The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #56897   Message #892843
Posted By: GUEST
18-Feb-03 - 01:30 PM
Thread Name: BS: Making Saddam Smile!
Subject: RE: BS: Making Saddam Smile!
"I am under the impression that American chemo and bio weapons were destroyed or scheduled to be destroyed. I could be wrong and I am open to enlightenment."

I sincerely doubt you are open to enlightenment. I sincerely believe you will never change your mind, regardless of the facts and information presented to you.

FYI, the US still possesses a stockpile of approximately 31,000 tons of chemical agents, and is believed to be in material breach of the BWC treaty, signed in 1972, and ratified in 1975. It is currently working on destroying its stockpiles of mustard, sarin, VX, and blister agent under the CWC Treaty, signed in 1993 and ratified in 1997.

The US claims to have unilaterally ended it's biological weapons program in 1969 (although because it did so unilaterally, it has not had to account for any of it's biological weapons). There is widespread belief among international arms control experts that the US is in material breach of the BWC treaty, because of it's current research under the US Biodefense Program.

Another little known fact: many countries have not signed either the CWC Treaty or the BWC Treaty. For instance, Iraq has not signed the CWC Treaty, but has signed the BWC Treaty. Israel has not signed the BWC Treaty, but has signed the CWC Treaty, even though it is widely believed by international arms control experts that Israel has a secret chemical weapons program, and is likely involved in a biological weapons research program as well.

International arms control experts also widely agree that the vast majority of Iraq's chemical and biological weapons programs were dismantled in the early 1990s under the UN weapons inspections in the post-Gulf War I era. It is also well known in international arms control circles that, despite Iraq's likely possession of some chemical weapons, and likely attempts to rebuild some of it's pre-Gulf War I chemical weapons infrastructure since inspectors left in 1998, that it would be impossible for Iraq to have actually rebuilt that infrastructure and started production of chemical weapons without foreign assistance, which they know has not happened.