I’m sad. Your site doesn’t like me and my comments do not appear :(

“”One day, we were walking toward the port and they had sulfuric acid exploding out of the stacks. We were covered with it, everything was burning on us, and we had to turn around and get to the medics,” said Army Staff Sgt. Frank Valentin, 35. ”

OK, was the sulfuric acid coming out of stacks because of bombs? (It’s not clear in the article, either that or I missed something.)

For the record, I’m not buying the “Agent Orange is OK” crap coming out of the maritimes, but this article is mixing up too much for me to determine whether the finger is pointing in the right direction(s).

Do I believe that the US soldiers are being exposed to crap? Definitely. But I believed that before this article.

Do I believe that the crap is the sole responsibility of the US Army? Not yet, for the reason stated above. Could I be convinced? Definitely.

One of the challenges of these types of accusations (accurate or otherwise) is the many who have been to Iraq and returned home without apparent health issues. It would probably make a fascinating study - I’m not trying to be cold-hearted here, I’m simply saying it would be interesting to review all the case studies - the healthy and the ill - to try and determine what the factors are (or seem to be) that determine who will fall ill and who will not?

Similar studies are (I believe) ongoing with respect to AIDS - many more are infected with HIV than actually succumb to the disease. The determining factors have, to my knowledge (limited), yet to be fully determined.

>We also know that chemical weapons have been used in the war and during the occupation

We do? Which chemicals, where and when? If you can’t provide factual links, I’ll do my own web searches if you can provide the names and at least approximate locations and times. I assume for the sake of discussion that you don’t mean combustible chemicals used in various munitions as propellants, explosives, smoke generators, and flammables; and do mean toxic chemicals in the customary (legal) sense.

>and there have been charges of US use of mustard gas, and nerve gas - charges that reasonable people have to take seriously.

Take seriously? Why? What is compelling about the evidence?

During the original Gulf War Syndrome media circus, I learned not to mistake increased publicity for increased incidence of what was reported. What is useful is comparison of mortality rates over time among the military population and its dependents (ie. don’t be misled by comparisons of mortality rates among service people and their families to the general population which will tend to conceal any real underlying problem - the military population and its dependents are slightly healthier on average). In simple terms: are they, on average, sicker now than usual?

People in war zones are exposed to plenty of stress factors and chemicals both mundane and uncommon. It should not be surprising if mortality rates due to exotic unexplained illnesses are higher, but it is foolish to pretend to know on the basis of superficial examination which one or two particular sources are responsible.

I do remember the earlier discussions, and I do remember pointing out that WP isn’t customarily recognized as a chemical weapon. Incendiary weapons are not generally prohibited, but there are prohibitions against use where noncombatants are likely to be (due to the indiscriminate nature of the weapons). I realize you disagree with the law as written.

>Because my dear fellow, if they would use napalm[like] and white phosphorous why wouldn’t they?

Is that the foundation of your hypothesis? I will leave it, then; I see no point trying to dispute articles of faith.

There is no shortage of articles documenting or claiming possession and use of mustard gas and nerve agents by Iraq. However, the handful of allegations against the US seem to all be based on the pet theory of Dr. Khalid ash-Shaykhli, whose own attributions of causes to observed injuries render his expertise unlikely.

>and since civilians were burned what does that tell you lrC?

Burns result from many things, including ordinary high explosives. Stipulating that some civilians may have been burned by incendiary bombs, it doesn’t necessarily follow that the US knowingly targeted areas with clusters of civilians. If the latter were also shown to be likely, then prosecution would be up to the discretion of any authority with jurisdiction - several nations claim the right to try crimes against international law in national courts, so it would not be difficult to find one. And that would still be a long ways from establishing that the US freely uses incendiary weapons against civilians.

Let’s just push the boundaries from “incendiaries, therefore nerve and mustard gas” a little in both directions: “gunpowder, therefore nuclear weapons”. If you’re going to depart the empirically-based world the “progressive” political elements are fond of claiming as their own, go big. An open mind shouldn’t be a complete vaccuum.

I haven’t moved any goalposts. Parts of the targeting process are to reconnoitre the target, including taking into account different levels of human activity at different times of day, and to vet targets with JAG lawyers. So when I write “knowingly targeted”, I implicitly mean the burden to safeguard noncombatants has been discharged - the targeter has positively affirmed that noncombatants are *unlikely* to be present irrespective of the features of the landscape (eg. a built-up area may be uninhabited and unused). I don’t mean the attacker can plead ignorance by omitting to do his homework.

>but that one was really weak, don’t ya think

What is weak is the inference that because the US continues to use weapons which it has customarily used for 40 (fuel-based incendiaries) to 70 (WP) years, that it would resort to using unequivocally banned weapons which it hasn’t used since 1918 and has been systematically destroying. Whatever reliance you may have placed on principles such as “weight of evidence” seems to have deserted you.