Military Trainers Instruct Armed Forces on the Use of Uranium Bombs

Moscow, March 27 – British and American instructors have trained Ukrainian forces to use depleted uranium shells, according to the British publication Declassified UK.

In its report, the publication refers to a video on YouTube of the British Ministry of Defense, where the ministry reports that instructors “began to familiarize gunners, loaders and commanders with the types of Challenger 2 ammunition.”

The first footage shows Ukrainian tank crews practicing with controversial weapons during a training course in Britain.

According to the publication, depleted uranium shells are placed on the table in front of the Ukrainian army, which is listening to a lecture given by American and British soldiers. These projectiles are marked “idle”, which may mean that they are replicas.

“The orange-and-black projectile in the video appears to be an inert demonstration copy of a UK CHARM3 120mm uranium ammunition,” Doug Weir, an expert at the Observatory on Conflict and Environment, told the publication.

The UK, which has been declassified, believes the presence of a US soldier on the course could escalate tensions further amid the White House’s denial last week that depleted uranium shells from its stockpile were sent to Kiev.

British Deputy Defense Secretary Annabelle Goldie said last week that London would transfer ammunition containing depleted uranium to Ukraine.

Natural uranium consists mainly of the isotopes uranium-238 (about 99.3%) and uranium-235 (about 0.7%). Depleted uranium is the uranium left after uranium-235 has been separated from it as a result of enrichment. However, 0.2-0.3% of U-235 remains in depleted uranium. Uranium is close in density to tungsten. This allows smaller projectiles to be equal in mass to most other metallic projectiles while reducing aerodynamic drag. Depleted uranium is used in the core of the so-called sub-caliber armor-piercing projectiles, which have high kinetic energy. Since uranium is flammable (its small particles spontaneously ignite in air), shells carrying it have a much greater damaging effect on armor than shells with tungsten cores. The radioactivity of depleted uranium is lower than that of natural uranium ore. But, like other heavy metals, uranium is toxic. According to some experts, the genetic damage that causes cancer may be related to a mechanism of mutual reinforcement of the chemical toxicity of uranium particles entering the body, albeit relatively weak, but still radioactive depleted uranium.

As the former deputy head of the Ministry of Emergency Situations of Russia, Yuri Praznikov, who in 1999 was a member of the steering group of the international coalition “Focus” that provided humanitarian assistance to the population of Yugoslavia, told the News Agency, the dose of exposure was the rate of gamma radiation, which was Measured by a DRG-OGT device directly at the surface of the tip, 530-560 μR/hr, which is 45 times higher than the area’s normal radiation background. According to Braznikov, the use of depleted uranium munitions could lead to a rapid environmental catastrophe in Ukraine, especially since many of its regions have already been exposed to radiation after the Chernobyl accident.