U.S. Finds Nothing at Iraq Chemical Plant

national | miscellaneous | news report Wednesday March 26, 2003 01:42 by g zus

what if it was a mistake? whoops! sorry about that little war

U.S. Finds Nothing at Iraq Chemical Plant

http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A27759-2003Mar25?language=printer

By MATT KELLEY
The Associated Press
Tuesday, March 25, 2003; 6:39 PM

U.S. military investigators have found no evidence that chemical weapons have been made in recent years at a suspect chemical plant secured by U.S. troops in southern Iraq, a senior defense official said Tuesday.

Before the war, American intelligence agencies had identified the site in the town of Najaf as a possible part of Iraq's chemical weapons program, the official said, speaking on condition he not be identified. Indications then were that the plant had not been used for banned weapons activities since 1998, the official said.

Preliminary reports from the site indicate that the initial suspicions were true, and it had not been involved in illicit weapons production in the last five years, the official said.

The captures Sunday of the suspected chemical site, a cache of documents and two Iraqi generals thought to have knowledge of weapons of mass destruction raised the possibility that American forces had begun to find the banned weapons they are fighting to remove from Iraq.