washingtonpost.com
Suspected Chemical Weapons Plant Uncovered in Mosul
Military Believes Insurgents Intended to Use Dangerous Agents Against U.S.,
Iraqi Forces
By Ellen Knickmeyer
Washington Post Foreign Service
Saturday, August 13, 2005; 2:09 PM
BAGHDAD, Aug. 13 -- U.S. troops raiding a warehouse in the northern city of
Mosul uncovered a suspected chemical-weapons factory containing 1,500
gallons of chemicals believed destined for attacks on U.S. and Iraqi forces
and civilians, military officials said Saturday.
Monday's early morning raid found 11 precursor agents, "some of them quite
dangerous by themselves," a military spokesman, Lt. Col. Steven A. Boylan,
said in Baghdad.
Combined, the chemicals would yield an agent capable of "lingering hazards"
for those exposed to it, Boylan said. The likely targets would have been
"coalition and Iraqi security forces, and Iraqi civilians," in part owing to
the difficulty anyone deploying the chemicals would have had in keeping the
agents from spreading out over a wide area, he said.
Military officials did not immediately identify either the precursors or the
agent they could have produced. "We don't want to speculate on any
possibilities until our analysis is complete," Col. Henry Franke, a nuclear,
biological and chemical defense officer, was quoted as saying in a military
statement.
Investigators still were trying to determine which group was responsible for
the alleged lab and whether the expertise came from foreign fighters or
members of Saddam Hussein's former security apparatus, the military said.
"They're looking into it," Boylan said. "They've got to go through it --
there's a lot of stuff there."
U.S. military photos of the alleged lab showed a bare concrete-walled room
scattered with stacks of plastic containers, coiled tubing, hoses and a
stand holding a large metal device that looked like a distillery. Black
rubber boots lay among the gear.
The operation was the biggest suspected chemical-weapon lab found so far in
Iraq, Boylan said. A lab discovered last year in the insurgent stronghold of
Fallujah contained a how-to book for chemical weapons and an unspecified
amount of chemicals.
The spokesman said the operation was new, not dating from before the
U.S.-led invasion. The Bush administration used allegations that Hussein's
government was manufacturing weapons of mass destruction as the main
justification for the invasion. No such weapons or factories were found.
Chemical weapons are divided into the categories of "persistent" agents that
wreak damage for hours, such as blistering agents or the oily VX nerve
agent, and "nonpersistent," such as chlorine gas or sarin nerve gas, which
dissipate quickly.
Iraqi forces under Hussein used chemical agents both on enemy forces in the
1980s war with Iran and on Iraqi Kurdish villagers in 1988. Traces of a
variety of killing agents -- mustard gas and the nerve agents sarin, tabun
and VX -- were detected by investigators after the 1988 attack.
No chemical weapons are known to have been used so far in Iraq's insurgency.
Al Qaeda announced after the 2001 attacks on the United States it was
looking into acquiring biological, radiological and chemical weapons. The
next year, CNN obtained and aired al Qaeda videotapes showing the killings
of three dogs with what were believed to be nerve agents.
Suspected Chemical Weapons Plant Uncovered in Mosul
Military Believes Insurgents Intended to Use Dangerous Agents Against U.S.,
Iraqi Forces
By Ellen Knickmeyer
Washington Post Foreign Service
Saturday, August 13, 2005; 2:09 PM
BAGHDAD, Aug. 13 -- U.S. troops raiding a warehouse in the northern city of
Mosul uncovered a suspected chemical-weapons factory containing 1,500
gallons of chemicals believed destined for attacks on U.S. and Iraqi forces
and civilians, military officials said Saturday.
Monday's early morning raid found 11 precursor agents, "some of them quite
dangerous by themselves," a military spokesman, Lt. Col. Steven A. Boylan,
said in Baghdad.
Combined, the chemicals would yield an agent capable of "lingering hazards"
for those exposed to it, Boylan said. The likely targets would have been
"coalition and Iraqi security forces, and Iraqi civilians," in part owing to
the difficulty anyone deploying the chemicals would have had in keeping the
agents from spreading out over a wide area, he said.
Military officials did not immediately identify either the precursors or the
agent they could have produced. "We don't want to speculate on any
possibilities until our analysis is complete," Col. Henry Franke, a nuclear,
biological and chemical defense officer, was quoted as saying in a military
statement.
Investigators still were trying to determine which group was responsible for
the alleged lab and whether the expertise came from foreign fighters or
members of Saddam Hussein's former security apparatus, the military said.
"They're looking into it," Boylan said. "They've got to go through it --
there's a lot of stuff there."
U.S. military photos of the alleged lab showed a bare concrete-walled room
scattered with stacks of plastic containers, coiled tubing, hoses and a
stand holding a large metal device that looked like a distillery. Black
rubber boots lay among the gear.
The operation was the biggest suspected chemical-weapon lab found so far in
Iraq, Boylan said. A lab discovered last year in the insurgent stronghold of
Fallujah contained a how-to book for chemical weapons and an unspecified
amount of chemicals.
The spokesman said the operation was new, not dating from before the
U.S.-led invasion. The Bush administration used allegations that Hussein's
government was manufacturing weapons of mass destruction as the main
justification for the invasion. No such weapons or factories were found.
Chemical weapons are divided into the categories of "persistent" agents that
wreak damage for hours, such as blistering agents or the oily VX nerve
agent, and "nonpersistent," such as chlorine gas or sarin nerve gas, which
dissipate quickly.
Iraqi forces under Hussein used chemical agents both on enemy forces in the
1980s war with Iran and on Iraqi Kurdish villagers in 1988. Traces of a
variety of killing agents -- mustard gas and the nerve agents sarin, tabun
and VX -- were detected by investigators after the 1988 attack.
No chemical weapons are known to have been used so far in Iraq's insurgency.
Al Qaeda announced after the 2001 attacks on the United States it was
looking into acquiring biological, radiological and chemical weapons. The
next year, CNN obtained and aired al Qaeda videotapes showing the killings
of three dogs with what were believed to be nerve agents.
