>>> Everyone agreed Iraq was a serious threat that needed to be dealt with.
Exactly. Case closed.
There remain, until this day, there are many tons of Mustard gas, Sarin, and Tabun, as well as VX nerve gas unaccounted for.
Iraq claimed to produced a total of 3,859 Tons of useable chemical agent, and claimed it had weaponized 3,315 Tons and used 80% of that. So, there is a total of about 1,100 TONS of chemical agent still missing.
Under the UN mandate, they were required to account for these weapons. In the meantime, Saddam was acting as guilty as OJ. In December, 2002, Blix's position was as outlined below.
How in HELL can a rational person with these facts oppose the Iraq War? You just cannot do it, given the history of the dictatorship and the possibility that he may choose to make some of those agents or components to the terrorists who had just killed 3,000 innocent Americans.
It would have been grossly incompetent for Bush not to have acted. And it is entirely hypocritical and two-faced for you [liberals] to be taking the positions you are today.
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Chief UN weapons inspector Hans Blix has said Iraq's
new declaration contains little information that had
not been declared by Baghdad before 1998 when UN arms
experts were last in Iraq.
The US and UK have long had concerns about what is
described as unaccounted for chemical, biological and
nuclear material. Their assessments were partly based
on a report by the weapons inspections organisation
Unscom, predecessor to Unmovic.
In early 1999, Unscom gave the Security Council its
own assessment of what Iraq had destroyed and what
remained unaccounted for.
The US and UK want a full explanation of what happened
to the following:
* 360 tonnes of chemical warfare agents, including 1.5
tonnes of VX nerve agent;
* 3,000 tonnes of chemical precursors (which are
developed into chemical weapons) including 300 tonnes
uniquely used for VX.
The 1999 Unscom report said:
"According to Iraq, 1.5 tonnes of VX were discarded
unilaterally by dumping on the ground. Traces of one
VX-degradation product and a chemical known as a
VX-stabilizer were found in the samples taken from the
VX dump sites. A quantified assessment is not
possible."
Biological
Britain and America want to know about:
* Growth media for 20,000 litres of biological warfare
agents. Any Iraqi claims that this will have
degenerated will not be accepted as mustard gas found
in shells in 1997 was active;
* Shells for use in biological warfare - 20,000 are
missing say the British, 15,000 say the Americans;
Unscom said in 1999:
"The commission has little or no confidence in Iraq's
accounting for proscribed items for which physical
evidence is lacking or inconclusive, documentation is
sparse or nonexistent, and coherence and consistency
is lacking.
These include, for example: quantities and types of
munitions available for biological weapons (BW)
filling; quantities and types of munitions filled with
BW agents; quantities and type of bulk agents
produced; quantities of bulk agents used in filling;
quantities of bulk agents destroyed; quantities of
growth media acquired for the programme; and
quantities of growth media used/consumed.
In addition, the commission has no confidence that all
bulk agents have been destroyed; that no BW munitions
or weapons remain in Iraq; and that a BW capability
does not still exist in Iraq."
Chemical warfare munitions
Washington and London demand disclosure on:
* 6,000 chemical warfare bombs.
Unscom said:
The commission has accepted the destruction of about
34,000 munitions on the basis of multiple sources,
including physical evidence, documents provided by
Iraq etc. However, it has not been possible to achieve
a numerical accounting of destroyed munitions due to
heavy bomb damage of the CW storage facilities, where
these munitions had been stored during the Gulf war.
The destruction of about 2,000 unfilled munitions
remain uncertain, 550 filled munitions remain
unaccounted for.
Other key concerns for the US and UK include the
following:
Why did Iraq try to import 60,000 aluminium tubes?
Rapidly spinning rotor tubes in centrifuges are used
to separate weapons grade uranium, though both the
British and American reports acknowledge that the
tubes could be used for conventional weapons as well.
Why did it try to import other equipment, including
vacuum pumps, a winding machine and special chemicals
needed in gas centrifuge cascades? |
