How did a "military grade" amount take so long to afflict the Skripals?
Explanations of slow acting methodology, rain washed most it off overnight have been offered.
The rain washing most of it off overnight is no longer plausible if the two suspects were indeed the wannabe assassins, given that the MET believes the door handle was targeted by these two suspects moments after 11:58 AM on Sunday.
Slow acting type might be plausible but it does not fit the "Novichok" said to have been invented by the USSR according to descriptions of how fast that one acted, so it'd have to be a new type. Or the descriptions were wrong. Bear in mind the OPCW refuses to name the nerve agent. i.e. They will not say if it's A-232 or A-234 or other. And also bear in mind that the impression that only Russia has such stuff has been proven wrong.
Another problem I have with the delay theory is that both Sergei and Yulia collapsed at the exact same time, some four hours later, without one being able to call for help when they saw the symptoms of the other. Then there are all the logistics issues with the door handle - how many police officers entered and touched the door before the house was sealed*, the Skripals would have touched a lot of things too including Zizzi's door handle yet this was left exposed, the bread given to three young boys by Sergei did not affect them one bit, etc.
* For example, we now know Detective Sergeant Nick Bailey was not the only one who entered the Skripal residence. He was part of a team. Was he the only one who touched the door handle? And he was wearing gloves, so even if the others wore gloves odds are they'd have been affected too.
We're not being told the whole story because some of it is classified, and there are two confirmed DSMA notices out, with chatter about more of these notices ("a flood" it is alleged) since March but nobody has confirmed these others to my knowledge. Neil Basu washed his hands like Pilate today, in his statement, in quoting Theresa May as saying the Russian State was responsible, and then asking for the public's help. For some reason he did not state whether he agreed with May or not. And he didn't mention "GRU" in his statement. In May's statement, we heard that evidence of the suspects being GRU, is "classified". So it would appear they don't intend to prove they are GRU, they will simply have a trial and charge them, and then continue adding "GRU" outside the court, through statements in the Commons, with Parliamentary privilege, and through the media, to set it in the public's minds that they were GRU.
Now some thoughts about what we have been told today:
1. We're being asked to believe that the Russian State asked/greenlighted two of their assassins to travel direct from Moscow to Gatwick, and return from Heathrow direct to Moscow. Not only that, but they were instructed to use their Russian passports instead of fake foreign ID. Interestingly, it is the MET itself who've brought up that they may have other aliases. Perfectly plausible of course, but then why didn't they use a foreign alias? It is also handy for them to bring that up, because if any proof surfaces of these two guys not being GRU, or even Russian, the MET and intelligence services can say "Well, we were led to believe that they were Russian, and had no evidence of otherwise, but remember we did warn they may have other aliases."
2. The nerve agent was discovered on May 4th, in a hotel room. In their hotel room. Yet the hotel was not immediately evacuated and sealed off to undertake a thorough investigation, and to prevent any possible harm to the public. We are then told that only very little traces of it were found (enough to point the finger at the two suspects...) and that all of it was actually cleaned off by the very swabs used to compile samples for testing, so further swabs showed up nothing, therefore no need to invite the OPCW to the hotel, cause "you won't find anything".
