Hundreds of chemical weapons found in Iraq: US intelligence

AFP ^

[Freeport]

US-led coalition forces in Iraq have found some 500 chemical weapons since the March 2003 invasion, Republican lawmakers said, citing an intelligence report.

"Since 2003, Coalition forces have recovered approximately 500 weapons munitions which contain degraded mustard or sarin nerve agent," said an overview of the report unveiled by Senator Rick Santorum and Peter Hoekstra, head of the intelligence committee of the House of Representatives.

[Freeport]

Smoke on the water....

[TennTuxedo]

Here is how the liberals are responding to the announcement of the discovery of WMDs in Iraq. They are using quotes from FOX News Chanel's Jim Angle, to discredit the announcement:
"Fox News’ Jim Angle contacted the Defense Department who quickly disavowed Santorum and Hoekstra’s claims. A Defense Department official told Angle flatly that the munitions hyped by Santorum and Hoekstra are “not the WMD’s for which this country went to war.”

The liberals then say they are degraded weapons and are no threat, so they really aren't WMDs.

My responses is that the reason fro the UN Sanctions were to find and destroy all of Iraq's WMDs and the onus was on Iraq to do so. 500 degraded shells filled with nerve agents are still extremely lethal from all I have read and heard. It would be great to hear from someone who can verify this.

[wolfcreek]

What did the Libs say about the weapons that were hurried off to Syria and the Bekka valley before our forces arrived?

[RasterMaster]

We know about chemical weapons (mustard & sarin) as well as radioactive material (1.77 metric tons of enriched material) in pursuit of nuclear weapons (Niger yellowcake), but have there been any reports of weapon materials since the mobile bio weapons labs were found?

Media won't report it, but that is the CHEMICAL, BIOLOGICAL, and NUCLEAR weapons that the DUmocrats gave lip service about during the Clinton years.

[From One - Many]

The demonrats are in 'dream world' again. Living one's life in 'dream world' causes people living in the 'real world' to have grief. The 'dream worlders' refusal to admit the truth can cause the deaths of 'real worlders'. America is bless with many in 'dream world'. We 'real worlders' have a monumental task to bring the 'dream worlders' back to the 'real world'. If we fail, people will probably die. Get the 'dream worlders' out of politics now, for the sake of the current and future generations health and safety.

[handy]

"Fox News’ Jim Angle contacted the Defense Department who quickly disavowed Santorum and Hoekstra’s claims. A Defense Department official told Angle flatly that the munitions hyped by Santorum and Hoekstra are “not the WMD’s for which this country went to war.”

Well, if an anonymous source says it's no big deal then that settles it I guess.

[Paloma_55]

I am sorry, but this cannot be true. I saw the story on Fox News, but when I went to NBC, ABC and the others, they only mentioned it like it might be a rumor or something.

Even on Fox, Colmes was quick to point out the Democrat talking points that these are old warheads that are not dangerous any more...of course, he wouldn't offer to store them in his garage... but still, these aren't the WMD that Bush talked about.

Did Saddam have WMD... OK, maybe but they were old.
Did Saddam ship his newer WMD to Syria... There is no proof.
Did Saddam use WMD on his people...well, that's not important.
Is the USA safer since the war in Iraq?? What was the question?

These guys have already started spinning this to avoid taking any responsibility for being flat out wrong!

[LesbianThespianGymnasticMidget]

Drudge picked up the story, which will force the alphabets to address this.

[rightwingintelligentsia]

This "Defense Department official's" statement sounds less like a factual declaration and more like an editorial opinion (he actually seems to be repeating the Dem talking point that we went to war solely for the WMDs, and certain ones, at that). I wonder if he's a Clinton holdover?

[johnny7]

“So what?!” -Mara Liasson

[rod1]

Totally off subect quote (as per the Joe Wilson clone's comment from the defense dept). They either were or were not weapons capable of mass destruction. If they were, then Iraq had them although the RATS said they didn't.

But we can only expect self-serving lies instead of accuracy from Nancy Pelosi's Party of Corruption.

[LowOiL]

500 degraded shells filled with nerve agents are still extremely lethal from all I have read and heard. It would be great to hear from someone who can verify this.

Yes, even old WW2 stuff is extremely dangerous... Don't let the liberals fool you, they go crazy even when they are our old amunitions being destroyed. Want proof??? Here it is... (just google Anniston and WMD and read hundreds of these articles)...

Not Iraq, but Anniston, Ala.

[Times photos: Chris Zuppa]
A truck waits on Anniston's East 10th Street, which is the Immediate Response Zone's border, where people would be at greater risk in a weapons stockpile accident.

---

The cache of chemical weapons includes 873,020 pounds of sarin, 1,657,480 pounds of VX nerve agent and 1,976,760 pounds of mustard agent - enough to kill or incapacitate millions.

By CHUCK MURPHY, Times Staff Writer
© St. Petersburg Times
published March 16, 2003

---

ANNISTON, Ala. -- They told William Hutchings he would have his building by now.

But when Hutchings and the 550 students, teachers and staff in his school practice what to do if there is an explosion at the Army depot 5 miles away, they pile into a converted music room, not a state-of-the-art shelter.

Exhaust from the incinerator travels through the pollution abatement system before going out the stack.

---

If there is an accident, the veteran principal declares, "everyone here would die. Everybody'd die."

As Hutchings talks, he paces in the lot where his shelter is supposed to be, behind C.E. Hanna school in Hobson City, just southwest of Anniston.

On the other side of the hill, the Army has stored enough nerve agent and mustard to kill or incapacitate millions. The rockets, artillery shells and mortar rounds are pointed toward the sky, awaiting destruction.

It has been that way for 40 years. But as the United States prepares to attack Iraq, partly over Saddam Hussein's failure to rid his nation of chemical weapons, Anniston is a vivid reminder that the weapons of mass destruction from the 20th century were a lot easier to make than they are to destroy.

Though the United States is required by international treaty to be rid of chemical weapons by 2007, nearly 75 percent of the nation's now-banned arms still exist. It amounts to a nationwide stockpile of 23,415 tons of liquid sarin nerve agent, blister-causing mustard agent, a deadly nerve liquid called VX and variants.

That's 46,830,000 pounds of chemicals. A teaspoon of any of them is enough to kill or maim.

Most of it is stored at eight sites around the country, still in the munitions into which it was loaded at the factory in the 1940s and '50s. It was never used in battle, only in practice. There are hundreds of other "nonstockpile" sites, as the Army refers to them, around the country. Several are in Florida, including the Tampa Bay area.

In Anniston, the more than 600,000 munitions that arrived in trains and trucks in the 1960s have long been the subject of whispers in the town of 24,276 in a county of 112,249. But as the date for their incineration approached last month, the whispers turned to debate.

Today, the residents of Calhoun County agree they want the weapons gone. But they divide sharply over how -- and how quickly -- the destruction should occur.

On one side are those who want the weapons to go away fast -- at least as soon as the Army prepares schools and homes just in case of an accident at the new incinerator at the depot.

On the other are those who have been fighting incineration for a decade. They hope the Army will be forced to scrap its burning plans in favor of what they believe is a safer process of chemical "neutralization" followed by disposal.

'A certain number of casualties'

Brenda Lindell, left, prays with her husband, Alan, right, and son Ryan, 16, in their Anniston home. Brenda Lindell and others protested the building of Anniston's incinerator.

---

Brenda Lindell needs pecans for her fruit salad. Once she gets them from her garage she returns to a topic she is passionate about: organophosphates.

"Even the CDC said they didn't know anything about the effects of low-dose, long-term exposure," Lindell said. "Well, if they don't know, then don't make us the guinea pigs!"

Lindell, 50, hardly matches the stereotype of a tree-hugging environmentalist. She is first and foremost a self-described homemaker who first heard about plans to burn the chemical weapons in 1991.

Even then, she fought the urge to battle the Army, preferring to move from Anniston rather than fight.

But she, her husband and their three kids stayed put. And over time, the Army's plans to burn Anniston's 2,254 tons of chemical agent in a big incinerator near town have become her passion.

"When the Army is given a mission, a certain number of casualties is acceptable to them, and they put on blinders and just go," Lindell said. "That's acceptable on a battlefield in war. But this is not a battlefield, and we're not supposed to be at war with our own government."

Over the protest of Lindell and other groups locally and across the country, Westinghouse Anniston (the Army's contractor) built the incinerator and got a permit to operate it.

It's the same technology that has been used in Tooele, Utah, and on Johnston Atoll in the Pacific. The Army said the destruction of 9,634 tons of chemicals in those two incinerators went relatively smoothly, with no fatal accidents and only minor glitches.

But those incinerators are, quite literally, in the middle of nowhere, not in the midst of more than 100,000 people like the one in Anniston.

And as Lindell and others are quick to point out, it's too soon to tell whether there will be any long-term damage to people or animals from trace amounts of the organophosphates -- the killers in the nerve agents -- that may have been released during those burns.

The Army is required to insure that incineration produces an exhaust that is 99.9999 percent free of harmful chemicals.

But the other 0.0001 could contain small amounts of toxic dioxins, maybe some heavy metals and, if you believe the dissenters, a little occasional nerve agent.

The Army points to a study from test burns at the Johnston Atoll. It showed that the maximum possible public exposure from cancer-causing agents coming out of the smokestack would be the equivalent of smoking 1.7 to 17 cigarettes per year.

"When you look at the working population on Johnston Island, we have not found any instances of workers having long-term health effects," said Army spokesman Mike Abrams.

The opponents don't buy it.

Craig Williams is one of those opponents. Williams, who heads a consortium of incineration opponent organizations called the Chemical Weapons Working Group, complains that the test burn data doesn't take into account the potential burps and hiccups that occur when an incinerator is really up and running. The data also doesn't take into account the long-term exposure to even low doses of those chemicals if incineration goes on for eight to 12 years.

The Johnston Island incineration lasted 10 years, but was usually conducted so that the plume from the incinerator blew out over the ocean, not toward the island's housing.

And finally, Williams charges, the Army hasn't accounted for Anniston's uniquely polluted population. The town is already among the most troubled in America. An abandoned factory on one side of town is awash in PCBs, and some residents already test positive for exposure to the cancer-causing agent.

"If you know that you've got a community already overburdened with toxic chemicals, it is unconscionable to look at that (data) in a vacuum and declare that these are safe levels," Williams said.

Eli and the gorilla

A decade ago, James "Eli" Henderson believed in the Army.

He spent 25 years working as a civilian at the Anniston depot. For 10 of those years, he checked the chemical weapons every day for "leakers."

But after initially supporting the idea of a quick incineration of the depot's chemical munitions, Henderson had a change of heart.

"We discovered that the VX (nerve agent) is 10 times more deadly than they told us and that the GB (sarin) is five times more deadly," Henderson said. "And we couldn't get any help."

Commissioner Eli Henderson originally supported the Chemical Agent Disposal Facility.

---

Henderson is a plain-spoken Democrat who was first elected to the Calhoun County Commission in 1994 (one of his bumper stickers read: Eli. 'Nuff Said). And he turned that ability to rally the public against the Army, the Federal Emergency Management Authority and just about anyone else in government who was pushing the incineration plan.

"I just began to raise hell," Henderson said.

It's not that he opposes incineration, though he says Lindell and her supporters "just might be right." Instead, he wants to make sure the county's residents are protected just in case the Army's safeguards fail.

But in January, with the February start of burning looming on the calendar, little of the promised protection had arrived, with the exception of a few "Shelter In Place" kits (a roll of duct tape, a pair of scissors and plastic sheeting to keep the chemicals out of your house).

So Henderson and others on the commission turned to their senior U.S. senator, Richard Shelby.

After hearings last year, Shelby wrote to Army Secretary Thomas White to complain about "the obvious safety shortfalls."

C.E. Hanna Elementary students Michael Roberts, left, Sierra Worthan, Carley Herren, Miranda Luker and Paige McCord, all 11, play recorders. Hanna is about 5 miles from the disposal facility.

---

Shelby, a Republican, got immediate attention.

"He was our 800-pound gorilla," Henderson said.

Though the Army maintains that it is nearly impossible for a plume of nerve or mustard gas to travel off the confines of the depot, Army officials declared that they would not begin burning until after Shelby and the County Commission were satisfied that safety plans were in place.

Almost immediately, FEMA gave the county $14-million to buy 20,000 chemical protection hoods for adults and another 2,000 for children and 750 for babies (all at $225 each) living in the "pink zone" closest to the incinerator.

Another 40,000 shelter-in-place kits were purchased at $22.34 each, despite complaints that duct tape and plastic would be no match for sarin or VX if a cloud moves off base. Residents in the pink zone also will get $365 recirculating air filters to put in one room of their homes, where they would wait out the crisis if it comes.

All of it will be distributed soon. And Shelby might not be done yet.

On Friday, Shelby's spokesperson said he was considering asking the Army to perform a study of the cost and benefits of switching the incinerator over to neutralization technology. That would allow the chemicals to be mixed, like baking soda with vinegar, to make the poison inert. It could then be diluted and disposed of. The Army is planning to use that technology at four other stockpile sites.

The Army's new director of the chemical demilitarization program told the Anniston Star recently that the agency would be willing to consider alternatives if they furthered the goal of safely disposing of the stockpile.

Still waiting at C.E. Hanna

In the meantime, FEMA has finished paying for a new state-of-the-art Calhoun County emergency management bunker in Jacksonville, 12 miles north of Anniston. There are 106 special sirens scattered around the county to blast a warning if the chemicals start to drift.

FEMA also has put special pressurization engines in the schools closest to the incinerator, so the air pressure in a large room at each school could be increased in the event of a chemical release so that no agent could get inside.

But while those schools are protected, Hutchings is still waiting.

On Thursday, Janet Shelby of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers said that C.E. Hanna School is still slated to get a new metal building with a pressurization engine.

"It will be done by October," Shelby said.

That's when the Army is hoping to start the burning 5 miles away. And that's when Army workers will reach into the "igloos" where the weapons are stored and begin withdrawing pallets of rockets and shells stacked together for 40 years.

In the worst case, one of the 77,000 M-55 rockets filled with sarin or VX would tip over, hit the ground and launch back into the igloo, igniting several thousand others and sending a cloud of deadly sarin toward the sky and out past the fence.

The sirens would go off and the fourth- and fifth-graders at C.E. Hanna would run to their new shelter before Hutchings, 63, turned on the pressurization machine.

But, first, he needs his building. And he is tired of waiting.

"You've got some people fighting over money like blind dogs in a meat house," Hutchings said. "But they're not doing anything for the common people."

Anniston provides home shelter kits to residents.

---

Shelter in Place

The home shelter kits provided to protect Anniston, Ala. residents from exposure to chemical nerve agents contain items that could be found at most hardware stores

1. A 10' X 25' roll of plastic sheeting

2. A roll of duct tape

3. A pair of scissors

4. A video explaining how to trim the plastic to fit windows and doors

The "Shelter in Place" kit also contains written instructions residents are to follow if they hear the chemical warning siren. Here they are:

1. Move inside immediately

2. Close all windows and doors

3. Turn off all ventilation systems

4. Go into and seal a room

5. Turn on the radio

http://www.sptimes.com/2003/03/16/Worldandnation/Not_Iraq__but_Annisto.shtml

[rod1]

Mara Liason would know "so what" the next time she asks for a little "mustard" with her mayo or happened to visit the NY city subway system during the attack that we missed.

She should be forced to watch a few old reels of WWI gassing or a few hours of Saddam's attack on the Kurds.

Talk about lack of reality.

[conservative physics]

Anyone who thinks Iraq didn't have WMD's is a freaking idiot.

Of course they had WMD's ! THEY FREAKING USED THEM ON THEIR PEOPLE !

Saying that Iraq didn't have WMD's because we hadn't found them yet is as stupid as saying the Jimmy Hoffa didn't exist because we haven't found his corpse.

[jveritas]

“A Defense Department official told Angle flatly that the munitions hyped by Santorum and Hoekstra are “not the WMD’s for which this country went to war.”

On Hannity and Colmes last night Alan Colmes asked Senator Santorum about this and the Senator told him “I am sure that this defense spokesman did not vote for President Bush”, and both him and Hoekstra said that they want to know who this DOD official is and they will wait for a real and official statement from the DOD.

[XR7]

[T]he report unveiled by Senator Rick Santorum...

Unveiled by Santorum?
That fact alone is enough to discredit this discovery in the minds of democRATS.
Next to President Bush and Donald Rumsfeld, Santorum is the Republican the left most loves to villify.

[rightinthemiddle]

Check out Google News:

http://news.google.com/nwshp?hl=en&tab=wn&q=


Nothing on the front page about WMD. Zip. Zilch.

As predicted yesterday, the MSM will disavow and ignore this story.

[jveritas]

These guys have already started spinning this to avoid taking any responsibility for being flat out wrong!

I will substitute “wrong” with “LIARS” : )

[kidd]

My understanding is that the mustard gas tends to polymerize over time (becomes gooey). OTOH, the Sarin has quite a long shelf life...especially if the binary shells are used.

The liberals who discredit this report have no basis to do so without a lot more detailed information. At the very least, these finds demonstrate that the weapons inspectors were unable to do a satisfactory job (due to interference by Saddam).

[johnny7]

“You're down 18 points in the polls Senator... aren't you just using this...” -Alan Colmes

[finnman69]

excuses from Democrats I have already heard:

"these were not the WMDs we were looking for"
"they are degraded"
"they are from pre-91'"

my favorite: "we knew about these WMD"

[steveegg]

“You're down 18 points in the polls Senator... aren't you just using this...” -Alan Colmes

That's exactly the tactic used by my local paint-catcher this morning. They gushed over Russ el-Slimeroad's latest pull-them-out-cuz-Bush-lied efforts, and even found time to mention Santorum's rock-bottom poll numbers in their paint-catcher-only National Roundup, but not one word about WMDs found in Iraq.

[edzo4]

this is why they want us out of iraq so badly, if it keeps getting better bush won, if they can force him out now they will try and hold it over him for ever...

[steveegg]

Notice that the foreign presstitutes, who are not completely invested in the "Bush lied" mantra, actually see this as a story, while crAP and their ilk, which are completely invested in said mantra, don't.

[CedarDave]

From the Fox News web site:

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."

Report: Hundreds of WMDs Found in Iraq

If this is the offical Administration position, it gives the Rats all the information they need to discount everything Santorum said yesterday. That "official" needs to be identified and put on the record. But the damage has been done. For whatever reason, instead of embracing the report and saying "See, we (the Bush administration) were right about WMD's; they were there all along," they are going the other direction and sticking with the "there were no recent WMD's" story. After all a chemical bomb is a chemical bomb. The question is why? Why are they shooting themselves in the foot and not only refusing to acknowledge this but not shouting it forcefully?

There should be some very hard questions asked of Snow and Defense officals at today's press briefings.

[LibLieSlayer]

Another joe wilson dim plant!

LLS

[MizSterious]

I'm really frustrated by this administration's responses to the WMD issue. They've known all along there were WMD there--in fact, as some of these were found, news articles were filed and posted on the internet--then the stories just died on the vine. We know some of the rivers were poisoned by mustard gas, we know they found an underground nuclear facility (and locals are still being poisoned by it when they pilfer from the site), we know sarin gas was found, we know they found massive stocks of atropine, injectors, and chem suits.

Sometimes, I'm tempted to say, Well, Bush Admin, if you're not going to stand up for YOURSELVES, why should WE? But I know why--the other choice is far, far worse.

[rightinthemiddle]

Media dismisses; Pentagon bureaucrats assist them:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/21/AR2006062101837.html

[cake_crumb]

Don't forget the disassembled gas centrifuge buried in that Iraqi physicist's back yard, or the vials of concentrated botulin in the other scientist's refrigerator.

[TruthShallSetYouFree]

I wrote this essay and posted it during the run-up to the last election:

Bush, Saddam, and the Weapons of Mass Destruction: WHO IS REALLY LYING?

“Bush lied about the Weapons of Mass Destruction.” It is the mantra of most of the democrat candidates, all of their professional spinmeisters, and the constant harangue of the liberal media. To determine if Bush did, in fact lie, we must accomplish two goals. First, we must determine what is meant by the word ‘lie.’ Then, we must consider the facts of the situation and see if President Bush did actually lie, as the word is generally understood.

So then, what is a lie? Is it merely an untruth? Is it just a false statement? No, it is more complicated than that. A witness in court must swear to “tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.” This three-part element, when violated in any of its components, is what a lie really is. It may be a lie of commission or omission, covert or overt.

When Bill Clinton said that he “never had sex with that woman, Monica Lewinsky,” he was committing an overt lie. The statement itself is patently false. It is so false that even Clinton, the master of the genre, could make only a feeble effort to redefine what “sex” is to try to extricate himself from his own falsehood. His democrat cohorts, however, committed a lie of omission in their defense of him. The party line became, “Sure he lied, but he only lied about sex. Any man would lie about a private act whose discovery would be hurtful to his family.”

What they omitted was that Mr. Clinton was the defendant in a sexual harassment case (Paula Jones) and was queried about Ms. Lewinsky because the law says that prior bad acts can be brought up in court in such cases, due to the “he-said, she-said” nature of the charges. So, if your secretary sues you because you told her that if she didn’t have sex with you, she would get fired, it would be permissible to bring up facts related to the last ten secretaries that had been dismissed. If one or more of them corroborates the plaintiff’s story, it would certainly lend credence to the charges. So, to say that Mr. Clinton’s lie was only about sex is as disingenuous as if Michael Jackson were found to be lying only about sex. Having sex with an underling, in the first case, or a twelve year-old boy, in the second, is different from having a consensual affair with your next-door neighbor.

It is evident that, for something to be the truth, it must be the whole truth and nothing but the truth. Here is another example. A woman hears her husband leaving the house early one Saturday morning. He returns at ten a.m. after being gone for several hours. He has had a history of philandering, so the wife is suspicious.

“Where the Hell were you?” she inquires. “I got the car washed,” is the reply. He points out the window to their gleaming sedan. But was he telling the truth, as it is commonly understood?

Here’s what actually happened: he left the house at seven, got to the car wash when it opened, left there at seven thirty, and drove to his girlfriend’s house a few miles away. He spent a few hours there committing adultery, and was back home at ten. His statement, that he “got the car washed,” while perfectly true and perfectly obvious from the car’s exterior, is, in fact, part of a lie. The lie is clearly one of omission. The critical question, from the wife’s viewpoint, was an implied, “Have you been seeing that bimbo again?” But, since it was not specifically asked, the question went unanswered. Had the wife countered with, “It took you all morning to get your car washed?” the man would still not be caught in an overt lie. He could have replied with “It takes over an hour to get the car washed on Saturday morning at eight o’clock.” While the statement is true, it is irrelevant because he wasn’t at the car wash at eight o’clock. He was there at seven when the lines are short. His answer implied that he was there at eight, but he didn’t actually say that he was. Bill Clinton would be proud.

Now to the question of George Bush and the Weapons of Mass Destruction, and the issue of who really is lying. The democrats are all using the same basic talking points. They allege:

1. George Bush said that Saddam had WMD’s.
2. He took the country into war because of it.
3. Despite nearly a year of searching, no WMD’s have been found, and therefore,
4. George Bush is a liar, which leads to
5. And should be replaced by a democrat, the party renowned for its honesty.

There are some shades and gradations of the above, depending upon whether it’s Howard Dean or John Kerry doing the talking, but the basic premise is the one I have outlined. Let’s check it for veracity.

The very first statement is a lie of omission, and is actually the key to the democrats’ game plan to discredit the President. On the face of it, the statement “George Bush said that Saddam had WMD’s” appears to be perfectly true. And it is, as far as it goes. But, as we have learned, sometimes statements don’t go far enough, and the veracity of the statement is quite dubious, based upon a key omission. What is it that is omitted here? We all heard the President make the statement many times. Here is the key element: because George Bush subsequently acted (attacked Iraq) based upon this statement, the democrats are trying to make it seem like the statement really is:

“George Bush (and George Bush alone) said that Saddam had WMD’s.” That is clearly what they are implying. But, before the war started, everyone in the world said that Saddam had WMD’s. Bush said it, but so did Clinton, Gore, Daschle, Kennedy, Pelosi and Kerry, to say nothing of Koffi Annan and Dominique de Villepin. Even Saddam Hussein said that he had weapons of mass destruction.

Weekly Standard Link.

Of course, it wouldn’t be much of an indictment of the President if the first premise was: “George Bush and the entire world said that Saddam had WMD’s,” or even, more accurately, “The entire world said that Saddam had WMD’s,” which clearly would include George W. Bush among its minions. No, the liars on the left find it convenient to assign a belief which is held by all, and attribute it to one (and only one) person. This disingenuous act is exacerbated by their turning the truth further on its head by calling Bush the liar.

The second statement, “He took the country into war because of it,” is also partly true, but false in what it omits. George Bush and, indeed, Colin Powell, made a very strong case for the war, and the existence of the WMD’s was only part of the reason. The democrats have attempted (rather successfully) to frame their argument that Bush made an assertion which ultimately he has been unable to prove. They (conveniently) omit just enough to keep their argument strong. Let’s examine what they have left out.

What is inarguable is that Saddam, at one point in time, did have Weapons of Mass Destruction. It is inarguable because there is clear evidence that he used them. He killed thousands of Kurds with poison gas, dealt the Marsh Arabs a similar fate, and was actively using chemical weapons throughout the long war with Iran. Nobody, not even Howard Dean or Scott Ritter can say, with a straight face, that Saddam never had WMD’s. The 1998 inventoried list, as cited above in The Weekly Standard, is not in dispute. The United Nations passed over a dozen resolutions, attempting to get Saddam to disarm. The final one, Resolution 1441, clearly, irrevocably, and for the final time, gave Saddam a last chance to come clean. Since the weapons clearly existed at one time, it was necessary for Saddam, as demanded by The United Nations, to hand over all proscribed munitions, and to explain and verify what had become of the rest. If weapons had been destroyed, he was to show evidence (video, trace element, even a bookkeeping entry) to prove it.

No evidence of such compliance has ever been offered. George Bush went to war because Saddam Hussein did not comply with the UN’s resolution. The onus was on Saddam to prove he had destroyed known stocks of illegal weapons. The onus is not, as implied by the democrats, on George Bush to find those weapons. It is almost as if George Bush had invaded some peace-loving nation, like Switzerland, accusing it of making illegal weapons. That is not the case at all. The prior existence of Saddam’s WMD’s was never in dispute

To give another analogy, consider the case of a mass-murderer who pulls out an automatic weapon and fires into a bunch of schoolchildren, killing nine of them. There are about a thousand witnesses, including a police officer, who gives chase. After a long run, he eventually starts gaining on the perpetrator, and yells, “Police! Put down your weapon! Put your hands up and surrender!” But, the alleged perpetrator keeps running. The policeman uses his own weapon to shoot the guy. Unfortunately, the police are unable to find the perpetrator’s weapon. If you are a democrat, the only conclusion that you could draw is that the weapon never existed. Tell that to the nine dead schoolchildren. And tell the Kurds that Saddam never gassed their village.

The left is forced into a syllogism that is absurd on its face. They really are saying:

1. Saddam had WMD’s.
2. We can’t find the WMD’s, therefore
3. Saddam didn’t have WMD’s , and
4. George Bush is a liar for saying that he did.

Clearly, syllogisms don’t work that way. One must start with a premise, and, based upon that premise, come to a conclusion. However, (and this is critical),
the conclusion can never invalidate the original premise.
For instance, my premise might be: “An apple is a fruit.” It is clearly a true statement. From this, I can infer that if I am eating an apple, I am, in fact, eating a fruit. I cannot, however, by the rules of logic, infer that if I am eating a fruit, it must be an apple. I obviously could be eating an orange or a pear, and would still be eating a fruit. One could make many statements related to the original premise, but one could never say, “An apple is a fruit. I am eating a fruit. It is a pear. Therefore, an apple is not a fruit.” One can never invalidate the original premise. It is an absurdity.

While Saddam’s possession of WMD’s is not quite the tautology of “An apple is a fruit, “ it is pretty close. If the democrats accept it as a fact, as they all did in 1998 when Clinton was president, they are left with the above non sequitur. Since he did have the weapons and we can’t find them, we cannot conclude that he never had them. (Unless we are democrats!) So then, what can rational people conclude? The choices are obvious. I will list them.

1. He hid them so well that we haven’t discovered them.
2. He transferred them to another country or entity.
3. He destroyed them.

Of course, there might be some combination of these three. If Saddam hid or transferred the weapons, the President was clearly correct in launching the invasion. That he had years to hide them does not make us at fault for not yet finding them. If he transferred them to a terrorist state, or a terrorist group, the invasion gains even more justification. Finally, the left might lead you to believe that if he destroyed them, we were wrong to invade. That is not the case. He had to show proof that he destroyed them, or else, like a gunman running from the police, the only safe assumption that can be made is that he still has the weapon or weapons. That’s why the police say, “Come out slowly with your hands up!” It is not enough to disarm. If you act as if you are still armed (for a criminal—keeping your hand in your pocket, pointing like a gun), the only way that you can be treated is as if you are, in fact, still armed. If the weapon is found, of course, these issues are moot. In Saddam’s case, the weapons have yet to be found in any significant quantity. This does not mean that he never had them, nor does it indicate that Saddam complied in any way with UN Resolution 1441, which passed unanimously, with even France and Germany approving it. Yes, there is a big lie involving George Bush, the invasion of Iraq, and the Weapons of Mass Destruction. Clearly, he’s not the one telling it.

[cdga5for4]

Bob Knight on anonymous sources

Bob Knight at a press conference in 2000 was told by a reporter that "an anonymous source has said you did...such and such." Knight retorted, "My anonymous source told me you guys like to have sex with sheep."

[avacado]

Attn to All:

It does not matter if the war heads are pre 1991, nor does it matter if they are not the WMD that were the stockpiles that we thought Saddam had... the onus was on Saddam to declare all WMD in his disarmament obligations laid out in the many United Nations Security Council Resolutions (UNSCRs). Saddam did not regarding these WMD, therefore, he was in breach of his disarmament obligations.

[cake_crumb]

"Even on Fox, Colmes was quick to point out the Democrat talking points that these are old warheads that are not dangerous any more...of course, he wouldn't offer to store them in his garage... but still, these aren't the WMD that Bush talked about."

But they ARE weapons Saddam claimed to have destroyed.

[FreeInWV]

"500 degraded shells filled with nerve agents "

Perhaps we should have Katie Couric crack one open on live TV, just to prove they're not dangerous. I'd pay good money to see that!

[cake_crumb]

Senator told him “I am sure that this defense spokesman did not vote for President Bush”, and both him and Hoekstra said that they want to know who this DOD official is and they will wait for a real and official statement from the DOD.

FOFLOL, good one! I love that guy.

[JamesP81]

We know some of the rivers were poisoned by mustard gas,

I remember back when that story broke. It ran for one day or less then was quashed by the lib media. I kept thinking, "they say there are no WMDs, but the stuff is in the river! I don't know how it got there, but it isn't fish s***!"

[topher]

Timing is everything.

RATS like Nancy Pelosi need to run for cover.

She has banked on a Democratic comeback in November.

Sounds like the Republicans are following a timetable that probably has been tested and tested before put into production.

It is probably a coup that President George W. Bush has selected a top person at Fox News for a post at the White House.

I think I can see of the magic and savvy of Carl Rove in these moves.

So the big bad DemoRATS (wolves in sheep's clothing) are going to huff and puff and try to blow down the titanium-composite materials house house built by the Republicans and various conservative coalitions.

This is really bad news for the Natural Gas market, as there appears to excess supplies of HOT AIR coming from New York, Massachusetts and California, where now TRILLIONS of UNTAPPED RESERVES of HOT AIR have been found that will erode the price NATURAL GAS on the markets today.

Dept of Energy is set to release weekly figures on Natural Gas at 10:30am...

On the downside, there may some immense explosions in these states because of such an enormous release of hot air.

Global Warming Scientists are very concerned about this explosion of HOT AIR coming from the RATS and may make a statement that AL GORE himself and friends might actually be the cause of GLOBAL WARMING because of all the hot air he and his friends are venting into the atmosphere at enormous rates...

News at 11 with more hot air to follow...

[CedarDave]

Please excuse the double post at #34.

[cake_crumb]

I recall that binary shells were found, One was attached to an IED. The left discounted it as "old" and said the "insurgents" probably didn't know it was a WMD they were using to kill Americans, so there was nothing to see, move along to Cheney and Halliburton [obvious paraphrase].

[ikez78]

PICK UP THE PHONE AND ASK CNN WHY THEY ARE IGNORING THIS.....

CNN Headline News
190 Marietta St NW
Atlanta, GA 30303

(404) 827-2600

[cake_crumb]

"Saddam did not regarding these WMD, therefore, he was in breach of his disarmament obligations."

Exactly. That's two of us. Wish there were more that got the point.

[CedarDave]

I'm really frustrated by this administration's responses to the WMD issue.

So are a lot of us. The question is why, WHY, WHY???

[CedarDave]

PICK UP THE PHONE AND ASK CNN WHY THEY ARE IGNORING THIS.....

Because the Administration is ignoring this.

[tomnbeverly]

The best response is that John Kerry is a liar... He said there were NO repeat NO that means NONE WMD found in Iraq... He Lied to the American People and he is lying to this day...

[steveegg]

The thing is I KNOW why CNN and the rest of the presstitutes are ignoring this; they're too invested in "Bush lied, thousands died" to have it blasted out from under them.

[Jeff Head]

“not the WMD’s for which this country went to war.”

First off, I never thought that the WMDs needed to be the reason to go to war. Sadam violated the cease fire agreements over and over from the Gulf War...we could have and should have taken him and his Ba'ath government down long ago.

Second, the libs/DNC will NEVER admit that the "proper" WMDs have been found. There will always be an excuse. This renders any such statement by them essentially meaningless.

The fact is, Sadam had WMDs and everyone knows it. We have now found hundreds of them, weaponized. There are more. He was actively seeking nuclear weapons but diod not have them yet, but the Chemical and biological he did have...and he used the chemical ones on a number of occassions against his own people and against the Iranians.

[Raycpa]

Okay move the goal posts back another 100 yards.....

[tomnbeverly]

I ask them why a prominent political figure like John Kerry, who obviously is engrossed in the complications of this war has taken to lying to the American people by stating without regard to the facts that there were NO absolutely NO WMD found in Iraq when in fact that is not the truth...

Thank you for your comment goodbye...

????????????

[cake_crumb]

"First off, I never thought that the WMDs needed to be the reason to go to war."

You're absolutely right...and it wasn't the only reason we went to war. That's the lefty spin line, which the administration let go too far and then was unable to counter.