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| quote: | Originally posted by tranced_out
do u know what bugs me...
1. Where are all the Weapons of Mass Destructions which Bush promised us. Come on Mr. Bush live up to ur part of the deal. U show us some WMD's and we show u the support. 
2. Today 4 U.S. soldiers were captured by the Iraqi military, and as soon as that happened Mr. Rumsfeld came on CNN and said that it was against some Ganeva convention to show POW's on T.V. My questions to Mr. Rumsfeld is don't these same conventions apply to the Iraqi POW's which were captured earlier. Or the Afghani POW's which were captured in the previous wars.
It seems like that the American Gov't is making up rules and conventions as they see fit.   |
I only half trust this because it's from Fox News, but hopefully it will be corroborated by some more reputable media outlet...
It would make me sick too, if he risked all of those lives and there were no banned weapons found.
'Huge' Chemical Weapons Plant Found in Iraq
Sunday, March 23, 2003
A senior pentagon official has confirmed to Fox News on Sunday that coalition forces have
discovered a "huge" chemical weapons factory near the Iraqi city of An Najaf, which is situated
some 225 miles south of Baghdad.
Coalition troops are also said to be holding the general in charge of the facility.
A senior American military officer had said on Saturday U.S. special operations troops combing
Iraq for Scud missiles and chemical or biological weapons had found none so far.
Maj. Gen. Stanley McChrystal, the vice director of operations for the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told a
Pentagon news conference that the Iraqis had not fired any Scuds and that U.S. forces searching
airfields in the far western desert of Iraq had uncovered no missiles or launchers.
Iraq denies having any Scuds, which have sufficient range to reach Israel, but Gen. Tommy
Franks, who is running the war, said Saturday that Iraq has yet to account for about two dozen
Scuds that United Nations inspectors have said were left over from the 1991 Gulf War.
Iraq also denies it holds any chemical or biological weapons. McChrystal said the United States
will either bomb any such weapons it should find or seize them with ground forces, whichever is
safer. He and other officials refused to say where in Iraq those searches are happening.
Also Saturday, the U.S. military abandoned plans to open a northern front against Iraq that would
have sent heavy armored forces streaming across the Turkish border.
Two U.S. defense officials said dozens of U.S. ships carrying weaponry for the Army's 4th Infantry
Division will head to the Persian Gulf after weeks of waiting off Turkey's coast while the two
countries tried to reach a deal.
McChrystal said that even without the 4th Infantry, "there will be a northern option." He would
not say what that might be. Other officials said Army airborne troops might join small numbers of
U.S. special operations forces already on the ground in northern Iraq, where American officials
fear clashes between Turkish forces and Iraqi Kurds.
Although U.S. officials on Friday said all 8,000 soldiers in Iraq's 51st Mechanized Division in
southern Iraq has surrendered, McChrystal said Saturday that only the unit's commanders gave
themselves up. The rest simply left the battlefield or were "melting away," he said.
McChrystal said the number of Iraqi prisoners of war was between 1,000 and 2,000.
In describing overall progress in the war, McChrystal said American and British forces have hit Iraq
with 500 cruise missiles -- 400 launched from ships and submarines and 100 launched from Air
Force bombers -- and several hundred precision-guided bombs over the past day. The use of
air-launched cruise missiles in Friday's attacks was the first since the war began.
Warplanes flew 1,000 missions from aircraft carriers and air bases in the region, he said.
Iraqi soldiers, "including some leadership," are surrendering and defecting in large numbers,
Pentagon spokeswoman Torie Clarke said.
"It is only a matter of time before the Iraqi regime is destroyed and its threat to the region ... is
ended," she said.
Northern Iraq is an important battleground because of the Kurdish presence in enclaves not
controlled by the Iraqi government. Turkey fears the Kurds will seize the northern oil fields or
establish an independent state, thus complicating Turkey's conflict with its own Kurdish minority.
The Pentagon wanted to put a heavy armored force into northern Iraq and had designated the 4th
Infantry for that mission. The only feasible avenue for them to reach northern Iraq was from
bases in Turkey, an option foreclosed by the Turkish government.
With U.S. ground forces advancing toward Baghdad, Pentagon officials expressed concerns the
troops might come across Republican Guard troops armed with chemical weapons.
"We would be hopeful that those with their triggers on these weapons understand what Secretary
Don Rumsfeld said in his comments yesterday: ‘Don't use it. Don't use it,"' Franks, the top U.S.
war commander, said Saturday at a news conference at his Persian Gulf command post.
The administration had once believed it could count on NATO ally Turkey to support the creation
of a northern front against Iraq. But after weeks of wrangling over financial compensation and
arrangements for Turkish forces to join the Americans in northern Iraq, the Pentagon has given
up.
The Turkish military on Saturday denied reports that 1,000 of its commandos had crossed into
northern Iraq. On Friday a military official had said soldiers in armored personnel carriers rolled
into northeastern Iraq near where the borders of Turkey, Iraq and Iran converge.
But on Saturday that was denied, and Pentagon officials said they saw no sign of a Turkish
incursion.
About 40 ships carrying the 4th Infantry Division's weaponry and equipment were to begin moving
through the Suez Canal on Sunday, said one U.S. official, speaking on condition of anonymity.
The 4th Infantry's soldiers, who remained at Fort Hood, Texas, after their weaponry and
equipment went to the Mediterranean last month, are likely to go to Kuwait, the officials said.
The redirected cargo ships are to begin arriving off the coast of Kuwait about March 30, one
official said. All the ships would arrive by about April 10.
From Kuwait they could move into Iraq to serve as reinforcements if the ground war lasts more
than several weeks, or as occupation forces after the Iraqi government's collapse.
Fox News' Bret Baier and Ian McCaleb contributed to this report.
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