DU does not respect sides in a battle. For instance, Israel, a U.S. ally, lies downwind of Iraq and is suffering from large increases in breast cancer, leukemia and childhood diabetes. (28) Britain, another ally, recorded the highest levels of DU ever measured after the Tora Bora bombings and the “Shock and Awe’ assault of 2003. (29)
Moreover, it does not take long for DU to travel. Within 7-9 days of the “Shock and Awe” campaign, very fine particles of DU were captured by filters 2400 miles away in Britain. (30)
“After forming microscopic and submicroscopic insoluble Uranium-oxide nanoparticles on the battlefield, DU remains suspended in air and travels around the earth as a radioactive component of atmospheric dust, contaminating the environment, indiscriminately killing, maiming and causing disease in all living things where rain, snow, and moisture remove it from the atmosphere.
“Global radioactive contamination from atmospheric testing was the equivalent of 40,000 Hiroshima bombs and still contaminates the atmosphere and lower orbital space today. The amount of low level radioactive pollution from depleted uranium released since 1991, is many times more (deposited internally in the body), than was released from atmospheric testing fallout.” (31)
According to Dr. Moret, DU is everywhere. She says that researchers have found the "smog of war" from Gulf War I in glaciers and ice sheets globally a year later. (32) Large annual dust storms originating in North Africa, the Middle East, and Central Asia quickly spread the radioactive contamination around the world, and weathering of old depleted uranium munitions on battlefields and other areas will provide new sources of radioactive contamination in future years. (33)
- DU cannot be cleaned up.
As Dr. Rokke reminds us, DU "cannot be cleaned up." (34) Dr. Moret calls it “the Trojan Horse of nuclear war, … the weapon that keeps killing. … There is no way to turn it off, and there is no way to clean it up.” (35)
- There is no known treatment for DU contamination.
According to Dr. Moret, “there are no known methods of treatment. (36) Dr. Rokke concurs: DU is “going to cause all [kinds of] health problems and there is no medical care and treatment. You can’t reverse radiation exposure damage to the body.” (37) Unlike in the first Gulf War, when 300 tons of DU were fired off in the Kuwaiti and Iraqi desert, in the second Gulf War nearly 10 times as much DU was largely exploded and burned in urban areas, putting the dust right in the path of millions of civilians. (38)
Vignettes of our future?
Near Sarajevo, Michel Chossudovsky found empty villages with full cemeteries. (39)
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