It seems as there is more proof showing up that U.S. troops used white phosphorus on those suspected of being terrorists and also women and children. Phosphorus doesn't bother clothing but burns the skin down to the bone, and when breathed it, blisters the lungs -- a horrible way to die. Do you really believe that the U.S. should be using such chemical weaponery in Iraq or anywhere else? If so, doesn't that mean that our enemies could use it upon our troops? Here's the latest news on the topic. **************************************************************** 11-11-05, 02:32 PM bunkboy Let's look into the actual evidence presented in the article:
quote:
A March '05 publication by the US Army confirms that US soldiers used white phosphorus offensively in the Battle of Fallujah.
The source was not actually given. Does it actually exist and what was the "confirmation"?
This is referred to as "blind sourcing", saying there's a source but not naming it so that it can be confirmed. In this era of journalistic funny business, it doesn't wash.
quote:
The new discovery also backs up the allegations made in an Italian documentary screened this week concerning the use of white phosphorous in Fallujah. (See… http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL0511/S00143.htm )
An Italian documentary sighting "allegations"? Anyone can make allegations, and many are. From my perspective, 99% of them never pan out because they're source is bitterness, not evidence.
quote:
The broadcast shows video of a U.S. helicopter repeatedly raining down a bombardment of white phosphorus across Fallujah at night.
Can you see white phosphorus at night? Was it phosphorus or water putting out a fire, and how can you tell from a video shot at night?
quote:
This confirms several firsthand reports from news sources at the time of the invasion.
Another blind source. If there are confirming "first hand" sources, why not name them?
quote:
In the video, Jeff Englehart, a Marine who served in Fallujah and who maintains a weblog at http://www.ftssoldier.blogspot.com , claims that there was widespread, indicriminate use of white phosphorus in last year's attack on Fallujah.
"Widespread, indiscrimminate use..." Nothing the US military does is indiscrimminate, we inventory everything and bury ourselves in accountability reports.
The test for these claims is in the people of Fellujah themselves. I would like to see the people who were burned. With "widespread" use and helicopters spraying such a large city as Fellujah, there should be tens of thousands of people affected with visible burns.
There are slugs of journalists in Iraq as we speak turning over every stone for evidence that GW Bush is a tyrant. Why are these supposed burn victims not all over the news?
11-11-05, 02:42 PM bunkboy Apparently Jeff Englehart has his detractors. You may want to read some of them from google, such as this one:
Web logs are not necessarily credible, so you should be cautious about anything you read on either side of the issue, especially when using blind sources. You have no idea who they are or what their credibility is.
11-11-05, 05:33 PM Kelleygirl You know, bunkboy, or whomever you are, I do not trust or believe everything that I read on the net -- just like I don't trust or believe everything that my government spoon feeds me. I thought that in this case there might be fire where's smoke (or in this case phosphorus) because I heard an interview with soliders returning from Iraq who had witnessed the injuries that this chemical causes -- it melts human skin. I, for one, would be happy to learn that this wasn't used on other human beings but with the Macchiavellian adminstration that we now have in place, it is not beyond their scope. I was also opening this topic up for discussion: Do you believe that the use of such chemicals during warfare could be justified?
11-11-05, 08:32 PM honilov Kelley, I don't think that the US should be using these chemicals, especially on innocent women and children.
Bunkboy, check this out and see if it appears to be blind photos. Make sure you scroll to the bottom. Here.
11-11-05, 09:23 PM newnickname From a US government website:
'November 10, 2005 note: We have learned that some of the information we were provided in the above paragraph is incorrect. White phosphorous shells, which produce smoke, were used in Fallujah not for illumination but for screening purposes, i.e., obscuring troop movements and, according to an article, "The Fight for Fallujah," in the March-April 2005 issue of Field Artillery magazine, "as a potent psychological weapon against the insurgents in trench lines and spider holes …." The article states that U.S. forces used white phosphorous rounds to flush out enemy fighters so that they could then be killed with high explosive rounds.' usinfo.state.gov
So phosphorous was used against hidden "enemy fighters" in the city to "flush them out". It doesn't seem too unlikely that there could have been civilian casualties from this use of phosphorous, does it?
11-12-05, 12:16 AM newnickname 'One year ago this week, US-led occupying forces launched a devastating assault on the Iraqi city of Falluja. The mood was set by Lt Col Gary Brandl: "The enemy has got a face. He's called Satan. He's in Falluja. And we're going to destroy him"
The assault was preceded by eight weeks of aerial bombardment. US troops cut off the city's water, power and food supplies, condemned as a violation of the Geneva convention by a UN special rapporteur, who accused occupying forces of "using hunger and deprivation of water as a weapon of war against the civilian population". Two-thirds of the city's 300,000 residents fled...
...As the siege tightened, the Red Cross, Red Crescent and the media were kept out, while males between the ages of 15 and 55 were kept in. US sources claimed between 600 and 6,000 insurgents were holed up inside the city - which means that the vast majority of the remaining inhabitants were non-combatants...
...The US also deployed incendiary weapons, including white phosphorous. "Usually we keep the gloves on," Captain Erik Krivda said, but "for this operation, we took the gloves off". By the end of operations, the city lay in ruins. Falluja's compensation commissioner has reported that 36,000 of the city's 50,000 homes were destroyed...'A name that lives in infamy
Was Falluja as a whole being punished for the brutal mob murder of those US mercenaries? Was it supposed to be an example; a show of force? Did all that destruction actually lesson the insurgency/terror one tiny bit?
11-12-05, 03:13 AM bunkboy
quote: I was also opening this topic up for discussion: Do you believe that the use of such chemicals during warfare could be justified?
No, and the US has certainly never done so. We have gone out of our way to avoid civilian casualties.
11-12-05, 03:23 AM bunkboy
quote: Originally posted by honilov: Kelley, I don't think that the US should be using these chemicals, especially on innocent women and children.
Bunkboy, check this out and see if it appears to be blind photos. Make sure you scroll to the bottom. Here.
The question is about phosphorus, and this link is posted to get an emotional response, as if the men being mistreated were citizens pulled from offices and homes at dinner with their children.
The US service members in the photos are showing amazing restraint, to say the least.
This message has been edited. Last edited by: Karrow, 11-12-05 02:52 PM
11-12-05, 03:35 AM bunkboy For all of Newnickname's research, he either doesn't know (or failed to mention) that injury from phosphorus incendiary devices is from the heat emitted, not from the chemical, and almost all reported injuries are the result of human error, not actual use.
Something rather obvious that no one has mentioned yet:
Why would our good ole' boys release a harmful chemical into the air right over the heads of US forces on the ground? Wouldn't they burn, too?
(Still no photos of these alleged burn victims?)
11-12-05, 10:12 AM newnickname The point of my 'Googling' (not 'research') was that the US government itself says phosphorous shells were used against people (not just as illumination or a screen) in Falluja. Of course the government would maintain that civilians weren't delibarately harmed, but such harm would have been a strong possibility, wouldn't it? If you fire shells into a city, resulting deaths among civilians are hardly an 'error'.
What has the destruction (collective punishment?) of Falluja achieved?
11-12-05, 08:00 PM Kelleygirl
quote: Originally posted by bunkboy:
quote: I was also opening this topic up for discussion: Do you believe that the use of such chemicals during warfare could be justified?
No, and the US has certainly never done so. We have gone out of our way to avoid civilian casualties.
Me thinks that either you are just too young to remember or too blinded by the belief that America is always wearing the white hats. You see during another war in Vietnam we used -- and it has been documented -- something called napalm which burns just as horrible and maybe even worse than phosphorus does. Wake up!
11-12-05, 10:25 PM coldfuse Without doing the research, I'll go out on a limb and suggest that a thermonuclear weapon is a smidge hotter than phosphorus.
Does anyone know the results of an investigation prompted by Panamanian charges against the United States regarding chemical weapons found on San Jose Island?
Nobody needs to look that up unless they really want to. The point is, we can't be so naive to think that we are on perfect behavior, ourselves. I mean, there are wars to win!
11-13-05, 02:18 AM bunkboy
quote: The point of my 'Googling' (not 'research') was that the US government itself says phosphorous shells were used against people (not just as illumination or a screen) in Falluja.
Actually, the government openly admits (and frequently publishes) the fact that white phosphorus is used in munitions, hand grenades, missiles and smoke bombs.
Pseudo-scientists who are lurking for something to belly-ache about are dishonestly reporting that the stuff burns innocent civilians.
(Still no photos of burn victims. No actual proof. I wonder why?)
I guess I shouldn't hold my breath waiting for an answer to such an infantile question that I was dumb enough to ask, "Why would it be used in close proximity to our troops?"
And why should I add another: "Where are the obvious resulting burn victims among our own service members? Are we so technologically advanced that we can "spray from the sky" and yet selectively miss our own guys?"
11-13-05, 05:05 AM newnickname
quote: Why would it be used in close proximity to our troops?
It probably wasn't. There were eight weeks of shelling and bombing of Falluja before the infantry assault. The US government site quotes, 'U.S. forces used white phosphorous rounds to flush out enemy fighters so that they could then be killed with high explosive rounds'. US troops wouldn't have been in close proximity.
quote: Still no photos of burn victims. No actual proof. I wonder why?
The media was banned from Falluja, along with the Red Cross. The US in Iraq may or may not have done reasonably enough to prevent civilian casualties, but it certainly has gone out of its way to prevent reporting of civilian casualties.
11-13-05, 04:23 PM Scotty
quote: The media was banned from Falluja, along with the Red Cross. The US in Iraq may or may not have done reasonably enough to prevent civilian casualties, but it certainly has gone out of its way to prevent reporting of civilian casualties.
Is there no end to your criticism of the US military?
11-13-05, 07:02 PM frankvan
quote: Originally posted by Scotty:
quote: The media was banned from Falluja, along with the Red Cross. The US in Iraq may or may not have done reasonably enough to prevent civilian casualties, but it certainly has gone out of its way to prevent reporting of civilian casualties.
Is there no end to your criticism of the US military?
I can't speak for others but I promise to end my criticism of the U.S military when you convince me that they are indeed above reproach. Are you in favor of making criticism of the U.S military a federal offense?
11-14-05, 12:17 AM newnickname There's also this...
'A reporter from the Sydney Morning Herald who witnessed another napalm attack on 21 March on an Iraqi observation post at Safwan Hill, close to the Kuwaiti border, wrote the following day: "Safwan Hill went up in a huge fireball and the observation post was obliterated. 'I pity anyone who is in there,' a Marine sergeant said. 'We told them to surrender.'"
At the time, the Pentagon insisted the report was untrue. "We completed destruction of our last batch of napalm on 4 April, 2001," it said.
The revelation that napalm was used in the war against Iraq, while the Pentagon denied it, has outraged opponents of the war.
"Most of the world understands that napalm and incendiaries are a horrible, horrible weapon," said Robert Musil, director of the organisation Physicians for Social Responsibility. "It takes up an awful lot of medical resources. It creates horrible wounds." Mr Musil said denial of its use "fits a pattern of deception [by the US administration]".
The Pentagon said it had not tried to deceive. It drew a distinction between traditional napalm, first invented in 1942, and the weapons dropped in Iraq, which it calls Mark 77 firebombs. They weigh 510lbs, and consist of 44lbs of polystyrene-like gel and 63 gallons of jet fuel.
Officials said that if journalists had asked about the firebombs their use would have been confirmed. A spokesman admitted they were "remarkably similar" to napalm but said they caused less environmental damage.
But John Pike, director of the military studies group GlobalSecurity.Org, said: "You can call it something other than napalm but it is still napalm. It has been reformulated in the sense that they now use a different petroleum distillate, but that is it. The US is the only country that has used napalm for a long time. I am not aware of any other country that uses it." Marines returning from Iraq chose to call the firebombs "napalm".
Mr Musil said the Pentagon's effort to draw a distinction between the weapons was outrageous. He said: "It's Orwellian. They do not want the public to know. It's a lie."
In an interview with the San Diego Union-Tribune, Marine Corps Maj-Gen Jim Amos confirmed that napalm was used on several occasions in the war.' www.globalsecurity.org
11-14-05, 01:11 PM Scotty
quote: In an interview with the San Diego Union-Tribune, Marine Corps Maj-Gen Jim Amos confirmed that napalm was used on several occasions in the war.' http://www.globalsecurity.org
Wow! You mean they actually tried to kill the enemy? Imagine that.
This message has been edited. Last edited by: Scotty, 11-15-05 11:09 AM
11-15-05, 09:52 AM newnickname The conclusion of the article Fourbrick2 links to
"Saddam, facing a possible death sentence, is accused of mass murder, torture, false imprisonment and the use of chemical weapons. He is certainly guilty on all counts. So, it now seems, are those who overthrew him."
The allegation of mass murder might be difficult to prove against the coalition - but tens of thousands of civilians have been killed, and far from all of them by the daily car-bombs and factional fights. There has certainly been torture, and the Whitehouse is insisting that it must continue. False imprisonment, and not just in Guantanamo, as the BBC article points out. And use of chemical weapons, as evidenced in this thread.
Napalm (or the Mark 77 firebomb) is banned for use against civilians, and white phosphorous is banned except for providing illumination and smokescreens. Of course, coalition troops will say they used napalm against the military or insurgents, and if civilians were hit it was an accident. (There doesn't seem to be any defence against the "shake and bake" use of WP.) They would say civilian casualties are regrettable accidents, and mass arrests, sometimes unfair, are a necessity of the situation.
But couldn't Hussein use the same kind of defence? How will this affect Hussein's trial? What if he draws the same parallels that the Guardian article does? Why wouldn't he, in fact?
11-24-05, 10:09 AM newnickname 'The Italian journalist who launched the controversy over the American use of white phosphorus (WP) as a weapon of war in the Fallujah siege has accused the Americans of hypocrisy.
Sigfrido Ranucci, who made the documentary for the RAI television channel aired two weeks ago, said that a US intelligence assessment had characterised WP after the first Gulf War as a "chemical weapon".
The assessment was published in a declassified report on the American Department of Defence website. The file was headed: "Possible use of phosphorous chemical weapons by Iraq in Kurdish areas along the Iraqi-Turkish-Iranian borders."
In late February 1991, an intelligence source reported, during the Iraqi crackdown on the Kurdish uprising that followed the coalition victory against Iraq, "Iraqi forces loyal to President Saddam may have possibly used white phosphorous chemical weapons against Kurdish rebels and the populace in Erbil and Dohuk. The WP chemical was delivered by artillery rounds and helicopter gunships."
According to the intelligence report, the "reports of possible WP chemical weapon attacks spread quickly among the populace in Erbil and Dohuk. As a result, hundreds of thousands of Kurds fled from these two areas" across the border into Turkey.
"When Saddam used WP it was a chemical weapon," said Mr Ranucci, "but when the Americans use it, it's a conventional weapon. The injuries it inflicts, however, are just as terrible however you describe it."'
11-24-05, 12:11 PM DorianGreyed ENDLESS TORMENT The 1991 Uprising in Iraq And Its Aftermath Copyright June 1992 by Human Rights Watch All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America. Library of Congress Card Catalog Number: 2-72351 ISBN 1-56432-069-3
There are also many unanswered questions about the methods and arsenal used by the government troops. Refugees alleged that Iraqi helicopters dropped a variety of ordnance on civilians, including napalm and phosphorus bombs, chemical agents and sulfuric acid. Representatives of human rights and humanitarian organizations who saw refugees with burn injuries or photographs of such injuries were unable to confirm the source of the burns, although doctors who examined injured Iraqis said that some of the wounds were consistent with the use of napalm.[8] The Iraqi government, for its part, denied using napalm, phosphorus or chemical weapons.[9]
A retired civil servant from Tuz told MEW that after the ouster of security forces,
There was peace and quiet for three days, then the army came, approaching from three directions. The Iraqis attacked the city from a distance of about one kilometer. The pesh merga replied with mortars and rocket-propelled grenades....The Iraqi helicopters dropped napalm and phosphorus....For two weeks, the city was attacked with artillery, helicopter, and missiles, 105, 130 and 155 millimeters. During this time the army did not enter the city, but a lot of people were killed. Eventually, the pesh merga ran out of supplies. -------- Exclusive: Classified Pentagon Document Described White Phosphorus As ‘Chemical Weapon’ -------- from gulflink.osd.mil/declassdocs/
IR 2 243 1050 91/POSSIBLE USE OF PHOSPHOROUS CHEMICAL
Filename:22431050.91r PATHFINDER RECORD NUMBER: 16134 GENDATE: 950504 NNNN TEXT: ENVELOPE CDSN = LGX854 MCN = 91107/02896 TOR = 911070142 RTTCZYUW RUEKJCS0771 1070142-CCCC--RUEALGX. ZNY CCCCC HEADER R 170142Z APR 91 FM JOINT STAFF WASHINGTON DC INFO RUENAAA/CNO WASHINGTON DC RUEAHQA/CSAF WASHINGTON DC RUEACMC/CMC WASHINGTON DC RUEKCCG/USDP-CCC WASHINGTON DC RUEAIIA/CIA WASHINGTON DC RUEALGX/SAFE R 160504Z APR 91 FM CDR500THMIBDE CP ZAMA JA//IAGPD-OP-CM// TO AIG 9149 RUCJACC/USCINCCENT MACDILL AFB FL//J2// RUSNNOA/USCINCEUR VAIHINGEN GE RUEDBIA/CDR513THMIBDE FT MONMOUTH NJ RUAGAAA/CDR501STMIBDE SEOUL KOR//IABDK-PH// RUAGAAA/CDR524THMIBN SEOUL KOR//IABDK-CX-PC// RUAJMAB/FOSIF WESTPAC KAMI SEYA JA//CSG// RUEOADA/9TIS SHAW AFB SC//INO// RUEHAK/USDAO ANKARA TU BT CONTROLS SECTION 001 OF 002
SERIAL: (U) IIR 2 243 1050 91
/*********** THIS IS A COMBINED MESSAGE ************/ BODY PASS: (U) DIA FOR ITF/JIC/OICC/; DA FOR DAMI-FII-E
COUNTRY: (U) IRAQ (IZ); TURKEY (TU); IRAN (IR).
SUBJ: IIR 2 243 1050 91/POSSIBLE USE OF PHOSPHOROUS CHEMICAL WEAPONS BY IRAQ IN KURDISH AREAS ALONG THE IRAQI-TURKISH-IRANIAN BORDERS; AND CURRENT SITUATION OF KURDISH RESISTANCE AND REFUGEES (U)
WARNING: (U) THIS IS AN INFORMATION REPORT, NOT FINALLY EVALUATED INTELLIGENCE. REPORT CLASSIFIED
--------------------------------------------------------------------- DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE ---------------------------------------------------------------------
DOI: (U) 910300.
REQS: (U) T-8C2-2650-01-90.
SOURCE: [ (b)(1) sec 1.3(a)(4) ][ (b)(7)(D) ]
SUMMARY: IRAQ HAS POSSIBLY EMPLOYED PHOSPHOROUS CHEMICAL WEAPONS AGAINST THE KURDISH POPULATION IN AREAS ALONG THE IRAQI-TURKISH-IRANIAN BORDERS. KURDISH RESISTANCE IS LOSING ITS STRUGGLE AGAINST SADDAM HUSSEIN'S FORCES. KURDISH REBELS AND REFUGEES' PERSONAL OBSERVATIONS AND PERCEPTIONS ARE PROVIDED. ---- IRAQ'S POSSIBLE EMPLOYMENT OF PHOSPHOROUS CHEMICAL WEAPONS -- IN LATE FEBRUARY 1991, FOLLOWING THE COALITION FORCES'OVERWHELMING VICTORY OVER IRAQ, KURDISH REBELS STEPPED UP THEIR STRUGGLE AGAINST IRAQI FORCES IN NORTHERN IRAQ. DURING THE BRUTAL CRACKDOWN THAT FOLLOWED THE KURDISH UPRISING, IRAQI FORCES LOYAL TO PRESIDENT SADDAM ((HUSSEIN)) MAY HAVE POSSIBLY USED WHITE PHOSPHOROUS (WP) CHEMICAL WEAPONS AGAINST KURDISH REBELS AND THE POPULACE IN ERBIL ---- THE WP CHEMICAL WAS DELIVERED BY ARTILLERY ROUNDS AND HELICOPTER GUNSHIPS (NO FURTHER INFORMATION AT THIS TIME). APPARENTLY, THIS TIME IRAQ DID NOT USE NERVE GAS AS THEY DID IN 1988, IN HALABJA ---- (SOURCE COMMENT) - IRAQ USED WP IN ERBIL AND DOHUK BECAUSE THEY WANTED THE KURDS TO PANIC AND FLEE FROM THE AREA. ----
The US army knows that its use as a weapon is illegal. In the Battle Book, published by the US Command and General Staff College at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, my correspondent David Traynier found the following sentence: "It is against the law of land warfare to employ WP against personnel targets." Last night the blogger Gabriele Zamparini found a declassified document from the US department of defence, dated April 1991, and titled "Possible use of phosphorus chemical". "During the brutal crackdown that followed the Kurdish uprising," it alleges, "Iraqi forces loyal to President Saddam may have possibly used white phosphorus (WP) chemical weapons against Kurdish rebels and the populace in Erbil ... and Dohuk provinces, Iraq. The WP chemical was delivered by artillery rounds and helicopter gunships ... These reports of possible WP chemical weapon attacks spread quickly ... hundreds of thousands of Kurds fled from these two areas." The Pentagon is in no doubt, in other words, that white phosphorus is an illegal chemical weapon. - InformationCLearingHouse.info -------- If it is true that WP "is not listed in the schedules of the Chemical Weapons Convention", as several sites defending the US use of WP state, it still fits the description of a chemical weapon, and it is very obvious that the US regarded it a such when Saddam used it. Once again, this administration is on the wrong side of ethics and morals. When we act as we say Evil has acted, what does that make us? Bush has done more damage to the US reputation in the eyes of the world than any former president. Possibly that fact, more than any other, will be his legacy.
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