Nothing Depleted, About Depleted Uranium

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Nothing Depleted, About Depleted Uranium

 

by Fintan Dunne, Updated 22 Jan '03

Editor www.SickofDoctors.com

 

 

What if they

started a nuclear war

and never told you?

 

When they said that

depleted uranium was

the US empire's weapon

of choice, they lied. That word 'depleted' is a public relations spin. It makes

it sound like the nuclear material is worn out.

 

It's not. It's Uranium.

Let's just call it Uranium.

 

It's a nuclear warhead of solid uranium 238 in a bullet or a shell. It minimizes

casualties among US forces. Casualties that would be hard to sell to domestic

opinion. Instead, the casualties are transferred to the future.

 

The Uranium babies of toxic Kosovo, or Iraq will die from it -whatever the name.

In Yugoslavia, as in Iraq, uranium dioxide dust contaminates the environment.

The future casualties of modern US warfare are unborn babies. Which makes the US

abortion debates look rather hypocritical.

 

What if they announced future babies deaths in time of war?

 

Nightly News might go like this:

" Coalition forces today captured a key

enemy stronghold. Thirty terrorists were killed and 150 babies horribly

malformed. President Bush says it proves that US strategy is working. In a

statement, Mr. Bush said that only 75,000 more deformed babies could secure the

capital for the US. Ed Carnage reports from Washington... "

 

The Uranium Babies will be with us for a verylong time. For billions of years to

come, Iraq, Kosovo and uranium test firing ranges in the USA, will be lands with

a poison harvest. So will all theaters of this slow, hidden nuclear holocaust.

 

Uranium nuclear war is a crime against humanity. Stop it.

 

 

Depleted uranium:

war hazard?

 

by Travis Dunn, 28 Dec '02

DisasterNews.net

 

 

 

Dr. Doug Rokke, former

head of the Pentagon's

Depleted Uranium Project

Recorded At: Seattle, WA

Producer: Mike McCormick

 

" Gulf War Casualties

& Depleted Uranium " .

 

[Dr. Rokke]

" Depleted uranium rounds destroy everything and anything they hit.

It's a most effective weapon.

A completely and extremely

effective weapon. "

 

" Each individual tank round is

ten pounds of solid uranium 238,

contaminated with with plutonium,

and other material. "

 

" They should never use depleted uranium munitions again. The use

of depleted uranium munitions is

a crime against God, it's a crime

against humanity. "

 

 

Dr. Doug Rokke has a

disturbing habit of laughing

when he should probably be

crying. He laughs when he talks

about battlefields contaminated

with radioactive waste. He can't

stop laughing when he talks

about what he claims is a

massive government cover-up.

And he keeps laughing when he

talks about his health problems,

which he attributes to deliberate

Army negligence, and which will

likely kill him.

 

Talking to Rokke on the telephone is disturbing enough without him laughing

about such horrors. A strange echo accompanies every utterance. When this

bizarre sound is pointed out to him, Rokke says he isn't surprised: he claims

his phone has been tapped for years.

 

It may be tempting to dismiss Rokke as a crank or a conspiracy theorist, but

Rokke is 35-year-veteran of the U.S. Army, and he isn't just a disgruntled

grunt. Rokke ran the US Army's depleted uranium project in the mid-90s, and he

was in charge of the Army's effort to clean up depleted uranium after the

Persian Gulf War. And he directed the Edwin R. Bradley Radiological Laboratories

at Fort McClellan, Ala.

 

Yet if you type Rokke's name into a search engine on any military website, you

will draw a blank, as if he doesn't exist.

 

 

The Nuclear Nightmare Starts

Two scientific study teams were sent to Afghanistan in the aftermath of the

conflict in 2001-02. 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 possibly causing the high levels of illness but also high concentrations of

non-depleted uranium. 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 and with some

types of chemical or biological weaponry. These included pains in joints,

back/kidney pain, muscle weakness, memory problems and confusion and

disorientation. Many of these symptoms are found in Gulf War and Balkans

veterans and civilians.Those exposed to the bombing report symptoms of flu-type

illnesses, bleeding, runny noses and blood-stained mucous.

 

The study team itself complained of similar symptoms during their stay. Most of

these symptoms last for days or months. The team also conducted a preliminary

sample examination of new-born infants, discovering that at least 25% may be

suffering from congenital and post-natal health problems that could be

associated with uranium contamination. These include undeveloped muscles, large

head in comparison to body size, skin rashes and infant lethargy. Considering

that the children had access to sufficient levels of nutrition, the symptoms

could not be due to malnourishment.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Dr. Doug Rokke Major,

Medical Service Corps, USAR

WMFO FM Nov 13, 2002

 

[sunny Miller]

" What kinds of retaliation have you experienced?

 

Wasn't there a firing range [in Aniston, Alabama] that included many kinds of

exposures -including depleted uranium. And you recommended that the Army be

responsible for environmental cleanup, and healthcare of exposed civilians. What

happened after that recommendation? "

 

[Dr. Rokke] " I lost my job as Director at the US Army Chemical School. "

 

" You made your recommendation on a Friday. "

 

" And I was gone on the Monday. "

 

" I've had senior officers[...] come up to me and say " 'Stop. You're supposed to

stop.' " " When you don't stop, [...] they go back to your house and they shoot at

you. Then they file IRS things against you... "

 

" When have you been shot at? "

 

" Back when I was working on depleted uranium and Monsanto PCB contamination...

I'm on the phone with individuals working on Monsanto PCB issues, literally at

my house, and all of a sudden bullets come right through my window. "

 

" There are three kinds of files that have been disappearing? "

 

" That's correct. ...The chemical and biological logs. The medical records.

Individual medical records that I personally wrote have been destroyed. We also

know that the detail work in person files have disappeared. Including my own

personnel file. "

 

 

 

If you read through hundreds of pages of government documents and transcriptions

of countless government hearings regarding the military use of depleted uranium,

not once will you come across his name.

 

That is more than a little unusual, since Rokke and his team were at the

forefront of trying to understand the potential health and environmental hazards

posed by the use of depleted uranium, or DU, on the battlefield.

 

" We were the best they ever had, " Rokke claims. He's not bragging. He's laughing

again.

 

The use of DU in combat is a fairly new innovation. It was used for the first

time in the Persian Gulf War as the crucial component of armor-piercing,

tank-busting munitions.

 

These munitions are tipped with DU darts that ignite after being fired. The

shells are so heavy and hot that they easily rip through steel.

 

" It's like taking a pencil and pushing it through paper, " Rokke said.

 

This uranium " pencil " then explodes inside its target, creating a deadly

" firestorm. "

 

As an anti-tank weapon, " these things are great, " Rokke said. They enable U.S.

troops to quickly take out enemy tanks at long-range.

 

According to the Web site of the Deployment Health Support Directorate, DU is " a

by-product of the process by which uranium is enriched to produce reactor fuel

and nuclear weapons components. "

 

In other words, DU is low-level nuclear waste. According to the same Web site,

DU can also contain trace amounts of " neptunium, plutonium, americium,

technitium-99 and uranium-236. "

 

A total of 320 tons of DU munitions were fired during the Gulf War. Rokke's job

was to figure out how to clean up US tanks, the unfortunate victims of " friendly

fire, " which had been blown apart by DU rounds.

 

After years of this kind of this work in Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, and on

practice ranges in the US Rokke reached a conclusion in 1996.

 

He told the Army brass that DU was so dangerous that it had to be banned from

combat immediately.

 

That conclusion, Rokke said, cost him his career.

 

'Contamination was all over'

 

Burning tanks, burning oil fields, charred bodies.

 

This was Kuwait after the Gulf War. Rokke had a mission clean up US tanks

contaminated with DU.

 

What Rokke found terrified him.

 

" Oh my God is the only way to describe it, " Rokke said. " Contamination was all

over. "

 

Rokke and his crew were measuring significant levels of radiation up to 50

meters away from affected tanks: up to 300 millirems an hour in beta and gamma

radiation, and alpha radiation from the thousands to the millions in counts per

minute (CPM) on a Geiger counter.

 

" That whole area is still trashed, " he said. " It's hotter than heck over there

still. This stuff doesn't go away. "

 

His team took three months to clean up 24 tanks for transport back to the US

 

The Army, Rokke said, took another three years to fully decontaminate the same

24 tanks.

 

But the contaminated tanks weren't the only problem.

 

Within 72 hours of their inspections, Rokke and his crew started getting sick.

 

But they continued with their work. They went back to the US to perform tests on

Army bases. They deliberately blew up tanks with DU rounds, then ran over and

jumped on the tanks while they were still burning. They videotaped the

uranium-oxide clouds pouring out, and they measured the radiation being thrown

off.

 

In the past decade, Rokke said 30 men out of 100 who were closely involved in

these operations dropped dead.

 

Rokke's lungs and kidneys are damaged. He believes that uranium oxide dust is

permanently trapped inside his lungs. He has lesions on his brain, pustules on

his skin. He suffers from chronic fatigue syndrome. He has reactive airway

disease, which means he can't stop wheezing and coughing, and experiences a loss

of breath when he exercises. He also has fibromyalgia, a condition that causes

chronic pain in his muscles, ligaments and tendons.

 

 

The VA tested Rokke for uranium levels in his body in 1994. He got the results

back two and a half years later. His urine had 5000 times the amount of

permissible uranium.

 

After years of fighting with the VA, Rokke said he managed to get a 40 percent

disability, but there is no official acknowledgment that his illnesses were

caused by his work with DU.

 

The Army and the Pentagon continue to insist that DU is safe. Rokke says they

know better, because he gave them the proof. He said they can't find evidence of

DU's dangers because " they're looking for the wrong stuff, and they're using the

wrong procedures. "

 

The problem with DU, he said, is the stuff that's given off when a round is

fired. The projectile begins burning immediately, and up to 70 percent of it

oxidizes. This aerosolized power uranium oxide is the really dangerous stuff,

Rokke said, particularly when it is inhaled.

 

Rokke insists that he and his men were wearing protective equipment or equipment

they thought would protect them. But their face masks were capable of straining

out particles of 10 microns or larger. That's as big as the DU particles get,

according to the Army and the Pentagon.

 

Rokke, however, insists that he has measured particles as small as .3 microns,

and that scientists at the Livermore laboratories have measured them as small as

..1 micron.

 

Thus these safety precautions, which are still in place now, are utterly

useless, he said.

 

'I'm a warrior and a patriot'

 

 

About one quarter of the 700,000 troops sent to the Persian Gulf War have

reported some sort of Gulf War-related illness, and Rokke is convinced that DU

has something to do with it, along with the host of other chemicals to which

troops were exposed, including low levels of sarin gas, smoke from oil fires,

countless pesticides as well as anti-nerve gas tablets which troops were

required to ingest.

 

If Rokke is right about the dangers of DU, why does the Department of Defense

continue to use it and insist that it is safe?

 

" When you go to war, your purpose is to kill, " Rokke said, " and DU is the best

killing thing we got. "

 

Rokke believes that the US military is putting more emphasis on firepower than

on the health and safety of its own troops.

 

He received a memo in the early 90s he says proves his theory.

 

Dated March 1, 1991, the memo was written by Lt. Col. M.V. Ziehmn at the Los

Alamos Laboratories in New Mexico.

 

" There has been and continues to be a concern regarding the impact of dU [sic]

on the environment. Therefore, if no one makes a case for the effectiveness of

du on the battlefield, du rounds may become politically unacceptable and thus,

be deleted from the arsenal, " the memo reads. " If du penetrators proved their

worth during our recent combat activities, then we should assure their future

existence (until something better is developed) through Service/DoD proponency.

If proponency is not garnered, it is possible that we stand to lose a valuable

combat capability. I believe we should keep this sensitive issue at mind when

after action reports [sic] are written. "

 

The meaning of this memo is quite clear, Rokke said. Since DU munitions are so

effective, they must continue to be used in combat, regardless of the

environmental or health consequences.

 

The other issue is financial, he said. If the true effects of DU were known,

cleanup costs would be absolutely staggering.

 

DU contaminated areas extend much farther than the Persian Gulf battlefields.

Rokke said DU is regularly used in practice maneuvers in the US, namely in

Indiana, Florida, New Mexico, Massachusetts, Maryland and Puerto Rico. Then

there's Kosovo, where DU rounds were used to take out Serbian tanks.

 

As the US stands on the brink of another war with Iraq, Rokke said he wants to

make sure the American public fully understands that this war will be far worse

that the last one, and that numbers of troops sickened by DU is likely to be

much higher.

 

Rokke insists he is no pacifist.

 

" I'm a warrior and a patriot, " he said. Given a verifiable threat against the

US, I would go to war in a heartbeat. "

 

But he said that he is speaking out for the good of American troops, and for

anyone, including Iraqi troops and civilians, who could be exposed to DU.

 

" Am I pushing for peace today? Yes, I am, " he said.

 

Before a war with Iraq can even be contemplated, Rokke said, DU has to be

removed from every arsenal in the world.

 

In order for that to happen, however, the Pentagon would have to admit that Doug

Rokke is right, and that would come at a price that no one has even imagined.

But money can t restore the lives of those that Rokke says have died from DU,

and money isn't going to get the uranium oxide out of his lungs. There are

people at the Pentagon who understand all this, Rokke claims, and that he deems

unconscionable.

 

" I hope God slam-dunks their butts, because this is absolutely criminal, " he

said.

 

First Posted to the Internet on December 30, 2002

 

********************************************************************************

 

LEUREN MORET'S TESTIMONY REGARDING DEPLETED URANIUM IN TOKYO

Testimony of Leuren Moret for the

International Criminal Tribunal for AfghanistanDec. 13-14, 2003, Tokyo, JAPAN ©

Leuren Moret

http://mindfully.org/Nucs/2003/Leuren-Moret-ICT13dec03.htm

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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