Balkan syndrome: no more effect than a cigarette

(B2 archives) When it comes to cancer or other illnesses among its soldiers sent to the Balkans, NATO does not intend to let communication escape it. Result... the worst!

The very controlled communication of NATO.

When General-Major Van Hoof came yesterday to report to the press on the meeting he chaired of the committee of heads of the military health services (Comeds) of the 19 member countries of the military organization, he appeared surrounded by men in blues and blacks of the military organization. So much so that the general, who is however not known in Belgium to be a follower of the jargon - on the contrary he is even one of the first to have seriously looked into the question of the disease of the Balkans - has been seriously tamed by NATO discipline. Symptomatic fact, facing the press, while most of the questions were directed towards the Belgian general, the NATO spokesman, Mark Laity, arrogated the right to answer, or hired a doctor-colonel (more sure) of the US military to comment.

Officially General Van Hoof denies

Solidly framed, General Van Hoof could only split a denial, quite innocent. “We do not find in the available data an atypical disease linked to the Balkans, these are very general complaints”. “From the available data, he added, we cannot identify any increase in blood cancers or death among soldiers who went on a mission in the Balkans compared to non-deployed soldiers”.

There is a syndrome whose causes are not explained

An opinion which is not, according to our information, so consensual. Even before this meeting, didn't a senior military official tell us that all the specific symptoms (chronic fatigue, memory loss, recurring skin problems, etc.) complained of by soldiers returning from operations in the former Yugoslavia are indeed a "syndrome" whose causes are not explained. Moreover, under cover of a polished speech, General van Hoof made a point of addressing a clear warning to the military forces of the North Atlantic: It is important to listen to military health concerns,” he said, “and to carry out all medical analyses, including independent studies of the situation. ". So he announced, the launch of an epidemiological study and the development of "common principles of soldier safety for operations of peacekeeping.

No more effect than a cigarette

While waiting to know this reality, we must rejoice in a great discovery, à la Pif-gadget, from NATO. In all seriousness, US Army Colonel David Lam delivered his " scientific reality: Anyone who smokes a cigarette for a year runs as much risk of radioactivity as someone who holds a 30 mm arrowhead 15 cm from the body”. Tobacco, NATO's new atomic weapon!