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United States army still using Napalm weapons?; Done on a technicality
Topic Started: Aug 13 2004, 04:52 PM (333 Views)
Ngagh
Member Avatar
Huh?
Quote:
 
The United States military has admitted it used napalm-type weapons in Iraq.

A Pentagon spokesman had told the Herald it did not have any stocks of napalm, but it seems the denial was a quibble.

The Pentagon no longer officially uses the brand-name Napalm, a combination of naphthalene and palmitate, but a similar substance known as fuel-gel mixture contained in Mark-77 fire bombs was dropped on Iraqi troops near the Iraq-Kuwait border at the start of the recent war.

"I can confirm that Mark-77 fire bombs were used in that general area," said Colonel Mike Daily, of the US Marine Corps.

Colonel Daily said that US stocks of Vietnam-era napalm had been phased out, but that the Mark-77s had "similar destructive characteristics".

On March 22 a Herald correspondent, Lindsay Murdoch, travelling with US marines, reported that napalm was used in an attack on Iraqi troops at Safwan Hill, near the Kuwait border.

His account was based on statements by two US marines officers on the ground. But Lieutenant-Commander Jeff Davis, from the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Defence, called Murdoch's story "patently false". "The US took napalm out of service in the 1970s. We completed the destruction of our last batch of napalm on April 4, 2001, and no longer maintain any stocks of napalm," Commander Davis said.

He was apparently referring to Vietnam-era Napalm-B, which consisted of inflammable fuel thickened with polystyrene and benzene. The inflammable fuel in Mark-77 fire bombs is thickened with slightly different chemicals, and is believed to contain oxidisers.

Neither weapon technically contains napalm

A Pentagon official told Agence France-Presse on Thursday that US forces used the Mark-77 fire bombs against Iraqi forces in their drive towards Baghdad and defended their use as legal and necessary.

The official, who did not wish to be identified, said that US marines jets dropped the fire bombs at least once to destroy Iraqi positions at Safwan.

The official told AFP: "It is like this: you've got [an] enemy that's hard to get at. And it will save your own lives to use it." There were no international conventions against it, the official said.

Marines used the napalm-like bombs on at least two other occasions during the drive to Baghdad, the San Diego Union-Tribune reported this week.

"The generals love napalm," the paper quoted Colonel Randolph Alles, the commander of Marine Air Group 11, as saying. "It has a big psychological effect."

Napalm was banned by a United Nations convention in 1980, but the US did not sign the agreement. The US military considers the use of Mark-77 weapons to be legal.

A spokeswoman for Rock Island Arsenal in Illinois said it was producing a further 500 Mark-77s for the marines. She said she did not consider them napalm bombs, but they are still referred to as napalm in some US documents.



EDIT: I didn't register to read the article, just a yahoo search, but here it is anywhoo...
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Admiralbill_gomec
UberAdmiral
We use FAEs (Fuel-Air Explosives), but not gellied gasoline bombs. The FAE weapons are airburst weapons that spread a fireball and a concussive blast, that is a lot more efficient than using a contact weapon like napalm.

By the way, Ngagh, you need to register to read that article. For those who might be interested, you might want to post the contents.
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Dwayne
Profanity deleted by Hoss
Cry me a freaking river ... these weapons were used on front line troops ... it's not like they were dropping them on villages of innocent people.
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cptjeff
Captain of the Enterprise-J
however, It is now a war crime to use them- no mater who they're used on.
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Ngagh
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Huh?
try this one. Maybe this one should work, same article.
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Admiralbill_gomec
UberAdmiral
cptjeff
Aug 13 2004, 04:19 PM
however, It is now a war crime to use them- no mater who they're used on.

Actually, it is not. Read the article.

Methinks the words "war crime" get bandied about too easily, much like the word "racism."

Ngagh: Thanks for the revised link. I read it. Interesting.
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somerled
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Admiral MacDonald RN
Napalm is very precise and surgical. :loling:

And I also saw the telecasts - and napalm was indeed used.
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ANOVA
Vice Admiral
(Sung To "Everything is Beautiful")

Napalm sticks to little children
All the children of the world
Red and Yellow, Black and White
They all scream when thay ignite
Napalm stick to all the children of the world.

Taught to me while in Marine Corps Bootcamp.

Modern weaponry has lost its psychological impact due to its presicion.
Fire has long instilled fear in man. More so in the islamic cultures due to the edict by Mohammed that fire is the only weapon that Muslims were prohibited from using against infidels becuase it was reserved by God to punish the infidels in hell. Mohammed making this statement after one ogf his generals beheaded every male in a nonmuslim town who was old enough to have "peach-fuzz".

Air fuel bombs are awesome. we used them during the gulg war to takeout bunkers. The fuel disperses in the air, including the air in frontline fortifications and then ignites burning everything inside the ignition, exploding outward to damage facilities like a conventional explosion, and cuase secondary ingnitions. Great stuff, though it is better to give then recieve.

ANOVA
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Admiralbill_gomec
UberAdmiral
somerled
Aug 13 2004, 09:43 PM
Napalm is very precise and surgical. :loling:

And I also saw the telecasts - and napalm was indeed used.

You're now an expert on an obsolete munition?
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ANOVA
Vice Admiral
^^^

You're surpised by this revelation?

Haven't found anything that Somerled doesn't have direct experience with. I'm surprised he didn't tell you about the time he was a UN weapons inspector, asked by Mr. Anon himself due to Somerled being a world renowned expert on incendiary devices.

Or maybe he sees fire and thinks Napalm.

ANOVA

BTW: We'll be grilling out over open Napalm later this weekend.
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cptjeff
Captain of the Enterprise-J
It is illegal to use in a combat scenario- look it up! can you say, War Crime? that's what you commit when you use nalm in a combat scenario.

ANOVA, you're fine. gasoline and styrofoam are legal to grill over. (how are you going to contain the Naplam? in a pie pan or somthing like that?
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gvok
Unregistered

Admiralbill_gomec
Aug 14 2004, 02:54 PM
somerled
Aug 13 2004, 09:43 PM
Napalm is very precise and surgical. :loling:

And I also saw the telecasts - and napalm was indeed used.

You're now an expert on an obsolete munition?

Come on Admiral, I don't think I've ever encountered a topic you didn't claim to be an expert on. most recently you claimed to know more about the state that I live in than I do.
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Minuet
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Fleet Admiral Assistant wRench, Chief Supper Officer
^^^Gvok, maybe you should sit back and not push the buttons.

Somerled can defend himself if he so chooses.
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gvok
Unregistered

Alright. Sorry Minuet.
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doctortobe
Speak softly, and carry a 57 megaton stick!
Jeff, fine, napalm is against the law to use. Even if you discount the fact that the US refused to sign onto it (and thus should not be bound by it), the fact of the matter is that this is not napalm.

Quote:
 
Neither weapon technically contains napalm


Now, if they were to say that all fire based weaponry is off limits, then you might have a case. But, the only thing even remotelly close to napalm about these weapons is the fact that they are fire based, and the fact that both have the COMMON (not official) designation of napalm.
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