Syrian Civil War

[Army Guy]

Gas Shells from WWI are commonly found in Europe and still very deadly to anyone exposed. Chemical agents designed today are meant to have a very long shelf life if stored and maintained properly. long enough to say anything buried in the desert would be deadly even after 25 years.

[DogOnPorch]

Its not laughable. Its possible that Saddam could have moved some chemical precursors to Syria. The problem is as I said before, thats not the part anyone scoffed at. Saddam was accused of having active industrial scale production, and large stockpiles of munitions.

Your post-hoc revisionism rewrites those old arguments to be just about precursors, but that wasnt the case.

Uh no...it was weeks before the actual invasion of Iraq. Myself and others pointed out the increased truck traffic between Iraq and Syria as picked-up by Defense Dept spy sats. That was Saddam's chemical weapons finding a new home.

[DogOnPorch]

Gas Shells from WWI are commonly found in Europe and still very deadly to anyone exposed. Chemical agents designed today are meant to have a very long shelf life if stored and maintained properly. long enough to say anything buried in the desert would be deadly even after 25 years.

VX lasts as long as an oil stain. Like...years...in the open. Mustard indeed can remain dangerous. It's sarin that has limited life once mixed. This is due to its extreme volatility.

[dre]

Uh no...it was weeks before the actual invasion of Iraq. Myself and others pointed out the increased truck traffic between Iraq and Syria as picked-up by Defense Dept spy sats. That was Saddam's chemical weapons finding a new home.

Yup, and that didnt pan out for you. THe facitilities where these supposed weapons might have been made were never found because they simply didnt exist. Its possible that Saddam might have had a very small cache of munitions left over frome before 1992, but that was not what he was accused of, and it was not what was used at the justification for war.

[Rue]

Yup, and that didnt pan out for you. THe facitilities where these supposed weapons might have been made were never found because they simply didnt exist. Its possible that Saddam might have had a very small cache of munitions left over frome before 1992, but that was not what he was accused of, and it was not what was used at the justification for war.

Tons of Chemical weapons were found and destroyed in Iraq. I am not sure what revisionist planet you live on but its getting tiresome listening to you bluffing and posing make believe allegations as facts.

[Rue]

Believe me, I would have no problem with agreeing with you wholeheartedly if I were as convinced as you seem to be that Assad indeed has been using chemical weapons against his own people.

What an absurd pretext for defending Assad's use of chemical warfare.

Using your logic we should not charge, conict and imprison murderers since there are so many out there.

Brilliant logic.

[DogOnPorch]

Tons of Chemical weapons were found and destroyed in Iraq. I am not sure what revisionist planet you live on but its getting tiresome listening to you bluffing and posing make believe allegations as facts.

If I claimed the sky was blue, dre would disagree.

[Rue]

Believe me, I would have no problem with agreeing with you wholeheartedly if I were as convinced as you seem to be that Assad indeed has been using chemical weapons against his own people.

Wait did you not just assert that since the world is filled up with bad guys and more bad guys what difference should it make?

First you use an absurd that the world is full of bad people as a pretext to avoid holding hold Assad responsible for his actions of using gas, now you claim you need prove he used gas? Hah.

Give me a break. You need convincing. Well the people who choked to death and their families don't.

The refugees who escaped to Lebanon,Turkey and Jordan fleeing these attacks don't.

Israel has reported the use of has by the Syrian regime for over a year. So has Turkey, France, Britain, the UN. Wait I know all are liars.

The eye witnesses-liars.

The UN inspectors who found chemical residue in the soil and in the blood of civilians-liars.

You need convincing.

Yah right.

http://www.lemonde.fr/proche-orient/article/2013/05/27/chemical-war-in-syria_3417708_3218.html

http://www.dw.de/syrian-activists-say-chemical-weapons-were-used-near-damascus/a-17035968

http://www.news.com.au/world-news/hard-evidence-syria-used-chemical-weapons-druing-civil-war-diplomats-claim/story-fndir2ev-1226619050866

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/middleeast/2013/06/20136483110675340.html

http://ca.search.yahoo.com/r/_ylt=A0geu8BvZDdSH3MANRPrFAx.;_ylu=X3oDMTB0Ymg0N2lpBHNlYwNzcgRwb3MDMTE3BGNvbG8DYWMyBHZ0aWQD/SIG=13qgfkbir/EXP=1379390703/**http%3a//www.ctvnews.ca/world/un-envoy-evidence-suggests-some-chemical-substance-used-in-syria-1.1429779

http://ca.search.yahoo.com/r/_ylt=A0geu8IZYzdSbUIAgoDrFAx.;_ylu=X3oDMTBzMmc1bTJhBHNlYwNzcgRwb3MDMzUEY29sbwNhYzIEdnRpZAM-/SIG=12sjs3evs/EXP=1379390361/**http%3a//edition.cnn.com/2013/06/04/world/meast/syria-civil-war/index.html

http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/federal-election-2013/overwhelming-evidence-of-chemical-attack-in-syria-pm-20130827-2sodr.html?skin=text-only

http://www.theatlanticwire.com/global/2013/08/visual-evidence-syrias-poison-gas-attack-overwhelming-and-disturbing/68586/

http://tv360nigeria.com/uk-has-new-chemical-evidence-on-syria-cameron/

[Black Dog]

Tons of Chemical weapons were found and destroyed in Iraq. I am not sure what revisionist planet you live on but its getting tiresome listening to you bluffing and posing make believe allegations as facts.

Chemical weapons that dated from before the first Gulf War. dre is correct in stating there is no evidence Iraq had an active chemical/biological program at the time of the invasion, as was alleged.

[GostHacked]

What an absurd pretext for defending Assad's use of chemical warfare.

You are assuming it was Assad who did it. What if it was the rebels?

[sharkman]

You are assuming that he didn't have a hand in any of the several incidents?

[bud]

You are assuming it was Assad who did it. What if it was the rebels?

it could very well be both.

at least the u.s. has suddenly turned around from supporting a dictator who used chemical weapons over 20 years ago to being so outraged with a dictator for possibly using chemical weapons. but then again, this outrage is accompanied by a strange silence towards the evidence that the guys they're supporting against the dictator have used chemical weapons in this war.

[Army Guy]

Chemical weapons that dated from before the first Gulf War. dre is correct in stating there is no evidence Iraq had an active chemical/biological program at the time of the invasion, as was alleged.

That is not what the ISG final report prior to the 2 and invasion has quoted. And that one of the reasons The US proceeded with the 2 and invasion was.

The U.S. government refused to accept the validity of UNMOVIC's conclusions and continued to assert that Iraq had failed to account for 1.5 tons of VX, 1,000 tons of mustard gas, and 550 munitions containing mustard gas during the UNMOVIC inspections, violating UN Security Council Resolution 1441.

• Saddam never abandoned his intentions to resume a CW effort when sanctions were lifted and conditions were judged favorable

• Iraq's CW program was crippled by the Gulf War and the legitimate chemical industry, which suffered under sanctions, only began to recover in the mid-1990s. Subsequent changes in the management of key military and civilian organizations, followed by an influx of funding and resources, provided Iraq with the ability to reinvigorate its industrial base.

• The way Iraq organized its chemical industry after the mid-1990s allowed it to conserve the knowledge-base needed to restart a CW program, conduct a modest amount of dual-use research, and partially recover from the decline of its production capability caused by the effects of the Gulf War and UN-sponsored destruction and sanctions.

• Iraq constructed a number of new plants starting in the mid-1990s that enhanced its chemical infrastructure, although its overall industry had not fully recovered from the effects of sanctions, and had not regained pre-1991 technical sophistication or production capabilities prior to Operation Iraqi Freedom (OIF).

http://www.nti.org/country-profiles/iraq/chemical/

Note it does not say Iraq was not producing Chemical wpns, just that they had not regained pre 1991 technical sophistication or production capabilities.

They also raise the fact that there is a large descrepancy between what the Iraqis report they manufactured and what was destroyed by Iraqis or outside inspection teams.

Following its defeat by United States and allied forces in 1991, Iraq declared to UN inspectors that between 1982 and 1990 it produced 3,859 tons of CW agents and more than 125,000 filled and unfilled special munitions, most of which was stored at the Muthana State Establishment, Iraq's primary CW production, filling, and testing facility. This declaration served as the basis for UNSCOM's subsequent efforts to verify the destruction of all Iraqi CW.

Taking into account items unilaterally destroyed by Iraq prior to the beginning of inspections, UNSCOM was able to account for the destruction of 88,000 filled and unfilled chemical munitions, over 690 metric tons of weaponized and bulk CW agents, approximately 4,000 metric tons of precursor chemicals, 980 pieces of key production equipment and 300 pieces of analytical instruments

Such as 3169 tons of Chemical agent, and 37,000 filled and unfilled special munitions.

I will also note that this report In January 2004 David Kay resigned as head of the ISG and began to criticise the underlying premises of the groups work. On the basis of his work with the ISG Kay rejected suggestions that there had been any significant Iraqi WMD activities since the end of the first Gulf War. Dr. Kay was replaced as head of the ISG by former UNSCOM member Charles A. Duelfer.

But even Kay had not come out and said Iraq was not producing Chemical wpns just that there had not been any significant activities

[Army Guy]

You are assuming it was Assad who did it. What if it was the rebels?

Then they should face the same consquences, sooner or later the west is going to have to deal with the problem that a large portion of the Rebels is made up of spliter groups of known terrorist organizations that we have spent over 14 years trying to destroy.

[GostHacked]

Then they should face the same consquences, sooner or later the west is going to have to deal with the problem that a large portion of the Rebels is made up of spliter groups of known terrorist organizations that we have spent over 14 years trying to destroy.

How would you go administering justice to those rebel terror groups? CIA just send them some equipment.

[Rue]

Once the precursors are mixed it has a limited shelf-life. Sarin, that is. VX has no such limits.

Exactly. Its not mixed. That is why its stored separately. If its mixed it becomes limited in shelf life not to mention unstable.

More to the point on this debate, the projection, angles and impact of the release of chemicals could only have been from missiles.

The rebels do not have the equipment to shoot missiles required for such a release of chemicals.

There are reports the rebels may have used chemicals. Probably. They may have picked up unexploded shells, white phosphorous arsenal on a very small scale, or come up with their own inventions, but this is no secret. The intelligence community particularly Israel has been monitoring the war from the ground and satellite technology is as accurate as it gets.

The UN has produced a report everyone already knew in the intelligence community, that there was chemicals in the blood of the victims and the soil was saturated.

Its interesting we went from Syria denying it had any chemical weapons to now agreeing to disarm them. When Israel said it had chemical weapons Israel was called a liar.

Israel reported for the last two years limited use of chemicals against Syrian citizens by Assad and the world ignored them and the UN before its latest release about the August 21 event, has now admitted it has proof Syria has used chemical weapons on a limited basis anywhere from 11 to 25 times before this latest event killed at last count 1,400 but is growing as we speak.

Assad has done exactly what Hussein did. He started off with small attacks and then each time made them a bit bigger testing the envelope and meeting silence except from Israel and Syrians fleeing to Lebanon, Turkey and Jordan.

Turkish medical teams then in the heat of the conflict between Turkey and Israel began reporting chemical poisoning symptoms in

refugees from Syria confirming Israeli intelligence. Then French and German intelligence confirmed use of chemicals through sources who bought the chemicals from both countries and sold it to the Syrian government. The British then also reported it from their sources.

The Americans at first denied chemical use. They downplayed it despite the British, French, Turks and Israelis telling them it was escalating in use. Then the US could no longer ignore its own naval and army intelligence.

Its all there. This is no state secret. You can not hide chemical use. The videos can not be faked. People who choke in their vomit and foam at the mouth are not trained actors. This is not the PLO making fake videos and having people pose dead then frames later get up and stand to the side while another film is made getting caught.

NGO's and neutral physicians have been reporting poisoned citizens for 2 years.

This pretending there were no chemicals to oh well it wasn't Assad its the rebels is a crock of shit.

It doesn't matter who is using them.

If the weapons can be removed from Syria yes it will help the region and anyone who thinks the rebels do not get the chemicals by stealing them from the Syrians is a fool. You need a missile projection system. The missiles are full of little balls that must be dispersed over a wide parameter as the missile comes down.

Rebel weapons consist of hand held rockets that can not be used to disperse the chemical heads required.

I could see rebels making a Molotov cocktail bomb like weapon but more than that I would like to see the fools claiming they are using chemical weapons explain how they have the missiles required for such an endeavour.

The missiles by the way come from Russia which sells.4.5 billion in military weapons to Syria every year. In fact Syria, Hezbollah and Iran get their weapons from 3 sources-Russia, North Korea and China. They may get other arms on the blackmarket but blackmarket weapons are usually suspect and defective otherwise they would not be on the blackmarket being sold.

Often intelligence agencies deliberately leak defective weapons on the blackmarket to their foes knowing they will be more of a danger to the idiots buying then anyone else and they can make money that way as well.

Some of the resident experts on this forum who want to apologize for Assad and make excuses for this sociopath need only

track where he buys his weapons from.

As for the revisionists like Dre and Bud, its laughable how we now hear from them there was no proof Iraq used chemical weapons let alone denial that tons of the chemical weapons had to be dealt with after Iraq collapsed.

In fact it is a huge environmental problem to Iraq now.

[jbg]

Its not laughable. Its possible that Saddam could have moved some chemical precursors to Syria. The problem is as I said before, thats not the part anyone scoffed at. Saddam was accused of having active industrial scale production, and large stockpiles of munitions.

Your post-hoc revisionism rewrites those old arguments to be just about precursors, but that wasnt the case.

Saddam huffed and puffed that he had all of the above. Too bad for him we believed what he had to say.

Maybe he was lying, maybe he wasn't. Either way why do we have to put up with that guff?

[eyeball]

It's not like anyone forced you to listen to it, but you chose to anyway.

[jbg]

It's not like anyone forced you to listen to it, but you chose to anyway.

Given the threatening nature of his communications they bore listening to. And if they were false and brought about his destruction so be it.

[bud]

totally jbg. it was saddam's fault that the u.s. lied about the evidence and went to war. i, as an idiot, couldn't agree more.

[dre]

^{Given the threatening nature of his communications they bore listening to. And if they were false and brought about his destruction so be it.}

^{They also brought about the deaths of thousands of Americans, and the debilitating injuries (lost limbs etc) of dozens of thousands more, and wasted trillions of dollars of US taxpayers money.}

^{But hey! So be it!}

Edited September 19, 2013 by dre

[dre]

As for the revisionists like Dre and Bud, its laughable how we now hear from them there was no proof Iraq used chemical weapons let alone denial that tons of the chemical weapons had to be dealt with after Iraq collapsed.

You just make this stuff up eh? Of course you can provide a link to me denying Iraq used chemical weapons? (like the links you provided when accusing me of denying Israels right to exist) LOL.

In fact it is a huge environmental problem to Iraq now.

Cite...

[Shady]

totally jbg. it was saddam's fault that the u.s. lied about the evidence and went to war. i, as an idiot, couldn't agree more.

Nope, it's Saddam's fault that he forbid weapons inspections for 4 years, and then bluffed that he had WMDs. It's also his fault for violating the ceasefire agreement, and turning the oil for food program into the oil for palaces for Saddam program.

[bleeding heart]

Nope, it's Saddam's fault that he forbid weapons inspections for 4 years, and then bluffed that he had WMDs. It's also his fault for violating the ceasefire agreement, and turning the oil for food program into the oil for palaces for Saddam program.

And that weapons inspectors were pointing out that there were no crucial issues on that front doesn't matter...because Cheney and Wolfowitz knew better.

That the British dossier exposed that there was a push to "sex up" the threat isn't relevant....because Saddam could strike the mainland UK in (wait for it!) "45 minutes."

Man, even after ten years, the monumental losers of the WMD "debates" remain as stubborn as ever.....

In other news, 9/11 was an inside job, and the earth is a few thousand years old.

Edited September 19, 2013 by bleeding heart

[dre]

Man, even after ten years, the monumental losers of the WMD "debates" remain as stubborn as ever.....

In other news, 9/11 was an inside job, and the earth is a few thousand years old.

Yup amazing revisionism.

14 155 mm shells filled with mustard gas

A few 122 mm chemical warheads

224.6 kg of expired growth media

Thats what was found....

I went to Iraq, spent 2-3 trillion dollars, and got hundreds of thousands of people killed (including more Americans than died on 911) looking for a vast active wmd manufacturing, huge stockpiles of chemical weapons, and a clandestine nuclear program....

And all I got was this crappy T-Shirt with "Mission Accomplished" on the front of it.