The Use of Depleted Uranium (DU) Weapons(World Iraq Tribunal

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The Excessive Use of Weapons and Banned Weapons

by Akira Maeda, Sayo Saruta, Koichi Inamori, ICTI

The Use of Depleted Uranium (DU) Weapons

1. The Truth About the Use of Depleted Uranium (DU) Weapons by US and UK Troops

The US and UK troops in the attacks on Iraq that started on 21 March 2001 used DU weapons during the battles at various places in Iraq. The truth of the use of DU weapons by US troop was verified and admitted by Brigadier General Brooks in a press briefing on 26 March of the same year when he said, "DU bombs had been used."

Michael Kilpatrick, Deputy Director of Deployment Health Support in the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Health Affairs, at a forum at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology on 6 March 2004, said, "The Army fired and used from tanks and armored vehicle 24 tons or less of DU bombs, and the Air Force, 10 tons or less of DU bombs from A-10 planes. These, when combined, would be equivalent to 115 tons of metallic uranium.

Also, before the outbreak of the war, on 15 March 2003, in a press briefing at the Department of Defense, Colonel Naughton, stated that "Abrams tanks had been loaded with DU bombshells," and "so were A-10 planes" because "there was not other choice. Witnesses had repeatedly seen civilian facilities being targeted by A- 10 planes starting with Iraq's Planning Ministry during the aerial bombing of Baghdad. Report on the investigation conducted by Scott Peterson, as a matter of fact, corroborated the statement given by Colonel Naugton at the above-mentioned press briefing. Abrams tanks were the main battle tanks used in the ground assault of Iraq. It is, therefore, highly probable that aside from the facts already verified, the US Armed Forces has used in large quantity DU weapons, even exceeding the reported volume, in all areas of offensive operations in Iraq, even at densely populated areas, particularly Baghdad, Basra, etc.

2. Special Properties of Depleted Uranium (DU) Weapons

Storing depleted uranium is enormously expensive, but disposing it by all means is what the US Department of Energy has wanted to do. It is in military weapons that depleted uranium is used in extremely large scale, and it is used mainly as penetration body that is attached to bombshells for the sake of increasing its penetration capacity, and also as armor of tanks in order to increase its defense capacity. Mainly, uranium weapons have the following advantages:

1) Depleted uranium, because of its very heavy density (1.7 times of lead, 2.5 times of iron) and hardness, when used to tip bullets, increases the penetration power of the bullets, and displays such tremendous capacity as to power to open holes in thick iron plates and concrete.

2) Even when there are no explosives inside the bombshell, it explodes upon impact, and the capacity to kill and injure the enemy is high because of the high temperature it causes when it burns.

3) It is very cheap because its raw materials are radioactive wastes.

Much more....must read:
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article9322.htm

[reprehensor]

1. Long.Overdue. Bump.

Thanks for posting.