Subscribe to Common Dreams News Updates
Most Popular This Week
Popular content
Today's Top News
Weapon of Choice: Depleted Uranium
PRAIRIE VILLAGE, Kan. - Since 1991 the U.S. military has admitted to using depleted uranium in armor and ammunition on a large scale. But since then, a debate has raged about its long-term health effects on soldiers and their families.
These 30mm munitions (jackets and penetrators) are made with depleted uranium. (Photo courtesy of the United Nations Environment Program) Could one of the most effective military tools in their arsenal actually be harming soldiers?
Jerry Wheat is one of the hundreds of thousands of American men and women who have enlisted in the U.S. Armed Forces.
"I was in the army for 4 years and 10 months. I joined in 1989 as a 19 Delta, which is a cavalry scout," said Wheat. "My job was to go out and look for the enemy."
Wheat was awarded the Purple Heart and the Bronze Star after his 1991 deployment in Gulf War I.
Wheat said his unit was in Iraq, heading toward Basra, when it got caught up in a firefight.
"My Bradley was hit again with another tank round, and that tank round knocked me unconscious," said Wheat.
In an instant flash of fire, smoke and shrapnel, Wheat became a casualty of war. But without knowing it, his battle was just beginning.
"I took shrapnel in the back of my head. I had some second- and third-degree burns, and there was about 25 pieces of shrapnel from my head all the way down my back," said Wheat.
The military initially denied it, but Wheat ultimately learned that the pieces of shrapnel embedded in his head and back were shards from "friendly fire" and some of the fragments contained depleted uranium.
"As a soldier, you know, most of us didn't know what DU was or made aware of to stay away from it," said Wheat.
When uranium is enriched for use as nuclear fuel or for nuclear weapons, a by-product called depleted uranium -- DU, for short -- is made. It is a form of uranium minus the most radioactive isotope.
The military discarded DU until it discovered that its properties as a heavy metal made it perfect to protect U.S. troops as armor and was very effective as ammunition.
Col. Mark Melanson, head of radiation safety at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, D.C., is the military's foremost expert on depleted uranium and its combat applications.
"When it encounters armor, it actually sharpens to a fine point as it penetrates into the armor," said Melanson. "DU has been well studied and the health effects are well understood. There are overwhelming international and national consensus in the scientific community of what the risks are."
But many critics aren't convinced.
Dan Fahey, a Navy veteran, has been studying DU and its effects for more than a decade. He points out that the Department of Defense and the Veterans Administration have thousands of studies and reams of test data on rats.
"Well, it's clear the military has done a lot of studies on DU, but the question is: are they doing the right studies?" said Fahey. "It's really time that the government does an adequate health study of veterans, and because the rat studies have shown that DU is carcinogenic, it can cause a variety of health problems."
Only 77 soldiers from Gulf War I and just four from Operation Iraqi Freedom are being tracked clinically. Jerry Wheat is one of them.
"I had a tumor removed in the 90s from my left arm that was in the bone, and DU stores in the bone," said Wheat.
Wheat said he has endured a series of health problems.
"I come back from the Gulf and have these abdominal problems and just not feeling well in general, and then my wife miscarriages," said Wheat.
Every two years, Wheat takes part in clinical surveillance headed by Dr. Melissa McDiarmid.
Since 1996, McDiarmid has been Medical Director of the DU Program at the Baltimore VA, responsible for studying and tracking the health effects on exposed soldiers.
"Your health risk is not only determined by your dose but by your duration of exposure. So those two things are working together," said McDiarmid. "It might be surprising for people to know that even the highest in the group that I follow who have retained fragments ... are just approaching what used to be allowable occupational limits for uranium exposure among workers 40 and 50 years ago."
Fahey criticizes the testing methods, characterizing the results as a case of "don't look, don't find."
"So, they have structured their studies, in my opinion, to come out with conclusions that validate their spin, which is that DU is completely harmless," said Fahey.
Fahey suggested that because DU continues to be a critical tactical advantage on the battlefield, the military has a vested interest in keeping it there.
"So, the thing about DU is that it's not always safe and not always dangerous," said Melanson. "As a scientist, my duty is to take a look at what the science says and assess the risks for the Army on what the risks from DU are. I am not an advocate for DU. I am not opposed to DU. I am neutral."
As experts debate the safety and toxicity of DU and the current testing methods for detecting it, Wheat said he lives with it every day and is proof of its effects.
"Prior to being exposed to DU I didn't have this and the tumor, and it's one thing after another," said Wheat.
- Posted in
42 Comments so far
Show AllHere's how to change the minds of those who "believe" that DU is not harmful: Ask them if they would allow several pieces of metal furniture made with DU to be permanent fixtures in their homes. Ask them if they would allow their yards and gardens to be bombed by DU and then ask them if they would gather the flowers from that yard and eat the vegetables from that garden. If they respond yes, then ask them if they can get the "safe" DU and go through with the experiment.
We Americans have the biggest bunch of uncaring, arrogant assholes in Washington, DC and running our military than in other place in the world.
Why are we in Afghanistan? Name one thing the Afghani people or government has ever done to the USA to justify our presence there? I know why we have been in Iraq, we want to steal their natural resources.
D I Z I
Speaking more of "arrogant uncaring a$$holes in Washington" … and other a$$holes 'in country' …
US tank operators that sit directly above M1 Abram's weapons storage ( DU savo ), have a significantly elevated risk of rectal cancer, based on ad hoc un-officially gathered data from dozens of Vet cancer victims.
Talk about taking up the a$$ for courageous service in our military !
And this US Army abomination is only by indirect proximity, consider the victims at the other end of the DU armor penetrating rounds, which are given front row seats to a rainbow scintillating and hued explosion of DU vaporizing into a fog of toxic heavy metal shards and dusts.
Check out the book ( with the poignant double twists of 'MEDAL of HONOR' ) :
[ _____ M E T A L __ O F _____ ]
[ ______ D I S H O N O R _____ ]
Continued use of these deadly DU materials is clearly a war crime ( besides the lies to start that war ) :
1st toward supposed "enemies" ( & to their innocent children for many future generations ),
2nd to our own troops ( and to their innocent wives & children for many future generations ),
3rd to our our Planet, and ultimately back to even more American and other innocents for many future generations
Is this really a case of "friendly" fire, when the gov't itself knowingly puts our troops at long term medical health risks, and death -- or is it treasonous fire ?
Namaste
Sioux Rose
LUMINOUS: You sure are in the know about the most dazzling and unusual facts & statistics!
Namaste probably is Leuren K Moret who makes her living as an anti-DU crusader. There is not truth to the rectal cancer claim. I am about to review Metal of Dishonor, which I have ordered from San Francisco under interlibrary loan - I expect that I will post large sections along with the relevant facts. I have no financial interest in this whatsoever. I spend hours doing research and responding to false information because the goal of the anti-DU crusader is not to protect the troops but get this country bombed as a thank you for our genocidal use of DU. This TV interview is biased. It believes Wheat without any support and disagrees with Dr McDiarmid who has really been studying people with DU in their bodies (and DU does not congregate in bones as Wheat claims, but that supports his claim that DU caused a tumor)- Wheat, though, can make any claim he wants because he knows that McDiarmid can never release Wheat's records - that's a violation of the Privacy Act. So, Kansas TV crew, did you demand to see Wheat's medical records; is Wheat willing to share them with the world or does he want to just make us take him on faith? Dan Fahey has done a lot of research, but he is now paid to advocate for people like Wheat and Dan's organization advocates for all without screening anyone to make sure that they really are telling the truth. That's sad. The entire DU controversy as the anti-DU crusaders call it is a manufactured one; it lies about uranium and what exactly uranium does to the human body and it ignores any scientist with genuine research experience. I have sought out the genuine scientist, but they don't get on YouTube and the TV station, seeking viewers, is not interested in boring mundane science, they want to titilate the audience.
Roger
DUStory-owner@yahoogroups.com
ah, "treasonous fire" - Moret, Doug Rokke and Dennis Kyne, all three of them very accomplished liars with an enormous gift of gab and ability to charm an audience like a snake charmer does a cobra, all appeared in the Neo Nazi Power Hour sponsored "Beyond Treason" video. Most of you probably don't know about the Neo Nazi connection, but the Power Hour and the American Gulf War Veterans Association are both creations of David Von Kleist who pushes "Beyond Treason" which is sold at Amazon, etc. Von Kleist is the Master of Ceremonies at this little event in Washington where he introduces Doug Rokke (Mr DU if you ask him; not if you really review his records like I have - I know about the Freedom of Information Act and I use it - you could too and you can probably get the same information that I have gotten, but it does take months of waiting and I have made some of it readily available and will gladly share every bit that I have with anyone interested in learning the truth about Douglas Lind Rokke), Holocaust deniers, Hitler admirers and even two Rabbis who got conned into attending and then are publicly humiliated on stage - it's all here at their blog - they are proud of themselves - but if you don't like fascists and Nazis, maybe you should learn more about who the leaders of the anti-DU crusade really are and who their friends are - www.chairmanofnordwave.blogspot.com
I will say one thing positive though about this posting - the photo from the UNEP shows three 30mm DU penetrators. Note that two of them are surrounded by something - that is the aluminum shroud and it is quite thick in comparison to the penetrator. These penetrators probably hit concrete or asphalt pavement and began to come out of the shroud, but did not hit armor plate so they are still partially inside.
You are a first time poster here. Luminous is a very regular poster, not just on this topic.
What exactly does the number of posts mean about their accuracy - a false posting posted a thousand times by a thousand people is still false - far as the other wise ass "Fox News is hiring" and comment about "creationism" - I have a BA in Geology - I was outraged when the creationist book was posted in the Grand Canyon National Park bookstore during the past administration; I know the age of the earth and I know why the half life of Uranium 238 is 4.5 billion years because half of it is still undecayed since the formation of the Earth in primordial space - I also was very active in the on-line duels with the Swift Boat Liars during the Kerry campaign and have voted Democratic since I was a young officer and voted for Eugene McCarthy! It is amazing how you jump to political conclusions when you don't really know anything about the science or the facts. I know enough science to know when I need to consult an expert and also enough to know the difference between verbose male bovine excrement and genuine science. I suspect that those of you who think that I don't probably never took a single college level physical science (chemistry, physics, geology) class.
You want to correspond with me, write me directly, don't use the gang up and wolf pack mentality - have the courage to pose your thoughts and questions directly and the wisdom to admit when you are wrong as well.
Roger
DUStory-owner@yahoogroups.com
R h o t e l 1
If you handle an actual factual discussion, look at the top of this thread, at time stamp:
Luminous May 8th, 2009 3:15 pm
Your arrogant pseudo-scientific apologist warmongering has lead me to do some research on my own, to devastatingly demonstrate your incompetence in research and outright distortions and bias.
¿ If you've been working on this research for years, my few hours of research must surely pale in comparison of your studious and thorough assertions, right ?
Hey left-tenant,
you appear to have left your proof in your other jacket.
Namaste
Rhotel1:
Faux (Fox) News is hiring. You'll do much better there than on CD.
But then again, many believe the planet is only 6,000 years old.
"many believe the planet is only 6,000 years old."
they think the Flinstones were documentaries.
They no more "believe" that DU is not harmful than they "believed" that Agent Orange was not harmful. The people of Vietnam, as well as the U.S. troops who fought there, are still suffering from poisoning by Agent Orange. The government lied for decades about Agent Orange, so they could deny the veterans the treatment that they were owed. In fact, commondreams.org has a story about those U.S. vets, "Vietnam Veterans Are Falling Ill, but Why Now?," just above this story.
In 30 years, the story will be "Iraq and Afganistan Veterans Are Falling Ill, but Why Now?" And the government will just then be getting around to admitting that DU caused all the diseases and birth defects that we already know it is causing.
The metal furniture would probably be ok to have round, DU doesn't cause many problems melted into the iron and just sitting there. I heard it's used in the aprons they put over people having x-rays. But vaporize it into little fragments and eat or breath in the dust and that's a whole other story. People in Iraq will be eating that dust in their vegetables, meat and milk for a long time. The US is actually using nuclear weapons when they use these shells. They just aren't using the big bang part of the explosion.
S N O W C R A B
I guess you didn't read my posting just below here
___ Luminous May 6th, 2009 12:31 pm
or didn't believe it, as you errantly ( and ironically ) state :
"metal furniture would probably be ok to have round, DU doesn't cause many problems melted into the iron and just sitting there."
So all of those tank ammo loaders who "just sitting there," and ended up with rectal cancers -- were just unlucky ?
Namaste
DU is also used for tank armor. It is said officially by the tank corps to be harmless in this capacity as are unexploded DU weapons.
What would one have to do to hammer home to the voters and taxpayers, although anymore the reasons to do so escape me, the idea to doubters that the U.S. has been and is actually using nuclear weapons? The DU powder that exists all over Iraq and Afghanistan has to be equivalent to the fallout from open air nuclear testing which was terminated by the nuclear test ban treaty.
Rectal cancers give the lie to the unexploded part. How about the armor? Why would riding around exposed to DU armor be any different? Maybe it causes skin cancer instead of rectal? Maybe thyroid? Would these cancers be voluntarily reported to the public? This is the first I've heard of the rectal cancers. Maybe there are others not yet reported.
DU is no more harmful than lead. You would not want to eat lead paint, but armies have fought with lead bullets for centuries. DU (Uranium 238) is the most common naturally occuring isotope of uranium, a very common mineral that is present inside every living thing on this planet. There is a lot of hype; it began with Saddam Hussein's exceptionally capable propaganda operation and it continues with those who hate George Bush even though Barack Obama is now our President. It is time that people began looking at the facts and ignoring the hype. It is also unlikely that DU was used to any degree, if at all, in Afghanistan. I have not been able to verify that the A-10s that have fought in Afghanistan did not use DU; I have corresponded with a former A-10 pilot, but I am not sure that he knew what ammunition he was firing when he flew close air support in Afghanistan. I was able to verify with him that no A-10 was present in Afghanistan when the Taliban still had tanks to oppose the Northern Alliance and since the DU kinetic energy penetrator is only effective against tanks, it is highly unlikely that it was used after that time.
To learn about DU and not the slogans or hype, go to www.depletedcranium.com - you will learn a lot more about uranium, which may in fact be responsible for life on earth. It certainly is responsible for the heat that keeps the core of the Earth molten and that keeps us from being a cold dead planet.
Nowhere has ever been bombed with DU. DU is not now, nor has it ever been used in conventional bombs. It has been used in atomic bombs, but as shielding material and as a neutron reflector, not as the explosive core. DU is not an explosive and bombs are explosive. A website hypothesizes that the best possible bunker buster would have a DU penetrator head, but that is a website; the bomb does not exist and there was no DU dropped on Baghdad in the "Shock & Awe" campaign or on Tora Bora in 2001 either. Those are very popular myths, just like the headline of this piece. DU is not a weapon of choice; Saddam did not like that it had been used very effectively to kill one of the largest armored forces in the world (Saddam did not have a two bit army, he had a lot of tanks and he had fought Iran to a standstill for a number of years). DU was developed to kill the modern Soviet Bloc tank in the mid-70's when everything else bounced off modern tank armor. Tungsten was considered, but it would not do the job. Nothing else worked and the US and NATO were very concerned that the thousands of Red Army and their Soviet Bloc puppet states' tanks on the other side of the Iron Curtain would pour through the Fulda Gap on the North German Plain at the beginning of World War III and that they would be unstoppable and go all the way to the North Sea. That's why the DU kinetic energy penetrator anti-tank rounds were developed; that's why the A-10 with its 30mm tank killing cannon was developed. Thankfully, there was no WW-III and DU was not needed until Saddam decided to take Kuwait. Saddam had thousands of Soviet manufactured tanks, far more than the US/UK and their allies, and based on the war with Iran, it was expected that those tanks would put up a very good fight. DU was very effective in eliminating that advantage and most of them were destroyed before they ever even saw the US/UK tank. Three of them were destroyed with one shot each after they had surrounded a US M1 Abrams tank which had been left behind because it was stuck in the mud - each of the three Iraqi tanks fired first, squarely hitting the Abrams which was undamaged and the Abrams then picked off each of the attackers with one shot of a 120mm DU penetrator and the last shot got an Iraqi that had hid behind a sand berm. This is all very well discussed on the Gulf Link website - nothing has been hidden; the secret documents from the 1970's have been declassified, but no one wants to read them, they just prefer, as this writer has done, to make up their mind first and then go read some more bad science fiction.
Roger
DUStory-owner@yahoogroups.com
Message 88 - http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/DUStory/message/88 has over 50 links to factual information - I invite each of you to read just one - I recommend that you start with the UN Environment Programme report of its indepth field and laboratory research in Bosnia-Herzegovina - Page 32 shows an intact 30mm DU penetrator still inside its aluminum shroud. No, Rosalie Bertell, the A-10 does not leave a trail of DU poison dust from the cannon's mouth to the ground, the DU is completely covered by a thin layer of aluminum and the DU does not become exposed unless that penetrator hits a hard target like a tank. Much of the DU lying in the desert is probably also still intact inside the aluminum shroud; the A-10 fires a large number of rounds, most of which miss, because it is fast moving in comparison to a tank and can not shoot just once and be assured of a kill. Those rounds that miss are probably still sitting there like the intact round on page 32 -for those of you do not want to go to Message 88, which has many more links, here is the direct link to the UNEP Report -
Depleted Uranium in Bosnia and Herzegovina - Postconflict Assessment
http://postconflict.unep.ch/publications/BiH_DU_report.pdf
The answer is blowing in the wind! You have seen how viruses attach themselves to dust particles and cross oceans.
The claim that DU is so heavy it stays in one place, can't be true in my mind. As small as molecules are compared to dust particles, I can only conclude DU rides around in dust storms!
It has a half-life of 4.5 billion years!!!
While low in emissions compared to other radioactive material, particles in the body should have no problem destroying DNA in the nucleus of cells.
Plate Tectonics seems to be the only way it's going to go away! Flip the continents over and start again.
Wow what a sad state of affairs. :(
There is a good book that says "Live by the sword, die by sword." or in modern day terms "Live by the gun, die by the gun."
I guess there is some truth to that book, aye? .....hint: it's the BIBLE.
I have said this before "Get rid of the super expensive military that flys half way around the world to blow up a goat farmer with a rocket launcher who can't even reach U.S."
Instead "Have one bad ass National Guard to guard U.S. not THEM and the rest of the money we save, grant it to broke kids to go to college. (just give it to them)"
Instead of making impressionable poor kids sell their soul to the service of the Death Merchants in exchange for a chance to go to college and be all they can be......DEAD or depleated!!!
Let the politicians fight there own wars.
NEWS flash: Boycott the military, and DON'T JOIN!!!!!
THERE ARE OTHER WAYS TO GO TO COLLEGE, OR JUST WORK AND GAIN EXPERIENCE.
The politicians have kids, let them have a fighting chance :)
And to quote the prophet Hosea, "For they have sowed the wind, and they shall reap the whirlwind ..." (8:7.)
One of the peculiar things about depleted uranium, is that it actually increases in radioactivity as time goes on. Thus, the longer it sits in a field, or someone's body, the greater the harm it causes. (Reference articles about DU as a landfill item!)
Aloha, salud, lechiem,
- Tobias
http://www.youtube.com/user/tobiasaurusrex
The use and manufacture of DU shells is a war crime, because it kills its victims long after the war ends, it targets kids and pregnant women, and it leaves areas pretty environmentally uninhabitable forever. People live there anyways, but some don't live there very long.
Is there any mention in this article that the use of DU is a war crime?
Is there any mention of the millions of exploded munitions in Iraq and the rising cancer rates there?
I guess those are only figments of my imagination.
"you've cast the worst fear that can ever be hurled:
the fear to bring children into the world."
the pentagoons know this shit is dangerous, but just keep "revising" their studies.
The Nuclear Policy Research Institute was founded in 2001 by Nobel Peace Prize nominee, physician, and author Dr. Helen Caldicott. The following is from NPRI’s 2003 report on DU (http://www.helencaldicott.com/depleted.pdf).
The U.S Army claims that it “complies with established statutes, regulations and procedures.” International law suggests otherwise:
• The UN Sub-Commission on Prevention and Protection of Minorities in 1996 passed a resolution banning DU weapons. They stated their concern that “abandoned contaminated equipment [may] constitute a serious danger to life” and noted the “repeated reports on the long term consequences of the use of such weapons upon human life and upon the environment.” It urged all countries “to curb the production and the spread of weapons of weapons of mass destruction or with indiscriminant effect, in particular…weaponry containing depleted uranium.”
• An August 2002 report by the UN Sub-Commission stated that the use of DU shells is a breach of the following laws: the Universal Declaration of Human Rights; the Charter of the United Nations; the Genocide Convention; the Convention Against Torture; the four Geneva Conventions of 1949; the Conventional Weapons Convention of 1980; and the Hague Conventions of 1899 and 1907. These laws all ban the use of weapons with indiscriminant effect or which cause long-term and/or unnecessary suffering.
FastEddie75:
Good post! I have a copy of Dr. Helen Caldicott's book, "The New Nuclear War," published in 2002, but still timely.
Caldicott is an authority on this topic and has lectured around the world about nuclear weapons, radiation, and depleted uranium.
One of the tragedies of this serious problem is that our men and women in uniform think they are protecting the US from whomever the crooks and liars in Washington D. C. deem "the bogeyman" or "the bad guys." To get a steady paycheck with good benefits and a good retirement PENSION (emphasis added), they hope "harm's way" circumvents them on the battlefield, and they return in good health, which is not always the case.
Innocent civilians are paying the penalty from the action's of the world's only super bully, folks who happen to live in these surrounding areas that the US Imperialists enjoy destroying.
When the American war machine used chemical weapons in South Vietnam, particularly Agent Orange, one bit of blowback from it was the early demise from cancer, of Admiral Zumwalt's son from Agent Orange, which affected him while serving over there.
Why do you think the Bush/Cheney Republican/Democrat Crime Family gave hefty pay raises to the military, plus handsome sign-up bonuses and even bigger reenlistment bonuses for certain "military occupational specialties?"
I highly recommend reading Dr. Cadicott's books or papers on nuclear subjects.
I
I saw Ms. Caldicott speak in Harrisburg PA not long after the TMI debacle. She was most compelling. I've also seen films of a couple of her speaking engagements. One term she used in Harrisburg was "internal emitters" which sums up the situation quite nicely. Ingested or inhaled radioactive dustmites become internal emitters. Somebody tell the VA. They're going to need to ramp up oncology services. Sure they will.
I've seen here speak on film and heard Helen on the radio, many times over the years. To me, she's angelic! I remember in 1980 or 81 when we in California had the "Nuclear Freeze Initiative" and Phil Donahue had Dr.Caldicott on his program. Everybody adored her, except the war mongers, and she called H-Bomb Edward Teller, "E T" after the Spielberg movie came out. I think he suffered a stroke from it.
It's all so unnecessary. For what?
H i P E A C E M A N
Helen's a real heroic saint with a great sense of humor, I still smile whenever I think about her book :
M I S S I L E _ E N V Y
Because 'my God is bigger than your God' entertains our demagogues so well , we will certainly need to reverse our earlier focus on "closing" that 'missile gap'.
Namaste
How can you spin that a bullet is "completely harmless" no matter what it's made of it is designed to harm.
wtf.
as are all weapons designed to destroy mass.
Helen Caldicott has never done any research into uranium, depleted or otherwise and she has bought into the propagandists. In correspondence with me, she told me that Dr Thomas Fasy in NY City was the "expert" on DU. Fasy went to Iraq in the 1990s and was indoctrinated by Saddam's government. He then tells people like NY National Guardsman Gerard Matthew who has a daughter with minor birth deformities that these are typical of DU. He only knows what Saddam's government told him, but that is the "expert" source according to Helen Caldicott. She is like Rosalie Bertell, both of them want to be on the cutting edge of social movements and DU has kept them in with the anti-war folks and they both like the limelight, but neither of them has actually done any research into the subject and they are trading on past accomplishments and their names. That's sad. They could just admit that they don't know anything, but then there would be no Poison Dust DVD to sell or book Metal of Dishonor (of which I stronglys suspect that the only actual dishonor is its complete failure to deal with facts and the brazen lying of its authors who have political agendas to sell and could care less about the chemistry, physics or geology or like Chris Busby in the UK the meterology either. I have been studying DU and the anti-DU crusaders since Doug Rokke smeared me all over the world and I read the smear in the Italian website that claimed to be the voice of the Iraq insurgency (but probably is paid for by some of the millions that Saddam and his henchmen smuggled out of the country when they looted Iraq) - I was supposed to just go away as being a thoroughly discredited Pentagon stooge, but I am not that kind of person. I am extremely persistent and a very thorough researcher and I have every e-mail I have ever exchanged on this subject for the past over four years - I also dig out facts and use the Freedom of Information Act - I posted a bio of Rokke at Amazon as a review to his latest video, Contaminated Forever, made by a long dedicated peace activist Wesley Rehberg who does not do very good research himself. If he did, he would know that his star is a con artist and fraud and not the patron saint of DU that Rehberg makes Rokke out to be. Rokke knows I have the facts - I have his Army records and they show that he never was the great combat "warrior" that he portrays himself as being when he goes on tour (his latest morph, like Leuren Moret's being with the 9/11 crowd because they pay better and put them up in better digs)- I also have his University of Illinois employment records and can prove he was not a "scientist" as he claims but actually something more akin to the stockroom clerk as a Physical Science Technician responsible for maintaining the laboratory equipment and taking readings off apparatus during experiments - hardly the role that Rokke claims he played before being activated as a "filler" with the 12th Medical Detachment for the Gulf War. If you want to learn all about your hero, go read it - Rehberg has posted rebuttals and I have posted counter rebuttals - I have facts I am willing to share with anyone - Rehberg just makes claims, not a single one of which is supported with a fact that he possesses.
Roger
DUStory-owner@yahoogroups.com
DUStory was created to enable the world to read the documents that I have obtained under FOIA - the Files Section has some of these documents - if you want to read them, go to Message 87 (or just the intro page) of the Yahoo Group DUStory - and use the guest user name and password to go to the Files Section and download or read - here is the link to Message 87, which also has an index of the Files Section as of of about six months ago - http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/DUStory/message/87
Jerry Wheat is not being accurate - his first false statement is that the military denied that his Bradley Fighting Vehicle had been hit by a DU round - all contemporary reports show that Bradleys that were hit by DU were immediately identified and their surviving crews well taken care of. I will bet that the TV station never even bothered to obtain Jerry Wheat's DD-214 to confirm that he actually was with the unit claimed and that he was actually in one of the Bradleys that was tragically struck by a 120mm main gun DU penetrator fired by an Abrams tank. The End Notes at Gulf Link have extensive contemporary reports about each of the "friendly fire" incidents, the condition of the Bradley and the casualties both killed (yes, some were killed, generally by a direct hit by the penetrator as it passed through the relatively thin skin of the Bradley) and wounded. Every single one of the wounded was then checked to see if they had DU shrapnel as Wheat claims he has and each of those was offered medical follow-up for life through the VA Medical Center in Baltimore.
The comments abound with political statements, they are not based on fact. DU does not become more radioactive with age unless you wait thousands of years. There is a point in its decay cycle with a 15,000 year hold - DU is less radioactive than the natural uranium in every reader's backyard, in the air that they breathe, and in every readers' body. The largest man made source of natural uranium air pollution is the coal burning power plant, but none of you are out picketing the Four Corners plants demanding that Los Angeles be put in the dark!
This link is one of about 50 posted in Message 88 at the Yahoo Group DUStory -
Uranium Emitted from Coal Fired Power Plants
http://www.ornl.gov/info/ornlreview/rev26-34/text/colmain.html
Message 88 is here http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/DUStory/message/88
Roger
DUStory-owner@yahoogroups.com
Long past bed time - but this one is also false -
"The military discarded DU until it discovered that its properties as a heavy metal made it perfect to protect U.S. troops as armor and was very effective as ammunition."
DU has never been discarded. It has been kept in the form of DUF6, the depleted uranium form of the hexaflouride chemical that is used for the separation of fissionable U235 from the prevalent U238. The military has not controlled this process since the Manhattan Project and U238 was used to feed the breeder reactors that created Plutonium during that. It was not until commerical power reactors began operating that large stocks of DUF6 began to be accumulated.
DU began being stocked as anti-armor ammunition in the mid to late 1970's. It never was used in combat until the Gulf War in 1991. It was then used in the Balkans and there are extensive UN Environment Programme field and laboratory reports posted to the web - http://postconflict.unep.ch/publications/BiH_DU_report.pdf this one for Bosnia-Herzegovina is the last one that was done and then DU was used again when the US/UK confronted Saddam's tanks on the way to Baghdad in 2003.
DU heavy armor was not developed until much later, but was in use during the Gulf War - a number of American tank crews are still alive thanks to the DU heavy armor and the DU kinetic energy penetrator rounds. When you fight, as Patton would say, your job is not to die for your country, it is to make the other poor #$% die for his - DU enabled our guys to come home!
Roger
DUStory-owner@yahoogroups.com
Different people have different reactions to certain exposures, or so I believe.
Many exposures to highly toxic materials can lead to all kinds of maladies. Mass vaccinations before deploying may cause a compromise of the immune system. Depleted uranium in its inert form is relatively benign. But vaporized and broken pieces in a body may cause some complications. You have been subject to much more dangerous scenarios; Radon build up in unventilated houses, abestos from break pads at every stop sign/light, superfund cites that in the 60's, us kids played in got the silica dust all over us.
I have fibromyalgia, have had prostate problems, tumors removed from the calves of my legs, and other associated disorders. I try to maintain a positive attitude, a healthy life, and move on.
re: "Rhotel1" posts...(aka "Ask Dr. Science -he knows more than you do!")
It's interesting that someone with no financial interest in this matter would spend so much time and effort "researching and responding to false information" about the poor, misunderstood stepchild of the nuclear industry, uranium weapons.
Not coincidentally, Dr. S, your little crusade occurs in an age of spectacularly audacious mendacity. An age of unctuous lies and distortions endlessly echoed by well-connected, respected "professionals" of all stripes (and their armies of bootlickers and lackies)--political, corporate, journalistic, military, scientific, financial--representing institutions and traditions that have, many more times than not, utterly failed humankind and the natural world.
While selected authorties sonorously intone the self-conceit of their "expertise" from behind a safe and secure fortress of entitlement and privilege, ordinary children and adults alike must engage their natural ability to detect the stench of lies and liars. It can be quite a challenge keeping mind and senses sharp, for in our so-called information age, the fetid aroma of prevarications, distractions and deception hangs daily like a thick smog in the air all around us, repellant as the stench of vomit.
No, Dr. S, not everyone is a clever, erudite piece of work like you, but a great many of us out here among the "unwashed" plebian masses know well and are sick to death of the monumental egoists of presumed knowledge, privilege and entitlement--charming, well-heeled sociopaths utterly devoid of care or conscience about the detrimental effect their words and deeds have on the rest of the world.
And as for your "research", Dr. S, whatever information you believe you have gathered neatly together about uranium weapons, it, like all else in this imperfect human world, falls far short of being 100% accurate. If you are half as scientific and learned as you take care to present yourself in undercutting the views of others, you are well aware that all true science proceeds from a basis of not knowing, and not from fixing "facts" around one's personal opinions and agendas. Absolutes and presumed certainty are the death of true science and the beginning of fanatacism, superstition and psychopathy.
Moreover, look what it is that you are so laboriously attempting to defend -- instruments of death and destruction. The question of whether or not uranium weapons causes rectal cancer matters not one whit to any unfortunates on the receiving end of such ordnance. And as for those soldiers using uranium weapons, if they in time suffer any illnesses or painful side-effects due to exposure to such materials, they certainly don't need you or any other "authorities" to lecture them on what may or may not have been the possible causes of their illness. They can certainly come to their own conclusions without such patronizing assistance.
I, for one, am not impressed by lectures by "authories" on the benign nature of uranium weapons. Such lectures tend to bear the repugnant aroma of self-serving delusions and lies, not least of which because they do not resonate the faintest hint of compassion or common decency. Rather, such sophomoric assertions tend to reflect someone of rather callous and shallow character who is most interested in presenting an authoritative and knowledgeable facade-- someone who doesn't really care one bit about suffering, death and destruction in the real world outside their little fortress of arrogance and privilege.
I C H I R O 7 9 5 1,
Thank for the thoughtful and illuminating posting, and your entertaining manner of making clear where humankind's chief interests are found and the essential core of the scientific pursuit of knowledge. I had initiated the writing of a rebuttal and then realized it would have been a wasted effort, attempting to respond with as much integrity as shown by Rhotel1.
Buried in the many lines, he mentions being an officer, which implies a likely supervisory role over other servicemen or women. My guess is that he is attempting to convince himself ( and of course us ), to relieve some of the guilt he likely feels, especially in how DU makes our troops so much "safer".
R h o t e l 1
I am happy to stipulate that the Earth's mantle will be allowed to continue to make use of it's Uranium to maintain the movement of plate tectonics, as we certainly wouldn't ever want the possible outlawing of DU, to cause the Earth to start to freeze up.
In addition, I've worked enough in prestigious research labs, in using nuclear materials and high energy accelerators, to realize that you really have very little understanding of isotopes, natural decay processes, human exposure, medical research, and/or practical military expediency as to what to do with those pesky facts that so spoil warmongering profiteerism.
Namaste
Ichirio,
The term "uranium weapons" was coined by the anti-DU crusaders such as Chris Busby of the UK. They did this to deliberately mislead the public by making them think that there was this new class of weapon of mass destruction, the uranium weapon. There are a few DU alloy bullets - 120mm fired by Abrams tank smooth bore main gun, 105mm that used to be fired by the now retired M-60 Patton tank that did fight on a small scale in the Gulf War in 1991, 30mm fired by the GAU-8 Gatling gun mounted on the A-10 Thunderbolt II tank killing aircraft, 25mm fired by the AV-8 Harrier flown by the Marine Corps in the Gulf War and by the chain gun on the Bradley Fighting Vehicle. Those are not "uranium weapons", they are bullets. They are not nuclear, so Moret's "Trojan Horse of Nuclear War" is a bogus analogy just like her claim that DU was seriously considered as an area denial weapon in 1943. The "Memo to Groves from 1943" that Moret sent to Congressman McDermott of Washington State and that she expounds upon at length in the video "Beyond Treason" and her many personal appearances that have been placed on You Tube is a forgery. Even then, it does not actually mention DU or uranium but Moret and Rokke wave it front of adoring audiences and make the claim that it does. I don't know how the last writer thought that I was "Doctor Science" because I am not - I am just me and I am very determined to stamp out the lies about depleted uranium because I think that they might end up killing us - how do lies kill? By convincing someone that they are true and that they should do something to avenge them by paying us back for poisoning the world forever. We never poisoned anything with DU, not Jerry Wheat or the Mid East or anywhere else - I really challenge Wheat to put his medical records and military records on the table. Let's find out how much is true and how much he made up. I do owe him one apology, my uranium expert told me that uranium does concentrate in bones, but that it is highly unlikely that there would be any radiation induced bone tumor as a result and that if Wheat does not have kidney disease that he most probably did not get any cancer from DU either. To my knowledge, DU has never caused cancer in anyone. If someone has a verified case, I am more than willing to look into it.
Roger
DUStory-owner@yahoogroups.com
The DU lovers are certainly well represented on this web site, and have no limit
to their expertize on the benefits of this US illegal and murderous weapon that wounds and kills friends as well as foes, and will keep on killing forever.
I was in Iraq in 2001 where our group met with a number of university and hospital
officials that had countless pictures and statistics proving what DU had been doing
to the suffering and dying Iraqi people since our 91 Gulf War.
Kindly check Google.com What Are We Doing To Our Own? for some true facts
in a 10 minute video showing what our veterans are bringing home with them.
Bud Deraps
The DU lovers are certainly well represented on this web site, and have no limit
to their expertize on the benefits of this US illegal and murderous weapon that wounds and kills friends as well as foes, and will keep on killing forever.
I was in Iraq in 2001 where our group met with a number of university and hospital
officials that had countless pictures and statistics proving what DU had been doing
to the suffering and dying Iraqi people since our 91 Gulf War.
Kindly check Google.com What Are We Doing To Our Own? for some true facts
in a 10 minute video showing what our veterans are bringing home with them.
Bud Deraps
Namaste (Moret or Moret adherent) and Ichiro - you really do think that you know everything when you don't know anything at all. I have zero guilt - I retired from the Air Force reserve in 1994 - I never had anything to do with DU - I did learn about nuclear fallout and how to keep people alive in the event of that terrible event, a nuclear war, and that gives me an edge. I know enough about fallout to know that DU is not fallout. That is what brought me into this fray, then Doug Rokke decided that I was cutting into his adoring fan club too much and he decided to smear me. That made me research Doug Rokke and the more I found, the more I became determined to expose liars like him to the world. I have no love for DU; I do like the idea that American tank crews are alive because DU gave them an advantage and I hate the idea that we might get paid back with a crude nuke or radiological dispersal device (dirty bomb) because people believe all the lies pumped out from Saddam, Hamas, Hezbollah, Rokke, Moret, Busby, Durakovic, Caldicott, Bertell, etc - they all feed on each other and trade the same lies back and forth citing each other as the "expert". Want to try a little experiment? Take every internet article that contains one of the following names - Doug Rokke, Leuren Moret, Chris Busby, Asaf Durakovic, Helen Caldicott and Rosalie Bertell, and discard it. Then see how many articles about DU are left. Remember, any one of those names is suspect and if the article cites one of those names as an "expert", you discard that article and move on to the next. Good night.
Want to learn more, write to me - this e-mail address works and unlike those who hide behind fake names like Namaste, I am not hiding behind anything.
Roger
DUStory-owner@yahoogroups.com
So you want to talk about only verified and consensus scientific and medical reality ?
How about When the dust settles, from
http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2003/apr/17/science.highereducation1
"During the 1991 Gulf war, US army guidelines recommended surgeons do their best to remove fragments of depleted uranium (DU) shrapnel from soldiers struck by flying chunks of metal from armour-piercing shells. In practice, that meant smaller bits of shrapnel were rarely removed. Getting those out just caused more damage to surrounding muscle and other tissue. Today, the guidelines are different: surgeons should be "aggressive" in removing any fragments of depleted uranium.
The small change betrays a big leap in understanding the threat posed by depleted uranium. Evidence is building that DU causes more genetic damage than scientists suspected - even at levels deemed so low as to be non-toxic."
And after nearly 2 thousand tones of DU being violently deposited ( perhaps 5% vaporized, and due to DU's Pyrophoricity -- burned ) in Iraq, consider that the USA requires any spills of DU over a couple of kg to be cleaned up thoroughly.
And from MIT's conference Depleted Uranium Weapons: Toxic Contaminant or Necessary Technology? provides an excellent and thorough review of DU issues, knocking out the wind of either extreme positions.
See extensive links at : http://web.mit.edu/pugwash/du/resources.html
This includes Fahey, D (2003): SCIENCE OR SCIENCE FICTION? Facts, Myths and Propaganda In the Debate Over Depleted Uranium Weapons.
And extensive background information on relevant expertise : http://web.mit.edu/pugwash/du/speakers.html
British Ministry of Defense is Forced to Pay Pension for DU Contamination, see http://www.cadu.org.uk/news/17.htm#icbuw
and here : http://vitw.org/archives/405
"A former soldier has become the first veteran to win a war pension appeal after suffering depleted uranium poisoning during the Gulf War, it has emerged.Kenny Duncan took the Ministry of Defence to the Pensions Appeal Tribunal Service over his claim that he suffered depleted uranium poisoning during active service in Iraq.
Mr Duncan's case relied on blood tests carried out by Dr Albrecht Schott, a German biochemist, which revealed chromosome aberrations caused by ionising radiation. The tribunal found that Mr Duncan’s exposure to the uranium was attributable to his service in the Gulf.
Dr Schott's research formed part of a study of 16 British veterans of conflicts in the Gulf, Bosnia, and Kosovo, which found that they had 14 times the usual level of chromosome abnormalities in their genes, raising fears that they will pass cancers and genetic illnesses to their offspring. Kenny Duncan believes that his children's health problems are linked to his service in the Gulf war. All three were born with deformed toes and low immune systems.
An expert report by three leading radiation scientists cautioned that children and adults could contract cancer after breathing in dust containing DU. But it was blocked from publication by the World Health Organisation (WHO), which employed the main author, Dr Keith Baverstock, as a senior radiation advisor. He alleges that it was deliberately suppressed. Baverstock also believes that if the study had been published when it was completed in 2001, there would have been more pressure on the US and UK to limit their use of DU weapons in last year’s war, and to clean up afterwards. “Our study suggests that the widespread use of depleted uranium weapons in Iraq could pose a unique health hazard to the civilian population,” Baverstock told the Scottish Sunday Herald. “There is increasing scientific evidence the radioactivity and the chemical toxicity of DU could cause more damage to human cells than is assumed.”
Isotope Analysis Shows Exposure To Depleted Uranium In Gulf War Veterans U.S. Veterans who were exposed to DU during the 1991 Gulf War have continued to excrete it in their urine for 6-8 years after their exposure, according to a new study published in the journal Health Physics. The study indicates that soldiers may absorb DU uranium particles through inhalation, ingestion, or wound contamination, said Roberto Gwiazda, lead author of the study. Using isotope analysis of urine, similar to new tests available in the UK, it was revealing that DU was present in the urine of a significant number of soldiers without embedded shrapnel but with potential exposure through inhalation, ingestion, or wound contamination."
See Gulf War Studies Link Cancer to Depleted Uranium
here ( also NYT ): __ http://www.commondreams.org/headlines01/0129-03.htm
WIKI, for DU has "The use of DU in munitions is controversial because of numerous unanswered questions about potential long-term health effects. Normal functioning of the kidney, brain, liver, heart, and numerous other systems can be affected by uranium exposure, because in addition to being weakly radioactive, uranium is a toxic metal.[4] DU is less toxic than other heavy metals such as arsenic and mercury. It is weakly radioactive and remains so because of its long half-life. The aerosol produced during impact and combustion of depleted uranium munitions can potentially contaminate wide areas around the impact sites or can be inhaled by civilians and military personnel.[5] In a three week period of conflict in Iraq during 2003 it was estimated over 1000 tons of depleted uranium munitions were used mostly in cities.[6] "
Lots of links here: http://www.chimerafilms.co.uk/children4.html
ANd then the USA catastrophic damages of DU machining and smelting in Colonie, New York, is documented in peer reviewed paper Depleted uranium contamination by inhalation exposure and its detection after ∼20 years: Implications for human health assessment, which can be downloaded here:http://www.albany.edu/news/pdf_files/Depleted_Uranium_Article.pdf
and is also described here: http://www.albany.edu/campusnews/releases_455.htm
here: http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/07/16/2573
and here: http://www.wise-uranium.org/dissmf.html
Our EPA has Depleted Uranium Technical Brief available here: http://www.epa.gov/radiation/docs/402-r-06-011.pdf
Namaste
Oh _ R h o t e l 1 _ wherefore art thou ?
The company of crickets is sublimely disquieting …
"The military discarded DU until it discovered that its properties as a heavy metal made it perfect to protect U.S. troops as armor and was very effective as ammunition."
Shouldn't this part read something more along the lines of;
"The Nuclear Power Industry discarded DU until it discovered that it could save big on expensive toxic disposal fees by converting DU into weapons systems for the military to dispose of in 'they hate us for our freedom' type countries."