Where Is Saddam's Deadly Weapons Stash?

April 10 -- It's the shoe that hasn't dropped in the war in Iraq.

Since U.S. forces began making their way to Baghdad, they have been searching for weapons of mass destruction. But even now, as U.S. soldiers and Iraqis celebrate victory in the streets of Baghdad, there is still no solid evidence that any exist.

Some experts say that this is only because Saddam Hussein hid them well, and soldiers haven't looked in the right places.

"The areas that we've invaded so far — the area that we came into from Kuwait, southern Iraq, and the area in northern Iraq, neither one of those areas are necessarily the kinds of places that if I were Saddam Hussein I would be storing weapons of mass destruction," said Kyle Olson, a consultant to the U.S. government on chemical and biological agents.

Only False Alarms So Far

Even though no so-called smoking gun stash of deadly weapons has been found, there have been several false alarms. First U.S. soldiers found chemical protective gear left behind by Iraqi soldiers, but no chemical weapons.

Last week, the U.S. Army found thousands of vials of white powder, which turned out to be explosives. Then Monday, soldiers found drums near Karbala that — according to early testing — may contain nerve gas. U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said the administration will await the results of lab tests in the United States before drawing conclusions.

Early reports can be misleading, he said.

"Dozens and dozens of instances where the first report comes in. Perfectly good reporting — but it's wrong," Rumsfeld said. "Therefore — we don't do that."

The Terrorist Connection

The Bush administration said that regardless of what is in the drums found in Karbala, the prime rationale for the war was to disarm Iraq of tons of chemical and biological agents that could end up in terrorists' hands. Even if nothing has been found, it doesn't mean that weapons of mass destruction do not exist, the president said.