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Exclusive: US to send depleted-uranium munitions to Ukraine (www.reuters.com)

submitted 1 year ago by jimmydoreisalefty@lemmus.org to c/news@beehaw.org

18 comments fedilink hide all child comments

cross-posted from: https://lemmus.org/post/587773

Edit: antiwar article, quotes for both articles

The rounds, which could help destroy Russian tanks, are part of a new military aid package for Ukraine set to be unveiled in the next week. The munitions can be fired from U.S. Abrams tanks that, according to a person familiar with the matter, are expected be delivered to Ukraine in the coming weeks.

Although Britain sent depleted uranium munitions to Ukraine earlier this year, this would be the first U.S. shipment of the ammunition and will likely stir controversy. It follows an earlier decision by the Biden administration to provide cluster munitions to Ukraine, despite concerns over the dangers such weapons pose to civilians.

The United States used depleted uranium munitions in massive quantities in the 1990 and 2003 Gulf Wars and the NATO bombing of former Yugoslavia in 1999.

Still, the radioactive material could add to Ukraine's massive post-war clean-up challenge. Parts of the country are already strewn with unexploded ordnance from cluster bombs and other munitions and hundreds of thousands of anti-personnel mines.

https://news.antiwar.com/2023/09/03/us-to-arm-ukraine-with-toxic-depleted-uranium-ammunition/

But at this point in the war, the administration has shown it’s not concerned about damaging Ukraine’s environment. In July, the US started arming Ukraine with cluster bombs, which spread small submunitions over large areas. Unexploded submunitions, or bomblets, can be found by civilians years or decades after use. Because of their history of killing civilians, cluster munitions have been banned by over 100 countries.

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[–] anachronist@midwest.social 6 points 1 year ago (1 children)

War is toxic. The American soldiers who got sick from the burn pits weren't burning DU.

DU is toxic in the same way mercury or cadmium is toxic: as a heavy metal. Its reactivity is very low. It's entirely believable that Iraqis are suffering birth defects and other sicknesses from the toxic after-effects of the war, and also that DU plays a small part in it. The article doesn't present any evidence that DU specifically and not the other thousands of toxins released during the war is responsible.

[–] liv@beehaw.org 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Well no, the article is about weird happenings in the research into this. You have to read actual research to see the evidence.

I apologize for not providing it here. I'm uncomfortably aware that I sound like one of those annoying trollish people who say Do yOuR oWn ResEarch instead of presenting evidence.

I read a bunch of research papers on depleted uranium years ago and found it very convincing, and that's what my opinion is based on, but unfortunately I'm finding google and duckduckgo kind of useless these days (any recs welcome), it's late at night and I'm tired. @Holden_Fartzen@beehaw.org if you have anything handy?

[–] anachronist@midwest.social 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Are you saying there's evidence that DU is toxic, or that it is the primary cause of incidents of congenital heart failure in Fallujah?

In the first case I completely agree DU is absolutely toxic. If a tank were lit up by a DU penetrator I absolutely would not want to breathe the smoke. But I would not want to breathe the smoke from a burning tank and I don't really care how it was knocked out. The smoke is going to be a toxic mess regardless. By the way the alternative is Tungsten which is 1) also somewhat toxic and 2) often alloyed with Thorium which is also radioactive.

With regards to Fallujah, one problem I have with this theory is that DU is used in Armor Piercing rounds (specifically armour-piercing fin-stabilized discarding sabots or APFSDS). The most important thing to understand about Fallujah is that the insurgents did not have armored vehicles in that battle and it would have made no sense to use APFSDS against soft targets. For instance it'd go right through a pickup truck and leave a tiny hole. The discarded fins would do more damage than the penetrator. Note I'm not arguing that Fallujah wasn't left a toxic mess by the Americans. There's millions of rounds of lead m4 ammo for instance. To say nothing about the residue of nalpam and white phosphorus.

By the way one of the main ingredients of nalpalm is Benzene or, as my chemist friend said "Benzene is what anti-nuclear people think nuclear waste is"

https://www.acs.org/molecule-of-the-week/archive/d/dewar-benzene.html

[–] liv@beehaw.org 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

You seem to know a lot more about ordinance than I do but from what you're saying, it sounds like tungsten that is not alloyed with thorium would be the way to go!!

I wish there were more international cooperation on this stuff.

My parents' generation all seem to hate benzene and warn us it's toxic as hell. That's the only time it seems to come up, might be to do with napalm now that you mention it. Much shorter life and half life I guess.

For what it's worth I also think deliberate napalm and white phosphorous use on humans are war crimes as well.

A couple of years ago Indonesia used white phosphorous on some West Papua villages and the results were horrific.

Edit, just realised I forgot to answer your first question. I do not recollect the details about the relative proportions of other causes of birth defects etc in that environment but I would argue that a) DU alone definitely earned its place as an unethical weapon and b) any known risk factor with that high a contribution should be phased out too.

It's a type of "future eating".