The Pentagon admits to using white phosphorous as a weapon (not simply as an illumination or smoke screen device) in Fallujah. But military spokesmen are still lying about the nature of the weapon, claiming that WP is an incendiary, not a chemical weapon.
What "incendiary" leaves clothing intact while melting flesh and bone?
They also claim that civilians were not targeted. Here you can find a picture of a woman in her kitchen who died from WP. She was far from the only civilian victim.
The above-cited ABC story indicates that the substance was used rather indiscriminately to "smoke out" insurgents from buildings. In Fallujah -- as in Vietnam, as in any situation involving popular support for irregular fighters against imperialist invaders -- any action against combatants will also target civilians.
(Since the neocons, not long ago, unapologetically embraced the "we're an empire now" concept, we may safely use the term "imperialist.")
Peter Kaiser, Chairman of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons at the Hague, has categorized white phosphorus as a chemical weapon. The United States has signed and ratified this convention; we are listed here and the State Department maintains a helpful Chemical Weapons Convention web page here.
American tax dollars have paid for the use of chemical weapons against civilians in direct violation of the convention. That much is established fact; any argument to the contrary is sophistry.
We melted civilians in order to save them.
5 comments:
I'm confused here. The government defense seems to be that:
A. WP is an incendiary device, not a weapon,
B. And, even if it were used as a weapon, it was not used against civilians,
C. And, even if it was used against civilians, the USA is not signatory to the international Conventions,
D. And, even if the USA was a signatory to the Conventions, they don't have the force of actual USA laws, and so don't have to be adhered to.
Have I got that right? Gonzales? Addington? Cheney? Anyone?
The criminality, incompetence and sheer stupidity of this Administration -- do they think the use of chemical weapons in urban areas will go unnoticed in the Arab world? - is now beyond "beyond belief". Then again, I suppose the rest of the world resides in the "reality-based community", unlike BushCo, and therefore it's of no consequence.
And to think we had an impeachment process, because somebody lied about a blowjob....
Does that mean if protestors lob a molotov cocktail they are using a chemical weapon?
Anon 8:18, gasoline (as in a MC) is clearly an incendiary weapon. I suppose that if one were forced to drink it, then it would become a chemical weapon, as in the case of Bobby Fuller, but I digress...
Fire is, of course, a chemical reaction. What is different about WP is that the "fire", or chemical reaction, is, for all intents and purposes, impossible to put out. That is what makes it a "chemical weapon."
IMHO, at least. What's yours?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phosphorus
I suggest reading this article on phosphorus in Wikipedia. However much I might agree with certain assertions here, it is important to get facts correct, to avoid giving one's critic's ammunition, eh?
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