Today's Article
Some security
experts say Bush
Administration
continues unneeded
program to bolster
long-disproven
claims.
The American Spark
Army Stockpiling, Destroying Unneeded WMD Antidotes In Iraq

By Cliff Montgomery - June 11th, 2007

Despite the Bush Administration's war-making claims of still-potent Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMDs) in
Iraq being firmly disproved by news reports and numerous government studies in the past four years, the U.S.
Army still ships to the country--and later destroys--millions of tax dollars worth of antidotes for nuclear, chemical
and biological weapons, according to Army documents unearthed by
Government Executive magazine.

The activity is a leftover from when the Bush Administration actively claimed that former Iraqi strongman
Saddam Hussein still possessed potent weapons of mass destruction, including chemical and biological
agents.

No active WMDs have been discovered in Iraq since the start of the war in March 2003; and both detailed
news accounts such as
one written by this journalist for Alternet.org and government reports from such bodies
as the Senate Select Committee for Intelligence have revealed that Bush's "evidence" for the Iraq invasion
was "either overstated" or was "not supported by the underlying intelligence reporting."

The antidote kits--which provide treatments and injectors for nerve gas, antibiotics to combat anthrax
exposure, and drugs to lessen the effects of exposure to radiation--are no longer even given to U.S. troops
when they arrive in Iraq.

The Army kits, called Individual Service Member Medical Chemical Defense Materiel, are kept in locked military
vans "without being issued to the individual soldier. In addition, millions of dollars worth of [the kits] are
incinerated annually in Iraq," according to the Army Medical Department documents obtained by
Government
Executive
.

"Current theater policy is to incinerate all [kits] prior to redeployment," the papers add. The documents do not
mention how much this waste is costing the American taxpayer.

The briefing documents were produced by the Task Force 3 Medical Command, the top medical command
operating in Iraq, and given to senior commanders.

Army spokesman Dave Foster told
Government Executive that the Army's policy is "to issue the [kits] to each
unit prior to deployment, and ensure all unused [kits are] turned in prior to the unit's redeployment for
destruction."

Foster refused to answer other questions, under the argument that the briefing documents were stamped "For
Official Use Only."

The U.S. Central Command, which decides primary policy issues for the Iraq theater, refused to field questions
on why the Army first deploys and then destroys the unneeded kits.

According to an Army Medical Materiel Agency supply bulletin, much of the kits' materiel--such as the atropine
injectors and the antibiotics--are to be stored at a controlled temperature of between 59 and 86 degrees
Fahrenheit.

Foster admitted to
Government Executive however that the kit components "expire after 12 to 15 months in
an uncontrolled temperature environment," such as Iraq, where temperatures routinely dip below 59 degrees in
winter and top 100 in summer.

Philip Coyle, senior adviser with the Center for Defense Information, a Washington, D.C.-based security policy
research organization, says the unnecessary storage and incineration of the Army kits are a waste of taxpayer
money.

Coyle, who served as both assistant secretary of Defense and director of the Pentagon's operational test and
evaluation office for the Clinton Administration from 1994 to 2001, believes the Army's storage of the kits in
Iraq is a simple political maneuver. The unnecessary storage of such kits allow top Army commanders to at
least subtly maintain the long-discredited Bush Administration falsehoods that Saddam Hussein still somehow
possessed WMD and "insinuations since by Vice President [Dick] Cheney and others that WMD might still be
found."

"Accordingly, it wouldn't be surprising if no one in the Army has wanted to raise the policy issue of why are we
still sending these kits to Iraq," Coyle told
Government Executive.

Ivan Oelrich, vice president for strategic security programs at the Federation of American Scientists in
Washington, D.C., stated that if the U.S. Army does continue shipping the kits to Iraq, "it has to be more than
symbolic...[They have] to be stored and managed correctly."

But since there's no WMD threat, storing the kits isn't the issue, Coyle retorted.

The Army and people like Mr. Oelrich can't argue that there is a sure "logistical advantage in lead time" to
keeping the kits in Iraq because of some imagined WMD exposure when "the kits are not being distributed to
the troops," Coyle said.  

"I can't imagine the Army would operate this way if they really believed there was a credible threat," he added.

We couldn't agree more.



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