What the heck is going on over there?!?

[RussSchultz]

So, who's wrong in their claims? The Swiss institute, or the people who came up with the common dreams article?

 

[Clashman]

The articles that the author links to at the bottom of the Swiss Institute article are precisely the studies that failed to take into account the effects of battlefield DU and inhaled DU. So I think there's a good reason for the discrepancy in the conclusions.

 

[Silent_One]

It's also a matter of what form it's in, Russ. When handled before it's fired, DU generally has a fairly low level of toxicity. DU after it's been fired, however, aerosolizes on impact and does in fact become highly toxic.

Quite true. However it should be noted that when DU does strike armor and that oxide is created, it's 1.7 times as heavy as lead and falls to the ground very quickly. Also if you look at the impact hole where the depleted uranium round went in and out, there is
an increased radiation where that metal was essentially welded onto the armor. But that's not going to go anywhere. It's not going to fall off. It's welded onto that armor. So its not going anywhere. And it's not floating around in the air.

 

[RussSchultz]

The articles that the author links to at the bottom of the Swiss Institute article are precisely the studies that failed to take into account the effects of battlefield DU and inhaled DU. So I think there's a good reason for the discrepancy in the conclusions.

That swiss article does address inhaled DU.

And inhaling it doesn't make it any more radioactive. How do we handle the discrepency between radioactivity measurements in the two studies?

 

[kyleb]

I almost positive that you posted (prior to the war) that any WMDs that would be found would probably have been planted by the US. At the very least I hope you can agree that the US has tried (trying) to get the truth out now.

later,

i do recall stating that i would not put it past the administration to plant wmds in iraq to provide the appearance of justification for their warmongering. i was open to the possibility that iraq did have such weapons, but saw no conclusive evidence either way and was therefore unable to accept the allegations as cause for war.

i imagine you simply misconstrued my perspective. i wasn't suggesting that the whole first army was going to match in and set up a nuclear weapon system and try and pin it on the iraqis; but rather that the few weasels who hoodwinked our country into this mess would try to pull off some stupid shit like the "mobile weapon lab" crap.

as for agreeing that the US is trying "to get the truth out now"; sure, it was bound to happen. people can only take so much of being mislead before becoming disillusioned regardless of wether it is or government or nvidia doing the lying.

 

[kyleb]

And inhaling it doesn't make it any more radioactive. How do we handle the discrepency between radioactivity measurements in the two studies?

well sure it can't make it more radioactive, but it obviously does expose the subject to more radiation.

 

[RussSchultz]

And inhaling it doesn't make it any more radioactive. How do we handle the discrepency between radioactivity measurements in the two studies?

well sure it can't make it more radioactive, but it obviously does expose the subject to more radiation.

Yes, but that doesn't make "the deserts where battles happened 1000x more radioactive" Where is the difference coming from?

 

[Dave H]

Even if we were only talking about toxicity, that's still a huge damn health disaster waiting to happen, (actually, it's already happening, come to think of it).

The toxicity of depleted uranium is not appreciably different from that of other heavy metals, e.g. lead. Remind me again what it is they would make bullets of if they weren't using DU?

There has never been a single death or illness conclusively linked to the environmental effects of DU munitions. The only scientific studies on the question have concluded that there is no increase in adverse health effects arising from exposure to sites where DU munitions were used. In fact, the only real claims of adverse health effects from DU came from Saddam Hussein's Iraq.

Meanwhile it is undeniable that DU has saved many lives by making battles shorter and more lop-sided, and by allowing e.g. a tank to be destroyed with a small, precisely targeted weapon instead of requiring a missle or bomb which is far more likely to cause collateral injury or death.

It also ignores the liklihood of us using NON-depleted uranium, which is also a huge health risk.

Depleted uranium is a by-product of the process of enriching uranium for use in nuclear power plants (or anything else). Hundreds of thousands of tons of DU already exist anyways, with no significant commercial usability except in DU munitions. Why on earth would the US choose to use natural uranium--which is more expensive and has a significant commercial use--when more DU than they could ever use is just lying around as an industrial waste product??

One thing you'll note I didn't say was that natural uranium is more dangerous, because it's not, at least not in any significant way. It is somewhat more radioactive, but radioactivity levels of either are so low as to require inanely unlikely situations to cause any adverse health effects. The only plausible negative effects from DU come from its heavy metal toxicity, and natural uranium is of course no worse or better in this respect.

 

[kyleb]

Joe, it seems pretty obvious that the diffrence is simply a matter of volume as well as the possablity that airborn du could wind up settleing in consentrated areas.

 

[Clashman]

Well, for one, I don't think the Swiss took any actual measurements. These measurements of much higher radiation levels seem to be substantiated by numerous other hand observations, and in different places where it was also used, as well, such as in the Balkans.

http://www.csmonitor.com/2003/0515/p01s02-woiq.htm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/408122.stm

 

[RussSchultz]

Well, for one, I don't think the Swiss took any actual measurements. These measurements of much higher radiation levels seem to be substantiated by numerous other hand observations, and in different places where it was also used, as well, such as in the Balkans.

http://www.csmonitor.com/2003/0515/p01s02-woiq.htm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/408122.stm

That first article you link states:

The alpha particle radiation emitted by DU travels less than an inch and can be stopped by cloth or even tissue paper.

Which isn't quite true, as its a statistical thing, but how do you measure 1000x background radiation? By putting the geiger counter directly against the mass of DU.

Does this mean the surroundings are 1000x more radioactive than background radiation? No!

Air will absorb the alpha particles, as will cloth, dirt, etc.

It ain't healthy, but it doesn't make the surrounding desert 1000x as radioactive, as is suggested by Zurich, or any of the alarmist press.

Is

 

[zurich]

Russ,

Just out of curiosity, since you're skeptical of DU, what do you think is causing/caused GWS?

 

[kyleb]

Russ, it seems rather obvious that while a single 1kg chunk only gives off a small amount of radiation, large quantities dispraised over a small area as well as vaporized into the air would exponentially raise radiation levels. also, while people worried about the situation are going to qoute statistics from the highest concentration areas, i hardly find that reason to lable them alarmists for it.

 

[Willmeister]

There are nickel alloys now that have similar yield strength characteristics of DU. There are probably some non-ductile aluminum alloys that are probably superior to DU.

I'm too lazy to go through ASME tables right now...

 

[RussSchultz]

Russ,

Just out of curiosity, since you're skeptical of DU, what do you think is causing/caused GWS?

Where did you get that I'm skeptical of DU?

I'm simply skeptical of the claim that it made the deserts where battles happened 1000x more radioactive than usual. DU shells end up meters beneath the ground (usually), and the aerosoled stuff quickly settles to the ground and sinks beneath--especially in sand. We're talking about dust that's heavier than lead!

But, as for the "gulf war syndrome", my personal guess is there was some useage by the Iraqi's, or exposure to, chemical weapons in Iraq War I. There's a fairly well reported accidental destruction of some nerve warheads during a normal ordinance removal operation that cast a cloud of partially incinerated stuff over at least one camp. Was this the only time?

 

[Willmeister]

uss, it seems rather obvious that while a single 1kg chunk only gives off a small amount of radiation, large quantities dispraised over a small area as well as vaporized into the air would exponentially raise radiation levels. also, while people worried about the situation are going to qoute statistics from the highest concentration areas, i hardly find that reason to lable them alarmists for it.

Inhalation of radioactive particles is much much worse than other forms of exposure actually. It doesn't require as much radioactivity to make you sick. It's actually pretty bad since particles can also be absorbed into a person's bloodstream.

DU shells end up meters beneath the ground (usually), and the aerosoled stuff quickly settles to the ground and sinks beneath--especially in sand.

Then dust storms come up and mix the DU particles back into the atmosphere. It will eventually drop in concentration though, but it may take some time for that to happen. And if this dust gets into agricultural soil, then it will eventually get absorbed into produce. So, no, your idea that DU just disappears overnight simply isn't true. This will be a major problem for years to come just like Agent Orange use in Vietnam thirty years ago is still causing massive birth defects today. DDT is also another substance that really hasn't dropped in concentration in North America (still used in Mexico though) despite being banned for decades; concentrations are down in one area, but are shooting up in others as these concentrations are making their way up the food chains. These man-made chemicals are not found in nature, and nature has no efficient method of dealing with them.

 

[Clashman]

The article actually said the surrounding desert was *only* 100x more radioactive, not 1000x. Zurich probably just got the two figures confused. One of the real problems, though, in Iraq as well as the Balkans and Afghanistan, is that people often end up scavanging these sites. Children often end up playing in them. Soldiers take parts of them home as war trophies. And while in the first Gulf War much of the bombing took place out in the desert, here we had much of the fighting occurring in populated areas, where the DU is going to have that greater of an effect. Also, just because it settles to the ground doesn't mean it becomes harmless. Iraq is known for it's dust storms, and there's the possibility that these things can get kicked up and back into the air over and over again. In less arid places, you might have problems with it seeping into ground water, etc.

 

[zurich]

No, I read it in an article somewhere, referring to downtown Bahgdad. Have no idea where the link is though, and would have no idea where to start.

 

[Legion]

and the aerosoled stuff quickly settles to the ground and sinks beneath--especially in sand. We're talking about dust that's heavier than lead!

Isn't this more of a density issue?

But, as for the "gulf war syndrome", my personal guess is there was some useage by the Iraqi's, or exposure to, chemical weapons in Iraq War I.

My first question would be how many suffered from notable symptons.

There's a fairly well reported accidental destruction of some nerve warheads during a normal ordinance removal operation that cast a cloud of partially incinerated stuff over at least one camp.

Interesting concept - will research

Was this the only time?

From what i remember reading not all who claimed to have symptoms where from the same groups or even in the same areas.

A lot of what i read about the Iraqi War I and the possibility of soldier contamination was bs spread by the same people who blamed UK and US for those whom starved in Iraq during the years of the oil for food act. I looked into a number of the cases of people whom claimed to have symptoms and found much of it to be rather unfounded. Most of their doctors seem to be reporting chronic fatique and digestion problems. Nothing at all concurrent with the effects radiotation poisoning, or for that matter, anthrax or VX nerve gas. I concluded most of these soldiers were suffering from kind of stress disorder.

Concerning the soldiers of whom were born mutated children i have no idea. I looked into research that was done on them an never was there a claim of mutated eggs or sperm. Their genitals seemed to be in working order. All i ever heard was, of course, accussations by doctors that some kind of bacterial, viral, or chemical agent must have caused sperm/egg mutation that was never proven to have been caused by any form of exposure . Needless to say the ambiguos nature of their accussations was not convincing.

 

[Clashman]

Chopper Shot Down in Iraq, Killing 15 GIs
4 minutes ago

By TINI TRAN, Associated Press Writer

FALLUJAH, Iraq - Insurgents shot down a U.S. Chinook helicopter over western Iraq (news - web sites) on Sunday as it carried troops headed for R&R, killing 15 soldiers and wounding 21 in the deadliest single strike against American troops since the start of war.

The strike by a shoulder-fired missile was a significant new blow in an Iraq insurgency that escalated in recent days ? a "tough week," in the words of the U.S. occupation chief. Other U.S. soldiers were reported killed Sunday in ground attacks here and elsewhere in central Iraq.


The only day that saw more U.S. casualties came March 23, during the first week of the invasion that ousted Saddam Hussein (news - web sites).


Sunday's attacks came amid threats attributed to Saddam's party of a wave of violence against the U.S. occupation, though there was still no sign of the rumored "Day of Resistance" allegedly planned for Saturday in Baghdad.


The aircraft was hit at about 9 a.m. and crashed amid cornfields near the village of Hasi, about 40 miles southwest of Baghdad and just south of Fallujah, a center of Sunni Muslim resistance to the U.S. occupation.


A U.S. military spokesman, Col. William Darley, confirmed the casualty count of 15 but said the cause of the crash was under investigation. He said witnesses reported seeing what they believed were missile trails. The U.S. military command said a search was under way for more survivors.


At the scene, villagers proudly showed off blackened pieces of wreckage to arriving reporters.


Others celebrated word of the helicopter downing, as well as a fresh attack on U.S. soldiers in Fallujah itself, where witnesses said an explosion struck one vehicle in a U.S. Army convoy at about 9 a.m. Sunday. They claimed four soldiers died, but U.S. military sources said they couldn't confirm the report.


"This was a new lesson from the resistance, a lesson to the greedy aggressors," one Fallujah resident, who wouldn't give his name, said of the helicopter downing. "They'll never be safe until they get out of our country," he said of the Americans.


Witnesses said they saw two missiles fired from a palm grove at the heavy transport copter, the biggest U.S. target yet shot from the skies. It had been ferrying soldiers to Baghdad International Airport for flights out of the country for rest and relaxation, or R&R.


The missiles flashed toward the helicopter from behind, as usual with heat-seeking shoulder-fired missiles such as the Russian-made SA-7. The old Iraqi army had a large inventory of SA-7s, also known as Strelas.


In Washington, Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld called Sunday "a tragic day for America and for these young men and women. I must say, our prayers have to be with them and with their families and their loved ones.


"In a long, hard war, we're going to have tragic days, as this is. But they're necessary. They're part of a war that's difficult and complicated. And in the last analysis, the people who are firing off these surface-to-air missiles are the same people who are killing Iraqis."


Insurgents have fired on U.S. aircraft before, downing two helicopters, and American military officials have repeatedly warned that hundreds of shoulder-fired surface-to-air missiles remain unaccounted for in Iraq since the collapse of Saddam's regime in April.


The death toll surpasses one of the deadliest single attacks during the Iraq war: the March 23 ambush of the 507th Maintenance Company, in which 11 soldiers were killed, nine were wounded and seven captured, including Pvt. Jessica Lynch. A total 28 Americans around the country ? including the casualties from the ambush ? died on that day, the deadliest for U.S. troops during the Iraq war.


The helicopter was part of a formation of two Chinooks carrying a total of more than 50 passengers to the U.S. base at the former Saddam International Airport, renamed Baghdad International Airport, which the military calls BIA.


"Our initial report is that they were being transported to BIA for R&R flights," a U.S. command spokeswoman in Baghdad said. She said at least some were coming from Camp Ridgway, believed to be an 82nd Airborne Division base in western Iraq.



Villagers said the copters took off from the air base at Habbaniyah, about 10 miles northwest of the crash site. One villager, Thaer Ali, 21, said someone fired two missiles from the area of a date palm grove about 500 yards from where the stricken copter crashed.

Another witness, Yassin Mohamed, said he ran out of his house, a half-mile away, when he heard an explosion. "I saw the Chinook burning. I ran toward it because I wanted to help put out the fire, but couldn't get near because of American soldiers."

Witnesses said the second copter hovered over the downed craft for some minutes and then set down, apparently to try to help extinguish a fire. The downed, 84-foot-long copter was already destroyed.

At least a half-dozen Black Hawk helicopters later hovered over the area, and dozens of soldiers swarmed over the site. Injured were still being evacuated at least two hours later.

In a separate incident, the U.S. command said a soldier from the 1st Armored Division was killed just after midnight when a makeshift bomb was exploded as his vehicle passed while responding to another incident.

In Abu Ghraib, on Baghdad's western edge, U.S. troops clashed with townspeople Sunday for the second time in three days, and witnesses reported casualties among both the Americans and Iraqis. There was no immediate official confirmation.

Local Iraqis said U.S. troops arrived Sunday morning and ordered people to disperse from the marketplace and remove what the Iraqis said were religious stickers from walls. Someone then tossed a grenade at the Americans, witnesses said, and the soldiers opened fire.

The U.S. command said it had no immediate information, but Iraqi witnesses said they believed three or four Americans were killed and six to seven Iraqis were wounded.

Last Friday at the same marketplace, attempts by U.S. troops to clear market stalls from a main road led to sporadic clashes that left two Iraqis dead, 17 wounded and two U.S. soldiers wounded.

The presence of the portable anti-aircraft missiles has represented a significant threat for military aircraft and raised concerns over the security of the few commercial flights in and out of Baghdad International Airport. The U.S.-led coalition has offered rewards of $500 apiece to Iraqis who turn the weapons in.

It was the third helicopter known to have been brought down by Iraq's insurgents since President Bush (news - web sites) declared an end to major combat in Iraq on May 1.

A U.S. Army Blackhawk helicopter crash-landed Oct. 25 in Tikrit after being hit by an unknown weapon, injuring one crewmember. On June 12, a U.S. Army Apache attack helicopter was shot down by hostile fire in the western desert, and two crewmembers were rescued unhurt.

The Pentagon (news - web sites) announced Friday it was expanding the home leave program for troops in Iraq, to fly more soldiers out of the region each day and take them to more U.S. airports. As of Sunday, it said, the number of soldiers departing daily via a transit facility in neighboring Kuwait would be increased to 480, from 280.

The workhorse, 10-ton Chinook, which has a crew of four, is the military's most versatile heavy-lift helicopter, used primarily for troop movements, transporting artillery and similar functions.

The shootdown of the Chinook came after what U.S. occupation chief L. Paul Bremer on Saturday called "a tough week" in Iraq, beginning with an insurgent rocket attack on Sunday against a Baghdad hotel housing hundreds of his Coalition Provisional Authority staff members. One was killed and 15 wounded in that attack.

A day later, four coordinated suicide bombings in Baghdad killed three dozen people and wounded more than 200, and that was followed by widespread rumors and leaflets threatening an escalation in the anti-U.S. resistance.

Attacks against U.S. forces had already stepped up in the previous week, to an average of 33 a day.

So, with this attack, (admittedly quite possibly a fluke), the others listed in it, those on http://www.pigstye.net/iraq/, and 3 soldiers killed Friday and Saturday that aren't posted in either yet, we've had close to 30 dead U.S. soldiers this week alone.

Edit: By the way, the pace at which Coalition Soldiers have been killed has picked up a bit. At the Current Pace:

(239 "after the war" listed on pigstye.net/iraq + 3 not listed + 16 confirmed in the article)= 258/186 days= 1.387 dead troops per day

We will have around 625 dead Coalition Soldiers by the one year anniversary of the war. (178 "during war" + (1.387x322 days)). That's a significant increase over the figure I estimated back in July, and the pace at which these happen has increased 14.93% since then. I think this may be starting to push into the realm of "militarily significant".