Originally published December 7 2005
Controversy surrounds U.S. military's use of white phosphorus in Falluja
by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, NaturalNews Editor
The Pentagon has admitted that white phosphorus was used by the U.S. military in the attack on Falluja last year, and now debate rages whether this ammunition qualifies as a chemical weapon.
The admission contradicted a statement this week from the new and clearly under-briefed US ambassador in London Robert Holmes Tuttle that US forces "do not use napalm or white phosphorus as weapons".
The official line to that point had been that WP, or Willie Pete to use its old name from Vietnam, was used only to illuminate the battlefield and to provide smoke for camouflage.
The article, written by a captain, a first lieutenant and a sergeant, was a review of the attack on Falluja in November 2004 and in particular of the use of indirect fire, mainly mortars.
We used it for screening missions at two breeches and, later in the fight, as a potent psychological weapon against the insurgents in trench lines and spider holes where we could not get effects on them with HE [High Explosive].
We fired "shake and bake" missions at the insurgents, using WP to flush them out and HE to take them out," the article said.
Such weapons are outlawed by the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) to which the United States is a party.
"No it's not forbidden by the CWC if it is used within the context of a military application which does not require or does not intend to use the toxic properties of white phosphorus.
The US can say therefore that this is not a chemical weapon and further, it argues that it is not the toxic properties but the heat from WP which causes the damage.
And, this argument goes, since incendiary weapons are not covered by the CWC, therefore the use of WP against combatants is not prohibited.
This prohibits WP or other incendiaries (like flamethrowers) against civilians or civilian objects and its use by air strikes against military targets located in a concentration of civilians.
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