http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=540&ncid=716&e=4&u=/ap/20040517/ap_on_re_mi_ea/us_iraq_sarin
or http://makeashorterlink.com/?C53D35358 "WASHINGTON - U.S. officials said Monday they are concerned that other sarin-filled munitions may still exist in Iraq � and may not be well marked � after evidence indicated a roadside shell that exploded contained the nerve agent. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said the results were from a field test, which can be imperfect, and more analysis needed to be done. "We have to be careful," he told an audience in Washington Monday afternoon... No one was injured in the initial detonation Saturday, although U.S. soldiers who later removed the round experienced symptoms consistent with low-level nerve agent exposure, said a U.S. official speaking on condition of anonymity. In this case, it appears two components in the shell, which are designed to combine and create deadly sarin, did not properly mix upon detonation, the official said. It was unclear whether those responsible for the attack knew it was a conventional or chemical round, the official said. The 155-mm shell did not have markings to indicate it contained a chemical agent, the official added. U.S. officials believe, based on evidence, that the shell was an experimental munition produced before the 1991 Gulf War (news - web sites), called a "binary type," the official said...Saddam's government had disclosed binary sarin testing and production after the 1995 defection of Iraqi weapons chief Lt. Gen. Hussein Kamel al-Majid, Saddam's son-in-law. But Saddam's government never declared that any sarin or sarin-filled shells still remained. For that reason, the U.S. government considers the discovery of the sarin shell as significant, the U.S. official said... ...Because the shell blew up as part of an improvised explosive devise, Kay said, the inert chemicals inside probably wouldn't have mixed as well as they would have had they been fired, so significant amounts of sarin wouldn't have been produced. At a Baghdad press conference Monday, Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt, the chief military spokesman in Iraq, said he believed that insurgents who rigged the artillery shell as a bomb did not know that it contained the nerve agent. The dispersal of the nerve agent from such a rigged device is very limited, he said. Nerve gases inhibit key enzymes in the nervous system, blocking their transmission. In large enough doses, sarin causes convulsions, paralysis, loss of consciousness and potentially fatal respiratory failure. Small exposures can be treated with antidotes, if administered quickly." Not a good development for the troops, if it is sarin, and there are more of these devices available for insurgents to use. Debbi __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? SBC Yahoo! - Internet access at a great low price. http://promo.yahoo.com/sbc/
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