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fallujah
Warnings as US and Russia Threaten to Deploy Depleted Uranium Weapons to Ukraine
"Look at Fallujah. Look at Yugoslavia. Long after the end of the Ukraine war, the use of depleted uranium will give Ukrainians cancer and birth defects for decades," said one journalist.
Jun 14, 2023
The Biden administration is expected to equip Ukrainian homeland defenders with armor-piercing depleted uranium munitions for their U.S.-supplied Abrams main battle tanks, The Wall Street Journalreported Tuesday, prompting Russian President Vladimir Putin to threaten to retaliate with DU rounds—which are linked to birth defects, miscarriages, and cancer.
Citing an unnamed senior Biden administration official, the Journal reported that "there appear to be no major obstacles to approving" the shipment of the highly controversial ammunition to Ukrainian forces as they launch a counteroffensive against Russian troops entrenched along a vast front in the eastern and southern regions of the country.
The new reporting comes four months after The Redacted's Dan Cohen reported the U.S. would send DU rounds to Ukraine.
In February, a top British defense official announced that the United Kingdom would supply Ukrainian forces with DU rounds, dismissing warnings from Moscow that the Russian government would regard the deployment of such weapons as an act of nuclear war.
\u201cThe US is planning to send depleted-uranium tank rounds to Ukraine\n\nThese are the extremely toxic weapons that led to a massive increase in cancer rates and birth defects in Iraq\n\nUkraine's economy relies heavily on agriculture. This could poison its land\nhttps://t.co/TJf4cqV3pf\u201d— Ben Norton (@Ben Norton) 1686671070
Reacting to news that the U.S. will likely supply Ukraine with DU munitions, Putin said Tuesday that "we have many such weapons, and if they use them, we will also reserve the right to use similar munitions," according to the state news agency TASS.
"There's nothing good about it, but, if need be, we can do it," he added. "We don't need to do it."
The Journal report prompted warnings from anti-war voices about the dangers of DU munitions.
"If you love Ukraine, if you care about Ukraine, depleted uranium is the last thing you would tell them to use," British journalist Richard Medhurst said on his video podcast Tuesday. "If you look at what the United States has done, everywhere they've used depleted uranium, it's like dropping a nuclear bomb."
\u201cLook at Fallujah\n\nLook at Yugoslavia\n\nLong after the end of the Ukraine war, the use of depleted uranium will give Ukrainians cancer and birth defects for decades.\u201d— Richard Medhurst (@Richard Medhurst) 1686707558
Medhurst added that in Fallujah, Iraq—where U.S. forces used DU rounds during two attempts to capture the city in 2004—"you have higher rates of birth defects and congenital heart disease... than you did in Hiroshima and Nagasaki."
DU rounds are highly effective at penetrating the armor of most modern tanks and armored fighting vehicles. The U.S. Abrams, British Challenger 2, and German Leopard 2 main battle tanks, along with U.S. Bradley Fighting Vehicles that are being sent to Ukraine, can all fire DU munitions. The ammunition can also be fired from warplanes or field artillery.
However, exploding DU shells produce radioactive dust that contaminates soil, water, and air for many years after their use. U.S. Army training manuals caution that DU contamination "will make food and water unsafe for consumption" and require soldiers to wear protective clothing when in or near contaminated areas.
\u201cTheir depleted uranium vs. our depleted uranium\u201d— 38Parrots (@38Parrots) 1686732239
U.S. and allied forces used DU munitions during the 1991 and 2003-11 invasions of Iraq, and in Syria during the war against Islamic State militants. Miscarriages, birth defects, and cancers soared in Iraq after both wars.
According to one study, more than half of the babies born in Fallujah between 2007 and 2010 had birth defects. Among pregnant women in the study, over 45% experienced miscarriages in the two-year period following the battles for Fallujah. Geiger counter measurements of DU-contaminated sites in Iraqi cities have consistently shown radiation levels 1,000 to 1,900 times greater than normal.
The U.S.-led NATO coalition that waged the 1999 air war against Yugoslavia also used DU munitions, which experts believe are responsible for a surge in leukemia in the region, both among the local population and foreign troops deployed in the war zone.
Peace groups have long campaigned for a ban on DU munitions. Last September, the United Nations General Assembly approved an Indonesian draft resolution urging further research of the "health risks and environmental impact" of DU weapons and calling for a "cautionary approach" to their use.
The resolution was approved by 147 nations. The U.S., U.K., France, and Israel voted against the proposal.
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'Shameful': Critics Denounce US Warship Named 'Fallujah,' Site of Civilian Massacres in Iraq
"Some of the most heinous U.S. war crimes committed during the Iraq War took place in the city of Fallujah," said journalist Jeremy Scahill.
Dec 14, 2022
Peace advocates responded with disgust to the Navy's decision to name its new warship after the two battles of Fallujah, during which U.S. troops massacred Iraqi civilians.
"Fallujah was a giant American war crime in Iraq."
"The future America-class amphibious ship will be named the USS Fallujah, LHA-9," Navy Secretary Carlos Del Toro announced Tuesday in a speech at Marine Barracks Washington, D.C. "The future USS Fallujah will commemorate the first and second battles of Fallujah, American-led offenses during the Iraq War."
Del Toro called it "an honor for me, and for our nation, to memorialize the Marines, the soldiers, and coalition forces that fought valiantly and those that sacrificed their lives during both battles of Fallujah."
U.S. troops slaughtered approximately 600 Iraqi civilians--including more than 300 women and children--along with 200 insurgents during the First Battle of Fallujah. Code-named Operation Vigilant Resolve, the battle was launched in April 2004 to avenge the deaths of four Blackwater contractors. Twenty-seven U.S. soldiers were killed during the retaliatory siege.
The Second Battle of Fallujah, known as Operation Phantom Fury, was fought from November to December 2004 to recapture the city from insurgent forces. In the process, U.S.-led occupation forces killed between 581 and 670 civilians across nine neighborhoods, according to Iraq Body Count.
"With over 100 coalition forces killed and 600 wounded, Operation Phantom Fury is considered to be the bloodiest engagement to the Iraq War and the fiercest serving combat involving U.S. Marines since the Vietnam War's battle of Hue City," said Del Toro. "This namesake deserves to be in the pantheon of iconic Marine Corps battles, and the LHA's unique capabilities will serve as a stark reminder to everyone around the world of the bravery, the courage, and commitment to freedom displayed by those who fought in those battles."
\u201cJaw. Floor. https://t.co/JqG8XMdeuL\u201d— Peter Maass (@Peter Maass) 1670986155
Critics called the Navy's commemoration of the battles of Fallujah "shameful."
\u201cThis is shameful. Fallujah was a giant American war crime in Iraq. Massively excessive force was used to punish an entire city, in two brutal waves, for the lynching of 4 mercenaries.\nhttps://t.co/nP6JzblvjT\u201d— Mark Gubrud (@Mark Gubrud) 1670974963
"Some of the most heinous U.S. war crimes committed during the Iraq War took place in the city of Fallujah," The Intercept's Jeremy Scahill, who reported from Iraq during the U.S. invasion, wrote Wednesday on social media.
In a 2007 appearance on the Bill Moyers show, Scahill described the siege of Fallujah as "one of the most brutal and sustained U.S. operations of the occupation," telling Moyers that the Pentagon's murderous response to the killing of Blackwater contractors set a dangerous precedent.
In 2016, journalist Hope Hodge Seck wrote about what she called "the whisper campaign for a USS Fallujah."
"At the time, it seemed unlikely to ever happen," she tweeted Tuesday. "But now it has."
Construction on the 45,000 metric-ton vessel, the first U.S. warship named after a post-9/11 battle, is set to begin this month at the Mississippi-based Ingalls Shipbuilding, which secured a $2.4 billion contract in October.
Civilians in Fallujah, meanwhile, continue to suffer from a sharp rise in birth defects that has occurred in the wake of the 2003 invasion.
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John McCain and Lindsey Graham Want to Invade Fallujah Yet Again
Jan 06, 2014
There were conflicting reports on Sunday morning about whether the Iraqi government and its allied tribal levies had regained control of the western city of Fallujah, which had fallen to the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS or ISIL) on Saturday. What was not in doubt was that some in the leadership of the GOP have a screw loose when it comes to foreign affairs.
Sens. John McCain (R-AZ) and Lindsey Graham (R-SC) tried to blame President Obama for the al-Qaeda presence in Fallujah, saying that he had been wrong to withdraw all US troops from Iraq in December of 2011.
McCain and Graham decided to invade Iraq with no justification in international law, overthrow its government, dissolve its army, fire most Sunni Arabs from their jobs, and dissolve most of the state-owned industries, creating massive unemployment. What did they expect to happen? In contrast, Obama opposed the Iraq War when he was in the Illinois Senate.
It is really rich that these two should try to blame Obama for the problem that they caused. There was no al-Qaeda in Iraq in 2002 and the Iraqi government would not have allowed such a thing.
McCain and Graham are wrong on this matter for the following reasons:
1. The Iraqi parliament rejected a Status of Forces Agreement with the US on George W. Bush's watch and refused to reconsider. Without a SOFA, as Sen. McCain knows very well, US troops could not engage in combat without risking being brought to Iraqi courts and charged with war crimes.
The only way Obama could have kept troops in Iraq would have been to invade the country all over again, abolish parliament and install a puppet government that would invite the US to stay. Actually, that is exactly what Leonid Brezhnev did in Afghanistan. How did that work out for the Soviet Union? In fact, McCain pursued in the 1980s more or less allied with Muslim holy warriors against the Soviets in Afghanistan, contributing the the rise of . . . al-Qaeda. So we have seen this picture.
2. The Islamic State of Iraq and other extremist Sunni fundamentalists controlled city quarters of Fallujah while the American troops were there! The US invaded Falluja twice directly in 2004 and then conducted a proxy campaign there in 2007-8 using tribal levies (the "Awakening Councils") a third time! So the US military presence in Iraq 2003-2011 did not crush the Sunni extremists in Falluja, which they had to keep invading over and over again, as is proved by the way the extremists were back in control of the city just this past weekend. If a small contingent of US troops were in Iraq now, what would they do? Could they even tell which Iraqis in Falluja were the bad guys?
3. Sen. McCain has never comprehended that the Iraqis did not want US troops in their country. Many Iraqis who don't even like Sunni extremists would be perfectly happy to join them in fighting US troops were they again to be on the ground in Iraq. They're just not that into you, Lindjohn. A US troop presence in a place like Iraq is radicalizing and destabilizing, not a solution to the problems.
The two maintained that US power has declined in the Middle East in the past 5 years. But if we went back to 2007 we would find the US mired in two quagmires, in Afghanistan and Iraq, its forces over-extended and doing 3 and 4 18-month rotations. It was the bogged down US in 2007 that was weak and irrelevant. No one in the Middle East cared what W. thought.
They also wanted a direct US intervention in Syria, apparently because their Iraq adventure went so well. There is no prospect that the US could intervene effectively in Syria. Even if it could, do they want to put the Syrian rebels in power in Damascus? Do they even realize that one major rebel group in Syria is -- you guessed it- the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, the same "al-Qaeda affiliate" they want to sent troops in to fight in Falluja!
Some people think war is the answer to every problem. It isn't even the answer to most problems.
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