[CPEO-MEF] DISPOSAL, VETERANS: "Conflict Over Vet Bill Brings Renewed Attention to Military’s Toxic Legacies"

[Lenny Siegel <LSiegel@cpeo.org>]

Conflict Over Vet Bill Brings Renewed Attention to Military’s Toxic Legacies

By Mike Ludwig
Truthout
August 2, 2022

Senate Republicans recently sparked widespread anger when they blocked a bill that would fund health care for military veterans exposed to toxic pollution, including fumes from large burn pits in Iraq and Afghanistan. The pits are linked to cancer, respiratory disease and other potentially fatal illnesses that Veterans Affairs clinics often refuse to treat. The veteran health legislation known as the Honor Our PACT Act is expected to eventually pass with bipartisan support, but the partisan conflict brought renewed attention to one of the more infamous legacies of the U.S. military both at home and abroad.

The U.S. military and its contractors have burned waste into the open air as a low-cost method of disposal for decades. The “burn pits” addressed by the bill in Congress are well-known among veterans of U.S.-led wars in the Middle East, where tens of thousands of soldiers lived and worked around large pits of burning trash, sewage, military vehicles, unexploded weapons, and other waste. The infamous burn pits set ablaze after the U.S. invasions of Iraq in 1990 and 2003 have drawn particular attention.

But the military has also used “open burn and detonation” practices to dispose of tens of millions of pounds of unexploded munitions and other wastes at military bases and compounds across the U.S. These “open burns” contaminate the air and groundwater, and they are one reason why environmentalists consider the U.S. military to be the world’s largest polluter as well as a top producer of climate-warming greenhouse gas emissions.

…

For the entire article, see
https://truthout.org/articles/conflict-over-vet-bill-brings-renewed-attention-to-militarys-toxic-legacies/?eType=EmailBlastContent&eId=96c91b4c-f640-4faa-837f-6bd2ce3d7c98

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Lenny Siegel
Executive Director
Center for Public Environmental Oversight
A project of the Pacific Studies Center
LSiegel@cpeo.org
P.O. Box 998, Mountain View, CA 94042
Voice/Fax: 650-961-8918
http://www.cpeo.org
Author: DISTURBING THE WAR: The Inside Story of the Movement to Get Stanford University out of Southeast Asia - 1965–1975 (See http://a3mreunion.org)

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