In previous reports I have explained the dangers associated with weapons containing uranium. This can be used in many ways. As a penetrator rod, a Shaped Charged Liner or as a counterweight etc. Whatever the application, we know that DU will ignite at 170c. 

On behalf of the US Army, Major Doug Rokke led a 434-man depleted uranium clean up team in the first Gulf War. In 1994, he was appointed as depleted uranium project director for the US Army. Despite his warnings of the dangers of DU exposure, both the US army and coalition forces continue to use DU munitions with catastrophic effects on their own troops.

Before going into how the DU contamination spreads around the globe lets again look at what exactly happens when a DU weapon makes contact with its target.

Doug Rokke explains: “Uranium munitions are probably the most effective weapon you’re ever going to encounter. These things are the silver bullet. They kill and destroy anything in their path. They are EXTREMELY effective. And what you need to understand, and contrary to what he saw in the media, the DU round is not coated and it's not tipped. The DU round is solid uranium 238. The M1 tank round is over 10 pounds of solid uranium 238, contaminated with plutonium, neptunium, and americium.”


When that 10 pound uranium dart strikes wood, metal, steel, iron, or anything - this thing is already on fire in flight. The uranium is pyrophoric and very soft. Uranium is not hard. It's soft. But the density is unbelievable. Extremely heavy per unit volume. So, you got this uranium dart, that basically three-quarters of an inch in diameter, 18 inches long, moving at better than 3000 feet per second. And when strikes, you have what we call, spalling is formed. About 40 to 50 percent of the dart breaks off and forms spalling [a shotgun effect]. 


The spalling is uranium fragments. Some of the stuff catches fire. And some of the stuff is just solid uranium. And what you see inside is if I took a handful of BB's and through it across this room, extremely high velocity, everything is on fire and fragments. You have secondary detonations due to concussion and ignition beyond comprehension. And the whole thing is a catastrophic explosion. (Approximately 50 to 70% of the penetrator is burned and forms particles 0.1 micron or smaller).


Leuren Moret is a geoscientist who worked almost around the clock educating citizens, the media, members of parliaments and Congress and other officials on radiation issues. She became a whistleblower in 1991 at the Livermore Nuclear Weapons Lab after witnessing fraud on the Yucca Mountain Project.

Leuren explained how these minute particles (nanoparticles) form and disperse into the world’s atmosphere. Leuren explains that uranium is a pyroforic metal, which means it burns and ignites at around 170c.When a uranium based weapon strikes its target it ignites into to fireball of around 5,000c. “The bullets and big calibre shells are actually on fire when they come out of the gun barrel because they are ignited by the friction in the gun barrel. Seventy percent of the DU metal becomes a metal vapour. It's actually a radioactive gas weapon and a terrain contaminant”. During this process large volumes of DU dust aerosols are formed.

Leuren went on to say “After forming microscopic and sub microscopic insoluble Uranium oxide particles on the battlefield, they remain suspended in air and travel around the earth as a radioactive component of atmospheric dust, contaminating the environment, indiscriminately killing, maiming and causing disease in all living things where rain, snow and moisture remove it from the atmosphere. Global radioactive contamination from atmospheric testing was the equivalent of 40,000 Hiroshima bombs, and still contaminates the atmosphere and lower orbital space today. The amount of low level radioactive pollution from depleted uranium released since 1991, is many times more (deposited internally in the body), than was released from atmospheric testing fallout”.


In her summary she stated: “The fact is that the United States and its military partners have staged four nuclear wars, "slipping nukes under the wire" by using dirty bombs and dirty weapons in countries the US needs to control. Depleted uranium aerosols will permanently contaminate vast regions and slowly destroy the genetic future of populations living in those regions, where there are resources which the US must control, in order to establish and maintain American primacy.”


Her conclusion was as follows: “Described as the Trojan Horse of nuclear war, depleted uranium is the weapon that keeps killing. The half-life of Uranium-238 is 4.5 billion years, the age of the earth. And, as Uranium-238 decays into daughter radioactive products, in four steps before turning into lead, it continues to release more radiation at each step. There is no way to turn it off, and there is no way to clean it up. It meets the US Government’s own definition of Weapons of Mass Destruction”


Before we go into the consequences of uranium based weapons (as used by US, NATO and IDF forces) lets look at the total disregard that Israel shows towards regional health and the environment of the Eastern Mediterranean. Their tunnel vision does not take into account “what goes around comes around” and the pollution it creates comes back to haunt them, including DU contamination, oil and sewerage pollution...


This oil spill occurred in July 2006 as a result of an IAF missile attacks on fuel tanks at the Jiyeh power station 30 kilometres South of Beirut, causing the leakage of 12,000 to 15,000 tons of fuel oil into the Mediterranean Sea. Israel must understand that they are also part of this same eco-system and such toxins enter the food chain of the entire Eastern Mediterranean. This thoughtless act hit populations of dolphins and turtles etc.

It is also interesting to note that as a direct result of the continued occupation and blockade of Gaza, the city can no longer treat its own sewerage. We now have a similar environmental disaster looming whereby raw thick sewerage is now entering the sea adjacent to Gaza.

If one can imagine the outflow from 1.5 million people, we can better understand that this is an extremely serious situation. Seawater samples collected were polluted with faecal bacteria, specifically coli forms and streptococcus, causing intestinal & infectious diseases, severe and potentially life-threatening diseases such as hepatitis, meningitis & a risk of cholera. The other issue that Israel would not wish to talk about is the fact that some uranium is passed in urine and further adds to the problem.

Again we see an identical situation developing where this outflow will make its way up the beaches of Israel and extend over its entire coastline. The Southern extremity of Israel will receive the highest concentrations especially the popular surfing beach at Ashkelon and Ashdod. The contamination will also extend up to Tel Aviv and Haifi in a more diluted form.

In the remainder of this article we will look at the fallout that occurred as a direct result of the attack on Lebanon in 2006 and Gaza in 2008/9 and how quickly these very fine particles spread in the immediate vicinity, cross border and beyond. We must also keep in mind that a significant amount of an aerosol ascends to many thousands of feet, after the initial explosion, riding on extremely hot convection current from the intense inferno at the target area.

On the anniversary of the IDF bombing of the UN observation post at Khiam, Southern Lebanon, I decided to map out a typical airflow pattern covering the Middle East and Europe. Using Lebanon and Gaza as the target area, I mapped out the main airflow tracks at three levels (low, mid and high levels winds). This information was obtained from standard sources as one would normally use when a pilot works out his flight plan.

The wind directions shown are only the main flow, but obviously at all levels the particles will divert in all directions as they meet local vortices and pressure systems. It must also be noted that the wind speed changes significantly at different levels with sometimes strong winds at low level caused through coastal effects and convection currents, and extremely strong upper level winds such as jet streams etc. Basically the nanoparticles divert almost everywhere and at all speeds around the globe.

We hear time and time again both during and after conflicts that the military forces concerned deny any usage of depleted or enriched uranium components in their weaponry. We find each and every time proof that their spin was incorrect when slowly but surely the evidence is found and the medical effects of these weapons starts to show up in the armed forces (Gulf War Syndrome) and in the innocent civilian populations.

Some so called expert or scientific correspondent will come out of a murky corner to say that weapons used in a particular conflict did not contain uranium components! Doesn’t it always appear so strange that weapons manufacturers or component manufacturers sometime shoot themselves in the foot by printing the fact that a particular shell contains DU or a missile?

Let’s look at two examples that I discover. I can assure you there are many more: MSC quote the following on their web “This now brings us to the use of Shape Charge Liners that are made from DU. Shaped charges increase the power by focusing explosives in one direction e.g. by containing them with a conical liner. A wide variety of guided weapons use "shaped charge" technology. These range from Maverick and Hellfire missiles to torpedoes, sub-munitions in cluster bombs and the first stage of BROACH MWS.

The list of suspect US weapons is huge and given the fact that Israel has its own nuclear facilities, one can only imagine what is going on behind closed doors!!

I decided to speak with Leuren Moret and ask her a few questions on this very important issue to try and put everything into perspective in Part 4 which will cover the many medical issues related to Depleted and Enriched Uranium. Whatever the spin from governments and the military, we must all fully understand that the use of Dirty Missiles, Dirty Bombs, Dirty Shells and Dirty Bullets is high on the agenda and continue to be used as we speak.

What is happening in Afghanistan and Pakistan right now is a re run of the Balkans and Iraq Wars… God knows how many will suffer under this terrible act against humankind. I again repeat that Israel must never be allowed to attack Iran. This is what the US wants and in doing so Israel will become the pawn for America with such catastrophic results. If one can imagine the radioactive fallout alone is beyond comprehension. Let’s finish with Leuren’s response to some questions.

PE - As these nanoparticles move around the globe, can you explain how they return to earth and how a human can become a victim and by what means?

LM - Once Uranium burns, it is a poison gas.  Just like smoke rings that disappear in a room within minutes, these invisible dust particles of DU are bumped by air molecules which keep them suspended indefinitely and they begin dispersing locally in air. As the DU nanoparticles, which are atmospheric dust size particles of DU, are mobilized from the point source or bomb impact sites etc., they become part of weather systems and air masses in the Troposphere, and move very quickly in all directions from the conflict zone as the maps show.

They quickly rise up to higher altitudes to become part of atmospheric dust clouds that travel long distances around the world and are completely mixed in the global atmosphere within one year. When moisture is present in the air masses, the DU particles become nucleating agents for water, and when they are heavy enough they drop from the sky as raindrops or fog or even attached to snowflakes - this is known as "rainout".

Because the DU is mostly confined to the Troposphere, the most dynamic part of the atmosphere, nearly all the DU particles are rained out in 2 months - causing a horrific global nuclear war in fact. As the rainout of these particles contaminates our biosphere, all living things are affected - the oceans, plants, animals, and especially humans who are more sensitive to radiation exposure than many animals. As the particles fall to the ground in rain, or are remobilized in dust storms in arid regions, they contaminate the air we breathe, the water we drink, and the food we eat.  There is no longer anywhere on this planet where we can hide from the global nuclear genocide.   

PE - When the particles enter the lower levels and enter our entire eco-system what happens to that contamination?

LM - The particles have surfaces that are wet and they stick to whatever they land on - rocks, sand, dirt, buildings, bodies of water, plants and leaves, skin - and they are nearly impossible to remove even with heavy scrubbing. As we breathe them, which is the most dangerous pathway into our bodies, they go directly into the blood from the lungs. The good thing about rainout is that they are removed from the atmosphere so they are no longer being inhaled. However they get into the groundwater and drinking water, and even at extremely low doses, environmental uranium causes infertility and reproductive cancers. As the environmental uranium moves through the biosphere, it degrades all living things, and the damage is cumulative and permanent.

PE - I have heard some terrible consequences in the animal kingdom can you explain?

LM - We know from studies in the coastal waters of the UK, Ireland, and Southern California offshore from two nuclear power plants, that fish populations exposed to Uranium and other radionuclide’s have an expanding population of females and shrinking male populations.  This is because the Uranium is an estrogen and hormone disruptor, and fish born as males soon turn into females. Scientists around the world are extremely concerned and are saying "It's all bad for the sperm". Male sperm in humans around the world has been reported to have 85% with damaged DNA, and only 15% with normal DNA. Sperm DNA damage and increasing infertility has been reported in Denmark in studies on young Danish males since 1991, before they enter the military. 

Female polar bears in the Arctic are now reported to have both male and female sexual organs, a result of the hormone and estrogen disruption. Of course this is all happening to humans as well since we share similar estrogen and the same hormones. That's why animal studies are so important; they tell us what we can expect as well from exposure to toxic substances. Otters in the Columbia River, downstream from the nuclear facility at Hanford, Washington, no longer know how to mate from the hormone disruption. 

Increasingly, people around the world now have to go to hospitals in order to have babies.  "Wild reproduction" in humans is on the decline due to rapidly increasing global infertility - one of the so called "miracles" of the Nuclear Age. Now I understand why the two nuclear weapons labs where I worked in the US had huge posters on the walls with images of thousands of damaged and malformed sperm. It's a depopulation agenda through nuclear pollution.
What goes around comes around. When will the Israelis understand that when you use depleted or enriched uranium (dirty weapons) you must fully understand that they are totally indiscriminate and therefore the aerosols drift back over the border to the place they call home!! (There’s no place like home).


Leuren closes off with her view on the bigger picture:
“The big picture is that as the Weapons of Mass Destruction, developed for the international financiers and bankers, become more globally destructive, we are destroying the web of life that supports all living things. As the web of life is destroyed, a future for humanity disappears. The destruction of global DNA, the product of 4.5 billion years of earth history, has been carried out in the past 55 plus years - since Hiroshima and Nagasaki.”

“A Geology Professor told me when I expressed my concern years ago as a student, ‘Well, don't worry, after humans exterminate themselves, Mother Earth will heal herself.’”  

(To be continued…)
Peter Eyre, a former British Naval officer, worked at NATO headquarters in cryptology, and spent a lot of time in the Middle East and South East Asia as a petroleum consultant; he lives in the UK and writes regularly for the Palestine Telegraph