Missing Iraq WMD rhetoric found
If this is the same type of 155-mm weapon of mass destruction currently being floated as justification for invading Iraq, it sure explains all the sensational headlines.
(Shown at left, an Iraqi child participating in an unrelated cleanup effort of shells in Baghdad, 05/17/04 India Tribune)
I’m skeptical, though. That high-tech delivery system might look imposing, but I doubt that kid could make it to American shores in 45 minutes, at least not without a note from his mom. Plus, he doesn’t look capable of eluding the $150 billion state of the art all-kid missile defense system the Pentagon has in place. (That’s where a telegenic kid points to a light in the sky and goes, “Hey, look!” before all hell breaks loose, just like in the movies.)
Still, the Republican Faithful have been asked to wax bombastic about the WMD find on the floor of the Senate and House, even though the potency of the WMD rhetoric barely survives first paragraphs of the AP article.
In Washington, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld cautioned that the sarin results were from a field test, which can be imperfect and more analysis needed to be done.
“We have to be careful,” he told an audience in Washington Monday afternoon. Rumsfeld said it many take some time to determine precisely what the chemical was, what its presence means in terms of risks to U.S. forces and other implications.
U.S. troops have announced the discovery of other chemical weapons before, only to see them disproved by later tests. Deputy State Department spokesman Adam Ereli said “the jury is still out” on whether chemical or other weapons of mass destruction remained in Iraq.
The former top U.S. weapons inspector in Iraq, David Kay, said it was possible the shell was an old relic overlooked when Saddam said he had destroyed such weapons in the mid-1990s.
Kay, in a telephone interview with The Associated Press, said he doubted the shell or the nerve agent came from a hidden stockpile, although he didn’t rule out that possibility.
Former U.N. weapons inspector Hans Blix, speaking to the AP in Sweden, agreed the shell was likely a stray weapon scavenged from a dump and did not signify that Iraq had large stockpiles.
Numerous arsenals and weapons depots were looted in the turmoil following the collapse of the regime last April. Some depots are still only lightly guarded. Many of the materials used for roadside bombs were believed to have been looted.
Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt said he believed that insurgents who planted the explosive did not know it contained the nerve agent. The 155-mm shell did not have markings to indicate it contained a chemical agent, a U.S. official said.
He said a U.S. military convoy discovered the round, which had been rigged as an explosive device. A detonation took place before soldiers could make the bomb inoperable, producing “a very small dispersal of agent.”
U.S. officials believe, based on evidence, that the shell was an experimental munition produced before the 1991 Gulf War, called a binary type – a bomb carrying two separate chemicals that when combined in an explosion, produce sarin. (05/18/04 AP/Torchia)
The only possible explanation for the screaming headlines about WMDs being found is that, the Abu Ghraib scandal having been declared officially over by the Department of Hooey, the White House has resumed torturing the media.
Well, thank goodness something else came along to distract us from widespread prisoner abuse sanctioned at the highest levels of our government. Otherwise, I was worried that we’d have to keep looking at footage of Nicholas Berg’s murder until November.
Yum, depleted uranium! If that boy lives long enough to have kids, they will have no face.
Isn’t it amazing how in such a short time frame, we get “proof” of both Al-Qaeda’s involvement in Iraq (Zarqawi and Berg) and of Iraq’s use of WMD’s. All the justification for the war coming down at the same time, giving wingnuts every reason to jizz all over the airwaves/blogs/tv’s in resounding triumph. A little too convenient methinks. But there’s no convincing them of the complete leap of logic their “proof” takes. Those unreleased Abu Ghraib pics must be something atrocious.
The Americans are using indigenous children to clear unexploded munitions??!??
Everything I see smacks of American double standards applied to brown-skinned untermenschen by the melanin-challenged North American Aryan Empire.
Imagine the outrage all across the USA by millions of white ‘soccer-moms’ if that was a white kid from North Carolina being employed and exploited in such a dangerous task by adults, while they, the fully armored ‘super-race’ enforcers, are relaxing in the background out of harm’s way… But a darkie Iraqi child? Who cares? Even the young children of dark-skinned people are treated as sub-humans and used as cheap, expendable labor.
I guess you can’t have Neo-Cons without Neo-Niggers, can you?
The Pale Faces have not only always spoken with fork tongue, they put it into practice at every opportunity without a second thought or twinge of conscience. It’s so ingrained, it’s a natural part of the ‘white’ psyche. Double standards everywhere you look in Iraq.
That kid could be providing the basic ingredients for IEDs while the GIs think he’s helping. What kind of control is there when kids can just wander around in an ammo dump. This is why we are in trouble, we don’t have the people we need to guard the known dumps, much less look for more.
BTW, wasn’t that old sarin shell stamped “Made in USA”? Because I think Rummy went over to iWaq in the 80’s to sell them all that shit to use in their war against Iran.
Come to think of it, he probably stopped off in Iran to sell them some, too!