Sarin in artillery shell in Iraq?
 

If confirmed this would seem to be an interesting development. If it is true, I am rather annoyed by Kay's reaction to it. I wonder what he means by it not "striking his as a big deal". It certainly is a big deal in my mind if insurgents are using shells with chemical agents in them (whether they are aware of the presence of chemicals or not).

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...2004May17.html

WMDs Found in Iraq?
 

Guess it wasn't an April Fool's Joke afterall...
http://www.defenselink.mil/news/May2...200405174.html

Obviously this isn't concrete evidence, but it does suggest the possibility of more. I'm very interested in seeing how this pans out, both in Iraq and in the news media.

[EDIT]From Fark: http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.j...toryID=5166153[/EDIT]

Justification finally! Now if feel silly for being a democrat. LOL

I just heard confirmation that our media is run by fucking morons. On CNN, a reporter just asked this question in regards to the shell...

No. It wouldn't have. The Sarin agents would've just turned the air into puppies and flowers.

I fucking hate the media.

TV reporters are too much like the sheep that watch them.

If they find more and I means lots more (thousands of shells or tons of sarin) then it will be interesting. Just one or to is not enough to justify going to war on the basis of WMD (although I think we should have gone just because Saddam is an assh*le.). But if they do find lots more it will be great news.

The point seems to be that it was an old shell, probably pre 1991, and the way it was wired up it would not have been effective as a nerve gas delivery system. This led Kay to think that it wasn't a big deal because the person with the shell didn't know what was in it.

We know Saddam had nerve agents. He used them, after all. But, the current thinking is that Saddam destroyed or moved out of Iraq all the WMD before Gulf War II. This discovery does nothing to change that line of thinking.

I think the story is pretty fair in its portrayal of the incident.

Wow....impressive.

It took less than a year, and only three hundred thousand troops to find this spent shell, Damn what a great day in our history.

Never a doubt in my conservative mind. Nope no doubt here.

I wonder how long until they find the true cache?

[sar]With the way things are going we have another 10-15 years to look before handing their country back to them. [/sar]

A booby trap with sarin gas means more than just a spent shell. It means that, obviously, Saddam lied to us about destroying what he had. It also means there was WMD's in Iraq (which admittedly, we already knew).

That said, 300k troops and one year is a bit long. Wonder how long it would have taken the inspectors? They probably wouldn't have come up with anything, even while Saddam actually let them in.

You're assuming alot. Judging by some of the quotes from Rummy and General, US govt. and military are not as assuming as you.

Republican? ;)

I think it's proof that Iraq had chemical weapons. We don't know if the weapon was taken from the Iraqi gov in the past or if it was taken after the regime fell to our invasion 1 yr ago.

1 artillery shell is not a big deal.

I find it interesting that most republicans (assumption) presumed the weapons were smuggled to Syria, but would never think that something might get smuggled in. Finding a spent shell, that "might" have contained sarin, is hardly the justification you seek. Considering the lives lost, money spent, reputation soiled, lies told, and mistakes made. There really needs to be an incredible payoff to make this fiasco resemble anything close to a good idea.
Maybe the troops coming from south Korea will have better luck, as we obviously don't need them there. I am so very glad we found the stinky gas Sadam had, it is far worse than the nukes in the hands of that sweet dictator in North Korea.

O.K. sarcastic rant over.

Yes it is an interesting development to have possibly found chemical weaponry in Iraq. It may lend some weight to our presence there. The agent Sarin is deadly, even in very small dosage, and could have killed many. That said, the time for finding WMD's is long over, as we have far bigger problems in Iraq. We are coming very close to losing control of the country(if indeed we ever had it) and entering into a much more costly phase of the occupation. In the coming months, finding WMD's will mean nothing to anyone exept the administration, and the hard core republicans looking for good news and justification.

Many more American soldiers will die, and not to find weapons. In fact , to this day I still don't really know why we are there. Simply because those who decided to go, haven't had the will to tell me the truth. And have changed the lies so many times that even they must be confused by now.

Great news? someone with thousands of chemical shells, already pissed at our soldiers, Great news?

And who do you think the next a@#hole we should take out is?
Just want to know so I can get help for the tens of thousands of innocent people who will be killed and maimed.

Hmmm.....why not North Korea, they have a pretty good a@#hole in charge there, and we KNOW he has WMD's.

Remember that Sadaam could of had that sarin-tipped, binary-mixing howitzer shell mounted on a plane and used it to attack the USA in 45 minutes.

Canada is looking pretty good as a northern territory, I'm just saying.

Um, we already took out Saddam. I'm not exactly sure what point you're trying to make.

I believe what Assilem was saying is that one shell is not a "big deal" in the context of the hunt for WMD to justify the war in Iraq. In fact, that's exactly what he said if you read the entire post.

if one shell doesn't justify it, how many will? 5, 10,...i seriously bet they could find 999 shells and people would still say that the war wasn't justified. whether the one shell is old or not, saddam never told weapons inspectors about it and that's what the whole war was about. i think this is huge...there's also a former iraqi scientist that says there's a lot more

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,120137,00.html

so i think this is a pretty big deal....on the other hand, isn't this the perfect time to start finding them...hmmmm

1 shell doesn't answer who the hell used it and how they got it

and if you know where they got it then its where the rest are...

because how ridiculous would it be to going to war over one bomb that may or may not be a remnant from 10 years ago OR may not even have come from there...

basically put im on the 'wait and see' list because its too early to make a decision on something we barely know about with little outside to say much

The point is, if there's one there's probably more. I assume the insurgents are using bombs they get from stockpiles cached somewhere. If so, the cache where this one came from (and is apparently the one they're working from) has a pretty good chance of holding more of them. As far as them justifying the war, I don't care. IMO the war was justified without WMDs but that's another topic altogether. The issue I have is that people are looking at this as "no big deal" when it's a significant change in the threat faced by our troops (assuming there are more of these shells).

As far as its rigging not being an effective method of dispersing it, I don't think that's true. While it probably isn't the most effective method, it could/would cause considerable damage to those in the immediate area. Most of these roadside bombs kill only one or two soldiers out of half a dozen to a dozen in the area. The addition of sarin to the mix could possibly double or triple the death toll. When these shells are fired from an artillery piece, the two agents mix to enable the toxic combination. Exploding the shell will likely vaporize the containers and mix the ingredients in the shock wave of the explosion. Apparently this bomb was only partially triggered and the agents were unable to mix and yet two soldiers were still exposed to the nerve agent and had to be treated.

Danger, Will Robinson. Be respectful, please.

I think if the people who employed this shell had known it contained sarin gas they would have tried to use it as it was intended rather than as they did. It seems that simply exploding it likely does not mix the binary elements, as it didn't, and the two soldiers who were exposed were bomb disposal experts who were working on the bomb itself, and were so minorly affected that they were later released and the area didn't have to be decontaminated. So it didn't disperse.
I don't argue that if these shells were employed as they were designed it would be catastrophic for our troops, but apparently this was just a special shell thrown in amongst the stockpile.

Weapons of Minor Inconvenience.
I feel safer. :suave:

On another note Rumsfeld is reported to say this is still just in the field test phase and we aren't really sure that it was sarin.

Remember the field tests we did on those 3 dozen or so rusted out shells that everyone was sure was the proof of wmd? That came up positive in the field test and was later disproven.

But it sure doesn't stop that media from screaming WMD WMD! to re-convince the 1/3 of americans who still believe we found WMD. The retraction shall be in 7 point font.

Also, if the resistance didn't know there was sarin in that shell (still speculative), they sure as hell do now.

I prefer to wait and see... one bomb makes me concerned but not overly.

I'm fine with the belief that those using the shell didn't know what they had. Also fine with the concept that rigging it as a roadside bomb is not the most effective way to activate the ingredients. What I have a problem with is the seeming belief that the contents would not have been more dangerous than the typical non sarin roadside bombs. From the reports that I've seen the bomb did not fully explode. It was only a partial explosion so its effects were not what you'd see if it had fully fired.

Who are you talking to?

Yeah the stories yesterday reported that they were confirmed and the fact that it happened a couple of days prior to the report lead me to believe it was beyond the field test phase. I typically ignore any reports relying solely on field tests that were positive but all indications yesterday were that it had already been confirmed.

It wouldn't surprise me in the least if it turned out to be a false positive.

My reaction to the story remains the same though because Kay's comments weren't modified by "if it turns out to be true" but were based on the assumption that they were true.

Here's the horses mouth.

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/20...nt_1474904.htm

It would take much longer than 45 minutes to fly to the US from Iraq- Or even cuba. Anyways Saddam did not have intentions on the United States as I understand it. He was captured because he harbored terrorists, oppressed his people, and tortured and killed many of them. But there was no plan to attack USA.

I think Tecoyah is dead on, and I feel that the american people will not support the many billions that it will take to rebuild the country.

Merged for your convenience.

one shell - so what...

i think the point is SOMEONE knew where to find it and as they have no howitzer to fire it they'll use it how and where they can...

Actually, that's not the point at all. The point appears to be that someone accidentally found it and wired it up as a roadside bomb, not knowing that it contained any sarin gas.

Also, this may turn out to be a false story, like the multiple weapons caches and biological weapons labs that were "found".

it seems that the attempt to derive wider implicatsion from this single shell have dropped away evenin the conservative press. these attempts seemed to me ridiculous from the outset.
the logical problems with trying to use this story to vindicate the bushwar are legion, overwhelming---i imagine that the folks at the helm would have loved--just loved--to find somewhere, at some level, a vindication of their actions in principle (it would certainly take the focus off the corrosive torture stories....) and would have happily grabbed this story and ran with it had it held up to any scrutiny. it is interesting to see the conservative press being used as a lab for media trial balloons---and a bit depressing to watch people take those ballooons as other than they are.

Actually I don't think "those at the helm" are looking for vindication. They believe they acted properly in invading Iraq and lots of people agree with them (as do I). The story was not solely reported by "conservative press" and the reason it has been backed off is that the initial reports that the shell had already been verified beyond field tests were wrong.

i do not think the arguments for war were compelling.
and i have a deep contempt for the bush administration.

that said, it is not important to me if bush et al understand themselves to be acting in good faith--it changes nothing from a political viewpoint--the attempts to link that shell to anything wider were floated in the conservative press yesterday and then died away. i think it is because the arguments are so obviously specious that it made no sense to go further with them.

it really did look to me like a karl rove special, though--float a ridiculous story for a while, let it get coverage, wait a few days, retract it (often on p. 5 or 6 of the major daillies)--the pattern you saw with the claims that the clinton had vandalilzed the white house on the way out for example.

as for what the administration thinks about itself, again, it is completely irrelevant--in a monarchy, maybe it would matter--but in a democracy, even one a superficial as the american--this register of claim makes no difference.

It was you who brought up that the administration was looking for "a vindication of their actions in principle" and that's why I responded that they are most assuredly comfortable with their course of action and have no need to justify it.

Again, as far as the "conservative media" theory, the story wasrun by the AP, CBS, Reuters, and many more "legitimate" news sources. It wasnot restricted to the "conservative media ".

http://www.boston.com/news/world/mid...n_iraq?mode=PF

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2003/...in560449.shtml

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/040517/325/etshk.html

if there is more, things are gonna get very bad, because these insane islamic turds are going to kill at the fastest rate possible. If there isn't more, great, because I would hate to see our troops getting hit with this. But this should prove enough that just like that bomb that was stopped at the syrian border, you give these crazies a weapon and they'll use it. It's a good thing our people are over there taking the means and ways away from them.

Given the rather large number of false alarms regarding chems, I would wait a week or so for more conclusive tests. Naturally, it would not surprise me to any number of results.

We do know that Saddam possessed chemical weapons more than a decade ago, and perhaps as recently as 1998. We also know he had 'basic' delivery systems; aircraft bombs and artillery shells. These are basically empty cannisters designed to be filled with chemicals, which are burst open upon hitting their target.

Chemicals don't store well. Without an active production program, your stocks rapidly become inert. However, the shells and bombs are metal...they are easily stored indefinitely.

Fast forward to 2004. Enter gangs of terrorists looking for materials for improvised explosive devices (IEDs). Enter the empty artillery shell. Complete with detonator, all the terrorist must do is stuff its hold with his explosives and he has a great IED. Now if this shell had once been filled with gas, there may be traces remaining, at least enough to trip highly developed US chemical sniffers. The terrorists may have been completely unaware of the chemical traces (not that it would have bothered them).

Just one of many possibilities, but to draw any conclusions yet is premature.

Great news for the Bush camp. At least maybe then the all mighty UN and world community might like us a little better. Like we should give a crap what they think. I've had enough of a bunch of little third world countries (the UN) telling us how to protect our soil. And I don’t really care how many “innocents” get killed or maimed in the process, that’s just the byproduct of war. A war that they started. Not us.

And yes Kim Jung Il should be next on the list. And then I say we bomb the crap out of Iran.