Many returning Coalition soldiers reported illnesses following their action in the war, a phenomenon known as Gulf War syndrome or Gulf War illness. There has been widespread speculation and disagreement about the causes of the illness and the reported birth defects. Some factors considered as possibilities include exposure to depleted uranium, chemical weapons, anthrax vaccines given to deploying soldiers, and/or infectious diseases. Major Michael Donnelly, a USAF officer during the War, helped publicize the syndrome and advocated for veterans' rights in this regard. Depleted uranium was used in the war in tank kinetic energy penetrators and 20--30 mm cannon ordnance. DU is a pyrophoric, genotoxic, and teratogenic heavy metal. Many have cited its use during the war as a contributing factor to a number of instances of health issues in the conflict's veterans and surrounding civilian populations. However, scientific opinion on the risk is mixed. On the night of 26--27 February 1991, some Iraqi forces began leaving Kuwait on the main highway north of Al Jahra in a column of some 1,400 vehicles. A patrolling E-8 Joint STARS aircraft observed the retreating forces and relayed the information to the DDM-8 air operations center in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.[136] These vehicles and the retreating soldiers were subsequently attacked, resulting in a 60 km stretch of highway strewn with debris—the Highway of Death. Another incident during the war highlighted the question of large-scale Iraqi combat deaths. This was the "bulldozer assault", wherein two brigades from the U.S. 1st Infantry Division (Mechanized) were faced with a large and complex trench network, as part of the heavily fortified "Saddam Hussein Line". After some deliberation, they opted to use anti-mine plows mounted on tanks and combat earthmovers to simply plow over and bury alive the defending Iraqi soldiers. One newspaper story reported that U.S. commanders estimated thousands of Iraqi soldiers surrendered, escaping live burial during the two-day assault 24--26 February 1991. Patrick Day Sloyan of Newsday reported, "Bradley Fighting Vehicles and Vulcan armored carriers straddled the trench lines and fired into the Iraqi soldiers as the tanks covered them with mounds of sand. 'I came through right after the lead company,' [Col. Anthony] Moreno said. 'What you saw was a bunch of buried trenches with peoples' arms and things sticking out of them...'"[138] However, after the war, the Iraqi government claimed to have found only 44 bodies.[139] In his book The Wars Against Saddam, John Simpson alleges that U.S. forces attempted to cover up the incident.[140] After the incident, the commander of the 1st Brigade said: "I know burying people like that sounds pretty nasty, but it would be even nastier if we had to put our troops in the trenches and clean them out with bayonets." Kuwait's expulsion policy was a response to PLO leader Yasser Arafat's alignment with Saddam, who had earlier invaded Kuwait. Prior to the war, Palestinians made up about 30% of Kuwait's 2 million residents.[141] The exodus took place during one week in March 1991, following Kuwait's liberation from Iraqi occupation. Kuwait expelled 200,000 Palestinians from its territory.[142] Before the exodus, more than 200,000 Palestinians voluntarily fled Kuwait during the Iraqi occupation of Kuwait due to harassment and intimidation by Iraqi security forces, in addition to getting fired from work by Iraqi authority figures in Kuwait.[143] The Iraqi education ministry in Kuwait fired 3000 Palestinians in September 1990,[143] and the dismissals of Palestinians from other sectors continued throughout October.[143] The Iraqis also put pressure on the PLO office in Kuwait,[143] which had refused to organize any Palestinian demonstrations and rallies in support of Iraq.[143] By 2011, many Palestinians had returned to Kuwait and today the number of Palestinians living in Kuwait is 90,000. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persian_Gulf_War

• published: 04 Nov 2014
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