Quieter than bombs, Iraq's foul water also kills

[sabra]

<<SNIP>>
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/GRA143200.htm

Quieter than bombs, Iraq's foul water also kills
11 Jul 2005 15:32:27 GMT

Source: Reuters


BAGHDAD, July 11 (Reuters) - In Baghdad's Sadr City slum a pipe has burst, turning an empty building lot into a garbage- strewn mudhole. Children are gambolling in the filth, cooling from the 45 degree Celsius (115 Fahrenheit) summer heat.

A man scoops up the dirty water with a tin bucket into a tub in the back of his pickup truck to take home to his family.

Insurgent sabotage, years of neglect and a reconstruction effort halted because of violence have turned Iraq's water supply into a stinking trickle, killing Iraqis as surely as bullets and bombs. Most of those who die are small children.

"My son is suffering from dehydration," says Lamia Khudier, clutching tiny baby Akeel at Sadr City's Health Clinic Number 6.

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[Mari333]

1. Let freedom reign! freedom is on the march! Bring it on!

Bush war killing kids, where are the "pro lifers" now? Oh..the kids are the wrong colour.

[warrens]

2. Gag. I hope that smirking imbicile ends up in a SuperMax

Locked down 24 hours a day with no communication to his ongoing criminal enterprise. Just like John Gotti. Who was 10 times the man this punk is.

[Toots]

3. It's okay because Saddam is under arrest.

The world is a safer place now. Especially Iraq.

[OneBlueSky]

4. the honest-to-God, bottom line truth is . . .

we have absolutely destroyed this country . . . and are doing very little to fix it . . .

the only remaining question is "Why?" . . .

[whatever4]

6. For me

I agree with you. But for me, it's less a question of why, because I answer that one with greed. For me, it's more a question of how many Iraqi people are going to live through this, with their lives, their limbs, and their genetic material intact? It is possible that the depleted uranium could cause massive cancer and birth deformity rates, in an already compromised nation with little access to food, water and medicine, and little change in sight. Their doctors have fled. This war could kill many millions. Many of them children. Sweet faced innocent children that will never have children of their own.

That's the horror I see in the destruction of this country. Not so much the damage to buildings, but the people. At this point, they are uniformly exposed to depleted uranium. For all those that doubt the possible devestating effects, there is this recently. Notice they don't talk about depleted uranium AT ALL, though other scientists are worried about it. They have known about the dangers of depleted uranium since the 1940's, and were warned by experts *then* that it was too dangerous to use as a weapon. It works TOO well; it cannot be contained.

http://www.truthout.org/issues_05/070105HC.shtml
Panel Affirms Radiation Link to Cancer
By H. Josef Hebert
The Associated Press

Wednesday 29 June 2005

Even very low doses of radiation pose a risk of cancer over a person's lifetime, a National Academy of Sciences panel concluded. It rejected some scientists' arguments that tiny doses are harmless or may in fact be beneficial.

The findings, disclosed in a report Wednesday, could influence the maximum radiation levels that are allowed at abandoned reactors and other nuclear sites and raises warnings about excessive exposure to radiation for medical purposes such as repeated whole-body CT scans.

"It is unlikely that there is a threshold (of radiation exposure) below which cancers are not induced," the scientists said.

While at low doses "the number of radiation-induced cancers will be small ... as the overall lifetime exposure increases, so does the risk," the experts said.

[whatever4]

5. and I'm remembering

all the statements I've heard, about how we removed a dangerous dictator, and how, at least, we've "freed" them. Freed them from...water? So sad, so many people I respect said such things, how it was "right" to take out Saddam. At least then they had water. So hard to express these tangibles to some.

[Nihil]

13. It's so very sad, the way "we" have freed them ...

Freed them from water, from power, from sanitation.
Freed them from houses, from schools, from hospitals.
Freed them from jobs, from education, from medical care.
Freed them from the elderly and the newborns.
Freed them from fathers, mothers, brothers and sisters.
Freed them from limbs, from life itself.
Freed them from happiness.
Freed them from hope.

Oh, they should be so grateful for all the freedoms they've been
granted since their leader decided to stop the Kuwaitis from stealing
Iraqi oil.

[whatever4]

17. And Freed them from their future

If any sizable fraction of what the experts expect to happen, we've freed them from their future as well. Many of the children born with no apparent birth defects WILL have children with birth defects. This thing will never stop, and will grow like a slow rolling snowball just like Aids did. But, unlike Aids, there IS not fix for the genetic damage. Aids can be lived with, treated, and at the very least, exposure can be limited when it is discovered. None of this holds true for depleted uranium.

In particles microns small, it can't even be filtered with gas masks. A heavy toxic metal which is also radioactive, airborn and microscopic. For this act alone we should throw those bastards out of office. It's going to be worse than Aids. From what I can see, it has to be. But just like Aids, not enough people are saying it. Yet. GOD I hate this!!!

And they've known since the 1940's. This was intentional. Hateful. Monsters. If that is what America is, I turn in my stripes.

[reprobate]

7. I believe our gov't has intended to depopulate Iraq and take it over.

If you look at the effect (predicted) of the sanctions we imposed for a decade, two wars scattering Depleted Uranium throughout the country, and our active wars on them, including giving sadam chemical weapons to dill them with, there can be no other conclusion.

I believe that our gov't is and has been on a path to turn iraq into a possession of the United States. They have no army now, no government, little electric power, and poisonous water, with a civil war starting that will kill huge numbers of them. Then when there's no one left to fight we stip in and take over.


The one thing that wasn't planned for was the huge numbers of foreign fighters that have taken up the fight. I wonder how many more will be necessary before they can push us out of the country for good.

[Karenina]

8. It is GENOCIDE

Planned and calculated.

[XemaSab]

9. What pisses me off

is all that crap about how the troops were frolicking in Saddam's old pools on the fourth.

Oh, there's clean water for our troops to make asses of themselves, but no clean water for babies born since the beginning of the war?

[ConcernedCanuk]

15. They were frolicking in those pools right from the start

.
.
.

The spoils of war and all ya know . .





And tens of thousands of Iraqis are homeless and without decent water

The above pics are from over a year ago - don't think they just left them palaces and pools empty until the 4th.

[XemaSab]

18. MTV

Spring Break Baghdad.

[arikara]

10. Chimpy and his gang of thugs

should be sentenced to live out the rest of their lives on the streets of Fallujah.

[cambie]

11. A continuation of the strategy from 1991. Why are they still alive?

http://www.gulflink.osd.mil/declassdocs/dia/19950901/950901_511rept_91.html

[leftchick]

12. ....

:cry:

[pointless]

14. I understand

that Bush is ultimately responsible for this but you cannot ignore the fact that this is the doing of the insurgents. Sabotaging the water supply in numerous villages, Saddam leaving the system in a state of disrepair, and again the insurgents not allowing the militay to take on a helpful role to repair and rebuild the basic utility services for the Iraqi people. I guarantee that the military personnel would rather be repairing water and power lines than be shot at and bombed.

These insurgents are killing their own people this way. They are not good people and deserve to be blamed for the death of those Iraqi's just as much as Bush.

[Nihil]

16. You've overlooked a few other points though ...

The deliberate policy of withholding spare parts for the sewage works
and water processing plants during the blockade years (between GW I and
GW II).

The deliberate policy of bombing power stations and water processing
plants during the blockade years.

The deliberate policy of bombing power stations and water processing
plants at the start of "shock'n'awe".

The result of the above is that Saddam didn't have much option to
"leaving the system in a state of disrepair".

No, I do not deny that any member of the Iraqi Resistance who bombs
the water supply for Iraqis are "bad people" (i.e., doing harm to their
own people). On the other hand, destroying the water supply to the
invader's fortress known as "The Green Zone" is a legitimate act of war,
much more so than the USUK bombing of civilian targets.

[Gregorian]

19. Why is this suddenly news! This has been going on for years.

And don't forget depleted uranium.

[shradda]

20. depleted uranium -- the killer that keeps on killing...

you're right, Gregorian -- to me, that's the worst of the worst. best of all (in the ironic sense), the US Army denies the severity of the reams of cancers and other health deteriorations the US servicemen and women are coming back to America with have any link to the quantities of DU we're spreading all around Iraq. oh, and Afghanistan. oh, and they used it in the Kosovo bombings, thanks NATO allies, in the '90s.

all of these countries are hot, in terms of radiation that won't stop for, oh, four millions years or so. birth defects are up. cancers are up. neurological diseases including psychotic episodes are up, way up.