, another sarin precursor, organized by Haddad's firm and destined for the Iraqi Ministry of Pesticides in Baghdad, was reportedly seized by customs officials at Kennedy International Airport in New York in March 1984; the firm is reportedly on a list, supplied by Iraq to the United Nations as part of its December 7, 2002 weapons declaration, of 31 major foreign suppliers of chemicals and equipment for the Iraqi chemical weapons program; the firm reportedly collapsed in the mid-1990s, and Haddad left the United States for the Middle East.
Gives one an idea what we're dealing with. Info like this ought to be shoved up the nose of anyone maintaining Saddamn had no WMDs. And look at the date.
I'll bet they could be fired in less than 45 minutes, too.
Bump for later.
And for those who keep repeating teh mantra that it's old stock previously known despite David Kay, Blix, et al stating rthat such didn't exist despite it being known.
*sigh*
I hate the convolutions the WMD denier go through to deny that Sarin existed or is a WMD.
The prison-abuse story is where the liberal media devotes it's intellectual curiousity! And their still morons!
Google seems to know about the website but getting no response. it is all very interesting, thanks for posting this.
I'll wait for Hans Blix to confirm this...
Until the Republicans go public with this information, it won't see the light of day because the mainstream press won't do it for us.
What are the Republicans waiting for? They are going to get their heads handed to them on a silver platter until they learn to play hard ball. But we seem to have this new "tone" in Washington that precludes even trumpeting the truth.
It is the same convulted logic that holocaust deniers use.
Yeah.
It's extremely convoluted and morally deplorable.
Not to mention intellectually dishonest.
But, people who'd deny the existence of even oxygen seem to gaggle together.
Been debating two or so of such for roughly a day now.
Makes me wonder where these people come from.
Like the guy who says that Sarin isn't a WMD...
...Despite it being internationally recognised as such.
Bump!
How'd you get that space below the text to disappear?
He won't be debating you today!
I wonder if we will ever see anything more on it, however.
It seems that there is no proof!:-)
LOL!
No, he won't be.
But one of his protege's was on one hand quoting David Kay saying there aren'y WMD's in Iraq, then stating that there are but "only two Sarin shells are hardly a case" for invading Iraq.
Still waiting to hear his latest.
Crud.
I'm officially gonna cry in forum now.
I just HAVE to know.
Gettin' annoyed with the large space below the posts.
But, but, it's just a small amount.
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