“WMDs at last?” asks warbot site The Command Post hopefully. Fox News (surprise! I bet you didn’t see that one coming….) is reporting that one entire shell might have had……sarin gas in it! WOO Hoo! See, America was imminently threatened, you anti-war doubters!!
Oh, the shell was rigged as an IED (aka roadside bomb) and exploded releasing “a small amount of agent” according to General “Change the Channel” Kimmitt. No mass destruction occurred, for which we can all be grateful, and apparently the danger of the “agent” floating from Iraq to the US is minimal.
Before all you warfloggers out there get all excited about this “WMD” it might be helpful to know what WMD is:
Chemical weapons, which are not WMD, are blistering, choking, or toxic agents. Mustard gas possessed by Iraq, Libya, Syria, Egypt and other nations is World War I technology. Horrible as they are, these are strictly battlefield weapons, requiring large, clumsy holding tanks, and depend on favourable winds. Winston Churchill authorized using poison gas against “primitive tribesmen” – Kurds in Iraq and Afghans – when he was British home secretary. Benito Mussolini’s Italy used mustard gas in Ethiopia and Libya.
Choking gas, like chlorine, is also a tactical battlefield agent. French troops without gas masks defending a 4-km front at Verdun in 1916 were hit by 60,000 chlorine gas shells, yet held their lines. So did Canadian troops in Flanders, also without masks, who heroically fought off superior German forces.
World War II vintage
Nerve gases, like Sarin and VX, are World War II vintage. Though deadly, they, too, are tactical agents designed for area denial and neutralizing high value targets. Using nerve gas requires specialized vehicles or aircraft with highly complex dispensing systems. Gas is dependent on temperature, humidity and wind. The Soviets tried various nerve agents in Afghanistan, but found them ineffective and dangerous to their own troops.
Nerve agents would be extremely lethal if released by terrorists in a large building, mall or airport but, again, they are weapons of localized destruction, not mass destruction. In 1995, a Japanese cult released nerve gas in Tokyo’s subway, killing 12 people.
Nerve gas was not used during WW II because of its unreliability and lack of wide area lethality. Many gases are unstable and have limited shelf lives. Iraq and Iran used poison gas during the 1980-88 Gulf War – killing or maiming many soldiers but achieving no strategic breakthroughs.
So, who in the region of the Middle East actually possesses real Weapons of Mass Destruction? Ask Mordechai Vanunu.
UPDATE BBC: However, a senior coalition source has told the BBC the round does not signal the discovery of weapons of mass destruction or the escalation of insurgent activity.
He said the round dated back to the Iran-Iraq war and coalition officials were not sure whether the fighters even knew what it contained.
UPDATE: Rumsfeld ruins millions of wargasms in progress.