Posted on 06/24/2006 11:17:55 AM PDT by Wiz
June 23, 2006: The revelation that Coalition forces have discovered about 500 shells containing chemical weapons (mostly sarin nerve gas and mustard gas) since 2003, most of which are pre-1991 Gulf War vintage, leads to the question as to why the U.S. waited so long to reveal this. The U.S. government has taken a beating for supposed failures to find weapons of mass destruction in the press, and from political opponents. There have been some discoveries that have made the news, most notably an incident in May, 2004, when terrorists used a 155-millimeter shell loaded with sarin in an IED. The shell detonated, exposing two soldiers to sarin nerve gas (both of whom survived and recovered). It is this attack that provides one explanation as to why many of the finds have been classified.
If the United States were to have announced WMD finds right away, it could have told terrorists (including those from al-Qaeda) where to look to locate chemical weapons. This would have placed troops at risk for a marginal gain in public relations. A successful al-Qaeda chemical attack would have been a huge boost for their propaganda efforts as well, enabling them to get recruits and support (many people want to back a winner), and it would have caused a decline in American morale in Iraq and on the home front.
(Excerpt) Read more at strategypage.com ...
If the shell had Russian, ChiCom or French Frog writing on it, the so called insurgents would never know what they had.
I don't know how I missed these stories. Thanks,
So chances are they didn't know what they had. I don't know which is scarier - ignorance or malevolence. Sometimes they have the same effect.
WUF WUF!
You're welcome!
"That's God's gift to France, Melissa Theuriau."
What's French for "cleavage"?
You're welcome.
Here's a couple more articles that you may have missed or forgotten.
US Reveals Iraq Nuclear Operation (1.7 Metric Tons+ Of Enriched Uranium Removed From Iraq In 2004)
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1514112/posts
The US has revealed that it removed more than 1.7 metric tons of radioactive material from Iraq in a secret operation last month.
"This operation was a major achievement," said US Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham in a statement.
He said it would keep "potentially dangerous nuclear materials out of the hands of terrorists."
Along with 1.77 metric tons of enriched uranium, about 1,000 "highly radioactive sources" were also removed.
The material was taken from a former nuclear research facility on 23 June, after being packaged by 20 experts from the US Energy Department's secret laboratories.
It was flown out of the country aboard a military plane in a joint operation with the Department of Defense, and is being stored temporarily at a Department of Energy facility.....
(Excerpted) see link above
_________________________________________________________
Democrats Continue To Put Self Before Nation
November 02, 2005
http://www.opinioneditorials.com/guestcontributors/jbell_20051102.html
(snip)
The Democrats incessant droning about Bush distorting intelligence and WMD call into question their interest in the truth. Repetition will never turn their fiction into fact.
In his book, Disinformation, Richard Miniter shares the truth with anyone willing to listen. For example, in June 2004, U.S. forces in Iraq seized 1.77 metric tons of enriched uranium that could have been used to make an atomic bomb.
Miniter also wrote about Polish general Marek Dukaczewski, who received information from Iraqis about chemical weapons being sold on the black market.
Polish military officials bought seventeen chemical weapons warheads from Iraqis for $5,000 apiece, Miniter wrote, to keep them from Iraqs so-called insurgents.
Tests confirmed that some of the warheads contained cyclosarin, a nerve gas five times more powerful than sarin. These chemical weapons were supposed to have been completely destroyed during the 1991-1998 UN inspection regime.
Other sources provide the truth that Democrats claim they seek. On October 2, 2003, Dr. David Kay, head of the Iraq Survey Group, told the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence that his group found WMD in Iraq.
Kay said, We have discovered dozens of WMD-related program activities and significant amounts of equipment that Iraq concealed from the United Nations during the inspections that began in late 2002. The discovery of these deliberate concealment efforts have come about both through the admissions of Iraqi scientists and officials concerning information they deliberately withheld and through physical evidence of equipment and activities that ISG has discovered that should have been declared to the UN.
Kay said their findings included, A clandestine network of laboratories and safehouses within the Iraqi Intelligence Service that contained equipment subject to UN monitoring and suitable for continuing CBW research
reference strains of biological organisms concealed in a scientists home, one of which can be used to produce biological weapons, new research on BW-applicable agents
continuing work on ricin and aflatoxin were not declared to the UN
a line of UAVs not fully declared at an undeclared production facility and an admission that they had tested one of their declared UAVs out to a range of 500 km, 350 km beyond the permissible limit
continuing covert capability to manufacture fuel propellant useful only for prohibited SCUD variant missiles, a capability that was maintained at least until the end of 2001 and that cooperating Iraqi scientists have said they were told to conceal from the UN
plans and advanced design work for new long-range missiles with ranges up to at least 1000 km - well beyond the 150 km range limit imposed by the UN.
-- see link above for full story
Yes, but three years too late.
WE did NOT go to war with IRAQ because of WMD! WMD was only ONE reason among several, all outlined in the resolution passed by the US Congress.
If not for BLAIR's request and OUR subsequent capitulation to go ONCE more to the UN with OUR PROOF of WMD, so he could get cover with the British people, we would not be in the position today vis a vie, WMD's.
Ignorance and evil are both very dangerous.
"So Bush should have been out front, ramming it down Howard the Dean's throat.
"
I would rather the President kept busy running the country and working on diminishing terrorism.
Why waste his time trying to discredit fools?
"The WH should never have allowed the dems to say over and over again "there were no WMDs" without challenging it."
And he would have ended up looking like the fool.
When your enemy insists on hanging himself, let him have all the rope.
Well, I understand that approach, but one could argue that taking the wind out of Howard the gasbag and his ilk qualifies as "diminishing terrorism".
taking the wind out of Howard the gasbag and his ilk qualifies as "diminishing terrorism".>/i>
You are correct. They have been aiding and abetting the enemy, and it behooves those who long for truth and justice to expose them.
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