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DEPLETED URANIUM - FAQs
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| 08 January 2001 |
What is Depleted Uranium?
Depleted Uranium (DU) is only used as a penetrator. It is not a warhead, bomb or explosive.
For what is Depleted Uranium used on the battlefield?
It is used to penetrate the armour of modern, the residual penetrator (and the high temperature fragments created as it passes through the armour) striking everything inside the tank and setting fire to its fuel and ammunition. In the Balkans, this would include the M84A (Russian T-72) main battle tanks of the Bosnian Serb VRS and the Serbian VJ forces. In the Gulf war, some of the Iraqi tanks were of the same T-72 type, manned by Saddam Hussein’s Republican Guards.
Who used it in the Balkans?
During the Balkans operations from 1992 to 1996, only the US Air Force acknowledges its use in some of its 30mm cannon shells fired from the GAU-8A cannon. It is true that some guided weapons used depleted uranium to increase the penetration effect and that the 20mm Phalanx close-in weapon system, used to protect warships at sea from sea-skimming missiles, also has a percentage of DU rounds.
What about the British Army?
The British Army fired 88 DU rounds against Iraqi tanks in the Gulf war; no such rounds were fired during the Bosnian and Kosovan campaigns. No British aircraft are equipped with DU warheads on their weapons, according to official reports. DU rounds are ‘war-use only’.
Any other uses?
DU is very dense so is also used as a counter-balance for large commercial aircraft including the Boeing 747, military aircraft such as the Harrier, and in yacht keels.
Also, on 14th March 1988 the US Department of Defence announced that a new, modified version of their Abrams main battle tank was due to enter production which would have improved armour containing DU. First production M1A1s with the new armour were completed in 1988. These tanks, which were shipped to US units in Germany, weighed about 65 tons. The heavy armour package deployed in Europe includes DU in the turret.
The armour design modification to the M1A1 incorporates steel-encased depleted uranium which is two and a half times the density of steel and is already used in a broad spectrum of civilian applications. Sealed within the tank, depleted uranium has a very low level of natural radiation which is within the acceptable range established by the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Currently, versions of the M1A2 tank also contain DU armour.
Can Depleted Uranium be replaced?
DU can be replaced (Britain, France, Russia and the US are the only commonly acknowledged users of DU as the penetrator material in kinetic energy munitions). The great majority of armies use kinetic energy munitions with tungsten alloy penetrators; however, these have a 20% lower penetrative performance, and the sintered materials used to make them are more expensive. Tungsten may not emit radiation, but, in common with DU, its particles are poisonous.
It is alleged that DU causes leukaemia?
Leukaemia is caused by (inter alia):
- Ionising radiation - x-rays, for example
- Derivatives of benzene (hydraulic fluid, lubricating oil, fuel oil, ceramic armour and other products found in modern armoured vehicles)
- Viruses
What happens when a DU round hits a tank?
The DU penetrator hits the tank armour, both the penetrator and armour partially liquefying under pressure. Once the armour has been perforated, that part of the penetrator which has not melted, together with the molten armour and fragments that break away from the interior, ricochet inside the vehicle. This usually causes a fire. Studies in the USA, UK and France show that when an armoured vehicle burns at about 10,000 degrees C, the resulting oxidisation of the materials aboard, including benzene products and depleted uranium, can create particulates that are harmful to the human body; ingested they can affect the lungs and kidneys.