Willy Pete alleged to have been used in Falluja

[John D Salt]

Originally posted by flamingknives:

Well the thing is, sgtgoody's negative that affirmed my negative also negates his initial assertation that no issued ammunition was prohibited.

No it doesn't.

All the best,

John.

[aka_tom_w]

It happened, U.S. admitted to it

US used white phosphorus in Iraq

Falluja suffered great damage during the offensive

The Pentagon has confirmed that US troops used white phosphorus during last year's offensive in the northern Iraqi city of Falluja.

"It was used as an incendiary weapon against enemy combatants," spokesman Lt Col Barry Venable told the BBC.

Col Venable denied that the substance - which can cause burning of the flesh - constituted a banned chemical weapon.

Early this month, Italian state TV, Rai, said white phosphorus had been used against civilians in Falluja.

White phosphorus is an incendiary weapon, not a chemical weapon

Col Barry Venable

Pentagon spokesman

US military interview

The US military vehemently denies this.

Washington is not a signatory of an international treaty restricting the use of white phosphorus devices.

The US-led assault on Falluja - a stronghold of the Sunni insurgency west of Baghdad - displaced most of the city's 300,000 population and left many of its buildings destroyed.

'Incendiary'

Col Venable told the BBC's PM programme that the US army used white incendiary munitions "primarily as obscurants, for smokescreens or target marking in some cases".

"However it is an incendiary weapon and may be used against enemy combatants."

WHITE PHOSPHORUS

Spontaneously flammable chemical used for battlefield illumination

Contact with particles causes burning of skin and flesh

Use of incendiary weapons prohibited for attacking civilians (Protocol III of Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons)

Protocol III not signed by US

Rai interview

And he said it had been used in Falluja, but it was "conventional munition", not a chemical weapon.

It is not "outlawed or illegal", Col Venable said.

"When you have enemy forces that are in covered positions that your high explosive artillery rounds are not having an impact on and you wish to get them out of those positions, one technique is to fire a white phosphorus round or rounds into the position because the combined effects of the fire and smoke - and in some case the terror brought about by the explosion on the ground - will drive them out of the holes so that you can kill them with high explosives," he said.

He said a statement on the US state department denying it had been used was old and based on "poor information".

After the Rai documentary was broadcast on 8 November, Italian protesters went to the US embassy in Rome to vent their fury.

But a spokesman at the UK Ministry of Defence said the use of white phosphorus was permitted in battle in cases where there were no civilians near the target area.

web page source BBC

[Battlefront.com]

I'm confused by hair splitting like this:

Use of incendiary weapons prohibited for attacking civilians (Protocol III of Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons)

Uhm... so where in the Geneva Convention is the list of weapons that can be legally used to attack civilians?

This is a lynchmob attack on US foreign policy or warfare itself. I don't mind people attacking either when they are being honest. But attempting to obscure the facts more than WP obscures LOS is just maddening. I've never had respect for "anti" or "pro" groups that lack the guts to come out and state what their real agenda is. This is absolutely not about whether WP is a chemical weapon or if the US is allowed to legally use it, because it isn't and they are.

Steve

[akd]

Can we stop talking about Willy Peter? He's so old school. We got these shiny new "chemical weapons" to use against jihadists.

Marines Quiet About Brutal New Weapon

War is hell. But it’s worse when the Marines bring out their new urban combat weapon, the SMAW-NE. Which may be why they’re not talking about it, much.

This is a version of the standard USMC Shoulder Mounted Assault Weapon but with a new warhead. Described as NE - "Novel Explosive"- it is a thermobaric mixture which ignites the air, producing a shockwave of unparalleled destructive power, especially against buildings.

A post-action report from Iraq describes the effect of the new weapon: "One unit disintegrated a large one-storey masonry type building with one round from 100 meters. They were extremely impressed." Elsewhere it is described by one Marine as "an awesome piece of ordnance."

It proved highly effective in the battle for Fallujah. This from the Marine Corps Gazette, July edition: "SMAW gunners became expert at determining which wall to shoot to cause the roof to collapse and crush the insurgents fortified inside interior rooms."

The NE round is supposed to be capable of going through a brick wall, but in practice gunners had to fire through a window or make a hole with an anti-tank rocket. Again, from the Marine Corps Gazette:

"Due to the lack of penetrating power of the NE round, we found that our assaultmen had to first fire a dual-purpose rocket in order to create a hole in the wall or building. This blast was immediately followed by an NE round that would incinerate the target or literally level the structure."

The rational for this approach was straightforward:

"Marines could employ blast weapons prior to entering houses that had become pillboxes, not homes. The economic cost of house replacement is not comparable to American lives...all battalions adopted blast techniques appropriate to entering a bunker, assuming you did not know if the bunker was manned."

The manufacturers, Talley, make bold use of its track record, with a brochure headlined Thermobaric Urban Destruction."

The SMAW-NE has only been procured by the USMC, though there are reports that some were 'borrowed' by other units. However, there are also proposals on the table that thousands of obsolete M-72 LAWs could be retrofitted with thermobaric warheads, making then into effective urban combat tools.

But in an era of precision bombs, where collateral damage is expected to be kept to a minimum, such massively brutal weapons have become highly controversial. These days, every civilian casualty means a few more “hearts and minds” are lost. Thermobaric weapons almost invariable lead to civilian deaths. The Soviet Union was heavily criticized for using thermobaric weapons in Afghanistan because they were held to constitute "disproportionate force," and similar criticisms were made when thermobarics were used in the Chechen conflict. According to Human Rights Watch, thermobaric weapons "kill and injure in a particularly brutal manner over a wide area. In urban settings it is very difficult to limit the effect of this weapon to combatants, and the nature of FAE explosions makes it virtually impossible for civilians to take shelter from their destructive effect."

So it’s understandable that the Marines have made so little noise about the use of the SMAW-NE in Fallujah. But keeping quiet about controversial weapons is a lousy strategy, no matter how effective those arms are. In the short term, it may save some bad press. In the long term, it’s a recipe for a scandal. Military leaders should debate human right advocates and the like first, and then publicly decide "we do/do not to use X". Otherwise when the media find do find out – as they always do -- not only do you get a level of hysteria but there is also the charge of “covering up.”

I'm undecided about thermobarics myself, but I think they should let the legal people sort out all these issues and clear things up. Otherwise you get claims of “chemical weapons” and “violating the Geneva Protocol.” Which doesn't really help anyone. The warfighter is left in doubt, and it hands propaganda to the bad guys. Just look at what happened it last week’s screaming over white phosphorous rounds.

-- David Hambling

November 14, 2005 10:22 AM | Ammo and Munitions

http://www.defensetech.org/archives/001944.html

Be sure to check out THERMOBARIC URBAN DESTRUCTION*.

*coming soon to a theatre near you

[ November 15, 2005, 04:03 PM: Message edited by: akd ]

[flamingknives]

At the risk of splitting hairs, the CCW isn't the Geneva Convention and it does forbid the use of incendiaries on concentrations of civilians. However, it also excepts WP as an incendiary, the areas of use probably couldn't be considered civilian concentrations and the US isn't signatory to it anyway.

[Edit: one doesn't call it thermobarics anymore. They are 'enhanced blast']

[akd]

[Edit: one doesn't call it thermobarics anymore. They are 'enhanced blast]

No, no. Read above. They are "Novel Explosives."

<--has visions of exploding copies of Oliver Twist and Jane Eyre.

[Romulus]

Originally posted by flamingknives:

At the risk of splitting hairs, the CCW isn't the Geneva Convention and it does forbid the use of incendiaries on concentrations of civilians. However, it also excepts WP as an incendiary, the areas of use probably couldn't be considered civilian concentrations and the US isn't signatory to it anyway.

flamingknives, the CWC was signed even by the USA as you can read on the official site

[cassh]

Well BBC Radio 4's Today programme has decided to run with the story. This will now get picked up in the UK news cycle.

The Italian news guy mentioned intact clothes again which underscored it was unlikely to be WP that killed the civilian alleged victims. He clearly is completely unfamiliar with the properties of WP.

The embedded US journalist, whose reports had been used in blogs to raise the question of WP use, said it use was neither indiscriminate nor directed against civilians, but in the case cited, was specifically directed at an insurgent positions in a palm grove that had been firing on helicopters. The intent was to fire a mix of WP/HE that would ignite the grove and nearby oil tanks.

Rt Hon Sir Menzies ‘MING’ Campbell [Liberal Democrat Party Defence Spokesperson] then stated how awful WP was as a weapon - like all the other agents of warfare are nice, fluffy, people-friendly ones. What a bone piece of logic.

I know the board must be apolitical; but I think that we, as an informed minority, should make our knowledge known in the wider media and blog-space.

WP is a vital weapon in the military arsenal. It provides instant screening (unlike chemical smoke), thermal-imaging screening (unlike chemical smoke), dismount blocking/denial agent (unlike chemical smoke), and vital incendiary properties.

None of these effects can be replicated by other munitions effectively; therefore, it is an important weapon.

As to its morality, it is arguably of higher moral standing as its psychological effect makes it less harmful/deadly to a target it has neutralised.

[Peter Cairns]

cassh,

Since when have "we" been an informed minority, most topics on this forum don't get by a half dozen posts before we're argueing amounst ourselves over detail and principle.

I've always enjoyed the debate on this forum but I've never seen it as any sort of font of wisdom.

Peter.

[Tagwyn]

"Willy Pete" used in Fallejua? Does Strumy know? He'll want to get in line. Tag

[akd]

Listen to Diane Rehm use a listener e-mail and her own nonsense to challenge Sen. John McCain on reports reports of U.S. use of the "chemical weapon" and "WMD" white phosphorous:

http://www.wamu.org/programs/dr/

at 21:09.

Diane Rehm: "We've had several e-mails in the last few days, knowing that you were coming on the program, asking us about this because there is some indication it has been used in Iraq and does, indeed, burn the skin."

John McCain: "So does napalm, and mortar shells cause penetration of metal into the body. War is not a pleasant experience. It's one of the reasons we try to avoid it, but white phoshorous has been used in many conflicts, as has napalm, and a lot of people don't like it. I wish we could use weapons that were not as lethal, but the business of war is to kill people..."

[ November 16, 2005, 01:58 PM: Message edited by: akd ]

[juan_gigante]

Is there any video floating around out there of this NE rocket taking down a building? That'd be quite a sight to see.

[Bigduke6]

Legal or no, U.S. use of WP in Falluja is echoing around the world. The lesson has to be that if the audience doesn't accept your rules, it really doesn't help you to claim you are playing by them. You have to win the moral high ground in other people's minds - because if you don't, fighting your war can get harder.

And a commander that ignores potential problems is bad commander.

This is a fast and dirty translation of an Thursday article in Ukraine's biggest newspaper, Fakty:

***Text begins

Americans used illegal phosphorus bombs in Iraq

- This chemical weapon can burn all flesh in its victim. The only thing that remains is bones...and clothing -

Natalia Terekh - FAKTY

Yesterday the Pentagon was forced to admit that the American army a year ago during operations in the city of Falluja used phosphorus bombs forbidden by international agreements. Earlier the military authorities and the State Department of the U.S.A. by all means denied the use of this dangerous chemical weapon in the Iraq campaign.

Italian journalists who made a film about the tragedy of Falluja forced Washington hawks to make the admission. The picture was aired on November 7 by the Italian television company RAI.

The film convincingly shows that white phosphorus was the cause of death for dozens of peaceful Iraqis, among them women and children. The victims suffered burns destroying all of their flesh. All that remained were bones...and clothing.

Nevertheless a represenative of the Pentagon, who was ordered to make a statement to the press about the use of phosphorus bombs, for a long time insisted that this weapon was not used against the civilian population.

"The bombs with white phosphorus were used in Falluja only against military forces of the enemy," he said. Moreover, the Pentagon reminded reporters that the U.S.A. has never signed a 1980 agreement forbidding the use of munitions containing phosphorus.

***Text ends

I don't want to get into the degree this report is correct or in error, as I see that as unimportant. The point is the WP story is bouncing around the world and showing up in major media in places like Ukraine, and there is precious little to counter it. The U.S. has a reputation of bullying smaller nations, and news stories like this, especially after their permutation, reinforce the reputation.

It would be possible in an ideal world for a warring nation to blow off 3rd party opinion, but that's not the way things work. To take the Ukrainian case, Ukraine has 1,500 or so infantrymen in Iraq. Its air cargo fleet, both civilian and military, are regular supply carriers to coalition forces. (When the Soviet Union broke up Russia and Ukraine split up the Soviet heavy lift aircraft force just about 50/50, and the Russians won't fly into Iraq. The Ukrainians, so far, will.)

Another thing the Ukrainians do is allow U.S. military aircraft across their airspace on the Germany-Middle East route. The opposition in Ukraine, unsurprisingly, wants the air corridor closed. Parliamentary elections are scheduled in Ukraine next March.

So if Ukraine decided the U.S. effort in Iraq wasn't worth supporting, that's a brigade of infantry, a useful air corridor, and probably a couple of dozen heavy lift aircraft removed from the U.S. capacity. That obviously wouldn't damage the U.S. war effort substantially, but it would make things a bit more difficult.

The U.S. war effort in Iraq depends on an international network of bases, airspace usage agreements, and foreign contingents. Use WP in Falluja and clearly, you can put that network at risk.

You focus on just the battlefield, you listen to just the soldiers, and you could very well create conditions where you lose the war. This is why I find arguements along the lines of "Well it's a war, the terrorists are dirtbags, any weapon is bad so let's use them all" simplistic. Even if you think that others don't. These days, if you want to win the war you have to reckon with the opinions of others.

Why does this rant speak to CMSF, and not rate lockout?

Because, my little grasshoppers, a really cool game feature would be weapons limitations on the U.S. force: you have to dig this bad guys out of this urban setting, but oh by the way you're not allowed to use an explosive any larger than a .30 caliber bullet.

See, there's a school and a mosque in there, and we don't want Italian TV putting picture of us smashing those buildings on the air, do the best job you can captian, remember how good this is going to look on your annual rating, assuming of course you don't get your company shot to bits, there's a good captain...

[ November 17, 2005, 03:12 AM: Message edited by: Bigduke6 ]

[SSgt Viljuri]

The SMAW-NE has only been procured by the USMC, though there are reports that some were 'borrowed' by other units. However, there are also proposals on the table that thousands of obsolete M-72 LAWs could be retrofitted with thermobaric warheads, making then into effective urban combat tools.

Indeed. This is very very interesting...

[Jeff Hays]

The russians have a similary round for thier RPG Launcher that is thermobaric in nature, they used it alot in grozny as mobile artilery. Also in the old cold war inventory there was a 4 tube 66mm rocket launcher that was part of TO&E up till the late 80's

[Vanir Ausf B]

The RPO-A Schmel [bumblebee] was also widely used in the third battle for Grozny. Another veteran of Afghanistan, the RPO-A flamethrower is a shoulder-fired, single-shot, disposable weapon with a maximum range of 1,000 meters, a maximum effective range of 600 meters and a minimum range of 20 meters. The round is 93 mm in diameter. It has three types of projectile: thermobaric (RPO-A), incendiary (RPO-Z) and smoke (RPO-D).14 It weighs 11 kilograms (24.25 pounds). (See figure 3). The Schmel's zone of destruction is 50 square meters in the open and 80 cubic meters inside a structure.

The RPO-A is also a chemical troop system and is found in chemical troop flamethrower platoons. These platoons are attached to motorized rifle battalions as needed. In Afghanistan, RPO-A flamethrower platoons were permanently attached to motorized rifle battalions. The Russian Army is considering making a flamethrower platoon part of every motorized rifle battalion. The proposed flamethrower platoon would consist of a platoon leader, 2 drivers, 2 vehicle/squad commanders, 14 gunners, 2 armored personnel carriers, 10 portable radios and 28 RPO launchers.

Link

Such weapons were widely used by Russian forces laying siege to the city of Grozny some two years ago.

Rather than air-delivered bombs, the Russian army employed 30-barrel large calibre rocket launchers firing a fuel-air explosive warhead to level the city block-by-block.

Link

[Battlefront.com]

The sad thing about this is how much effort US forces put into doing things the legal way. I've seen more than one account of a field commander holding off on doing something until the lawyers give the OK. The irresponsible reporting by anti-American voices not only distort the picture about the specific use of WP, but they also pervert the reality of the the whole conduct of US military personnel. Sure, they sometimes screw up (even HUGELY screw up), but day in and day out the Iraqi civilians are probably more safe from harm by US forces than any other civilian population in an active conflict zone in all of history. Not perfect, of course, but nothing ever is.

But then again, if everybody was fair and kept things in perspective, then extremists with agendas wouldn't exist. Since they do, it is no surprise we have the sorts of stuff like this WP bullcrap. There is also plenty of opposite bullcrap out there too (i.e. right wing hawk "kill them all and let my God sort them out") stuff out there as well.

Steve

[GSX]

WP is good for creating instant smoke. Its also good for target marking, from say a 60mm Mortar. Im sure any Insurgent wouldnt be bothering about 1 round of WP, they would be looking for the 500lb HE Bomb that was heading in their direction from the F-18 that was using the WP as a marker.

That said, if its being used in a built up area and civilians are around I wouldnt use it as it does cause a lot of damage.

The guys on the ground should use their common sense with it, but thats easy to say when your sitting at home and not in the heat of the action.

I would have thought the press and any Anti-Americans (God I hate that phrase, if your not with me you must be Anti-American)would have consentrated on the use of Napalm, er firebombs! I'm sure they were banned a while back too!

[MikeyD]

I 'think' thermobaric bombs are classed more as blast weapons than incendiary. Dispersing the combustion agent greatly magnifies the blast and shockwave. Sounds like a small-scale version of the U.S. fuel-air explosives which are used to detonate minefields. Basically more bang for the buck, not purpose-made incendiary devices.

As to civilians being relatively safer from harm, I guess its all on a sliding scale. We hear the reports about the Iraqi reporters and translators and contractors and policemen and relatives of diplomats who have not survived random encounters with the U.S. military in the field. How much those reports can be extrapolated to the safety of the anonymous civilan population we don't know

[flamingknives]

Also in the old cold war inventory there was a 4 tube 66mm rocket launcher that was part of TO&E up till the late 80's

The M202 flash is most definately an incendiary weapon.

BigDuke6:

The media does seem to have picked this up and run with it, despite it being manifestly wrong.

By the same reasoning (it's how people view it), there is nothing that is not fair game for having lies made up about it.

For example, The M855(?) 5.56mm round tends to fragment at close range, thus contravening some of the original Hague conventions. Tracer and incendiary shells and bullets are also liable for targetting, despite being excepted from the CCW protocol III. The LAW NE is probably a bad thing from some angles, because it isn't regular HE.

Thermobaric weapons are, these days, called 'enhanced blast' because, quite simply, that's what they are. They have little or no incendiary effect, relying instead on blast and secondary fragmentation.

My point? Simply that with the amount of ill-feeling bouncing around, it doesn't matter a jot what the US army do or do not use (within reason), as someone will pick up on one thing or another and make it sound bad.

[SgtMuhammed]

Which is why you can't base policy on opinion polls. If the press were to start harping about how mean it is to shoot people are we supposed to stop? I guarantee you the other guy won't.

[Bigduke6]

Flame,

It's not ill-feeling, it's perception. Just because the U.S. says something is "legal" doesn't make it "legal" in the minds of neutrals, wafflers, and the great really-could-care less. Unless you can prosecute the war absolutely independently of others, or enjoy their unconditional support, you are going to have to take their opinions into account. That doesn't mean you have to kow-tow to the opinions of others, but there is risk attached to dismissing it.

Legality of WP is not important here in terms of, if WP were illegal, some U.S. policy makers and soldiers would stand trial in a fair court and go to jail. No one expects that to happen, the possibility of judicial punishment has nothing to do with discussions about the legality or illegality of a U.S. move in a foreign war.

Rather, legality is being used by most people in most places as a short-hand for "In keeping with avowed U.S. high moral principles" or "In keeping with our high moral principles" or "Not in contradiction with U.S. assertions of right or wrong that have been made before."

By that standard, WP fails the test - at least in the minds of lots of people whose support the U.S. would prefer to have, if it were possible.

To measure the price of that failure to U.S. warfighting ability, let's look at the first Gulf War. Clear goal, solid coalition, excellent casus belli, every one understood the point, and even lots of America-dislikers - in fact most of them - signed up with support. The war was over fast and the media fallout was negligible. The thing that drove that was, obviously, coalition forces had been handed a doable task, and the time and resources to make absolutely sure they would do what they set out to do.

The international support network for that op was great. The Syrians sent troops to fight against their Arab brothers, the Saudis allowed basing rights to the Christian infidels, the mullah of Mecca said kicking Saddam out of Kuwait was legitimate jihad, sort of, the Turks mobilized the Cappodocian frontier, the Europeans at minimum kept their mouths shut and at maximum fielded forces the Americans really could use, heck, even the Chinese and Russians said the right things in the UN. Even the Israelis bit their toungues and let some one else look after their security - when was the last time Jerusalem let something like that happen?

All sorts of bennies followed. The buildup went great, air strikes could go at the enemy from about every point on the compass; and so on. No fourth (or fifth) Arab-Israeli war. Nobody whined about WP, fuel area explosives, anti-personnel submunitions, or attempts to assassinate a head of state with smart weapons.

Most people reading this are well aware that most of the Iraqis killed that war died in something not very far away from murder - they didn't want to be there, and they didn't have a chance. Yet where was the international outcry about U.S. bullying?

Besides the morality side, think about oil. Oil prices remained basically stable during and after the first gulf war. Oil prices have not remained stable but rather have doubled because of the second gulf war. That may suck in the U.S. driving your SUV - but think for a second about all the poorer countries already in debt because they can't afford enough energy? Their fuel bills have doubled, and for what? You're going to ask people like that to send troops, allow basing rights, sign up in the UN, not support the Iraq insurgency on the sly?

You can ask, but the asking gets harder if on top of the oil price whammy you have to explain to potential allies why you think WP is a legal chemical weapon.

It is wrong and narrow-minded, and indeed sloppy if you are making policy yourself, to assume criticism of U.S. policy occurs just because some people like to criticise America. An attitude like that effectively assumes people in other places are incapable of even thinking rationally - they exist, therefore they criticize the U.S.

In fact, this increasingly globally connected world means the "rest of the planet" is better and faster informed, and in more detail, than it ever was. Ipso facto actions of any big nation, including certainly the U.S., are going to cause more repercussions in more places.

An attitude of "Well, they hate us, so screw 'em" is only possible if you have the means and will to go your foreign wars alone.

If you need help, there are real benefits to having most of the rest of the world thinking you are fighting a morally acceptable. Blow off the rest of the world, and you face the risk of losing some of the benefits. Keep it up and you can convert former supporters to the other side.

This is the biggest problem I have with the Syria scenario, BTW. They guys at BFC are good, but how they can imagine a U.S. invasion of Syria after four years of U.S. military ops in Iraq is beyond me. Maybe the Turks and the Israelis would sign up, but who else?

[GSX]

Cracking post BigDuke.

Thats the problem. Come to liberate, but stay to occupy.

I think in Iraq, its a case of, your free, but only if you do what we want.

This is the main problem.

[flamingknives]

Bigduke6:

There are many greivances, real or percieved, with the US in Iraq, but this characterisation of WP as an illegal chemical weapon is preposterous. In fact it is neither.

If WP hadn't been used, rest assured that something else would have sparked international media ire, be it fragmenting small-arms-ammunition, use of 40mm grenades on point targets, Marine IEDs or whatever.

I don't think that the Coalition has any moral right to ignore criticism, but that criticism really ought to be founded in reality rather than on cuckoo-cloud-nine.

My disparagement of this 'story' is just that. Specifically directed at this monumental cock-and-bull focus on something the reporter clearly do not understand.

[juan_gigante]

After reading his posts, here and elsewhere, and his excellent ROW AARs, I think I'll start paying Bigduke6 to write my papers for college for me. I want to just quote the whole post and put "Great post!" afterwards. But I won't.