Toxic legacy of US assault on Fallujah 'worse than Hiroshima'

Toxic legacy of US assault on Fallujah 'worse than Hiroshima'

www.independent.co.u k

Dramatic increases in infant mortality, cancer and leukaemia in the Iraqi city of Fallujah, which was bombarded by US Marines in 2004, exceed those reported by survivors of the atomic bombs that were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945, according to a new study.

(visit the link for the full news article)

This is... disturbing.

The military will tell you that DU rounds are necessary, and that they are not particularly harmful, but in a conflict where inflicting "collateral damage" was a big no-no, it appears that "legacy damage" is now a huge issue.

And was some of this born out of recklness?

In the assault US commanders largely treated Fallujah as a free-fire zone to try to reduce casualties among their own troops. British officers were appalled by the lack of concern for civilian casualties. "During preparatory operations in the November 2004 Fallujah clearance operation, on one night over 40 155mm artillery rounds were fired into a small sector of the city," recalled Brigadier Nigel Aylwin-Foster, a British commander serving with the American forces in Baghdad.

He added that the US commander who ordered this devastating use of firepower did not consider it significant enough to mention it in his daily report to the US general in command.

Its kind of scary to think that things may have been slightly out of control here from a military perspective.

Any way you look at it, our "liberation" of Iraq seems to look shakier and shakier.

www.independent.co.u k
(visit the link for the full news article)

Depleted uranium is still uranium and it still dangerous. It will be radioactive until it is lead. Being exposed to it is a bad thing. I do not understand why our government exposes out troops to it. I do understand why it is used as bullets. We will not allow nuclear waste dumps to be built and it has to go somewhere. So they bury it about 4 inches deep in random hillsides on the other side of the planet.

The hypocrisy is so great that it is hard to comprehend.

This isn't exactly breaking news. This has been reported on for years and there are a couple of academic surveys and investigations into the claims.

Here, www.mdpi.com...

and here, www.mdpi.com...

Your thread brought to mind a few others I've read.

For example, US Could Use Limited Nuclear Weapons in Iraq, - Posted January '03.
The Source from that thread, 9 years ago, reads in part:

U.S. forces could use nuclear-tipped "bunker-buster" bombs against buried terrorist weapons in Iraq, should Congress approve funding to develop the new weapons. The enhanced bombs, called "Robust Nuclear Earth Penetrators (RNEP)," would be used to destroy caches of weapons of mass destruction hidden deep inside hardened caves and bunkers. Like the conventional "bunker-busters" used in Afghanistan against cave-hidden Taliban and al Qaeda weapons and personnel, the Robust Nuclear Earth Penetrator bomb will not fully detonate until deep below ground. Unlike the explosives in the conventional bunker-buster, however, the RNEP's warhead will pack a nuclear punch.

Of course, we also get this "reassurance:"

While the Robust Nuclear Earth Penetrator is undeniably a nuclear weapon, Pentagon officials are quick to point out that it be designed to do its job without spreading radiation into the atmosphere, and that its development would comply with all nuclear arms reduction and test ban treaties.

So the US clearly showed a desire to deploy at least one form of nuclear weapon (as of '03). The US Massive bombardment of Fallujah occurs in '04. And now the numbers of birth defects, cancers, etc. in the area are undeniable.

Shame shame shame on us.

Edit to add: Additional Thread Link - www.abovetopsecret.com...

You should watch the vids on you tube about the birth deffects caused by d.u..
I showed my wife and she couldn't believe they were real.
It's a shame that no one's.really makeing noise about d.u..
It's a crime against humanity to do this.
Another crime commited in our name that we will turn a blind eye to.

Originally posted by neformore

Toxic legacy of US assault on Fallujah 'worse than Hiroshima'

With DU floating around in the atmosphere, blown up into the sky from the battlefields of Kozovo, Iraq, Afganistan and Libya this is what our children's children will one day look like...



Remember, Americans; red dust originating from the Sahara Desert reaches the east coast of America every year.

Thanks to you bombing Libya, that dust will now be radioactive.

reply to post by neformore


RT recently had a documentary on this horrible subject.
rt.com...

The program starts by guessing that the use of white phosphorus is responsible for the birth defects and elevated cancers in Fallujah-that is until they test the soil and find Uranium..
It interviews Dr Chris Busby-Professor Christopher Busby is the scientific secretary of the European Committee on Radiation Risks,who concludes Uranium munitions are the cause.

He was also interviewed separate from the documentary in this RT piece:



This subject along with the still ongoing agent orange birth defects/cancers is one of the worst war crimes the USA has ever committed IMO.
To use a weapon which will destroy the following generations,none of whom have ever participated in any acts of aggression against the USA is pure EVIL.
The fact it is still going on today,and no one is held to account makes it even worse...

Utterly shameful,evil war crimes,committed against INNOCENTS,by the "freedom loving", "democratic" leader of the "free world."
This will still be killing and maiming innocent babies for many decades/centuries.

And people wonder why so many folks in the middle east hate the USA???

I served right in the middle of this battle and can tell you first hand of the horrors both sides endured. It was pretty bad to say the least. I have some stuff to do thismorning but I will ome back on later and give some acounts of just what happened there. I will also share some of the info I have as well. Good thread subject as the truth about Fallujah is not known by many.

Doesn't just stop at battleground guys.

Flightline workers have a high risk of developing digestive disorders shortly after getting out, I've said it once I'll say it again, I was fine before going in, and a year after being discharged, I was hospital bed ridden for 2 years.

Governments don't care, that's why they form governments in the 1st place.

Can't form a capitalistic marketing regime without a non-giving a damn government.

Depletive Uranium is terrible because although not very radioactive, the price for this is that it's half life is extreme (4.68 billion years) so it will still be killing half as many people today when our sun finally absorbs the Earth.
No other weapon can kill in a million years time, let alone literally thousands of times longer.

Here How It Works...
Depletive Uranium only emits Alpha radiation (which you can stop with a piece of A4 paper)
And Beta (which can be stopped by a thin sheet a aluminum)

BUT...
When a shell hits a target, the friction of impact rips it apart, and then the Uranium burns (like magnesium or lithium chemically burn in air) then the warhead is converted into microscopic particles, that can be inhaled-ingested directly into the human body. Then these particles emit radiation at point blank range into your cells (i.e. DNA) and they do this for years, and that's how you get birth defects from it.
The stuff is supposed to have a biological half life of only 15 days, but this isn't accurate as it depends if your a growing child-baby (in which case it becomes part of you) and how much has got into your body fat. U238 accumulates in body fat, meaning a cow eating grass with DU on it, will have milk far more contaminated than the grass it ever ate. Basically it's rather like DTT for human beings, and worst of all (unlike DTT) more than half will be around as long as the Earth can sustain life from the sun. The military knows what's its done to its own, as well as the civilians it leaves behind.

This is horrific and sickening.
Even the WHO remains hush-hush about it? It's pure evil, and wrong on so many levels...
the woman in the vid has implored the public to notify their governments, wherever they live, to bring this to light. I am astounded, embarrassed, disgusted, and grief-stricken over what men decide to do to people in the name of whatever stupid resource or principle they select.

Uggh. This is just as valid a reason for protests like OWS as any. War is EVIL. I can only imagine how many generations will be destroyed, or live in fear of having children. Perhaps the human race is so close to self-designed extinction and irreversible damage that no amount of liberal egalitarian do-overs and reorganizations can help.

I'm beginning to un-hope that I live to be a grandmother. It breaks my heart to think of the waste and ugliness our descendants already face....can't these warmongering asses just STOP already?

Stupid. Sickening and stupid.

The pictures of the affected children are horrifying and more than I can bear to see again. Let's not forget the whole reason for attacking Fallujah was over a couple of paid Blackwater mercenaries which the MSM conveniently buried within the reporting to make it seem as if US troops were hung from the bridge instead.
Add to the DU and possible nuclear weapons white phosphorous which was reportedly used in bombing.
Fallujah was also a critical battle during the second world war which cost the British heavily to take. Sometimes place names on maps have an historical significance that our leaders can't seem to relinquish without heavy loss of life.
I believe Fallujah to be one of them and the children will bear the scars of war for generations to come.
It seems the casualties never end in modern warfare.

reply to post by neformore


This is not the result of DU. This is a myth pushed by anti-war propagandists.

Depleted Uranium is most commonly used against armor assets. Not against soft targets. Not enough depleted uranium could be used to cause this. Secondly DU is NOT U235 which is highly radioactive. I recommend doing more research on what DU actually is rather than what the media and propagandists would have you believe it is.

Thirdly, Falluja's infrastructure was destroyed in the intense fighting. No electricity, running water, sanitation and health services. Conflict tends to cripple these things and as a result infant mortality rates go up. Infection rates of diseases not normally associated with the area goes up. While it is equally terrible that such suffering is going on, misdiagnosing the problem just to cast aspersions on the US military does no one any good.

Familiarize yourselves with it:

Depleted uranium WHO

About 98% of uranium entering the body via ingestion is not absorbed, but is eliminated via the faeces. Typical gut absorption rates for uranium in food and water are about 2% for soluble and about 0.2% for insoluble uranium compounds.

What about du enetering your lungs and through your skin?
oooops

DU AND chemical weapons
coming soon to a neigbourhood near you...

Research links rise in Falluja birth defects and cancers to US assault• Defects in newborns 11 times higher than normal
War contaminants' from 2004 attack could be cause

www.guardian.co.uk...

Depleted Uranium and Health: Facts and Helpful Suggestions
by Glen Lawrence Ph.d.
Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, Long Island University, Brooklyn, NY 11201
PDF file) Essential information for soldiers and civilians who are at risk for uranium contamination in areas where DU munitions have been used

www.grassrootspeace.org...

guns will be a big help holding that off





oh yeah and NO effin WMD

reply to post by Danbones


DU's entrance through the skin is negligible at best as current research shows.

Secondly, from your article:

"We suspect that the population is chronically exposed to an environmental agent," said one of the report's authors, environmental toxicologist Mozhgan Savabieasfahani. "We don't know what that environmental factor is, but we are doing more tests to find out."

So this is all supposition and all of you have no damned clue what you're talking about? Gotcha.

Originally posted by projectvxn
reply to post by Danbones

 

DU's entrance through the skin is negligible at best as current research shows.

Secondly, from your article:

"We suspect that the population is chronically exposed to an environmental agent," said one of the report's authors, environmental toxicologist Mozhgan Savabieasfahani. "We don't know what that environmental factor is, but we are doing more tests to find out."

So this is all supposition and all of you have no damned clue what you're talking about? Gotcha.

that was for the chemical agent statement in my post smart boy
read the pdf re DU
and where are those wmd again?
gotcha

reply to post by Danbones


How about I read more of the article you used?

Scientific studies have so far established no link between the rounds, which contain ionising radiation to burst through armour and are commonly used on the battlefield.

Hmmm.

And the fact that this same article quotes the researchers as saying that MANY different types of toxins and residue, commonly found on battlefields(not just battlefields where the US is involved) may be contributing factors.

And please stay on topic. This isn't about Bush's BS excuses for invading Iraq. This is about more DU mythology.

I see you skipped the essential reading part

The report acknowledges that other battlefield residues may also be responsible for the defects. "Many known war contaminants have the potential to interfere with normal embryonic and foetal development," the report says. "The devastating effect of dioxins on the reproductive health of the Vietnamese people is well-known."

from the uk article above
guess this isn't your first rodeo

and the gulf of tonkin never happened either