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That's the good news. The bad news is we're the ones who used it.

Depleted uranium munitions were used extensively in the Gulf War back in 1991 — about 320 tons worth. Despite evidence that DU poses a serious contamination risk and remains radioactive in the environment virtually forever, DU shells were later used in Kosovo and Afghanistan.

In our second go-round with Iraq, we used the WMD yet again:

An expert report warning that the long-term health of Iraq’s civilian population would be endangered by British and US depleted uranium (DU) weapons has been kept secret.

The study by three leading radiation scientists cautioned that children and adults could contract cancer after breathing in dust containing DU, which is radioactive and chemically toxic. But it was blocked from publication by the World Health Organisation (WHO), which employed the main author, Dr Keith Baverstock, as a senior radiation advisor. He alleges that it was deliberately suppressed, though this is denied by WHO.

Baverstock also believes that if the study had been published when it was completed in 2001, there would have been more pressure on the US and UK to limit their use of DU weapons [during the 2003 invasion of Iraq], and to clean up afterwards.

Hundreds of thousands of DU shells were fired by coalition tanks and planes during the conflict, and there has been no comprehensive decontamination.

So let's see — we invaded Iraq to prevent it from using WMDs that it turned out it didn't have, and to help us obliterate their army, we used our own WMD on them.

How can Americans sleep at night?

Apparently, with no problem whatsoever. The government just placed a multi-million-dollar order for thousands more rounds of the WMD, from weapons manufacturer Alliant Techsystems. Alliant likes to brag about the weapon's "outstanding accuracy and lethality."

Here's something else Alliant can be proud of:

Depleted uranium remains radioactive for 4.5 billion years. The byproduct of manufacturing nuclear weapons or reactors, the rounds contaminate water and soil. Along some highways in Iraq where the weapon was used during in the first Gulf War, radiation levels register 1,000 times normal background radiation levels. Cancer levels in Iraq are attributed to the shells

I have a better slogan for Alliant's DU shells — The weapon that keeps on killing.

Cross-posted today at Blognonymous.