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Depleted NUCLEAR WEAPONS, GENOCIDE & That's Right - The UNITED STATES Republication
Originally published June 27, 2005 @ http://tabacco.myblogsite.com/
Originally published at Blog-City November 17, 2005
Depleted Nuclear
Weapons, Genocide
& That's Right -
The UNITED STATES
Q. What is Depleted Uranium?
A. When one hears the word “uranium,” images of nuclear reactors, atomic bombs, and perhaps radiation sickness come to mind. While uranium has applications within these contexts, Depleted Uranium (DU) serves other, very important functions, both military and otherwise.
Uranium is said to be "depleted" when the most radioactive components have been removed by the process of enrichment, usually for use in reactors or atomic weapons, and you are simply left with a heavy metal, not altogether different from lead. Thus, Depleted Uranium (DU) is a dense, radioactive waste product that remains after Enriched Uranium has been removed from natural uranium metal. Of course radioactivity still exists in DU, but in such trace amounts that there would be no cause for concern unless it is ingested. DU is generally not harmful if merely handled, but when it explodes and burns, it has been ingested by soldiers and civilians.
Armour Piercing Shells
Q. What are Depleted Nuclear Weapons?
A. They are used by the military in many countries as armor-piercing projectiles, as ammunition, and as tank armor. They are also used as ballast in aircraft controls and in oil drilling equipment. In fact, DU is finding its way into the commercial marketplace in a variety of surprising and troubling venues.
Some DU munitions have been found to contain traces of Plutonium, which is the most toxic substance we know of. Its half-life is approximately 4.5 billion years, meaning that in that amount of time half of it will have broken down. DU is ingested when soldiers or civilians come into contact with it. 
Q. What is a “Bunker Buster”?
A. "The "bunker buster" is designed with a Depleted Uranium tip allowing the weapon according to the government, to penetrate 10 to 20 meters of hardened concrete or rock, though Iraq has bases to depths of 60 meters."
Source: http://www.uwec.edu/grossmzc/resenhmw.html
By U.S. law the military cannot make any new nuclear weapons but can modify conventional Earth Penetrating Weapons (EPW) “bunker busters” into “Robust Nuclear Earth Penetrators” or nuclear tipped warheads between 0.3 and 340 kilotons. Currently the U.S. employs 50 conventional and nuclear weapons in its arsenal. The "bunker buster" is designed with a Depleted Uranium tip allowing the weapon, according to the government, to penetrate 10 to 20 meters of hardened concrete or rock, although Iraq has bases to depths of 60 meters.
David Wright, a nuclear-weapons expert at the Union of Concerned Scientists in Washington DC claims that the weapon would have to penetrate at least 70 meters in normal dry soil or 40 meters in rock to contain the radioactive dust that would be created.
The military suggests that using a nuclear tipped “bunker buster” could be used safely with minimal collateral damage. But a one-kiloton bomb exploded in shallow ground would create one million tons of dirt and dust. The surrounding population would be exposed to a deadly dose of radiation creating a large amount of collateral damage. In addition, the debris around the explosion site would be contaminated with low-level radiation increasing the long-term civilian causality rates.
The targeting with nuclear “bunker busters” weapons on chemical and biological weapons storage facilities would inevitably spread a deadly cloud chemical and radioactive dust into the atmosphere and contaminate surrounding civilians. Most underground storage facilities have complex tunnel work with multiple storage rooms and levels, reducing the effectiveness of the thermal heat produced by the nuclear detonation and completely destroying the WMD.
Q. Does United States of America Use Depleted Nuclear Weapons?
A. Now what country on this planet could possibly be using depleted nuclear weapons containing DU (depleted uranium)? Possibly Iraq? No. How about North Korea? No. Maybe the USSR? Not now anyway. How about Great Britain, Israel and the United States?????? B-I-N-G-O! The unholy triumvirate. You know, of course, that the only nation E-V-E-R to drop a nuclear warhead on actual living people is the United States. But what about all of Bush's yelling and screaming about WMDs in Iraq. And doesn't Bush want North Korea, China and everybody else (except Great Britain, Israel and the USA of course) to disarm themselves of WMDs? If we can't trust China, North Korea, Iraq, India, Pakistan, Russia etc with WMDs, then why in H-E-L-L should those countries trust the United States, Great Britain & Israel. Some of those countries are Arabs, who would never trust Israel if Israel has WMDs and they don't. So disarmament looks like a lost cause.
No subject, tackled by this Blog, is more important to humanity or less salient to the media at large. I must defer to sources, more informed than I in this matter. Why it is being overlooked by the media, in my opinion, should be laid at the feet of George W. Bush and his administration comrades now. But Bill Clinton cannot wash his hands of the matter a la Pontius Pilate. This abomination has been going on for some time.
The use of depleted uranium weaponry by the United States, defying all international treaties, will slowly annihilate all species on earth including the human species, and yet this country continues to do so with full knowledge of its destructive potential.
LEUREN MORET
Since 1991, the United States has staged four wars using depleted uranium weaponry, illegal under all international treaties, conventions and agreements, as well as under the US military law. The continued use of this illegal radioactive weaponry, which has already contaminated vast regions with low-level radiation and will contaminate other parts of the world over time, is indeed a world affair and an international issue. The deeper purpose is revealed by comparing regions now contaminated with depleted uranium — from Egypt, the Middle East, Central Asia and the northern half of India — to the US geostrategic imperatives described in Zbigniew Brzezinski’s 1997 book The Grand Chessboard.
http://www.mindfully.org/Nucs/2004/DU-Trojan-Horse1jul04.htm
Q. What is the Bush Policy Re Depleted Nukes?
Nuclear Options by Matthew Resenhoeft
resenhmw@uwec.edu
http://www.uwec.edu/grossmzc/resenhmw.html
The Policy
In 2002, the Bush Administration classified Iraq, Iran and North Korea as part of the “Axis of Evil,” partly because the Administration accused these countries of developing Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD). Yet WMD use by the U.S. has also been openly discussed by the U.S. as a method to prevent these countries from acquiring WMDs. The philosophy of threatening the use of WMD in order to prevent or deter other countries from possessing similar weapons can be viewed as hypocrisy on the part of the U.S., which has possessed a large number of nuclear and chemical weapons for decades, and is the only country to have used nuclear arms. It is a double standard in the Middle East, considering that Israel has had nuclear weapons for three decades.
During the war in Iraq the U.S. did not use its nuclear card though it was in the military’s arsenal of weapons. The population of the U.S. and the world has a low opinion of the use of tactical nuclear weapons, perhaps making their potential use more unlikely.
Q. Why does the USA use these ultimate weapons?
A. The U.S. only has two possible uses for the ultimate weapons according to Los Angeles Times:
1- Attacking Iraqi facilities located so deep underground that they might be impervious to conventional explosives.
2- Thwarting Iraq's use of weapons of mass destruction.
The United States is using Weapons of Mass Destruction in order to discourage the use and/or possession of the same types of weapons it is currently possessing and threatening to use. This is the same type of philosophy followed in the USA by States which sanction Capital Punishment. We kill people to show them that killing is wrong! Neither policy makes any sense at all.
Depleted Uranium Storage Facilities
The 2003 War In Iraq
U.S. forces dropped two conventional 4,700-pound “bunker busters” on communication facilities in Baghdad. In addition, four 2,000-pound “bunker busters” were dropped on a Baghdad suburb building, suspected to house Saddam Hussein. The war in Iraq remained a conventional war and left the nuclear weapons for hopefully not another day. -Matt Kelly, Associated Press
1991 Gulf War
During the first Gulf War in 1991, weapons containing depleted Uranium were used for the first time in combat. Depleted Uranium
(http://web.ead.anl.gov/uranium/faq/index.cfm)
was desired because it can penetrate any material known to man. Although it may seem a desirable weapon, the environmental consequences and the effects on humans were not revealed and are still highly denied by the U.S. government. Symptoms of being affected by DU include achy joints, falling ill, developing rashes and memory loss. According to Paul Sullivan, President of the National Gulf War Resource Center, the residue from DU weapons settles in the bone, the lungs, kidneys and testicles. The most infamous example of the effects of DU is that it can be passed from the mother to the child and often causes abnormalities and other birth defects.
In the Basra General Hospital in Southern Iraq
(http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos/iz.html)
according to Dr. Anuar Abdul Mehsen, MD., the number of cancer cases he has seen in his hospital has increased significantly since the end of the Gulf War. In 1988 he saw 34 deaths caused by various types of cancer, and in 1988 there were 428 deaths caused by cancer. He adds that there is an average of 1-2 deformed babies born per day.
From 1991 to 2003, U.S. and British jets patrolled the No-Fly-Zones in Northern and Southern Iraq, often bombing Iraqi anti-aircraft sites that threatened them. These air strikes also involved DU munitions.
Israel: An Arab Neighbor and Unacknowledged Member of Nuke Club
Israel has possessed nuclear weapons since the 1970s and has received help from the United States and Europe.
The Israelis’ claim a “weapons for peace” philosophy, to justify having nuclear arms. Israel, the Middle Eastern country that borders Egypt, Jordan and Syria, has a nuclear arsenal estimated at between 100 and 200 weapons. This includes low-yield tactical nuclear bombs and long-range missiles (Jericho-1 and Jericho-2), making Israel a major nuclear power in the region. The United States has not demanded complete nuclear or other WMD disarmament of Israel, unlike North Korea and Iraq. Currently there are no major disarmament talks or other dialog concerning Israel's nuclear arsenal.
The International Coalition to Ban Uranium Weapons (ICBUW) has organized an international conference in the building of the European Parliament in Brussels, on 23 and 24 June, 2005. Members of Parliament and scientists were invited to participate in a debate and in workshops.
"Testing has once again become an issue due to the recent use of DU ammunition by US and UK forces in Iraq. The UK military apparently shot DU only during the March 2003 invasion, but the continued use of DU munitions by the US military is possible, though unknown.
Of course the US isn't going to give away those figures, even to US servicemen, made sick by these DUs. It's not like bombing Hiroshima and Nagasaki, where you are sure of hitting mainly the Japanese. These weapons make us sick too. Who could be so indifferent to their own soldiers? Great Britain, Israel and the United States. Please note that on this score, Democrats and Republicans are equally culpable. Bill Clinton and ole Harry S. Truman both had their fingers on the nuclear trigger.
"By U.S. law the military cannot make any new nuclear weapons but can modify conventional Earth Penetrating Weapons (EPW) “bunker busters” into “Robust Nuclear Earth Penetrators” or nuclear tipped warheads between 0.3 and 340 kilotons. Currently the U.S. employs 50 conventional and nuclear weapons in its arsenal."
SILENT WMDs EFFECTS OF DEPLETED URANIUM
By Admiral Vishnu Bhagwat
Former Chief of the Naval Staff, India
FEBRUARY 29, 2004
http://www.thepowerhour.com/articles/du_effects.htm
This brief presentation is aimed at conveying to the primarily Indian participants of the Conference the fateful and disastrous consequences of the indiscriminate use of depleted and non DU munitions on the people of the west, central and south Asian regions, women, children, men, animals, plant and animal life now and in the future, in gross violation of international law, the Hague convention and domestic US military law.
Official Gamma Ray damage caused studies have been deficient in a number of aspects: internal contamination, internal dose to individual cells, omissions of diseases other than cancer, mutagenic, long term degeneration, oncogenesis, effects of the killer isotopes in particular. The case studies of the years 1945-50 were ignored. A recent European Parliament Report ECRR 2003 (European Committee on Radiation Risk) concludes that A-Bomb studies underestimate the radiation risk by more than 1000 times and failed to consider the internal exposure and diseases caused by Alpha and Beta rays. They did not consider the Manhattan Project classified memo that, in case the Project objective of producing Plutonium fission and the A-Bomb did not succeed, Depleted Uranium munitions would be deployed towards the attainment of the same objective (encl. 1). 
DU weapons emit Alpha particle dose to a single cell from U-238, which is 50 times the annual dose level. Cancer is initiated with one alpha particle; its daughter isotopes effect generations as the isotopes bio-concentrate in plants and animals, and travel up the food chain. It is a nuclear weapon because the energy is derived from the nucleus of the atom. They enter the body through the lungs, the digestive system or breaks in the skin. One gram of DU releases more than 12,000 particles per second. The radiation slowly kills the cells that make life possible. The Gulf War syndrome of 1991 did just that (reported by Dr Asaf Durakovic, Prof. of Medicine, Georgetown University, and discoverer of the Gulf War Syndrome.)
The induction of DU weapons in 1991 in Iraq, the radioactive trash from nuclear plants broke a 46-year taboo. This Trojan Horse of nuclear war, an omnicidal weapon has since then continued to be used more and more. DU remains radioactive longer than the age of the earth (estimated at 4.5 billion years.)
The long-term effects from over a decade of DU exposures are emerging in Southern Iraq. They are devastating. The increased quantities of radioactive material (including non-depleted uranium), used in Afghanistan are 3 to 5 times greater than Iraq 199. In Iraq 2003 they are already estimated to be 6 to 10 times 1991 and will travel through a larger area and affect many more people, babies and unborn. Countries within a 1000-mile radius of Baghdad and Kabul are being affected by radiation poisoning, that includes the Capital, New Delhi, where the ruling elite lives. The reported coming of an AIDS epidemic last year in India, down wind, may have a relationship to DU bombing in Afghanistan. If we think cancer is a problem now wait until more DU is released in wars against terror and for regime change, on mistaken intelligence reports.
More than 500 tons of DU munitions have been dispensed in Afghanistan. Professor Yagasaki calculated, in a paper presented at the World Uranium Weapons Conference in Hamburg in October 2003 (5 months ago), that 800 tons of DU is the atomicity equivalent to 83,000 Nagasaki bombs. The amount of DU used in Iraq in 2003 is equivalent to nearly 250,000 Nagasaki bombs (Busby and Leuren Moret have calculated that 1900 tons of DU is equivalent to 60 TBq of Alfa and Beta particulate activity). 
UN Logo
INTERNATIONAL PEACE AND SECURITY
AS AN ESSENTIAL CONDITION
FOR THE ENJOYMENT OF HUMAN RIGHTS
ABOVE ALL THE RIGHT TO LIFE
The Sub-Commission on Prevention of Discrimination and Protection of Minorities
Guided by the principles of the Charter of the United Nations, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the International Covenants on Human Rights and the Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949 and the Additional Protocols thereto,
Recalling General Assembly resolutions 42/99 of 7 December 1987 and 43/111 of 8 December 1988 reaffirming that all people have an inherent right to life,
Concerned at the alleged use of weapons of mass or indiscriminate destruction both against members of the armed forces and against civilian populations, resulting in death, misery and disability,
Concerned also at repeated reports on the long-term consequences of the use of such weapons upon human life and health and upon the environment,
Concerned further that the physical effects on the environment, the debris from the use of such weapons, either alone or in combination, and abandoned contaminated equipment constitute a serious danger to life,
Convinced that the production, sale and use of such weapons are incompatible with international human rights and humanitarian law,
Believing that continued efforts must be undertaken to sensitize public opinion to the inhuman and indiscriminate effects of such weapons and to the need for their complete elimination,
Convinced that the production, sale and use of such weapons are incompatible with the promotion and maintenance of international peace and security,
Urges all States to be guided in their national policies by the need to curb the production and the spread of weapons of mass destruction or with indiscriminate effect, in particular nuclear weapons, chemical weapons, fuel-air-bombs, napalm, cluster bombs, biological weaponry and weaponry containing depleted uranium;
Requests the Secretary-General:
To collect information from Governments, the competent United Nations bodies and agencies and non-governmental organizations on the use of nuclear weapons, chemical weapons, fuel-air-bombs, napalm, cluster bombs, biological weaponry and weaponry containing depleted uranium, on their consequential and cumulative effects, and on the danger they represent to life, physical security and other human rights;
To submit a report on the information gathered to the Sub-Commission at its forty-ninth session, together with any recommendations and views which he may have received on effective ways and means of eliminating such weapons;
Decides to give further consideration to this matter at its forty-ninth session, on the basis of any additional information which may be contained in reports of the Secretary-General to the Sub-Commission or to other United Nations bodies, or which may be submitted to the Sub-Commission by Governments or non-governmental organizations.
34th meeting, August 1996
[Adopted by 15 votes to 1, with abstentions. See chap. XIV]
E/CN.4/Sub.2/1996/L.11/Add.3
http://www.mint.gov.my/policy/treaty_nuclear/unhchr_sub_res9616.htm
United Nations Commission on Human Rights:
Sub-Commission on Prevention
of Discrimination & Protection of Minorities
Resolution 1996/16:
International Peace and Security
as an Essential Condition for the Enjoyment
of Human Rights above All the Right To Life
policy.research @mint .my
Malaysian Institute for Nuclear Technology Research (MINT)
Comprehensive coverage of global nuclear policy issues from Malaysia's perspective.
The Objective, the Issues, the Instruments, the Tools, the Fora, and the Output
Tue Jan 23 11:37:56 2001
If you have heard little or nothing about Depleted Nuclear Weapons, you are in a large majority. If you do nothing else, with inspiration from this Blog, please investigate this subject thoroughly and review the websites listed here and others that you, yourselves, may find, then “spread the word”. Everyone must be made aware. Word of mouth, I truly believe, is the key. We can no longer sit quietly in front of our TV sets, allowing the media to select, which stories are important and which are not.
The Michael Jackson story may be interesting, but Depleted Nuclear Weapons is earth shatteringly consequential. Don’t let politicians and the press suppress this one. Your future and the future of mankind may depend on what we do with this story.
So you mean to say that Great Britain and the good old USA, the world's policemen, are using DUs, not only on their enemies, but on their own soldiers too? Why haven't I heard anything about this on CBS, ABC, NBC, FOX, CNN, MSNBC or C-Span? Makes you wonder doesn't it! But then again you don't hear much about Iraqi women and children dying from our military actions either, do you - at least not from those news sources.
"Heat not a furnace for your foe so hot that it do singe yourself." -William Shakespeare (1564-1616)
This article states the problem, but not the solution. All I can do is “spread the word”. The solution rests with all of us. Or the total annihilation.
Reference Websites:
http://www.uwec.edu/grossmzc/resenhmw.html
http://nuclearweaponarchive.org/Nwfaq/Nfaq1.html
http://nuclearweaponarchive.org/Israel/
http://www.bandepleteduranium.org/
http://www.idust.net/
http://www.greens.org/s-r/15/15-20.html
http://www.transnet-jp.com/DUban/
http://encarta.msn.com/related_761557628/Uranium.html
http://www.francenuc.org/en_chn/fab_weapons_e.htm
http://www.onlinejournal.com/Media/052705Nichols/052705nichols.html
http://www.mindfully.org/Nucs/2004/DU-Dennis-Kyne1jul04.htm
http://www.peacehost.net/PacifistNation/CaldicottAndDU.htm
http://www.miltoxproj.org/depleted_uranium.htm
http://www.nuclearfiles.org/menu/key-issues/nuclear-weapons/issues/depleted-uranium/
http://www.oilempire.us/depleted-uranium.html
http://www.kucinich.us/issues/nuclear_weapons.php
http://www.reachingcriticalwill.org/legal/npt/NGOpres2003/IPPNW.htm
http://www.thepowerhour.com/articles/du_effects.htm
http://www.theotherside.org/archive/jul-aug00/berrigan.html
http://www.endthewar.org/abolishdu_events.htm
http://www.swans.com/library/art7/zig057.html
http://science.howstuffworks.com/bunker-buster4.htm
http://environment.about.com/od/nuclearwarandweapons/
http://www.globalresearch.ca/articles/MOR407A.html
http://www.vredesactie.be/view.php?lang=en&artikel=301
http://www.harpers.org/WMD.html
And Republished today as separate article,
Corporals Don't Order Nuclear Radiation Weapons - Presidents Do
http://www.progressivetrail.org/articles/040902Nichols.shtml
DO YOU STILL WONDER WHY THE REST OF THE WORLD
HATES THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA?
Tabacco: I consider myself both a funnel and a filter. I funnel information, not readily available on the Mass Media, which is ignored and/or suppressed. I filter out the irrelevancies and trivialities to save both the time and effort of my Readers and bring consternation to the enemies of Truth & Fairness! When you read Tabacco, if you don’t learn something NEW, I’ve wasted your time.
In 1981's 'Body Heat', Kathleen Turner said, "Knowledge is power".
T.A.B.A.C.C.O. (Truth About Business And Congressional Crimes Organization) – Think Tank For Other 95% Of World