Your Blix cite is the same as mine. :-)

They both cite his UN SC presentation on the 14th. I think the most straight-forward reading is that UNMOVIC - not UNSCOM - found the thiodiglycol material, and it was found recently. We may have to agree to disagree.

The FAS links are good. One of them, [link|http://www.fas.org/nuke/intro/cw/produce.htm|here] says:

Drums of thiodiglycol, produced in the United States and illegally diverted from their intended recipients, were found by international inspectors after the Gulf War at Iraqi CW production sites.

[link|http://www.cbwinfo.com/Chemical/Precursors/p1.html|This] link lists some of the industrial uses of thiodiglycol. It's perfectly reasonable for the US to have shipped the material to Iraq for peaceful industrial purposes. (The link says 1 M pounds are produced in the US annually and the US no longer produces chemical weapons.) Obviously the people approving the export should have been more congnizant of its potential of being diverted for military uses, and in retrospect the export should have been forbidden.

Tangentially related to this topic is another interesting link on the FAS site [link|http://www.fas.org/irp/gulf/af/970211/970207_aadbc_001.html|here]. It seems to be a DOD cable from CENTAF (US Central Command Air Force) from September 1990 discussing the history of Iraq's unconventional weapons programs. It says they started work on chemical weapons in the 1960s.

2. \t (U) IRAQ'S CHEMICAL PROGRAM

A. \tIRAQ APPEARS TO HAVE INITIATED ITS CHEMICAL WEAPONS'

PROGRAM IN THE 1960'S. BY 1985, IRAQ WAS PRODUCING A NUMBER OF

CHEMICAL AGENTS, INCLUDING MUSTARD GAS AND TWO DIFFERENT TYPES OF

NERVE AGENTS. IT IS POSSIBLE THAT IRAQ HAS DEVELOPED A CHEMICAL

AGENT PRODUCTION CAPACITY OF 700 TONS PER YEAR. SOME OTHER

ESTIMATES HAVE THE PRODUCTION CAPACITY 20 TIMES LARGER.

B. \tTHE CHEMICAL AGENT USED MOST COMMONLY DURING THE IRAN-IRAQ

WAR WAS MUSTARD GAS. BY 1985, AT A SMALL PLANT IN SAMARRA, THE

IRAQIS WERE CAPABLE OF PRODUCING ABOUT 50 TONS OF MUSTARD GAS PER

YEAR. THOUGH ETHYLENE IS THE BASE ELEMENT IN THE PRODUCTION OF

MUSTARD GAS, IT IS THIODIGLYCOL THAT IS THE MOST COMMON PRECURSOR.

INITIALLY, IRAQ HAD TO RELY ON WESTERN EUROPE AND THE UNITED STATES

FOR THIS IMPORTANT PRECUSOR AGENT. HOWEVER, IRAQ NO LONGER RELIES -

ON IMPORTS OF THIODIGLYCOL, DUE TO SELF SUFFICIENCY. ABOUT ONE TON

OF THIODIGLYCOL MAKES ONE TON OF MUSTARD GAS. THE OTHER KEY

INGREDIENT, HYDROCHLORIC ACID, CAN BE OBTAINED ON THE OPEN

MARKET.

(Double-spaced to try to make it easier to read.)

FWIW.

Cheers,
Scott.

Particularly near the end.

When the Iraqis produced chemical munitions they appeared to adhere to a \ufffdmake and use\ufffd regimen. Judging by the information Iraq gave the United Nations, later verified by on-site inspections, Iraq had poor product quality for their nerve agents. This low quality was likely due to a lack of purification. They had to get the agent to the front promptly or have it degrade in the munition. This problem would have been less severe in their mustard rounds because of less aggressive impurities. The problem of degradation inhibited their ability to deploy and employ nerve weapons but probably did not have a great effect on their use of mustard. Using their weapons soon after production probably worked well in the Iran-Iraq War, where the skies over Iraq were controlled by the Iraqis. Unfortunately for the Iraqis, loss of air control in the Gulf meant the weapons could never reach the front. The chemical munitions found in Iraq after the Gulf War contained badly deteriorated agents and a significant proportion were visibly leaking.

That matches what I had heard before.

It's also possible that they've managed to beat their storage problems.

But then they'd also need to have the facilities to manufacture quantities of these agents. And so far, none have been located.

Which is why I replied to Boxley that way. The Iraqis MIGHT have agents, but if they do, I believe they have small quantities of them (aka "laboratory quantities") and that these will not pose any real threat (read: "the threat posed by the chemical agents will be less than the threat posed by conventional weapons").

Which is the reason, I believe, that the inspectors are having such a hard time finding any. It's not too difficult to find a ton of something. It's a lot harder to find a quart.

Now, on the other hand, Iraq still has the KNOWLEDGE of how to produce these agents. And, as you've noted, the ingrediants are not that unusual for an industrial nation.

Welcome to IWETHEY!