Taking the Human Out of Humanitarian

In the shadows of the great concern for leaking radiation in Japan, little attention has been placed on the radiation contamination issues in Libya. It's not that Libya is experiencing radiation leaks from a nuclear reactor -- they don't have any! No, the contamination has been brought to the Libyan people by their so-called liberators: the United States of America.

Our wonderful humanitarian gift comes in the form of depleted uranium munitions (DUA).

DUA is the weapon of choice when it comes to killing armored vehicles, and A-10s are specialists at using it. The U.S. used 320 tons of it in the first Gulf War, 10 tons in Kosovo, and over 1,000 tons in the invasion of Iraq. It is lethal to tanks, but it also damages anything that comes into contact with it. Common photos back in 1991 were of U.S. soldiers climbing on top of knocked-out Iraqi tanks to have their pictures taken or to look for souvenirs. When they did, they inhaled uranium oxide or impregnated their uniforms with it. The soldiers didn’t know better because the U.S. Defense Department (DOA) told them DUA was harmless, even though the DOA knew better...

While anyone with any sense knows that war is hell, the use of DUA makes that hell a heck of a lot worse! It begs a serious question: How can one truly conduct a so-called humanitarian military mission if the some of the weapons being deployed spread death and sickness for decades to come? What is humanitarian about that?!