From the newswires ... rumor mill stuff yet, individual reports, none with corroboration or official verification (oldest report first):
Quote:1244 GMT - Col. John Peabody, an engineer brigade commander with the 3rd Infantry Division, on April 4 said U.S. troops found thousands of boxes of white powder, nerve agent antidotes and Arabic documents on how to engage in chemical warfare at the Latifiyah industrial facility 25 miles south of Baghdad. U.S. soldiers also found atropine, which is used to counter the effects of nerve agents. The facility is part of a larger complex known as the Latifiyah Explosives and Ammunition Plant al Qa Qaa. It had been identified by the International Atomic Energy Agency as a suspected chemical, biological and nuclear weapons site. U.N. inspectors visited the plant at least nine times, including as recently as Feb. 18, 2003.
Quote:1336 GMT - A reporter embedded with forward units of the U.S. 3rd Infantry Division says reports that U.S. soldiers found a potential chemical or biological weapons site with thousands of vials of white powder appears to be untrue.
Quote:1408 GMT - U.S. troops on April 4 found a second site near Baghdad containing vials of unidentified liquid and white powder, according to an unidentified U.S. officer cited by Reuters. The second site was close to the Latifiyah Explosives and Ammunition Plant al Qa Qaa where soldiers earlier found boxes of vials and what are believed to be chemical warfare manuals. An MSNBC reporter embedded with the U.S. 3rd Infantry called the first reported find into question, however.
Quote:1445 GMT - U.S. Marines have detected large quantities of cyanide and mustard agents in the Euphrates River near An Nasiriyah, according to a reporter embedded with the troops.
There are mounting, if conflicting, indications of WMD. Today and tomorrow could see significant related announcements, according to "Sources". Of course, "Sources" are not "Facts".
It has also since been belatedly reported that these sites were declared to the U.N. and, after examination, were cleared by U.N. Weapons Inspectors many weeks ago - but anything can and will be claimed as possible W.M.D.s by those desperately seeking something to prove they are not lying mass-murderers.
Today, April 7, 2003, it seems the US forces may have found some drums of WMD's. We'll have to wait and see to find out if they really are, but it's more likely than not at this point. Why, you ask? Well, they were burried, and the coalition forces also found some missiles they think has traces of WMD's. c.i.
I can't find any of this news on the BBC.......
.......found some from yesterday....
The latest chemical find has proven negative re militiary capability.
cicerone imposter wrote:Today, April 7, 2003, it seems the US forces may have found some drums of WMD's. We'll have to wait and see to find out if they really are, but it's more likely than not at this point. Why, you ask? Well, they were burried, and the coalition forces also found some missiles they think has traces of WMD's. c.i.
Today, April 14, 2003 (one week later).
No WMDs have been found until today.
All the WMD are tranfered to Syria.
Of course. 100.000 foreign soldiers in the country and the Iraqi govt still managed to transfer truckloads and truckloads of WMD over the border with Syria.
I even found some evidence. Here you see hundreds and hundreds of Iraqi trucks loaded with WMD crossing the border.
One of the things I've noticed about this war is the way the media has a way (intended or not) of stringing the public along. One day the front page headline reads "Barrels of WMD Found!" The public gets excited, their brains register that WMD's have been found, and they forget about it. The next day, on the last page of the newspaper and in a brief mention on TV, they state "Oops, sorry, they were just pesticides." But, by the time the truth is released, we're already hearing another rumor about the "evil Iraqi government."
I find it really depressing that the American public is so naive and so easily brainwashed as to go along with this war, even though the only justifications they had for going to war in the first place have evaporated, leaving behind the obvious intentions of the Bush administration.
In a great war some details are bound to get lost, or bogged down. We have just won a great war. Why mess it up with details such as the stated reasons for going into this war?
Or maybe...we'll find a way or make one. Meanwhile, it seems as though the pretense of the word "coalition" is coming down to the US and GB, and GB appears to be playing a more and more minor role.
When it comes to WMD, who haas more than us? But, of course, we are the peaceable kingdom.
Bush has claimed over this past weekend that Syria is hiding some of Iraq's WMDs.
So they have not found those weapons, but they found a lame excuse why they cannot find them.
Yeah - that's the ticket. they couldn't use the WMDs against us, but they took the time and trouble to smuggle them out of the country. Yeah, makes sense to me.
I take it you guys believe Saddam.
I DON'T BELIEVE SADDAM.
I just don't think Bush is any more truthful than Saddam.
Sofia wrote:I take it you guys believe Saddam.
Nice try to counter criticism on the Bush doctrine. Maybe it works in a home for retarded infants, but not here.
Sofia wrote:I take it you guys believe Saddam.
I don't know - what'd he say?
As far as we know, the only thing Saddam has told us is that he has no WMD.
His regime crumbled. We can assume that he used everything in his power to keep it, and failed. Also, though the American forces have been searching, they've found no evidence of WMD in Iraq.
With the information we have so far, any logical person has to believe that Saddam possessed no WMD. So yes, I believe him.
Certainly there are many other explanations. It's very possible that the WMD were shipped away, that Saddam is stashed away on a secret island with Elvis, that the moon landing was a hoax... But, I'm inclined to believe the facts that we currently have.
There can be a reasonable explanation of why were not the WMD's found. Prior to inspectors' arrival Saddam managed to smuggle chemical and biological weapons to Syria; later he did not have any opportunity to return them: if he did while the inspectors were in the country they could have found these, and later the regime was busy with atempting to survive under powerful attacks of the Allied Forces, and WMDs got the very low priority (they would not help to Saddam to win the war, on the contrary, their usage could justify a nuclear response from the U.S. side). And Syria was not interested to return this stuff during the war either: if disclosed, this could cause an American attack on it.
steissd wrote:There can be a reasonable explanation of why were not the WMD's found. Prior to inspectors' arrival Saddam managed to smuggle chemical and biological weapons to Syria; later he did not have any opportunity to return them: if he did while the inspectors were in the country they could have found these, and later the regime was busy with atempting to survive under powerful attacks of the Allied Forces, and WMDs got the very low priority (they would not help to Saddam to win the war, on the contrary, their usage could justify a nuclear response from the U.S. side). And Syria was not interested to return this stuff during the war either: if disclosed, this could cause an American attack on it.
How hard is it for an army that thinks it can shoot nuclear missiles out the air with their Star wars program, to survey a border? How hard is it for an army that said several hundreds of Special forces were operation in Iraq serveral moths before the war broke out to search for special trucks that cross the border between Iraq and Syria? Satelite images are used by centcom to show how well they bombed the place. Why dont they use it to show how Saddam moved his WMD to Syria? And i don't think Saddam loved Syria so hard he would give his WMD to them. Not even for a brief periode of time.
