Tuesday, November 08, 2005

U.S. ' Used Chemical Weapons In Iraq '

ROME. In soldier slang they call it Willy Pete. The technical name is white phosphorus. In theory its purpose is to illumine enemy positions in the dark. In practice, it was used as a chemical weapon in the rebel stronghold of Fallujah. And it was used not only against enemy combatants and guerrillas, but again innocent civilians.



The Americans are responsible for a massacre using unconventional weapons, the identical charge for which Saddam Hussein stands accused. An investigation by RAI News 24, the all-news Italian satellite television channel, has pulled the veil from one of the most carefully concealed mysteries from the front in the entire US military campaign in Iraq.

A US veteran of the Iraq war told RAI New correspondent Sigfrido Ranucci this: I received the order use caution because we had used white phosphorus on Fallujah. In military slag it is called 'Willy Pete'. Phosphorus burns the human body on contact--it even melts it right down to the bone.

RAI News 24's investigative story, Fallujah, The Concealed Massacre, will be broadcast tomorrow on RAI-3 and will contain not only eye-witness accounts by US military personnel but those from Fallujah residents. A rain of fire descended on the city. People who were exposed to those multicolored substance began to burn. We found people with bizarre wounds-their bodies burned but their clothes intact, relates Mohamad Tareq al-Deraji, a biologist and Fallujah resident.

I gathered accounts of the use of phosphorus and napalm from a few Fallujah refugees whom I met before being kidnapped, says Manifesto reporter Giuliana Sgrena, who was kidnapped in Fallujah last February, in a recorded interview. I wanted to get the story out, but my kidnappers would not permit it.

RAI News 24 will broadcast video and photographs taken in the Iraqi city during and after the November 2004 bombardment which prove that the US military, contrary to statements in a December 9 communiqué from the US Department of State, did not use phosphorus to illuminate enemy positions (which would have been legitimate) but instend dropped white phosphorus indiscriminately and in massive quantities on the city's neighborhoods.

In the investigative story, produced by Maurizio Torrealta, dramatic footage is shown revealing the effects of the bombardment on civilians, women and children, some of whom were surprised in their sleep.

The investigation will also broadcast documentary proof of the use in Iraq of a new napalm formula called MK77. The use of the incendiary substance on civilians is forbidden by a 1980 UN treaty. The use of chemical weapons is forbidden by a treaty which the US signed in 1997

Notes

(1) This claim of the use of MK77 in Fallujah is not being made by myself , it is however being made by RAI News 24 and they are providing evidence


(2) There is video evidence of what seems like genuine cases of the use of MK77 on civilians in Fallujah but (a) i have decided not to show the video as the images are quite sickening and (b) i am not any kind of expert on MK77 and so have decided to leave my judgement on the claim until after the evidence is presented (on Italian TV) and the US government has given some kind of response to the claim.

(3) The claim that MK77 was used against civilians in Fallujah is not new , many news agencies have made the claim before , but i think RAI News are the first to supply any kind of evidence of such a crime

IF this claim by the Italian news company turns out to be genuine then this is beyond sickness
The use of chemical weapons in Iraq which is the claimed reason for being there . So the actual use of such weapons by the US in Iraq would be the ultimate hypocracy and i doubt this information could be withheld from the wider world for very long.

6 Comments:

Blogger G_in_AL said...

H, keep me posted via email (or my site) on this one. if it turns out to be true, in the entirity (I'll explain that in a second), then I would like to know. Right now I wont post on it at all because it still has a feel of conjecture and brazen accusation.

I say "entirity" to mean this:

The military regularly uses WP for flares and as granades to destroy equipment they dont have the time to secure or move out (it is really good at burning through an engine block). But it does not (I know from experiance) have any kind of "kill radius", much less 150 feet. It simply burns, very hot, in direct proximity.

If they used flares to light up areas they were engaged in night time fire-fights, and the flare dropped onto someone's roof, burned through, and hit an innocent civilian....

You see where I am going. Before I jump on this (and I will if it is true), I would need something concrete to make sure it is not inflated or exagerated claims, made by people with a specific agenda. Here is another article for you btw:
http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/08/08/1060145828249.html?oneclick=true

and one other note:
Mk-77s were used by the US Marine Corps during the First Gulf War. Approximately 500 were dropped, reportedly mostly on Iraqi-constructed oil filled trenches. Thirty Mk-77s were also used in the 2003 invasion of Iraq.

Use of incendiary bombs against civilian populations was banned in the 1980 United Nations Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons. The US has not signed this agreement although they did retire use of napalm.

Russia and the US are the only two nations that still produce and use fuel-gel bombs

November 08, 2005 6:17 pm  
Blogger _H_ said...

G , I have more 'claimed' evidence of this and i am happy to send that to you

In fact I have a link to the entire program that will be broadcasted in italy

I decided not to post such a video as i would not want young people to just watch such a film simply due to the link being here

with your military knowledge i would be interested in your assesment of the film

I will email you shortly with the details

November 08, 2005 7:03 pm  
Blogger _H_ said...

PS , your link just brings up a membership screen , maybe you could post a snip here ?

November 08, 2005 7:54 pm  
Blogger G_in_AL said...

The Pentagon no longer officially uses the brand-name 'Napalm', but a similar sticky, inflammable substance known as 'fuel-gel mixture', contained in weapons called Mark-77 fire bombs, was dropped on Iraqi troops near the Iraq-Kuwait border at the start of the war.

"I can confirm that Mark-77 fire bombs were used in that general area," Colonel Mike Daily of the US Marine Corps said.

Colonel Daily said that US stocks of Vietnam-era napalm had been phased out, but that the fuel-gel mixture in the Mark-77s had "similar destructive characteristics."

"Many folks (out of habit) refer to the Mark-77 as 'napalm' because its effect upon the target is remarkably similar," he said.

On March 22nd, correspondent Lindsay Murdoch, who was travelling with the US Marines, had reported that napalm was used in an attack on Iraqi troops at Safwan Hill, near the Kuwait border. Murdoch's account was based on statements by two US Marine Corps officers on the ground.


Lieutenant-Commander Jeff A. Davis, USN, Office of the Assistant Secretary for Defense (Public Affairs) had called Murdoch's story "patently false".

November 08, 2005 10:35 pm  
Blogger _H_ said...

two questions G

(1) is there any evidence that Murdoch's story is false , or are we just told that it is

whats so interesting about this story is that it is not single sourced , they have a multitude of people who 'claim' this happened

so isnt the fact of whether one person is (or is not) lying irelevent ?

or have i missed something your saying ?

(2) how does this connect to the video testimony of the people in fallujah and the doctors etc ?

(3) have you seen the video yet ?

it is very hard to deny what happened to these people , i have NO doubts that such weapons were used G , my doubt is on whether it was planned / accident / or whatever

you will find that even to use agaisnt unmaned targets the Use of such weapons is illigal under the US signed UN treaty in 1997

but i will wait for your opinion of the film i have sent you before i go any further

November 08, 2005 10:58 pm  
Blogger _H_ said...

LOL i cant count


thats 3 questions

November 08, 2005 10:59 pm  

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