"UK providing Ukraine with depleted uranium ammunition" Topic

TASS in 2018: Upgrading Russian tanks to fire depleted uranium ammunition "does not violate any international treaties"

TASS in 2023: UK providing Ukraine with depleted uranium ammunition "violates the fundamentals norms of international law"

Jonny Tickle, Mar 23, 2023.

Druzhina
Illustrations of Costume & Soldiers

Standard b******s coming out of the Soviet Union,

Tally Ho!

That said, DU rounds are something you'd be far happier shooting off in someone else's country rather than your own. I guess the number of tubes we are sending is pretty limited though

Nick +1

IIRC as we saw in Iraq, DU rounds leaves radioactive dust, etc. Can be harmful to everyone.

If I'm wrong, I'm sure David will correct me …

You aren't wrong

DU is not radioactive. It does not give off radioactive dust, or neutrons. Uranium is toxic. It's not good to consume it. But that's mostly irrelevant.

When uranium comes out of the ground 99.25 or 99.3% is U-238, which does not decay. It is stable. It's poisonous if you eat too much, it is not radioactive. It's uranium, but it's not radioactive. It sounds scare, it is not. It's like Cadmium or something.

The other 0.7% is U-235, which *is* radioactive, and *is* dangerous. But there's not enough of it to matter.

Uranium enrichment is a challenging process by which the two are separated. The U-235 is concentrated. Get the portion of U-235 up to 2%, 4%, 5%, and you can use it in a civilian reactor. It will not explode. It is dangerous. But when you put it in a reactor it will start to decay much more rapidly, enough to generate power. Military reactors aboard subs and what not use uranium enriched up to 20% so they're much trickier, but much more efficient.

Weapons grade is enriched to 85+% U-235.

Needless to say, when you do the enriching you end up with lots and lots of (mostly) harmless U-238, which has few uses. One of those, though, is that, since it's really, really dense, it makes good cores for discard sabot anti-tank rounds. Those rounds are not "nuclear" or "nucular". They are fired at tanks. If they miss they bury themselves deeply in the ground, where they proceed to do nothing forever. If they hit they vaporize while killing the tank, and *that* is an environmental problem because toxic (not radioactive) dust forms when the vaporized metal condenses to solid form.

People have blamed all kinds of things on this dust, but science says it mostly causes kidney problems with chronic exposure. It's removed from drinking water pretty much the same way as cadmium or arsenic or lead, though distillation or various kinds of filters. Your average plastic pitcher filter from Costco does a more than decent job. Lots of private wells have uranium in the water. If your drinking water is treated properly you should have to worry about uranium. If your drinking water is not treated properly you have bigger problems than uranium.

I'm not saying using DU rounds is not bad. I'm saying it ranks pretty low on the scale of things that are bad.

Ukraine will have to test for uranium in their drinking water in the future, but they already had to do that because of various things the Soviet Union did. But at least it will be Ukrainians testing the Ukrainian drinking water instead of Russians managing the Ukrainian drinking wager.

Putin is counting on people reacting emotionally to the word "uranium" and "nuclear". He is weaponizing ignorance. That will probably work pretty well, it usually does.

+1 Andrew

TBH Ukraine's post-war environmental problems are more likely to revolved around UXB, mines and all those nasty organic compounds that can arise from the combustion of everything that caught fire from tanks to industrial plants. For older Russian vehicles that have been trashed asbestos insulation may add to the "fun" for clean-up crews.

Plus any scorched-earth vengeance stuff the Russians do, like Sadam Hussein lighting the oil wells on fire.

To be honest we don't need them. The Russian tanks seem to blow up splendidly without them.

Good summary A W.
Ukraine will have a H of a lot of 'munitions' around for a long time.

I'm hoping we send them WP rounds too.

Then the media will stop having conniptions whenever WE use them, and explain that the primary purposes of WP are marking and concealing, and an equal weight of HE will cause more (and equally horrific) casualties to exposed civilians.

For decades Russia has called the tune for the Western media on which weapons to protest, and which not to. By amazing coincidence, the protests have historically been aimed at western weapons, while things like TOS-1 get a shrug.

The media turnaround on the subject of DU shows that Russia's grip on them has weakened.

You aren't wrong

Thanks David … I'm old and I forget stuff …

Thanks for the info Andrew. I was never very good at science …

As some have mentioned it seems we don't need DU rounds. The Russian tank/AFV high losses reflect that …

while things like TOS-1 get a shrug.

Very true … some mentioned it initially. But I heard little about its use recently.

On TOS-1 usage:
"On the contrary, the Russians achieved — IMHO — their biggest success in this war since early January — when, on 12th or 13th of March, forcing the ZSU to, finally, abandon Pervomaiske. Apparently by several volleys of TOS-1 (so much about ‘lack of ammunition'), and after something like 7–8 months of fighting for that place…. Indeed, the Russians are meanwhile attacking the next village to the west: Netaliove. This means, they're moving yet deeper around the southern and western flank of the ZSU garrison in Avdiivka."
Tom Cooper, 16 March 2023.

Druzhina
Illustrations of Costume & Soldiers

I guess the number of tubes we are sending is pretty limited though

AFAIK the only tubes that UK is sending that can discharge DU munitions are the ones on the 14 Challenger 2 tanks.

As for actual nuclear safety issues in Ukraine, there have also been concerns regarding the safety of Zaporizhaya (spelling?) nuclear plant, as well as the remains of Chernobyl plant, during the present conflict.

"AFAIK the only tubes that UK is sending that can discharge DU munitions are the ones on the 14 Challenger 2 tanks."

Exactly

On TOS-1 usage:
"On the contrary, the Russians achieved — IMHO — their biggest success in this war since early January — when, on 12th or 13th of March

I had not heard those reports. Thanks for the intel.

"AFAIK the only tubes that UK is sending that can discharge DU munitions are the ones on the 14 Challenger 2 tanks."

Well if only 14 MBTs are using DU. It won't be too much of a problem.

I am not in the know, now. 70s/ early 80s..APDS as Tank Killer. Russians favoured HEAT/HESH. OUR guns were Better!
Long time ago.
Just TRYING to imagine impact of a DU round on a tank! I WILL have seen in Gulf pics… just did not think.
Chally 120 on a T62/T55… end of !

If they hit they vaporize while killing the tank, and *that* is an environmental problem because toxic (not radioactive) dust forms when the vaporized metal condenses to solid form … It's removed from drinking water pretty much the same way as cadmium or arsenic or lead, though distillation or various kinds of filters.

Besides drinking water, there might be potentially issues with this dust ending up in the soil of the fertile Ukrainian fields, which provide open terrain that facilitates long term tank battles. And from the soil, it can eventually end up in plants, which are then harvested, shipped around the world and consumed for food. Whether the amounts eaten in such way would be large enough to provide a real health hazard is another issue, though as previously mentioned there can be also other kinds of unpleasant micro-gunk ending up in the soil from destroyed tanks (including fuel and lubricants).

Processing large amounts of contaminated soil is a rather heavy operation, and probably no high in the priority list of your average farmer, who is likely more concerned about immediate hazards posed by mines and unexploded ordnance embedded in the fields – compared to what an encounter with those can cause, long term health effects of low level chemical exposure are likely to be considered as a lesser issue.

Personally I'd doubt that even vaporised the uranium concentrations in soil would approach problem levels with plant uptake. Particularly averaged over an entire field that will have also been ploughed and harrowed. Its 14 tanks and suspect we've not given them that much DU!

I've already seen numerous stories about the hazards Ukrainian farmers are exposed to from unexploded ordinance. De-mining is probably going to ongoing for years if not decades.

My guess is particularly bad patches may show up as poor plant growth, things bad for us are often bad for plants, in future seasons – farmers will probably dig out those patches, dump the soil in a corner, plow in the hole and carry on. The Oryx database may well have a very practical secondary use after the war!

I've already seen numerous stories about the hazards Ukrainian farmers are exposed to from unexploded ordinance. De-mining is probably going to ongoing for years if not decades.

In soft soil, unexploded ordnance can sink quite deep, only to reappear at a later time. My understanding is that there is still WWI ordnance showing up in regions of Flanders and eastern France.

The amounts of munitions fired in Ukraine, and the rate of duds, might not be quite on WWI levels, but on the more heavily shelled areas there might be quite scary amounts of unexploded HE lurking underground.

[On a somewhat related note, Finland has committed to supplying three Leopard 2 mine-clearing tanks to Ukraine. Lacking cannons, these are of limited use when it comes to actually shooting at enemy – though they have MG armament – but are otherwise likely to find plenty of work.]

[On a somewhat related note, Finland has committed to supplying three Leopard 2 mine-clearing tanks to Ukraine. Lacking cannons, these are of limited use when it comes to actually shooting at enemy – though they have MG armament – but are otherwise likely to find plenty of work.]

Those will not operate unsupported, e.g. tanks, IFVs, FA, etc. if enemy contact is possible.

HUGE ammounts of WW1 /WW2 ordnance… shells, bombs, Grenades…still showing up in France, Belgium. Pile up on roadside until enough to warrant disposal team!
Watched TV doc covering Monte Cassino, WW2 Italy. Still grenades, mortar rounds just lying around on slopes!
WW2 mines still around in some places! 'Somewhere ' in 'Russias'… tanks or planes 'left' as still in minefield.
Not sure whether still there… but there was a crashed jet…with Pilot still inside, in a Cyprus minefield, from Greek/Turk conflict, many years later.

Somehow, do not think DU ammo will be enormous problem, compared to everything else.

Somehow, do not think DU ammo will be enormous problem, compared to everything else.

I tend to agree … again how many MBTs will be using DU ? So far only 14 AFAIK.

The problem is that Russia also has such munitions, but so far has not used them. Now probably – will be used.

link

TOS-1 does not leave any poisonous or radioactive trace after use. I do not understand what the claim to this weapon is. It is no more dangerous than any other conventional weapon.

The problem is that Russia also has such munitions, but so far has not used them. Now probably – will be used.

Can T-54s be retro-fitted to fire that kind of ammo?

Good question … I don't remember hearing that T-54/55 have DU rounds ?

As for Russian military decisions to use or not DU ammunition, more important factor might probably be whether they think those would be needed to be able to take out the Challenger 2 tanks (which have now been confirmed to have arrived in Ukraine) on the battlefield.

Glad to hear the Challenger II is there now. As well as some other NATO, etc. equipment plus more on the way. A former CIA officer recently said on an interviewed of FOX, as I and many others have said. As Putin was massing on the border over a year ago. The US, etc. should have been sending heavier lethal aid by the ship & plane load before Putin's forces crossed the border. As that may have deterred the invasion. Or made it more costly than it was to halt the invasion.

Every enemy troop, tank, etc. that you kill today is one less you have to kill tomorrow … And is one less that may kill you and/or comrades.