"Depleted Uranium and the Gulf War syndrome"
BY Siegwart-Horst Gunther
----

The conditions in Baghdad hospitals where leukemia and cancer
patients are housed are particularly depressing.  The rooms are
overcrowded. Most of the cases come from the South. Their increasing
number is attributed to the radioactivity and toxicity of depleted
uranium (DU) ammunition used by the Allied forces during the war and
abandoned afterwards. Since 1991, I have been constantly warned about
the DU danger to the population. Many of the DU-projectiles spread
over the battlefields have been collected by children and used by
toys with possibly devastating consequences. Inhaled uranium dust is
highly toxic and can result in lung cancer.

According to recent estimates by UNICEF, 80,000 to 100,000 Iraqi
children died in 1993.  Thomas Eckwall, UNICEF director in Baghdad,
specified that an urgent emergency program would require $83.2
million, but barely an eighth of that sum is in hand.

 -- PROPERTIES OF DEPLETED URANIUM  --

In natural uranium, the proportion of the Isotope 235 is only about
0.7 percent.  The greater part is uranium 238.  As only uranium 235
is suitable as fissile material for use in nuclear power plants, the
uranium ore has to be enriched by artificially increasing the
proportion of this isotope. As a result, there are large quantities
of waste produced in this procedure, i.e., the so-called DU
consisting almost solely of the isotope 238.

In Europe, these waste products from the uranium industry are stored
in specially shielded deposits at considerable cost because of their
high toxicity and radioactivity. In order to reduce these high costs,
depleted uranium of the isotope 238 is passed on to interested
parties, sometimes even free of charge.

Depleted uranium has properties, which make it highly attractive to
the armaments industry:

1. It is practically the heaviest naturally occurring substance.

2. DU projectiles, the development of which is presumably based on
German technology, have a great penetrating power and are better
suited for penetrating steel armor plating than any other weapon.

3. It is also an inflammable material.  It ignites immediately upon
piercing armor plates, releasing highly toxic and radioactive
substances upon combustion.

4. After the Gulf War, since 1992, U.S. tanks are being strengthened
by a layer of DU.

Different types of depleted uranium ammunition have been manufactured
in the US by Aerojet and Honeywell.  Aerojet began mass production in
1977.  At present such ammunition is also being mass-produced in
Britain and France. It is likely that it is being exported to other
NATO countries as well as to Australia, Japan, and New Zealand.

 -- Medical effects --

At the beginning of March 1991, I detected projectiles in an Iraqi
combat area, which had the form and size of a cigar and were
extraordinarily heavy. At a later point, I saw children playing with
projectiles of this kind; one of them died of leukemia.

My efforts to have one of these projectiles examined brought me into
serious trouble in Germany: the material was highly toxic and
radioactive. The projectile was confiscated by a large police
detachment, carried away under enormous safety precautions, and
stored in a special shielded container.

As early as the end of the 1991, I diagnosed a hitherto unknown
disease among the Iraqi population, which is caused by renal and
hepatic dysfunctions.

During the last five years, I have been able to carry out extensive
studies in Iraq. The results produced ample evidence showing that
contact with DU ammunition has the following consequences, especially
for children:

-- A considerable increase in infectious diseases caused by the most
severe immune-deficiencies in a great part of the population.

-- Frequent occurrence of massive herpes and zoster afflictions, also
in children.

-- AIDS-like syndromes.

-- A hitherto unknown syndrome caused by renal and hepatic
dysfunction-now called "Morubs Gunther."

-- Leukemia, a plastic anemia and malignant neoplasm.

-- Congenital deformities caused by genetic defects which were partly
also diagnosed in animals.

 -- DU AND TNE GULF WAR SYNDROME --

The results of my studies show similarities to the Gulf War Syndrome
found in allied soldiers and their children.  The congenital
deformities caused by genetic defects in American and Iraqi children
are identical.

According to U.S. statements, vaccinations against anthrax and
botulism, malaria prophylaxis, benzenes used for delousing,
pyridostigminbromides DEET or permethrin, as well as the DU
ammunition are responsible for the development of this syndrome.  The
Allied troops were not informed about the health dangers caused by
the DU projectiles until nine days after the end of the war.  Like
all heavy metals, such as lead, or cadmium, uranium is highly toxic.
The human body must not come into contact with them.

Newspapers recorded that many Gulf War soldiers from the U.S. feared
they may have been used as guinea pigs in a radiation experiment.
This syndrome among U.S. Gulf War soldiers and their families was
debated in the U.S. Congress.

In the opinion of the American nuclear scientist Leonard Dietz,
the development of the uranium projectiles is as revolutionary as
the machine-gun was during the First World War, However, he observed
that the Gulf War was the most toxic war in the history of mankind.

According to statements by the U.S. Army about 14,000 high-caliber
shells were fired during the Gulf War, Estimates by the British
Atomic Energy Authority say about 40 tons of this type of ammunition
are scattered in the border regions between Iraq, Kuwait, and Saudi
Arabia.  Other experts assume that there is probably 300 tons of it.
Not more than 10 percent of these projectiles have been detected.
The major parts of them have been covered with blowing sand or are
lying deep in the ground.  When it rains, the toxic substances
permeate into the ground water and enter the food chain-a long-term
source of danger in areas of Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Iraq.

A British company had rejected the order to remove this uranium
ammunition because the health risks to their staff would be too
great.

Bedouins from Kuwait battlefields, which U.S. soldiers used as
training grounds, reported that hundreds of dead camels, sheep, and
birds lie in the desert.  Examinations made by an American
veterinarian, a specialist in infectious diseases, showed that the
animals had died neither from bullets nor from disease, Some
carcasses were covered with insects, but the insects were also dead.

Saudi Arabia had demanded that all tanks, -vehicles and instruments
of war, which had been destroyed by uranium ammunition on their
territory, are collected by the U.S. Army.  This material was carried
away and transported to the U.S. Before, that, it had been buried in
the desert.

 -- POSTWAR DEATH TOLL --

The president of the American Gulf War Veterans Association is
especially, preoccupied by the Gulf War Syndrome.  This syndrome
includes damages to organs, genetic manifestations, chronic fatigue,
loss of endurance, frequent infections, sore throat, coughing, skin
rashes, night sweats, nausea and vomiting, diarrhea, dizziness,
headaches, memory loss, confusion, vision problems, muscle spasms and
cramps, joint pains and loss of mobility, aching muscles, swollen
glands, dental problems, and malformation of newborns. According to
his estimates, 50,000 to 80,000 U.S. Gulf War veterans are affected;
39,000 have been dismissed from active service already; and 2,400 to
5,000 have died so far.  Today in Great Britain around 4,000
soldiers suffer from the Gulf Syndrome.  About 160 already have died,
as have a number of Australians, Canadians, and French.

Similar symptoms have occurred, in Kuwait and are proliferating.  It
is believed that in Iraq, 250,000 men, women, and children may have
been affected. The death rate is high A study carried out in 1993 by
three American scientists estimated that about 50,000 Iraqi children
had already died during the first eight months after the Gulf War
from the detrimental effects of DU projectiles.

 -- DU DANGERS ARE SPREADING --

In May 1994, reports published in the U.S. found that among 251
families of veterans of the Gulf War living in the state of
Mississippi, 67 percent of the children were born with congenital
deformities-their eyes, ears, or fingers are missing or they are
suffering from severe blood disease and respiratory problems.

A parallel can be drawn with the situation that has developed after
the 1986 accident at the Chernobyl nuclear reactor.  Since then,
there has been a sharp increase in cancer, especially among children.
Their mortality rate is very high, as are malformations at birth.

It is important to point out what happened in Germany in 1988, after
a U.S. Army plane crashed in Remscheid, and in Holland, in 1992,
after an Israeli El Al transport plane crashed in Amsterdam.  It is
suspected that both planes were carrying radioactive material.  In
both these regions there has been an increase in skin diseases,
kidney dysfunctions, leukemia among children and birth defects.

In Bosnia, it was reported in November 1996 that about 1,000 children
were suffering from an unknown disease: earaches, aching muscles,
abdominal pain, dizziness, respiratory problems, and other
afflictions.

Similar symptoms were described by victims of the Gulf War
Syndrome. Meanwhile, six hundred of these children still receive
hospital treatment. In December 1997 and January 1998, the media in
the Balkans reported a dramatic increase in leukemia and cancer
within the population of Republika Srpska as well as an increased
number of malformations in babies. The cows in these regions also
show reduced and bloody milk production, while in other animals, milk
production stopped. Unusual vegetation is growing, and many fruits
have strange formations. After investigations by experts from the
Nuclear Research Institute in Vinca, Yugoslavia, it was found
that radiation increased dangerously after the NATO bombardment, in
which DU ammunition was used.

The grave dangers are increasing because DU weapons are at the
disposal of several states. These weapons have already caused
irreparable damage.  It is for the citizens of the world to see that
such dangerous weapons system are not used again and are immediately
banned.