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... GLOBAL NEWS ... NEWS not fully explain why some counties in the GULF WAR SYNDROME'S SHOCKING US TOLL US have only 100 violent crimes per undreds of pages of sworn US Senate testimony show that five years after the celebrat- 100,000 people each year, while others ed end of a war unprecedented in its toxicity, the people of Iraq are not the only have over 3,000. losers. What was first dismissed by the head of a special Task Force on Gulf War Masters analysed a wide range of statis- | Health as a disorder caused by "lack of recreation" or "alcohol deprivation" has turned out to tics, including crime figures from the FBI _|be an undiagnosable contagion striking as many as one in 10 Gulf War veterans—as well as and information compiled by the EPA on {many of their spouses and offspring. ; industrial discharges into both water and While Washington admits that some 84,000 US veterans are sick, the Gulf War Veterans Association insists that possibly double that number are "sick, disabled or dying". Often in with the highest levels of lead and man- their mid-20s or early 30s, all casualties were in top physical condition before going to the ghest reve’s . Gulf. Today, many are exhausted after a short run or a climb upstairs on errands whose pur- ganese pollution typically have crime rates pose they cannot remember. three times the national average. ; Memory loss is a common complaint among sick Gulf War veterans. So is a constellation Masters argues that when brain chemistry | of seemingly unrelated symptoms, including night sweats, weight gain, insomnia, inconti- is altered by exposure to toxic metals, any | nence, rashes, diarrhoea, bleeding gums and rectums, sensitivity to light, chronic coughs, violent urges may be difficult to restrain. _ | shortness of breath, hair loss, nausea, dizziness, blurred vision and blackouts. "It's the breakdown of the inhibition mech- For many Gulf War vets, the war is just beginning. In 1995, Washington raised the official anism that's the key to violent behaviour," death toll from 148 US combat deaths to 6,526 dead war veterans who had succumbed to a syndrome that does not officially exist. Among hardest-hit units, three out of four spouses suffer from the same debilitating symp- toms. Some wives complain that their returned husbands’ sperm burns like ammonia. In November 1995 LIFE magazine published a shocking photo-essay depicting "The Tiny PENTAGON KEEPING QUIET ON Victims of Desert Storm". Among 400 veterans’ families studied by US Senate investigators, GPS ACCURACY LIFE reported that 65 per cent of infants conceived after the war were found to have been ivilian users of the US military's Global | born with grossly displaced limbs or internal organs. Positioning System got an unexpected Potential causes of Gulf War syndrome (GWS) are multiple and synergistic. Working and tantalising treat recently. For about 19 |Uupwind from large concentrations of friendly troops, coalition forces demolished four hours on 20 April, while the US Air Force |Nuclear power plants and 27 chemical warfare production and storage sites. Along with extremely toxic oil smoke from 1,100 broken and burning oil wells, hundreds of tons of round attack aircraft missing in the Rock depleted-uranium munitions spread radioactive debris over these Middle Eastern battlefields. Mountains the satellite navigation svete, | Ofer attacks were deliberate. Early in the air war, the French Ministry of Defence detect- Ountains, the satellite navigation system | eq chemical fallout—"probably neurotoxins'—in small quantities throughout the war zone. suddenly became far more accurate than | Czech decontamination unit reported sarin and mustard gas among US positions in Saudi usual—in fact, more accurate by a factor of | Arabia. The US Department of Defense spokesperson on chemical and biological weapons 10 than the Pentagon admits it can be. old Senate investigators that 14,000 chemical-warfare alarms sounded "three times a day" GPS satellites broadcast two signals. hroughout the war. From 17 January 1991 until late the following month, more than 20 One signal is available to everyone with a | confirmed sarin and mustard gas attacks on US positions were logged by Fox ‘sniffer’ vehi- civilian GPS receiver, which is usually able |Cles and litmus-wielding sergeants. Eight soldiers were decorated for detecting "chemical agent contamination"—or for their chemically-induced wounds. —although if signals are rebroadcast from a we most glaring commonality among all GWS sufferers is the pyridostigmine bromide (PB) fixed receiver at a known location it is pos- ey were ordered to take three times a day. In the race to develop a successor to an earlier . . P soman nerve agent antidote which had caused genetic damage in humans, side-effects from sible to narrow this down even more. The |pB had crash-landed carefully screened US Air Force test subjects into hospitals with other signal is encrypted so that it is acces- | impaired breathing, vision, stamina and short-term memory. sible only to the military. The Pentagon A post-war US Army safety bulletin describes pyridostigmine bromide as "an unnecessary the atmosphere. He found that counties he claims. (Source: New Scientist, 31 May 1997) was searching for the wreckage of an A-10 to calculate location to within 100 metres claims that military GPS receivers are accu- ealth and safety hazard to soldiers, their family members (especially children), and the gen- rate to within about 20 metres, even with- {eral public". Many soldiers who took the small white tablets became sick immediately from out "differential" GPS refinement. an unlicensed drug that amplified the effects of sarin. US servicewomen who took birth con- rol pills were especially vulnerable to this experimental drug. But no one was briefed on am aa " atch" aihich ean acti PB's known side-effects, which a manufacturer's product sheet lists as "drowsiness, dizziness program called "SA Watch" which can esti- | 47 blurred vision...stomach upset, gas, headache, sweating, flushing, muscle twitching or mate the error in GPS signals—says that, | inoreased tears and saliva’. on 20 April, civilian GPS receivers were | The potential liability of British, American, Canadian and Australian governments—who providing locations with an accuracy of as _ |issued PB without their troops’ informed consent—could make the US$180 million awarded little as two metres without the help of — | to Vietnam veterans exposed to Agent Orange look like parking-meter change. PB has been rebroadcasting. found by University of Mississippi researchers to be made many times more toxic by the The US Air Force Space Command, __|stress, DEET insect repellent, lindane and caffeine familiar to desert-dwelling Gls. which operates the GPS satellites, confirms The implications of bio-warfare in the Gulf could put a severe dent in the popularity of future wars. The biggest hope among ailing veterans is that coalition governments will acknowledge that something happened in the Gulf that fundamentally altered their health, personalities and lives. If they are finally heard, a dirty, secret, nearly forgotten war will become the burial ground instead of a dress rehearsal for the next germ warfare contest. (Source: © William Thomas, wilco@mail.islandnet.com) However, Stan Huntting—author of a that the usual intentional inaccuracy in the civilian signal—a feature known as "selec- tive availability"—was deactivated on 20 April, but refuses to explain why. (Source: New Scientist, 17 May 1997) NEXUS -9 GULF WAR SYNDROME'S SHOCKING US TOLL AUGUST - SEPTEMBER 1997