hunt for Scuds/Banned Weapons comes up empty... They're around here somewhere :/
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From: 49th Parallel
hunt for Scuds/Banned Weapons comes up empty... They're around here somewhere :/
There seems to be no evidence of WMD, but I have complete faith that they will turn up sooner or later... of course this will be after the war ends when the US will import them to Iraq, and say "Here they are!" as they have done in the past... The civilian death count keeps rising, more are dying, less questions are being answered, God Bless America.
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From: richmond
evidence forthcoming....
Sunday, March 23, 2003
Fox News
Coalition forces discovered Sunday a "huge" suspected chemical weapons factory near the Iraqi city of Najaf, some 90 miles south of Baghdad, a senior Pentagon official confirmed to Fox News.
Coalition troops are holding two Iraqi generals said to be in charge of the facility. Defense officials told Fox News that the officers are providing "good information" that could be crucial to searching out and dismantling Iraq's weapons of mass destruction program.
U.S. Central Command, which oversees the war in Iraq, said in a statement that troops were examining several "sites of interest," but said it was premature to call the Najaf site a chemical weapons factory.
The Jerusalem Post ran a story earlier Sunday that was written by a journalist on-hand with the U.S. unit -- the 1st Brigade of the 3rd Infantry Division -- that took the plant.
The article states that one soldier was lightly wounded when a booby-trapped explosive was triggered as he was "clearing the sheet metal-lined chemical weapons production facility."
The chemical plant is described as a "100-acre complex," surrounded by an electrical fence. The plant was also apparently camouflaged to avoid aerial photos being taken.
It is not yet known what chemicals were being produced at the plant.
Asked at a news conference in Qatar Sunday about reports of the chemical plant, Lt. Gen. John Abizaid of U.S. Central Command declined comment. He said top Iraqi officers have been questioned about chemical weapons.
"We have an Iraqi general officer, two Iraqi general officers that we have taken prisoner, and they are providing us with information," Abizaid said.
The Jerusalem Post report also states that immediately following coalition entry into the camp, at least 30 Iraqi soldiers and their commanding officer fully obeyed instructions given by U.S. soldiers by lying down and surrendering.
U.S. forces are checking other sites based on leads from captured Iraqis and documents -- but officials cautioned it was premature to conclude any forbidden weapons had been located.
American special operations forces found documents in western Iraq that also could lead to chemical or biological weapons facilities, said Gen. Richard Myers, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
Myers said U.S. commandos found the papers along with a cache of millions of rounds of ammunition after a firefight on Saturday, and the discovery "might save thousands of lives if we can find out exactly where and what they have."
"I just know that they have some papers that they want to exploit as quickly as possible, and we're going to do that, of course," Myers said.
President Bush and other U.S. officials say ridding Saddam's regime of chemical and biological weapons is the main objective of the war. Finding such weapons would be a huge boost for Bush, since much of the international criticism of the U.S.-led war has focused on the fact that United Nations inspectors had not found any banned weapons in Iraq.
Iraqi officials have insisted that they destroyed all of the chemical and biological weapons they made after the 1991 Persian Gulf War -- a claim U.N. weapons inspectors have questioned.
U.N. weapons inspectors are not aware of any large-scale chemical sites which could be used to make chemical weapons in Najaf, said Ewen Buchanan, spokesman for the inspectors. However, there are many such dual-use sites in other parts of the country because of Iraq's petrochemical industry.
U.N. inspectors visited a cement plant in the Najaf area earlier this year to check on its explosives cache but did not report finding anything improper. A team of biological weapons inspectors also visited a university and school in Kufa, a few miles north of Najaf.
Sunday, March 23, 2003
Fox News
Coalition forces discovered Sunday a "huge" suspected chemical weapons factory near the Iraqi city of Najaf, some 90 miles south of Baghdad, a senior Pentagon official confirmed to Fox News.
Coalition troops are holding two Iraqi generals said to be in charge of the facility. Defense officials told Fox News that the officers are providing "good information" that could be crucial to searching out and dismantling Iraq's weapons of mass destruction program.
U.S. Central Command, which oversees the war in Iraq, said in a statement that troops were examining several "sites of interest," but said it was premature to call the Najaf site a chemical weapons factory.
The Jerusalem Post ran a story earlier Sunday that was written by a journalist on-hand with the U.S. unit -- the 1st Brigade of the 3rd Infantry Division -- that took the plant.
The article states that one soldier was lightly wounded when a booby-trapped explosive was triggered as he was "clearing the sheet metal-lined chemical weapons production facility."
The chemical plant is described as a "100-acre complex," surrounded by an electrical fence. The plant was also apparently camouflaged to avoid aerial photos being taken.
It is not yet known what chemicals were being produced at the plant.
Asked at a news conference in Qatar Sunday about reports of the chemical plant, Lt. Gen. John Abizaid of U.S. Central Command declined comment. He said top Iraqi officers have been questioned about chemical weapons.
"We have an Iraqi general officer, two Iraqi general officers that we have taken prisoner, and they are providing us with information," Abizaid said.
The Jerusalem Post report also states that immediately following coalition entry into the camp, at least 30 Iraqi soldiers and their commanding officer fully obeyed instructions given by U.S. soldiers by lying down and surrendering.
U.S. forces are checking other sites based on leads from captured Iraqis and documents -- but officials cautioned it was premature to conclude any forbidden weapons had been located.
American special operations forces found documents in western Iraq that also could lead to chemical or biological weapons facilities, said Gen. Richard Myers, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
Myers said U.S. commandos found the papers along with a cache of millions of rounds of ammunition after a firefight on Saturday, and the discovery "might save thousands of lives if we can find out exactly where and what they have."
"I just know that they have some papers that they want to exploit as quickly as possible, and we're going to do that, of course," Myers said.
President Bush and other U.S. officials say ridding Saddam's regime of chemical and biological weapons is the main objective of the war. Finding such weapons would be a huge boost for Bush, since much of the international criticism of the U.S.-led war has focused on the fact that United Nations inspectors had not found any banned weapons in Iraq.
Iraqi officials have insisted that they destroyed all of the chemical and biological weapons they made after the 1991 Persian Gulf War -- a claim U.N. weapons inspectors have questioned.
U.N. weapons inspectors are not aware of any large-scale chemical sites which could be used to make chemical weapons in Najaf, said Ewen Buchanan, spokesman for the inspectors. However, there are many such dual-use sites in other parts of the country because of Iraq's petrochemical industry.
U.N. inspectors visited a cement plant in the Najaf area earlier this year to check on its explosives cache but did not report finding anything improper. A team of biological weapons inspectors also visited a university and school in Kufa, a few miles north of Najaf.
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From: Estes Park
Evo, I'm glad you keep trying, one step ahead of having your threads locked. And, I would like to comment on the "Chemical factory" thing. It looks like it was well disguised and camoflaged, but something here is amiss. On a 100 acre compound, supposedly heavily guarded and ringed with fences, we have buildings disquised as a ghetto? What kind of ghetto has that kind of fencing, even in Iraq. I have a friend who flew covert missions in areas we still won't acknowledge, and he told me, not jokingly, that thirty years ago they could count the number of buttons on your jacket at night from thirty thousand feet. Just imagine what can be done now. So the question is... How did they miss this one, and why wasn't the info given to the inspectors? Can someone out there help me? I don't think you can overlook 100 acres.
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From: 49th Parallel
heh, my sentiments exactly. (I am tired of repeating myself, so I am just gonna copy what I have from the other posts)
Like i said from the start, the US can do whatever they want with the land they capture..
And as I've said before if they knew where all this was (all their past proofs were disproved, they basically just went in), well, they could have given the co-ordinates to the inspectors...
Do you honestly think that the UN inspectors would miss a 100- acre chemical plant, and US marines "discovered" it? I don't think so...
And answering the News Article, it uses words like "premature" and "suspected", this is all speculation at this point..
Like i said from the start, the US can do whatever they want with the land they capture..
And as I've said before if they knew where all this was (all their past proofs were disproved, they basically just went in), well, they could have given the co-ordinates to the inspectors...
Do you honestly think that the UN inspectors would miss a 100- acre chemical plant, and US marines "discovered" it? I don't think so...
And answering the News Article, it uses words like "premature" and "suspected", this is all speculation at this point..
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From: Tulsa, OK
So what will you say Evo if they do find these weapons of mass destruction? Will you talk eloquently of how great and misunderstood Saddam was and how the evil imperialist pigs should have let him continue to kill his own people? Get a grip.
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From: Estes Park
I don't think anybody is defending Saddam. But I wonder if our intelligence is that good? Or maybe it is so good that we didn't want to divulge it to the world, but if that is so, we sure aren't real popular right now, so why not spill the beans? Pol Pot and Idi Amin weren't real gentle fellows either, so how is this awful situation different? Grades of viscosity.
