Re: DU

[BobCherry@AOL.COM]

In a message dated 7/22/2003 11:47:10 AM Pacific Daylight Time, cireland@democratandchronicle.com writes:







Mr. Cherry,

  

Good questions for Mr. Rokke. I'll ask. 



I know Andy. I'll call him.









Thank you for the encouraging reply.



Dan Fahey is also an activist but he seems to have realized recently that he may have been riding the wrong horse with DU.  I believe that Dan has always had the veterans in mind altruistically. At the same time, Rokke has become more frantic in the last few years and his self-promotion has reached new heights.



Among my concerns early on when the DU controversy arose around 1992 was that attention to DU would distract veterans and researchers from finding the real cause for the Gulf War Syndrome, if it could be found. Biological effects of uranium exposure have been well researched and well known since at least the fifties. Manhattan Project workers and Navajo miners exposed to much higher levels of uranium than our soldiers did not show effects similar to the Gulf War Syndrome.



Soldiers hit by "friendly fire" DU who still have measurable amounts of DU shrapnel in their bodies show no ill effects. (Surgeons determined that leaving the shrapnel was safer than attempting to remove it.)



Anyway, good luck with your questions. He is a slippery one. He has been doing this for years. He has amateur acting experience and has his act down pat.



Bob Cherry



PS I am aware of the limitations journalists often have in pursuing stories of this type. While it is important to me, it may not be important enough to your readers to justify spending your scarce resources on it. 



The other writer's opinion about what you may do next are not the same as mine. Just that you bothered to answer me is a comfort to me. Again, thanks.