I happened to come across this article when I was looking for something else on The Independent's Web site. The white phosphorus story seems to be getting more attention overseas than it is in the US, and for that reason is worth following by anyone interested in US public diplomacy. What really struck me as interesting about this article, though, is that it gives an unusually comprehensive picture of Pentagon and US embassy officials responding to a news story -- not always in step with one another -- and a frank statement about how reporters and editors at one publication wound up feeling about the quality of information they received from US government sources.
"The Fog of War: White Phosphorus, Fallujah and Some Burning Questions," by Andrew Buncombe and Solomon Hughes (in Washington) - The Independent (UK), 15 Nov 2005
The controversy has raged for 12 months. Ever since last November, when US forces battled to clear Fallujah of insurgents, there have been repeated claims that troops used "unusual" weapons in the assault that all but flattened the Iraqi city. Specifically, controversy has focussed on white phosphorus shells (WP) - an incendiary weapon usually used to obscure troop movements but which can equally be deployed as an offensive weapon against an enemy. The use of such incendiary weapons against civilian targets is banned by international treaty.
The debate was reignited last week when an Italian documentary claimed Iraqi civilians - including women and children - had been killed by terrible burns caused by WP. The documentary, Fallujah: the Hidden Massacre, by the state broadcaster RAI, cited one Fallujah human-rights campaigner who reported how residents told how "a rain of fire fell on the city". Yesterday, demonstrators organised by the Italian communist newspaper, Liberazione, protested outside the US Embassy in Rome. Today, another protest is planned for the US Consulate in Milan. "The 'war on terrorism' is terrorism," one of the newspaper's commentators declared.
The claims contained in the RAI documentary have met with a strident official response from the US, as well as from right-wing commentators and bloggers who have questioned the film's evidence and sought to undermine its central allegations.
While military experts have supported some of these criticisms, an examination by The Independent of the available evidence suggests the following: that WP shells were fired at insurgents, that reports from the battleground suggest troops firing these WP shells did not always know who they were hitting and that there remain widespread reports of civilians suffering extensive burn injuries. While US commanders insist they always strive to avoid civilian casualties, the story of the battle of Fallujah highlights the intrinsic difficulty of such an endeavour.
It is also clear that elements within the US government have been putting out incorrect information about the battle of Fallujah, making it harder to assesses the truth. Some within the US government have previously issued disingenuous statements about the use in Iraq of another controversial incendiary weapon - napalm.
Following the RAI broadcast, the US Embassy in Rome issued a statement which denied that US troops had used WP as a weapon. It said: "To maintain that US forces have been using WP against human targets ... is simply mistaken." In a similar denial, the US Ambassador in London, Robert Tuttle, wrote to the The Independent claiming WP was only used as an obscurant or else for marking targets. In his letter, he says: "US forces participating in Operation Iraqi Freedom continue to use appropriate, lawful and conventional weapons against legitimate targets. US forces do not use napalm or phosphorus as weapons."
However, both these two statements are undermined by first-hand evidence from troops who took part in the fighting. They are also undermined by an admission by the Pentagon that WP was used as a weapon against insurgents.
In a comprehensive written account of the military operation at Fallujah, three US soldiers who participated said WP shells were used against insurgents taking cover in trenches. Writing in the March-April edition of Field Artillery, the magazine of the US Field Artillery based in Fort Sill, Oklahoma, which is readily available on the internet, the three artillery men said: "WP proved to be an effective and versatile munition. We used it for screening missions ... and, later in the fight, as a potent psychological weapon against insurgents in trench lines and spider holes ... We fired 'shake and bake' missions at the insurgents using WP to flush them out and high explosive shells (HE) to take them out...."
In the aftermath of the battle, the State Department's Counter Misinformation Office issued a statement saying that WP was only "used [WP shells] very sparingly in Fallujah, for illumination purposes. They were fired into the air to illuminate enemy positions at night, not at enemy fighters." When The Independent confronted the State Department with the first-hand accounts of soldiers who participated, an official accepted the mistake and undertook to correct its website. This has since been done.
Indeed, the Pentagon readily admits WP was used. Spokesman Lt Colonel Barry Venables said yesterday WP was used to obscure troop deployments and also to "fire at the enemy". He added: "It burns ... It's an incendiary weapon. That is what it does."
Why the two embassies have issued statements denying that WP was used is unclear. However, there have been previous examples of US officials issuing incorrect statements about the use of incendiary weapons. Earlier this year, British Defence Minister Adam Ingram was forced to apologise to MPs after informing them that the US had not used an updated form of napalm in Iraq. He said he had been misled by US officials....
Also see:
"Did the US Use 'Illegal' Weapons in Fallujah?" - USINFO, US Department of State, created 9 Dec 2005, updated 10 Nov 2005 (see the note in the second para from the end)
The fighting in Fallujah, Iraq has led to a number of widespread myths including false charges that the United States is using chemical weapons such napalm and poison gas. None of these allegations are true.
Qatar-based Internet site Islam Online was one of the first to spread the false chemical weapons claim. On November 10, 2004, it reported that U.S. troops were allegedly using "chemical weapons and poisonous gas" in Fallujah. ("US Troops Reportedly Gassing Fallujah") It sourced this claim to Al-Quds Press, which cited only anonymous sources for its allegation.
The inaccurate Islam Online story has been posted on hundreds of Web sites.
On November 12, 2004, the U.S. Department of Defense issued a denial of the chemical weapons charge, stating:
"The United States categorically denies the use of chemical weapons at anytime in Iraq, which includes the ongoing Fallujah operation. Furthermore, the United States does not under any circumstance support or condone the development, production, acquisition, transfer or use of chemical weapons by any country. All chemical weapons currently possessed by the United States have been declared to the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) and are being destroyed in the United States in accordance with our obligations under the Chemical Weapons Convention."
To its credit, Islam Online ran a Nov. 25, 2004, story carrying the U.S. denial....
In both stories, Islam Online noted that U.S. forces had used napalm-like incendiary weapons during the march to Baghdad in the spring of 2003. Although all napalm in the U.S. arsenal had been destroyed by 2001, Mark-77 firebombs, which have a similar effect to napalm, were used against enemy positions in 2003.
The repetition of this story on Islam Online’s led to further misinformation. Some readers did not distinguish between what had happened in the spring of 2003, during the march to Baghdad, and in Fallujah in November 2004. They mistakenly thought napalm-like weapons had been used in Fallujah, which is not true. No Mark-77 firebombs have been used in operations in Fallujah....
[O]n Nov. 28, 2004, the UK’s Sunday Mirror inaccurately claimed U.S. forces were "secretly using outlawed napalm gas" in Fallujah.
The Sunday Mirror story was wrong in two ways.
First, napalm or napalm-like incendiary weapons are not outlawed. International law permits their use against military forces, which is how they were used in 2003.
Second, as noted above, no Mark-77 firebombs were used in Fallujah.
The Sunday Mirror’s phrasing "napalm gas" is also revealing. Napalm is a gel, not a gas. Why did the Sunday Mirror describe it as a gas?
It may be that, somewhere along the line, a sloppy reader read the inaccurate New York Transfer News headline, "Resistance Says US Using Napalm, Gas in Fallujah," and omitted the comma between napalm and gas, yielding the nonsensical "napalm gas...."
Finally, some news accounts have claimed that U.S. forces have used "outlawed" phosphorous shells in Fallujah. Phosphorous shells are not outlawed. U.S. forces have used them very sparingly in Fallujah, for illumination purposes. They were fired into the air to illuminate enemy positions at night, not at enemy fighters.
[November 10, 2005 note: We have learned that some of the information we were provided in the above paragraph is incorrect. White phosphorous shells, which produce smoke, were used in Fallujah not for illumination but for screening purposes, i.e., obscuring troop movements and, according to an article, "The Fight for Fallujah," in the March-April 2005 issue of Field Artillery magazine, "as a potent psychological weapon against the insurgents in trench lines and spider holes …." The article states that U.S. forces used white phosphorous rounds to flush out enemy fighters so that they could then be killed with high explosive rounds.]
There is a great deal of misinformation feeding on itself about U.S. forces allegedly using "outlawed" weapons in Fallujah. The facts are that U.S. forces are not using any illegal weapons in Fallujah or anywhere else in Iraq.
I left quite a bit of the State Department text out, for reasons of space. (Click through to read the original.) Even what's quoted here, though, shows how much detail the rebuttal goes into. That's actually a problem, especially when you're dealing with a technical subject. You leave yourself open to having to go back to correct or clarify something that was miscommunicated to you, or that you didn't understand correctly yourself in the rush to get a statement out on a short deadline.
More importantly, chances are good that you're missing the forest for the trees. You're dealing with a court of public opinion, not a court of law. In this case, it's not really the question of whether weapons used by the US in Fallujah were legal or not (or whether they come in gas or gel form) that upsets people. It's the idea of civilians being burned alive. That's what US public diplomacy on this story needs to address.
Added 16 Nov 2005:
"Iraq Probes US Phosphorus Weapons" - BBC News, 16 Nov 2005
An Iraqi human rights team has gone to the city of Falluja to investigate the use of white phosphorus as a weapon by US forces, a minister has told the BBC.
Acting Human Rights Minister Narmin Uthman said her staff would examine the possible effects on civilians.
The US has now admitted using white phosphorus as a weapon in Falluja last year, after earlier denying it.
The substance can cause burning of the flesh but is not illegal and is not classified as a chemical weapon.
The BBC's Caroline Hawley in Baghdad says it will be some time before the human rights team reports back.
The US had previously said that white phosphorus had been used only to light up enemy positions.
BBC defence correspondent Paul Wood says having to retract its denial is a public relations disaster for the US....
A Pentagon spokesman, Lt Col Barry Venable, confirmed to the BBC the US had used white phosphorus "as an incendiary weapon against enemy combatants" - though not against civilians, he said.
He said earlier denials had been based on "poor information".
Washington is not a signatory to an international treaty restricting the use of the substance against civilians.
San Diego journalist Darrin Mortenson, who was embedded with US marines during the assault on Falluja, told the BBC's Today radio programme he had seen white phosphorous used "as an incendiary weapon" against insurgents.
However, he "never saw anybody intentionally use any weapon against civilians", he said....
"Propaganda Nightmare of Chemical Hypocrisy," by Bronwen Maddox (Foreign Editor's Briefing)- The Times (UK), 17 Nov 2005
How damaged is the US by the row over its use of white phosphorus in Fallujah last year? On the facts available now, it is within the letter of the law, even though it has not signed the most relevant protocol on the use of the weapon.
But that assertion depends on the US claim that there were few civilians left in Fallujah by the time the assault began last November. There is strong evidence to support the US position. But conflicting reports, inevitable in the circumstances, leave room for debate, and even more for rumour.
Even if the US is right on the legality, there is no question that it has inflicted a serious propaganda blow on itself. No matter the technical explanations of how useful the chemical is in flushing out insurgents from cellars. In using a weapon notorious in Vietnam, with effects on the human body straight from a science fiction film, it has given a gift to its enemies. It is now loudly accused of hypocrisy: justifying the war partly by Saddam Hussein’s use of chemical weapons, but then using particularly nasty ones itself.
Worse: the muddle of official denials, followed by an admission of use (in a limited sense), has fuelled those who disbelieve every American assertion....
Added 18 Nov 2005:
"Chemical Reactions," by Al Kamen ('In the Loop') - the Washington Post, 18 Nov 2005 (registration required)
American ambassadors abroad -- especially those in high-profile postings -- are often called upon to defend this country against scurrilous allegations. So it was no surprise that our man in London, mega-Bush contributor Robert H. Tuttle , fired back big time when the Independent in London last week accused the military of using chemical weapons in Iraq, specifically white phosphorus.
The controversy erupted after Italy's Rai News 24 news channel repeatedly aired a documentary that alleged many civilians had been burned to death by the incendiary substance during the assault on Fallujah a year ago. (Hey, doesn't our pal Silvio Berlusconi , the Italian prime minister, own Rai?) "These reports are not true," Tuttle wrote in Tuesday's editions of the Independent. "Had your correspondents acted responsibly," he wrote, "by checking these assertions either with the U.S. Embassy or with the Department of Defense, they would have learned the truth."
What's more, "U.S. forces do not use napalm or white phosphorus as weapons," Tuttle said in his first major foray into diplo-battle since arriving this summer. He noted that there's nothing wrong with using white phosphorus as "smoke screens and for target-marking" or flares, just not as weapons.Alas. That same day, Lt. Col. Barry Venable , a Pentagon spokesman, was acknowledging in Washington that white phosphorus had been used at times during the fighting in Fallujah last year as an incendiary weapon -- though civilians had not been targeted. Defense officials of course could not rule out the possibility that civilians may not have been hit accidentally.
An article written by three of the soldiers in the Fallujah battles in a recent issue of Field Artillery magazine discussed their use of white phosphorous.
Venable, according to British news accounts, said a denial of the use of such weapons on the State Department's Web site had been entered more than a year ago and was based on "poor information."
Tuttle told the Times of London: "We did the best we could with the information we had, but we regret that it was not totally accurate."
The issue of white phosphorus has sparked a major flap and has been widely reported in European media, we're told -- and most likely hasn't been ignored in the Middle East, either -- but it has attracted virtually no attention in this country.
Behold the Geneva Convention.
Please pass the preceding link around to all antiwar blogs you frequent. The relevant excerpt is as follows:
"Protocol III - Geneva Conventions
...
Article 2.
...
2. It is prohibited in all circumstances to make any military objective located within a concentration of civilians the object of attack by air-delivered incendiary weapons."
The "White Phosphorous is not a banned munition" meme is already taking root in the print media. We must shame them into telling the truth about this.
The Ape Man
Posted by: The Ape Man | 15 November 2005 at 06:28 PM
Une fois qu'on atteint ce nombre 144000 (Apocalypse14: 1) le saint secret de dieu arrivera à terme, cet ancien système du monde dirigé par Satan et ses hommes disparaîtra, le royaume au ciel de Jéhovah dirigera aussi notre terre, le paradis s'installera sur la terre, les justes posséderont la terre et sur elle ils résideront pour toujours (Psaumes37: 29, Matthieu5: 5, Proverbes2: 21, Isaîe11: 9, Ecclésiaste1: 4, Isaîe45: 18 )... Le royaume céleste de Jéhovah dirigé par Jésus Christ est le seul espoir pour la terre entière, face à ce système diabolique planétaire défaillant en toute sorte. Très bientôt, il dirigera notre terre. Il y aura 144000 rois (reines) choisis par dieu parmi les êtres humains qui règnent avec Jésus Christ au ciel après ses morts, ils(elles) dirigeront la terre, Jésus Christ est le roi de ces rois... Comme la fin de ce monde dirigé par Satan€$£ et ses militaires6 ainsi que ses peuples5 tombe bien à notre ère, donc, il faut oser à dire par tout le moyen à tous les humains que: ce qui ne font pas la volonté de dieu Jah et ce qui ne croit pas au sacrifice de Jésus C. pour nous délivrer mourront à Har-Maguédon (Apocalypse16: 16)... Pourquoi l' indépendance à Jah n'est pas bonne? Parce que lors de la rébellion d'Adam, Eve et Satan contre Jéhovah notre dieu créateur,ils ont choisi de ne pas dépendre de dieu, alors que: dieu Jah les laisse se diriger entre eux sans intervenir pour prouver s'il est vraiment bon ou mauvais de ne pas dépendre de lui "ou" de ne pas suivre sa parole (ses conseils). Les conséquences de cette désobéissance (indépendance) est donc: la mort, la maladie, la haine, la tuerie6, l'égoïsme de certains dirigeants, l'hypocrisie de la religion... Les conséquences de cette épreuve d' indépendance (qui a eu lieu sur notre terre) est très importante à démontrer à l égard des anges du ciel et des êtres humains aussi voilà pourquoi dieu Jah n' a pas tué Satan, Adam et Eve sur le champs. Cette fois, la façon dont Jéhovah dirige ses créatures était remise en cause une fois pour toute, dieu Jah est notre créateur donc c'est lui seul connaît ce qui nous fera du bien ou du mal surtout pas Satan, il occupe aussi la bonne place pour nous conseiller (diriger) Voici mes adresses mail pour contact anonyme: carnage6.net@hotmail.fr, jesuschrist-est-notre-sauveur@example.com, sixchaque6.monde@hotmail.com, cyclique-infini6.monde@hotmail.com
Je conseille à tout le monde de lire ces 2 site pour savoir qui est le maître de ce monde d' actuel?, top secret...:
1-http://art-engage.net/Comme-avant.html
2-http://www.syti.net/SilentWeapons.html
sixchaque6.monde@hotmail.fr
"Crains le vrai dieu et garde ses commandements. Car, c' est là toute l' obligation de l' homme" Ecclésiaste 12: 13
Posted by: X X X X X X | 07 July 2008 at 10:13 AM
What is that guy talking about?
Posted by: Liposuction | 06 January 2009 at 05:57 PM