The Gulf War has long since been over. Yet its repercussions are found even today; specifically in the health of those soldiers who took part in it. But while these symptoms of ill-health have manifested several years ago, it is only now that the US government and more recently a cautious UK, admitted to the possibilities of chemicals affecting the soldiers.
Strange are, thus, the ways of the governments. It took Pentagon four years of outright denial before getting around to finally accept the presence of the Gulf War Syndrome -- the confusing mix of various disabilities affecting the soldier, from headaches, nausea, breathing difficulties, fatigue and depression to memory loss and body pain. Pentagon insisted all the time that US soldiers were not exposed to chemical or biological weapons during the war. Then in June this year, the US defense department admitted that some 400 engineers could have come in contact with a poisonous gas called sarin. The numbers slowly went up to 5,000 in September but now a Pentagon official, Kenneth Bacon stated in the first week of October that close to 15,000 soldiers could have been exposed to various chemical explosions during the war.
While the government plays the number game, more and more soldiers are being troubled by ailments to which they have no clue. The defense department announced recently that the National Academy of Sciences and its Institute of Medicine will undertake the investigation into the syndrome.
Meanwhile, in UK, Nicholas Soames, a junior defense minister stated that "the use of some organophosphate pesticides may possibly be a clue to the conditions that some of the Gulf War veterans have suffered from". Around 51,000 British troops took part in the 1991 war. Soames added that more pesticides, other than malathion, were used during the conflict.
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