Newsgroup: it.politica.internazionale
Titolo: forse scoperto primo impianto produzione armi chimiche

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=JPost/A/JPArticle/PrinterFull&cid=1048389497622
Non e' ancora chiaro cosa si producesse, ma era camuffato per evitare di
essere visto dagli aerei e al momento dell'incursione vi si trovavano 30
militari iracheni fra cui un generale.

...

Hai ragione sul "forse".
http://news.ft.com/servlet/ContentServer?pagename=FT.com/StoryFT/FullStory&c=StoryFT&cid=1048313098973
Search at Najaf yields no sign of chemical weapons
By Mark Huband, Security Correspondent, in London
Published: March 24 2003 20:18 | Last Updated: March 24 2003 20:18
Department of Defense officials said on Monday that no evidence of
chemical weapons production had been found at a facility close to the
southern Iraqi town of Najaf occupied by US forces on Sunday.
Forces from the US 3rd Infantry Division occupied the 100-acre site.
According to military officials, the site is surrounded by an electric
fence and the buildings within it are camouflaged, raising suspicion
that it was still in use. However, a Pentagon official said on Monday
that the site had probably been abandoned some time ago.
Two military sites described in a CIA assessment last year as part of
Iraq's weapons of mass destruction programme are now in territory
occupied by US and UK forces. Neither site - one at Nasiriya and the
other at al-Khamisiya, both in the southern part of the country - has
so far provided evidence of WMD production.
General Tommy Franks, the commander of US forces, said on Monday:
"It's a bit early for us to have any expectation of having found them
. . . We'll wait for the days ahead."
Responding to the first report of the Najaf site's alleged purpose,
which appeared in the Jerusalem Post, a senior western intelligence
officer said on Monday: "It's been in the interests of the Israelis to
play up a whole range of issues. A degree of healthy scepticism is
very necessary."
Iraq is thought by intelligence services to have dispersed its
chemical weapons production among 16 sites, seven of which are around
Baghdad.
Among the 2,000 Iraqi troops the US is now holding, several senior
officers - in particular, two army generals - are being interrogated
with the specific purpose of trying to establish a clearer picture of
Iraq's WMD arsenal. Documents seized by US special forces who captured
two airfields in western Iraq at the weekend are also being examined
for leads on the WMD arsenal, a US military spokesman said.
The Najaf site did not figure in either the US or UK intelligence
analyses of suspected WMD sites issued last year to bolster the case
against President Saddam Hussein. Nor did United Nations weapons
inspectors suspect or visit the site during their mission to unearth
Iraq's WMD arsenal.
Intelligence officers and military officials believe that Iraq has
succesfully hidden a substantial amount of its WMD arsenal and
research, much of it buried and sealed. They are working on the basis
that only the occupation of substantial parts of the country will give
them the opportunity to prove that the WMD arsenal exists.
"I think we'll find weapons of mass destruction once we have had an
opportunity to occupy Baghdad, stabilise Iraq, talk to Iraqis that
have participated in the hiding and the development of it," said Lt
Gen John Abizaid of US Central Command.
Even so, the challenge to coalition forces to find the evidence with
which to justify the war to overthrow the regime is stark. Hans Blix,
the chief UN weapons insp- ector, said in the early hours of the
conflict: "The paradox is, if they don't find something then you have
sent 250,000 men to wage war in order to find nothing."