The claim was that the big bad USA had sold Saddam Hussein chemical and biological weapons - That I refuted. As yet that no-one has shown any evidence of the USA having sold Iraq any weapons.

I have claimed that the US armed forces do not have chemical or biological weapons in their inventory of weapons - I invited contradiction of that statement from any ex-US armed forces personnel here on Mudcat - so far nothing (And there won't be) - Sort of begs the question then that if the US doesn't possess chemical or biological weapons how the hell can they sell them to anybody, particularly to an army massively equipped with Soviet and Chinese military hardware.

Now I see Jom "The Impartial" accuses me of "Evasive Semantics" his side of the arguments way of admitting that I am in fact correct and that what was sold to the Iraqis were bits and pieces that might be used for quite a number of purposes, perhaps tom cross the i's and dot the t's Jom can provide through many of his cut'n'pastes the sales details where the purpose of the purchase on the export licence application states.

"x" tons of sodium fuoride to make Sarin to kill Kurds" - signed Saddam Hussein 1988

So no weapons sold merely some of the components - the wherewithall - that is a start.

Now if the big bad west provided this wherewithall who was it do you think provided Saddam & Co, such as ol-Bashar's Dad and those pesky Egyptians, Angolans, Sudanese, etc with the recipe? My guess would be Soviet Russia, as they were busy making and maintaining tons of the stuff at the time.

Now let us look at Jom's latest bit of Wiki Trawling

1: "Project 922 was the codename for Iraq's third and most successful attempt to produce chemical and biological weapons. Within three years (1978–1981), Project 922 had gone from concept to production for first generation Iraqi chemical weapons (mustard agent).

Now let me see Iraq broke off all diplomatic relations with the USA in the Summer of 1967. So Jom could you please tell us what part the USA could possibly have had in Project 922? None as far as I can see

2: By 1984 Iraq started producing its first nerve agents, Tabun and Sarin.

By being the operative word, as any form of relations with iraq were not restored until November 1984. BY which time Iraq had already started producing Tabun and Sarin. OK Jom, what part did the US play in assisting the Iraqi Sarin R&D efforts?

Seems to me like the whole Iraqi chemical and biological agent thing was home grown with technical advice from the USSR & China.

Their VX programme time line?
Developed production capability by 1988
Forced to abandon it in 1991
Restarted it in 1995 while they were supposed to be co-operating with UNSCOM to get rid of all this shit
At no point in this did the Iraqi's ever succeed in effectively weaponising it - according to UNSCOM & UNMOVIC

By the way there were 30 instances of chemical attacks during the course of the Iran/Iraq War.

3: "As part of Project 922, German firms such as Karl Kolb helped build Iraqi chemical weapons facilities such as laboratories, bunkers, an administrative building, and first production buildings in the early 1980s under the cover of a pesticide plant.

Karl Kolb was supplying equipment to Iraq that the Iraqi's said was for a pesticide plant - in the years leading up to 1978 could you explain to us all Jom why the Germans at Karl Kolb should have thought that the Iraqis were lying?

4: Other German firms sent 1,027 tons of precursors of mustard gas, sarin, tabun, and tear gasses in all.

OK I am really dying to know what these precursors were and what other things can be made from them - and again why should they not have been sold to Iraq in the 1970s?

5: "France also provided glass-lined reactors, tanks, vessels, and columns used for the production of chemical weapons."

What did the Iraqis tell the French they were for at the time? Care to tell us that Jom?

What does dual use mean? Does it mean that it can be instantly converted into some deadly WMD? Or does this transformation rely on years and years of secretive conniving, double-dealing, slight of hand and duplicitous behaviour on the part of the servants of a rogue regime in every sense of the word to acquire the means to convert said "dual use" items into WMD.

Whole thing complete and utter tosh.