'CHEMICAL SHELLS FOUND' (Hello Mr. Blix!)

Sky News ^ | 13 April, 2003

[Happy2BMe]

'CHEMICAL SHELLS FOUND'

US Marines have discovered 278 artillery shells carrying a substance that tested positive as a blistering agent, senior officers have said.

Major Stephen Armes, of the Marines 1st Battalion, 5th Regiment, said the shells were found in trailers parked in a schoolyard.

Three were mounted on launchers, he said.

But the battalion commander said more tests were required before any conclusions could be drawn.

Coalition forces have yet to find any evidence of chemical weapons since launching the war in Iraq on March 20.

All the alleged finds have so far turned out to be false upon further analysis.

But military commanders remain confident they will eventually uncover weapons of mass destruction.

They say thousands of sites have to be searched and it is only a matter of time. 

"I have not found any that I have absolutely satisfied myself are...weapon of mass destruction materials," Coalition commander General Tommy Franks told reporters.

"But you're talking about 2,000, 3,000 perhaps, places in this country where we know we're going to go and investigate each one of them.

"We may have...somewhere between five and 10 and 15 site exploitations ongoing in a 24-hour period of time."

In some of these cases the testing could take up to three weeks or more, he added.

[Nebr FAL owner]

Also opening one of these suspect shells in the main hall of the U.N. while all the little weasels are watching only don't let em have gas masks.

[VRWC_minion]

Something is wrong with all these secondary tests, though, that or we are having much information witheld from us, either to be released later as a complete report, or to nevr be released.

Another possibility is cross containmination. Lets say that they have weapons with chemical warheads annd without. Some of the same tools, facilities and people will come in contact with both.

Assuming the field tests are very senstive they may be picking up trace amounts which were transfered from contact with other weapons. Later when a less sensitive but more comprehnsive test is done it comes up negative because its only trace amounts.

In other words these trace readings may be confirming the presence of WMD because these have been in contact with them but these are not them.

[Vets_Husband_and_Wife]

I heard our tests in the field are extremely sensitive for the sake of the troops. I would wait on ANY reports coming from embeddeds to be verified before believing them as fact.

Otherwise, we become as the little boy crying wolf.

IMHO

Hope it is true, but will wait and see.

Vets

[JudyB1938]

I couldn't care less if they find any WMDs or not. The mission has been accomplished to get rid of the thing that caused the MOST "mass destruction" - and that was Saddam himself.

I am so pleased that we now have a President who shows the world that they'd better be real careful who they mess with! Murdering Americans is not the sport they thought it was.

[George W. Bush]

I tend to agree but it's way better than CNN or Peta Jennings. I would be nuts by now if it was not for FOX.

Granted. Me too. But there's a limit to how much of a pass we can give Fox on getting their facts straight and avoiding sensationalism as a tool to boost ratings. It needs to be Fair & Balanced & Accurate if FNC is to finally become the dominant media outlet.

[RaceBannon]

I think some one gave a simple answer to a simple reporter, these are rocket warheads or something, like a Katyusha or FROG or some other ss missile

[George W. Bush]

I couldn't care less if they find any WMDs or not.

Ding-ding-ding! You are the winner, Judy!

The truth is that it doesn't matter any more if we found WMD. The American people don't care about it except for the Lefty whiners who will never accept the war anyway. The Weasels only pretend to care about it. No one is saying much. Not even the Arabs.

They discussed this on Fox News Sunday today and indicated new polling that said that Americans, having seen the liberation and the horrors of Saddam, no longer care whether we find WMD because Saddam was so horrible to his own people. America actually does see this now primarily as a liberation effort.

So, Judy, you are the majority opinion here. I realized when looking at this thread that I don't care about the WMD either. I'm glad Saddam is gone and that America saved those poor Iraqis from him and his sons, a regime that was going to torture and murder for decades to come if we hadn't invaded. And they'll have a chance at being a wealthy oil democracy if they can hold on to it.

[Happy2BMe]

"Murdering Americans is not the sport they thought it was."

I know of at least 260,000 U.S. Servicemen and Women who would STRONGLY agree with that statement!

[Maelstrom]

I do not feel I can concur.

The WMDs initially "found" were later not "confirmed" as WMDs.

I haven't seen reports that they were determined not to be WMDs but instead were confirmed as "X". What I have seen as Fox say "WMDs" and NPR say "Pesticide" when it's the same chemical composition only concentration matters.

So...listeners have a choice...*suspect* WMDs or *suspect* Pesticide.

[clamboat]

False Alarms?
Not one yet.
Each has to undergo further investigation, none have been proven as something other than WMDs any more than they've been confirmed as WMDs.

Really? Not a single one, huh?

"Smoking gun" WMD site in Iraq turns out to contain pesticide

[Driver70]

I say we pop a few off toward Syria to test them out, we'll find out real quick what's in those shells.

BTW, the MOAB (and Daisy Cutter) can't be used from a B-1 or any other bomber, it has to be shoved out the back of a transport (usually a C-130) because it's so darn big.

I would like to see a MOAB go off, it's got to be just awesome!

[LibertyThug]

Was that a Blix quote? LOL!

[BenLurkin]

[BenLurkin]

NO U.N. BUMP!

[BenLurkin]

LOL! (But the guys too tall.)

[exDem from Miami]

If you saw Fox News at Sears it was probably because the store had it on a DISH sat system tied into their TVs.

DISH is wonderful and the satellite picture resolution is far better than cable. You should go back to Sears and get it.

[Bonaparte]

Oh, Scotty! SKAH-TEEEEE!

[Cachelot]

Really? Not a single one, huh?

Actually, the "pesticide" claim isn't conclusive either.

And if I remember, there were two sets of materials at that site - one set that might be pesticides with "dual use", that is, nerve agent precursors, and one set that contained nerve agents and blister agents.

None of this stuff is all tested out yet, because they follow (according to G. Liddy) a protocol of distributing samples to different labs all over the world. It'll take the time it takes.

[JudyB1938]

Thank you very much for sharing that. Says it all, doesn't it !!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Happy2BMe]

"Says it all, doesn't it !!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

Could you please be a bit more specific - e.g., post #?