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Post by Watchman on Mar 25, 2006 13:54:20 GMT -5
***Chopped from cutting edge news- Watchman***
NEWS BRIEF: "Depleted Uranium In India, Spreading Worldwide": They Kill Us For Sport , From Karl W B Schwarz, Rense.com, 3-20-6
"Depleted uranium is a deadly toy in the hands of the ruling bloodlines. A particle of DU ingested or inhaled can cause one or more of the 90+ seriously debilitating diseases, fatal or temporarily non-fatal. The half life of DU is 4.5 billion years, and it can destroy living things and the environment; most importantly it can destroy perfectly healthy lives. Depleted uranium has been used in at least the last four wars by the United States and its allies: Gulf War 1, Bosnia and Kosovo in the Balkans, Afghanistan and Gulf War 2. The last two of the four wars, all illegal, took place in 2001 (Afghanistan) and 2003 (Iraq). Effects of the contamination can manifest from within a few hours to five years.
"Evidences clearly indicate that depleted uranium is blowing in the wind all over the world. Its effects on health are showing up in distant lands. Earlier, gulf war veterans and local civilians were affected; now, of all the places, the US is showing six-fold increase in just lung cancer cases. ... The worst contamination would of course occur at and around the theatres of war, but region within 1000 mile radius would face serious depleted uranium contamination. 1000-mile radius means a total area of 3.14 million square mile. The two circles in the map represent an area of 6.28 million square miles and, deducting say 20% for the overlapping area, the net affected area is just over 5 million square mile. The total land area of earth is about 57.3 million square mile, which implies that roughly 8% of total land area of the earth is now severely contaminated. And I am not including Bosnia and Kosovo theatres of war, which has seriously affected the Balkans as well as the NATO troops.
Did you get that shocking piece of information? "roughly 8% of total land area of the earth is now severely contaminated"?
We have often wondered why Bush/Rumsfeld committed less than one-half the manpower the Pentagon said they needed, wondering if the real purpose of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars was to spread deadly D.U. over a huge area of the entire world's "Non-Integrating States". This article more than confirms this long-held suspicion. We encourage you to read it in its entirety, for the information is priceless and the map of the regions affected will sober you.
How many people in this "Non-Integrating States" region is now contaminated with this deadly D.U.? Prepare to be shocked.
"Referring to the map, with Afghanistan's capital Kabul as the centre, depleted uranium affected region includes Pakistan, entire northwest India, parts of Nepal, parts of China, major regions of Central Asian Republics, Iran, and the Gulf countries, including Dubai and Abu Dhabi, two major financial and trading centres. Taking Baghdad as the centre, the regions affected includes the entire West Asia, parts of Egypt, parts of Greece, Cyprus, regions around the Caspian Sea and islands in the eastern Mediterranean ... The total estimated population within the two circles was about 857 million (See Table) in July 2005."
Nearly one billion (1,000,000,000) people are thus being daily exposed to deadly Depleted Uranium! Since a person will begin dying if they breath in just ONE tiny speck of D.U. contaminated dust, the chances of 75% of these people dying in the next 20 years is incredibly high. One day, before the White Throne Judgment, President George Bush, Defense Secretary Rumsfeld, generals of the Pentagon, and everyone who aided and abetted this incredible crime will stand condemned for the deliberate genocide of 857 million people! These people will include all Evangelical pastors who stand in their pulpits and do everything in their power to persuade members of their flock that Bush is a Christian and needs to be supported and who deliberatly ignore every bit of evidence to the contrary!
Yet, in all the current news articles accusing President Bush of war crimes, very few ever mention Depleted Uranium as the major crime of which he should be accused. Mass Media is evidently an accomplice in this horrible crime. What else is new?
NEWS BRIEF: "God Forgive America", Another Day In The Empire, March 23rd 2006
"Instead of 'God Bless America', we should put 'God Forgive America' bumperstickers on our cars. Americans, as participants in horrendous war crimes, should ask for forgiveness. America is a killer nation—not only do we kill Iraqis and Afghans, but we are in the process of killing ourselves."
For the next several paragraphs, the author lists the medical afflictions with which Depleted Uranium Poisoning afflicts its victims. Since we have already reported these horrific effects in our Depleted Uranium Section, we shall not cover them in this newsletter, but shall just continue with this author's dialogue.
"In short, we will pay for the crimes of our government—a government several magnitudes more destructive than the Nazis—and so will our children, and our children’s children ... Bush tells us nuclear war (and using depleted uranium is indeed nuclear war) is required in order to save us from 'al-Qaeda', a phantom created by the very government Bush represents ... God forgive Americans who tune out reality in preference for televised football games and sit-coms while a pathological government kills hundreds of thousands of innocent people in their names. If you believe in God, now is the time to ask for forgiveness. Now is the time to get off the sofa and out of the gym or mall and demand that your government stop murdering not only Iraqis and Afghans, but the entire planet with depleted uranium and other war-making toxins and poisons. It will be too late on the day you sit helplessly by and watch in horror as your child dies from cancer caused by depleted uranium blowing in the wind. 'I am death, shatterer of worlds', declared Robert Oppenheimer, head of the Manhattan Project, quoting the Bhagavad-Gita, after the explosion of the first atomic bomb."
"Let’s call a spade a spade—this largely ignored horror has a name: omnicide, the murder of all life on the planet. God forgive America"
And when he had opened the second seal, I heard the second beast say, Come and see. And there went out another horse [that was] red: and [power] was given to him that sat thereon to take peace from the earth, and that they should kill one another: and there was given unto him a great sword. (Rev 6:3-4)
And when he had opened the fourth seal, I heard the voice of the fourth beast say, Come and see. And I looked, and behold a pale horse: and his name that sat on him was Death, and Hell followed with him. And power was given unto them over the fourth part of the earth, to kill with sword, and with hunger, and with death, and with the beasts of the earth. (Rev 6:7-8)
America's second Skull & Bones President in the past two decades is leading the way in possibly setting up the final scenario by which 25% of the people of the world may die. War will break out and many of the deaths will occur from that, but Depleted Uranium is slowly working its way toward its final climax, reaching its killing height at the time these prophecies are fulfilled.
But, God will not forgive an America whose inhabitants have not asked for forgiveness; rather, He will judge her -- "For her sins have reached unto heaven, and God hath remembered her iniquities." (Rev 18:5)
Therefore shall her plagues come in one day, death, and mourning, and famine; and she shall be utterly burned with fire: for strong [is] YHWH Elohyim who judgeth her. (Rev 18:8)
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Post by Watchman on May 5, 2006 15:12:26 GMT -5
Pentagon Conspiracy: Genocide by Depleted Uranium (continued)
by DOUG WESTERMAN
Many acquire cancer and leukemia, suffering an early and painful death. Huge increases in severe birth defects are reported. Oncologists are overwhelmed. Soccer fields, sand lots and parks, traditional play areas for kids, are no longer safe. People lose their most basic freedom, the ability to go outside and safely breathe.
Sound worse than 9/11? Welcome to Iraq and Afghanistan.
Dr. Jawad Al-Ali (55), director of the Oncology Center at the largest hospital in Basra, Iraq stated, at a recent ( 2003) conference in Japan:
"Two strange phenomena have come about in Basra which I have never seen before. The first is double and triple cancers in one patient. For example, leukemia and cancer of the stomach. We had one patient with 2 cancers - one in his stomach and kidney. Months later, primary cancer was developing in his other kidney--he had three different cancer types. The second is the clustering of cancer in families. We have 58 families here with more than one person affected by cancer. Dr Yasin, a general Surgeon here has two uncles, a sister and cousin affected with cancer. Dr Mazen, another specialist, has six family members suffering from cancer. My wife has nine members of her family with cancer".
"Children in particular are susceptible to DU poisoning. They have a much higher absorption rate as their blood is being used to build and nourish their bones and they have a lot of soft tissues. Bone cancer and leukemia used to be diseases affecting them the most, however, cancer of the lymph system which can develop anywhere on the body, and has rarely been seen before the age of 12 is now also common.",
"We were accused of spreading propaganda for Saddam before the war. When I have gone to do talks I have had people accuse me of being pro-Saddam. Sometimes I feel afraid to even talk. Regime people have been stealing my data and calling it their own, and using it for their own agendas. The Kuwaitis banned me from entering Kuwait - we were accused of being Saddam supporters."
John Hanchette, a journalism professor at St. Bonaventure University, and one of the founding editors of USA TODAY related the following to DU researcher Leuren Moret.
He stated that he had prepared news breaking stories about the effects of DU on Gulf War soldiers and Iraqi citizens, but that each time he was ready to publish, he received a phone call from the Pentagon asking him not to print the story.
He has since been replaced as editor of USA TODAY.
Dr. Keith Baverstock, The World Health Organization's chief expert on radiation and health for 11 years and author of an unpublished study has charged that his report "on the cancer risk to civilians in Iraq from breathing uranium contaminated dust" was also deliberately suppressed.
The information released by the U.S. Dept. of Defense is not reliable, according to some sources even within the military.
In 1997, while citing experiments, by others, in which 84 percent of dogs exposed to inhaled uranium died of cancer of the lungs, Dr. Asaf Durakovic, then Professor of Radiology and Nuclear Medicine at Georgetown University in Washington was quoted as saying,
"The [US government's] Veterans Administration asked me to lie about the risks of incorporating depleted uranium in the human body."
At that time Dr. Durakovic was a colonel in the U.S. Army. He has since left the military, to found the Uranium Medical Research Center, a privately funded organization with headquarters in Canada.
PFC Stuart Grainger of 23 Army Division, 34th Platoon. (Names and numbers have been changed) was diagnosed with cancer several after returning from Iraq. Seven other men in the Platoon also have malignancies.
Doug Rokke, U.S. Army contractor who headed a clean-up of depleted uranium after the first Gulf War states:
"Depleted uranium is a crime against God and humanity."
Rokke's own crew, a hundred employees, was devastated by exposure to the fine dust. He stated:
"When we went to the Gulf, we were all really healthy,"
After performing clean-up operations in the desert (mistakenly without protective gear), 30 members of his staff died, and most others" ncluding Rokke himself "developed serious health problems. Rokke now has reactive airway disease, neurological damage, cataracts, and kidney problems.
We warned the Department of Defense in 1991 after the Gulf War. Their arrogance is beyond comprehension.
Yet the D.O.D still insists such ingestion is "not sufficient to make troops seriously ill in most cases."
Then why did it make the clean up crew seriously or terminally ill in nearly all cases?
Marion Falk, a retired chemical physicist who built nuclear bombs for more than 20 years at Lawrence Livermore Lab, was asked if he thought that DU weapons operate in a similar manner as a dirty bomb.
"That's exactly what they are. They fit the description of a dirty bomb in every way."
According to Falk, more than 30 percent of the DU fired from the cannons of U.S. tanks is reduced to particles one-tenth of a micron (one millionth of a meter) in size or smaller on impact.
"The larger the bang" the greater the amount of DU that is dispersed into the atmosphere, Falk said. With the larger missiles and bombs, nearly 100 percent of the DU is reduced to radioactive dust particles of the "micron size" or smaller, he said.
When asked if the main purpose for using it was for destroying things and killing people, Falk was more specific:
"I would say that it is the perfect weapon for killing lots of people."
When a DU round or bomb strikes a hard target, most of its kinetic energy is converted to heat " sufficient heat to ignite the DU. From 40% to 70% of the DU is converted to extremely fine dust particles of ceramic uranium oxide (primarily dioxide, though other formulations also occur).
Over 60% of these particles are smaller than 5 microns in diameter, about the same size as the cigarette ash particles in cigarette smoke and therefore respirable.
Because conditions are so chaotic in Iraq, the medical infrastructure has been greatly compromised. In terms of both cancer and birth defects due to DU, only a small fraction of the cases are being reported.
Doctors in southern Iraq are making comparisons to the birth defects that followed the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in WWII. They have numerous photos of infants born without brains, with their internal organs outside their bodies, without sexual organs, without spines, and the list of deformities goes on an on. Such birth defects were extremely rare in Iraq prior to the large scale use of DU. Weapons. Now they are commonplace.
In hospitals across Iraq, the mothers are no longer asking, "Doctor, is it a boy or girl?" but rather, "Doctor, is it normal?" The photos are horrendous.
Ross B. Mirkarimi, a spokesman at The Arms Control Research Centre stated:
"Unborn children of the region are being asked to pay the highest price, the integrity of their DNA."
Prior to her death from leukemia in Sept. 2004, Nuha Al Radi , an accomplished Iraqi artist and author of the "Baghdad Diaries" wrote:
"Everyone seems to be dying of cancer. Every day one hears about another acquaintance or friend of a friend dying. How many more die in hospitals that one does not know? Apparently, over thirty percent of Iraqis have cancer, and there are lots of kids with leukemia."
"The depleted uranium left by the U.S. bombing campaign has turned Iraq into a cancer-infested country. For hundreds of years to come, the effects of the uranium will continue to wreak havoc on Iraq and its surrounding areas."
This excerpt in her diary was written in 1993, after Gulf War I (Approximately 300 tons of DU ordinance, mostly in desert areas) but before Operation Iraqi Freedom, (Est. 1,700 tons with much more near major population centers).
So, it's 5-6 times worse now than it was when she wrote than diary entry!!
Estimates of the percentage of D.U. which was 'aerosolized' into fine uranium oxide dust are approximately 30-40%. That works out to over one million pounds of dust scattered throughout Iraq.
As a special advisor to the World Health Organization, the United Nations, and the Iraqi Ministry of Health, Dr. Ahmad Hardan has documented the effects of DU in Iraq between 1991 and 2002.
"American forces admit to using over 300 tons of DU weapons in 1991. The actual figure is closer to 800. This has caused a health crisis that has affected almost a third of a million people. As if that was not enough, America went on and used 200 tons more in Bagdad alone during the recent invasion.
I don't know about other parts of Iraq, it will take me years to document that.
"In Basra, it took us two years to obtain conclusive proof of what DU does, but we now know what to look for and the results are terrifying."
By far the most devastating effect is on unborn children. Nothing can prepare anyone for the sight of hundreds of preserved fetuses " scarcely human in appearance. Iraq is now seeing babies with terribly foreshortened limbs, with their intestines outside their bodies, with huge bulging tumors where their eyes should be, or with a single eye-like Cyclops, or without eyes, or without limbs, and even without heads. Significantly, some of the defects are almost unknown outside textbooks showing the babies born near A-bomb test sites in the Pacific.
Dr. Hardan also states:
"I arranged for a delegation from Japan's Hiroshima Hospital to come and share their expertise in the radiological diseases we
Are likely to face over time. The delegation told me the Americans had objected and they decided not to come. Similarly, a world famous German cancer specialist agreed to come, only to be told later that he would not be given permission to enter Iraq."
Not only are we poisoning the people of Iraq and Afghanistan, but we are making a concerted effort to keep out specialists from other countries who can help. The U.S. Military doesn"t want the rest of the world to find out what we have done.
Such relatively swift development of cancers has been reported by doctors in hospitals treating civilians following NATO bombing with DU in Yugoslavia in 1998-1999 and the US military invasion of Iraq using DU for the first time in 1991. Medical experts report that this phenomenon of multiple malignancies from unrelated causes has been unknown until now and is a new syndrome associated with internal DU exposure.
Just 467 US personnel were wounded in the three-week Persian Gulf War in 1990-1991.
Out of 580,400 soldiers who served in Gulf War I, 11,000 are dead, and by 2000 there were 325,000 on permanent medical disability.
This astounding number of disabled vets means that a decade later, 56 percent of those soldiers who served in the first Gulf War now have medical problems.
Although not reported in the mainstream American press, a recent Tokyo tribunal, guided by the principles of International Criminal Law and International Humanitarian Law, found President George W. Bush guilty of war crimes.
On March 14, 2004, Nao Shimoyachi, reported in The Japan Times that President Bush was found guilty "for attacking civilians with indiscriminate weapons and other arms,"and the "tribunal also issued recommendations for banning Depleted Uranium shells and other weapons that indiscriminately harm people."
Although this was a "Citizen's Court" having no legal authority, the participants were sincere in their determination that international laws have been violated and a war crimes conviction is warranted.
Troops involved in actual combat are not the only servicemen reporting symptoms. Four soldiers from a New York Army National Guard company serving in Iraq are among several members of the same company, the 442nd Military Police, who say they have been battling persistent physical ailments that began last summer in the Iraqi town of Samawah.
"I got sick instantly in June," said Staff Sgt. Ray Ramos, a Brooklyn housing cop. "My health kept going downhill with daily headaches, constant numbness in my hands and rashes on my stomach."
Dr. Asaf Durakovic, UMRC founder, and nuclear medicine expert examined and tested nine soldiers from the company says that four "almost certainly" inhaled radioactive dust from exploded American shells manufactured with depleted uranium. Laboratory tests revealed traces of two manmade forms of uranium in urine samples from four of the soldiers.
If so, the men - Sgt. Hector Vega, Sgt. Ray Ramos, Sgt. Agustin Matos and Cpl. Anthony Yonnone - are the first confirmed cases of inhaled depleted uranium exposure from the current Iraq conflict.
The 442nd, made up for the most part of New York cops, firefighters and correction officers, is based in Orangeburg, Rockland County. Dispatched to Iraq in Easter of 2003, the unit's members had been providing guard duty for convoys, running jails and training Iraqi police. The entire company is due to return home later this month.
"These are amazing results, especially since these soldiers were military police not exposed to the heat of battle," said Dr. Asaf Duracovic, who examined the G.I.s and performed the testing.
In a group of eight U.S. led Coalition servicemen whose babies were born without eyes, seven are known to have been directly exposed to DU dust. In a much group (250 soldiers) exposed during the first Gulf war, 67% of the children conceived after the war had birth defects.
Dr. Durakovic's UMRC research team also conducted a three-week field trip to Iraq in October of 2003. It collected about 100 samples of substances such as soil, civilian urine and the tissue from the corpses of Iraqi soldiers in 10 cities, including Baghdad, Basra and Najaf.
Durakovic said preliminary tests show that the air, soil and water samples contained "hundreds to thousands of times" the normal levels of radiation.
"This high level of contamination is because much more depleted uranium was used this year than in (the Gulf War of) 1991," Durakovic told The Japan Times.
"They are hampering efforts to prove the connection between Depleted Uranium and the illness," Durakovic said
"They do not want to admit that they committed war crimes" by using weapons that kill indiscriminately, which are banned under international law."
(NOTE ABOUT DR. DURAKOVIC; First, he was warned to stop his work, then he was fired from his position, then his house was ransacked, and he has also reported receiving death threats. Evidently the U.S. D.O.D is very keen on censoring DU whistle-blowers!)
Dr. Durakovic, UMRC research associates Patricia Horan and Leonard Dietz, published a unique study in the August 2002 issue of Military Medicine Medical Journal.
The study is believed to be the first to look at inhaled DU among Gulf War veterans, using the ultrasensitive technique of thermal ionization mass spectrometry, which enabled them to easily distinguish between natural uranium and DU.
The study, which examined British, Canadian and U.S. veterans, all suffering typical Gulf War Syndrome ailments, found that, nine years after the war, 14 of 27 veterans studied had DU in their urine. DU also was found in the lung and bone of a deceased Gulf War veteran. That no governmental study has been done on inhaled DU "amounts to a massive malpractice," Dietz said in an interview.
The Japanese began studying DU effects in the southern Iraq in the summer of 2003. They had a Geiger counter which they watched go off the scale on many occasions. During their visit,a local hospital was treating upwards of 600 children per day, many of which suffered symptoms of internal poisoning by radiation.
600 children per day? How many of these children will get cancer and suffer and early and painful death?
"Ingested DU particles can cause up to 1,000 times the damage of an X-ray", said Mary Olson, a nuclear waste specialist and biologist at the Nuclear Information and Resource Service in Washington D.C.
It is this difference in particle size as well as the dust's crystalline structure that make the presence of DU dust in the environment such an extreme hazard, and which differentiates its properties from that of the natural uranium dust that is ubiquitous and to which we all are exposed every day, which seldom reaches such a small size. This point is being stressed, as comparing DU particles to much larger natural ones is misleading.
The U.S. Military and its supporters regularly quote a Rand Corp. Study which uses the natural uranium inhaled by miners.
Particles smaller than 10 microns can access the innermost recesses of lung tissue where they become permanently lodged. Furthermore, if the substance is relatively insoluble, such as the ceramic DU-oxide dust produced from burning DU, it will remain in place for decades, dissolving very slowly into the bloodstream and lymphatic fluids through the course of time.
Studies have identified DU in the urine of Gulf War veterans nine years after that conflict, testifying to the permanence of ceramic DU-oxide in the lungs. Thus the effects are far different from natural uranium dust, whose coarse particles are almost entirely excreted by the body within 24 hours.
The military is aware of DU's harmful effects on the human genetic code. A 2001 study of DU's effect on DNA done by Dr. Alexandra C. Miller for the Armed Forces Radiobiology Research Institute in Bethesda, Md., indicates that DU's chemical instability causes 1 million times more genetic damage than would be expected from its radiation effect alone.
Studies have shown that inhaled nano-particles are far more toxic than micro-sized particles of the same basic chemical composition. British toxicopathologist Vyvyan Howard has reported that the increased toxicity of the nano-particle is due to its size.
For example, when mice were exposed to virus-size particles of Teflon (0.13 microns) in a University of Rochester study, there were no ill effects. But when mice were exposed to nano-particles of Teflon for 15 minutes, nearly all the mice died within 4 hours.
"Exposure pathways for depleted uranium can be through the skin, by inhalation, and ingestion," writes Lauren Moret, another DU researcher. "Nano-particles have high mobility and can easily enter the body. Inhalation of nano-particles of depleted uranium is the most hazardous exposure, because the particles pass through the lung-blood barrier directly into the blood.
"When inhaled through the nose, nano-particles can cross the olfactory bulb directly into the brain through the blood brain barrier, where they migrate all through the brain," she wrote. "Many Gulf era soldiers exposed to depleted uranium have been diagnosed with brain tumors, brain damage and impaired thought processes. Uranium can interfere with the mitochondria, which provide energy for the nerve processes, and transmittal of the nerve signal across synapses in the brain.
Based on dissolution and excretion rate data, it is possible to approximate the amount of DU initially inhaled by these veterans. For the handful of veterans studied, this amount averaged 0.34 milligrams. Knowing the specific activity (radiation rate) for DU allows one to determine that the total radiation (alpha, beta and gamma) occurring from DU and its radioactive decay products within their bodies comes to about 26 radiation events every second, or 800 million events each year.
At .34 milligrams per dose, there are over 10 trillion doses floating around Iraq and Afghanistan.
How many additional deaths are we talking about? In the aftermath of the first Gulf War, the UK Atomic Energy Authority came up with estimates for the potential effects of the DU contamination left by the conflict. It calculated that "this could cause "500,000 potential deaths". This was "a theoretical figure", it stressed, that indicated "a significant problem".
The AEA's calculation was made in a confidential memo to the privatized munitions company, Royal Ordnance, dated 30 April 1991. The high number of potential deaths was dismissed as "very far from realistic" by a British defense minister, Lord Gilbert.
"Since the rounds were fired in the desert, many miles from the nearest village, it is highly unlikely that the local population would have been exposed to any significant amount of respirable oxide," he said. These remarks were made prior to the more recent invasions of both Afghanistan and Iraq, where DU munitions were used on a larger scale in and near many of the most populated areas. If the amount of DU ordinance used in the first Gulf War was sufficient to cause 500,000 potential deaths, (had it been used near the populated areas), then what of the nearly six times that amount used in operation Iraqi Freedom, which was used in and near the major towns and cities?
Extrapolating the U.K. AEA estimate with this amount gives a figure of potentially 3 million extra deaths from inhaling DU dust in Iraq alone, not including Afghanistan. This is about 11% of Iraq's total population of 27 million. Dan Bishop, Ph.d chemist for IDUST feels that this estimate may be low, if the long life of DU dust is considered. In Afghanistan, the concentration in some areas is greater than Iraq.
What can an otherwise healthy person expect when inhaling the deadly dust? Captain Terry Riordon was a member of the Canadian Armed Forces serving in Gulf War I. He passed away in April 1999 at age 45. Terry left Canada a very fit man who did cross-country skiing and ran in marathons. On his return only two months later he could barely walk.
He returned to Canada in February 1991 with documented loss of motor control, chronic fatigue, respiratory difficulties, chest pain, difficulty breathing, sleep problems, short-term memory loss, testicle pain, body pains, aching bones, diarrhea, and depression. After his death, depleted uranium contamination was discovered in his lungs and bones.
For eight years he suffered his innumerable ailments and struggled with the military bureaucracy and the system to get proper diagnosis and treatment. He had arranged, upon his death, to bequeath his body to the UMRC. Through his gift, the UMRC was able to obtain conclusive evidence that inhaling fine particles of depleted uranium dust completely destroyed his heath. How many Terry Riordans are out there among the troops being exposed, not to mention Iraqi and Afghan civilians?
Inhaling the dust will not kill large numbers of Iraqi and Afghan civilians right away, any more than it did Captain Riordan. Rather, what we will see is vast numbers of people who are chronically and severely ill, having their life spans drastically shortened, many with multiple cancers.
Melissa Sterry, another sick veteran, served for six months at a supply base in Kuwait during the winter of 1991-92. Part of her job with the National Guard's Combat Equipment Company "A" was to clean out tanks and other armored vehicles that had been used during the war, preparing them for storage.
She said she swept out the armored vehicles, cleaning up dust, sand and debris, sometimes being ordered to help bury contaminated parts. In a telephone interview, she stated that after researching depleted uranium she chose not to take the military's test because she could not trust the results. It is alarming that Melissa was stationed in Kuwait, not Iraq. Cleaning out tanks with DU dust was enough to make her ill.
In, 2003, the Christian Science Monitor sent reporters to Iraq to investigate long-term effects of depleted uranium. Staff writer Scott Peterson saw children playing on top of a burnt-out tank near a vegetable stand on the outskirts of Baghdad, a tank that had been destroyed by armor-piercing shells coated with depleted uranium.
Wearing his mask and protective clothing, he pointed his Geiger counter toward the tank. It registered 1,000 times the normal background radiation. If the troops were on a mission of mercy to bring democracy to Iraq, wouldn"t keeping children away from such dangers be the top priority?
The laws of war prohibit the use of weapons that have deadly and inhumane effects beyond the field of battle.
Nor can weapons be legally deployed in war when they are known to remain active, or cause harm after the war concludes.
It is no surprise that the Japanese Court found President Bush guilty of war crimes.
Dr. Alim Yacoub of Basra University conducted an epidemiological study into incidences of malignancies in children under fifteen years old, in the Basra area (an area bombed with DU during the first Gulf War). They found over the 1990 to 1999 period, there was a 242% rise. That was before the recent invasion.
In Kosovo, similar spikes in cancer and birth defects were noticed by numerous international experts, although the quantity of DU weapons used was only a small fraction of what was used in Iraq.
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Post by Watchman on May 5, 2006 15:13:03 GMT -5
Verifiable statistics for Iraq will remain elusive for some time, but widespread field studies in Afghanistan point to the existence of a large scale public health disaster. In May of 2002, the UMRC (Uranium Medical Research Center) sent a field team to interview and examine residents and internally displaced people in Afghanistan. The UMRC field team began by first identifying several hundred people suffering from illnesses and medical conditions displaying clinical symptoms which are considered to be characteristic of radiation exposure. To investigate the possibility that the symptoms were due to radiation sickness, the UMRC team collected urine specimens and soil samples, transporting them to an independent research lab in England. UMRC's Field Team found Afghan civilians with acute symptoms of radiation poisoning, along with chronic symptoms of internal uranium contamination, including congenital problems in newborns. Local civilians reported large, dense dust clouds and smoke plumes rising from the point of impact, an acrid smell, followed by burning of the nasal passages, throat and upper respiratory tract. Subjects in all locations presented identical symptom profiles and chronologies. The victims reported symptoms including pain in the cervical column, upper shoulders and basal area of the skull, lower back/kidney pain, joint and muscle weakness, sleeping difficulties, headaches, memory problems and disorientation. Two additional scientific study teams were sent to Afghanistan. The first arrived in June 2002, concentrating on the Jalalabad region. The second arrived four months later, broadening the study to include the capital Kabul, which has a population of nearly 3.5 million people. The city itself contains the highest recorded number of fixed targets during Operation Enduring Freedom. For the study's purposes, the vicinity of three major bomb sites were examined. It was predicted that signatures of depleted or enriched uranium would be found in the urine and soil samples taken during the research. The team was unprepared for the shock of its findings, which indicated in both Jalalabad and Kabul, DU was causing the high levels of illness. Tests taken from a number of Jalalabad subjects showed concentrations 400% to 2000% above that for normal populations, amounts which have not been recorded in civilian studies before. Those in Kabul who were directly exposed to US-British precision bombing showed extreme signs of contamination, consistent with uranium exposure. These included pains in joints, back/kidney pain, muscle weakness, memory problems and confusion and disorientation. Those exposed to the bombing report symptoms of flu-type illnesses, bleeding, runny noses and blood-stained mucous. How many of these people will suffer a painful and early death from cancer? Even the study team itself complained of similar symptoms during their stay. Most of these symptoms last for days or months. In August of 2002, UMRC completed its preliminary analysis of the results from Nangarhar. Without exception, every person donating urine specimens tested positive for uranium contamination. The specific results indicated an astoundingly high level of contamination; concentrations were 100 to 400 times greater than those of the Gulf War Veterans tested in 1999. A researcher reported. "We took both soil and biological samples, and found considerable presence in urine samples of radioactivity; the heavy concentration astonished us. They were beyond our wildest imagination." In the fall of 2002, the UMRC field team went back to Afghanistan for a broader survey, and revealed a potentially larger exposure than initially anticipated. Approximately 30% of those interviewed in the affected areas displayed symptoms of radiation sickness. New born babies were among those displaying symptoms, with village elders reporting that over 25% of the infants were inexplicably ill. How widespread and extensive is the exposure? A quote from the UMRC field report reads: "The UMRC field team was shocked by the breadth of public health impacts coincident with the bombing. Without exception, at every bombsite investigated, people are ill. A significant portion of the civilian population presents symptoms consistent with internal contamination by uranium." In Afghanistan, unlike Iraq, UMRC lab results indicated high concentrations of NON-DEPLETED URANIUM, with the concentrations being much higher than in DU victims from Iraq. Afghanistan was used as a testing ground for a new generation of "bunker buster" bombs containing high concentrations of other uranium alloys. "A significant portion of the civilian population"? It appears that by going after a handful of terrorists in Afghanistan we have poisoned a huge number of innocent civilians, with a disproportionate number of them being children. The military has found depleted uranium in the urine of some soldiers but contends it was not enough to make them seriously ill in most cases. Critics have asked for more sensitive, more expensive testing. ------------------------------------ According to an October 2004 Dispatch from the Italian Military Health Observatory, a total of 109 Italian soldiers have died thus far due to exposure to depleted uranium. A spokesman at the Military Health Observatory, Domenico Leggiero, states "The total of 109 casualties exceeds the total number of persons dying as a consequence of road accidents. Anyone denying the significance of such data is purely acting out of ill faith, and the truth is that our soldiers are dying out there due to a lack of adequate protection against depleted uranium". Members of the Observatory have petitioned for an urgent hearing "in order to study effective prevention and safeguard measures aimed at reducing the death-toll amongst our serving soldiers". There were only 3,000 Italian soldiers sent to Iraq, and they were there for a short time. The number of 109 represents about 3.6% of the total. If the same percentage of Iraqis get a similar exposure, that would amount to 936,000. As Iraqis are permanently living in the same contaminated environment, their percentage will be higher. The Pentagon/DoD have interfered with UMRC's ability to have its studies published by managing, a progressive and persistent misinformation program in the press against UMRC, and through the use of its control of science research grants to refute UMRC's scientific findings and destroy the reputation of UMRC's scientific staff, physicians and laboratories. UMRC is the first independent research organization to find Depleted Uranium in the bodies of US, UK and Canadian Gulf War I veterans and has subsequently, following Operation Iraqi Freedom, found Depleted Uranium in the water, soils and atmosphere of Iraq as well as biological samples donated by Iraqi civilians. Yet the first thing that comes up on Internet searches are these supposed "studies repeatedly showing DU to be harmless." The technique is to approach the story as a debate between government and independent experts in which public interest is stimulated by polarizing the issues rather than telling the scientific and medical truth. The issues are systematically confused and misinformed by government, UN regulatory agencies (WHO, UNEP, IAEA, CDC, DOE, etc) and defense sector (military and the weapons developers and manufacturers). Dr. Yuko Fujita, an assistant professor at Keio University, Japan who examined the effects of radioactivity in Iraq from May to June, 2003, said : "I doubt that Iraq is fabricating data because in fact there are many children suffering from leukemia in hospitals," Fujita said. "As a result of the Iraq war, the situation will be desperate in some five to 10 years." The March 14, 2004 Tokyo Citizen's Tribunal that "convicted" President Bush gave the following summation regarding DU weapons: (This court was a citizen's court with no binding legal authority) 1. Their use has indiscriminate effects; 2. Their use is out of proportion with the pursuit of military objectives; 3. Their use adversely affects the environment in a widespread, long term and severe manner; 4. Their use causes superfluous injury and unnecessary suffering. Two years ago, President Bush withdrew the United States as a signatory to the International Criminal Court's statute, which has been ratified by all other Western democracies. The White House actually seeks to immunize U.S. leaders from war crimes prosecutions entirely. It has also demanded express immunity from ICC prosecution for American nationals. CONCLUSIONS: If terrorists succeeded in spreading something throughout the U.S. that ended up causing hundreds of thousands of cancer cases and birth defects over a period of many years, they would be guilty of a crime against humanity that far surpasses the Sept. 11th attacks in scope and severity. Although not deliberate, with our military campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan, we have done just that. If the physical environment is so unsafe and unhealthy that one cannot safely breath, then the outer trappings of democracy have little meaning. At least under Saddam, the Iraqi people could stay healthy and conceive normal children. Few Americans are aware that in getting rid of Saddam, we left something much worse in his place. ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=viewArticle&code=20060503&articleId=2374 Depleted Uranium - Far Worse Than 9/11 Depleted Uranium Dust - Public Health Disaster For The People Of Iraq and Afghanistan by Doug Westerman May 3, 2006 Vital Truths and Information Clearing House For media inquiries: crgeditor@yahoo.com © Copyright Doug Westerman, Vital Truths and Information Clearing House, 2006
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Post by Watchman on Aug 15, 2006 12:34:23 GMT -5
Depleted Uranium is striking our soldiers dead as they return home from the battlefields of Iraq and Afghanistan! While the U.S. Army fiddles and obfuscates, grieving widows and families are left without either an understanding as to what has just happened to their formerly healthy loved ones or without financial funds with which to survive.
This is the sad story of Windy Rogers, whose husband died suddenly from complications of Depleted Uranium and/or Toxic Vaccinations shortly after returning from duty in Afghanistan. Windy discovered Cutting Edge and our many articles on this horrific subject and realized that the facts we presented perfectly matched the facts of her husband's tragic death.
Windy is now struggling with raising 6 children, the oldest of whom is a Senior in high school. This is her story -- you can multiply it tens of thousands of times, for we have sent over one million men through the battlefields of Iraq and of Afhganistan; remember, over 75% of all American soldiers who served through the 100-hour war of Gulf War I in 1991-1992, are now dead or dying from this deadly combination of Toxic Vaccinations and Depleted Uranium poisoning.
You will realize that the Windy Rogers story is exactly what Cutting Edge has been warning since 2003.
Now, listen with your heart to Windy Rogers.
"Hi my name is Windy Harris-Rogers a 38 year widow of the late Staff Sgt. Christopher L. Rogers of Raleigh, NC who too died of MYOCARDITIS, INFLAMATION OF THE HEART MUSSLE ON 2/14/05, 9 months after returning home from Afghanistan in which he served 1 year. I'M JUST LIVID WITH THIS ENTIRE SITUATION HERE."
"I was reading an article on the Death of PI Christopher Abston, the 26 year old from Fort Bragg, NC that died in Dec. 05 14 days after he received the smallpox vaccine. The military is not telling truth, I reand another article where they stated '120 military personnel have developed myocarditis, or other similar conditions, after receiving the smallpox vaccination, but none have died' and that's just a BOLD FACE LIE!!! My husband's cause of death was Myocarditis, 1 week prior to his death another soldier out of Bragg died suddenly with flu like symptoms; he too had only been home a few months after serving time in Iraq before he suddenly became sick of flu like symptoms."
"On Dec. 26, 2004, another case, Soldier died with Flu like symptoms out of Fort Bragg, all three to include my husband were Fort Bragg Soldiers. In March of this year a National Guard Reservist, also a NEW JERSEY CITY COP, died suddenly as well with FLU LIKE symptoms. He had returned to home from Iraq in Nov.05 and his brother stated that he complained of having flu-like symptoms, high fever, etc. He was found dead in his apartment.
"I'm so angry with this entire process, and how they are not telling us the truth. There are no words to describe the pain I feel losing my husband. We have 6 children, with one entering into her Senior year in high school and the hurt, pain, and suffering they have had to endure because of our loss is beyond words. The devastation of our only son, age 9, not having his father anymore is so hard for him to except. Having to face not having his father to attend football, basketball and baseball practices and games was extremely hard on him when his teammates would have their fathers."
"I have had to fight since 2/14/05 to receive the Military Benefits that's rightfully due and it's so damn frustrating to have to file for claims wait for denial letters and go through appeal processing's before you can get medical benefits etc. This is so unfair to the families and I know for a fact that I'm not the only one. I still have claims pending after having them filed last Feb.05 & March 05.My husband served 19 years in the Army/Army Reserves, fought for this country until his death on Valentines day last year and his family is not being taken care of at this time. I would love to be able to get in contact with PI Christopher Abston's Parents, my heart really goes out to them as well as the other family members who have lost loved ones because of this."
"Our local news stations here in Raleigh, NC interviewed me and I've attached a copy of one of the articles for your review which will clearly show that the military is not telling the truth about this situation. An investigation out of Washington DC was ordered on my husband's death but not one Official or Personnel has contacted me with a status on the investigation and it's been well over a year now. I intend to seek Justice in this matter, I was ROBBED OF MY Marriage of only 3 1/2 years and out of those 3 1/1 years, 1 yr I had to spend separated from my husband because he was deployed to Afghan from 03 - 04. My children have to grow up without the support of their father and yet the military forces us to go through so much RED TAPE in order to receive benefits, PLEASE TELL ME WHERE IS JUSTICE IN THIS COUNTRY."
"My faith in God will not allow me to sit back and not fight back, I owe it to my husband and our children. He devoted 19 years of his time and gave his life to this country, I want justice!! GOD DOES HAVE THE FINAL SAY SO AND HE DOES HAVE ALL POWERS, HE CAN AND WILL EXPOSE the truth, my faith is too strong not to believe and my heart as well as our children's is too broken to give up. I'M A FIGHTER and certainly a "MOVER & SHAKER" and I intend to seek JUSTICE IN THIS MATTER."
I have put a call into Windy Rogers, to help her understand why our government is killing its own soldiers, and even of their family members as the wife has physical relations with her returning sick husband. We live in a most tragic era, that period of time following the return of Israel to her land, that era known as the "End of the Age". And, just as the Bible foretells, our leaders and too many of our people fulfill some very terrible prophecies:
"BUT UNDERSTAND this, that in the last days will come (set in) perilous times of great stress and trouble, hard to deal with and hard to bear. For people will be lovers of self and utterly self-centered, lovers of money and aroused by an inordinate, greedy desire for wealth, proud and arrogant and contemptuous boasters. They will be abusive, blasphemous, scoffing, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy and profane. They will be without natural human affection, callous and inhuman, relentless - admitting of no truce or appeasement; they will be slanderers (false accusers, troublemakers), intemperate and loose in morals and conduct, uncontrolled and fierce, haters of good. They will be treacherous betrayers, rash, and inflated with self-conceit. They will be lovers of sensual pleasures and vain amusements more than and rather than lovers of God." (2 Timothy 3:1-4;Parallel Bible, KJV/Amplified Bible Commentary)
As Windy is discovering, America's leaders -- both civilian and military -- are characterized by many parts of this description.
And, Windy herself is suffering from the prophesied "perilous times of great stress and trouble, hard to deal with and hard to bear". The really hard part Windy must deal with is that America's civilian and military leadership knew that over 75% of all soldiers sent to battle with D.U. weaponry would die in this manner, and they sent them anyway.
And, now, they are denying any personal culpability and even trying to deny this poor woman her rights as she struggles to support 6 children.
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Post by Watchman on Nov 30, 2006 14:15:01 GMT -5
By Doug Rokke
The delivery of at least one hundred GBU-28 "bunker buster" bombs containing depleted-uranium warheads by the United States to Israel for use against targets in Lebanon will result in additional radioactive and chemical toxic contamination, with consequent adverse health and environmental effects throughout the Middle East. Israeli tank gunners are also using depleted-uranium tank rounds, as photographs verify.
Today, US, British, and now Israeli military personnel are using illegal uranium munitions—America and the United Kingdom's own "dirty bombs"—while US Army, US Department of Energy, US Department of Defense (DOD), and UK Ministry of Defence officials deny that there are any adverse health or environmental effects as a consequence of the manufacture, testing, or use of uranium munitions, so that they may avoid liability for the willful and illegal dispersal of a radioactive toxic material—depleted uranium (DU).
The use of uranium weapons is absolutely unacceptable and a crime against humanity. Consequently, the citizens of the world and all governments must force the cessation of uranium weapons use. I must demand that Israel now provide medical care to all DU casualties in Lebanon and clean up all DU contamination.
American and British officials have arrogantly refused to comply with their own regulations, orders, and directives that require DOD officials to provide prompt and effective medical care to all exposed individuals ("Medical Management of Unusual Depleted Uranium Casualties," DOD, Pentagon, 10/14/93; "Medical Management of Army Personnel Exposed to Depleted Uranium (DU)," US Army Medical Command, 4/29/04; Section 2-5 of US Army Regulation 700-48).
They also refuse to clean up dispersed radioactive contamination, as required by Army Regulation 700-48, "Management of Equipment Contaminated With Depleted Uranium or Radioactive Commodities" (Department of the Army, September 2002) and US Army Technical Bulletin 9-1300-278, "Guidelines for Safe Response to Handling, Storage, and Transportation Accidents Involving Army Tank Munitions or Armor which Contain Depleted Uranium" (Department of the Army, July 1996). Specifically, Section 2-4 of United States Army Regulation 700-48 (dated September 16, 2002) requires that:
(1) Military personnel identify, segregate, isolate, secure, and label all RCE (radiologically contaminated equipment),
(2) Procedures to minimize the spread of radioactivity will be implemented as soon as possible,
(3) Radioactive material and waste will not be locally disposed of through burial, submersion, incineration, destruction in place, or abandonment, and
(4) All equipment, to include captured or combat RCE, will be surveyed, packaged, retrograded, decontaminated and released.
The previous and current use of uranium weapons, the release of radioactive components in destroyed US and foreign military equipment, and releases of industrial, medical, and research-facility radioactive materials have resulted in unacceptable exposures. Therefore, decontamination must be completed as required by US Army Regulation 700-48 and should include releases of all radioactive materials resulting from military operations.
The extent of the adverse health and environmental effects of uranium weapons contamination is not limited to combat zones but includes facilities and sites where uranium weapons were manufactured or tested, including Vieques; Puerto Rico; Colonie, New York; Concord, Mass.; Jefferson Proving Grounds, Indiana; and Schofield Barracks, Hawaii. Therefore, medical care must be provided by the United States Department of Defense to all individuals affected by the manufacturing, testing, or use of uranium munitions. Thorough environmental remediation also must be completed without further delay.
I am amazed that fifteen years after was I asked to clean up the initial DU mess from Gulf War I, and over ten years since I finished the depleted-uranium project, US Department of Defense officials and others still attempt to justify the use of uranium munitions while ignoring mandatory requirements. I am dismayed that DOD and Department of Energy officials and representatives continue making personal attacks aimed to silence or discredit those of us who are demanding that medical care be provided to all DU casualties and that environmental remediation is completed in compliance with US Army Regulation 700-48. But beyond the ignored mandatory actions, the willful dispersal of tons of solid radioactive and chemically toxic waste in the form of uranium munitions is illegal and does not even pass the test of common sense.
According to the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS), DU is a "dirty bomb." The department issued "dirty bomb" response guidelines on January 3, 2006 for incidents within the United States, ignoring DOD use of uranium weapons and existing DOD regulations. These guidelines specifically state that "a radiological incident is defined as an event or series of events, deliberate or accidental, leading to the release, or potential release, into the environment of radioactive material in sufficient quantity to warrant consideration of protective actions. Use of an RDD or IND is an act of terror that produces a radiological incident." Thus, the use of uranium munitions is an "act or terror," as defined by DHS. Finally, continued compliance with the infamous March 1991 Los Alamos memorandum that was issued to ensure continued use of uranium munitions cannot be justified.
In conclusion, the president of the United States, the prime minister of the United Kingdom, and the prime minister of Israel must acknowledge and accept responsibility for the willful use of illegal uranium munitions—their own "dirty bombs"—resulting in adverse health and environmental effects.
President Bush, Prime Minister Blair, and Prime Minister Olmert should order medical care for all casualties and thorough environmental remediation, and stop the illegal use of depleted-uranium munitions.
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Post by Watchman on Mar 6, 2007 11:09:21 GMT -5
Monitoring depleted uranium Protecting the public against exposure By Kristine Kubat
While weapons made with depleted uranium can penetrate any substance known to man, the issues surrounding the use of this radioactive, heavy metal are having a much harder time sinking in.
Here in Hawai`i, Linda Faye Kroll is a retired nurse who has dedicated her life to educating the public about the dangers of military toxics. When Representative Josh Green introduced H.B. 1452 this legislative session, he created a forum for Kroll and others to voice their concerns.
"Don't believe anything I tell you," Kroll cautions, "look into it for yourself." Advice that seems to be gaining momentum at the local and state levels as U.S. Senator Inouye once again pushes for an increase in the military presence here and citizens are raising concerns about the increase of pollution that, inevitably, comes with the deal. "Make no mistake, everything having to do with preparing and making war is toxic," says Kroll.
In fact, the U.S. Department of Defense is the single largest producer of pollution in the world.
H.B. 1452 originally called for testing soil outside the military's live-fire ranges in the state of Hawai`i to determine if DU is present. The bill passed out of the Energy and Environmental Protection Committee and was heard for the second time last Saturday, this time by the Finance Committee chaired by Marcus Oshiro. Here it was amended to include air and water testing. The only opposition to the bill thus far has come from the Department of Health, which has taken the position that it can't afford the testing, estimated by DOH at $5 million per year. Rep. Green believes the federal government should share the cost because "any DU we're being exposed to must have come from the military."
All decision makers at the hearing voted in favor of passage, there were 17 ayes. Now H.B. 1452 is headed for the senate.
Depleted uranium (DU) is the by-product of the process that yields nuclear fuel. For decades, the U.S. government has been quietly converting stockpiles of it into weapons. The use of DU munitions in our own country is prohibited, a fact which does not keep the Pentagon from deploying them abroad, primarily in Iraq. They have also been used extensively in Serbia and Bosnia.
The Pentagon claims that the low levels of radiation emitted from DU weaponry pose no health risks. Many scientists disagree with the way this conclusion is drawn. The military looks only at how the trillions of healthy cells that comprise the human body are affected by exposure to low dosages when handling the munitions. They ignore the fact that as DU munitions are exploded, they burst into flames and vaporize.
Dr. Helen Caldicott is the co-founder of Physicians for Social Responsibility, an organization of 23,000 doctors committed to educating their colleagues about the dangers of nuclear power, nuclear weapons and nuclear war. She also founded an international umbrella group called International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War, which won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1985. Caldicott herself was personally nominated for the Nobel Prize by Nobel Laureate, Linus Pauling.
According to Caldicott, up to 70% of the uranium released when DU munitions are exploded is converted into microscopic particles that can be inhaled or ingested immediately or when air, soil and water get contaminated. Once inside the human body, these particles kill or mutate the cells they come in contact with. Photographs of DU particles in living lung tissues show them as tiny sun-like, radiating objects. The half-life of this radioactive substance is 4.5 billion years.
Over 375 tons of DU was released into the Iraq environment during the first Gulf War. Since that time, scientists, doctors and soldiers have been trying to understand how a war that lasted 100 hours and left 148 killed in action could have resulted in 10,324 veterans dead and another 221,502 disabled.
DU is the prime suspect in any independent investigation of the situation. As research continues, the military is slowly shifting from its once adamant position that DU was not involved. Recent publications from the Armed Forces Radiobiology Research Institute (AFRRI) and the Army Environmental Policy Institute reflect the change.
The AFRRI published its findings that DU transforms cells into tumorigenic phenotypes, is mutagenic, induces genetic instability and induces oncogenes, suggesting carcinogenicity. AFRRI's conclusion: "Strong evidence exists to support detailed study of DU carcinogenicity." In 1995, the AEPI admitted that DU may cause liver, lung and kidney damage.
A recent Army report to Congress sheds light on DOD's predicament: If a link between the use of DU and the deaths and disabilities resulting from the Gulf War were established, the costs to the government would be astronomical. Here disabilities would also include the birth defects that are found in the returning soldiers' offspring.
The name of the organization Kroll founded to educate the public about the risks of DU is called "Ten Fingers, Ten Toes" -- a reference to the alarming incidence of birth defects found in areas where DU weapons have been used in Iraq and Kosovo. AFRRI also found DU produced chromosome damage and caused delayed reproductive death.
In 2002, the United Nations declared DU a weapon of mass destruction and its use a breach of international law. So far America has used over 2000 tons in the second Gulf War.
Until August of 2005, when DU munitions were found at Schofield Barracks, people in Hawai`i who had concerns about the use of the radioactive substance were looking at this bigger picture. With the local discovery, the issue has hit home.
The EIS that was prepared for the Stryker Brigade stated that DU was never used in Hawai`i. Evidence to the contrary turned up after Kyle Kajihiro, of the American Friends Service Committee, made repeated FOIA requests and dredged through endless stacks of documents. He discovered a single paragraph revealing that DU was present in the ground at Schofield, forcing the Army to admit that they misrepresented the facts to the community, including Senator Daniel Inouye.
For a long time, the Navy has stored DU at Lualualei on O`ahu under its Naval Radioactive Materials permit. In 1994, two DU rounds were accidentally fired from Pearl Harbor; they landed above Aiea and have never been recovered.
Leimaile and Kamoa Quitevis are literally on the front lines of the DU issue. The couple was hired by Garcia and Associates to monitor construction related to the expansion of Schofield to accomodate the Stryker Brigade. Their job was to ensure that sacred Hawaiian sites were not disturbed. Along with others who assisted the Quitevises in their fieldwork, the couple has been exposed to DU. Kamoa has photographic evidence that ordinances known to contain DU were open-air detonated. He testified before the house committee hearing H.B. 1452 that he has seen thousands of shards from Davy Crocketts, as the ordinances are called, scattered about Schofield.
None of the cultural monitors were ever told about the dangers related to DU exposure. Whether or not the Army agrees that such dangers exist, their own guidelines require the use of protective gear for DU clean-up, including respirators. None of the personnel on base wore protective gear; none of the cultural monitors were informed about the presence of DU; none of them knew they should be taking precautions against exposure.
Just recently, Leimaile's sister who was assisting on site and pregnant at the time, gave birth to a child with a serious birth defect. The baby was born with it's intestines outside its body.
"We can't say for sure that the baby's defect came from DU," says Leimaile, "but there's a chance. We need to start monitoring."
Copyright © 2007 Big Island Weekly
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Post by Watchman on Jul 25, 2007 11:27:17 GMT -5
Iraqis blame U.S. depleted uranium for surge in cancer 19:20 | 23/ 07/ 2007
CAIRO, July 23 (RIA Novosti) - Iraq's environment minister blamed Monday the use of depleted uranium weapons by U.S. forces during the 2003 Operation Shock and Awe for the current surge in cancer cases across the country.
As a result of "at least 350 sites in Iraq being contaminated during bombing" with depleted uranium (DU) weapons, Nermin Othman said, the nation is facing about 140,000 cases of cancer, with 7,000 to 8,000 new ones registered each year.
Speaking at a ministerial meeting of the Arab League, she also complained that many chemical plants and oil facilities had been destroyed during the two military campaigns since the 1990s, but the ecological consequences remain unclear.
"Our ministry is fledgling, and we need international support; notably, we need laboratories to better monitor air and water contamination," she said.
The first major UN research on the consequences of the use of DU on the battlefield was conducted in 2003 in the wake of NATO operations in Kosovo, Bosnia, and Montenegro. The UN Environment Program (UNEP) said in its report after the research that DU poses little threat if spent munitions are cleared from the ground.
"Health risks primarily depend on the awareness of people coming into contact with DU," UNEP writes in its 2004 brochure "Depleted Uranium Awareness."
No major clean-up or public awareness campaigns have been reported in Iraq.
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Post by Watchman on Oct 1, 2007 13:17:08 GMT -5
Depleted Uranium
Uruknet | September 30, 2007
THE RADIOACTIVITY PERSISTS FOR OVER 4,500,000,000 YEARS KILLING MILLIONS OF EVERY AGE FOR CENTURIES TO COME .THIS IS A CRIME AGAINST HUMANITY WHICH MAY RANK WITH THE WORST ATROCITIES OF ALL TIME .
The people out there � the Iraqis, the media and the troops � risk the most appalling ill health. And the radiation from depleted uranium can travel literally anywhere. It's going to destroy the lives of thousands of children, all over the world. We all know how far radiation can travel. Radiation from Chernobyl reached Wales and in Britain you sometimes get red dust from the Sahara on your car.'
This is a story in which the facts have been concealed from those who needed them most. It is also a story we need to know if the people of Iraq are to get the medical care they desperately need, and if our troops, returning from Iraq, are not to suffer as terribly as the veterans of other conflicts in which depleted uranium was used . 'Depleted' uranium is in many ways a misnomer. 'Depleted' sounds weak. The only weak thing about depleted uranium is its price. It is dirt cheap, toxic, waste.
On hearing that DU had been used in the Gulf in 1991 the UK Atomic Energy Authority sent the Ministry of Defence a special report on the potential damage to health and the environment. It said that it could cause half a million additional cancer deaths in Iraq over 10 years. In that war the authorities only admitted to using 320 tons of DU � although the Dutch charity LAKA estimates the true figure is closer to 800 tons. Many times that may have been spread across Iraq by this war. The devastating damage all this DU will do to the health and fertility of the people of Iraq now, and for generations to come, IS BEYOND IMAGINING
The radioactivity persists for over 4,500,000,000 years killing millions of every age for centuries to come. This is a crime against humanity which may rank with the worst atrocities of all time.
Since DU darkened the land Iraq has seen birth defects which would break a heart of stone: babies with terribly foreshortened limbs, with their intestines outside their bodies, with huge bulging tumours where their eyes should be, or with a single eye � like Cyclops, or without eyes, or without limbs, and even without heads.
A U.S. Department of Veterans study of 251 Gulf war veteran's families found that 67% had children with severe illnesses or birth defects.
Depleted uranium, also known as the radioactive isotope U-238, doesn't just dissolve or go away.
The genocidal US and UK military has permanently poisoned Kuwait, southern Iraq, Bosnia, the Kosovo highlands of Yugoslavia and much of the Yugoslavian Danube River basin=wherever DU fire was concentrated.
In Iraq, cancer rates have quadrupled in areas of southern Iraq bombed by the American and British state terrorists. Cases of leukemia are starting to show up among people who served as NATO occupation forces in Bosnia and Kosovo.
Pentagon officials have been forced to admit that thousands of U.S. soldiers were "unnecessarily exposed" to depleted uranium radiation in the Gulf War. But of course they claim those exposures were "not medically significant." Since Nature does not take orders from the Pentagon, however, the Gulf War Syndrome affects one out of seven Gulf War veterans. By some estimates, more than 120,000 Gulf War veterans are chronically ill
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Post by aimal on Dec 3, 2007 0:31:38 GMT -5
Depleted Uranium is striking our soldiers dead as they return home from the battlefields of Iraq and Afghanistan! While the U.S. Army fiddles and obfuscates, grieving widows and families are left without either an understanding as to what has just happened to their formerly healthy loved ones or without financial funds with which to survive. This is the sad story of Windy Rogers, whose husband died suddenly from complications of Depleted Uranium and/or Toxic Vaccinations shortly after returning from duty in Afghanistan. Windy discovered Cutting Edge and our many articles on this horrific subject and realized that the facts we presented perfectly matched the facts of her husband's tragic death. Windy is now struggling with raising 6 children, the oldest of whom is a Senior in high school. This is her story -- you can multiply it tens of thousands of times, for we have sent over one million men through the battlefields of Iraq and of Afhganistan; remember, over 75% of all American soldiers who served through the 100-hour war of Gulf War I in 1991-1992, are now dead or dying from this deadly combination of Toxic Vaccinations and Depleted Uranium poisoning. You will realize that the Windy Rogers story is exactly what Cutting Edge has been warning since 2003. Now, listen with your heart to Windy Rogers. "Hi my name is Windy Harris-Rogers a 38 year widow of the late Staff Sgt. Christopher L. Rogers of Raleigh, NC who too died of MYOCARDITIS, INFLAMATION OF THE HEART MUSSLE ON 2/14/05, 9 months after returning home from Afghanistan in which he served 1 year. I'M JUST LIVID WITH THIS ENTIRE SITUATION HERE." "I was reading an article on the Death of PI Christopher Abston, the 26 year old from Fort Bragg, NC that died in Dec. 05 14 days after he received the smallpox vaccine. The military is not telling truth, I reand another article where they stated '120 military personnel have developed myocarditis, or other similar conditions, after receiving the smallpox vaccination, but none have died' and that's just a BOLD FACE LIE!!! My husband's cause of death was Myocarditis, 1 week prior to his death another soldier out of Bragg died suddenly with flu like symptoms; he too had only been home a few months after serving time in Iraq before he suddenly became sick of flu like symptoms." "On Dec. 26, 2004, another case, Soldier died with Flu like symptoms out of Fort Bragg, all three to include my husband were Fort Bragg Soldiers. In March of this year a National Guard Reservist, also a NEW JERSEY CITY COP, died suddenly as well with FLU LIKE symptoms. He had returned to home from Iraq in Nov.05 and his brother stated that he complained of having flu-like symptoms, high fever, etc. He was found dead in his apartment. "I'm so angry with this entire process, and how they are not telling us the truth. There are no words to describe the pain I feel losing my husband. We have 6 children, with one entering into her Senior year in high school and the hurt, pain, and suffering they have had to endure because of our loss is beyond words. The devastation of our only son, age 9, not having his father anymore is so hard for him to except. Having to face not having his father to attend football, basketball and baseball practices and games was extremely hard on him when his teammates would have their fathers." "I have had to fight since 2/14/05 to receive the Military Benefits that's rightfully due and it's so damn frustrating to have to file for claims wait for denial letters and go through appeal processing's before you can get medical benefits etc. This is so unfair to the families and I know for a fact that I'm not the only one. I still have claims pending after having them filed last Feb.05 & March 05.My husband served 19 years in the Army/Army Reserves, fought for this country until his death on Valentines day last year and his family is not being taken care of at this time. I would love to be able to get in contact with PI Christopher Abston's Parents, my heart really goes out to them as well as the other family members who have lost loved ones because of this." "Our local news stations here in Raleigh, NC interviewed me and I've attached a copy of one of the articles for your review which will clearly show that the military is not telling the truth about this situation. An investigation out of Washington DC was ordered on my husband's death but not one Official or Personnel has contacted me with a status on the investigation and it's been well over a year now. I intend to seek Justice in this matter, I was ROBBED OF MY Marriage of only 3 1/2 years and out of those 3 1/1 years, 1 yr I had to spend separated from my husband because he was deployed to Afghan from 03 - 04. My children have to grow up without the support of their father and yet the military forces us to go through so much RED TAPE in order to receive benefits, PLEASE TELL ME WHERE IS JUSTICE IN THIS COUNTRY." "My faith in God will not allow me to sit back and not fight back, I owe it to my husband and our children. He devoted 19 years of his time and gave his life to this country, I want justice!! GOD DOES HAVE THE FINAL SAY SO AND HE DOES HAVE ALL POWERS, HE CAN AND WILL EXPOSE the truth, my faith is too strong not to believe and my heart as well as our children's is too broken to give up. I'M A FIGHTER and certainly a "MOVER & SHAKER" and I intend to seek JUSTICE IN THIS MATTER." I have put a call into Windy Rogers, to help her understand why our government is killing its own soldiers, and even of their family members as the wife has physical relations with her returning sick husband. We live in a most tragic era, that period of time following the return of Israel to her land, that era known as the "End of the Age". And, just as the Bible foretells, our leaders and too many of our people fulfill some very terrible prophecies: "BUT UNDERSTAND this, that in the last days will come (set in) perilous times of great stress and trouble, hard to deal with and hard to bear. For people will be lovers of self and utterly self-centered, lovers of money and aroused by an inordinate, greedy desire for wealth, proud and arrogant and contemptuous boasters. They will be abusive, blasphemous, scoffing, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy and profane. They will be without natural human affection, callous and inhuman, relentless - admitting of no truce or appeasement; they will be slanderers (false accusers, troublemakers), intemperate and loose in morals and conduct, uncontrolled and fierce, haters of good. They will be treacherous betrayers, rash, and inflated with self-conceit. They will be lovers of sensual pleasures and vain amusements more than and rather than lovers of God." (2 Timothy 3:1-4;Parallel Bible, KJV/Amplified Bible Commentary) As Windy is discovering, America's leaders -- both civilian and military -- are characterized by many parts of this description. And, Windy herself is suffering from the prophesied "perilous times of great stress and trouble, hard to deal with and hard to bear". The really hard part Windy must deal with is that America's civilian and military leadership knew that over 75% of all soldiers sent to battle with D.U. weaponry would die in this manner, and they sent them anyway. And, now, they are denying any personal culpability and even trying to deny this poor woman her rights as she struggles to support 6 children.
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Post by Watchman on May 22, 2008 14:57:03 GMT -5
Depleted Uranium Shells Used by U.S. Military Worse Than Nuclear Weapons by David Gutierrez
(NaturalNews) The use of depleted uranium (DU) munitions by the U.S. military may lead to a death toll far higher than that from the nuclear bombs dropped at the end of World War II.
DU is a waste product of uranium enrichment, containing approximately one-third the radioactive isotopes of naturally occurring uranium. Because of its high density, it is used in armor- or tank-piercing ammunition. It has been fired by the U.S. and British militaries in the two Iraq wars and in Afghanistan, as well as by NATO forces in Kosovo and the Israeli military in Lebanon and Palestine.
Inhaled or ingested DU particles are highly toxic, and DU has been classified as an illegal weapon of mass destruction by the United Nations.
The United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority has estimated that 50 tons of DU dust from the first Gulf War could lead to 500,000 cancer deaths by the year 2000. To date, a total of 2,000 tons have been generated in the Middle East.
In contrast, approximately 250,000 lives were claimed by the explosions and radiation released by the nuclear weapons dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
"More than ten times the amount of radiation released during atmospheric testing [of nuclear bombs] has been released from DU weaponry since 1991," said Leuren Moret, a U.S. nuclear scientist. "The genetic future of the Iraqi people, for the most part, is destroyed. The environment now is completely radioactive."
Because DU has a half-life of 4.5 billion years, the Middle East will, for all practical purposes, be radioactive forever.
The two U.S. wars in Iraq "have been nuclear wars because they have scattered nuclear material across the land, and people, particularly children, are condemned to die of malignancy and congenital disease essentially for eternity," said anti-nuclear activist Helen Caldicott.
Since the first Gulf War, the rate of birth defects and childhood cancer in Iraq has increased by seven times. More than 35 percent (251,000) of U.S. Gulf War veterans are dead or on permanent medical disability, compared with only 400 who were killed during the conflict.
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