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Comment by mcsb4 | Hacker News Reader

The fact that it was invented in Russia doesn't mean that this sample was Russian made. Every decent chemist can produce that stuff. We were also shown powerpoint slides of Saddams truck-mounted labs of WMD - they just didn't exist. The second mission was to "win hearts and minds". Result: 1,000,000 people dead. Women, old people, children and toddlers included. Just watch collateral damage again. Do it 100,000 times and you know what happened in Iraq. Plus a dash of abuse and torture of prisoners of war in the Abu Ghraib prison. There are plenty of things I doubt when I hear about them.

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>Every decent chemist can produce that stuff.

After reading, "Novichok agents: a historical, current, and toxicological perspective"[1] it looks like the only places to have produced such agents are Russian chemical weapon labs and the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons Central Analytical Database.

Maybe someone who works in the field can provide some more evidence either way?

[1]https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6039123/#R19

Iranians were the first to publish about the synthesis:

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/rcm.7757

https://analyticalscience.wiley.com/do/10.1002/sepspec.1591c...

I am pretty sure that the Porton Down military research facility next to Salisbury is capable or producing it too - but that doesn't mean they produced the specific poison used to attack the Skipals.

The same for VX gas that was used to kill Kim Jong Un's brother in Malaysia. VX was indeed invented by the brits but I would seriously doubt that they killed Kim Jong-Nam.

Edit: this is just factual information. What kind of fscking loosers do downvote this? Go get a reality check.

You're right - any well-equipped state could have synthesized the nerve agent used on the Skripals. But that's not the only evidence: two suspects were identified, who traveled from Russia and stayed at a local hotel. The nerve agent was found in their hotel room.

Of course, you could argue that British intelligence framed those Russians during the investigation, and poisoned the Skripals themselves as some sort of ruse for expelling diplomats. But if you deny the evidence and proceed down that path, you've made the decision not to alter your beliefs and no discussion will change your mind.

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