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From: nuchat!steve@uunet.UU.NET (Steve Nuchia)
Newsgroups: sci.military
Subject: Re: depleted uranium ammunition
Message-ID: <15380@cbnews.ATT.COM>
Date: 10 Apr 90 02:01:06 GMT
References: <15220@cbnews.ATT.COM> <15264@cbnews.ATT.COM> <15306@cbnews.ATT.COM>
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From: nuchat!steve@uunet.UU.NET (Steve Nuchia)

In article <15306@cbnews.ATT.COM> sysmgr@KING.ENG.UMD.EDU (Doug Mohney) writes:
>Of course (not to put on a GreenPeace(tm) hat), nobody knows what leaving
>depleted uranium laying around all over future battlefields will do to 
>the environment on a long-term basis...

I wish I could remember where I read this, but I can't.

In india there are groups of "untouchables" living on the
edges of artillery and bombing ranges who make their living
collecting shell fragments and the occasional dud for sale
as scrap metal.  Their desperation is such that they sometimes
go out before the shelling has stopped, and in any case
unexploded munitions are dangerous.  They suffer a lot of
casualties, but it beats starving.

I'd guess that in most scenarios that include a lot of
DU slugs in the ground outside of designated ranges, there
will be refugees or others who will "mine" the metal for
its scrap value, which will be high as long as the fighting
continues, and non-zero afterwards.

Of course the slugs in the ranges in most of the world
aren't being collected, and probably contribute to the
heavy metal content of the runoff water from those areas.
I wonder if it is any worse than the lead runoff from all
the military and private small-arms ranges all over the world?