Last weekend, a chemical weapons attack was launched on American forces, knowingly or not. In a frightening scenario, Islamic terrorists in Iraq may have at long last found a new weapon against our troops—Saddam’s weapons of mass destruction.

Many of you may be unaware of this, given the mainstream media’s focus on Abu Ghraib and gas prices, so I’ll fill you in:

According to military reports, a roadside bomb was set up near Baghdad International Airport last Saturday. The apparent goal, as is common in all such attacks, was to blindside an American convoy, but, in this case, a more heinous motive was revealed.

Apparently, the terrorists who set up this IED (improvised explosive device) used a munition containing the deadly chemical nerve agent, Sarin. American forces detonated the device, unaware of its contents. Two soldiers were treated for minor exposure, but, luckily, no one was seriously injured.

Many partisan politicians and so called media "experts" have claimed that this was an isolated incident—that the terrorists randomly pulled this shell from a stockpile of conventional weapons and that this in no way reveals the truth about WMD in Iraq. I beg to differ.

It is erroneous to claim this Sarin artillery shell was a one in a million shot, pulled randomly from some stockpile of weapons. How foolish must one be? Given Saddam’s past, why would anyone believe that this was just randomly floating around Iraq? Of course there are more of these! Why would Saddam be satisfied with only one? It just doesn’t make sense.

Yet this is what former UN weapons inspector Hans Blix would have you believe. In an interview last week, Blix claimed that this was a "random" occurrence, stating Iraq is a "dangerous place" and that this in no way represents the tip of the iceberg in the search for WMD. Gazi George, a former Iraqi scientist under Saddam Hussein (and chief scientist in charge of weapons programs, by the way), disagrees.

According to George, Iraq is a hotbed of such weapons. Moments after the story broke, George, in a Fox News interview claimed, "Saddam had those weapons…[they] are either buried underground or shipped out of the country to Syria and are being brought back…with the insurgents."

I tend to believe George over a UN puppet like Blix, but the truly compelling point of this whole situation is the fact that when Iraq declared its weapon stocks last year, the Hussein regime claimed no Sarin laced munitions in its arsenal—not one!

Interestingly enough, this Iraqi munition found last weekend contained Sarin. I wonder how that could be? Could it be that Saddam lied about his WMD stock? It wouldn’t be much of a surprise—and I hope no one was gullible enough to fall for his lies and half-truths.

In combination with a shell found a couple weeks ago containing mustard gas (which Hussein claimed to have destroyed), this discovery seems to enhance the likelihood that Iraq did not comply with UN resolutions demanding the dismantling of WMD and retained the weapons they claimed not to have.

This would overrule the foregone conclusion of the mass media and liberals that Saddam had no such weapons, but don’t hold your breath for any sort of repentance. They’ll likely come up with some lame excuse to explain this occurrence—or ignore it all together (as appears to be happening).

Terrorists may not have known what they were dealing with when they used the Sarin shell in the attack against coalition forces, but my gut tells me that they did. A frightening scenario tossed about as of late is that these terrorists, in an attempt to derail the June 30 handover of power to the Iraqi Governing Council, have intensified their attacks by incorporating Saddam’s WMD.

Perhaps they are getting desperate in the face of escalating coalition pressure to disarm—and are resorting to these weapons as a last hope of defeating American forces and ending Iraqi dreams of peace and liberty. Perhaps it was just dumb luck that they came across a chemical weapons stockpile. Either way, they now know they have access to WMD and appear to be more than willing use them.

It’s a dangerous situation that we wished to avoid, but a reality of the enemy we face. They will stop at nothing to see that American forces die and are more than willing to use these terrible weapons to accomplish their goal.

Americans must be steadfast in their resolve, for this obstacle, like all of the others in Iraq, can and will be overcome.

Andy Obermann is majoring in History and Secondary Education at Missouri Valley College.

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