depleted uranium
Despite vowing not to use depleted uranium (DU) weapons in its military action in Syria, the U.S. government has now admitted that it has fired thousands of the deadly rounds into Syrian territory. As Foreign Policy Magazine reports:
"U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) spokesman Maj. Josh Jacques told Airwars and Foreign Policy that 5,265 armor-piercing 30 mm rounds containing depleted uranium (DU) were shot from Air Force A-10 fixed-wing aircraft on Nov. 16 and Nov. 22, 2015, destroying about 350 vehicles in the country's eastern desert."
Operation Inherent Resolve spokesman John Moore said in 2015 that:
"U.S. and coalition aircraft have not been and will not be using depleted uranium munitions in Iraq or Syria during Operation Inherent Resolve."
Now we know that is not true.

Numerous studies have found that depleted uranium is particularly harmful when the dust is inhaled by the victim. A University of Southern Maine study discovered that:
"...DU damages DNA in human lung cells. The team, led by John Pierce Wise, exposed cultures of the cells to uranium compounds at different concentrations.

"The compounds caused breaks in the chromosomes within cells and stopped them from growing and dividing healthily. 'These data suggest that exposure to particulate DU may pose a significant [DNA damage] risk and could possibly result in lung cancer,' the team wrote in the journal Chemical Research in Toxicology."
We should remember that the United States is engaged in military activities in Syria in violation of international and U.S. law. There is no Congressional authorization for U.S. military action against ISIS in Syria and the United Nations has not authorized military force in violation of Syria's sovereignty either.

The innocent citizens of Syria will be forced to endure increased risks of cancer, birth defects, and other disease related to exposure to radioactive materials. Depleted uranium is the byproduct of the enrichment of uranium to fuel nuclear power plants and has a half-life in the hundreds of millions of years. Damage to Syrian territory will thus continue long after anyone involved in current hostilities is dead.


Comment: Depleted Uranium: How dangerous is it?
The insidious adverse effects of DU in the body was illustrated by scientists at the DOD's Armed Forces Radiobiology Research Institute in Maryland, in research presented to the American Association for Cancer Research and the Society of Toxicology. They tested the effects of embedded DU by inserting shrapnel-like pellets into the legs of rats. The researchers were surprised at how quickly oncogenes - genes believed to be precursors to cancer - formed. Another discovery was that DU kills suppressor, or health-maintaining, genes. The experiments also demonstrated that DU spreads throughout the body, depositing itself in the brain and spleen, among other organs, and that it can be passed by a pregnant rat to a developing fetus.(27)

Many of the symptoms experienced by Gulf War veterans and their families are indicative of radiation poisoning. These include nausea, vomiting, memory loss, and increased cancer rates. In addition, veterans' children are manifesting an alarming rate of birth defects, lowered immunity, and childhood cancers. Radiation-affected sperm may be contributing these defects.

Dr. Jay Gould, author of The Enemy Within: The High Cost of Living Near Nuclear Reactors, has been an outspoken critic of low-level radiation. Gould says that exposure to DU released into the atmosphere poses the same grave dangers any other exposure to uranium. "There is nothing new about it," Gould says, stressing that a biochemical impact of low-level radiation can immediately attack the immune response.(28) Since immune response is a key factor in maintaining good health, a weakened immune system makes people vulnerable to any kind of infection or allergic response. Consequently, everything from cancer to allergies and multiple chemical sensitivities can be activated by the uranium dust.