Breaking News: WMD's Found

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Al Norris

Moderator Emeritus
Santorum: We Found the WMD - Think Progress Blog

Santorum: Military has found 500 chemical munitions shells in Iraq (Video added) - Hot Air Blog

Document Details WMD Recovered In Iraq, Santorum Says - Townhall.com

GOP, Democrats maneuver for advantage in Iraq debate - Boston Globe

No links from CNN.com or Foxnews.com, although the broadcast news on Fox and the O'Reilly Factor reported this.

Senator Santorum said:
"The idea that, as my colleagues have repeatedly said in this debate on the other side of the aisle, that there are no weapons of mass destruction is in fact false," Santorum said. "We have found over 500 weapons of mass destruction and in fact have found that there are additional chemical weapons still in the country."
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So, 500+ canisters/projectiles (from the shots shown, they look like 250 gallon sealed/presurized tanks) of Mustard and/or Sarin gas have been found, according to some declassified documents from the DOD, and read to congress a few minutes ago.

I have some questions on this... Mainly, given the stink over WMD's, why in the world was this ever classified to begin with? Why haven't the PTB reported these finds as they have occured?
 
FoxNews has it on their website now, but it is buried in the "political" page.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,200499,00.html

Funny, I'd have figured that this is enough of a political bombshell (completely discrediting the "Bush Lied" crowd of nutcases) that it deserves front page headlines.

About the finds -- no, I'm not at all surprised. It wasn't so much if there were WMDs, it was where they were and when they'd turn up. And apparently we haven't found anywhere near the whole inventory.

About the information being classified until now -- with 20-20 hindsight, I'm not that surprised about that, either. It avoided tipping our hand to AQ. Yes, it would have been a good thing to know about this quite some time ago -- it would have saved us all a whole bunch of "Bush Lied" whining. But operationally speaking it was better to keep a lid on it.

This actually speaks well for Bush and the administration, especially those involved with the opearational and intel aspects of the war. They kept a lid on this thing for quite a while, even through an election cycle, even though it cost them political points and provided a club for the opposition to beat them with.
 
Its already happening, Alan Colmes and some liberal babe saying,"well these arent the weapons we were talking about, we meant the other ones" What a joke.
 
Five hundred mustard gas artillery shells. Wow. They could have slung those a good thirty miles.

For all the folks who still maintain that we went to war because of WMDs, I'm glad to see that our 2,500 young men and women and hundreds of billions of dollars of taxpayer money were well invested. Those are now the most expensive artillery shells in history.
 
Five hundred mustard gas artillery shells. Wow. They could have slung those a good thirty miles.
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And they could have been handed them out like like lollypops at the AQ dentist and been imported here for our pleasure. A few million illegals sneak across the border and I don't see it as a stretch to think a few hundred artillery shells could be snuck across.
Is it all of them? Doubtful, but it's 500 less in the inventory.
Yes, they were expensive, but it's the price some of us are willing to pay and many have already paid willingly.
 
It's not "breaking news," it was reported when they were found. If it was the smoking gun, you can be sure the administration would be all over it.
 
I'll wait and see how this one pans out. Of course, it should be no great surprise why this wasn't released before - and I'm hardly surprised some jerky from Congress has stamped this with the "WMD" label. Come on. Weapons? Yes. Of Mass Destruction? I'm pretty sure we didn't invade Iraq hoping to find a relatively small cache of some degraded nerve agent.

More likely, they were being stored for the Republican Guard to be used during an extended invasion against the Americans. Seriously - 500 artillery shells isn't much.
 
pickpocket said:
I'll wait and see how this one pans out. Of course, it should be no great surprise why this wasn't released before - and I'm hardly surprised some jerky from Congress has stamped this with the "WMD" label. Come on. Weapons? Yes. Of Mass Destruction?
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Are you aware of what actually qualifies as a WMD?

Are you aware that Saddam was specifically precluded from possessing these chemical warheads by UN resolutions after gassing civilians and invading his neighbor, under penalty of asskicking?
 
Those are now the most expensive artillery shells in history.
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Well, but the find...dividing some of the search cost by the recovered materials, lowers the cost of the search by placing the value in the shells. Don't worry, it is political math, not real math.

As for lobbing distance and not being much, had such weapons been able to be fired from the Babylon guns (never fully completed), the range would have been in the neighborhood of 750-1000 km or into orbit.
 
JohnG
Get ready for "Bush planted the WMDs," and "those aren't nuclear so they don't count."
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S**t John, I wanted to wallow in the pleasure a little longer... :rolleyes:
I wasn't ready for the next round of "bull-oney". :D :D
 
I'm not a liberal...just thought I'd preface what I'm going to say with that...

We went to war with Iraq to get a foothold in the Middle East so as to monitor the region and ensure that the flow of oil is not disrupted. People in this country don't like to think that we would go to war for such a cause, but it is a fact...and here is why. A minor disruption in the supply of oil can cause major economic fallout...simply put, we really are too dependent on oil (not a new discovery, but it is worth repeating).

The only way to not be so dependent on oil (and therefore to not need to go to war over it) is too use less. There are lots of ways to use less oil...from alternative fuels, riding bikes, or simply planning your 'errands' better so that you use less gas...or maybe not just getting in the car to drive to Starbucks for a latte just for the hell of it.

People need to wake up and realize that the way we live in America is NOT SUSTAINABLE. It will change one day...whether by choice or necessity. We are not entitled to drive SUVs and sip lattes...unless you are willing to put up with the deaths of our best young people.

You know, I see bumper stickers from time to time that say 'War is not the answer.' The funny thing is that these stickers are often on SUVs...and for those people war is the answer...because it is necessary to sustain our gluttoness lifestyle...a lifestyle that is totally and completely and unfortunately dependent on the flow of oil from other nations to ours...and most of it comes from nations that don't like us.

I do think that the changes in Iraq are for the better...but we didn't go over there for that...and we didn't go over there for WMDs...we went over there for our 'interests'.......oil.
 
Mad Martigan said:
Are you aware of what actually qualifies as a WMD?
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Better than some. And I know exactly what Sarin and Mustard gas will do.
And I know they aren't a REAL threat to anyone beyond 30km...coz that's about as far as you can throw them. Even if they had completed the "Babylon Guns", what does 1000km really get them? Certainly not right up to our doorstep. Maybe they could've sent a few East to Iran. Really - when we started talking about WMD I really had hoped that what we found would live up to the hype.

And artillery is considered a tactical weapon.


My point is that it's a bit anti-climactic, don't you think? Everyone's jumping around like they've been vindicated and it's the second coming of Christ. More likely, those chemicals were either being saved for an invading force or being used against his own people....oh, like the Kurds, Shia, and any Sunnis who wouldn't join the Baath party.

Mad Martigan said:
Are you aware that Saddam was specifically precluded from possessing these chemical warheads by UN resolutions after gassing civilians and invading his neighbor, under penalty of asskicking?
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Indeed. However, sanctions aside, do you really believe this is what we've been looking for?

WMD may indeed still be out there. But this is like saying winning $20 justifies buying 1000 lottery tickets.
 
And artillery is considered a tactical weapon.
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I thought you said you knew what qualified.:confused:
Conventional international definitions unerringly include nuclear, biological and chemical weapons. Delivery is irrelevant.

Indeed. However, sanctions aside, do you really believe this is what we've been looking for?

WMD may indeed still be out there. But this is like saying winning $20 justifies buying 1000 lottery tickets.
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Which is why I wouldn't put it that way.
It is some small vindication and just accentuates a few points some people (for various reasons) don't want to accept. Did Saddam have WMDs? Yes. Is it just another example of his heap of resolution violations? Yes. Does it illustrate the fact that Blix and crew were as worthless as we thought? Yes.
 
For what it's worth, there have been several occassions where WMDs in the form of chemical and biological weapons have been found in Iraq since we went to war there, but each time it has been trace amounts and swiftly buried by the press.

On another note, Liberals cannot be pleased....

They cry foul against a Republican President because he WASN'T PROACTIVE ENOUGH and didn't take measures on 9/10/01 to prevent 9/11 (forgetting the fact it would have been nearly impossible);

They cry foul against a Republican President that is TOO PROACTIVE against a PROVEN WMD using dictator and cry "impeachment";

If we had waited and taken a reactive measure and America was attacked with WMDs, Liberals would have been the first and loudest to cry "impeachment."

They cry foul when there are no WMDs found;

They cry foul when WMDs are found;

That's one of the main reasons I cannot understand Liberals.
 
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