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[dankir]

Ooouf those pics of the dead kids...
fucking cowards whoever did this.

 

[Vincent Alexander]

Jeez...this is a fucked up world. Wish I had more to contribute.

 

[TheRedSnifit]

Could you provide evidence for your assertions? I'd be more than glad to engage with them, if you're willing to make the effort.

as for depleted uranium, yes, it is worse. Dear fucking gods, is it worse. No comment on other sorts of AP rounds, you're the one introducing that argument, so i've no particular desire to engage with it.

Do keep in mind that "which weapon is worse" is just a side argument, tho, limited unto itself.

Okey dokey

It evaporating quickly is only a plus if you believe that inhaling fumes is perfectly safe. Sarin fumes can still kill via skin exposure, by the way,

Sarin is the most volatile of the nerve agents. This means it can easily and quickly evaporate from a liquid into a vapor and spread into the environment. People can be exposed to the vapor even if they do not come in contact with the liquid form of sarin.

. . .

A person's clothing can release sarin after it has come in contact with sarin vapor, which can lead to exposure of other people.

. . .

Even a small drop of sarin on the skin can cause sweating and muscle twitching where sarin touched the skin.
Exposure to large doses of sarin by any route may result in the following harmful health effects:

Loss of consciousness
Convulsions
Paralysis
Respiratory failure possibly leading to death

https://emergency.cdc.gov/agent/sarin/basics/facts.asp

and in urban areas it can take days to dissipate.

Although sarin dissipates quickly, the area won't be safe to enter without protective equipment for months, he warns.

”The danger that there's a little pool, even though it's highly volatile, and it's going to be causing symptoms in your soldiers. If you had gas masks, you could go in hours afterwards."

http://globalnews.ca/news/806057/ga...oes-syria-have-and-what-does-it-do-with-them/

[note: That means it's too dangerous to go in without full body gear for several hours]

Nobody does chemical warfare because poison gasses are shitty weapons against enemy soldiers, who carry special gear for the occasion.

This is pretty common sense, I don't understand what's hard to get about it. Military commanders have indeed considered the possibility of chemical attacks and train/equip troops to deal with it. Whereas most civilians do not own gas masks or have the training to properly use them, let alone full hazmat suits that can protect against nerve agents.

Even in WWI, when they were still figuring out how to deal with chemicals, it was largely ineffective.

Although gas claimed a notable number of casualties during its early use, once the crucial element of surprise had been lost the overall number of casualties quickly diminished. Indeed, deaths from gas after about May 1915 were relatively rare.

It has been estimated that among British forces the number of gas casualties from May 1915 amounted to some 9 per cent of the total - but that of this total only around 3% were fatal. Even so, gas victims often led highly debilitating lives thereafter with many unable to seek employment once they were discharged from the army.

In large part this was because of the increasing effectiveness of the methods used to protect against poison gas. Gas never turned out to be the weapon that turned the tide of the war, as was often predicted. Innovations in its use were quickly combated and copied by opposing armies in an ongoing cycle.

http://www.firstworldwar.com/weaponry/gas.htm

It did have a nasty tendency to blow into nearby towns and villages though.

No comment on other sorts of AP rounds, you're the one introducing that argument, so i've no particular desire to engage with it.

Mmm.

Know what's also pretty bad? high penetration rounds given to infantry with very little training engaged in urban warfare.

Yeah, it's bad in the sense that all weapons are bad. Comparable to chemical weapons though?

as for depleted uranium, yes, it is worse. Dear fucking gods, is it worse.

That's a really long-winded way of saying "Uranium is a toxic heavy metal." Like, uh, lead. And tungsten. And most other things bullets are made of.

As for the radiation hazards, the World Health Organization did a pretty exhaustive study regarding their use in the former Yugoslavia:

Conclusions drawn by the mission from the currently available scientific data:
1. Depleted uranium is only weakly radioactive and emits about 40% less radioactivity
than a similar mass of natural uranium.
2. Scientific and medical studies have not established a link between exposure to
depleted uranium and the onset of cancers, congenital abnormalities or serious toxic
chemical effects on organs. Caution has been expressed by some scientists who would
like to see a larger body of independently (i.e. non-military) funded studies to confirm
the current viewpoint.
3. Soldiers, particularly those at the site of an attack, are the most likely to have inhaled
uranium metal and oxides in dusts and smoke. It is likely that the general population
would not have encountered this form of transmission pathway or, at the very worst,
only in very isolated instances.
4. The presence of minute quantities of plutonium in the depleted uranium used in
Kosovo was reported by UNEP on 16 February 2001 (press release). UNEP has
stated that ‘these newest findings on the composition of the depleted uranium only
lead to a minor change in the overall radiological situation and therefore should not
cause any immediate alarm'.
. No convincing evidence is available to indicate any health impacts to the Kosovo
population associated with the use of depleted uranium.
6. The health and population information systems presently available in Kosovo do not
permit the reliable identification of any changes in disease frequency in the
population.
7. The present health information system, in spite of the best efforts of many people, is
fragmented and inadequate. In particular, for non-communicable diseases the health
information system does not exist. The comprehensive collection and continuing
statistical analysis of all forms of recorded illnesses must be re-established swiftly
and implemented in all health institutions in the same way. Without a functioning
health information system it will not be possible to discern with certainty any health
trends in the future, mediated by whatever cause.
8. There are a variety of responses to the claims of health impacts from depleted
uranium in Kosovo, and no communication strategy that involves all relevant players
is in place. Decisions on health screening, environmental monitoring, the type of
analyses and treatment to be given to the data collected, which results to distribute
and to whom, and how to issue that information, are being taken separately by
different agencies and military groups. These different initiatives and pieces of
information provided separately by each of these groups add confusion to the present
situation.
9. Unnecessary speculation and anxiety about the potential for risks from depleted
uranium, which, from what the mission can judge so far, are not present or minimal,
are being fuelled by the different opinions expressed as a consequence of the normal
process of scientific debate, as well as by the lack of a common communication
strategy.
10. The presence of high levels of lead in people in the Mitrovicë/Mitrovica region and
the absence of efficient measures to reduce the long-term exposure to lead, together
with the alarmingly high rate of traffic-related deaths, both observed by the mission,
require urgent attention by UNMIK and other organizations. The unlikely health
effects of depleted uranium exposure, if any, are much smaller in comparison to these
causes of death or incapacity.

DU rounds also, as you know, have a perfectly valid use as an anti-armor round. Considering ISIS and friends do operate armored vehicles, there's an actual reason for its use.

But I dunno, maybe the WHO is lying and it's actually worse than a nerve gas that's useless against soldiers and extremely lethal to civilians?