Posted on 05/18/2004 10:24:23 PM PDT by kattracks
You would have thought that the discovery of an actual weapon of mass destruction in Iraq would be big news, especially since it was aimed at American soldiers. But apparently not in the eyes of most U.S. newspaper editors and network television producers, who chose largely to ignore one of the major stories coming out of Iraq this week.
On Monday, the Iraqi Survey Group, which is tasked with searching for Saddam Hussein's WMD, confirmed that an artillery round containing weaponized sarin nerve gas was detonated in an improvised explosive device (IED) aimed at U.S. troops in Baghdad on Saturday. Thankfully, the IED didn't kill anyone, and the sarin components dispersed without causing real harm because the 155-mm shell had not been used as an artillery round, as it was intended. The weapon's design required the shell to be fired from a launcher that would have allowed the binary components of the sarin to mix as the shell spun at high speed, which would have turned the relatively small artillery round into a devastating killer. Instead, the device detonated in an IED, and most of the 3-4 liters of sarin were not activated.
So how did the major dailies treat this story? They buried it. The Washington Post carried a story on page 14, with a subtitle that dismissed its significance, "Weapon Probably Not Part of a Stockpile, Experts Say." But despite the headline, the story said nothing of the sort. The Post reported that David Kay, the man previously in charge of the Pentagon's search for WMD, "said the discovery did not conclusively prove the existence of stockpiles of concealed chemical and biological weapons," which is very different than saying somehow it proved the contrary. The story goes on to quote Raymond Zilinskas, a former U.N. weapons inspector: "The question is: Was it part of a cache that contains another 10 or 20 of these, or is it one of a kind? ... We have no way of knowing at this point."
The New York Times headline on page 11 was also dismissive. "Army Discovers Old Iraqi Shell Holding Sarin, Illicit Weapon." Most of the story was a re-hash of the complaints that the Bush administration had failed to find the WMD the president and his advisers had said Hussein possessed. The Times only grudgingly admitted that the existence of the shell offers "some of the most substantial evidence to date that Mr. Hussein did not destroy all of the banned chemical agent, as he claimed before the war last year."
One shell does not a stockpile make -- but where there is one such weapon there are likely to be others, dozens, maybe hundreds. No matter how you slice it, this story is important. But most of the liberal media have been too busy focusing on the Abu Ghraib prison scandal or other bad news from Iraq to pay attention.
On the same day the Times put the WMD story on page 11, it ran a front-page piece breathlessly reporting that "M.P.s Received Orders to Strip Iraqi Detainees." Since "strip-searches" are a routine fact of life in most U.S. jails and prisons, and these detainees are arguably more dangerous than common criminals, this "revelation" seems a little overblown. Furthermore, nothing in the story suggests that there were any orders to force the prisoners to engage in sexually degrading behavior or to encourage soldiers take pictures of naked prisoners, much less to jump on them, punch them or have others abuse them.
No matter how hard the media try to turn a prison scandal involving a handful of rogue soldiers into an official policy of abuse, they haven't yet been able to produce a smoking gun. Yes, the soldiers involved should be punished, but that appears likely. Four soldiers will face military courts this week, with one having already pled guilty. The only foot-dragging by the military so far involves the three female soldiers who are implicated in the scandal but who have yet to be charged. Oddly, the media aren't screaming foul on this apparent double standard.
Mark my words, these proceedings will dominate the news in the days ahead, even if we stumble across more of Hussein's WMD in Iraq.
Linda Chavez is President of the Center for Equal Opportunity, a Townhall.com member organization.
©2004 Creators Syndicate, Inc.
Can't remember exactly in which article it was pointed out yesterday, but Iraq didn't have these types of shells (mix-in-flight) when they claimed to have destroyed all there WMDs.
Shhhh...I can hear crickets through the silence. Where are those abused prisoners anyway?
Our Officer in Charge of Security carefully considered the risk and asked our input and we decided to form a search party to find him in the ASP. We found the body of the shepherd directly adjacent to a small crater which was obviously caused by the detonation of a relatively small UXO. We used a technique to roll him onto his back from a remote location in case the body was booby-trapped with an IED (improvised explosive device). On close examination we determined that in addition to entering a dangerous restricted area, the shepherd had obviously been tampering with the UXO which led to his own demise.
ping
The amount of Sarin found was sufficient to administer about eight million lethal doses. But the media doesn't think this is a big deal.
A better question is why would anyone go to the trouble to make just one? To think that this is the case is absurd.
Another example of how this newsworthy item is being minimized by the mainstream media:
http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/iraq/2004-05-17-sarin_x.htm
David Kay is quoted as stating, "It doesn't strike me as a big deal." A quote from Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt is cited; "This produced a very small dispersal of agent,". Daryl Kimball, executive director of the Arms Control Association, is quoted as saying the use of the shell by insurgents is likely an "accident".
I wonder if the press will ever acknowledge just how fortunate we are that the insurgents screwed up when using this shell as an IED. I fear we won't be as lucky next time . . .
bttt
The Iraqi order of battle in 1991 did indeed include several 155mm systems, such as the GHN-45 and the G-5 howitzer.
But they got all their chemical weapons from the Russians. However they may have developed their own round for the 155mm if they used it to carry an agent. A modification of a WP round would have worked. I still say it is a safe bet that the round used as an IED was probably 152mm. This is what we saw in Egypt during Nimbus Moon when American EOD helped clear the Suez Canal.
You will have to fire WMS's on the press to get them to notice.
Could be.
Nope, you are wrong about the 155 v 152 mm.
Read the UNSCOM reports - they are full of declarations of 155mm chemical artillery.
Well then they must have made it themselves which is a serious implication. WP counts as chemical but I doubt that is what they were talking about. If they developed their own process for the 155mm, this means that capability was developed after the Iran/Iraqi war and is a very important find. This justifies Bush's actions even more. But try and explain that to a liberal.
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