Weapons of Mass Destruction?

[SpotDancer]

Since our whole premise of going to war with Iraq was to overthrow Saddam Hussein before he could either give his WMD away to other terrorists or use them himself - I have one simple question:

Since the US has dropped nearly every weapon in its arsenal on Iraq (except an atom bomb!) what do they call these weapons? Confetti?

Just a thought.

 

[Alistar7]

conventional.

 

[CaptnKirk]

So Iraq using nothing constitutes WMD.

 

[Alistar7]

Originally posted by: CaptnKirk
So Iraq using nothing constitutes WMD.

they used conventional weapons, and various terrorist tactics.

Good question about the WMD though, hopefully the ones Saddam admitted having but could never account for will be found. Educated guess, some were already handed off to another group or nation.

 

[MacBaine]

They will be found. I find it amusing to think that after everything Saddam did to avoid inspections, lying to the UN, etc... that he did it just 'because'.

 

[Ferocious]

Actually I read that the 'depleted uranium shells' used by the USA are considered WMD's under UN guidelines.

Though that story seems to have been squashed by the mainstream press.

Not sure if there is a story there or not.

 

[Phuz]

Originally posted by: Alistar7

Originally posted by: CaptnKirk
So Iraq using nothing constitutes WMD.

they used conventional weapons, and various terrorist tactics.

Awww, they used 'terrorist tactics'. You've been sold on another catch phrase. You're right.. they should have played nice.

Actually I read that the 'depleted uranium shells' used by the USA are considered WMD's under UN guidelines.

The whole idea of trying to differentiate and categorize weapons of war is ridiculous.
Conventional - Conforming to established practice or accepted standards; traditional.
WDM's are JUST that. Weapons of Mass destruction. Yet another STUPID catch phrase.
Explain to me how cluster bombing is conventional. THAT is mass destruction.
Explain to me how D.U. is conventional. (DUH)
Explain to me how Napalm is conventional.

Just because the technology behind it has been around for a long time doesn't make it any more 'acceptable' than anything else. We're desensitized.
The purpose behind a chemical agent and the purpose behind a cluster bomb is essentially the same. To kill as efficiently as possible. It doesn't matter if you're getting killed by a warhead with gas, or a rain storm of bullets.. you're still going to die a painful death.
If you take the definition literally; by the way things are going, in 30 years chemical weapons will be considered a conventional weapon, they'll be an established practice.

 

[steell]

Perhaps they should be called "Wide Area Weapons"? Conventional weapons are destructive in a limited area (maybe three hundred yard square), whereas WMD (Formerly known as NBC, Nuclear, Biological, Chemical) can be destructive over thousands of square miles (in the case of biological), hundreds of square miles (nuclear), or tens of square miles (chemical). Once WMD is released, Nature controls the spread (and thus damage), not man. And I believe that is the difference.

 

[Phuz]

Originally posted by: steell
Perhaps they should be called "Wide Area Weapons"? Conventional weapons are destructive in a limited area (maybe three hundred yard square), whereas WMD (Formerly known as NBC, Nuclear, Biological, Chemical) can be destructive over thousands of square miles (in the case of biological), hundreds of square miles (nuclear), or tens of square miles (chemical). Once WMD is released, Nature controls the spread (and thus damage), not man. And I believe that is the difference.

Good point(s).

 

[charrison]

Originally posted by: Ferocious
Actually I read that the 'depleted uranium shells' used by the USA are considered WMD's under UN guidelines.

Though that story seems to have been squashed by the mainstream press.

Not sure if there is a story there or not.

They are not. Many in the UN do not like them, but they are by no standards considered WMD.

 

[Phuz]

Charrison - explain what makes D.U. conventional.

 

[charrison]

Originally posted by: Phuz
Charrison - explain what makes D.U. conventional.

It is conventional because operates pretty much like every other bullet.

 

[Phuz]

Originally posted by: charrison

Originally posted by: Phuz
Charrison - explain what makes D.U. conventional.

It is conventional because operates pretty much like every other bullet.

Thats irrelevant. A missile with a chemical warhead operates pretty much like every other missile; the end-effect sure as hell isn't the same.

 

[BaliBabyDoc]

Gatherings like the Chemical Weapons Convention take place b/c almost ANYONE could potentially make chem/bio weapons and use them. Once released these weapons DO NOT discriminate between combatant and non-combatant. The only way to control them is to agree NOT to produce them.

Of course, misdirected cruise missiles and JDAM pose a great threat to civilians as well. Furthermore, all nations with nukes should be ostracized b/c they are the ultimate WMD . . . and NO nation can be trusted with them.

 

[konichiwa]

What makes DU bullets any different from, say, mortar rounds or hand grenades filled with chemical agents?

 

[apoppin]

Originally posted by: MacBaine
They will be found. I find it amusing to think that after everything Saddam did to avoid inspections, lying to the UN, etc... that he did it just 'because'.

You are absolutely right, they WILL be found by US troops even if they have to be planted there. :Q

 

[CaptnKirk]

Colin Powell went to the UN and the World and said 'We've got pictures - We've got Documents'

The pictures he showed were of something else - the Inspectors had been there many times,
and the Doucments were fradulent - crude forgeries - why would they be believed ?

The 'missing' WMD ? How about the vast quantities of materials that were destroyed at the end of Gulf I
by General Johnathan Winters? (O.K. - Swatrzkoff just LOOKS like Winters) Destroyed Weapons

 

[apoppin]

Report: Iraqi discloses WMD details (Today, Mon 21/04/03)

N.Y. Times says U.S. getting information on banned weaponry

NEW YORK, April 21 ? An Iraqi scientist who claims to have worked in Saddam Hussein?s chemical weapons program told a U.S. military team that Iraq destroyed and buried chemical weapons and biological warfare equipment only days before the war began March 20, a newspaper reported Monday.

MEMBERS OF MET Alpha ? the Mobile Exploitation Team set up to hunt for illegal weapons of mass destruction ? said the scientist led Americans to material that proved to be the building blocks of illegal weapons, according to The New York Times.
The Iraqi scientist, who was not named for fear he might be harmed, also said Iraq has secretly sent stockpiles of deadly agents and weapons technology to Syria in the mid-1990s, and more recently was cooperating with Osama bin Laden?s al-Qaida terror network.
The U.S. Central Command could not confirm The New York Times report, and the White House had no immediate comment on it.
The report was withheld by military censors for three days, and some details about the chemicals were not allowed to be published. The reporter was not allowed to interview the Iraqi scientist.

BURYING THE EVIDENCE
The Bush administration says that U.S. forces went into Iraq and toppled Saddam?s regime to rid the world of the threat of weapons of mass destruction.
Military officials said the scientist told them that several months before the war, he watched as Iraqi officials buried chemical precursors for weapons and other sensitive material to conceal and protect them for future use. Four days before President Bush gave Saddam an ultimatum in March, the scientist said Iraqi officials set fire to a warehouse where biological weapons research was conducted.
The scientist reportedly gave a note to the Army?s 101st Airborne Division. That was passed on to the MET Alpha team, which tracked the scientist down at his home.
?What they have discovered could prove to be of incalculable value,? the paper quoted Maj. Gen. David Petraeus, commander of the Army?s 101st Airborne Division, as saying.
?Though much work must still be done to validate the information MET Alpha has uncovered, if it proves out it will clearly be one of the major discoveries of this operation, and it may be the major discovery,? he added.

INTERESTING

 

[Alistar7]

there is a thread about that find... "Illicit Arms Kept Till Eve of War, an Iraqi Scientist Is Said to Assert"

also he discussed how the regime courted Al-Queeda...

 

[apoppin]

Originally posted by: Alistar7
there is a thread about that find... "Illicit Arms Kept Till Eve of War, an Iraqi Scientist Is Said to Assert"

also he discussed how the regime courted Al-Queeda...

I see it now as it has just been bumped to the top . . . however, my link ALSO seems to fit very well here as it purports to answer the topic's question.

 

[HeroOfPellinor]

Originally posted by: konichiwa
What makes DU bullets any different from, say, mortar rounds or hand grenades filled with chemical agents?

You seem to think each of these bullets turns into a mini-mushroom cloud on whatever they hit. People hit by DU bullets don't die from radiation poisoning like people around a chembio weapon die from chembio agents. Your fat a$$ has been eradiated more by your 19" monitor than you would be by taking a DU bullet.

"With respect to reactions with the soil, in time depleted uranium will likely leach into the soil and become mixed with it. It will for all practical purposes be chemically indistinguishable from the natural uranium that is already present in the soil all over the earth. One could create all kinds of scenarios, but probably the best way to think about DU in the soil is to compare it with lead. Because lead and uranium are so similar from a toxicological standpoint, the concerns are about the same."

I'm surprised you tin foil hat wearing freaks even leave your dingy studio apartments for fear of depleted uranium hail. Or is equating DU bullets to chembio weapons more liberal logic?

 

[CaptnKirk]

Educate yourself about DU before you claim it's harmless

Would you like to wash that food down with a cup of Agent Orange ?

 

[Alistar7]

What about DU, I worked around a 400 lb ball of it for over a year, with a film badge for monitoring, my exposure to radiation from that was about half a chest x-ray, or double the amount your own body radiates itself annualy. The ball of DU was used to SHIELD the radioactive source for my protection BTW, DU by itself does not even register as radioactive at a distance of a few feet.

How much dioxin is absorbed/ingested during a normal direct dusting of agent orange? If it is less than the amount found in a typical sampling of Ben & Jerry's I would still rather eat the ice cream. What is the yearly allowable limit for dioxin consumption from all sources, including natural?

 

[CaptnKirk]

There's a big difference between working around (a 400 Lb. ball) DU material in the lab environment and being exposed to the dust and debris -
Uranium Oxide left from using the weapon variety. Hell I've hanlded it in applications of counterweights and control surface balance weights for aircraft.
It comes with a warning " Do not grind or sand, dust and oxides are hazardous to your health "

Whats left over after combat is not the same as an 'Inert' DU material just sitting there, the
combustible oxides and dust have a hazardous life expectancy of 24,000 years.
Let's not get into the games about "Half-Life" radioactivity decay, nobody lives long enough to measure
the accumulative effects that will be seen at the 6,000 year milestone anyway.

90% of the Gulf War Syndrome has been associated with the use of DU during Gulf-1, do you think those Vets lie for fun ?

We don't even know about all the effects 35 years later about the 'Agent Orange' (or Agent Blue, Purple, Yellow - there were others)
But we do know that Dioxins are dangerous - look at all the high cost cleanups spent on Dioxin contaminations in the US from the
50's through the 70's before we knew the consequences like at Times Beach, Missouri
Here, have some more Dioxin

We put a hell of a lot more down in 'Nam then there. (Now they're saying that there was actually 4 times as much used in 'Nam as
was actrually reported - and the people living there get to eat and drink it from their environment every day.
Agent Orange, and other yummy things
(I always did wonder why I saw all those kids with extra fingers and toes, as well as missing parts that weren't from wounds)

 

[apoppin]

Originally posted by: CaptnKirk
There's a big difference between working around (a 400 Lb. ball) DU material in the lab environment and being exposed to the dust and debris -
Uranium Oxide left from using the weapon variety. Hell I've hanlded it in applications of counterweights and control surface balance weights for aircraft.
It comes with a warning " Do not grind or sand, dust and oxides are hazardous to your health "

Whats left over after combat is not the same as an 'Inert' DU material just sitting there, the
combustible oxides and dust have a hazardous life expectancy of 24,000 years.
Let's not get into the games about "Half-Life" radioactivity decay, nobody lives long enough to measure
the accumulative effects that will be seen at the 6,000 year milestone anyway.

90% of the Gulf War Syndrome has been associated with the use of DU during Gulf-1, do you think those Vets lie for fun ?

We don't even know about all the effects 35 years later about the 'Agent Orange' (or Agent Blue, Purple, Yellow - there were others)
But we do know that Dioxins are dangerous - look at all the high cost cleanups spent on Dioxin contaminations in the US from the
50's through the 70's before we knew the consequences like at Times Beach, Missouri
Here, have some more Dioxin

We put a hell of a lot more down in 'Nam then there. (Now they're saying that there was actually 4 times as much used in 'Nam as
was actrually reported - and the people living there get to eat and drink it from their environment every day.
Agent Orange, and other yummy things
(I always did wonder why I saw all those kids with extra fingers and toes, as well as missing parts that weren't from wounds)

No doubt the American taxpayer will get to foot the bill for the cleanup.