On February 9th, 1994, Donald W. Riegle, Jr.

Donald W. Riegle, Jr.

Donald Wayne Riegle Jr. is an American politician from Michigan, who served for five terms as a Representative and for three terms as a Senator.-Early life:...

 delivered a report, commonly referred to as The Riegle Report to the U.S. Senate regarding the health of Gulf War veterans. In the report, Senator Riegle cites evidence that biological and chemical weapons were used against American and Czechoslovakian troops, and that some of the bacteriological agents developed and used by Saddam Hussein

Saddam Hussein

Saddam Hussein Abd al-Majid al-Tikriti was the fifth President of Iraq, serving in this capacity from 16 July 1979 until 9 April 2003...

 during the Gulf War

Gulf War

The Persian Gulf War , commonly referred to as simply the Gulf War, was a war waged by a U.N.-authorized coalition force from 34 nations led by the United States, against Iraq in response to Iraq's invasion and annexation of Kuwait.The war is also known under other names, such as the First Gulf...

 in Iraq

Iraq

Iraq ; officially the Republic of Iraq is a country in Western Asia spanning most of the northwestern end of the Zagros mountain range, the eastern part of the Syrian Desert and the northern part of the Arabian Desert....

 originated from within the United States. Senator Riegle implicates the U.S. Department of Commerce as well as the American Type Culture Collection

American Type Culture Collection

The American Type Culture Collection is a private, not-for-profit biological resource center whose mission focuses on the acquisition, authentication, production, preservation, development and distribution of standard reference microorganisms, cell lines and other materials for research in the...

 in the shipment of these agents:

"Records provided by the supplier show that, from at least 1985 through 1989, the period for which records were available, the United States government approved for sale to Iraq quantities of potentially lethal biological agents that could have been cultured or grown in large volume in an Iraqi biological warfare program. These exported materials were not attenuated or weakened and were capable of reproduction."

Senator Riegle also censures the U.S. Department of Defense

United States Department of Defense

The United States Department of Defense is the U.S...

 for its irresponsibility in taking care of afflicted veterans and families of veterans:

"Frankly, the Defense Department does not have too much interest in [a retired Army colonel who is sick and unemployed]. They are looking ahead to other things. They are not looking back at the large number of sick veterans who are out there.

"But it does not take a Ph.D., knowing Saddam Hussein's record, knowing he had the production facilities, knowing that we went in and bombed some of those production facilities, and knowing that the things that we sent him helped him produce biological weapons, to understand that such exposures may—I underline the word `may`—be causing the problems of a lot of our sick veterans that otherwise are defying explanation."

See also

• Gulf War syndrome
  Gulf War syndrome
  Gulf War syndrome or Gulf War illness describes a medical condition that affected veterans and civilians who were near conflicts during or downwind of chemical weapons depot demolition, after the 1991 Gulf War. A wide range of acute and chronic symptoms have included fatigue, musculoskeletal...
  
  
• The Riegle report on-line at gulfweb.org

or see the text on Wikisource.