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

Well we got rid of hundreds of thousands of pounds of Depleted Uranium we would have had to otherwise store on US soil. What if another administration decides we are liable to have to clean it all up? which we always seem to rebuild the countries we destroy in war. If that happens count on massive amounts more fatalities of technicians and soldiers while it is being located and disposed of, simply from attack by country nationals in their hatred of the US. Plus the cost of cleanup will bankrupt us. You can thank George Bush for this fiasco.... The gallows is too good for him.

reply to post by projectvxn

But I don't think that DU saturation is such that it could be causing anything of this scale. Even the article and scientists involved in the research weren't capable of giving a definitive answer.

Yes it is. I was there. I saw with my own eyes, thousands upon thousands of DU rounds being used all over that city from both armored vehicles, tanks and aircraft. Our unit alone fired thousands of rounds of 25mm DU ammo into that place. Trust me, it is everywhere. Not to mention all the red and white phosphorus that was used and all of the SMAWs, JAVELINs, and other crap we used.

Honestly why am I not surprised. I've only really read into tank crews from desert storm who started to get sick due to the DU shells... But not surprised at all.

reply to post by usmc0311


That may be the case. I am not entirely discounting it. But since you were there, you would also know that Fallujah had no running water, sanitation, and other public health infrastructure that the fighting all but destroyed. Many diseases, syndromes and deformities have been attributed to these conditions after conflicts throughout the 20th century. Not just in American involvements either. While DU is a contaminant that in my opinion could cause these things, even the researchers quoted in the article could not be sure. There are too many factors. Combined with the nature of DU itself, I am not inclined to place the blame squarely on the use the DU munitions.

People need to face some hard facts I think.

It doesn't matter if you were there. It doesn't matter what the circumstances were.

I know people want to try and pass this off because they don't want things on their conscience. I can understand that, and really, it should not be. The medical science of the after effects of weapons aren't required reading for those who fire them, such things come later in the cold light of day when the shooting stops. You can't blame Tibbets for dropping the atom bomb, and no one here should blame the troops on the ground for what may be happening - in fact the troops may well suffer the effects themselves.

Fact is, there is an issue. And we should be dealing with it.

And we should be making damn sure it doesn't happen again.

Originally posted by mayabong
reply to post by arbiture

 

You do understand that the us gave Iraq those chemical weapons right?

Do yo also know that the united states got the Kurds to rise up?

As for the US giving Iraq chemical weapons, no. They are not difficult to make, both chemical and nerve agents. In fact we found the facilities that made those weapons when we invaded, so thats one more thing we can't be blamed for. However your comments about us encouraging the Kurds to rise up is absolutely correct. CIA had several different programs that did just that. I've seen the decrypts.

The fact the Kurds did rise up and perhaps were led to believe or told we would back them up if they did I don't know. But our encouraging them to rise up with out us then backing them up was appalling. The Kurds were hit by VX and Sarin and we let that happen indirectly by not backing them up. Disgusting.

Originally posted by projectvxn
reply to post by usmc0311

 

That may be the case. I am not entirely discounting it. But since you were there, you would also know that Fallujah had no running water, sanitation, and other public health infrastructure that the fighting all but destroyed. Many diseases, syndromes and deformities have been attributed to these conditions after conflicts throughout the 20th century. Not just in American involvements either. While DU is a contaminant that in my opinion could cause these things, even the researchers quoted in the article could not be sure. There are too many factors. Combined with the nature of DU itself, I am not inclined to place the blame squarely on the use the DU munitions.

I don't think many syndromes and deformities has anything with just sanitation.... if it was that the case the many third world countries would had made the correlation before. And that is not the case. We shouldn't try rationalize the problem because the reason is kinda obvious.

Originally posted by blackcube
I don't think many syndromes and deformities has anything with just sanitation.... if it was that the case the many third world countries would had made the correlation before. And that is not the case. We shouldn't try rationalize the problem because the reason is kinda obvious.

You make a damn good point there.

Malnutrition, TB, Polio etc are all cataloged and known conditions and where you would expect to find them, they're there.

This is more medically extreme, and as the guy quoted in the article I linked in the OP says

"to produce an effect like this, some very major mutagenic exposure must have occurred in 2004 when the attacks happened"

Something came into their world at that point. And we were probably the ones hurling it.

reply to post by usmc0311


i would just like to clarification from you for everyone what i already know. Al-Fallujah was a sunni fortified city, there were no shia there, nor was it safe for iraqi shia (or any other shia muslim) to be there, is this correct?

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Originally posted by OpinionatedB
reply to post by usmc0311

 

i would just like to clarification from you for everyone what i already know. Al-Fallujah was a sunni fortified city, there were no shia there, nor was it safe for iraqi shia (or any other shia muslim) to be there, is this correct?

For the most part yes. It was a predominantly Sunni area. There were some Shiites, but the ones we knew of lived in fear of the Sunnis. I imagine they are more equally spread out in that area now but I do not know for sure.

Originally posted by usmc0311

Originally posted by OpinionatedB
reply to post by usmc0311

 

i would just like to clarification from you for everyone what i already know. Al-Fallujah was a sunni fortified city, there were no shia there, nor was it safe for iraqi shia (or any other shia muslim) to be there, is this correct?

For the most part yes. It was a predominantly Sunni area. There were some Shiites, but the ones we knew of lived in fear of the Sunnis. I imagine they are more equally spread out in that area now but I do not know for sure.

na'am... shukran

Found some of my old photos today so I thought I would post them here for the followers to see. These pictures were taken just days after the city was declared secure.

reply to post by neformore


In Serbia its much worse, people have been dying from the NATO bombs, innocent little babies have been born without a leg or arm in most cases

I just watched "Battle for Haditha" after reading this thread. Sad thing what war does to people involved. I think sometimes the dead have it easier.