US admits it used napalm bombs in Iraq

So let me guess, again, US, throwing napalm as a method for "seeking peace", or another system against the Brutal VX gassing of saddam, but whait who are those who are paying all of this�? INNOCENT CITIZENS !
And the worse, is that we will get people on this thread saying that the napalm was just for the troops, and that they didn�t kill any civilian, destroy the entire place, or kill the ecosystem.....



US admits it used napalm bombs in Iraq
By Andrew Buncombe in Washington
10 August 2003


American pilots dropped the controversial incendiary agent napalm on Iraqi troops during the advance on Baghdad. The attacks caused massive fireballs that obliterated several Iraqi positions.

The Pentagon denied using napalm at the time, but Marine pilots and their commanders have confirmed that they used an upgraded version of the weapon against dug-in positions. They said napalm, which has a distinctive smell, was used because of its psychological effect on an enemy.

A 1980 UN convention banned the use against civilian targets of napalm, a terrifying mixture of jet fuel and polystyrene that sticks to skin as it burns. The US, which did not sign the treaty, is one of the few countries that makes use of the weapon. It was employed notoriously against both civilian and military targets in the Vietnam war.

The upgraded weapon, which uses kerosene rather than petrol, was used in March and April, when dozens of napalm bombs were dropped near bridges over the Saddam Canal and the Tigris river, south of Baghdad.

"We napalmed both those [bridge] approaches," said Colonel James Alles, commander of Marine Air Group 11. "Unfortunately there were people there ... you could see them in the [cockpit] video. They were Iraqi soldiers. It's no great way to die. The generals love napalm. It has a big psychological effect."

A reporter from the Sydney Morning Herald who witnessed another napalm attack on 21 March on an Iraqi observation post at Safwan Hill, close to the Kuwaiti border, wrote the following day: "Safwan Hill went up in a huge fireball and the observation post was obliterated. 'I pity anyone who is in there,' a Marine sergeant said. 'We told them to surrender.'"

At the time, the Pentagon insisted the report was untrue. "We completed destruction of our last batch of napalm on 4 April, 2001," it said.

The revelation that napalm was used in the war against Iraq, while the Pentagon denied it, has outraged opponents of the war.

"Most of the world understands that napalm and incendiaries are a horrible, horrible weapon," said Robert Musil, director of the organisation Physicians for Social Responsibility. "It takes up an awful lot of medical resources. It creates horrible wounds." Mr Musil said denial of its use "fits a pattern of deception [by the US administration]".

Rest of the article:

news.independent.co.uk...

Is anyone really surprised by this?? I doubt it. Americans have never been known to follow the rules or tell the truth. However, in this case, as they didn't sign the treaty, they did not break any rules. "All is fair in love and war," I guess, but what a horrible way to go.

This is a case where there were probably better ways to destroy the enemy, but the generals were looking for the "psychological effect" as stated in the article...still, fairly digusting conduct ethically speaking.

The Pentagon said it had not tried to deceive. It drew a distinction between traditional napalm, first invented in 1942, and the weapons dropped in Iraq, which it calls Mark 77 firebombs. They weigh 510lbs, and consist of 44lbs of polystyrene-like gel and 63 gallons of jet fuel.

Officials said that if journalists had asked about the firebombs their use would have been confirmed. A spokesman admitted they were "remarkably similar" to napalm but said they caused less environmental damage.

But John Pike, director of the military studies group GlobalSecurity.Org, said: "You can call it something other than napalm but it is still napalm. It has been reformulated in the sense that they now use a different petroleum distillate, but that is it. The US is the only country that has used napalm for a long time. I am not aware of any other country that uses it." Marines returning from Iraq chose to call the firebombs "napalm".

Mr Musil said the Pentagon's effort to draw a distinction between the weapons was outrageous. He said: "It's Orwellian. They do not want the public to know. It's a lie."

There you go. they didn't lie, they just changed the brand name.


Edited: Just added the rest. Really sums the whole thing up, doesn't it?

[Edited on 11-8-2003 by zed]

Zed,

hahaha, same shoe different pile. there shouldn't be any surprise though, this is the way the American governmetn operates. Lies, lies, lies, misdirection, lies.

"A 1980 UN convention banned the use against civilian targets of napalm, a terrifying mixture of jet fuel and polystyrene that sticks to skin as it burns. The US, which did not sign the treaty, is one of the few countries that makes use of the weapon. It was employed notoriously against both civilian and military targets in the Vietnam war."

Like Lukefj said we technically we didn't do anything wrong, we never signed the treaty so the use of Mark 77 was ok. Trust me, if you see an outpost or whatever get napalmed and then go look at the destruction and victims, you will certainly sh!t your pants, it does have a good "psychological effect" on the enemy and that's exactly why we used it.

War is hell! There is NO nice bombs.

We already have a thread on that subject.

www.abovetopsecret.com...

According to international law, the use of Napalm against individuals without adequate cover constitute a crime against humanity because of the "unnecessary suffering" they bring. To top it off, that "unnecessary suffering" was precisely what the criminal monsters intended : "psychological impact". The US did not sign the Napalm ban, but Napalm is nevertheless a weapon banned by the UN (and by 99% of the nations on earth, the exceptions are, as always the axis of evil Iran, Iraq, DPRK, plus Israel and USA). What is funny (or sad) about the story is that the US attacks Iraq with banned weapons because of inexistent Iraqi banned weapons ???





[Edited on 11-8-2003 by Mokuhadzushi]

Originally posted by Mokuhadzushi
We already have a thread on that subject.

www.abovetopsecret.com...

According to international law, the use of Napalm against individuals without adequate cover constitute a crime against humanity. The US did not sign the Napalm ban, but Napalm is nevertheless a weapon banned by the UN (and by 99% of the nations on earth, the exceptions are, as always the axis of evil Iran, Iraq, DPRK, plus Israel and USA). What is funny (or sad) about the story is that the US attacks Iraq with banned weapons because of inexistent Iraqi banned weapons ???

Don't give me the "we didnt sign it thus it's legal" line .. Hitler or Saddam didnt sign anything outlawing genocide or use of chem. weapons either.



[Edited on 11-8-2003 by Mokuhadzushi]

The U.S. did NOT use real Napalm. The stuff they used is technically NOT banned by UN.

The fact is, it was Napalm, whether it was slightly modified or not, it produces the same results through the same process with slightly different ingredients. If that helps you sleep at night, fine, but don't try and pass it off as a different weapon, it is very much the same.

They used "fuel/gel mixture", an improvement of Napalm. The UN bans incendiary devices, thus the exact term is irrelevant. By the way the UN also bans weapons which kill by oxygen consumption, and i think the US did sign that other protocol (but there, im not 100% certain)

It's also interesting to note that over 40.000 gallons of Napalm were used in GW1, enough to wipe a middle-sized town off the surface of earth...




[Edited on 11-8-2003 by Mokuhadzushi]

"Don't give me the "we didnt sign it thus it's legal" line .. Hitler or Saddam didnt sign anything outlawing genocide or use of chem. weapons either."

Mokuhadzushi, you can't compare our few napalm uses in Iraq to the crimes that were committed by Hitler and Hussein. We had a "legitimate" reason to use the napalm, what Hitler and Sad'am did to their people was far more worse and lacked reasoning for their actions.

Far worse, i dont know .. if 10.000 people die a horrible death (just a speculation for napalm use in GW1) or if Saddam gasses 10.000 kurds (or 50.000? i dont know).. is the same type of horror, and the same magnitude. Even the motivations are the same :"psychological impact"...

Mutilator,

i'm not sure there was a "legitimate" reasonf or it's use. There were other, "more ethical," options that were ignored. The Americans resorted to fighting terror with terror...silly. The repercussions will be felt on American soil.

I still haven't gotten over all that 'looting'

The only difference is we napalmed our enemy, who were fighting back at us. Sad'am and Hitler attacked and killed defenseless innocent people. So in my opinion, the innocent and defenseless people what were gassed and burned under the hands of Hitler and Sad'am's regimes had it worse then the Iraqi extremists that were napalmed when fighting back against US troops.

Originally posted by Midnight Mutilator
The only difference is we napalmed our enemy, who were fighting back at us. Sad'am and Hitler attacked and killed defenseless innocent people. So in my opinion, the innocent and defenseless people what were gassed and burned under the hands of Hitler and Sad'am's regimes had it worse then the Iraqi extremists that were napalmed when fighting back against US troops.

Who is talking about Hitler? You can't use him to justify any actions in Iraq.

Originally posted by Midnight Mutilator
The only difference is we napalmed our enemy, who were fighting back at us. Sad'am and Hitler attacked and killed defenseless innocent people. So in my opinion, the innocent and defenseless people what were gassed and burned under the hands of Hitler and Sad'am's regimes had it worse then the Iraqi extremists that were napalmed when fighting back against US troops.

First of all, where did you get that term "Iraqi extremists" ? These were regular, loyal Iraqi soldiers. And they didnt attack the US... the US attacked them. That is important to notice. Also Napalm was used right at the beginning of the war, to "impress" the Iraqis with air strikes against bridges, and other strategic targets...

It remains a crime against humanity, even if it was used against soldiers, and even if it was used for "psychological purposes".

Lukefj we were in a state of war. During war, we can use any weapon at our disposal, regardless of the reasons of going to war. The US generals felt it necessary to use napalm so there isn't too much we can do about it. We never signed the UN treaty so it wasn't "breaking the rules."

maynardsthirdeye what are you talking about? I'm not using Hitler to justify the war in Iraq; I was simply making a comparison to Mokuhadzushi's post.

Mutilator,

if you look above you will see that the US did break several UN resolutions by using the "Napalm." I wonder how your tune would change if an Iraqi soldier made ti into the US and ignited a bunch of Napalm ina busy metropolitan area..hmmmmm, or a bridge full of people??

I doubt you would use the same argument, that they were in a state of war so they can use any means necessary. How about the "supposed" biological weapons...can they use those? What about nuclear weapons...those too? Under your logic that's fine.

It's fine as long as it's not in your back yard I guess.

[Edited on 11-8-2003 by Lukefj]

"During war, we can use any weapon at our disposal, regardless of the reasons of going to war."

Yes you "can" but don't be surprised that the use of these weapons at your disposal is interpreted as war crimes by most of humanity, especially as you attacked the Iraqis which didnt intend harm on the US, and that there will be trials on crimes against humanity as a consequence of that...



[Edited on 11-8-2003 by Mokuhadzushi]