Could Obama and Brown be guilty of War Crimes?

Could Obama and Brown be guilty of War Crimes?
Even possibly Mass Genocide?

Tomorrow we see Ex Prime Minister Tony Blair face the Iraq Inquiry in London but there is much more to this than the reasons for going to war. We have seen repeated violations for those privileged to be in office and yet War Crimes are carried out on almost a daily basis. As it stands at the moment one could say with great confidence that the respective leaders, Secretary of Defence, Foreign Minister and Chiefs of staff etc have and continue to commit War Crimes against humankind.

As far as the previous regimes are concerned that implicates George Bush, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, Condoleezza Rice and many others and on this side of the pond Tony Blair, Gordon Brown, Bob Ainsworth, John Hutton, Des Browne, John Reid, Geoff Hoon, George Robertson, David Miliband, Margaret Beckett, Jack Straw, Robin Cook etc However, in regard to Robin Cook I feel that although he carried such an important responsibility he never agreed with the war and resigned after going to war in Iraq on moral and ethical grounds.

The list doesn’t simply stop there we also have to implicate all the NATO countries, their leaders and staff and last but not least Israel which has totally abused the vast array of evil weapons that is contained in its arsenal.

We have to fully understand that many of todays so called conventional weapons are in actual fact WMD’s as they contain uranium components. Many other weapons used were also totally illegal under the terms of their usage. So what does constitute a war crime and furthermore mass genocide?

Every leader and their senior staff members are fully aware of every stage of a conflict or war. They are briefed on a regular basis on all aspects of the war, including the logistical support i.e. what is being sent and associated costs etc all of which are vetted by all those in senior positions including the Chancellor. It all comes with the title and you have to take full responsibility if you become involved or implicated in any wrong doing.

Today we see Gordon Brown host yet again another conference on Afghanistan and as he stipulates this will be a decisive year. What exactly is meant by this statement is anyone’s guess but for sure this year is going to be a blood bath. What I find incredibly is the fact that if one is loosing a war or if there is a risk of loosing you immediately put more troops in without delay or you do a phased pull out. Now we see another surge planned but there appears to be no rush to do this.

Obama says he’s putting another 30,000 troops into Afghanistan for this surge which has yet to take place but what will this mean? We also again see a change of tact in that both sides now admit they have to talk to the Taliban, possibly employ them and put some in government.
We must all fully understand that the Taliban are still holding the cards and control a vast majority of the country. They may be poorly equipped by comparison to the coalition forces but they are relatively young hardened fighters that know their country better than the invading forces and have an unbelievable spirit to endure the impossible. In all such conflicts the local militias have always been a force to deal with and in the main are never defeated.

Normally in the winter months such militias are keeping a low profile but this winter has been one of their most active. This is a clear warning to the west that soon the spring will be upon us and this is when the Taliban mobilize into a significant force. Regrettable the coalition forces will sustain very heavy losses this year and could almost double that of 2009. We can also see such a fighting forces over in north Yemen that despite the superiority of the Saudi armed forces and the continues aerial bombardment by both the US and Saudi Air Force the Saudi only a few weeks ago lost 82 troops and 21 are missing.

I have always believed that we in the west have to change our “Iron Fist” foreign policy and pull out of this game. Bring all the troops home and close all bases on Islamic soil. Once this has been done terrorism as we know it today will cease. Then we have to learn to negotiate and trade with the Middle East and not try to take their resources, control their markets and totally change our foreign policy. Unfortunately the US must take the majority of blame by implying they are the police of the world. Secondly when there is any regional conflict it should be dealt with by those involved and the adjoining countries and not by the west that in general have no understanding of the complexity of tribal groups or their religion.

I would ask the question why a conference on Afghanistan is being held in London with a strong US and NATO presence. Why isn’t such a conference being held in Iran, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan Uzbekistan or Pakistan with the exclusion of the US, UK and EU……why do we always have to control such events when we have no feelings or understand on how such countries think…..its really does show signs of colonialism or imperialistic greed.

So back to the topic….are all these western leaders and senior politicians guilty of warm crimes or mass genocide…..the answer is clearly yes. If one chooses to use a weapon that could be considered to be a WMD’s then you are in breach of the UN, the Geneva Convention and the Nuclear Non Prolific Treaty. So where have these weapons been used, where are they currently being used and by whom?

We have to turn the clocks back to the mid 1940’s when during atomic weapons testing the authorities realized the potential of creating radioactive nanoparticles aerosols that could be released over the battlefield.

A vital memo giving details of their evil intentions was worded as per below. It must be clearly understand that back in 1943 nuclear experts were discussing the advantages of using fine dust as a weapon. One such document was issued on the 30th of October 1943 which quoted: “It is recommended that a decision be obtained from competent authority authorizing additional work pertaining to the use of radioactive materials in order that this country may be ready to use such materials or be ready to defend itself against the use of such materials”. This same document contained information as follows:

2 As a gas warfare instrument the material would be ground into particles of microscopic size to form dust and smoke and distributed by a ground-fired projectile, land vehicles, or aerial bombs. In this form it would be inhaled by personnel. The amount necessary to cause death to a person inhaling the material is extremely small. It has been estimated that one millionth of a gram accumulating in a person's body would be fatal. There are no known methods of treatment for such a casualty.

Two factors appear to increase the effectiveness of radioactive dust or smoke as a weapon. These are: (1) It cannot be detected by the senses; (2) It can be distributed in a dust or smoke form so finely powdered that it will permeate a standard gas mask filter in quantities large enough to be extremely damaging. This document gave the background to today’s weapons that are not only highly effective in there ability to penetration deep into the target but also the pyrophoric qualities of this product allows it to ignite spontaneously and create a huge cloud of fine DU dust that becomes a lethal airborne aerosol. I have a copy of this memo.
So now the scene was set for these crazy minded scientists to develop the weapons that we see today. They have all been re categorized as conventional weapons when in actual fact they are clearly WMD. So how do today’s weapons violate the Geneva Convention?

The use of Depleted Uranium (DU) was condemned in 2000 by experts from Germany namely Prof. Dr. Albrecht Schott and Prof. Dr Siegwart Horst Gunther. In their submission to phohibit DU they stated - Given the known chemical and radioiogical toxicity of depleted uranium and its compounds causes damage to humans, animals and the ecological cycle, of which there is conclusive evidence we demand that the military and civilian use of depleted uranium (DU) be banned. “The preservation of creation and the dignity of humankind forbid the use of DU. The Invasion of DU, and the compounds produced by its self-ignition due to heat, into the soil and water cycle of Iiving communities, and the environment we live in, make them uninhabitable for thousands of years (the half-life of uranium is 4.5 billion years; uranium forms long-term radiologically dangerous decay products) “.
Legal references were made in this submission as follows: The military use of DU violates current international humanitarian law, including the principle that there is no unlimited right to choose the means and methods of warfare (Art. 22 Hague Convention VI (HCIV); Art. 35 of the Additional Protocol to the Geneva Convention (GP1); the ban on causing unnecessary suffering and superfluous injury (Art. 23 §le HCIV; Art. 35 §2 GP1), indiscriminate warfare (Art. 51 §4c and 5b GPI) as well as the use of poison or poisoned weapons). The deployment and use of DU violate the principles of international environmental and human rights protection. They contradict the right to life established by the Resolution 1996/16 of the UN Subcommittee on Human Rights. Wo demand the following individual points:

1. A ban an the use, development, production, transport, storage and possession of DU weapons and DU armour-plating, as well as all other military uses of DU.
2. Medical treatment of all victims of DU, in particular children.
3. Destruction of all DU weapons and means of its deployment and secure storage of the uranium in a stable chemical compound.
4. A ban on the civilian use of DU because of accidental future, past or present exposure fo uranium or its compounds.
5. Decontamination of all military and civilian equipment contaminated by DU.
6. Decontamination of all territory contaminated by DU. This not only means theatres of war but also military practice ranges and other areas where DU has been deployed.
7. Conversion of the global stocks of DU in the form of Uranium Hexafluoride, approx. 2-3 million tons, from its presently insufficiently stable form into a stable Uranium Oxide and safe deposition.
8. Punishment of the military use of DU as a war crime (in accordance with Art. 85 §3b GP1; Art. 6b IMT Statute; Art. 2c, 3a and b ICTY Statute; Art. 8 §2b Statute of Rome).
9. Eradication of consequential damage caused by DU use according to customary liability principles in international (humanitarian) law.
10. Creation of a centre for the worldwide documentation of all DU contaminated regions, in particular theatres of war, military practice ranges, scenes of accidents, etc., and to study the DU problem.

As you can see these so called conventional weapons clearly do violate almost every aspect of the above listed. It was also interesting for me to read another report by Leuren Moret. US Expert Leuren Moret in her article: DEPLETED URANIUM
THE TROJAN HORSE OF NUCLEAR WAR (8 July 2004) gives a full account of all the issues relating to DU. Lauren’s contribution in the fight against DU is exemplary and I urge you all to read the above article in full as well as many other articles she has produced. In the above article she makes reference to the follow: ILLEGAL UNDER INTERNATIONAL LAW- Four reasons why using depleted uranium weapons violates the UN Convention on Human Rights:

LEGALITY TEST FOR WEAPONS UNDER INTERNATIONAL LAW
Temporal Test - Weapons must not continue to act after the battle is over.
Environmental Test - Weapons must not be unduly harmful to the environment.
Territorial Test - Weapons must not act off of the battlefield.
Humaneness Test - Weapons must not kill or wound inhumanly.
I have so many other documents from both military and civil sources that clearly say that there is no safe level of uranium and therefore any type of uranium that is allowed to enter our atmosphere (including low level radiation) in any form is totally against the Geneva Convention.

We can now look as to where and when these evil weapons were first used in the battlefield. Most people would be shocked to learn that it was Israel who first used them extensivley (with the assistance of US Military experts) during the Yom Kippur War(October 1973). The IDF has used these weapons almost continuously since this date in all areas of conflict with significant use during the Lebanon 2006 conflict and again during Cast Lead on Gaza in 2008/9. One must also remember that these weapons would have been fired within Israel territory on a test basis and also during IDF exercises.

We then turn to the US, UK and NATO forces use of such weapon in the Balkans in 1995 and finally on to Kuwait, Iraq, Afghanistan, Lebanon, Gaza and Pakistan. It would also appear that such weapons have been used in Somalia and now in Yemen. Because these WMD’s weapons are totally indiscriminate and do not recognize international borders they have the ability to drift all over the globe. There can sometimes be huge clouds of nanoparticle aerosols floating around in the earth’s atmosphere and it only takes one particle to enter your lung and start the process. We must further understand that we are talking here about millions of nanoparticles off each weapon.

It makes one feel acutely sick to know that a few select people in high places have known the consequences of such weapons and the magnitude and levels of contamination both within a given conflict area and beyond. They would have known that this could be classified as a massive depopulation tool that is totally indiscriminate and could well contaminate the country that implemented its usage. As an example when Israel used them in Lebanon and Gaza it was also contaminating its own Israeli population, land, crops and water supply.

So there you have it…..we know where the products are made, who exports them and who uses them. We know all the countries involved or implicated i.e. US UK, NATO countries, not forgetting Israel. We know all the Presidents, Prime Ministers, Senior Members of Government and Chiefs of Staff etc.

These countries have already caused immeasurable suffering and death in the Balkans. They have killed the genetics of Iraq and soon probably Afghanistan, they have contaminated Lebanon and Gaza and as a result of their actions that have contaminated adjacent countries and states such as the Punjab etc. They have also carried out the greatest crime of all and that is to contaminate their own troops and their own populations. The IDF latest conflict in Gaza is a classic example which is still on going. Only this week I again see pictures of badly disfigured babies being born in the Gaza Hospital. In Fallujah and Basra women are scared to have a child.

Maybe you the jury can now reach a verdict? Are all of the above listed countries guilt of war crimes, mass genocide or both? From my perspective they certainly are. I would repeat a comment I have made so many times before – What is the reason for the existence of the United Nations? And why do with have a person allocated within the UN to deal with such terrible atrocities – Francis Deng Special Adviser for the Prevention of Genocide whom I have notified and who does nothing?

Only the ordinary people in this world can turn this around….it will take much courage and you may loose many friends on the way who think you are insane. It’s entirely up to you. Remember when you look into that sweet face of your child or grandchild ask yourself, “How can I leave them this legacy” Be strong and Bless you all.
Peter Eyre – Middle East Consultant – 28/1/2010