The Daily Grasshopper

How does one define “weapons of mass destruction,” anyway? A story that appeared in today’s Boston Sunday Globe started me thinking about that question. According to an Elizabeth Neuffer article, “Iraqis trace surge in cancer to US bombings,” (World/Nation, p. A11) the vast amounts of radioactive material that our military left in Iraq after the 1991 invasion may be the cause of a tenfold increase in the number of cases of cancer in parts of the country. Of course, the use of depleted uranium munitions has been reported elsewhere before, but rarely are the effects looked at in a mainstream publication like the Globe. Here’s the article:

http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/026/nation/Iraqis_trace_surge_in_cancer_to_US_bombings+.shtml

Are “weapons of mass destruction” any weapons that cause widespread death and suffering among a non-combatant population? It’s an important question. Because if so, the remnants of the weapons our troops used there in the first Gulf War qualify. Here are some highlights from the Globe story today, in case you didn’t hit the link (just a guess…):

"Hospital statistics in Basra document that cancer rates are indeed on the rise. In 1988, there were 11 cases of cancer per 100,000 people in the city. By 2001, that number had increased to 116 per 100,000, according to Dr. Jawad al-Ali, a leading Iraqi cancer specialist who teaches at the Saddam Training Hospital in Basra. Breast and lung cancer, lymphoma, and leukemia are among the most common cancers, he said.

Iraq's 1999 National Cancer Registry in Baghdad, also noted an alarming increase in leukemia cases, particularly near Basra. Countrywide, the number of overall cancer cases has grown steadily since the Gulf War, with 7,481 cases in 1989 and 8,592 in 1997, according to registry statistics.

At first, doctors said, they were puzzled by the surge in cancer patients in Basra. Then an American veteran suffering from Gulf War syndrome, Staff Sergeant Carol Picou, drew attention to the fact that many US munitions contained depleted uranium, which remains radioactive, prompting a series of studies. Basra was heavily targeted by the US-led bombing campaign in 1991.

Depleted uranium, because of its high density, is used in armor-piercing shells. When these shell casings explode, small uranium particles are sprayed into the air and can be carcinogenic if inhaled, according to the World Health Organization. The particles are also absorbed by soil and water, entering the food chain."

If you haven’t heard the term “depleted uranium munitions” before, that’s understandable. It’s one of the many dirty little secrets of U.S. foreign and economic policy, at least as far as corporate media commentators are concerned. Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR) documented the media’s willingness to overlook the use of depleted uranium weapons during the Balkans War:

http://www.fair.org/press-releases/nato-du.html

The report, from January, 2001, starts off this way:

Concern has been mounting rapidly throughout Europe over the effects of depleted uranium (DU) munitions used by NATO in Bosnia and Yugoslavia during the 1994-95 and 1999 wars. At least 12 soldiers - six Italian, five Belgian and one Portuguese - who served in the Balkans have died of leukemia or other forms of cancer; several Italian, Spanish, French and Dutch soldiers are being treated for cancer; and several other European countries are currently testing their soldiers for signs of illness.

Other soldiers and aid workers have experienced symptoms including "chronic fatigue, hair loss and various types of cancer" (New York Times, 1/7/01), ailments which have collectively come to be known as "Balkans War Syndrome," much like Gulf War Syndrome.

Here’s how it ends:

Despite questions raised by veterans, health researchers and international organizations like the UN, NATO's use of DU in Kosovo has received almost no sustained media attention, either during or after the war. One wartime report on ABC's Nightline (4/1/99) criticized Serbian state media's coverage of the conflict, highlighting what it described as "this astonishing claim" from a Belgrade news report: "They [NATO forces] even use radioactive weapons...which are forbidden by the Geneva Convention." Astonishing, perhaps, but true; at the time, the Pentagon had already admitted using DU in Kosovo. As for the possibility that NATO violated the Geneva Conventions, ABC has never returned to it.

There are a number of sources of information on the web for Depleted Uranium, some very dense with technical detail and others more accessible. I’ll try to provide a range of these resources to you, in the hopes you will take a few minutes to learn more about the weapons our soldiers are using (and that our tax dollars pay for). Much will be made about the threat of “weapons of mass destruction” in the coming days. It is up to us to decide who represents the biggest threat to world peace at the moment – Saddam Hussein or George W. Bush – and act accordingly.

The British Broadcasting Corporation also produced a short story in January, 2001 about the World Health Organization’s decision to begin a fact-finding study (warning: the photo accompanying this story is graphic):

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/1138552.stm

The Christian Science Monitor’s Scott Peterson has done by far the best reporting in the mainstream press on the issue of Depleted Uranium. I highly recommend you check out CSM's page “Trail of a Bullet,” devoted to his reporting on the issue:

http://www.csmonitor.com/atcsmonitor/specials/uranium/

A Dutch organization called Laka has been studying DU since the early 1990s, sending an investigator to Iraq as early as 1992. Here’s their 1999 report (“Depleted Uranium: A Post-War Disaster for Environment and Health”):

http://www.rimbaud.freeserve.co.uk/dhap99f.html

Here are some highlights of the report:

"Prior to the Gulf War, the U.S. Army was aware of the potential for depleted uranium contamination to cause health problems among civilian populations. However, during and after the Gulf War, the U.S. Department of Defense took no steps to warn the inhabitants of Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and Iraq about depleted uranium contamination on their lands. In contrast, U.S. Army reports express more concern about public outcry and future restrictions on the use of depleted uranium weapons than with contaminating foreign lands and poisoning civilians.

The 1991 Persian Gulf War included an array of the twentieth century's most frightening and devastating weapons. Nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons were all poised for use, each with the ability to cause massive casualties among friend and foe alike. When hostilities subsided in March, 1991, the world breathed a collective sigh of relief that weapons of mass destruction had not been used. Or had they?

During the Gulf War, American and British forces introduced armor-piercing ammunition made of depleted uranium, a radioactive and toxic waste. By war's end, more than 290,000 kilograms (640,000 pounds) of depleted uranium contaminated equipment and the soil on the battlefields of Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and southern Iraq.[1] Though investigations are ongoing and additional research is needed, it now appears that some veterans and civilians exposed to depleted uranium contamination are suffering health problems including kidney damage and cancers…

The use of a radioactive and toxic waste in ammunition heralds a dangerous new era in land warfare, one in which the line between conventional and unconventional warfare is irreversibly blurred. The increasing proliferation and use of depleted uranium weapons ensure their part in armed conflict for the foreseeable future. Accordingly, we must learn from the lessons of the use of depleted uranium weapons in the Gulf War and take steps to minimize and prevent the adverse effects on soldiers, civilians, and food and water supplies."

Two other headlines, both from the Sunday Globe’s front page, add urgency to our fact-gathering: “US entering ‘last phase’ before war” and “Planning underway to manage Iraqi oil.” I wrote yesterday that by pre-emptively attacking Iraq, our country will be breaking international law in what it claims is an effort to uphold international law. Will we also be using our weapons of mass destruction (again) against a dictator whose major crime seems to be that he might be planning to use such weapons at some future point? Questions worth pondering as we get ready to hear President Bush make the case for war.