[Peace-discuss] IAC

[Dlind49 at aol.com]

September, 2003
>
> Iraqi Cities 'Hot' with Depleted Uranium
> Dutch Worry About Depleted Uranium As Troops Enter Iraq
> By Sara Flounders
>
> Has U.S. use of depleted-uranium weapons turned Iraq into a  
> radioactive danger area for both Iraqis and occupation troops?
>
> This question has already had serious consequences. In hot spots in 
> downtown Baghdad, reporters have measured radiation levels that are 
> 1,000 to 1,900 times higher than normal background radiation levels.
>
> It has also opened a debate in the Netherlands parliament and media as 
> 1,100 Dutch troops in Kuwait prepare to enter Iraq as part of the 
> U.S./British-led occupation forces. The Dutch are concerned about the 
> danger of radioactive poisoning and radiation sickness in Iraq.
>
> Washington has assured the Dutch government that it used no DU weapons 
> near Al-Samawah, the town where Dutch troops will be stationed. But 
> Dutch journalists and anti-war forces have already found holes in the 
> U.S. stories, according to an article on the Radio Free Europe > website.
>
> DU-caused radiation had already raised alarms in Europe after studies 
> showed increased rates of cancers, respiratory ailments and other 
> disabilities of occupation troops from NATO countries stationed in 
> Bosnia, Kosovo and Afghanistan.
>
> In general, the health and environmental dangers of weapons made with 
> DU radioactive waste have received far more attention in Europe than 
> in the U.S.
>
> In this year's war on Iraq, the Pentagon used its radioactive arsenal 
> mainly in the urban centers, rather than in desert battlefields as in 
> 1991. Many hundreds of thousands of Iraqi people and U.S. soldiers, 
> along with British, Polish, Japanese and Dutch soldiers sent to join 
> the occupation, will suffer the consequences. The real extent of 
> injuries, chronic illness, long-term disabilities and genetic birth 
> defects won't be apparent for five to 10 years.
>
> By now, half of all the 697,000 U.S. soldiers involved in the 1991 war 
> have reported serious illnesses. According to the American Gulf War 
> Veterans Association, more than 30 percent of these soldiers are 
> chronically ill and are receiving disability benefits from the 
> Veterans Administration. Such a high occurrence of various symptoms 
> has led to the illnesses being named Gulf War Syndrome.
>
> This number of disabled veterans is shockingly high. Most are in their 
> mid-thirties and should be in the prime of health. Before sending 
> troops to the Gulf region, the military had already sifted out those 
> with disabilities or chronic health problems from asthma, diabetes, 
> heart conditions, cancers and birth defects.
>
> A long-term problem
>
> The impact of tons of radioactive waste polluting major urban centers 
> may seem a distant problem to Iraqis now trying to survive in the 
> chaos of military occupation. They must cope with power outages during 
> the intense heat of summer, door-to-door searches, arbitrary arrests, 
> civilians routinely shot at roadblocks, outbreaks of cholera and 
> dysentery from untreated water, untreated sewage and uncollected 
> garbage, more than half the work force unemployed, and a lack of 
> food--which before the war was distributed by the Baathist regime.
>
> But along with these current threats are long-range problems. Around 
> the world a growing number of scientific organizations and studies 
> have linked Gulf War Syndrome and the high rate of assorted and 
> mysterious sicknesses to radiation poisoning from weapons made with 
> depleted uranium.
>
> Scott Peterson, a staff writer for the Christian Science Monitor, 
> reported on May 15 about taking Geiger-counter readings at several 
> sites in Baghdad. Near the Republican Palace where U.S. troops stood 
> guard and over 1,000 employees walked in and out of the building, his 
> radiation readings were the "hottest" in Iraq, at nearly 1,900 times 
> background radiation levels. Spent shell casings still littered the 
> ground.
>
> At a roadside vegetable stand selling fresh bunches of parsley, mint 
> and onions outside Baghdad, children played on a burnt-out Iraqi tank. 
> The reporter's Geiger counter registered nearly 1,000 times normal 
> background radiation. The U.S. uses armor-piercing shells coated with 
> DU to destroy tanks.
>
> The Aug. 4 Seattle Post Intelligencer reported elevated radiation 
> levels at six sites from Basra to Baghdad. One destroyed tank near 
> Baghdad had 1,500 times the normal background radiation. "The Pentagon 
> and the United Nations estimate that the U.S. and Britain used 1,100 
> to 2,200 tons of armor-piercing shells made of depleted uranium during 
> attacks on Iraq in March and April--far more than the 375 tons used in 
> the 1991 Gulf War," wrote the Post Intelligencer.
>
> The Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle analyzed swabs 
> from bullet holes in Iraqi tanks and confirmed elevated radiation 
> levels.
>
> Radioactive and toxic
>
> The extremely dense DU shells easily penetrate steel armor and burn on 
> impact. The fire releases microscopic, radioactive and toxic dust 
> particles of uranium oxide that travel with the wind and can be 
> inhaled or ingested. They also spread contamination by seeping into 
> the land and water.
>
> In the human body, DU may cause harm to the internal organs due both 
> to its chemical toxicity as a heavy metal and its release of > radiation.
>
> An otherwise useless by-product of the uranium-enrichment process, DU 
> is attractive to military contractors because it is so cheap, often 
> offered for free by the government.
>
> According to the Uranium Medical Research Center, the toxic and 
> radiological effects of uranium contamination may weaken the immune 
> system. They may cause acute respiratory conditions like pneumonia, 
> flu-like symptoms and severe coughs, renal or gastrointestinal 
> illnesses.
>
> Dr. Asaf Durakovic of UMRC explains that the initial symptoms will be 
> mostly neurological, showing up as headaches, weakness, dizziness and 
> muscle fatigue. The long-term effects are cancers and other 
> radiation-related illnesses, such as chronic fatigue syndrome, joint 
> and muscle pain, rashes, neurological and/or nerve damage, mood 
> disturbances, infections, lung and kidney damage, vision problems, 
> auto-immune deficiencies and severe skin conditions. It also causes 
> increases in miscarriages, maternal mortality and genetic birth 
> defects.
>
> For years the government described Gulf War Syndrome as a 
> post-traumatic stress disorder. It was labeled a psychological problem 
> or simply dismissed as mysterious unrelated ailments. In this same way 
> the Pentagon and the Veterans Administration treated the health 
> problems of Vietnam vets suffering from Agent Orange poisoning.
>
> The cover-up
>
> The U.S. government denies that DU weapons can cause sickness. But 
> before the first Gulf War, where DU weapons were used extensively, the 
> Pentagon's own internal reports warned that the radiation and heavy 
> metal of DU weapons could cause kidney, lung and liver damage and 
> increased rates of cancer.
>
> Ignoring these dangers, the Pentagon went on to use these weapons, 
> which gave it a big advantage in tank battles. But it denied publicly 
> that DU use was related to the enormously high rate of sicknesses 
> among GIs following the war.
>
> Today the Pentagon plays an even more duplicitous role. It continues 
> to assert that there are no "known" health problems associated with 
> DU. But Army training manuals require anyone who comes within 75 feet 
> of any DU-contaminated equipment or terrain to wear respiratory and 
> skin protection.
>
> The manuals say that "contamination will make food and water unsafe 
> for consumption." According to the Army Environmental Policy 
> Institute, holding a spent DU round exposes a person to about 200 rems 
> per hour, or twice the annual radiation exposure limit.
>
> This March and April U.S. and British forces fired hundreds of 
> thousands of DU rounds in dense urban areas. Superfine uranium oxide 
> particles were blown about in dust storms. Yet the Pentagon refuses to 
> track, report or mark off where DU was fired. There is no way Iraqis 
> or the occupying soldiers can keep 75 feet away or use respiratory and 
> skin protection in 120-degree heat.
>
> The American Gulf War Veterans Association (AGWVA) reports that 
> suffering veterans are receiving little, if any, medical treatment for 
> their illnesses. "Whenever veterans become ill, the term 'mystery 
> illness' seems to be the first and often the only diagnosis that is 
> ever made. Veterans are then left to fend for themselves, sick and 
> unable to work, with little hope of a normal life again."
>
> Iraq's National Ministry of Health organized two international 
> conferences to present data on the relationship between the high 
> incidence of cancer and the use of DU weapons. It produced detailed 
> epidemiological reports and statistical studies. These data showed a 
> six-fold increase in breast cancer, a five-fold increase in lung 
> cancer and a 16-fold increase in ovarian cancer.
>
> Because of the U.S.-imposed sanctions, Iraqi doctors and scientists 
> were barred from presenting their research papers in most of the > world.
>
> Doug Rokke of AGWVA, former head of the U.S. Army DU Project, who is 
> seriously ill with respiratory problems, has been campaigning against 
> the use of DU. Rokke reports that U.S. troops presently in Iraq are 
> already falling sick with a series of Gulf War Syndrome symptoms.
>
> The AGWVA says the Department of Defense has information regarding 
> "mystery" deaths of soldiers in this latest war and the emergence of a 
> mysterious pneumonia that has sickened at least 100 men and women.
>
> U.S. position: no clean-up
>
> While the U.K. has admitted that British Challenger tanks expended 
> some 1.9 tons of DU ammunition during major combat operations in Iraq 
> this year, the U.S. has refused to disclose specific information about 
> whether and where it used DU during this year's campaign. It also is 
> refusing to let a team from the United Nations Environmental Program 
> (UNEP) study the environmental impact of DU contamination in Iraq.
>
> Despite this refusal, it is public knowledge that the U.S. made 
> extensive use of weapons that can fire DU shells. These include the 
> A-10 Warthog tank-buster aircraft with 30-mm cannons that can fire up 
> to 4,200 DU rounds per minute; the AC-130 gunship; the "Apache" 
> helicopter, and Bradley fighting vehicles that fire anti-armor 105-mm 
> to 120-mm tank rounds containing DU.
>
> The U.S. followed the same tactics in the wars in the Balkans. While 
> claiming full cooperation with UNEP's Balkans studies, the Pentagon 
> delayed releasing target locations for 16 months. It gave misleading 
> map information. Then bomb, missile and cluster-bomb targets were 
> excluded. NATO allowed 10 other teams to visit or clean up sites 
> before UNEP inspections started.
>
> Washington refuses to acknowledge DU use anywhere or that it poses any 
> danger. To acknowledge radiation poisoning would immediately raise 
> demands for a cleanup.
>
> According to Alex Kirby, BBC News Online environment correspondent: 
> "The U.S. says it has no plans to remove the debris left over from 
> depleted uranium weapons it is using in Iraq. It says no cleanup is 
> needed, because research shows DU has no long-term effects."
>
> Evidence of DU use
>
> But in the information age, the Pentagon can't suppress all the 
> evidence. The Dutch example shows this. Though the U.S. government 
> specifically denied any firing of DU weapons near the city of 
> Al-Samawah, where Dutch troops were to be stationed, a simple Internet 
> search by journalists undid this lie.
>
> The Dutch government, to get a resolution through the parliament to 
> authorize sending troops to Iraq, depicted the Al-Samawah region as a 
> remote, barely inhabited desert where no noteworthy events had 
> occurred.
>
> In actual fact, Al-Samawah is strategically located on the road from 
> Basra to Baghdad, providing access to a bridge over the Euphrates 
> River. On its march to Baghdad, the U.S. Army encountered fierce 
> resistance from Iraqi forces there, according to American officers. 
> This was well covered by their embedded media.
>
> It was more than a week before the town and the road were cleared of 
> all pockets of resistance. Some 112 civilians, most of them 
> inhabitants of Al-Samawah, were killed in battle.
>
> DU ammunition was widely used during this operation. In a widely 
> distributed field message, Sergeant First Class Cooper reported that 
> the weapons systems used by the 3rd Infantry, 7th Cavalry, en route to 
> Al-Samawah and on to Najaf, were performing well, especially the 25-mm 
> DU and 7.62.
>
> Of greater interest to Internet researchers was a letter a young 
> soldier sent home to his parents, which they posted in their church 
> bulletin on the Internet. In the letter E. Pennell, a crew member on a 
> Bradley Fighting Vehicle of the 1st Infantry Battalion, 41st Infantry 
> Regiment, described how his crew fired a 25-mm DU round as they 
> encountered seven Iraqi troops in the town of Al-Samawah.
>
> Pennell's letter has raised concern among groups like the United 
> Federation of Military Personnel, a kind of labor union for Dutch 
> troops. It fears that its members might be at risk of contracting 
> cancer or other diseases because of exposure to DU ammunition.
>
> Resistance: the only solution
>
> Officers and politicians in imperialist countries have always treated 
> rank-and-file soldiers as cannon fodder. These young lives are totally 
> expendable. The occupied or colonized people are not counted at all.
>
> As a global movement against imperialist wars grew over the past 
> century, military planners made great efforts to hide the true costs 
> of war, especially the human cost. The nearly 60,000 U.S. casualties 
> in the Vietnam War provoked a mighty mass anti-war movement. This 
> time, long before U.S. casualties reached 100 soldiers, the movement 
> to "Bring the Troops Home" had gained momentum.
>
> This new movement must demand a true accounting of the enormous human 
> costs of the war. The impact on the health and future of not only U.S. 
> troops but the millions of people in Iraq must be part of the demand.
>
> A growing international movement must demand full reparations for the 
> Iraqi people. A cleanup of the toxic, radioactive waste is in the 
> interests of all the people of the region. The cost of the war must be 
> calculated in terms of bankrupt social programs here in the U.S. and 
> the health of all the people who were in the region during the war and 
> will be in the years to come.
>
> Sara Flounders is co-director of the International Action Center and 
> coordinator of the DU Education Project. She is an editor and a 
> contributing author of the book "Metal of Dishonor: Depleted
>
> Uranium," and helped produce a video by the same name. The IAC helped 
> organize
>
> an international effort to bring the issue of DU to the UN  Human 
> Rights
>
> Commission in Geneva and helped measure radiation levels in Iraq 
> before the 2003 war.
>
> © Copyright S Flounders 2003  For fair use only/ pour usage équitable 
> seulement .
>
>  
>