US army blocks aid convoy for Falluja

[CHIMO]

The US military has prevented an aid convoy from reaching the besieged city of Falluja, a doctor based in Baghdad who accompanied the convoy says.

"The Iraqi ministry of health asked us to go to Falluja. When we were on our way, the US army stopped our convoy, and carried out a search," said Dr Ibrahim al-Kubaisi.

"There is a terrible crime going in Falluja and they do not want anybody to know. I transferred four injured people from the Jordanian field hospital to a hospital in Baghdad.

"They told me that there is a crime in there; chemical weapons are being used. The corpses don't have traces of gunshots but black patches.

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/F0A47D67-7D17-4140-A992-2AEC1CF0624A.htm

[Erika]

1. Yes. Rumors have it that agent orange

is now being used just as it was in Vietnam on the population. One thing now that might bring this to light is the foreign correspondents there with knowledge.

[purduejake]

9. Oh Gawd...

If this is true, I think we will see a backlash like none other. We went in there to eliminate chemical weapons.... errr I mean to save the people and now it looks like we may be killing them with the chemical weapons we're so against.

[happyslug]

10. Agent Orange is a defoliant

Which you do not need in a Desert. Agent Orange was used to kill the Jungle undergrowth in Vietnam not people (Through people were affected).

Please remember the US for DECADES refused to sign the anti-Chemical Warfare treaty on the Grounds we wanted to preserve our right to use tear gas in war. The Treaty was proposed and signed by most countries in the 1920s, but the US did not sign it to the 1970s (For the reason stated above i.e. preserving the US right to use tear gas). When the US did sign the Treaty the Senate "reserved" the right for US forces to use Tear Gas. Tear Gas was use in Vietnam so I have complete faith it is being used in Iraq.

[in_cog_ni_to]

13. AGENT ORANGE???!!!!

Have we learned NOTHING??? Holy Shit! This is nothing less than a NIGHTMARE!

[nodehopper]

17. do you have a source for the Agent Orange info?

I am not surprised if they are using it, I just want to be able to cite it.

[nodehopper]

2. oh god.

[Erika]

3. Yes, Chemical Agents against a civilian

population that caused us no harm.

[Erika]

4. Yes, Chemical Agents against a civilian

population that caused us no harm.

[happyslug]

11. Civilians are the ideal target of Chemical Weapons

Chemical Weapons work best against people who have absolutely no defense against the Weapon. Thus Civilians have often been the targets of Chemical Warfare (For example when the Italians used Chemicals against the Ethiopians in 1936).

Against troops (or even civilians) with minimal protection (Basically only a gas mask), the effectiveness of Chemicals drop. The drop is substantial. The best way to show the extent of the drop in effectiveness is that if you have a choice between using chemicals against troops armed with just masks (No protective suits and the troops are carrying the masks not wearing the masks) and conventional high explosives against the same troops. Using the High Explosives would cause more damage.

In planning warfare since WWI (When Chemicals were first used in the modern era) the above fact is the main reason chemicals are not used. Even the most minimal protection lowers the effectiveness of Chemical weapons. The main reasons why Chemicals are used is either to force the other side into their Chemical suits (Thus restricting their activities), or eliminating unprotected people (Mostly Civilians but can also be troops).

Now Chemicals can be effective but only against entrenched troops whose maneuverability is other wise restricted. For example Omar Bradly commented that had the Germans used Chemicals on Omaha Beach on D-day we would have lost the beachhead. Our troops were already pinned to a restricted area, the Germans had protection against chemicals in their entrenchments, our troops would have been massacred. Similarly when the Germans planned to storm Leningrad (Before and now St. Petersburg's) during WWII, the Germans planned to use Chemicals to wipe out the trenches surrounding the City (knowing this will also kill most of the Civilians in the City). The Germans knew they would have the ability to maneuver and thus avoid the Chemicals (Mostly by waiting for the chemicals to dissipate), while the Russians would have to withstand the chemical attack so to be able to defend against the subsequent infantry Attack. The Russians by having their backs against the wall of Leningrad had no place to maneuver to avoid the effects of the Chemicals.

Chemical Warfare is useless against an enemy who can maneuver and thus avoid the Chemicals. Chemical Warfare is useless against an enemy who can close in with you before you can detect him, (as in the Vietcong during the Vietnam War). Chemical Warfare is almost as useless against an enemy who has "Gas masks" even if the masks are old and out of date (Unless you can restrict the maneuverability of those troops by some other means).

Given the nature of the Present Iraqi War I doubt the US is using Chemicals. The Resistance movement has never stood and fought (and thus opening themselves up to a sustain attack). The Resistance groups have continue to fight everywhere and no where. Unless the US decides to eliminate the "Sea" the Guerrillas "Fish" is living in, chemical warfare is useless.

For you people who do not what I mean by "Fish" and "Sea", that is to the comment of Mao, who said a Guerrilla must be like a Fish is a Sea of supporters. The Fish must swim in that sea, he can not survive without that sea. What I meant by the US eliminating the Sea is to eliminate the supporters of the Guerrillas. One way is to Gas areas of Support as Saddam allegedly did. Just eliminate the "Sea" by killing everyone off. Hopefully the US will not adopt such a policy but other countries have done it is the past (and the US practices it via Concentration Camps during the Civil War).

[dttk0009]

5. Wow...

I hope to God this isn't true. But it just makes so much sense. Why ELSE won't they let anyone in there?

[Emillereid]

6. Where is the outcry? Where is the United Nations? The French or Germans?

Is there no force in the Universe that can at least protest this barbarism?

I don't think we've evolved one bit as a species for all our so called civilization. We are nothing more than the beasts we fear!

[Erika]

7. No. We're Not

But at least I can say that I fought against this attack on an innocent people as hard as I could. I don't possibly know what the Republicans can tell themselves. That's their problem. But they have a heck of a lot of explaining to our kids who died there as well as Iraqi innocents. It's on their conscience. They want to get serious about God. Now is the time they should do so.

[Briar]

8. Where is Sistani and the Shi'a?

Letting the US do their ethnic cleansing for them?

[0007]

14. Don't worry the outrage will be coming!

http://www.thecouriermail.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5936,11389206%5e1702,00.html

More... AN Iraqi Red Crescent aid convoy waiting at the edge of Fallujah will not be allowed to enter the city centre today, a US Marine officer said.

"They will not be allowed to cross the bridge today," Captain Adam Collier told Reuters at Fallujah hospital, where the convoy is waiting to cross the Euphrates river into the main part of the embattled Iraqi city. He cited security reasons.

The Iraqi Red Crescent sent seven trucks and ambulances to Fallujah yesterday, hoping to get food, blankets, water purification tablets and medicine to hundreds of families trapped inside the city during the past six days of fighting.

To enter the city proper, the convoy will have to pass over one of two bridges spanning the Euphrates. US forces have said that those bridges remain unsafe, even though the military has said it has taken almost full control of Fallujah.

"We don't know when the bridge will be open for civilian traffic," Capt. Collier said.

Red Crescent officials, who are also trying to get aid to thousands of families who fled Fallujah ahead of the offensive and are now sheltering in nearby towns and villages, said they would wait in Fallujah's hospital until they could go in.

"We will wait for permission and we will stay here tonight," Jamal al-Karbouli, the leader of the convoy, said.

Those trapped inside the city, whose population was put at about 300,000 before the offensive but has fallen to around 60,000 according to some estimates, say they are reaching a point of desperation.

"Our situation is very hard," said one resident contacted by telephone in the central Hay al-Dubat neighbourhood. "We don't have food or water. My seven children all have severe diarrhoea.

"One of my sons was wounded by shrapnel last night and he's bleeding, but I can't do anything to help him," he told Reuters.

[nodehopper]

18. love the Orwellian title of the article: troops HELPING convoy, are they?

[fraud08]

12. more WAR CRIMES to hang them on - n/t

peace

[Supersedeas]

15. Any irony in the use of chemical weapons??? Where is the U.S. press?

[nodehopper]

16. I'm sure they are using chem weapons but where is the Agent Orange info

from?