Chemical Shame

Even the major media have noticed that the use of white phosphorous (WP) weapons by US troops against Falluja was not only bad PR but possibly a war crime. Many have explored the Army's policies on the subject. The canard that WP is legal against soldiers but not against civilians is now, however, exploded.

George Monbiot in the Guardian finds that "In the Battle Book, published by the US Command and General Staff College at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, [it says,] "It is against the law of land warfare to employ WP against personnel targets." Monbiot, whose beat is usually the environment, takes up the use not only of WP against civilians but of a particularly vicious form of "fuel-air" explosive as well.

He concludes, "is there any crime the coalition forces have not committed in Iraq?" Well, gee, we don't seem to be using rape as an instrument of policy...