Irony: US using chemical weapons in Iraq?
 

The United States went to Iraq to stop the current regime from storehousing, using, selling, or otherwise having any kind of weapon of mass destruction. A WMD is any device designed to kill indiscriminately. In a huge twist of irony, I found this out.
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Video Footage: WARNING THIS IS EXTREMELY GRAPHIC.


Discuss!

Isnt that just one of those cases were they say:

"we did to them, to prevent them of doing it with us first... since they have this kind of technology it is trully fair game to use such military weaponry aganst them; As it quickens the process of ending the war and avoids further unnecessary death of both innocents and american troops"


Its sorta like "we kill faster to kill less" or saying that in that area there is plutonium, so its fair game to use a atomic bomb... even if the people you are using against dont have whats is needed to make ir, launch it or aperate such bomb...

I mean... really... you cant make WMD's on a house basement... if the US knows this technology, them it knows what is needed to produce it... mostly laboratories and factories... so it really is a matter of bombimg THOSE instead of civilan cities... even if those cities DO hide the people who knows how to make them and wants to use them... if they cant, they wont...

Unless the military actually belives that there are hundreds of underground secret missile factories that they cant find like if it was a freakin james bond movie...

Of course, im being a little too much of a "rantie" right now... but sometimes its looks like that military strategy and knowledge used in Iraq only makes sense for those who actually are deciding about it...

Incidentally, all of the chemical weapons and the WMD's that Iraq had, We (the United States) gave to them.
So it is some sort of SUPER irony that we use these weapons on these people. Lord Almighty, I mean if you watched the video...good God, I actually wretched.

Well, White Phosphorus, the way it was used in Falujah, is no less conventional than napalm. Every ammunition consists of chemicals. Bullet consist of lead, which you can find in the Mendeleev's table. Will you call AK 47, which uses lead bullets and gunpowder gases a chemical weapon?
Chemical weapons in my understanding are PHosgene, Sarin, Ipryte, etc. Compounds that can be cheaply manufactured, spread over a large area where they will affect most people (like WWI gas barrages or Sadamd use of chemical weapons). White phosphorus would make poor WMD: too expensive to produce in amounts necessary for MD, too hard to spread, etc.

That is the problem with media. They look at small things like white phosphorus while at the same time ignore the fact that USA stormed Falujah "Groznyj-style" - leveling the city together with those who did not flee. Media does not care that artillery shells killed way way way more people than white phosphorus. Artillery shells are boring - everyone knows what they are... Those will get poor ratings. They need something chemicaly sounding like white phosphorus. Journalists know nothing about chemistry and will not be able to tell what it is anyway. Nor will most of viewers.

I bet we shall soon have a story about how US troops poison Iraquis with dihydrogen monooxide - a known cancer agent by the way!


But we shall not hear about creeping barrages turning cities and their inhabitants in messesof sand, concrete and blood.

Try to see the fact that the usage of White Phosphorus was not really something that the US military was telling everyone they did and do... such as the media were talking about this like if it was a huge secret of war... and it kinda is...

Its not about the stuff that we find out its beeing done... its about imagining all the stuff that is done and we never know about...

Psycological warfare if you may...

But this thread is just about the irony... theu US gives weapons, then it acuses them of having these weapons, and because they belive that no one should have this weapons, they use this weapons agains them...

In a simplistic nutshell, thats about it

Yes, yes, despicable, horrible, etc, etc.

But -- and here's the important part -- why should we care? As a speech and debate teacher would say, "What's the impact of this story?" Does revealing this information change opinons about the war? Should it? Does this call for new legislation, impeachment of elected and/or appointed officials, or simply a court-marshaling of those involved?

The Democrats have a very hard time impacting anything. The attitude is closer to "Hey! Hey, yeah, over here! Dude, you see what these jerk-offs did? Isn't that totally lame? What a bunch of turd-sandwiches."

Hell, half the time they forget to call for an expulsion of Republican politicians when making a point of news events like this -- they expect the people to put together everything for themselves, which is a completely baseless expectation, that suggests a rather serious disconnect with reality on the part of the Democrats, and speaks to their larger absense of any cohesive, over-aching ideology which should bind their party and sub-ideologies together into an election-winning, Republican-ass-kicking machine.

Oh, and, btw, it also just makes for better forum posts/discussions if you impact the news story, rather than just say "discuss" (I'm sure I'm guilty of this very crime, but as a (master) debater, I should know better, and I generally try not to)

So, give us an impact, so we have some meat to sink our virtual teeth into.

This look conventional to you
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v6...low/napalm.gif
how bout this
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v6...jah_phosph.jpg
that was a woman!


War is death and war is murder, we are talking about the use of white phosphorus here and the irony of that. I also fail to see what your point is about the use of weapons here, I am talking about SLAUGHTER. I am also talking about WMD's which kill indiscriminately, which WP falls under that category.

And I fail to see HOW there is no impact here.
Also, Its Up to discuss and debate which is what we are doing, make a valid point.

And they also did not announce what model of mortar charges US forces are using.
Where oil for machinery US army uses is produced, by what company, what brand.
They did not give us detailed maps with locations of airstrikes.
They have not flashed blueprints of every piece of machinery US forces use in Iraq, etc.
White Phosphorus was used in a tactical situation. It was not something US army could have planned in advance.

US government cannot tell us everything. As long as US government was not actively trying to conceal the fact of usage of White Phosphorus, we cannot accuse them of dishonesty.
It is media in a rich bored western nation we are talking about. They see huge secrets of war in everything. Mass media is an unreliable source of infirmation, especialy when they are talking about something that gives them ratings.
And I am talking about AK-47 bullets that kill tens of thousands each day in africa.
Should I post pictures of bodies disfigured by bullet fire? There are plenty. I have one here right now with juicy brains on the wall. It wasn't even AK, it was a 9mm pistol.
Or should I post pictures of fragments of WWI soldiers after artillery shells burst next to them? I can find some way more gruesome than what you've shown here.
Those are conventinal WEAPONS.
Weapons KILL. Hell, that is why they are produces and bought for enormous amounts of money. After all, political power comes out of the barrel of the gun.
About "killing indiscriminately", I suggest you re-read my post, part of which you have quoted. When USA stormed Fallujah, WAY more civilians were killed by artillery fire (as I said, Grozny-style attack). And believe me, a lot of those deaths were no less gruesome than the ones you've displayed here. War is hell. Be prepared to see hellish images.

Every nation, as well as United Nations, accepts high-explosive artillery shells as conventional weapons. Those are no less indiscrimenate than White Phosphorus.


Now, if those were actual WMDs you would not see the pictures. Why? Because journalists would run away from the area. A conventional bomb hits a house and kills 10 people inside. A chemical weapon goes off in a large city and killes 100000. And there will be no journalists to take pictures till the poison is gone.
A nuclear bomb small enough to fit in a truck going off in New York can kill millions. THAT is what WMDs.


Conventional weapons make tragedies. WMDs make statistics...

The problem with the media is it doesn't report facts. It reports news. There's a difference. News is subjective, its presentation reflects the presentor's biases. As pointed out above, there's probably tons of facts not reported.

SpacePope, posting images for shock value doesn't make your thoughts any more factual. The first picture was from the Vietnam War, and the second one was probably Iraq. I'm not entirely sure what you're trying to present. That military hardware causes deaths? Well, yeah, that's kind of the point. That war is highly unpleasant? Again...yeah, that's the entire point of it.

Now to the actual newspost...Fallujah razed to the ground? Yeah...I don't think so. A major city that was a hotbed for conflict and strife, where the major (biased) news outlets of the world watched and reported every US casualty with all the glee of a lawyer following an ambulance, suddenly razed to the ground without a peep to any media outlet in any country? I'm skeptical to say the least.

Is WP an incenidary? Yep. Is it used in Iraq? Wikipedia says yes:

"Yes, it was used as an incendiary weapon against enemy combatants. When you have enemy forces that are in covered positions that your high explosive artillery rounds are not having an impact on and you wish to get them out of those positions, one technique is to fire a white phosphorus round into the position because the combined effects of the fire and smoke - and in some case the terror brought about by the explosion on the ground - will drive them out of the holes so that you can kill them with high explosives."

But again, to call it "razing the city to the ground" seems a bit on the extreme.

Oh, and its been around since World War 2 and is credited with the defeat of many entrenched Nazi Bunkers. This is not new SpacePope. Stop acting like its OMG THOSE DAMN REPUBLICANS ARE SANCTONING CHEMICAL WEAPONS?!!!! You want to bash them for poor planning, yeah I can live with that. Poor funding/logistics? Sure. Poor reasons? That's debatable. But for using chemical weapons? You mean like how its been used in every major US conflict since WW2? Yeah, no.

(Also according to wikipedia, WP is used mostly as a screening agent, and is regarded as the best screening agents known to man. Further more, they are not classified as chemical weapons according to the UN.)

Nick: I actually agree with your points. Explosives and Bullets kill more than chemical weapons for sure. What I am trying to get at is that the United States used a pretext to enter Iraq, and have our men die there. They are also on the same hand using the derivatives of the pretext in the combat. THAT is what I am talking about. Not the weapons of war, which are also devastating and horrible.
Rayerlin:
The point is to highlight that both chemicals have been labeled as inhumane and the use of Napalm was outlawed in the 80's. While white phosphorus has yet to be banned there are several groups out to see that it is.
Precedent is no reason to keep a terrible evil around. They used mustard gas in WW1, was that okay?
Also, the bold part, I never said that, Ummm...You don't have to be a member of any party to think that something that bad should be legal.


OH and About wikipedia, where you say that it isn't a chemical weapon.....

White phosphorus (weapon)
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This article is about the military applications of white phosphorus. For more general information, see Phosphorus.

White phosphorus is a common allotrope of the chemical element phosphorus which has found extensive military application as an incendiary agent [1], smoke-screening agent, and as an antipersonnel flame compound capable of causing serious burns[2]. White Phosphorus (WP) bombs and shells are essentially incendiary devices, and can be used in an offensive anti-personnel role against enemy troop concentrations. It is used in bombs, artillery shells, and mortar shells which burst into burning flakes of phosphorus upon impact. White phosphorus has been described as a chemical weapon, but it has a long history of use in warfare for both offensive and target-marking purposes. It is commonly referred to in military jargon as "WP". The Vietnam War era slang "Willy(ie) Pete", "Willy(ie) Peter", or "Whiskey Pete" is still occasionally heard.

Chemical properties of Phosphorus
Article of The effects of Phosphorus on people.Italian reporter EYEWITNESS accounts.

I can see how it might be okay if it was fired away from people, but exposure to the dust that it throws up, people 300Ft away can and do get scorched by it, and if you touch the dust, your skin will also burn. Something that can kill after the initial explosion, which bullets cannot, neither can bombs. (discounting injuries and fire..Ie. if you get shot you can bleed to death or a building could collapse from a bomb, or the bomb could be unexploded and explode later, but this is obvious.) If it can kill when it is lying on the ground, then it's a chemical weapon. And again, that is what I am talking about, should it be made a chemical weapon?