ENVIRONMENTAL EFFECTS
OF WARFARE
Consumption of resources
Toxic chemicals
Munitions dangers
Nuclear contamination
The world’s armed forces
are the number-one
polluters on Earth
In the Cold War,
the U.S. and Soviet militaries rarely
battled each other.
Yet they killed thousands of their
own soldiers and civilians through
environmental contamination.
CONSUMPTION
OF RESOURCES
• Huge amounts of energy (8% in U.S.)
• Large percentage of iron and
steel, and other metals
• Nearly half of Periphery’s debt
is from importing of arms
Military spending
United States
Russia
Japan
Britain
France
Germany
Saudi Arabia
Italy
Military spending
(billions of dollars)
China
Iraq, Iran, Libya, Syria, N. Korea
0
100
200
300
400
Our global priorities
Military
Energy efficiency
Soil erosion
Renewable energy
Actual spending
(billions of dollars)
Needed spending
(billions of dollars)
Clean water
Acid rain
Global warming
Deforestation
Ozone depletion
Land mines
0
100
200
300
400
TOXIC CHEMICALS
Chemical weapons use
Military toxic wastes
Chemical weapons disposal
Agent Orange
Chemical weapons use
Gas attacks in World War I
Iran, Iraq used gas in 1980-88 war;
Iraq gassed Kurdish minority
Chemical weapons use
Moscow
gas raid kills
121 hostages,
2002
U.S. experiments
on military
personnel and
civilians, 1950s-60s
Sarin attack in
Tokyo subway,
1995
Agent Orange defoliant
20 million gallons
of herbicides sprayed
in Vietnam War to deny
Cover to guerrillas
Also used by So. Africa
Effects of Agent Orange (dioxin)
Limited
compensation
to veterans for
cancers,
diabetes,
birth defects
U.S.
veterans
Vietnamese civilians
and veterans
Chemical releases in Gulf War?
Detections of
chemicals in air
Bombing of Iraqi
biochemical sites, 1991
Moral responsibilties
of both sides?
Chemical
Bunkers
In Iraq
Detonation of Iraqi
chemical/biological storage
after end of Gulf War
Possible exposure to troops?
Kuwait oil
well fires, 1991
Set by withdrawing
Iraqi forces; also
spilled oil into
Persian Gulf
Draining of
southern Iraq
marshes, 1992
Area was haven for
Marsh Arabs, Shi’a rebels
Bombing civilian
chemical plants
Toxic cloud after NATO bombing of
Pancevo plant in Yugoslavia, 1999
Chemical
weapons
testing and
disposal
Alabama protest against
chemical arms incineration
6000 sheep killed in
Utah nerve gas test, 1968
Toxic wastes left on bases
U.S. military bases in
the Philippines,
Panama, Alaska
Soviet bases in
Eastern Europe
Badger Army Ammunition Plant, Wisconsin
Propellant plant, 1940s-70s.
Groundwater poisoned with nitrates.
Ironies of abandoned toxic bases
Many military
bases are Superfund
toxic clean-up sites.
Rocky Mountain Arsenal in
Colorado was poisoned underground,
but the surface is a wildlife haven.
MUNITIONS
Land mines
Gulf War Syndrome
Cluster bombs
Bombing ranges
Depleted Uranium
Flight ranges
Land mines
Old land mines explode every
22 minutes, claiming about
26,000 victims a year.
Cambodia
Sudan
Kosovo
De-Mining
Operations
1998 ban on
plastic land mines
Schoolyard in Laos
Cluster bombs
Cluster bombs
Bomblets
in Laos
Nis, Yugoslavia
market bombing,
1999
Depleted Uranium (DU)
Dense munitions to penetrate
tanks, armor. Made from
low-level reprocessing waste.
Depleted Uranium (DU)
Releases radioactivity when
explodes or burns, leaves behind dust
Huge cancer rates in
southern Iraq (387 tons
of DU left behind)
DU tested on Vieques Island, Puerto Rico.
Would cost $4 billion to clean Indiana base.
Depleted Uranium (DU)
82% of U.S combat troops in
Iraq came in contact with DU dust
DU also used in Bosnia,
Kosovo, Afghanistan
“Metal of Dishonor” video
www.konscious.com
Gulf War Syndrome
“Agent Orange of the 1990s”
A variety of illnesses
reported by military personnel
Increase in personnel cancers, 1991-97
Gulf War Syndrome
CAUSES?
Depleted Uranium?
Chemical releases?
Children of U.S. troops affected
Oil well fires?
Iraqi civilians
also affected:
leukemia victim
in Basra hospital.
Pesticides?
A combination?
Vieques naval
bombing range,
Puerto Rico
Explosions,.noise, affect on fishing,
use of DU and chemical testing.
Hidden
undetonated
explosives
Opposition to
Vieques bombing
Rallies in
San Juan and
New York
Fishermen blockade
Navy ships, 1970s
Christian camp after stray bomb
kills guard, 1999. Navy agrees
to gradual withdrawal.
Low-level jet flights
Practice for flying under radar.
Effect on cattle, wildlife,
horses, human stress
Driven out of Europe.
Went to Nevada, Canada, etc.
Low-level flights
in Canada
Innu Indians
in Labrador protest
disruption of their
hunting culture
NUCLEAR WEAPONS
Production, Use, Testing, Waste
Uranium mining
Began during
Manhattan Project 1940s
Deaths of Navajo, Dene
uranium miners
Nuclear weapons production cycle
Spent fuel from civilian energy industry can be used for bombs
Military nuclear waste at Hanford, Washington
Leaking tanks contaminated
Columbia River
Los Alamos Nuclear Labs, New Mexico
Fires in 2000 endangered
Los Alamos, Hanford
Atomic bombing of Japan
220,000 died at
Hiroshima and
Nagasaki
280,000 more
exposed to
Radiation
(Hibakusha)
Nuclear Club
Original:
U.S., Russia, Britain, France, China
Spread since 1970s: Israel, India, Pakistan, possibly North Korea
Disarmed in 1990s: Ukraine, Belarus, Kazakstan, South Africa
Weapons-grade uranium stockpiles
Atomic Veterans
and
“Downwinders”
17,000 cancer cases
in the U.S. alone
Nuclear fallout from
Nevada Test Site
Reassuring government leaflet
Atmospheric nuclear
tests halted in 1963;
continued underground
Strontium-90 in milk
U.S. tests in the Pacific
75% increase in cesium in islanders
Evacuation of Islanders
Soviet tests
in Kazakhstan
Genetic defects
near Semey
(Semipalatinsk)
Kazakhs protest
British nuclear
tests in Australia
Effects on
Aborigines
French tests in Polynesia
Also in Algeria in 1950s
French bombing of
Greenpeace ship in
New Zealand, 1985
Chinese nuclear tests in Xinjiang
In Muslim Uigur minority region after 1964
1996 Comprehensive
Nuclear Test Ban signed;
but some small tests continue
India and
Pakistan
nuclear tests
Indian leader in front
of H-Bomb mural
Pakistani
crowds
celebrate
first test,
1998
Military nuclear accidents
• “Broken arrow”
• Lost nuclear weapons: 43+ Soviet, 7 U.S.
– Plane crashes, sub sinkings, silo explosions
– Some scattered radiation
• Lost submarine reactors: 6 Soviet, 2 U.S.
Nuclear plants as targets of war
Israel bombs Iraq’s Osirak
reactor construction, 1981.
Iraq launches missile at
Israel’s Dimona nuclear
laboratory, 1991.
U.S. bombs Iraqi
operating reactors, 1991
Reactors as possible
terrorist targets?
Kyshtym waste disaster,
1957
Orphans
– Explosion at Soviet weapons factory forces
evacuation of over 10,000 people in Ural Mts.
– Area size of Rhode Island still uninhabited;
thousands of cancers reported
Websites
Military Toxics Project
www.miltoxproj.org
Center for Defense Information
www.cdi.org
Council for a Livable World
www.clw.org
U.S. military environmental agencies
http://aec.army.mil
http://enviro.navy.mil
http://www.af.mil/environment
Gulf War Veterans Resource Links
http://www.spidersmill.com/gwvrl
Chemical Weapons Working Group
www.cwwg.org