DU Death Toll Tops 11,000
Nationwide Media Blackout Keeps U.S. Public Ignorant
About This Important Story
http://www.americanfreepress.net/html/du_death_toll.html
By James P. Tucker Jr.
The death toll from the highly toxic weapons component
known as depleted
uranium (DU) has reached 11,000 soldiers and the growing
scandal may be the reason behind Anthony Principi’s
departure as secretary of the Veterans
Affairs Department.
This view was expressed by Arthur Bernklau, executive
director of Veterans for Constitutional Law in New York,
writing in Preventive Psychiatry E-Newsletter.
“The real reason for Mr. Principi’s departure was really
never given,” Bernklau said. “However, a special report
published by eminent scientist Leuren Moret naming
depleted uranium as the definitive cause of ‘Gulf War
Syndrome’ has fed a growing scandal about the continued
use of uranium
munitions by the U.S. military.”
The “malady [from DU] that thousands of our military
have suffered and died from has finally been identified
as the cause of this sickness, eliminating the guessing.
. . . The terrible truth is now being revealed,”
Bernklau said.
Of the 580,400 soldiers who served in Gulf War I, 11,000
are now dead, he said. By the year 2000, there were
325,000 on permanent medical disability. More than a
decade later, more than half (56 percent) who served in
Gulf War I have permanent medical problems. The
disability rate for veterans of the world wars of the
last century was 5 percent, rising to 10 percent in
Vietnam.
“The VA secretary was aware of this fact as far back as
2000,” Bernklau said. “He and the Bush administration
have been hiding these facts, but now, thanks to Moret’s
report, it is far too big to hide or to cover up.”
Terry Johnson, public affairs specialist at the VA,
recently reported that veterans of both Persian Gulf
wars now on disability total 518,739, Bernklau said.
“The long-term effect of DU is a virtual death
sentence,” Bernklau said. “Marion Fulk, a nuclear
chemist, who retired from the Lawrence Livermore Nuclear
Weapons Lab, and was also involved in the Manhattan
Project, interprets the new and rapid malignancies in
the soldiers [from the second war] as ‘spectacular’—and
a matter of concern.’ ”
While this important story appeared in a Washington
newspaper and the wire services, it did not receive
national exposure—a compelling sign that the American
public is being kept in the dark about the terrible
effects of this toxic weapon. (Veterans for
Constitutional Law can be reached at (516) 474-4261.)
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