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Massive Epidemic of Severe Birth Defects Result of
America's Attacks Against Iraq
The terrible price of war is
not limited to dollars, combat deaths and injuries but includes the
horrible human suffering that persists for many years after the shooting
war stops.
By James P. Tucker Jr.
In
the decade following Gulf War I, the rate of birth defects among newborn
Iraqi babies leaped tenfold from 11 per 100,000 births to 116 per 100,000
births. In the wake of Gulf War II, physicians and human rights groups are
anticipating further increases in horrible deformities and sick and dying
children with which Iraq's shattered medical system will be unable to
cope.
Protocol Additional to the Geneva Conventions of 12
August 1949, and relating to the Protection of Victims of International
Armed Conflicts (Protocol 1)
Adopted on 8 June 1977 by the Diplomatic Conference on the
Reaffirmation and Development of International Humanitarian Law
applicable in Armed Conflicts; entered into force 7 December 1979
It is prohibited to employ methods or means of warfare
which are intended, or may be expected, to cause widespread, long-term
and severe damage to the natural environment.
Weapon of Mass Deception: What the Pentagon doesn't
want us to know about "depleted" uranium.
By Frida Berrigan | 6.20.03
The real threat-not only to U.S. troops but to Iraqis as
well-may prove to be a weapon scarcely mentioned before, during or after
the war: depleted uranium.
A toxic and radioactive substance, depleted uranium (DU)-otherwise known
as Uranium 238-was widely used by U.S. troops as their Abrams battle tanks
and A-10 Warthogs thundered through Iraq this spring.
When a DU shell hits its target, it burns, losing anywhere from 40 to 70
percent of its mass and dispersing a fine dust that can be carried long
distances by winds or absorbed directly into the soil and groundwater.
Depleted uranium's radioactive and toxic residue has been linked to birth
defects, cancers, the Gulf War Syndrome, and environmental damage.
But the Pentagon insists depleted uranium is both safe and necessary
November 11, 2003
President Arafat: Israel Used Depleted
Uranium to Suppress the Palestinian People
The Poisoned Battlefield:
View Fact Sheet
(.PDF) |
View Fact Sheet (.DOC)
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Listening To Veterans of the First Gulf War
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2 of 5 Gulf War Vets On Disability
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UK Troops in Gulf to use Depleted Uranium Shells
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Study Validates Vets' Syndrome
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Don't Ignore Health Risks of a Gulf War II
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Invading a Toxic Kill Zone
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Iraqi Coverage Fails to Address Health Risks
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From Bosnia, More DU
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Will The US News Media Wake Up?
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Most Media Ignoring 160,000 U.S. Casualties
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U.S. Debates Dangers of Depleted Uranium
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The Fallout of War
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A "Silver Bullet's" Toxic Legacy
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Steve Robinson Executive Director, NGWRC
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May 2002 Gulf War Veterans Information Systems
Briefing For:
National Gulf War Resource Center (.PDF)
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DUM: SABOT 120mm, M829 AP Kinetic Energy Round
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DUM: Policy Papers and News
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Types of DUM Weapons
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World Health Organization Fact Sheet on DUM
Environmental Impacts of Gulf War
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More AMMO Data for SABOT
Depleted Uranium Legacy Awaits Our Troops
US
rejects Iraq DU clean-up
DEPLETED URANIUM (DU)
The Military is still
using this dangerous form of death and destruction which is a dire
threat to all of our military personnel in the Gulf. Just look at the
history of D U munitions to see how many have been effected by this
atrocity
DU is a by-product of nuclear power plant generation. Munition
suppliers manufacture it into military projectiles, the preferred weapon
due to its abilities to penetrate tank armor and other fortified
targets.
All uranium is a toxic radiological element. If DU oxides are
inhaled, there is a high probability that residual alpha particles will
be distributed throughout the organs of the body and are potential
sources of radiation emission. This fact was not thoroughly researched
prior to the 1991 Gulf War. Once inside the lungs these particles
pass through the lung-blood barrier and circulate freely throughout the
body. At this point they act as a heavy-metal poison as well as
cause low-level cell irradiation in the bone marrow, brain, kidneys, and
reproductive organs. The more immediate heavy-metal oxide damage,
i.e. kidney failure, brain damage, is well documented in the scientific
literature and the potential for radioactive damage leading to
carcinogenic disease is ever present ( Dr Durakovic, et. al. 2002 ).
697,000 American military personnel were deployed in 1991 to Iraq,
Kuwait, and Saudi Arabia. According to the official Gulf War
Veterans (GWV) briefing, the total casualty count for the 100 hour war
was 760: 294 dead and approximately 400 wounded or ill. In the
decade following the war, 30,000 Gulf War Vets are dead and 221,000 are
receiving medical disability benefits for war related causes (May2002
GWV
Report). Dr Durakovic's findings reveal high DU levels in urine
and bone samples in GWVets ten years after the war.
Major Doug Rokke (Rantoul, Illinois) advocates an international ban
against DU based upon what happened to many GWVets as well as those
assigned to clean up highly selected DU contaminated areas after the
Gulf war in Kuwait. He reports on the incidence of throat and lung
cancer among members of his own team. Some are dead, others
seriously ill. The number of deaths by cancer recorded on various
GWVets Internet sites leads one to question the official position of the
Department of Defense that DU is a safe weapon.
DU half-life is 4.5 billion years.
birth defects in southern Iraq, 1989, 11/100,000, 2001,
116/100,000 *
cancer deaths in southern Iraq, 1988, 34, 1998, 450,
2001, 603 *
Is
Depleted Uranium Creating a New Nuclear Danger in Iraq?
A debate on DU between Nuclear Policy Research
Institute President Helen Caldicott, radiation physicist Geoffrey Sea
and Dr. Thomas Fasy.
22 February 2004
WHO 'suppressed' scientific study into
depleted uranium cancer fears in Iraq
Baverstock's study, which has now been passed to the Sunday Herald,
pointed out that Iraq's arid climate meant that tiny particles of DU
were likely to be blown around and inhaled by civilians for years to
come. It warned that, when inside the body, their radiation and toxicity
could trigger the growth of malignant tumours. That means Iraqis and
"coalition" battle troops are already affected and their replacements
are going into a hazardous environment.
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See the
map of Depleted Uranium facilities and test ranges
The war that keeps on killing
American babies
"Sixty-seven percent of babies born to the 400,000 vets who suffer
from Gulf War Syndrome have birth defects," said Joyce Riley, a former
nurse who flew in Iraq and the founder and spokesperson of the American
Gulf War Veterans Association. "But the Department of Defense and Veterans
Affairs do not want America to know the number of sick, dead and deformed
kids that vets are having. It's another cover-up."
A chamber of horrors so close to the 'Garden of Eden' in Southern Iraq
01 December 2001
 I thought I had a strong stomach - toughened by the minefields and foul
frontline hospitals of Angola, by the handiwork of the death squads in
Haiti and by the wholesale butchery of Rwanda. But I nearly lost my
breakfast last week at the Basrah Maternity and Children's Hospital in
southern Iraq.
 Dr
Amer, the hospital's director, had invited me into a room in which were
displayed colour photographs of what, in cold medical language, are called
"congenital anomalies", but what you and I would better understand as
horrific birth deformities. The images of these babies 
were head-spinningly grotesque - and thank God they didn't bring out the
real thing, pickled in formaldehyde. At one point I had to grab hold of
the back of a chair to support my legs.
I won't spare you the details. You should know because - according to
the Iraqis
 and
in all likelihood the World Health Organisation, which is soon to publish
its findings on the spiraling birth defects in southern Iraq - we are
responsible for these obscenities.
During the Gulf war, Britain and the United States pounded the city and
its surroundings with 96,000 depleted-uranium shells. The wretched
creatures in the photographs - for they were scarcely human -are the result, Dr Amer said.
 He guided me past pictures of children born without eyes, without
brains. Another had arrived in the world with only half a head, nothing
above the eyes. Then there was a head with legs, babies without genitalia,
a little girl born with her brain outside her skull and the
whatever-it-was whose eyes were below the level of its nose.
Then
the chair-grabbing moment - a photograph of what I can only describe
(inadequately) as a pair of buttocks with a face and two amphibian arms.
Mercifully, none of these babies survived for long.
 Depleted uranium has an incubation period in humans of five years. In
the four years from 1991 (the end of the Gulf war) until 1994, the Basrah
Maternity Hospital saw 11 congenital anomalies. Last year there were 221.
Then there is the alarming increase in cases of leukaemia among Basrah
babies lucky enough to have been born with the full complement of limbs
and features inthe right place. The hospital treated 15 children with leukaemia in 1993.
In 2000 it was 60. By the end of this year that figure again will be
topped. And so it will go on. Forever.
 (Depleted uranium has a half-life of 4.1 billion years the age of the
earth. Total disintegration occurs after 25 billion years.)
And finally, this one is American, a legacy of an illegal and immoral
war, if there ever was a war that was legal or moral. This gallery of
horror is the beginning of the gathering of evidence for an International
War Crimes Tribunal.
AMERICANS TO TEST SUPERGUN IN SCOTLAND
AMERICA is to test a new secret supergun at a
defence base in Scotland.
The electromagnetic gun (EM gun) will be
tested at an experimental weapons range in Dumfriesshire.
The US Department of Defense believes the
range at Dundrennan, near Kirkcudbright, is the only suitable location to
test the new supergun.
But the move has sparked fury among concerned
locals.
South of Scotland MSP Alasdair Morgan, an
outspoken critic of the weapons range, yesterday slammed the US military's
plans.
He said: "It is not as if America has a
shortage of areas in its own country where they could test their latest
weapons. I find it bizarre they need to do it here."
The MoD has faced complaints over its use of
the range to fire thousands of shells coated with depleted uranium into
the Solway Firth. There are fears the tests could be damaging the health
of locals and the environment.
Both the US and the UK were well aware of the
dangers of Depleted Uranium ammunition, even before the war began.
"Aerosol DU exposures to soldiers on the battlefield could be
significant with potential radiological and toxicological effects. [DU
is] a low level alpha radiation emitter which is linked to cancer when
exposures are internal, [and] chemical toxicity causing kidney damage.
[...] Short-term effects of high doses can result in death, while long
term effects of low doses have been linked to cancer. [...] Our
conclusion regarding the health and environmental acceptability of DU
penetrators assume both controlled use and the presence of excellent
health physics management practices. Combat conditions will lead to the
uncontrolled release of DU. [...] The conditions of the battlefield, and
the long term health risks to natives and combat veterans may become
issues in the acceptability of the continued use of DU kinetic
penetrators for military applications."
- Excerpts from the July 1990 Science and Applications International
Corporation report: ' Kinetic Energy Penetrator Environment and Health
Considerations', as included in Appendix D - US Army Armaments,
Munitions and Chemical Command report: 'Kinetic Energy Penetrator Long
Term Strategy Study, July 1990'
"There has been and continues to be a concern regarding the impact of
DU on the environment. Therefore, if no one makes a case for the
effectiveness of DU on the battlefield, DU rounds may become politically
unacceptable and thus be deleted from the arsenal. I believe we should
keep this sensitive issue in mind when action reports are written."
- Lt. Col. M.V. Ziehmn, Los Alamos National Laboratory memorandum, March
1st 1991
"DU is a low-level radioactive waste, and, therefore, must be
disposed of in a licensed repository. [...] No international law,
treaty, regulation, or custom requires the United States to remediate
the Persian Gulf war battlefields."
- Report by the US Army Environmental Policy Institute: 'Health and
Consequences of Depleted Uranium use in the US army', June 1995
To date, both the US Defence Department and the British Ministry of
Defence deny that there is any link between DU and the unprecedented
rise in cancer and birth deformities experienced by Iraqi civilians and
Gulf War veterans. The Sanctions Committee continues to prevent Iraq
from importing large-scale quantities of anti-cancer medicines, as they
contain radioisotopes, and thus constitute '...nuclear materials...'
Iraqi requests for decontamination equipment are similarly blocked.
The cancer rate in Iraq has risen between two and ten
fold, the deformity rate between four and six fold. The Iraqi Atomic
Agency estimates that 48% of the entire population has been exposed to
carcinogenic material.
THE GULF WAR SYNDROME - A PARALLEL TO CHERNOBYL:
DOCUMENTATION OF THE AFTERMATH OF THE GULF WAR
by
Professor Siegwart Horst - Gunther
President of YELLOW CROSS INTERNATIONAL
1995
Professor Siegwart Horst-Gunther founded THE INTERNATIONAL
YELLOW CROSS in Austria in 1992. A humanitarian organisation helping
suffering children, it has worked closely with the Red Cross and the Red
Crescent, amongst others, to deliver food and medicine directly into the
hands of the needy in countries all over the world. The bulk of its'
activities over the last few years have been focussed on Iraq.
During the course of his
investigations in Depleted Uranium, Professor Gunther was arrested by
German customs whilst attempting to transport DU shell fragments and
dust back into Germany for analysis. The authorities charged him with
'transporting nuclear materials across international borders'. He claims
he was severely beaten whilst being held in custody for two weeks,
without access to a lawyer or any form of representation, or contact
with the outside world.
Article transcribed by Grant
Wakefield, and subject to minor editing and grammatical changes for the
purposes of clarification and sentence structure.
Since 1991 I have been constantly
warned about the danger of Depleted Uranium for the civilian population
[of Iraq]. Many of the DU projectiles spread over the battlefields have
been collected by children and were used as toys with possibly
devastating consequences. Inhaled Uranium dust is highly toxic and can
result in lung cancer.
The conditions in Baghdad hospitals where leukaemia and
cancer patients are housed are particularly depressing. The rooms are
overcrowded; most come from the South of the country. Their increasing
number is attributed to the radioactivity and toxicity of Depleted
Uranium ammunitions used by the allied forces during the war and
abandoned thereafter.
In natural Uranium, the proportion of the isotope 235 is only
about 0.7%, the greater part is Uranium 238. As only Uranium 235 is
suitable as fissile material for use in nuclear power stations, the
Uranium ore has to be enriched by artificially increasing the proportion
of this isotope. As a result there are large quantities of waste
produced by this procedure, i.e. the so-called DU, consisting almost
solely of isotope 238.
In Europe these waste products from uranium industry are
stored in specially shielded deposits at considerable costs because of
their high toxicity and radioactivity. In order to reduce costs, DU of
the isotope 238 is passed on to interested parties, even free of charge.
DU has properties that make it highly attractive to the
armament industry:
1) It is practically the heaviest naturally occurring
substance.
2) DU projectiles, the development of which is presumably
based on German technology, have a greater penetrating power and are
better suited for penetrating steel armour plating than any other
weapon.
3) It is also an inflammable material. It ignites immediately
on penetration of armour plates, releasing highly toxic and radioactive
substances on combustion.
4) After the Gulf War, US tanks are being manufactured with
an increased strengthening layer of DU. Ironically these tanks are
called 'Radiation Deponies.'
Different types of DU ammunition have been manufactured in
the US by HONEYWELL and AEROJET, the latter beginning mass production in
1977. At present such ammunition is also being mass produced in Britain
and France, and exported to other NATO countries as well as to
Australia, Japan and New Zealand.
The first mass use of DU ammunition was conducted in the Gulf
War by the US led coalition, with devastating effects and consequences.
At the beginning of March 1991 I detected projectiles in an Iraqi combat
area which had the form and size of a cigar and were extraordinarily
heavy. At a later point in time I saw children playing with projectiles
of this kind. One of them died of leukaemia. As early as the end of
1991, I diagnosed a hitherto unknown disease among the Iraqi population
that is caused by renal and hepatic dysfunctions.
My efforts to have one of these projectiles examined brought
me into serious trouble with the German police. The projectile, highly
toxic and radioactive, was confiscated and carried away under enormous
safety precautions and stored in a specially shielded deposit.
During the last five years I have carried out extensive
studies in Iraq. The results have produced ample evidence to show that
contact with DU ammunition has the following consequences, especially
for children:
1) A considerable increase in infectious diseases caused by
severe immuno-deficiencies in a great part of the population.
2) Frequent occurrence of massive herpes and zoster
afflictions, also in children.
3) AIDS - like syndromes.
4) A hitherto unknown syndrome caused by renal and hepatic
dysfunctions, now so-called 'Morbus Gunther.'
5) Leukaemia, aplastic anaemia and malignant neoplasm.
6) Congenital deformities caused by genetic defects; also
partly diagnosed in animals.
The results of my studies show similarities to a clinical
picture described recently by the term 'Gulf War Syndrome' in allied
soldiers and their children. The congenital deformities in American and
Iraqi children are identical.
According to US and Pentagon statements, vaccinations against
anthrax, botulism, and malaria; benzenes used for delousing,
pyridostigminbromides DEET or permethrin, as well as the DU ammunition
used, are held responsible for the development of this syndrome. Allied
troops were not informed of the dangers of DU until nine days after the
war.
Like all heavy metals, such as lead and cadmium, Uranium is
highly toxic. The human body must not get into contact with them.
Newspapers recorded that many US soldiers in the Gulf felt uncertain and
feared that they may have been used as 'guinea pigs' in a radiation
experiment. This subject was debated before the US congress. According
to American nuclear scientist Leonard Dietz, the arms technology of the
Uranium projectiles is as revolutionary as the machine gun was in the
World War One. The Gulf War, as he said, was also the most toxic war in
the history of mankind.
According to statements by the US army, about 14,000 high-calibre
shells alone were fired during the Gulf war. According to estimates by
the British Atomic Energy Authority, about 40 tons of this type of
ammunition is supposed to be scattered in the frontier area between
Iraq, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia. Other experts assume that there is as
much as 300 tons of it. Not more than 10% of these projectiles have been
detected; most have been blown over and covered by sand, or are lying
deep in the ground. During rainfall the toxic substances permeate into
the ground water, thus entering the food chain; a source of danger in
the long run in these areas.
A British company refused a request to remove this Uranium
ammunition because of too great a health risk to their staff.
Bedouins from Kuwait battlefield areas, which US troops used
as training grounds, reported hundreds of camels, sheep and birds lying
in the desert. Examinations made by American veterinary specialists
showed that the animals had died neither from bullets or diseases. Some
carcasses were covered with insects, but the insects were also dead.
Saudi Arabia had demanded that all tanks, vehicles and
instruments of war destroyed by Uranium ammunition on their territory be
collected by the US army. The material was collected and transported to
the USA; prior to their request it had been buried in the desert.
The President of the US Gulf War Veterans Association is
engaged in research into the so-called 'Gulf War Syndrome.' Symptoms
include defects and damage to internal organs, chronic fatigue, loss of
endurance, frequent infections, sore throat, coughing, skin rashes,
night sweats, nausea, vomiting, diahorrea, dizziness, headaches, memory
loss, confusion, vision problems, muscle spasms and cramps, joint pains,
loss of mobility, aching muscles, swollen glands, dental problems, and
malformation of new born children.
He estimates 50,000 to 80,000 veterans are affected. 39,000
have been dismissed from active service; 2400 to 5000 have died to date. DU contamination engenders cancer risks, and several soldiers reported
that upon their return through commercial airports, the Geiger counters
had '.become crazy.'. In Britain approximately 4000 soldiers are
affected; about 160 have already died, as well as a number of
Australians, Canadians and French.
Similar symptoms have occurred in Kuwait and are spreading
out. It is believed that as many as 250,000 Iraqis have been affected,
with high death rates. An American study in 1993 is said to have shown
that approx. 50,000 Iraqi children died during the eight months after
the war from the detrimental effects of DU projectiles.
In March 1994, reports published in the US found that of 251
families of veterans living in the state of Mississippi, 67% of the
children of these families were born with congenital deformities. Eyes,
ears or fingers were missing, or they suffered from severe blood disease
and respiratory problems.
A parallel can be drawn with the situation which developed
after the accident at the atomic reactor in Chernobyl in the former
Soviet Union. Since then a sharp increase in cancer has been recorded,
especially among children. Their mortality rate is also very high, as
are malformations at birth.
Other incidents of suspected DU contamination occurred in
Germany in 1998 when a US A-10 plane crashed at Remscheid. Additionally
an Israeli El-Al transport plane crashed in Amsterdam, Holland in 1992.
Both planes were suspected of carrying radioactive materials on board.
In both cases an increase in skin diseases, kidney dysfunction,
childhood leukaemia and birth deformities have been registered.
In November 1996 it was reported that in the former
Yugoslavia approx. 1000 children were suffering from an unknown disease:
headaches, aching muscles, abdominal pain, dizziness, respiratory
problems and others, symptoms highly similar to 'Gulf War Syndrome.' 600
of these children were receiving hospital treatment. In December 1997
and January 1998 the Balkan media reported a dramatic increase of
leukaemia and cancer development within the population of Srpska, as
well as an increase in malformation of new born children. The cows in
this region showed reduced and bloody milk production, while milk
production in other animals stopped completely. In Bosnia unusual
vegetations are growing and fruits show unusual forms. Investigations by
the Nuclear Research Institute in Vinca revealed a dangerous increase of
radiation levels after NATO used DU ammunition during bombardments.
There are indications that DU ammunitions have been developed
by German based technologists and given for use to 'friendly' countries.
As is well known, German industry also developed poisonous gases that
were used to kill millions of people in German concentration camps.
German scientists again developed rockets that were used during World
War Two to kill thousands. These technologies have since been refined
and improved, leading to untold human suffering, bitterness and hatred.
In my position as a physician and scientist I call upon all
those responsible, as well as the public at large, to see that the use
of DU ammunition is banned. This is a very real danger as such weapons
are at the disposal of several states at present. It has already been
used in one war, with irreparable damages. It is for us, the citizens of
the world, to see that such dangerous weapon systems are banned and
never used again.
Mysterious
Diseases Haunt US Troops In Iraq 7-17-3
BAGHDAD (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) -- Several mysterious diseases
were reported among a number of American troops within the vicinity of
Baghdad airport, a military source closely close to NATO unveiled.
U.S. soldiers deployed around Baghdad airport started showing symptoms of
mysterious fever, itching, scars and dark brown spots on the skin, the
source, who refused to be named, said in statements published Thursday,
July 17, by the Saudi Al-Watan newspaper.
He asserted that three soldiers who suffered these symptoms did not
respond to medical treatment in Iraqi hospitals and were flown to
Washington for medication.
The military source reported a media blackout by U.S. officials to hide
such information from the public.
The Americans claim the symptoms and the mysterious diseases were
resulting from exposure to the scourging sun, which the U.S. troops are
not used to, he added.
U.S. officials did not come up with an explanation for the symptoms,
which NATO experts tend to believe result from direct exposure to powerful
nuclear radiations of the sophisticated B-2 bombs used in the war on Iraq,
particularly in striking Iraqi Republican Guards forces who deployed to
defend the vicinity of Baghdad airport.
The military source stressed that the shrouds of secrecy imposed by
American officials on the issue were prompted by fears of creating waves
of panic and anger among the troops, particularly after announcements that
American troops would remain in Iraq
indefinitely.
He asserted that NATO experts measured levels of radioactive pollution in
Iraq and confirmed there were levels of radioactive pollution with
destructive impacts on man and environment that may lead to risks suffered
by generations to come.
On April 25, the British Observer quoted military sources as affirming
that depleted uranium shells and bombs used by U.S. and British troops
during Iraq invasion were five times more than the number used during 1991
Gulf war.
The Pentagon had admitted shelling Iraq with about 350 tons of depleted
uranium in 1991, aggravating cancerous tumors cases among Iraqis.
On July 16, the News-Leader site operating out of Springfield,
Missouri published a detailed report describing the symptoms of one of
the soldiers who has died from the alleged pneumonia. Josh Neusche, a
20-year-old, fit and healthy Missouri National Guardsman, collapsed in
Baghdad on July 2. He was evacuated to Landstuhl, Germany. His family
was informed he was suffering from pneumonia caused by fluid in his
lungs. According to his mother, his liver, kidneys and muscles then
began to break down. He was placed on dialysis, but fell into a coma and
died on July 12.
For anyone familiar with the research into the medical effects of
exposure to depleted uranium, the details of Josh Neusche's death would
have to ring alarm bells. The 2001 World Health Organization report into
the issue notes: "Brief accidental exposure to high concentrations of
uranium hexafluoride has caused acute respiratory illness, which may be
fatal." [Full report available at
http://www.who.int/ionizing_radiation/pub_meet/ir_pub/en/]
WHAT WE DON'T KNOW ABOUT THIS WAR: WHAT HAVE THEY WROUGHT?
From Jon Rappoport
www.nomorefakenews.com
April 7, 2003
Yesterday, in an attempt to find out more about the death of NBC
reporter, David Bloom, I spoke with the former head of the Pentagon
Depleted Uranium Investigation Team, Dr. Doug Rokke.
Rokke was the man who went to Iraq a decade ago on a mission to report
on depleted uranium (DU). What he found was so horrifying the Pentagon
scuttled his work and tried to make him an invisible man. Rokke suffered
uranium poisoning himself. But his medical records, and those of who
knows how many thousands of other soldiers, do not reflect that. History
has been suppressed, has been re-written.
Our conversation began with me asking Rokke if he thought that the
announced cause of David Bloom's death, pulmonary embolism, could have
resulted from DU. But Rokke stopped me short. He said, "This was the
diagnosis they immediately gave out? I don't see how. You can't diagnose
that from the battlefield. You really need an autopsy to discover
whether that's the cause..."
Which opened up new questions. Rokke began to talk about conditions in
the Gulf now. He said that the PR about the US limiting civilian
casualties is absurd, because, for example, the Pentagon admits to
losing 700 cruise missiles that have been fired at Baghdad in the
current campaign. In other words, those missiles strayed off course and
no one really knows where they landed and exploded. "700 missiles, each
one loaded with DU, is 700,000 pounds of explosives," he said. 700,000
pounds of explosives going off, spreading
cancer-causing uranium in all directions.
Rokke then informed me that, since 1990, and up to the beginning of Gulf
War 2, some 260,000 US soldiers have been granted disability. 10,000
have died. I'm relaying these facts to you in a sober way, but of course
I was staggered as Rokke talked. He painted a picture of the Iraqi
landscape as a toxic soup. DU, yes. But also many other toxins, because
as he explained, when bombs and missiles rip up ANY material that is
composite or synthetic, like plastics, you get all sorts of poisonous
byproducts. And that, for example, is what happened at the WTC on 9/11.
Rokke said, "I trained a lot of those first health responders. They're
dead now."
Rokke, over the years, together with colleagues, has issued report after
report describing what, in essence, are the inevitable consequences of
modern warfare as it is carried out. A lingering toxic landscape that
kills over time.
When Rokke was in the Gulf a decade ago, one of his fears was confirmed:
the masks worn to protect against DU don't work. They can't filter out
the smallest and deadliest particles of uranium. "We could taste the
stuff [uranium]," he said. Rokke states that the Pentagon is completely
aware of the dangers to US solders and combatants, and just doesn't
care.
I asked him why DU is used in projectile shells and missiles. He told me
it was because uranium is so dense the weight of impact on a target
causes a lot more damage. And, he said, these shells are not merely
coated or tipped with uranium, as some Pentagon people have stated. They
are packed with it. Rokke likened the situation to having uranium rods
in your backyard. He went on to explain that the PB pills US soldiers
have been taking, as protection against nerve gas, are themselves nerve
agents. If taken immediately before a
nerve-gas attack---and then followed up with two other medicines---the
soldier might get protection from nerve gas. But the PB pills are being
swallowed long in advance of any possible contact with nerve gas. In
essence, soldiers are getting "nerve gas" attacks
FROM THE POISON PILLS.
Rokke mentioned a number of sites around the world---Afghanistan and the
former Yugoslavia, and places in the US---where DU is a major problem
right now. By this point in our conversation, Rokke was piecing together
an emerging picture of modern war as both murder and suicide. He
predicted the consequences of the Iraq war are going to be worse than
Gulf War 1. Worse, in terms of damage and death to US troops and the
Iraqi people.
I hung up the phone stunned. I can only ask that you get this
information out to as many people as possible. To give the widest
possible benefit of the doubt to mainstream news reporters, THEY JUST
DON'T KNOW. They have no idea what they are supporting when they allow
the picture of this war to be painted as a careful and controlled
campaign. All those maps and arrows and targets---they need to be
enveloped in a cloud of MULTIPLE POISONS. Then we would have some
concept of what is really going on---and what is going to happen when
it's over.
Rokke mentioned that, between Gulf War 1 and the start of Gulf 2, the
Iraqis tried to build new water treatment facilities in Basra. To clean
up their horrible, illness-causing contaminated water. Each time they
tried, he said, those emerging facilities were destroyed...
What is happening in the Gulf is not merely the result of ignorance. It
is not only depraved indifference. It is a plan to depopulate and
destroy. US soldiers will be sacrificed, in huge numbers, to forward the
larger goal; the depopulation and debilitation of Iraq. Yet, the news
networks still display that graphic: OPERATION IRAQI FREEDOM. And DOD
spokesmen keep saying the protection of the Iraqi oil fields is being
done to preserve "the future wealth of the Iraqi people." That sick joke
takes on a new and very ominous meaning.
If 260,000 US vets now on disability from Gulf 1 can be hidden from the
stupefied American people, what else can be hidden, here and in Iraq, in
the coming months and years? How many cases of cancer? How many birth
defects? How many kidney and liver failures? How many
immune-system destructions? How many American families who support their
children now doing time in the Gulf will later watch those sons and
daughters waste away, while the Pentagon claims it's all post-traumatic
stress? How far do all the toxic clouds drift? How many cases of illness
are being misdiagnosed as the result of germs?
We are in a time of madness. I can't fault prayer or the
distractions of television or even the desperate accoutrements of
so-called patriotism. But somehow we have to live beyond clichés and
summon up the outrage equal to the destruction. Equal to the moment.
The wretched hairless generals are striding through the Pentagon
thinking they are on a course of victory, thinking whatever they have to
think to avoid the truth that is chasing them like a snake.
Let the cardboard floors of lies give way and collapse. Let the voices
of the intelligent pro-war advocates incorporate this news.
Let them, finally, arrive at a further shore of conscience that
compels them to take a stand. They are viewing old images, they are
seeing a fantasy of war, they are imagining situations that no longer
exist.
War is now different. It is a sword you always fall on.
WAKE UP. WAKE UP.
Sites relating to the effects of taking nerve agent antidotes and being
in contact with Depleted Uranium...
http://www.mindfully.org/Health/Gulf-Children-Defects.htm
http://www.cnn.com/HEALTH/9712/08/briefs/gulf.war.birth.defect
http://www.chronicillnet.org/online/children.html
http://www.gulflink.osd.mil/news/na_med_16jun.htm
http://www.af.mil/news/Jun1997/n19970605_970669.html
From Jon Rappoport
=======================
March 5, 2004
A radioactive nightmare in Concord, Massachusetts:
"Depleted Uranium" kills Americans in America
April 4, 2004
Shocking report reveals local troops may be
victims of America's depleted uranium
munitions
The 442nd is made up for the most part of New
York cops, firefighters and correction officers. New Yorkers, you're
getting slammed again
Please pass the above information on to your network and help spread the
real story of what is going on with this administration and what they
have done.
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