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Oh ya there are more then that but that is all that has been declassified at this time. this is also only for chemical weapons we do not know at this time how many other forms of WMD may have been found but not yet declassified.

Way to go Bush! You spent 300 billion dollars of our kids’ money so we could find weapons we already knew they had back in the 1980’s. How did we know? They were USING them!!

Now call me fiscally conservative, but if I had just ordered almost 3000 Americans to die, I wouldn’t be bragging about this discovery as if it justifies everything. It tells us what every textbook already could: that they had and used mustard and sarin nerve agents over 25 years ago.

“Now that the proper documents have been declassified and we know we found chemical weapons what does the left say?”

They’re degraded pre-gulf war shells. I’m sure Fox is already telling everyone — that was really the whole point of this exercise. Fool the people again — and it’ll probably work.
Santorum was picked to break this news because he’s been doing poorly in the polls for his state. That’s all I have to say.

“Proper Documents”… what the frell does that mean? Don’t tell me they found pieces of paper TALKING about WMD!!!

Where are the WMD themselves?

I did not know it mattered when it was made but that Bush said he had them. We know there are more. Yes it is true they are degraded so what. It will still kill. It will still burn the skin off of anyone coming into contact with it. Why does it matter that we knew they had them prior to the first war. Did you want old cans of serin gas in the hands of a madman or in the hands of terrorist.

I am sure that is one of the big things the insurgents have been really looking for.

Come on get real. The war was not all about WMD but that was a big part of it. It was about freeing people who could not free themselves.

So now we freed the Iraqi people and we found WMD so where is the great lie you folks keep talking about?

Aldous

We found them in weapon caches and we now have them. I understand there are actually more out there that we found and currently have in our possession.

Randall

Good work. Michelle Malkin is all over this too. Unfortunately, by tomorrow night, the left will be “ya butting” all over the place. I can hear it now..”Those were pre-1991 WMDs..they don’t count.

What counts, according to the information that I have read this evening, is that the are still useable, and that people on the black market in Iraq may be trying to buy them.

If this is true, and at this point it looks that it is, then the president is vindicated.

This week will be a very interesting week indeed.

Degraded weapons are just as deadly should a terrorist get hold of them, and that’s the point.

Hussein said he destroyed all WMD, which we know was a lie.

500 shells were found; Hussein used 15 to kill 5,000 Iraqi Kurds.

Darfur would be about freeing people who could not free themselves. Somolia would be about freeing people who could not free themselves. Rwanda would be about freeing people who could not free themselves. North Korea would be about freeing people who could not free themselves. Iran would be about freeing people who could not free themselves. Syria would be about freeing people who could not free themselves. ETC. ETC.

That’s just rhetoric. No more.

He told us about them trying to buy uranium from Africa. He told us that they had a direct link to Osama. They even told us he financed terror and allowed them to train in Iraq.

Those were the arguments EVERYONE, especially most pro-war people were using and believing.

Why does this have to be constantly re-visited? Emotional thinking clouds the facts, and the rhetoric of “freeing people who could not free themselves” was just fluff. We use it every time.

The American people didn’t go to war in order to find 25 year old shells of mustard gas and sarin in a degraded condition. They were told we were going because of “mushroom clouds” from a reconstituted nuclear program that used “uranium from Africa”.

More details about the WMD findings, the Santorum press conference, and the declassified documents here.

Kevin

I love when the left accuses the right of emotional thinking, since that’s all the left uses.

Please, please, please pull your head out of the Right Wing Echo Chamber (tm) once in while. This is tiresome. If you are genuinely so easily fooled by right wing propaganda, why are you even trying to have a discussion on a blog like this?

Kevin:
“Why does this have to be constantly re-visited?”

Because they’re petrified the American people might vote in droves for Democrats because of how horribly they’ve messed things up with this war and how much money they’ve spent. I view what they’re doing as a real act of desperation — but like I said, if the media plays again rolls over like they have with everything else the administration has done, it might work once again.

That should read: plays along again and rolls over like they have with everything else…

Get me correctly, I love the fact we found those containers. No one dug them up yet, and that says something about the frenzy in which they must have been buried. Maybe Saddam Insane killed everyone who knew and then forgot. Who knows?

Here’s what I know. The UN inspectors were looking for this stuff and knew it existed. Just as did the American public (well, the ones who read anyway). We didn’t know where it was.

I’m mostly upset about the costs of this war in Iraq…lives and money. Not ours by the way, don’t forget that…or maybe its easier for people that way.

So I say two conclusions can be drawn from the news.

First: great job securing the gas

Second: hindsight being what it is, this still isn’t enough to justify the costs. We could have let the international community do it, and I believe we could have gotten them to act on any good intelligence. We should have put focus on getting good information. Instead Bush and company kicked in the door and started shooting. Sorry…too soon?

Holy crap!

Kevin23,

“I believe we could have gotten them to act on any good intelligence.”

Intelligence agencies throughout the world drew the same conclusion that America did: Saddam had WMD.

The UN did not act, nor would it when China, Russia, and France were the ones assisting Saddam.

“So now we freed the Iraqi people and we found WMD so where is the great lie you folks keep talking about?” - Randall

WMD? Get real. You think Bush, Cheney, and Co. sold this war on 500 shells of depleted chemical agents? They were talking mushroom clouds, anthrax, nuclear programs that were not in existence. Are you really asking with a straight face where the great lies were?

As for freeing the Iraqi people and helping jump start arab democracy in the middle east. I kept telling myself this must be the real reason. Perhaps I’m not as big a cynic as I should be but I thought, surely Wolfowitz and others were advocating for going into Iraq the day after Sept 11 because they genuinely believed (all along) that the USA should use its overwhelming military to change the world while it could (however misguided)or squander the greatest power on earth. But then, they screwed up so ridiculously I can’t even think that with a straight face anymore. How could someone who wanted to build a democracy do all the things they did wrong starting with so little planning about securing the damn place? It doesn’t add up.

Either they are incredibly incompetent or just plain liars, you choose.

The inspectors were on the ground in Iraq driving around in circles not knowing where to look.

If we could have told them where to go, imagine the cost savings.

This administration really needs to stop leading the bull by the horns. But I’m not afraid to admit it when they finally have good news. It is good. But they are still innept overall.

Can anybody say pandering? its that time. Congress is the place and its all old news.

As I said on the previous part of this thread: These are pre-gulf war Chemical weapons which had degraded from the high-level toxicity that made them effective weapons. These were not the weapons that were supposed to have been made and stockpiled since the Gulf War, these are just the forgotten relics of the Iran-Iraq war.

There’s a reason why this information wasn’t released sooner. It would have been throroughly shot down and exposed for what it is. They’re hoping they can get an artificial kick off of this and throw Democrats off their stride.

This is how the Republican Noise Machine works: What they tell you is not as important as what they don’t tell you.

Stephen,

Sarin gas does not expire, though mustard gas does.

Kevin,
“Way to go Bush! You spent 300 billion dollars of our kids’ money so we could find weapons we already knew they had back in the 1980’s.”

Ah ha! These “pre-Gulf War” weapons were the same weapons that Saddam said he didn’t have. He was supposed to disclose these weapons, via the cease fire agreement, and he didn’t; in fact, this finding proved he (Saddam not Bush) “LIED” about them. Oh my goodness, “SADDAM LIED KIDS DIED”, that has a nice ring to it; the libs ought to try that one, for a change.

These weapons definitely blow the whole “it is believed Clinton destroyed those weapons, via bombings in 1998, so that’s why all those Democrats were caught with their quotes of Iraqs’ WMD’s in the late 90’s” bullcrap out of the water. Keep in mind, the bloggers that made those comments don’t have the guts to stand up to those remarks now and I don’t have the time (nor the panache right now) to go back and copy and paste their quotes (they’re damn lucky, too!).

Busted, libbies. Flat out!!!

I’m not sure how Saddam lying is new news to anyone. We ALL knew that.

We went looking for undeclared weapons. After we failed to find any, we should have covertly gathered good intelligence and came back when we knew something specific. That would have been prudent.

Instead all we got was paranoid claims, half of which had already been discredited by intelligence officials. But now we found a nut, so it was ALL worth it? No, it was still a blunder from the get-go. If the new Republican moddo is going to be “it’s better to be lucky than good” then lets hope to god they lose the house and senate.

Actually, Sarin in its unitary form is quite short lived, only lasting a matter of weeks or months. Binaries last longer, but that might be an issue of years rather than weeks.

Rahdigly-
If Bush had only said that Saddam still had stockpiles of weapons somewhere around, you might be free and clear, But Bush Was arguing three things: Current stockpiles, An ongoing CBW production capability, and terrorists around waiting to snap the weapons up. Moreover, Bush combined this with claims of a working Nuclear Weapons program to justify a PRE-EMPTIVE WAR.

That last detail has been highlighted because it is essential to make a distinction between a violation which poses little threat to us, and one which has significant bearing on our calculations there, if for no other reason than it’s our only legal justification for going to war in first place.

These shells were not a real threat to us. They were buried stockpiles of shells from a war long over, not even typically marked to tell them apart from conventional shells.

These do no represent or vindicate the kinds of claims that were made to justify this war. They don’t even really represent the kinds of stockpiles we dealt with in the inspection regimes just after the Gulf War. These represent no justification for America to go to war without being attacked first.

Curious, what is significantly degraded - mustard gas that you could use on a hotdog? If there were a there there the Bush Regime would have declassified imediately - and you know it.

Chemical weapons are often unstable, if for no other reason than they tend to be very reactive. It doesn’t better if its impure, and Iraq’s munitions could have terrible quality control. The end products of such reactions would not be very healthy to consume (Mustard gets its name from the mustard seed smell), but they wouldn’t be the deadly substance advertised.

If they are useless then lets give them to the DNC to use as party poppers in 08. After all they are outdated, useless and insignificant 80’s equipment.

Oh by the way, just so ya know kevin23, if it is 80’s stuff, why was it not destroyed. I read somewhere all his weapons programs were destroyed and all his bulletts made blanks. I even believe that it was the ship without a rudder DNC that yaked it in their yaking points.

After all to listen to the Democrats it seems he just missed sainthood by nose.

“We went looking for undeclared weapons. After we failed to find any, we should have covertly gathered good intelligence and came back when we knew something specific.”

So, we found weapons that Saddam said he didn’t have; does that come close to “undeclared weapons”?!

As for the “good intelligence” comment, the democrats said he had the weapons in 1998 and 1999; then again in 2002 and yet, the libs on this blog said that “Clinton presumbly destroyed those weapons in the 1998 bombings”. Those are facts.

One thing is for sure, we have “good” intelligence gathering now that we’re in Iraq.

And, if this mustard gas is so non threatining (“mustard gas that you could use on a hotdog”), are you going to prove that this summer when you put those weapons (that they found) on your nathans or ballpark?!! Hmmm…

This is very pathetic, you folks who supported the war are looking for any vindication you can get. If there was anything of any significance the Bush Admin would have made it public long ago. It needs the PR. But they didn’t..why? Becasue it is nothing of significance.

Lets look at at Saddams Weapons program;

The US knew and/or assumed he had WMD’s becasue we sold them to him. He used them in the 1980’s and the US (Reagan, Rumsfeld and Bush) was silent about it. We rasied no objection until 15 years later when it suits our purpose, we decide to highlight his use of WMD’s as pretex for war.

Now we know according to fox news that the WMD’s found pre-date 1991 and does not indicate an active weapons program during the 1990’s. In addition, Not one Iraqi was a 9/11 hijacker and not one Iraqi is at Guantanamo Bay. The 9/11 comission says Iraq has no ties to Al-Qaeda.

Unprovoked we attack a sovern nation against the UN and international law. Many thousands innocent Iraqi’s are dead. (far more than the number of innocent Americans killed on 9/11)

But somehow you pro-Iraq war crowd feel vindicated becasue of we found outdated WMD’s. So please tell me, How are we (USA) the good guys in all of this?

Dr Politico, Hussein did not deny having WMD. His statements were carefully crafted to leave room for believing he did still have them and was capable of inflicting tremendous harm on an American invasion force. That was part of the abject insanity of Saddam Hussein, who probably never was educated in the concept of the self-fulfilling prophesy.

I wonder why, with such an amazing stockpile of such weapons of mass destruction, that Saddam did not use them on the invading American troops?
Pandering to the chicken hawks is all this is about.

“if it is 80’s stuff, why was it not destroyed”

What does it matter at this point? And who cares? Nobody doubted he’d buried stuff in the desert. What, where, how much? These are questions we should have been asking all along.

And has anyone addressed my point yet? This war is WAY TOO COSTLY???

I guess people are too busy “winning” to comprehend what hame they are playing.

I have two sixpacks of Amstel from the early nineties in the back of my garage, well I guess it still classifies as beer.

Well good thing they found something, Saddam looked at that info and said “oh thaaaat’s where I put those I been lookin’ everywhere”.

ATTENTION REPUBLICANS!—here’s your chance! Now CAN YOU PROVE that there were the propulsion systems to get those over-aged cans of Raid over here into the US?????????? THAT IS WHAT THE CLAIM WAS—let me say it again—THAT IS WHAT THE CLAIM WAS, that they could fire them into the United States!!!!—Your go!

Stephen,

“Binaries last longer, but that might be an issue of years rather than weeks.”

That’s a strange claim to make. According to the link you provided, the benefit of binaries is that shelf-life becomes irrelevant.

According to Senator Santorum:

“The purity of the agents inside the munitions depends on many factors, including the manufacturing process, potential additives and environmental storage conditions. While agents degrade over time, chemical warfare agents remain hazardous and potentially lethal,” Santorum read from the [intelligence] document.

I’ll take the words of America’s intelligence departments over Wikipedia.

Still, we’re getting way ahead of ourselves. As I wrote, WMD were found. They would be dangerous in the hands of terrorists. I’ll wait for official information rather than speculate further. I recommend you do the same before arguing that these weapons were harmless.

Let’s do the big test. Take the top 500 liberals in the country and give them each one cylinder to store in their cellar, den, garage or the room of their choice. At election time we will check on those cylinders and see what the status is.

Note to Randall, Sean Hannity has been wrong so many times that he is more likely to spontaneously combust than ever be right about anything.

Randall to answer your questions:
Yes W is still a liar. Well unless these gases are the mushroom clouds we heard so much about but seen so little of.
Yep, still thinking the war was a bad idea. It had nothing to do with terrorism. I think W and the traitors that follow him just want to bankrupt this Country.
This crap is more of the same from the far right. Nothing changes same crap different day.
This issue makes little difference because it is insignicent when compared to Nuclear warheads that we were told we would find. Just more pandering to hide the real issues surrounding the reason we went to war.

It seems like only fox news has found wwmd’s in Iraq.I pity there scared and hysterical fans.

I don’t beleive for one moment that U.S. troops located these outdated weapons without some intelligence from inside Iraq. Namely civilians who were somehow convinced that the weapons were all we were after, and that we would leave once they were in our possession. Hell, isn’t that what everyone was lead to beleive?

Is it surprising that they were found? No. We suspected they were there.

Is it surprising that it wasn’t confirmed? No. If it had been we’d probably been asked to leave.

If we’ve found all of the weapons, then insurgents have no tangible upper hand and non-insurgents outnumber insurgents by about 200 to 1, and there is no reason to stay. Even if we have found all of them, it most probably will be presented that we haven’t, which will lend credence to continued U.S. presence.

Now all the lefties will argue about the quality of the weapons. But there is a definite bottom line.

Saddam had WMD. He lied about it. There may be more.

We can argue about how bad it is, but you do have to give up the Bush lied rhetoric.

This also shows the problem with intel. There is a lot of uncertainty.

But we all know lefty has long since given up on truth. No matter what, lefty has the script written.

We taunt you a fifth time. I do enjoy this. I get to do it about once every two weeks.

Stefano

We DID NOT sell WMD to Saddam and contibuted only 0.47 of his total arsenal. FYI - that is less than places like Czechoslovakia or Brazil. It is statistically about zero. Please do not continue to spread that disinformation about your country. It is wrong factually and wrong to do. You can continue to hate Bush & Reagan w/o telling lies about the U.S.

I know you saw a picture of Rumsfeld with Saddam and that convinced you that the U.S. created Saddam. If you check archives you can find lots of pictures of people with Saddam. THe history is complicated and I do not have time to explain it to you. Suffice to say that the weapons we faced in the Gulf War were Soviet or French. You may recall that.

Isn’t Mustard Gas is a World War I weapon? Maybe they’ll find a cache of hand grenades with wooden sticks on them too. Hitler supposedly had a raspy voice because of a Mustard Gas attack burning his vocal chords. This is really high tech modern stuff here.

Prove to me they had the propulsion systems to vault it into the US as Bush and Cheney claimed and I promise I’ll shut up.

Stephen,
“Actually, Sarin in its unitary form is quite short lived, only lasting a matter of weeks or months. Binaries last longer, but that might be an issue of years rather than weeks.”
Posted by: Stephen Daugherty at June 21, 2006 10:36 PM

Of course, you left out the “Biological Effects” section of that link. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarin#Shelf_life

Let’s take a look and what it says:

“Sarin is an extremely potent organophosphate compound that disrupts the nervous system by inhibiting the cholinesterase enzyme by forming a covalent bond with the site of the enzyme where acetylcholine normally undergoes hydrolysis. This allows acetylcholine to build up and continue to act so that any nerve impulses are, in effect, continually transmitted…As the victim continues to lose control of bodily functions, he vomits, defecates and urinates. This phase is followed by twitching and jerking. Ultimately, the victim becomes comatose and suffocates in a series of convulsive spasms
…Sarin is a highly volatile liquid.
Inhalation and absorption through the skin pose a great threat. Even vapour concentrations immediately penetrate the skin. People who absorb a nonlethal dose but do not receive immediate appropriate medical treatment may suffer permanent neurological damage…Even at very low concentrations, sarin can be fatal.Death may follow in one minute after direct ingestion of about 0.01 milligram per kilogram of body weight if antidotes, typically atropine and pralidoxime, are not quickly administered. Atropine, an acetylcholine inhibitor, is given to treat the physiological symptoms of poisoning.”

Oh Stephen, it sucks when you keep reading a source (that you cited) and it says that’s it’s deadly. Now, if these weapons, that were found (500 to be exact) were used in 9/11, or worse it got into the hands of terrorists, how catastrophic that would be! It’s WMD’s and, in the hands of the enemy (which is “actually” not Bush, by the way), would be extremely fatal to us “infidels”.

Novenge

This is a discussion we have had before. These chemical weapons are dangerous because they are easy to make. Any bad guy with money and the will to do so can make them if he defies the international community. That is also the reason why it is so stupid to believe that the U.S. supplied these things to Saddam. There is no need.

Chemical weapons are not very dangerous against organized military. We learned how to adapt by 1918. They are a potent weapon against civilian targets and as a terror weapon. That is why they are so odious. They are essentially only a murder weapon. To repeat, they are dangerous because they are easy to make by someone who has money, controls a country and has the will to use them. Not many people fit all these categories. Saddam did.

AND also Aren’t thse armaments left over from the Iran Iraq war???? THEY ARE AREN’T THEY? YES THEY ARE oooh Fox is reeeeeaally on to something—they were in a war in the eighties—WOWIE what a breakthrough.

So Jack - If intelligence was uncertain, how was Bush so absolutely certain that Saddam was lying? And how can anyone feel vindicated in the fact that Bush’s “Silly guess” turned out to be true? Do you actually suggest that he may have God-like powers of omnipresence? Everyone in the world knew that they could have them. Bush had the sales ledger. Intelligence only cast a shadow on whether or not they still existed or not, and if so, where they might be.

It seems too small a victory to suggest that your political adversaries grovel in your presence.

Jack they did not have the ICBM propulsion systems to get them into the US, such as was the fear.

Novenge

The US was not the primary target. Israel was, is and always will be. They would rather destroy Israel than anybody else on earth. That is what they live for, the destruction of Israel. It will never happen.

Ah…its refreshing days like this that make me proud to sit up and smell the burnt odor o’ napalm and liberals with their pants on fire. Whine all you want, Saddam really was interested in getting yellow cake uranium from Nigeria.Never mind the bs report made by that lying slob and his not quite a spy wife (who did not send him on that “fact finding” trip). That was political backstabbing from our friends deep in the Cia, ones made a little uncomfortable by Porter Gauss. And he *Saddam* did have a nuclear program, french made, of course…but it was only for peaceful power purposes. (Just like the one next door in Iran, also french and russian made, Thanx guys)
Lets not forget all that french made military radio and other equipment our boys kept finding.

No one, not even the dumbest leftie thought for a moment that he would shoot a missle full of junk at us…that would leave radar tracks pointing right back at him, and he’d get nuked. Novenge thinks he’s pretty cute, but the best memory against a democrat or a leftie is a good memory and a strong right hook. (as opposed to the effete left jab or eye scratch)
No, the point has always been the use of third party intermediaries in his asymetrical warfare against the US.
“Terrorists” such as the agents used by Libya on the Lockerby bombing are much more deniable than something with the islamic equivalent of “UP Yours America!” painted on the side of it. Actual nut jobs willing to die, eliminating their connection back to you are even better, especially since ol bushie still has yet to do a damned thing about the largely undefended borders. Wake up Bush! its not just about %$?!!! illegals, its about everyones safety!
(Are you happy now, liberals, even conservatives can get pissy with Bush)

Saddam was very cozy with Al queda and other terrorist types, happily giving medical treatment at his best hospitals, providing safe harbor for animals like Abu Nidal and the late, unlamented Abu Zackerwhatshisdeadfacis LONG before the so called slow motion “Rush” to war. There is plenty of evidence showing his cozying up to palestinin nutjobs whenever they killed a jew or an american, and that alone should have cost him and his rotten sons their lives. But none of that matters to you guys, does it?
Liberals don’t mind when Americans die in their failed military adventures, they only care when it looks like we might win…and increase our standing in the world.
Only an idiot would believe for a second that you gain respect in a rough and tough world by being the biggest pussy on the block. You get…and keep respect, by kicking ass, which our military does very well. Oh…and the world knows that when the chips are down from some natural disiaster, Americans will come save their sorry asses once again.
If liberals are successful in “knocking us down to size” who will be the savior of drowning people in Fiji after some tsunami? The blue helmeted child rapists in Africa? China? France? Russia? I wouldn’t bet on it.
America is the best, and I can say that having been around the world courtesy of the USN. Don’t like it? Thats too bad…for you.
The rest of us will go back to enjoying the delicious smell of burning liberal pants.

The aversive psychology from the right is just so blatant.How do you contain your embarrassment.

Noevenge,
“AND also Aren’t thse armaments left over from the Iran Iraq war???? THEY ARE AREN’T THEY? YES THEY ARE oooh Fox is reeeeeaally on to something—they were in a war in the eighties—WOWIE what a breakthrough.”

The point is that Saddam lied (once again) about these weapons and, in the hands of the wrong people (Saddam or Al Qaeda), they are a “threat” to their enemies (you know, infidels like Americans and Jews).

It also debunks the critics that say that “if we let the weapons inspectors have more time, we wouldn’t have to go to war”; even though Saddam told the weapons inspectors (in 2003) that he didn’t have these kind of weapons (from the 80’s).

Yet, keep blaming Bush, conservatives and (of course) Fox news. That’s it, you’re on to something now. Nice…

Oh and while we are all at, let us not forget for a moment that the real threat, the elephant in the room, is China. And guess what, they really do have nukes that can hit us. Bill Clintion made sure of that with his satellite technology deal. If China wasn’t looking over its shoulder at the newly strengthened Russian bear, we would probably have had it out with them over Taiwan by now.

Okay Rah,

Lets backtrack to the 90’s we knew Saddam was lying as was the case continually, continually made by Scott Ritter of Unscom. So saddam is a lir but we went to war for a little more than left over cannisters of Mustard Gas and Serin or whatever. WE are if anything looking for VX or something with real potential and in truth I think there may be more myself but this isn’t the big cache if there is one. So hence I won’t concede to let Bush be given this brownie point—I need more evidence before I let him off the hook. Yes Saddam was damn near a psycho if not a monster inside and out but we did invade on a claim.

Another sidepoint is that right next door you have Pakistan with a damn-near department store of you name it—they have it, that is one coup away from a monomaniacal anti-western Islamic theocracy. Nothing said from the Bush administration—interesting to say the least.

Tom H,

Right from the horses mouth, Israel correct! but what was the reason Bush and Cheney said we were going to war in Iraq (which I just think should have waited until we had the job done in Afghanistan), they said something about mushroom clouds was it? and that we had to act right that minute with no waiting. With exception ofcourse to giving Saddam ten months of preparation.

There may be more but this isn’t the biggie.

Novenge is right that Pakistan bears careful watching.
Once again, the adminstration doesn’t telegraph its moves so that the liberal press can sabotage its actions: we are involved on almost every level I can think of with Pakistan. We are also VERY involved with India and its less than well known about anti-ballistic missle system, some of which involves energy weapon technology. It should come as no surprise that the Bushies have nothing to say about all this, they are closed mouthed because the enemies at home are more dangerous to them and America in general than even the worst depradations of a terrorist.

And let us not forget that Scott Ritter, convicted child molester, had lots of negative stuff to say about Saddam until recently. Makes you wonder what kind of blackmail…or bribe that Saddam or Dems used to make him shut up.
Interesting that he has completly gotten out of the spotlight these days.

The Bush administration kept the discovery of these chemical weapons classified until now because they wanted the American people and the rest of the World to believe that the administration had lied about WMD’s to get us into the war.

The shells have made in the U.S.A. stamped on them. One even has presented to Sadam by your friend Rummy.

Most of us can make something out of nothing when we want to.

HHH - Damn! About 12 uninteligent counterpoints, and then you come out with something I can’t dispute. Perhaps the Chinese will forgive our anti-social behavior since Nixon.

Hard Hat Harry,

Saddam reportedly executed Abu Abas, one of the worst Palestinian terrorist, the mastermind behind the Achile Lauro and perhaps several airline highjackings.

Novenge

Many reasons were given to take out Saddam. An imminent attack on Israel, of course, is always a good reason for an interdictive strike. I suppose the threat of WMDs is another one. How about something financial? Interruption of oil? Saddam posturing to join OPEC? How about Saddam ignoring countless UN resolutions?

What do you need? When you start practically every statement with the same litany (typically starting with “Bush and Cheney…”) I get the feeling that you are just using talking points, and not really thinking about all the facts at hand.

The DoD reminds people that these munitions likely would not have worked if deployed and were not necessarily the WMD that intel agencies reported. However, they also acknowledged that Saddam’s retention of his Gulf War munitions shows his deception to the UN and the cease-fire powers.

Defense Department debunks Santorum/FOX News claim that we found WMD in Iraq

Iraq Survey Group Final Report

Okay the facs are this Bruce, this was claimed to be involved somehow with 9-11. It was claimed that we could be attacked by Saddam. It was claimed that they had massive stockpiles of WMD. It was claimed that this was the next stop on the war on terror for these reasons.

And as far as Bush being close-lipped for security reasons and that the liberal press will be treasonous or something is a crock. Granted there is a bit of it but my contention is and has been that these guys are not all that on the ball to begin with. Did you hear the ideas of how we were supposedly going to pay off this war??—with Iraqi Oil revenues. Gee when is that going to start? These are not the brightest nor the best but ideologues that I have no choice but to rest some semblance of faith in.

I can’t say Bush has been vindicated on this one.

Facts, not opinion…

According to President Putin, Saddam was impressed by 9/11, and offered to assist in similar style attacks…
Recent declassified audio tapes, have Saddam speaking to his generals of future attacks on America, that cannot be traced back to Iraq…
Saddam repeatedly violated UN cease fire accord which ended the first gulf war…
IF Saddam used WMDs in the past, on his own coutrymen, then at the very least he possessed the knowledge and capability to reconstitute those programs once he felt it was safe to do so, and could pass this onto Al-Quadea..
As for Bush’s reference to Iraq attempting to purchase Uranium from Bigeria, he preferenced it to British intelligence whom still stand by that assertion…
Terrorists do not want a free democratic region in the middle east because it would interfere with their agenda, so they have decided to make Afghanistan and Iraq their battleground… if they were not engaging our trained and brave military in those countries, does anybody seriously believe they wouldn’t be plotting against us, and we would be engaged on American soil?
Does anybody really believe that Bin Laden and his terrorist network only intended to strike us once on 9/11 and then leave us alone?
Is anybody on this blog briefed by our intelligence agencies, or cleared for classified intel? The declassfied document Santorum referenced is only a partial document, there have been other weapons found, and NO FOX didn’t trumpet these findings, they explained that the Bush administration hasn’t released this intel, because even though the weapons discovered can be used as WMDS, the BUSH administration didn’t believe this finding validated their earlier assertions.
I challenge anybody on the right or left, too review speeches by Clinton / Gore and top democrats, before Bush ever campaigned for president, they all issued statements stating categorically that Saddam had WMDS and would if given the oppotunity would use them against us.
Before Bush ran for president, every intelligence agency in the world came to the same conclusion that Saddam possessed WMDS.
Those who still protest the war, demoralize our soldiers, validate our enemies opinion of us, and often repeat their rhetoric to recruit other terrorists.
Saddam paid the famalies of suicide bombers 5,000.00 and more.
Those who rally against the war, must believe that the world would be better with Saddam / Zarquari left alone, and that a frighten Bin Laden shouldn’t be on the run.
The best and fastest way to bring the troops home is too support a complete and total victory.
After 2 of our brave men were tortured and brutally murdered, even the most vocal opponent of the war, should be outraged.
I am sadaned that so many Americans can be so vocal when it comes to how we treat our POWS, but, have no such outrage at Americans being viciously murdered.
I know soldiers in the war, these brace men and women are reenlisting in record numbers, volunteering to return to harms way, because they believe they are involved in a conflict that can make a difference not only in the middle east but here at home.
Let’s not forget that a few times Clinton had a chance to give the kill order on Bin Ladan, but for political reasons he chose not too, if he had, perhaps the Twin Towers might still be standing.
Clinton was guided by pollsters, Bush governs by conviction, he says there isn’t a day he doesn’t think about 9/11 nor a day he doesn’t pray for the troops and their famalies.
IF you support the troops, you will not engage in rhetoric which gives the enemy comfort and criticizes a noble goal.
And let’s not forget, that the oil for food scandal in the UN was the main reason the UN did not act against Iraq.
If the UN had acted in the manner of which it was intended, the invasion would not have been necessary.
Saddam was embolden by his ties to the UN, and felt confident his allies would block any resolution, and Uday told his brother they didn’t have anything to worry about, to which his brother replied, “I’m not to sure, we’re not dealing with Clinton anymore,”
His words were more prophetic than perhaps even he realized.
The weapons which Santorum refrred, proves that Saddam did not abide with UN rules nor was truthful with inspectors.
Nor let us forget that he expelled inspectors from his country, if he had nothing to hide, then why antagonize the west ?
War is regrettable, but history has proven that often it is necessary, it’s ironic that even President Lincoln faced much of the same criticism, he too wanted to free an oppressed people.
Truman also was criticized even after Pearl Harbor, had Lincoln and truman cow towed to his critics then how different might the world be today?
And if Bush allows middle east thugs and liberal socialists both here and abroad, to run us out of Iraq, then how will the world look tomorrow.
I cannot say with any degree of certainty what we should or should have not done, and neither can any of you, because none us on this or any other blog has all the facts…
If history teaches us nothing else, it’s that as times changes often does perception and realization.
It’s a known fact that the Bush administration has foiled many terrorists attacks, so it stands too reason there are many more that we will never know about…
I have voted for both democrat and republican for president, whether I agree with their policy or not, I love my country enough, that when our commander in chief sends out the troops, I support them, and root for total victory..
There was a time when rallying around the flag was in vogue…And those who believe FOX is right wing biased and CNN isn’t left wing bias, lives in the land of OZ..
As Jay Leno once said, liberals were upset because the right had Rush Limbaugh and Fox news, to which Leno, asked what about ???? ABC

These don’t sound like the same WMDs the administration talked about pre-war.

CHENEY:

Well, I think I’ve just given it, Tim, in terms of the combination of his development and use of chemical weapons, his development of biological weapons, his pursuit of nuclear weapons.—-We know that based on intelligence that he has been very, very good at hiding these kinds of efforts. He’s had years to get good at it and we know he has been absolutely devoted to trying to acquire nuclear weapons. And we believe he has, in fact, reconstituted nuclear weapons.

While a small number of old, abandoned chemical munitions have been discovered, ISG judges that Iraq unilaterally destroyed its undeclared chemical weapons stockpile in 1991.

Or these:

On October 7, 2002, George W. Bush, said… “The evidence indicates that Iraq is reconstituting its nuclear weapons program. Saddam Hussein has held numerous meetings with Iraqi nuclear scientists, a group he calls his “nuclear mujahideen” - his nuclear holy warriors. Satellite photographs reveal that Iraq is rebuilding facilities at sites that have been part of its nuclear program in the past. Iraq has attempted to purchase high-strength aluminum tubes and other equipment needed for gas centrifuges, which are used to enrich uranium for nuclear weapons.”

Jay Jay,

And the DoD said that these were not the WMD that the US went to war for—nice save!

They made a flawed attempt to save Rick’s butt. We can’t blame them for that, it’s politics.

Just a question for our resident experts….

Are these weapons that they have found part of the same weapons that were listed in the FIFTY THOUSAND PAGE fairy tale the Iraqi’s gave us as PROOF that EVRYTHING had been destroyed, just prior to the invasion?….

Appreciate your input….

BTW…Can there be a single American who isn’t rejoicing that we have over 500 weapons that will never be obtained by the terrorist element and brought to American soil?…That is after all a large part of why we’re in Iraq…Isn’t it?

That DOD spokesperson who contradicted Santorum should be locked up for aiding and abetting the enemy.

(continued) ABC, NBC,CBS, N.Y. Times, LA TIMES, CNN, NPR, PBS, MSNBC, CNN, etc…
Liberals can understand anybody except those who disagree with them.. they love gays but hate christians..they resort to mean spirited name calling, (if you are against any liberal issue, there is a label awaiting you, and slander rather than debate the issue in any meaningful way…
Conservatives could survive without liberals but liberals could not survive without conservatives, because liberal programs are funded primarily by capitalist taxpayers…
I defy all liberals who read this to discuss politics without name calling, or slander, to discuss your viewpoint in an intelligent and reasonable manner…
The late Patrick Monahayn of NY once was asked what was the major difference between Reagon and Clinton, to which he replied, a handshake with Reagan was an iron clad contract, and even a contract with Clinton wasn’t a guarantee, and he believed President Bush was a man of honor, interity.
He was widely chastised for his remark, and he brudgedly campaigned for Hillary Clinton to replace him..

Since 2003 Coalition forces have recovered approx. 500 weapons munitions which contain degraded mustard or sarin nerve agent.

Why didn’t Bush make mention of this at this October 7, 2004 press conference?

BUSH: The chief weapons inspector, Charles Duelfer, has now issued a comprehensive report that confirms the earlier conclusion of David Kay that Iraq did not have the weapons that our intelligence believed were there.

Status Whoa:

How did you feel when the 500 TONS of high-explosives were stolen from unsecured Iraqi Ammo Dumps after the fall of Iraq?

I assume you are rejoicing that all those explosives are being used for IEDs in Iraq instead of the American Soil? Good thing we got GIs there for convenient targets, eh?

Bo, Pearl Harbor was FDR.

ABC is not liberal, Koppel isn’t a liberal he just isn’t ranting, so I guess that makes him a liberal?

I think the focus of radical Islamic attrocities, being that is what they are radical Islamist, is because no one is talking about the real problem and the dems on this site would differ immensely on it. Which is Islam is really an evil primative violent religion masquerading as a lamb of the valley. Both Shiia and Suni are dark, stupid and heinously capable of massive violence and they will kill their own countrymen to make any point that crosses their uneducated minds. There is too much PC but if we are to go after all this and not lay reallistic claim that the real problem is inside the mosque, we don’t see the truth.

Muslims live to kill jews, the same way some dogs are bred to chase game and the social aspects are not changing. But we as a nation cannot for some reason just call a spade a spade and say Islam is violent and primative or we are racists. The Wahabist schools are still running, terrorist monies are still flowing and my president is off on a bender not dealing with either.

bo,

Liberals can understand anybody except those who disagree with them.. they love gays but hate christians

I love Gays and Christians.

they resort to mean spirited name calling, (if you are against any liberal issue, there is a label awaiting you, and slander rather than debate the issue in any meaningful way…

Who has resorted to this? You obviously haven’t listened to Rush, Ann, O’Reilly, etc..

Conservatives could survive without liberals but liberals could not survive without conservatives, because liberal programs are funded primarily by capitalist taxpayers…

I don’t understand this claim. I pay 25% of my wages in taxes, and I am not a capitalist.

I defy all liberals who read this to discuss politics without name calling, or slander, to discuss your viewpoint in an intelligent and reasonable manner…

And I defy you to discuss the topic actually being discussed. I believe it has something to do with WMDs. I am very proud of the intelligent and reasonableness of the arguments made by my liberal counterparts here.

I’m not sure what those comments about Reagan and Clinton have to do with this discussion.

DOC

Bush made his estimate based on intelligence. These decisions are always made in a climate of uncertainty.

I do not understand your sales ledger comment. I am sure there is some erroneous implication there. You know that the U.S. did not sell chemical weapons to Saddam and supplied 0.47% of his total arsenal even when you are very broad in defintion of weapons.

Jlw

The made in the USA crack is a complete lie. Those who believe it show both their hatred of the United States and their ignorance of chemical weapons, and perhaps their gullibility. I take it from your tone that you are trying to be ironic, funny. Please do not do that. There are plenty of people who really are dumb enough to believe it when they hear it repeated.

All

The discovery of WMD just indicates the uncertainty we were working with before the war. The fact is even AFTER all this, we still are uncertain. The Bush lied scenario assumes the President had something approaching perfect knowledge and then lied about it. The real scenario is more like this.

The President is charged with making our country safe. Before 9/11 we thought we had a lot of leeway in making decisions. After 9/11, we saw there was less margin for error. Whenever you set decision criteria you take into account the quality of your information and the consequences of being wrong. We clearly UNDERESTIMATED Saddam’s program in 1990 and we seriously underestimated the progress Pakistan was making before they came up with the bomb. Our decision makers knew that the consequences of underestimating Iraq were very serious, so they set the decision criteria with that in mind. It makes perfect sense.

After something has happened, it is usually easy to see errors. Hindsight is usually 20/20. But in this case we see how hard it was even AFTER. It becomes impossible to maintain that Bush made dishonest decisions based on the information he had in 2002 when even in 2006 we are STILL uncertain.

Reasonable people and those who have experience making real life decisions will understand this. Others, blinded by hatred or w/o significant experience being a boss, will not. And nobody will be able to explain it to them at their current level of understanding.

QUOTE: “How did you feel when the 500 TONS of high-explosives were stolen from unsecured Iraqi Ammo Dumps after the fall of Iraq?

I assume you are rejoicing that all those explosives are being used for IEDs in Iraq instead of the American Soil? Good thing we got GIs there for convenient targets, eh?

WOW….I’d try to agrue the logic of your post Aldous, however it plum escapes me……

I tell ya what I’m rejoicing about….After listening to the hyperventilating left that THERE WERE NO WMDs…..I don’t think I’ll be hearin that anymore….

Now that IS “rejoicable”….

“Islam is violent and primative”

“Muslims live to kill jews”

Doesn’t anyone in America read history anymore?
How can anyone advocate this type of worldview?

Well, luckily for some we are in America. I can’t believe there is no recognition of the fact that whole civilizations and cultures were routinely wiped out and destroyed in the name of Christianity.

It is easy to point the finger at the most obvious thing. I’m surprised I’ve yet to hear about the theory: “the browner you are the more of a terrorist you are.” Just as fruity.

I mispoke Truman came into office in 1945, my mistake, and I meant to say FDR, I profoundly apologize for my my mistake, luckliy I had a liberal around to correct me, as if that changed the point I was making, that liberals have have always opposed war, regardless of the reasons, when things were a mess in Iraq, it was reason to leave, when the people of Iraq voted it was reason to leave, new government formed, let’s leave, when Zarqwari was killed let’s leave (his whole mission in life was to run out of Iraq, so when we kill him, let’s honor him by doing what he wanted, leave,…okay so I agree it was FDR and he was actively opposed to his position on WWII,
The reference to Reagan/Clinton. Bush, is that the liberals routinely refer to Bush A a liar, BUT EVEN A LIFELONG LIBERAL LIKE Monihayn believed him to be a man of faith and honest, about WMDS, even though long before he came into office this was popular worldwide opinion, Clinton, GOre, Kerry, Pelosi, Reid, etc…all the top democrats asserted the same conclusion, Saddam had WMMDS and was a threat, Gore called him one of the biggest threats in the world, it’s all public record, so instead of correcting me, why not go back do some research and correct those friends of yours, that your so proud of.
If you’re not a captilist, are you admitting liberals are socialists, who has more faith in government than the people..? And I said “primarily” and even you have to admit, those with their hands out depending on welfare, etc… are not vcontributing to society, but depending on others who do…
Tell me one time Rush Limbaugh has resorted to
mean spirited name calling?? Even Ann Coulter when she resorts to lambasting somebody has a valid point, while I commend you for a rational reply, I defy you to count how many times conservatives on this blog or any other, resort to slander and name calling, versus your liberal friends.
And obviously you have never really watched O’Reilly, he doesn’t name call, he debates the issues and only uses facts, I know some former liberals who were life long democrats, hated republicans, but after watching O’Reilly, for awhile now for the first time vote and support Republcians..
FYI O’Reilly, chastises people on both sides who resort to name calling and slander and has called Ann Coulter on it face to face on his show, even told her such tactics demeans the debates…
Every topic, if considered properly, I previously discussed has to do with the debate over WMDS…And I did not know that you decided what was valid or not valid points…
As for my reference to liberals love gays and hates Christians by and large who does groups like ACLU support and who do they oppose???
One last question, do you believe we should cut and run, or do you believe we should do everything in our power to achieve victory and give democracy a chance in the middle east???
If the soldiers on the front line support the noble mission, and we have an all volunteer army, unlike the draft in Vietnam then why is it so bad to support them and rally around the flag because one of the best weapons in the war on terror is a united front that can demoralize the enemy?
I apoligize for diaobeying your rules, and speaking about other relevant issues, and remember this top democrats saw the same intel Bush did and voted for force…unlike Bush, they’re more interested in defeating Republicans than our enemies abroad and domestically…

The main argument coming from Democrats is that these weapons are from the pre-Gulf War period. The Defense Department has yet to officially verify this claim.

Nevertheless, Saddam Hussein had assured the world that ALL WMD had been destroyed; that was a lie.

500 WMD shells were found today; it required only 15 shells for Hussein to wipe out 5,000 Iraqi Kurds.

The argument that these weapons are old and therefore degraded means nothing. If these weapons fell into the hands of terrorists, they would have been just as deadly as they were when they were first developed.

General Tom Mcinerney is reporting on Fox Hannity and Colmes right now that that the administration has been keeping this low profile to avoid exposing 3 of the 5 members of the UN Security council; Russia, China, and France. McInerney says these weapons will be traced to these countries, and asserts it is well known that Russia helped Saddam move most of his WMD stockpiles out of Iraq before the war.

Status

Unfortunately, you have not heard the end of it. Lefty will continue the story w/o much of a pause. Look at this thread. They deny this and some even bring up the U.S. armed Saddam story. Truth makes a difference and now many will tone down this part of the arguments, but those who believe that the election was stolen in 2004, that we made Saddam etc will still believe that Bush lied. They cannot give it up since it is so much part of their world view.

If you want to see how this works, look at the archives of this blog. Take a look at the lefty predictions re Iraqi elections etc. Then watch them pass over their mistakes w/o taking a breath. Their capacity to ignore facts is impressive.

“The chief weapons inspector, Charles Duelfer, has now issued a comprehensive report that confirms the earlier conclusion of David Kay that Iraq did not have the weapons that our intelligence believed were there.”

Cause you know Charles Duelfer and David Kay are traitors who love Saddam.

Jack:

The only thing anyone will see looking at the archives are Reds claiming Saddam did 9/11, that deficits are a good thing and that the Iraq War will pay for itself.

I very rarely post to a blog but I can now say I told you so. So I will.

I am in no way a Bush supporter and would consider my self a little left of middle left. I love the art of politics more than a debate over one’s interpretation of the facts.

The last time I posted to a blog, it was to make the statement that the Left better be weary of the “where are the WMD’s, Bush lied” line of debate. It will bite us in the butt in the end.

Here is what we know:

1. The entire world believed they were there, including those against to military invasion

2. We knew he had used them in the past.

3. We believed that we had destroyed some of them during the Clinton era.

4. We gave him quite a bit of time to do something with them before we went in.

5. We know that the Russians were in Iraq 6 weeks before the invasion moving something around.

6. We know something went over the border into Syria in a convoy of trucks.

7. Saddam loved to hide things (including himself) underground.

8. Iraq is approximately the size of California.

We also know that if your local news reported for 6 months that a certain house in your community had a stockpile of illegal drugs, by the time the police broke in, they would probably be gone.

Now you guys can argue back and forth as you already have about wether the weapons are old or new, potent or not, and all the little nit-picking things both sides will argue the next few days.

But here is my point:

This is just the beginning and we are now in a trap. The argument that there were NO WMD is now invalid. It doesnt matter how old or how potent. They will find more! I don’t like it! I want the Republicans to go down in smoke! But mark my words: They will find more!

Politically: The Reagan Democrats are those who mainly follow headlines. They dont have much discussion. They dont follow the facts very deep. All they will see is that the Dems called him a liar for a long time and now they were wrong.

If more and more weapons show up, (and I could totally be wrong but I believe they will), it will make the Bush is a liar strategy suicide for the Democratic party.

Okay Bo here’s the response in itemized form,

Yes you had a liberal to inform you, does it effect the point?—I don’t know. See the main point is this we do not trust Bush, we do not trust theman and that is what this comes down to he plays politics with everything. We aren’t Americans for asking questions of this thing—we are treated like a pariah and then he asks why we don’t stand behind his policies. Reason: You have given us no reason to trust you and that you have not laid out convincing reasons or more to the point convincing strategies that will ensure that this is not a waste of hundreds of billions of dollars. He could not explain why we were doing this at the same time that we had just gotten into Afghanistan—and the list goes on. No reason is provided as to why we should trust Bush with any strategizing.

Moynihan/Reagan is an interesting point that I’ve never heard before. I was not especially fond of Clinton or Reagan particularly for different reasons. So I can’t bear comment other than to say that it is probably true perhaps.

I’m proud of Clinton, Gore, Kerry, Pelosi and Reid? Huh? I liked B.Clinton when he came in but upon seeing his complete unresponsiveness to issues and then NAFTA—not so proud.

Now as for the Democratic tent it’s scattered, I want full and reallistic reprisal for 9-11 all I saw were political games and then Iraq and the argument was so phony it warranted my complete distrust of this administration. Then the phoniness panned out to be phony.

I am not a socialist, my personal political bent is more libertarian left but I still do not like Bush and hate petty political games and sniggling for brownie points even more. And Bo as much corporate welfare as Bush has put out there really the welfare you are talking about is actually, and this is true only less than 2% of the entire welfare system. The lion’s share is corporate and also goes to companies who are government contractors. Corporate welfare and subsidization is a scam pure and simple.

Okay we called bush “a liar”, Republicans called Bush everything under the sun and then some. O’reilly twists facts to serve his own position, it’s quite transparent upon further review so we call him out too. AND Coulter does call people names endlessly as that is how she makes her living.

I’m sure if you look at the cases involving the AXCLU there are probably a few cases of the ACLU defending the rights to a person’s personal rights to their religious beliefs. I’m not so fond personally of the gay issues myself being a bit conservative there as it especially pertains to gays raising kids. I am against gay marriage but see the rights of civil union as quite viable. And I don’t hate Christians I hate hearing Christians talk that insano Tim LaHaye crap. I hate being beaten over the head by Jerry Falwell. I think fundamentalist Christians are only slightly brighter than goldfish or for that matter country music stars. I think Christian fundamentalist churches at Nascar rallies are whacko. I don’t think Jesus would like to mindlessly watch cars go around in circles. I think that Christ’s message is taken away from depth and meaning by such petty things. I prefer a noble sublime jesus they prefer a jesus with bloodsoaked robes and a sword killing non-Christians teaching them a lesson for not letting LaHaye and Fallwell rule the entire country. I feel theocracy is dangerous the same way it is in Iran.

Your final question: They should achieve victory but stop listening to the crackpot ideas that the Bush Administration is pulling out of it’s butt. They are using this war to generate wedges and ones that politicize and segrate anyone from having an invested interests in what is going on and Bush is obviously a bullshitter (yes another name). WE are not a nation at war, we are 10% of our nation at war with a bunch of sheople standing around expected to graze listlessly and ask no questions.

Sorry mistake I said “Bush” in the top of third paragraph from bottom , I meant Clinton—oops.

These old shells did they happen to say which was the country of origin. See file photes of Rummsfeld shaking hands with Sadam after arms deal to suport him in his war with Iran. This was done while he wsa @ the Pentagon during Regan Admin.

Hi,
Earl above is right! This old chemical warfare ammo stuff has been buried since the US sent chemical weapons to Saddam Hussien during Iraq’s war with Iran back in the early and mid eithties!

Randall Jeremiah,

We know there are more. Yes it is true they are degraded so what. It will still kill. It will still burn the skin off of anyone coming into contact with it.

Tell me again how such shells could have come into contact with US citizen. Saddam Hussein didn’t ever have ICBMs.

Why does it matter that we knew they had them prior to the first war. Did you want old cans of serin gas in the hands of a madman or in the hands of terrorist.

I rather like old cans of serin gas being in the hands of a dictator we have for years under magnify than in a totally unsecure land ridden of terrorists since US invaded it.

To be totally honest, I’m for destroying all chemical weapons on Earth, but we all know we can’t always do as we want in real world.

Umm, If this was significant, why in the world would this info have been secret until declassified when the administration had been pining for such a discovery. Can someone from the celebration party answer that? I didn’t think so.

Anti-war arguments will be thusly:

They were old shells from past wars, so they don’t count.

They didn’t find all that much, so they don’t count.

Bill Clinton destroyed the really bad stuff during Operation Desert Fox, so they don’t count.

They were planted by evil Republicans, so they don’t count.

They werent the right kind of WMD, so they don’t count.

They couldn’t hit America with them, so they don’t count.

These are all specious arguments, because they change the focus of the argument. The argument has been that there were NO WMDS. If it is now proven that there are in fact WMDs, then that argument goes out the window.

I’m not willing yet to say that these are the real thing, that they constitute enough of a threat to justify war, or that they were usable or not.

But to simply declare that they don’t matter is just politicking from the anti-war left. They did it re Zarqawi. Before Zarqawi died, they thought he was important. After he died, he was a nobody.

I believe Saddam’s real goal was to undo the sanctions. At that point, he’d have been out of containment, and weapons such as sarin gas would have been more dangerous. We know that his missile program exceeded what the UN allowed—its not a far reach to suggest that without sanctions, he could have exceeded the flight path in a great way.

Its too soon to say what the import of this information is. But if true, it puts a dent in the no WMD argument.

I just wondered….

Having only experienced the basic Chem/Bio training when I was in the military, I have no real knowledge of WMDs…Could one of our resident expert tell me if an “old” WMD kills you LESS dead than a new one?

Thanks in Advance….

“Umm, If this was significant, why in the world would this info have been secret until declassified when the administration had been pining for such a discovery.

Posted by: Schwamp at June 22, 2006 08:00 AM”

Elections!

EnvioLib
VERY good post!

On the question of Binaries, I’ll admit that I haven’t found a shelf life on the most important of the components: Methylphosphonyl difluoride.

That said, I may have found out something else. Apparently the spin mixed binaries were rare. Most Sarin shells were mixed by hand instead, the Methylphosphonyl difluoride mixed into a shell that already had Isopropyl alcohol in it just before use.

If that’s the case, though many of these unused “Binary” Sarin shells might just very well be WMD only to germs, since all you’d find in them was rubbing alcohol Of course, I could be wrong on their distribution.

If we’re talking about unitary shells, the suckers were bad within weeks. Only the binary shells, which I believe were fairly rare among Iraqi munitions could survive years. How many, I am not certain, because I have not yet found out the shelf-life of Methylphosphonyl difluoride, which I wager would be the more unstable of the two.

Rahdigly-
Go back and read my stuff again, dear boy. I shall have to send you to the back of the classroom. My argument is that most of these munitions are no longer all that useable. Yes, Mustard Gas is nasty! Yes, Sarin is particularly lethal! My argument is not that they’re benign.

My argument is that that most of them are no longer in that lethal form. The Mustard gas rounds we’ve found are degraded. You wouldn’t want to rub this stuff on your skin, but it’s not as toxic as it once was. The Sarin, if in unitary form, is long since decayed into more stable chemicals. If in Binary form, it’s either a rare part of the munitions, or it’s mixed by hand, in which the likelihood is you only have a shell full of Rubbing Alcohol, if nothing has leaked.

Jack-
If the weapons were mostly degenerated, Saddam’s intentions are irrelevant: these munitions didn’t pose a threat.

There are a ton of issues your side isn’t bringing up and answering, not the least of which is the fact that we were heading there to confront a continued operation for producing these kinds of weapons, not to ensure the destruction of mostly defunct chemical ammunition. The threat was that Saddam was still making these things, and intending to hand them to terrorists. Go check your transcripts from that time. You folks weren’t talking about mushroom-cloud smoking-guns just to hear your lips flap.

This is not the threat we went there to face. The sooner you acknowledge that, the sooner we can talk about what these shells really signify, and why, through years of political desperation, they never tried to pull a stunt like this.

Old rotten shells were not the threat that we’ve seen 2500 Americans and tens of thousands of Iraqis die to rid the world of. You folks sent us to Iraq to face a dictator still making this stuff post-gulf war, to face a person who had an active nuclear program and active collaboration with terrorists. None of these things were true. You can muddy the water with “discoveries” like this, but they don’t cut the mustard here, much less the mustard gas.

Stephen, WWII shells are still showing up in Europe from time to time. That is all that needs to be said about this. Everything else is political shrill. Old shells in Iraq mean exactly what WWII shells mean in Eurpope today. In the past, there was a war there.

End of story. Has no meaning for today’s wars or their motives.

Jack -

Since you accuse me of telling lies that the US supplied Saddam with WMD’s, let me explain my source - if you follow these links you will see we were a major weapons supplier to Iraq during the 1980’s.

http://www.commondreams.org/headlines02/0908-08.htm

http://www.iranchamber.com/history/articles/arming_iraq.php

Also, you assumed I saw and was referring to the picture of Saddam with Rumsfeld. I never mentioned it. I was referring to our support for Iraq during the Iraq/Iran War, which Iraq started. We provided weapons and logistical support. The links above talk to this as well.

Jack you can believe what you want to believe in your naive world that the US is the good guy in this war, but you miss the bigger picture. This war with Iraq is hypocritical, we can make Saddam into our enemy or friend which ever serves our interests at the time.

This is not an isolated event. We did this to Norreiga as well as many others. This is our foriegn policy. 240 times since WWII we intereferd with foriegn countries elections or supported coups. It is about our interests, WMD’s, freedom, democracy, and fighting dictators are all a ruse to justify a war to the American People. And you line up behind your blind patriotism and say yes sir, sounds good to me.

This is why Europeans see the US as a greater threat to World Peace than Iran.

JBOD,

Anti-war arguments will be thusly:

They […] werent the right kind of WMD, so they don’t count.

They couldn’t hit America with them, so they don’t count

According to the FoxNews article, at least one senior Defense Department official is then anti-war himself:

Offering the official administration response to FOX News, a senior Defense Department official pointed out that the chemical weapons were not in useable conditions.

“This does not reflect a capacity that was built up after 1991,” the official said, adding the munitions “are not the WMDs this country and the rest of the world believed Iraq had, and not the WMDs for which this country went to war.”

How come an anti-war could have an high rank in US Defense Department!?

These are all specious arguments, because they change the focus of the argument. The argument has been that there were NO WMDS. If it is now proven that there are in fact WMDs, then that argument goes out the window.

Agreed. So, let’s now find facts that prove that:

1) These pre-Gulf War (aka pre-1991) shells are still operative. The declassified report exert say it’s degraded gas sarin shells. How much degraded?
2) Saddam knows about these shells exists/were not destroyed
3) Saddam had an ICBMs program that could threat US citizens in a very short term after leaving Iraq sanctions
4) Last but not least, over 20,000+ iraquis civilians and 2500+ US soldiers death is a small cost compared to the threat these 500 shells could have posed.

PS: I always think Rummy wasn’t lying when he said “we know there’s WMDs in Iraq”, because comparing the list of WMDs destroyed under UN inspectors with the list of WMDs sold to Iraq by US before 1991 told him.

environmentalliberal said:

Here is what we know:


1. The entire world believed they were there, including those against to military invasion

WRONG!!! I reasoned that he had gotten rid of WMD based on the psychology of the man and his history, and I wrote about this many times here at WB and elsewhere. Hence, your statement above is patently false, and demonstrably so.

Now I am just a bloke with a psychology degree. I reasoned the following. Hussein was a paranoid man with power who spent an entire life covering his ass. This man has inspectors about to snoop around in his country looking for WMD. If they find WMD it could mean the U.S. would invade and dethrone him from power. Hence, I reasoned, this paranoid man would NOT keep WMD lying about for the world to use as predicate for taking him down.

Hence I opposed the invasion in Iraq, on the grounds that Bush’s and Cheney’s claims of WMD were unfounded on a purely logical basis. And without irrefutable evidence to the contrary, Saddam maintaining WMD made no sense.

So, no, you are wrong. Everyone, did not believe he had WMD as I have been writing for years.

What about this? The Duelfer report from 2005 addendum:

ISG assesses that Iraq and Coalition Forces will continue to discover small numbers of degraded chemical weapons, which the former Regime mislaid or improperly destroyed prior to 1991. ISG believes the bulk of these weapons were likely abandoned, forgotten and lost during the Iran-Iraq war because tens of thousands of CW munitions were forward deployed along frequently and rapidly shifting battlefronts.

The left has been clamoring for Pres. Bush to “admit he was wrong” for the better part of 2 years.

Time to eat crow, lefties. WHEN ARE YOU GOING TO ADMIT S.H. POSSESSED WMDS, USED WMDS AND DID NOT DESTROY THEM AS HE WAS MANDATED TO DO BY THE ENTIRE WORLD??

1) If you actually read Joe Wilson’s full report, which I’ve done, you’ll find the “Africa” statements are true. What he’s been saying publicly is in direct conflict with the report he submitted to the CIA. He is a liar.

2) SH did aid terrorists and did provide financial backing in the form of payment to the families of suicide bombers who attacked western and Isreali targets. There were training sites in Iraq in the 1990’s. No one has ever pointed the finger directly as SH as the person responsible for 9/11. That argument was manufactured by the left as a political attack.

3) The biggest obstacles to a more diplomatic resolution and a more wide-spread coalition were the several biggest financial beneficiaries of SH’s dictatorship. Namely France, Germany, Russia and the UN “Oil for Food” administrators. The international corruption created by SH was what made this war inevitable.

4) The declassified document mentions that SH’s scientists were poised and ready to resume productions immediately as soon as the sanctions were lifted, which was SH’s goal. If you remember, he was constantly asking and attempting to persuade the world to lift them.

BTW, David, if the WMD’s that have been found have no meaning because they are more that a few weeks old (Stephen’s assertation), why has the left been so adimate in pointing out that “they did not exist” or that “Clinton destroyed them in 1998”? I don’t recall the president EVER saying that SH was currently making WMD’s…Only that he had not provided proof that they had been destroyed as required by over a dozen UN Resolutions. These “Old, useless WMD’s” meant something when you didn’t think any had been found, now that it seems we HAVE found a handful, they magically don’t matter?

Again, as I’d commented a few days ago, this is another example of the left hanging themselves with the rope they created. All we need to do is just stand back and let them do it. It’s almost too easy.

Stefano

I have written many times about the complexity of politics. During the Iraq/Iran war, the best case scenario was for nobody to win. We allowed Arab allies to share data with Saddam. And even today the idea that Iran would overrun Iraq may have been the worse choice among two bad choices

A country as big and powerful as the U.S. is never out of any action. You could also argue that the U.S. supported Iran in the war, since we shipped spare parts during Iran/Contra.

The key is significance. Your source on chemical weapons tries really hard to make nefarious pharmaceutical and agricultural exports (and very small amounts). I can go to my local farm supply store and buy precursor chemicals. What kills pine beetles on boll weevils may often be modified to harm people. The danger of chemical weapons is that they can be made from ordinary products. So we sold small amounts of dual use materials. There is NO reason to believe any of these products went into WMD and if they did they would not be significant.

Other weapons are even easier to refute. Saddam DID NOT HAVE AMERICAN WEAPONS. The conspiracy people can point to meetings or innuendo, but there is a bottom line that he didn’t have them, or more precisely 0.47% (that is about ½ of 1%) of Saddam’s weapons came from Americans sources. This conspiracy theory just wilts in the light. IF Saddam bought American arms, why didn’t he have any?

So I know that American hands are not always clean, although I would submit that given our immense power doing nothing is never an option. You know that we are often the largest aid donor even to our enemies. U.S. aid prevented famine in Afghanistan during the time of the Taliban, for example. You could well say the U.S. supported the Taliban.

But in the case of Saddam Hussein, we are clearly not the big guys. We had little to do with him most of his time in office. He was a Soviet client. He bought mostly Soviet and Warsaw Pact arm. He got lots of arms from France, who supported his nuclear power ambitions against our wishes. (When Isreal destroyed his nuclear plant (thank God) the same guys who complain out us now were outraged.) Was America involved in Iraq? Yes. Are we involved almost everywhere? Yes. Was our contribution large? No.

It is like blaming the company that makes steel for an auto accident and just as inappropriate.

We could find 500 nukes in Iraq and the left would still say Bush lied. It is very tiring. Bottowm line: we removed a top ten all-time mass murderer and are attempting to give the middle east a democratic form of government. “pay any price, bear any burden…” They don’t make democrats like JFK anymore.

David Remer,

Could you send me some of whatever it is you’re smoking? I’d like to slip the surly bonds of reality myself. First, you say that old shells from WWII turning up only points out that there was a war there. I have a dare for you. Take one of these old shells, throw it into a fire, and stand around and see if it blows up. Your argument is complete nonsense. Aren’t liberals the ones who campaign constantlys against landmines? Isn’t the reason they do so because they’re dangerous until destroyed, either by EOD or some Afghani child walking into them? If you’re so sure these chemical weapons are degraded, open one up with a hacksaw with no chemical protection and see what happens.

An excerpt from a link I’ve had, and which was mentioned earlier by stefano:

December, 1982: Hughes Aircraft ships 60 Defender helicopters to Iraq. [Doing Business: The Arming of Iraq. Daniel Robichear]

October, 1983: The Reagan Administration begins secretly allowing Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and Egypt to transfer United States weapons, including Howitzers, Huey helicopters, and bombs to Iraq. These shipments violated the Arms Export Control Act. [Bush’s Secret Mission. The New Yorker Magazine. November 2, 1992]

November, 1983: Banca Nazionale del Lavoro of Italy and its Branch in Atlanta begin to funnel $5 billion in unreported loans to Iraq. Iraq, with the blessing and official approval of the US government, purchased computer controlled machine tools, computers, scientific instruments, special alloy steel and aluminum, chemicals, and other industrial goods for Iraq’s missile, chemical, biological and nuclear weapons programs. [Columbia Journalism Review. March/April 1993. Iraqgate]

March, 1986: The United States with Great Britain block all Security Council resolutions condemning Iraq’s use of chemical weapons, and on March 21 the US becomes the only country refusing to sign a Security Council statement condemning Iraq’s use of these weapons. [Glen Rangwala. Labor Left Briefing, 16 September, 2002]

May, 1986: The US Department of Commerce licenses 70 biological exports to Iraq between May of 1985 and 1989, including at least 21 batches of lethal strains of anthrax. [Kurt Nimno. AlterNet. September 23, 2002]

May, 1986: US Department of Commerce approves shipment of weapons grade botulin poison to Iraq. [Riegle Report: Dual Use Exports. Senate Committee on Banking. May 25, 1994]

and there are more if you want to read the page.

So, “Saddam DID NOT HAVE AMERICAN WEAPONS”?

We were just sending him bug spray?

Rich,

4) The declassified document mentions that SH’s scientists were poised and ready to resume productions immediately as soon as the sanctions were lifted, which was SH’s goal.

No, it doesn’t.
But Fred Barnes is actually quoted in the FoxNews article for saying something similar:

“We know it was there, in place, it just wasn’t operative when inspectors got there after the war, but we know what the inspectors found from talking with the scientists in Iraq that it could have been cranked up immediately, and that’s what Saddam had planned to do if the sanctions against Iraq had halted and they were certainly headed in that direction,” said Fred Barnes, editor of The Weekly Standard and a FOX News contributor.

Seems Mr Barnes is not working for the Defense Department Intelligence but for FOX News and others conservatives oriented medias.

But, hey, no harm, we all knows how it’s easy to confuse official declarations with fox news ones.
;-)

“Reasonable people and those who have experience making real life decisions will understand this. Others, blinded by hatred or w/o significant experience being a boss, will not. And nobody will be able to explain it to them at their current level of understanding.”
-Jack

Jack,

Your posts are often on the intelligent and reasonable side of the conservative position but your accusation that this discussion is just further proof that liberals are blinded by their hate for Bush and that arguments that Bush did not lie don’t ring true.

Anyone can be emotionally blinded or polarized by fixating on certain leaders, just reference Bo’s insinuation Clinton is to blame for China having the bomb and means to deliver it to the US.

I am still convinced that Bush and Co. made the decision to take out Saddam and decided to sell that decision to the American people by any means they could get away with. Lest you forget, invading any country that has not threatened us or is about to attack was the standard and for good reason. War kills many innocent people and destroys many more lives. This administration seized upon the flimsiest of evidence (and some that didn’t exist) to sell this war. Bush’s oft repeated phrase denying he had not decided to go to war in the build-up to the invasion was refering only to a formality, not his policy of invading Iraq.

If Bush and Co. had tried to sell this war to the American people in real terms or goals they knew they would not be going to war. If Bush and Co. and said what the real costs of the war would be and our real reasons for invasion the American people would not have bought it. Instead, fear mongering, references to mushroom clouds, and repeating “911” with “Iraq” as often as possible was the way to sell the war.

The facts are we invaded another country that did not threaten us. We killed many more innocent Iraqi men, women, and children than the terrorists did on Sept. 11th in the name of self-defence. Planning for the post-war aftermath of a country everyone knew would become unstable (remember the first Gulf War?)was woefully unattended to. Do you and your leaders(?) with experience being a “boss” ever really appreciate what we have done?

I am not blinded by hate for Bush. I would say the Right and much of the American people are blinded by fear and an unwillingness to look at other people with respect and compassion. If you can tell me how you justify the lives we have taken for a bogus war in any convincing and reasonable way I will change my tune.

David,
So, you’ve personally interviewed SH to diagnose a paranoid disorder?

I think that SH is an evil, power hungry, greedy, hateful vindictive person whose sole motivation was to decieve the world into thinking that he had no WMDs so sanctions would be lifted….all the time they were hidden and secret plans were in place to revive the programs as soon as possible.

But, then again, I’m not a “bloke with a degree”. I’m an average Joe that looks around and forms his own opinion based on my observations and experiences. I realize that some people are just plain bad and no amount of psychobabble will help them.

Has anyone looked at that “declassified document”?! It’s seems like a joke — a really bad one.
Negroponte, you know, the guy who carried out the covert funding of the Contras, and helped coverup human rights abuses by CIA-trained operatives in Honduras, declassified this information?
Why should we believe ANYTHING coming from these people?
Before we’d believe anything these people tell us, don’t we need a bit more information? Details like: Where in the country were these “WMD’s” found, exactly? Are there any pictures of these shells you could show us? Where are they now?
How can they be considered “WMD’s” if there was no way to get them to the US?
Without a way to launch them, doesn’t that mean they’re NOT WMD’s the way the administration was defining them before the war?
Without a way to launch them, doesn’t that make them WMD’s only to the Iraqi people themselves?
If Saddam knew he had WMD’s, why didn’t he tell his army to use them on us during our invasion?
If Saddam was so friendly with Al Qaeda terrorists, why wouldn’t he have passed the info on where these things were buried along to them, once he was in hiding?
These kind of questions need to be asked — because these people have lied so damn much, it’s difficult to believe any bit of information they give us.

Jack,

So your argument is that US is the biggest and most powerful nation, is involved everywhere, was involved in Iran-Iraq war but her contribution was NOT large?

What’s the point of being involved everywhere and being the most powerfull nation on earth if your contribution are so small?! What a waste of power.

It is like blaming the company that makes steel for an auto accident and just as inappropriate.

Steel contribution to car industry is nothing like small. I, for one, would rather have a car accident if every cars was made of… let’s say cotton instead of steel. Don’t you?

Adrienne,

Good questions indeed, that deserve honest answers.
Wait guys, I said “honest”!

Ad,
Typical….anything that disputes your opinion must be a pack of lies.

Funny how you first say that they are not “WMD”s, then later say they are only “WMD”s to the Iraqi people (due to the lack of a delivery method). Are they, or are they not? Come on…look at you memo to find out what you’re supposed to think on