Nerve Gas May Have Harmed Troops, Scientists Say

[cal04]

Scientists working with the Defense Department have found evidence that a low-level exposure to sarin nerve gas — the kind experienced by more than 100,000 American troops in the Persian Gulf war of 1991 — could have caused lasting brain deficits in former service members.

Though the results are preliminary, the study is notable for being financed by the federal government and for being the first to make use of a detailed analysis of sarin exposure performed by the Pentagon, based on wind patterns and plume size.

The report, to be published in the June issue of the journal NeuroToxicology, found apparent changes in the brain’s connective tissue — its so-called white matter — in soldiers exposed to the gas. The extent of the brain changes — less white matter and slightly larger brain cavities — corresponded to the extent of exposure, the study found.

Previous studies had suggested that exposure affected the brain in some neural regions, but the evidence was not convincing to many scientists. The new report is likely to revive the long-debated question of why so many troops returned from that war with unexplained physical problems. Many in the scientific community have questioned whether the so-called gulf war illnesses have a physiological basis, and far more research will have to be done before it is known whether those illnesses can be traced to exposure to sarin. The long-term effects of sarin on the brain are still not well understood.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/17/us/17sarin.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin

[Christa]

1. Why am I not surprised?

:cry:

[madrchsod]

2. no shit..they needed a study?

[fed-up]

6. 16 years later finally more answers-here is old DoD news briefing and other testimony

October 22, 1996
http://www.fas.org/irp/imint/bb961022.htm

Turning to Khamisiyah, our investigations of the demolitions that occurred at the Khamisiyah ammunition storage dump in March of 1991, have been proceeding over the summer. We stated when we first announced that we believed chemical munitions had been present when U.S. troops destroyed the bunkers at Khamisiyah, that this was going to be a complex puzzle, and that we would be trying to put the pieces together over time. That turns out, if anything, to have been an understatement. Khamisiyah and the events that occurred there are proving to be quite challenging for us. At the same time, we are learning a lot, and we're going to continue to try to learn a lot.

We have previously announced that we were going to attempt to contact troops who may have been in the vicinity of Khamisiyah, and today we are announcing that the effort to do that is going to be expanded to approximately 20,000 U.S. troops who were within a 50 kilometer radius of Khamisiyah -- the exact number I believe is 20,867. That's not an exact number, of course, but that's the best approximation we have right now.


..snip
http://scholar.lib.vt.edu/VA-news/VA-Pilot/issues/1996/vp961023/10230473.htm
GULF WAR GAS VICTIMS MAY EXCEED 20,000 PENTAGON WARNS THAT NUMBERS COULD RISE

The Pentagon said Tuesday the number of U.S. soldiers who may have been exposed to chemical agents during the demolition of the huge Khamisiyah Iraqi weapons depot in 1991 now may top 20,000, rather than the 15,000 it had estimated a few weeks ago.

The revision came after authorities discovered battlefield logs from the period suggesting that U.S. soldiers may have been involved in another major demolition in the area that could have affected thousands more U.S. troops as far as 30 miles away.

Pentagon officials previously said they were concerned about two explosions, which took place when U.S. Army engineers blew up the Khamisiyah weapons depot in southern Iraq on March 4 and March 10, 1991.

The Pentagon said Tuesday that U.S. troops may have blown up a third site within ..



then the numbers rose to over 100,000 exposed


http://veterans.house.gov/hearings/schedule106/nov99/11-16-99/ngwr.htm
November 16, 1999
Testimony of Paul Sullivan
Executive Director National Gulf War Resource Center

Before the House Veterans’ Affairs Committee
Subcommittee on Health &
Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations

Similarly, the demolition of Iraqi chemical warfare agent stockpiles, the use of depleted uranium ammunition, and the presence of other toxins could very well represent the world’s largest friendly fire incidents all rolled into one never-ending conflict.

Today, the NGWRC urges Congress, based on new information released by the Department of Defense (DoD), to reexamine the utility of current research and benefits laws that have failed to adequately address Gulf War veterans’ illnesses.

The mission of the NGWRC is very narrow: request our government to determine why so many of our comrades are ill and disabled, to provide medical treatment to those in need, to provide compensation to the disabled, and to learn from mistakes made in the Gulf War so that future toxic exposures and illnesses may be reduced or prevented.

...snip

II. NGWRC Position on the Need for Research and Treatment

The NGWRC is here today to re-state our justifiable anger and strong disappointment at the Pentagon for failing to admit earlier that PB pills cannot be ruled out as associated with some of the illnesses reported among Gulf War veterans. The DoD has possessed this information for years. Gulf War veterans have been aware since 1991 due to our battlefield experience with PB.

The military remains, for the most part, unresponsive to calls by Gulf War veterans for more research and treatment, not only on PB pills, but on other matters, including oil well fire particulate matter, depleted uranium radioactive toxic waste, the anthrax vaccine, and low-level chemical warfare agent exposures, among others.

..snip

In 1993, Congress funded research on inhaled, ingested, and imbedded depleted uranium (DU). DU is a radioactive toxic waste used as ammunition. However, the DoD chose to research only imbedded DU shrapnel. The NGWRC urges Congress to investigate the failure of the Pentagon to research inhaled and ingested DU in accordance with Section 271 of PL 103-160, enacted on November 30, 1993.

On April 15, 1999, Bernard Rostker, in his dual role as Undersecretary of the Army and the Special Assistant for Gulf War Illnesses, was asked by the NGWRC to conduct research on inhaled DU. Rostker publicly refused, saying there was "no need" to conduct research on inhaled DU.

In a 1999 report prepared for DoD, RAND recommended more research into depleted uranium. Several peer-reviewed, published research reports from the Armed Forces Radiobiology Research Institute (part of DoD), recommended research into the possible links between cancer and depleted uranium. The NGWRC asks Congress to hold hearings on how Bernard Rostker and Army Colonel Eric Daxon may have undermined the intent of Congress. The NGWRC believes objective, independent research on inhaled and ingested DU must begin soon.


..snip
Attachment #1: NGWRC Position on the Required Use PB Pills

The NGWRC is not testifying today to cast blame on the individuals who may be responsible for the decision to take the pills, the failure to keep records, or the failure to launch research on PB pills when veterans first began experiences problems.

The NGWRC is not here to debate the issue of human rights and the Nuremberg Code prohibiting the use of experimental drugs on unknowing participants. The NGWRC position remains clear: the use of PB is a mistake, and the possible adverse effects have been well documented and accepted – with the notable exception of the DoD.

...

In August 1990, Iraq invaded Kuwait, and U.S. troops were deployed to the region. The military learned that Iraq was armed with the same chemical warfare agents (some supplied by U.S. and other nations) that Iraq had previously used against Kurds inside Iraq, including soman, sarin, cyclosarin, mustard, and others.

In late December 1990, the DoD requested a waiver from the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) so the military could order U.S. troops to take investigational new drugs (INDs), including PB pills. The use of PB pills was needed because Iraq was able to obtain dual-use technology and equipment as well as pre-cursor chemicals from the U.S. and other nations needed to manufacture weapons of mass destruction.


..snip
In December 1994, the Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee sounded a loud alarm on the PB pills. Many non-DoD scientists, including James Moss, a former Department of Agriculture scientist, claimed there may be a problem associated with the use of PB pills at the same time other toxins were present.

Led by Senator John Rockefeller, the panel’s staff reached a firm conclusion that

… pyridostigmine bromide pretreatment makes individuals more vulnerable to other nerve agents, such as VX and Sarin.

Sarin, cyclosarin, and mustard agents were released into the air as a result of post-cease fire demolitions efforts by U.S. troops, including two such incidents at Khamisiyah, Iraq on March 4 and March 10, 1991. Many others remain under DoD investigation.

Shortly after Senator Rockefeller’s report was released, the DoD and VA began additional medical research into the PB pills, with total appropriations of $20 million since 1994. This is commendable, yet DoD failures between 1990 and 1994 cost years of precious time for Gulf War veterans seeking answers and treatment.

More disturbing information was released in April 1996, as research conducted by Mohamed Abou-Donia at Duke University was published in New Scientist to

… suggest that an anti-nerve gas pill taken by many of the troops may have interfered with the body’s natural defenses against the toxic effects of an insecticide and an insect repellent they routinely used to protect against disease-carrying flies and mosquitoes. A year ago, the researchers reported that chickens exposed to relatively low levels of all three chemicals developed nerve damage. Last week … the researchers outlined a possible mechanism behind the damage.

There were other official warnings, too. Later in 1996, the National Academy of Science’s Institute of Medicine, in their report, "Health Consequences of Service During the Persian Gulf War," found

A third hypothesis that there were synergistic reactions among some combination of PB pesticides, and insect repellents used by the troops. It has been known for many years that the simultaneous or sequential administration of two anti-AchE drugs can have an additive or even synergistic effect.

And then there were more warnings in 1996, as the Presidential Advisory Committee on Gulf War Veterans’ Illnesses concluded

Ongoing federally funded studies should help the scientific community draw conclusions about the synergistic effects of PB and other risk factors.

Congress continued working on the issue of PB pills, and in August 1998, the Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee, under the leadership of Chairman Arlen Specter and Senator John Rockefeller, published a scathing report on Gulf War illnesses, confirming

DoD kept no records to document who took PB and how much was taken despite FDA’s requirement to do so. DoD believes that about 250,000 personnel took at least some PB during the deployment.

… PB may also interact with pesticides and potentially create adverse health effects at lower doses of these agents, although the health consequences of such multiple exposures are unknown.




and another one on depleted uranium

https://www.mvrd.org/ref_library/depleted%20uranium.htm

1 of 42 DOCUMENTS


Copyright 2005 The Hartford Courant Company
Hartford Courant (Connecticut)

July 22, 2005 Friday
5 NORTHWEST CONNECTICUT/SPORTS FINAL EDITION



and PBS's frontline whitewash of Gulf War Syndrome

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/syndrome/etc/script.html
FRONTLINE
Show #1607
Air date: January 20, 1998
The Last Battle of the Gulf War
Written, produced and directed by Jon Palfreman

NARRATOR: Everyone wanted to know what happened. Khamisiyah was a large Iraqi ammunition storage depot that allied troops blew up in March, 1991, shortly after the war ended. Days before the demolition, at least three intelligence leads raised the possibility that the site might contain chemical weapons. But the Pentagon says they were lost in the fog of war. So thinking it was a conventional weapons site, the Army blew it up and moved on. There were no confirmed chemical detections and no medical symptoms reported. The site was forgotten.

A few months later, in October of '91, Khamisiyah was visited by a United Nations inspection team. They found parts of the site heavily contaminated with sarin. They also found an empty U.S. Army explosives crate. Since whoever destroyed the site might have been exposed to sarin, the U.N. passed on its findings to U.S. authorities. The Pentagon investigated, but dismissed the possibility that U.S. troops had been involved. Now, five years later, Congress wanted to know why.

Rep. CHRISTOPHER SHAYS: Oh, it's clearly a cover-up. I mean, I have no reluctance in saying that. I might have earlier on, but after 11 hearings, everything that we've learned we've had to pull out of DoD.

NARRATOR: The Pentagon claimed it was all an innocent mistake.

Dr. BERNARD ROSTKER, Ph.D., DoD Special Assistant, Gulf War Illnesses: There was no cover-up. No one who was at Khamisiyah had any indication, any inkling that they were dealing with chemical weapons, either during the period they were rigging the site for demolition or after it blew up. ((B*LLSH*T))

[whistle]

3. Who dispersed sarin nerve gas during the Gulf War?

[fed-up]

5. The troops were NOT told there were chemical munitions even though the Pentagon knew

they were there. They were left over old stockpiles some given to Saddham by the US.

[fed-up]

4. Their CO's told them that their sensors were giving "false positive" readings

My baby brother celebrated his birthday at Khamisiyah while the toxic munitions were being blown up. He was told at the time that the readings on the chemical sensors they had were "false positives".

*(^$*&^$(*& ing LIARS



from the story:

"For more than five years after the explosions at Khamisiyah, the Pentagon denied that any American military personnel had been exposed to nerve gas. Confronted by new evidence in 1996 and 1997, it acknowledged that up to 100,000 troops might have been in the path of the plume and exposed to low-level doses that produced no immediate effect. In 2002, it released a report saying the exposures had been too low to have caused a long-term adverse effect on health."