Kerry and Iraq

[Douglas]

yeah i thought it was allawi...

 

if it becomes a referendum on iraq' date=' i have lost my faith in the voting population. iraq is definately not the greatest of our worries.

 

the republicans need to face the facts: the economy blows and bush and co screwed us all

 

what about social security? what about social issues such as human rights? what about international affairs (aside iraq)?

 

seriously; the bush administration is attempting to play up iraq and terrorism when they arent the major issues[/quote']

Hey budullewraagh, you need to apply for a position on Kerry's staff, or perhaps PBS or CBS. You could be the top honcho, you've got the rhetoric down pat.

[Sayonara]

I'm not sure what most Americans think, but the 9/11 commission found that there were ties between Saddam and al-qaeda

What they may not have mentioned at the time was that those ties were of a "he didn't like them very much" nature.

[john5746]

I'm not sure what most Americans think, but the 9/11 commission found that there were ties between Saddam and al-qaeda, but no ties between Saddam and 9/11

 

I think most of the prominent members in Al-Queda are from Saudi Arabia and Egypt. Probably some "ties" in those countries. Probably some ties in Iran, they unlike Saddam are not a secular government.

 

The argument is would Saddam sell weapons to terrorists? Probably. Would he sell WMD's? That is a stretch, but possible.

[Pangloss]

What they may not have mentioned at the time was that those ties were of a "he didn't like them very much" nature.

 

Yah he allegedly had a falling out with AQ, but he still let terrorists stay, operate and train in his country.

[Sayonara]

Yah he allegedly had a falling out with AQ, but he still let terrorists stay, operate and train in his country.

If that's true, and we are going to remain democratic and civilised, surely we should approach allegations against Hussein in this matter in the same way you insist that we approach the allegations of lying made against Bush and Blair.

 

After all, for all we know AQ could have been allowed to stay in Iraq because they threatened to plough 747s into one of Hussein's palaces.

[Pangloss]

I'll assume you mean to suggest that they posed a threat to Hussein himself, since it stretches credibility to presume that a terrorist threat against Iraqi civilians would have carried any weight with a guy who had no compunction about killing them himself.

 

I don't have a problem with that suggestion in general, but I believe it is counter-indicated by the evidence, which speaks of high-level meetings and discussions. If it was just a case of terrorist demands, they would have simply said "do this or die" and he would have either complied, or not.

 

Still, it's a reasonable suggestion.

[Sayonara]

I'll assume you mean to suggest that they posed a threat to Hussein himself, since it stretches credibility to presume that a terrorist threat against Iraqi civilians would have carried any weight with a guy who had no compunction about killing them himself.

Yes, him personally - I don't think he allowed civilians to bunk down in his palaces.

 

 

I don't have a problem with that suggestion in general, but I believe it is counter-indicated by the evidence, which speaks of high-level meetings and discussions. If it was just a case of terrorist demands, they would have simply said "do this or die" and he would have either complied, or not.

Not necessarily. If Iraq had agreements with AQ in the past, which deteriorated to the point where AQ were asked to leave, there may well have been discussions that escalated towards open threats.

 

I don't suppose we're likely to find out.

[Douglas]

I think most of the prominent members in Al-Queda are from Saudi Arabia and Egypt. Probably some "ties" in those countries. Probably some ties in Iran' date=' they unlike Saddam are not a secular government.

 

The argument is would Saddam sell weapons to terrorists? Probably. Would he sell WMD's? That is a stretch, but possible.[/quote']

John, the definition of WMD,s is nuclear, chemical and biological weapons.

Since he used chemical weapons against the Kurds, I think he'd sell chemical and biological weapons to Al-Qaeda, but not nukes (if he had them)

[john5746]

I think Sayo brought up a very good point. We tend to think all these countries do things only thinking about America or Israel, when in fact, they are posturing to avoid conflicts with their brethren and terroists.

 

The mafia would have very formal meetings, etc but then go out and wipe the streets with one another. This is one reason why Saddam might not want people to know he actually didn't have any weapons of consequence. If he doesn't have power, he is dead.

[Phi for All]

John, the definition of WMD,s is nuclear, chemical and biological weapons.

Douglas, we have determined, in other threads, for the purposes of our own arguments, that the only WMDs are nuclear. Chemical and biological agents are used to disperse people. As long as you can leave an area affected by these weapons, they are rarely deadly.

 

Of course, you can use the gasses to make an entrenched enemy move, then gun them down, but the gasses themselves are not WMDs.

 

The other side of the "gassing the kurds" story

Chemical & biological weaponry

[Douglas]

Douglas' date=' we have determined, in other threads, [u']for the purposes of our own arguments[/u], that the only WMDs are nuclear. Chemical and biological agents are used to disperse people. As long as you can leave an area affected by these weapons, they are rarely deadly.

 

Of course, you can use the gasses to make an entrenched enemy move, then gun them down, but the gasses themselves are not WMDs.

Sorry Phi, chem and bio weapons can kill 10s to 100's of thousands people if spread properly.

WMD's are sometimes called ABC's

Atomic

Biological

Chemical

[Phi for All]

Sorry Phi' date=' chem and bio weapons can kill 10s to 100's of thousands people if spread properly.

WMD's are sometimes called ABC's

Atomic

Biological

Chemical[/quote']I'll try to reference some of the other threads where this has been discussed, but we have several reliable links, authorities and real life incidents that show the kind of numbers you're talking about are not realistic with anything but nukes.

 

I goofed when I linked you to YT2095's website. I thought it took you directly to the info I wanted you to read. You have to let the page load and then go to the bottom of the page to the "Terrorism" link to access the military expert's opinion on various so-called WMDs. Definitely worth reading.

[budullewraagh]

Sorry Phi, chem and bio weapons can kill 10s to 100's of thousands people if spread properly.

the term "chemical weapon" is a terrible term conceived by idiots who know little to nothing about chemistry. people go down the list: lewisite, xylyl bromide, novichok agents, vx, sarin, mustard gas, chlorine etc and call them all "chemical weapons". well, they are all chemicals and they can all be used as weapons. at the same time, they dont all have the same effects. an example would be chlorine. it smells bloody terrible. in fact, it smells so bad that if one were to be exposed to it, they would know to leave before concentrations got anywhere remotely close to lethal. chlorine is a respiratory irritant and attacks the mucus membrane in the esophagus and the lungs, causing people to drown in their own mucus and blood. of course, this is only if they have been exposed to lethal doses. usually, it just causes a little mucus to be coughed up. i have made chlorine gas before. i have breathed it in on accident. i coughed a few times and was fine about say 15 seconds later.as and i had a good deep breath of it too. lewisite and mustard gas are similar compounds.

 

xylyl bromide is annoying but just a tearing agent. you will cry and not really feel hurt.

 

now, if we start talking about sarin, vx and novichok agents, we are getting into organophosphates, which can be a number of different compounds that contain a phosphate group usually with fluorine attached. these are nerve agents and they are no good. depending on the concentration of people in an area and various other factors these can be dangerous. in tokyo, 400 people were killed in a subway by a sarin attack many years ago. this was a subway; underground, with many people. it only killed 400 of them which isn't as bad as many like to pretend sarin is.

 

as far as biological weapons go, they can be used in many ways, some more effective than others. it is all relative to many variables, so you can't just say that any attack will kill hundreds of thousands of people.

 

also, i'd like to add that in our major cities, take washington dc for example, trains go rumbling by with pressurized liquid boron trifluoride in them every day. all it takes is a coordinated terrorist or, hell, a stray bullet from a shooting (you know, the lack of a ban on automatic weapons makes it easier now) to release enough boron trifluoride to kill the entire city (or would it? maybe theyre just tyring to scare you again). also, these chemicals are stored just outside of huge cities, with almost no security (refer to 60 minutes).

[Pangloss]

That's fine if you (we) want to use that as an internal point for discussion. I think it's an open debate and some good points exist on both sides. Just bear in mind that there is a larger context for WMDs that happens to be different, so you're going to continue to run across articles and discussions that take a different point of view. (shrug)

 

I think the point here was just that budullewraagh was trying to explain why someone above responded in a certain way.

[Sayonara]

Just to reiterate, there are very few biological agents that can be used as WMDs, and they are difficult to implement in that fashion even under ideal conditions. The same is largely true of chemical weapons. It's also fairly obvious that very few actually cause what we would traditionally call "destruction".

 

These weapons are designed for Area Denial, not mass destruction.

[Phi for All]

That's fine if you (we) want to use that as an internal point for discussion. I think it's an open debate and some good points exist on both sides. Just bear in mind that there is a larger context for WMDs that happens to be different' date=' so you're going to continue to run across articles and discussions that take a different point of view. (shrug)

 

I think the point here was just that budullewraagh was trying to explain why someone above responded in a certain way.[/quote']Since you are usually more interested in getting at the truth than in political arguments, I am very surprised at your answer here, Pangloss. Like most Americans, I had the impression, before learning the truth from the science crowd here at SFN, that chemical & biological weapons were capable of many more deaths. I think most people picture tens of thousands of city dwellers dropping left and right when you say "nerve gas". It's an impression this administration has done little to correct and it is FALSE even in practically ideal situations.

[Pangloss]

Oh I think the point that chem/bio weapons are "area denial" weapons rather than "WMDs" is fascinating, and more power to you guys for debating and discussing it. There's no question that the misconceptions by the public in that area, even with regard to actual nukes, are tremendous, and much in need of discourse.

 

But it's a different subject. If we're going to talk about whether "Iraq had WMDs", then the discussion has to include chem/bio, because the context is an historical one -- we're trying to determine whether the decisions made were correct from a political perspective, not a scientific one. To go on to discuss whether they were scientifically correct is *also* very interesting and relevent, but it's a different subject.

 

Put another way, it's not Bush/Blair's fault that chem & bio weapons are considered WMDs. The obligations we have to hold them to should be pertinent to the socio/political understandings of that time frame.

 

Put yet another way, if 50,000 barrels of Sarin were found tomorrow in a warehouse outside Baghdad, the primary debate over whether the war was justified would be over. We could certainly go on to discuss other aspects of justification, but I think most observers would consider that a technical/scientific debate, and not of primary importance.

 

One should also probably keep in mind that the purpose of UN resolution 687, establishing the term "weapons of mass destruction" and including chemical and biological weapons, was not scientific, but sociological.

[Douglas]

Just to reiterate' date=' there are very few biological agents that can be used as WMDs, and they are difficult to implement in that fashion even under ideal conditions. The same is largely true of chemical weapons. It's also fairly obvious that very few actually cause what we would traditionally call "destruction".

 

These weapons are designed for Area Denial, not mass destruction.[/quote']

I have read that if Anthrax were spread with a modified "crop duster" it could kill millions.

- 100 kilograms of virulent anthrax

- effectively dispersed at night over Washington DC

- could cause between one and three million deaths.

http://www.hi.is/~joner/eaps/ds_biow.htm

 

Then there's "small pox" and probably other bacterial and viral infections that I don't know about.

[Phi for All]

Beware reading only one source, Douglas.

Anthrax truths

More on Anthrax

Conservative truth about Anthrax

 

Anthrax is usually more deadly to those who are attempting to prepare it than to anyone on which it is used. Hurray for our side!

[Douglas]

Beware reading only one source' date=' Douglas.

Anthrax truths

More on Anthrax

Conservative truth about Anthrax

 

Anthrax is usually more deadly to those who are attempting to prepare it than to anyone on which it is used. Hurray for our side!

Tell that to the dozen people that died of Anthrax by simply opening a letter with Anthrax dust. Think about what would have happened if this stuff was dropped from a plane by a terrorist who wanted to die, so he could get his hands on the 70 virgins.

 

Furthermore, WMD.s have already been defined....ABCs

[Sayonara]

Tell that to the dozen people that died of Anthrax by simply opening a letter with Anthrax dust. Think about what would have happened if this stuff was dropped from a plane by a terrorist who wanted to die, so he could get his hands on the 70 virgins.

What dozen people? Were they all opening the same letter, or are these actually practical examples of a Weapon of Virtually No Destruction being deployed?

 

Since you raised this with me originally I would point out that my post said "very few biological agents".

 

Anthrax dropped on a city from a plane would do **** all to the population. You'd have about 20 deaths, if any.

[Phi for All]

Tell that to the dozen people that died of Anthrax by simply opening a letter with Anthrax dust. Think about what would have happened if this stuff was dropped from a plane by a terrorist who wanted to die' date=' so he could get his hands on the 70 virgins.

 

Furthermore, WMD.s have already been defined....ABCs[/quote']You may be able to peddle that crap to the misinformed, the mislead, and the just plain mistaken, but this is the Science Forums. People here have looked beyond the BS, the terror and the mass hysteria.

 

Every report you've heard about anthrax killing thousands assumes impossible conditions, like absolutely no wind, complete and seamless distribution, no buildings, massive poor health and everyone standing naked outdoors breathing deeply for days with self-inflicted open wounds all over their bodies.

[LucidDreamer]

What about Ebola? Seems like you could create a means to infect several people of a large city or airport and watch it spread like a wild fire.

[Phi for All]

What about Ebola? Seems like you could create a means to infect several people of a large city or airport and watch it spread like a wild fire.

Again, from what I've read, it sounds so devastating to take some killer disease and release it on an unsuspecting population. But in reality, think of the logistics: everyone who works with the virus, purchasing it, transporting it, setting it up in some kind of delivery system, doing the actual delivery, are all exposed and at risk. With ebola, they wouldn't get very far along the process. Even if they are willing to die, it doesn't give them good odds of living long enough to accomplish their task.

 

Trillions of anthrax spores got loose in a Russian city of 1.2 million and killed just over 60 people. It's much more time and cost effective for terrorists to blow up a building to kill a hundred or more.

[Pangloss]

All true, but you know they'd love to do it anyway. Some of the more intelligent articles I've read call them "weapons of mass disruption" -- the sheer terror and panic they can obviously cause is tremendous.

 

Which puts governments and scientists in the position of having to focus attention on how to stop them, deserving or not.