By Tim Wolcott
Most people realize that reusing products is a sustainable strategy for the future. As in many things, it can depend on the specific circumstances. I believe that in the case of reusing depleted uranium for armor shielding, bullets, missiles and bombs, it is neither a sustainable strategy for the planet nor a humane way to support our troops.
Depleted Uranium (DU) is a waste product of the process that removes the fissionable
U 235 from natural deposits of uranium. The U 235 is primarily used as a fuel in nuclear power plants and nuclear bombs. Many scientists believe that DU is 60% as radioactive as the natural U 235. DU is also heavier than lead and stronger than steel. America has 1.5 billion lbs. of DU in hazardous waste storage. Since its half-life is 4.5 billion years, depleted uranium is a long- term liability, even if we only store it.
The US has given DU to 29 nations, primarily because it is highly valued by the military. The material’s high density and self-sharpening properties help it to penetrate enemy tanks and bunkers. Consequently, NATO forces in Bosnia, Serbia and Kosovo, Coalition forces in both Gulf Wars, as well as Israel and Kuwait have used it in munitions and armor. The UN Environmental Program estimates that shells containing 1700 tons of the material were fired during the 2003 Iraq war.
Upon impact DU oxidizes into the air into particles smaller than soot. The aerosol and radioactive gas can be breathed locally and/or incorporated into the soil and water. Furthermore, the heavy metal particles are small enough to circle the globe dispersing chemically toxic waste that biomagnifies in concentration as it goes up the food chain.
Some researchers contend that depleted uranium left in the environment by spent munitions causes cancer, birth defects and other ill effects. Governments and the military disagree and argue that there is no conclusive evidence for this. They agree that DU is weakly radioactive, but contend that the effect is too small to explain the genetic damage at the levels seen in war veterans and civilians.
Chris Busby and Ewald Schnug of the Institute of Plant Nutrition and Soil Science in Braunschweig, Germany have postulated how depleted uranium could cause genetic damage. Their experiments indicate that uranium atoms in the body could act as "radiation antennas" that capture background gamma radiation and then re-emit it as beta type radiation. That energy could be over 1000 times more damaging than the alpha radiation released by depleted uranium’s slow nuclear decay. Radiation biophysicist Mark Hill of the University of Oxford isn’t convinced yet and believes that investigations with more detailed calculations and dose estimates for realistic situations with and without uranium present would confirm or reject Busby and Schnug’s hypothesis. Work is ongoing toward that end.
The controversy over whether DU is harmful to our soldiers and the planet and, if so, should be curtailed or banned under international law has not been discussed enough in the public media. I believe that this conspicuous omission is neither inadvertent nor benign. Karen Parker, a lawyer with the International Educational Development/Humanitarian Law Project consults for the UN. She contends that DU "violates the existing law and customs of war". Rep. Cynthia McKinney, D-Ga. introduced a bill calling for "the suspension of the use, sale, development, production, testing and export of depleted uranium munitions pending the outcome of studies of the health effect." It remains in committee awaiting comment from the Defense Department.
In 1991, thousands of veterans returning from the 1991 Gulf War reported a variety of disease symptoms, including chronic fatigue syndrome, immune dysfunction, urinary disorders, joint pains, and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis. The Veterans Administration dismissed their problems with the same all-purpose diagnosis they used on the Vietnam vets exposed to Agent Orange - battle stress. In 1997, a House panel found "no credible evidence" that the Gulf War Syndrome (GWS) resulted from wartime stress. Rather, it pinpointed toxic agents, including nerve gases, vaccines, pesticides, smoke from oil well fires and depleted uranium as the causes.
In the year 2000, NATO officials said that US aircraft fired more than 10,000 depleted uranium projectiles in Bosnia and Kosovo. The governments of Italy, Belgium, Holland, Spain, Finland and Turkey reported similar illnesses to GWS developing in returning troops from the Balkan Wars. The UK Ministry of Defense contended that no scientific evidence links DU to the deaths of alliance soldiers.
The UK and US military establishments have scientific support for their positions. Dr. Ronald L. Kathren, Health Physics Society Past President in 2001 stated that "military personnel and others who may have had contact with depleted uranium from munitions are suffering from various illnesses is not in dispute. That their illnesses are attributable to their exposure to uranium is very, very unlikely." Dr. G.C. Jiang in 2007 studied depleted uranium’s neurotoxicity in rats and found that, in the form of uranyl acetate, the public concern regarding DU as of an agent of neurodegenerative conditions associated with the Gulf War Syndrome is not warranted. Indeed, in 2001 the WHO’s media center reported that field measurements taken around selected impact sides in Kosovo indicated that DU contamination in the environment was localized to a few tens of meters around impact sites with the probability of significant exposures to local populations to be very low. The WHO did qualify its findings with the assertion that the present health information system in Kosovo is fragmented and inadequate. Thus, "without a functioning health information system, it will not be possible to discern with certainty any health trends in the future, mediated by whatever cause."
In any case, Dr. Rosalie Bertell, President of the International Institute of Concerns for Public Health advocates banning DU weaponry. Dr. Bertell believes that, because of the concentration of the uranium in the depleted uranium waste, DU is much more radioactive than uranium in its natural state. Furthermore, in 1999 at the Hague Peace Conference, she contended that the damage to lungs and kidneys by uranium compounds is a result of the combined radiation and chemical toxicity of the aerosol. Dr. Bertell believes that both vectors for illness should be studied simultaneously in order to determine illness causality.
Her work followed a military study in 1991 by Dr. Asaf Durakovic, who was Chief of the Nuclear Medicine Clinic at the Veterans Affairs hospital in Wilmington, Delaware. He discovered significant evidence of uranium exposure in his patients, severe pathology of the renal and geneto-urinary systems. After two of the Gulf War patients died, Dr. Durakovic wanted to expand the tests to the patients’ skeletal systems. The tests were not performed, medical charts disappeared, the uranium Registry Office was dismantled, and Dr. Durakovic was laid off in 1997. Dr. Durakovic, in 2002, as Director of the Uranium Medical Research Center in Canada and the US published in the August issue of Military Medicine a study which examined British, Canadian and US veterans, all suffering typical Gulf War Syndrome illnesses. He found that nine years after the war, 14 of 27 veterans studied had DU in their urine. "DU was also found in the lung and bone of a deceased Gulf War veteran."
The US Army acknowledges the hazards of depleted uranium in a training manual, in which it requires that anyone who comes within 25 meters of any DU-contaminated equipment or terrain wear respiratory and skin protection. The manual states that "contamination will make food and water unsafe for consumption." But today the Pentagon plays down the effects. In 1999, a UN subcommission considered DU hazardous enough to call for an initiative banning its use worldwide. The initiative has remained in committee, blocked primarily by the US.
The testing and use of DU munitions have created radioactive "hot spots" in Europe, the Middle East and in the US. Ralph Charles Whitley, Sr., an activist veteran against the use of DU, contends that Eglin Air Force Base and Avon Park Bombing Range in Florida are contaminated sites. Moreover, the chemical toxicity of the DU aerosol can be detected worldwide. Even if depleted uranium is only as chemically toxic as lead and as 60% as radioactive as natural uranium, common sense tells me it belongs in hazardous waste storage, not in aerosol form in and around our soldiers and the planet.
What about the US Army warning "DU contamination will make food and water unsafe for consumption" don’t we understand? Yes, it helps us penetrate the bunkers of enemies, but at what cost to our soldiers and to the planet?