Because terrorist cells would go looking for undiscovered gas shell caches and use them to make IEDs. The results would have been disasterous.
I hope the Terrorists do not get their hands on any of these!
http://www.washtimes.com/national/20031004-123026-1690r.htm
Iraq also was working to convert some of the 300 Chinese-made HY-2 Silkworm antiship missiles into land-attack cruise missiles, Mr. Kay said. The most ambitious program involved replacing the liquid-fueled rocket motor on the Silkworm with turbine engines taken from Russian-made Mi-8 and Mi-17 transport helicopters.
Mr. Kay said the conversion program was "intriguing and, I guess, frightening if it had been carried out."
"This was designed to be a 1,000-kilometer cruise missile that would have carried a warhead of about 500 kilograms, a significant warhead with a large range," Mr. Kay said.
Other Silkworms had been modified into 93-mile-range land-attack cruise missiles and about 12 had been built at the time the Iraqi war started March 19.
"One of these was the one that slammed into the Kuwaiti shopping center during the war," Mr. Kay said.