If Ukraine Uses Depleted Uranium, Then It's Already A Nuclear War

Source: Medical Association for Prevention of War presentation on Depleted Uranium, 2006

My late friend Cecile Pineda wrote a powerful book arguing that nuclear war was already with us. 

As I wrote in my eulogy for Cecile, Devil's Tango: How I Learned the Fukushima Step by Step (Wings Press, 2013) argued a thesis that acted as a tsunami demolishing my lifelong dread of nuclear war. It's not that I don't still dread it (and notice it creeping closer with each passing day), it's that I followed Cecile's carefully reasoned argument that nuclear holocaust is already here. Constant pollution from radiation leaks, accidents, and deliberate use of ordnance composed with depleted uranium already have global cancer rates and birth defects skyrocketing. Continuing to build nuclear weapon systems without any meaningful plans for containing the waste is collective suicide. 

On March 22, China and Russia issued a joint statement of their intention to avoid the use of nuclear weapons.

Within days, Great Britain announced it will ship DU ammunition to Ukraine for use in the proxy war against Russia. Meanwhile, research physicist Chris Busby published data showing elevated levels of uranium in the atmosphere over the British isles. That's a fact, and his hypothesis about causation is that DU is already present in munitions used by Ukraine.

The British government's announcement has had several consequences.

☢️ Some commenters wondered if the plan to irradiate Ukraine's prime agricultural land would sit well with big corporate players like Monsanto that have been buying up real estate there.

☢️ Russia announced it plans to move nuclear weapons into Belarus this summer. (Naturally the U.S. and NATO nations are crying foul without acknowledging that they already have nuclear weapons in position in Belgium, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, and Türkiye if not Poland, too.)

☢️ More attention was paid to data on the long term effects in Serbia of being bombed with DU munitions by NATO during the Clinton administration e.g. "5,500 out of every 100,000 Serbs suffer from some kind of carcinoma, a rate nearly three times the global average."

☢️ Same for data on the use of DU by the U.S. and NATO in Iraq, especially concentrated in the area of Fallujah. Clusters of birth defects occurred early there attributed to DU, and these persist. 

The Coalition for Nuclear Disarmament (CND) condemned the UK decision to send depleted uranium shells to Ukraine and elaborated thus:

A byproduct of the nuclear enriching process used to make nuclear fuel or nuclear weapons, DU emits three quarters of the radioactivity of natural uranium and shares many of its risks and dangers. It is used in armour piercing rounds as it is heavy and can easily penetrate steel. However on impact, toxic or radioactive dust can be released and subsequently inhaled. 

DU shells were used extensively by the US and British in Iraq in 1991 and 2003, as well as in the Balkans during the 1990s.

It is thought that the extensive use of these shells is responsible for the sharp rise in the incidence rate of some cancers like breast cancer or lymphoma in the areas they were used. Other illnesses linked to DU include kidney failure, nervous system disorders, lung disease and reproductive problems. However, a lack of reliable data on exposure to DU means no large-scale study on its true impact exists. 

DU sidesteps frying its targets to a crisp. In other words, the thermo part of thermonuclear is absent. And that is a good thing.

My friend Fang used to protest during the Iraq war using a sign that said D.U. = war crime. I used to tease him about what passing motorists made of his message, guessing that they read D.U. as the Homer Simpson exclamation, "Duh!"

Maybe I was underestimating how informed the general public is, but after watching highlights of the congressional hearings about Tik Tok this week I don't think so. 

To end this grim post on a lightly humorous note (and the promise to do another geography quiz post soon):

Crenshaw: [Chinese citizens] must cooperate with Chinese intelligence whenever they are called upon, and if they are called upon they're bound to secrecy. That would include you.
TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew: I'm Singaporean. pic.twitter.com/YXICSoIY4c

— Caitlin Johnstone (@caitoz) March 24, 2023

Link to tweet if embedded video does not work for you: https://twitter.com/caitoz/status/1639087482380910594

Ten Years After, The Stench Remains

The stench of bodies burned by white phosphorus, of stillborn children with depleted uranium-induced deformities so gross they are barely recognizable as human, of torture and rendition conducted by contracting firms such as Blackwater (now known as Academi), recently revealed as directly in the employ of the CIA and its taxpayers; the stench of burning oil fields, of hungry children shivering in the cold in North America, of the farts of fat, sleek war profiteers the mainstream media tells us to revere as "winners" in the vicious game of access to the dirty fuels that keep the light burning for capitalism.

Business, politics and war -- there you have it. Haliburton, the love of Dick Cheney's life, made billions off the Iraq war.  Bush will get a presidential lie-brary in Texas. Rice will continue with lucrative teaching and lecturing gigs. Et cetera, ad nauseum.

The people of Iraq will continue to suffer the effects of civil unrest, and of the destroyed infrastructure that was never repaired even though corporations billed the U.S. government billions to do the job.

The veterans who went to invade Iraq will continue to wrestle the demons of despair, many broken in body and spirit. Many will not make it back to their families or the lives they left behind. Many went into the military after the gigantic lie of 9/11 -- that it was the unaided work of Islamic terrorists -- and many more went, not out of idealism, but because there were no living wage jobs for kids with high school diplomas, and they wanted the money to go to college. They never studied true world history and current events, so they never really knew that the dictator they were supposed to be risking their lives to topple had been a close U.S. friend and ally for years.

Four million Iraqi refugees, one million of whom have yet to return home. At least hundreds of thousands, perhaps as many as a million civilian deaths in Iraq. A highly profitable war for the 1%. That's why Bush made a buffoon of himself very early in the occupation declaring "Mission Accomplished." The direct feed from the U.S. taxpayer to the corporations that kept him in office was firmly in place. And in 2013, the U.S. taxpayer is still bleeding dollars into those accounts faster than a human being could even count.

Walk for Fukushima & Nuclear Truth

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
contact Mie at 207-691-3508 
mkathearn@mail.goo.ne.jp.

Walk for Fukushima

Mie Athearn, a Japanese woman living in Maine and a native of Fukushima Prefecture, is undertaking a "Walk for Fukushima" to deliver a message to the Japanese government appealing for stronger actions to protect children from radiation hazards in the wake of the Fukushima Daiichi disaster.
Ms. Athearn, acutely aware of the heightened stresses being experienced by her close family members over the ongoing releases of radioactive contamination from the crippled reactors, and distressed by the Japanese government response seemingly dictated by expediency and downplaying, has decided to walk from Rockland to the Japanese Consulate in Boston to seek an audience with officials there urging a stronger public health response to the crisis.

She was also inspired by the Peace Walkers who came through Rockland last year, led by Japanese Buddhist monks and nuns. Just back from their latest pilgrimage from Boston to Albany, with stops at nuclear power plants in Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Vermont, the Grafton Peace Pagoda is now lending its support to the Walk for Fukushima.

With her husband Steven, Jun Yasuda of the Peace Pagoda, and various others, Mie set out from Rockland on Sunday, September 4 and expects to arrive in Boston on September 19, covering a distance of nearly 200 miles. The walk will partly coincide with a series of anti-nuclear actions within Japan planned for the week of September 11, and culminating with a "goodbye nukes" rally in Tokyo on September 19. Those dates are, respectively, six months since the March 11 earthquake and tsunami, and five months since a Ministry of the national government, MEXT, directed Fukushima Prefecture to adopt a much laxer standard for radiation exposure, making higher-than-controlled-workplace doses for children officially acceptable.
They also plan to make a stop at the Seabrook Station nuclear power plant in New Hampshire.

People wanting to lend a hand by offering overnight accomodations, daytime rest stops, organizing events along the way, or joining some portion of the walk themselves may contact Mie at 207-691-3508 or mkathearn@mail.goo.ne.jp.  A schedule of stopping points for the walk is given below.

Schedule, "Walk for Fukushima"

9/4 Rockland – Warren
9/5 Warren – Nobleboro
9/6 Nobleboro – Edgecomb (Reception/meeting at Shadis Law Office, Newcastle, 7 pm)
9/7 Edgecomb -- Bath (Excursion to view spent fuel canisters at former Maine Yankee site, Wiscasset)
9/8 Bath – Brunswick
9/9 Brunswick – Yarmouth
9/10 Yarmouth – Portland
9/11 4-5 miles in Portland ("Freedom trail" walk leaving from Meg Perry Center, Congress St at 2 pm, then participation in evening 9/11 program at Back Cove)
9/12 Portland – Saco (Reception by mayor of Biddeford, 3 pm; Potluck reception at First Parish UCC, Saco, 6 pm)
9/13 Saco – Wells
9/14 Wells – York
9/15 York – Portsmouth (After arrival in Portsmouth, transport to NRC public comment session, Hamption, 1:30 to 4:30 pm)
9/16 Portsmouth – Seabrook (Afternoon vigil at Seabrook Station; Evening reception Newburyport)
9/17 Seabrook – Rowley
9/18 Rowley – Saugus
9/19 Saugus -- Boston (Meet Leventhal Park 12 pm then walk to Japan Consul General)

Here are ources of information that Steve Ahearn wanted to share with us:

Professor Kodama's historic angry speech to the parliamentary subcommittee on July 27:

http://fukushimanewsresearch.wordpress.com/2011/07/29/indie-part-2-professor-tatsuhiko-kodama-of-tokyo-university-tells-the-politicians-what-are-you-doing/

http://fukushimanewsresearch.wordpress.com/2011/08/13/indie-radiation-effects-on-health-protect-the-children-of-fukushima/  (A seemingly good written translation of his talk, with graphics)


Nuclear engineer Arnie Gundersen's regular Fukushima updates are an excellent way to follow developments: http://www.fairewinds.com/updates

Radioactive fallout, Japan:
"NHK Special: Mapping the radioactive fallout"
http://fukushimanewsresearch.wordpress.com/2011/08/11/indie-nhk-special-mapping-the-radioactive-fallout-video/ (Excellent NHK documentary with English narration - 1.5 hrs)

Radioactive fallout, North America, August 2011:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lPxCLJQ5tj (Oklahoma City, first rain after drought 8/6/11)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BDSpCxjZ2D8 (Toronto, Canada 8/14/11)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gJCRmaIDCQE (St Louis 8/20/11)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nEsKxmJPUmM (positive identification of 8/20 fallout - long discussion)

Petitions, Japan:
http://sayonara-nukes.org/shomei/ Sayonara nukes petition.

A few informative articles:
"34 spots top Chernobyl evacuation standard" (Yomiuri Shinbun)
http://fukushima.greenaction-japan.org/2011/09/01/34-spots-top-chernobyl-evacuation-standard/

"Wanted: The right to relocate: Growing radiation exposure and the July 19 citizen government talks in Fukushima":
http://fukushima.greenaction-japan.org/2011/08/03/wanted-the-right-to-relocate-%E2%80%94-growing-radiation-exposure-and-the-july-19-citizen-government-talks-in-fukushima/

"Japanese NGOs urge UN to investigate violation of children's human rights in Fukushima"
http://fukushima.greenaction-japan.org/2011/08/17/japanese-ngos-urge-un-to-investigate-violation-of-children%E2%80%99s-human-rights-in-fukushima/

D.U. = WAR CRIME

I once had to protest an administrator in my old school district who was gung-ho to hang a flag of our state, sent from Iraq by a National Guards-mom whose daughter had been a student of ours.

The principal was going to hang it proudly in the gym because as she explained, "It had flown over Fallujah!" She had already read aloud a letter from soldier mom to her kid at graduation the previous spring. (The use of high school graduation ceremonies for recruiting purposes is a topic I will leave for another day.)

As the U.S. prepares to "exit" Iraq at the end of this month, leaving behind only 50,000 troops and the largest embassy compound ever built (fortifed, natch) I am reflecting on the battle of Fallujah. Some years have passed since my country used my tax dollars to bombard the city with weapons of mass destruction. Many of the WMD's were made of depleted uranium; because it is a very dense material, D.U. is used to make missile points that will penetrate strongly. Then the explosion turns the D.U. to fine dust that becomes part of the local environment for a very long time.

One of my stalwart fellow vigilers held a sign for years that said: D.U. = war crime. We used to tease him by saying that those driving by us on the bridge probably thought it said "Duh" because no one knew what D.U. meant.

The children that have been born in Fallujah since the U.S. attacked know what D.U. means, because they are living with birth defects caused by radioactivity levels that scientists who studied the situation describe as "worse than Hiroshima." Cancer, Infant Mortality and Birth Sex-Ratio in Fallujah, Iraq 2005-2009 was published here in June. The little girl pictured above was lucky to be born with deformed feet rather than a misplaced eye or nose -- I guess. Wonder what will happen if she tries to have children of her own someday?

Nuclear Detonation Timeline "1945-1998"
A horrible, strangely beautiful rendering of historical data
by Isao Hashimoto (www.ctbto.org/specials/1945-1998-by-isao-hashimoto/)