Our national arrogance and hypocrisy has reached ridiculous levels. Our government condemned Saddam for torturing his opponents in his prisons and then turned around and started torturing 'our' opponents in those same prisons. They sought to condemn Saddam for using chemical weapons, even going so far as to officially label the use of WP on civilians and Kurdish insurgents as "chemical weapon attacks", and then turned around and showered napalm and white phosphorus on Iraqi civilians with artillery shells.

Report drops Fallujah bombshell

New Zealand Herald
24.11.05
By Peter Popham and Anne Penketh
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/st...ectID=10356665

ROME: The controversy over the American use of white phosphorus as a weapon of war in Fallujah deepened yesterday when it was revealed that a US intelligence assessment had characterised WP as a "chemical weapon".

The Italian journalist who sparked the controversy, Sigfrido Ranucci, told a press conference in Rome that while a colleague was browsing American Defence Department websites he had stumbled on a declassified intelligence report from the first Gulf War.

The file was headed "Possible use of phosphorous chemical weapons by Iraq in Kurdish areas along the Iraqi-Turkish-Iranian borders".

The report was made in late February 1991 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 (WP) chemical weapons against Kurdish rebels and the populace in Erbil and Dohuk. "The WP chemical was delivered by artillery rounds and helicopter gunships."

The intelligence report added that"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".

Ranucci commented that "when Saddam used WP it was a chemical weapon but when the Americans use it, it's a conventional weapon. The injuries it inflicts, however, are just as terrible, however you describe it".

In the original RAI documentary, witnesses inside Fallujah during the November 2004 bombardment described the terror and excruciating agony suffered by victims of the shells fired by American artillery.

Two former US soldiers who fought at Fallujah told how they had been ordered to prepare to use the weapons.

The film and still photos posted on the website of the channel that made the film - rainews24.it - show the strange corpses discovered after the city's destruction.

Many of the skin on the bodies had apparently melted or caramelised so their features were indistinguishable.

Ranucci said he had seen "more than 100" of what he described as "anomalous corpses" in the city.

The US State Department and the Pentagon have shifted their position repeatedly in the aftermath of the film's showing.

After initially denying that US forces use WP as a weapon, the Pentagon said WP had been used against insurgents in Fallujah.

Military analysts said there remained questions about the official US position on its observance of the 1980 conventional weapons treaty which governs the use of WP as an incendiary weapon and sets prohibitions, such as its use on civilians.

Daryl Kimball, the director of the Arms Control Association in Washington, yesterday called for an independent investigation to scrutinise the US use of WP in Fallujah.

"If it was used as an incendiary weapon, clear restrictions apply," he said. "Given that the US and UK went into Iraq on the ground that Saddam Hussein had used chemical weapons against his own people, we need to make sure that we are not violating the laws that we have subscribed to." Although WP is classified as a conventional not a chemical weapon, its effects are chemical as well as merely thermal. The choking white smoke it produces is highly toxic, and causes severe burns internally and externally to anyone caught in its path.

Yesterday a further wrinkle was added to the row when Adam Mynott, a BBC correspondent posted to Nassiriya during the invasion of Iraq in April 2003, told Rai News 24 that he had seen WP apparently used as a weapon against insurgents in that city.

Copyright © 2005, APN Holdings NZ Ltd

(In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.)

__________________
"Everybody's worried about stopping terrorism. Well, there's a really easy way: stop participating in it. " --Noam Chomsky

The question is, will anyone take responsibility for any of this or is it again just all fair in war when you are on the winning side???

White Phosphorous is not a Chemical Weapon its an incindiary.

Oh and BTW the US doesn't use Napalm anymore....it also was never afaik delivered via artillery.

Next Gunpowder wil be a chemical weapon according to these idiots.



I really figured that FAE's would have been the "evil" weapon of the anti-war crowd in this war(they always pick some weapon to decry as evil-Depleted Uranium Shells anyone ). That its WP is funny but not surprising since the anti-war "movement" has been so incompetant and reliant on some of the most moronic conspiracy theories ever thoght up by mankind.

In this case they also imply and often simply state that our soldiers intentionally target civilians. Not a civilian is accidently harmed by being in a battlefield..no no.... they INTENTIONALLLY target them.


One thing WP has is alot of use so alot of pictures..tada.

You really are quite slow, aren't you? The point of the article is that when Saddam used WP on the Kurds, the US intel estimate labeled that as chemical weapon use, but when US troops use it as a terror weapon by pumping artillery shells loaded with it into civilian neighborhoods in Fallujeh, then it isn't labeled a chemical weapon. Even though it is admitted that the "choking white smoke it produces is highly toxic, and causes severe burns internally and externally to anyone caught in its path". That's very Orwellian, though I doubt that you know what I mean by that.

US admits it used napalm bombs in Iraq

The Independent
August 10, 2003
By Andrew Buncombe
http://www.globalsecurity.org/org/ne...alm-iraq01.htm

American pilots dropped the controversial incendiary agent napalm on Iraqi troops during the advance on Baghdad. The attacks caused massive fireballs that obliterated several Iraqi positions.

The Pentagon denied using napalm at the time, but Marine pilots and their commanders have confirmed that they used an upgraded version of the weapon against dug-in positions. They said napalm, which has a distinctive smell, was used because of its psychological effect on an enemy.

A 1980 UN convention banned the use against civilian targets of napalm, a terrifying mixture of jet fuel and polystyrene that sticks to skin as it burns. The US, which did not sign the treaty, is one of the few countries that makes use of the weapon. It was employed notoriously against both civilian and military targets in the Vietnam war.

The upgraded weapon, which uses kerosene rather than petrol, was used in March and April, when dozens of napalm bombs were dropped near bridges over the Saddam Canal and the Tigris river, south of Baghdad.

"We napalmed both those [bridge] approaches," said Colonel James Alles, commander of Marine Air Group 11. "Unfortunately there were people there ... you could see them in the [cockpit] video. They were Iraqi soldiers. It's no great way to die. The generals love napalm. It has a big psychological effect."

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.

© Copyright 2003, Independent Digital (UK) Ltd

(In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.)

__________________
"Everybody's worried about stopping terrorism. Well, there's a really easy way: stop participating in it. " --Noam Chomsky

First if the document exists is in question. IF it does then they are referring to it being used on CIVILIANS intentionally.

Do you get the distinction?
Do you get the differnce between using it on enemy forces where civilians may be as opposed to intentionally using it on civilians?

You probably do but then that doesn't fit your rhetoric so...

Then of course you go on to say...

Implying it was specifically used to kill civilians. That it was used in a haphazard area effect manner(terror). That its use was directly targetted at killing civilians.

I wonder what others here besidesme who have served in the military think of that..my bet is they think you full of crap and have no idea wth your talking about.

But we can take that you believe US soldiers are basically murderers the equivelant of Nazis who go into towns and randomly murder civilians for the hell of it. Probably take soemthing that you wilnever do to beat that stupidity out of your head..like joining the military.





As for NAPALM- it says in your article what?


Your opinion goes with the anti-war types who in that article don't make a distinction because they don't want to...not because there is not one. Napalm is a catchy phrase that they can get images of Vietnam in peoples heads with.

Not to mention you said its delivered by artillery which I for one have never ever heard Napalm being delivered via...besides aircraft delivery it has been used though in flamethrowers.

But as I said and is confirmed by your article(your good at that) Napalm is no longer used by the US and the Mark 77 "Firebomb" while referred to as Napalm by some is NOT in fact Napalm.


But then that is my opinon as you will note those who don't agree with me in that article are stating their OPINIONS. Of course to you opinions that agree with your opinions are basic facts nobody can deny but those who canot comprehend or lying Neocons brainwashed by Fauxnews!..zz

The Marines call it Napalm becasue it looks like Napalms and I woudln't be shocked if they called it other things you won't see in print for fear of offending someone..like maybe "raghead burner"..or something...

DuH, does your name mean 'Denial until Hell-freezes-over'? I wonder if those who get burned with the new, improved (not-napalm) appreciate the profound difference that mixing polystyrene with kerosene instead of aviation gas makes in their suffering and deadly burns?

__________________
"Everybody's worried about stopping terrorism. Well, there's a really easy way: stop participating in it. " --Noam Chomsky

I doubt they care.

I doubt you care but that's on your soul.
I don't think that this little guy thought there was some great difference between what burned him and what the US military burned civilians with in Vietnam 35 or 40 years ago.
http://www.iraqvictims.com/photos.asp?page=26
Click on this picture.....for starters.
O O O O
X O O O
O O O O

__________________
"Everybody's worried about stopping terrorism. Well, there's a really easy way: stop participating in it. " --Noam Chomsky

hate to break it to you but it was not wp that saddam used on the kurds but it was various nerve gases
http://www.nti.org/e_research/profil...3883_3895.html
why is it that everyone love to make things up to blame the us for things?
this is one of those stoires. carfeully edited picture from vietnam while saying that it is happening in iraq. then pictures of dead bodies from who knows where or when and saying this is the fault of the us. they died from what? no one knows but the reporters says it is from wp, then with no proof they say that the miltary targeted civilians with the weapons.
just like people belived that italian repoter that claimed she had to scoop the bullets out her car by the handfull, (of course when people relized that a .50 would go right though a car, and if that many bullets where fired everyone would have been killed she changed her story.)
and people belive them. i guess when it concerns the us miltary the standards of proof is well heard a person that heard a person that knew someone that this is what happend.

Why bother to post on a thread if you are too lazy or dumb to read the first post in the thread? Maybe Saddam used both. You're missing the point.

__________________
"Everybody's worried about stopping terrorism. Well, there's a really easy way: stop participating in it. " --Noam Chomsky