Roger said:

The link below will take you to the very comprehensive report of the UN Environment Programme detailed on-site research and subsequent laboratory analysis of 32 sites where Hezbollah supporters (including Chris Busby, Doug Rokke and Leuren Moret) claimed that DU-tipped bunker busting bombs had been used during the 2006 war – The UNEP team went looking for DU and found none – that’s about how sound the claims that started with Norwegian physician Mads Gilbert in his Palestinian cause spokesperson role are about DU being used in Gaza – then the French group followed with “proof” that tons of DU were used – I haven’t seen any real proof, just a lot of smoke and mirrors and hype -

The fact that they didn’t use DU is immaterial to me. I doubt that they would have, just because it’s not generally used when you’re not taking on armor. However, I could see circumstances where depleted uranium rounds might be used in general combat if they were what a given military unit had on hand or if they were avaliable at the time. For example, if an A-10 pilot spots a target of opportunity that is not heavily armored, but the aircraft is loaded with the DU armor penetrating rounds, or if munitions with depleted uranium are loaded because of the off chance of encountering armored opposition. I could see how a naval unit might use them, given that the weaponry they have is limited to what is on board in the stores of the ship.

The only real issue with that is that it is wasteful because depleted uranium rounds tend to be more expensive due to the issues with alloying and machining the stuff. So it would be better to conserve it for targets that actually need it.

In any case, I just don’t see how it matters. Using a weapon made of tungsten versus depleted uranium really doesn’t change anything.

Recently, charges by Norwegian physician Mads Gilbert, a long time active
Palestinian propagandist, that Israel used DU in Gaza have resurfaced with the
claim of
a 33 page report by the French anti-nuclear group ACDN, including the completely
unsupportable claim that Israel had used no less than 75 tons of DU in Gaza.
http://acdn.france.free.fr/spip/breve.php3?id_breve=887&lang=en

The UN Environment Programme Postconflict Branch investigated similar claims of
Israeli DU use in Lebanon in 2006. Their report is at
http://postconflict.unep.ch/publications/UNEP_Lebanon.pdf

Pages 6,7 in Foreword discuss that 32 sites were examined and that no DU was
found

Pages 10, 36-38 (Sampling & Measurement equipment and techniques) and 145-153
(Weapons team findings) and 164 are germane to whether or not DU or any other
“uranium weapon” as Chris Busby and his adherents like to call them, had been
used. Bunker busters are specifically discussed and the negative results of
smears of the walls of destroyed underground facilities are specifically mentioned. No
Uranium was found.

All DUStory messages are public and I periodically post links in them to scientific reports – the last time I did a list was over a year ago, but there are more links in the Links section that anyone can access by using the guest user name and password and signing in – they are in Message 87, which also refers you to the Files Section where original documents from Rokke, Moret, Durakovic’s records also may be found – I have also started posting some of these to the Internet Archive at http://www.archive.org since those are much easier to access.

        George Carty said:

Indeed. I disagree with our host on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, but when I read rumours of Israel using depleted uranium in Gaza, my immediate thought was “Why? Has Hamas managed to get hold of some tanks from somewhere?”

I will say what I have on this subject in the past: Depleted uranium really does not matter as the material because the hazards are no greater (and possibly less than) other munitions made of lead or tungsten or anything else.

Therefore, whether or not the conflict or action was justified is independent of the use of depleted uranium.

If a peaceful nation fires depleted uranium munitions in order to repel an act of aggression against their security and safety, then they are justified in doing so. They would be no more or less justified if they fired tungsten or lead or anything else. If munitions are fired in an otherwise unjustified act of aggression, then it is just as wrong whether they are depleted uranium or not.

There is nothing about depleted uranium that makes it especially harmful to civilians or presents any significant enviornmental risk. It is simply a good material to make anti-armor rounds out of.

You can oppose a conflict in which depleted uranium is used without believing that depleted uranium is harmful as a material or even relevant to the issue.

        Q said:

If you knew the first thing about Depleted Uranium you’d know that it is not used very much in general purpose weapons and is chiefly used in armor piercing kinetic energy rounds.

Most munitions don’t have it.

It is used in armor piercing rounds because it works fantastically in that role.

Indeed. I disagree with our host on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, but when I read rumours of Israel using depleted uranium in Gaza, my immediate thought was “Why? Has Hamas managed to get hold of some tanks from somewhere?”

        Jason said:

There are quite a few youtube videos promoting myths about DU using these images. There is also this one:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P-8PlJVhogs

with “Dr. Rokke” who claims to be an expert in this. I found some stuff out there that this guy might not have even been in the service as he claims or hold a doctorate. He’s a fraud I’d definitely like to see exposed.

Jason,

Rokke is a fraud, but not quite in the way that you mention. He has a PhD, but it is in Vocational Education and he did serve in the Gulf War in a unit responsible for food and water sanitation, not one on the front lines – his base was Riyadh and he was a First Lieutenant Army Reservist who was activated as a “filler” for the 12th Medical Detachment (Preventive Medicine) of Beloit, Wisconsin. After the war, since Rokke had a BS in Phsyics, he was attached to the group that was assessing the level of radioactive contamination of the Bradley Fighting Vehicles and a couple of M1A1 Abrams Tanks that were hit by DU projectile friendly fire. He also got to render first aid, cleaning wounds of contamination and applying BandAids and SteriStrips to cuts acquired by soldiers fighting a fire in a tank that was being towed home from Iraq. That “front line” service was three months after the war ended. When you hear Rokke in person or on video, though, he claims to have been there with the “warriors”. He wasn’t. I am writing an unoffical biography of Rokke and his pals like Asaf Durakovic and Leuren Moret by obtaining their public records. Write me for more information DUStory-owner@yahoogroups.com .

        do’minique said:

Who ever does not believe that depleted uranium is not the cause of these birth defects of these poor innocent children is a BIG FAT HEAD IDIOT!!!!!! You big dumb penis head tricks. HERES PLAIN PROOF!!Take your dirty self to iraq come back and start a family. If one of your kids comes out looking like that you will know why. Thats the only way to make you insubordinate unprestigous rats learn!!

No. Depleted uranium does not cause any birth defects and even if it did, these pictures have been clearly found to be fraudulent. One is from a Thalidomide baby, which happened a lot in the late 1950’s and just looking at it you can see it’s got the yellowish color you’d see in a vintage 40 year old image. Another is from a museum.

Anyway, your vulgar language makes you look all the worse when you consider the subject is a falsable scientific one that you clearly do not understand.

There is a wealth of information on this website if you actually want to find out the truth about things.

Oh by the way: I have three friends who served in Iraq and while none have yet had children they are perfectly healthy.

If you knew the first thing about Depleted Uranium you’d know that it is not used very much in general purpose weapons and is chiefly used in armor piercing kinetic energy rounds. Most munitions don’t have it. It is used in armor piercing rounds because it works fantastically in that role.

You know where you can find lots of depleted uranium? Go to a flea market or a tag sale and look for vintage 1950’s-early 1980’s dinnerware in the color bright orange. It’s coated in depleted uranium oxide glaze. Yes, people ate off of it and still do!

        do’minique said:

Who ever does not believe that depleted uranium is not the cause of these birth defects of these poor innocent children is a BIG FAT HEAD IDIOT!!!!!! You big dumb penis head tricks. HERES PLAIN PROOF!!Take your dirty self to iraq come back and start a family. If one of your kids comes out looking like that you will know why. Thats the only way to make you insubordinate unprestigous rats learn!!

Yes, l the power of your logic is overwhelming.

By the way, beyond your obviously brilliant grasp of English prose, do you have any proof from valid sources to back up your claim, or are you just basing your conclusions on these photographs, most of which it would seem do not come from Iraq, or show patients exposed to DU, but come from pathology textbooks and other similar sources far predating the conflict in question.