Is Bush microwaving Iraqis?

[GePap]

Japan surrendered in mid august, so several days after the two nukes fell- with enought time to loose Manchuria to the Soviets.

[Urban Ranger]

The Soviets started the offensive against the IJA on August 9 1945, before the US dropped the first a-bomb.

[BlackCat]

Originally posted by Urban Ranger
The Soviets started the offensive against the IJA on August 9 1945, before the US dropped the first a-bomb.

Actually it was a couple of hours before they dropped the second bomb.

[realpolitic]

Originally posted by Oerdin


Who gives a rat's ass since the target doesn't die from the armor piercing rounds breaking into small pieces. He dies because a chain gun just blew a half dozen .50 cal sized holes through his body.

DU kills more than the target; US servicemen and civilians too, also DU shells are much bigger.

[debeest]

In case anyone cares about the opening post:

Though I'm entirely ready to believe that the US government would test experimental weapons on the Iraqi people, I'm pretty sure the post is wrong.

Microwaves and other radio waves cause tissue heating. There are no other known health effects, although it's not certain that there are no other health effects. I would be dubious about the OP on that basis. What really convinces me is the claim that it's the same frequencies that "drove whales crazy so that they beached themselves," or some such line. Radio waves don't travel very well underwater; that's why they use sonar instead of radar. It's extremely low-frequency noise that drives the whales crazy.

[Dinner]

Originally posted by realpolitic
DU kills more than the target; US servicemen and civilians too, also DU shells are much bigger.

Have you ever seen one? I have. Depleted Uranium is used as part of a standard armor piercing round and as such they come in several sizes. Everything from .50 cal anti vehicle rounds on up to arty and tank rounds use DU because it is very dense and thus can punch its way through all but the thickest of armor.

If you have a better way to produce an armor piercing round which offers superior performance which doesn't use depleted uranium then I am all ears, however, until such a round is invented then we will have to continue using the best equipment we have.

[Patroklos]

DU kills more than the target; US servicemen and civilians too, also DU shells are much bigger.

How many studies have to prove this wrong before you give it up. And sorry man, DU comes in alot of sizes, but the most prevelant by far is .50.

[Elok]

I don't know much of the science behind, or not behind, such theoretical weapons, but it seems like a pretty stupid strategy to me if it were true:

*Irradiating wide areas indiscriminately makes no sense when your troops have to move through said areas on a regular basis.

*Also, this definitely qualifies as a war crime, and I don't think even Bush is quite stupid enough to risk such a thing after the Abu Ghraib mess.

*And, given that the main advantage of the insurgency is its frustrating mobility-they could be anywhere-they would have to absolutely blanket Baghdad with radiation to have any hope of hitting more than fifty percent of their enemies, and no matter how they aimed it they would always cause excessive collateral damage.

*We're trying to give this whole mess over to the Iraqis themselves, or were last I checked. We're having genuine difficulties. The Iraqi National Guard is flighty and unreliable enough without being decimated by radiation poisoning. If we irradiated the entire population, friend and foe alike, we'd never get out of the blasted country.

*How are we keeping these invisible death-ray dishes, scattered over several blocks, powered at all times, when our food and supply convoys are sitting ducks? Or are they spliced into the building's power grid, and the Iraqi civilians just fail to notice the immense increase in their electrical use? On those occasions that the power grid hasn't been deactivated by terrorism or looting? Not to mention the widespread symptoms of irradiation across a wide cross-section of the population with no evident pathogen and no common factor aside from location?

*And how do they keep the blasted things from overheating or burning out, when they're reeking enough radiation to sicken a couple of blocks from their position in the middle of a scorching desert with minimal shadow cover and full exposure to the elements, including lots of wonderful blowing sand and grit, which all electronics love so dearly? Between inevitable waste heat and environmental stress, those dishes would have to be VERY hot for rather long periods of time if they were operating 24/7.

Do I need to go on explaining the legion ways this idea is ridiculous?

[Dis]

aren't we all taking this topic a little too seriously?

[Tuberski]

Originally posted by Patroklos


How many studies have to prove this wrong before you give it up. And sorry man, DU comes in alot of sizes, but the most prevelant by far is .50.

Like what?

CIWS is 20mm.

ACK!

[BlackCat]

Originally posted by Dissident
aren't we all taking this topic a little too seriously?

How can you say that when the article proves that the occupation forces has reached one of their primary goals in killing at least 65.000 children ?

[Dinner]

I just love it when people who know jack cheese about armor piercing rounds run around screaming about war crimes and how wide areas of the country side are being irradiated.

Ignorant people believe that because the word uranium is used that it means radiological weapons are being used which is entirely false. Battel Corp completed a study which was requested by the US Congress in order to seporate scientific facts from media induced fiction. What did the study say? First that the level of radiation in DU in so low that it is just barely higher then the natural background radiation we all experience just walking around; you recieve orders of magnitude more exposure getting an X-Ray.

Nearly every modern country uses depleted uranium in the armor of their tanks and armored personnel carriers because it is considered a safe and cost effective way to provide the best possible protection. Thus that armor is very tough and one of the only things known to man to have an equally good chance of piercing it is DU though tungsten bullets show promise and are currently being evaluated (tungsten is far more expensive and harder to find).

The greatest danger with DU is when the round hits something very hard it can break into small pieces and those small pieces might be inhaled especially if it is in an enclosed enviroment. The maximium effective range of this risk is only about 5ft to 10ft depending up the wind and because the particals are so heavy they settle very quickly. The only case the US has of people in real life of this occuring was lin 2003 when a US tank got hit by friendly fire during the intial invasion of Iraq. The tank was damaged but no one was killed and the crew continued to live in the unventilated tank thus inhaling the dust. Tests were done and depleted uranium was found in their urine though the levels of radiation exposure were in what doctors consider to be safe ranges.

Several doctors and researchs have said it is wiser to be extra careful and avoid any use of DU as it might cause health risks we don't know about. As yet no one has showen any risks greater then what is considered exceptable with other commonly used materials. The UK's ministry of Defense has announced that they will began to stop accepting new perchases of DU rounds due to public pressure though it currently doesn't have a suitable alternative. The UK is also testing tungsten based armor piercing rounds.

[Dinner]

I imagine that everyone of you wireless phone users gets many times the radiation every time you yak on the phone. Why aren't you all running around commenting upon the war crimes Nokia is commiting? A bit of bias maybe?

[techumseh]

Wasn't Gulf War Syndrome caused by DU?

[BlackCat]

Originally posted by techumseh
Wasn't Gulf War Syndrome caused by DU?

No.