IRAQI TANK GRAVEYARD

yannarthusbertrand2

photobucket

jdraiders

jdraiders

SmileDarling

Kiwi Nomad

Iraq's iron graveyard

Amid the desert’s howling winds and forsaken dunes rests an iron ruin – the Iraqi tank graveyard. The graveyard, near Al Jahrah, Kuwait in the Rheris Valley is one of many timeless reminders of the devastating outcome of war, both to humans and to the environment. Tanks and other wreckage left behind by defeated troops during the war remained on the battlefield.

The tanks were collected into 'tank graveyards' like this one, north west of Jahra. This area is full of hundreds of tanks, trucks, artillery pieces and other heaps of rusted & busted metal. They’re not just pieces of metal; in some cases, they’re coffins, relics and tombs to those killed while serving their country. The U.S. doesn’t want to bring them home because it costs less to let them rot rather than transport them back, refurbish them, and redeploy them.

THE CITY OF DEATH

You'll need a GPS to find your way around this cemetary...

This is my second post on interesting cemetaries. (See: THE COFFINS OF SAGADA). I came across these pics on Beyond the Invisible.

Wādī al-Salām in Najaf, is the largest Islamic cemetery and one of the largest cemeteries in the world. It covers an area of six square kilometers and holds an estimated five million bodies. Millions of Muslims over the centuries have been brought here for burial from all parts of the world. It is called both 'The Valley of Peace' and 'The City of Death'.

The trade involving the transportation of dead bodies from far off areas has been operated for centuries. When the war started in 1980, Saddam banned corpses trafficking. After his fall corpses trafficking, resumed, reviving the local economy with a profitable 100 funerals a day.

The corpse traffic is organized and regulated by the Health Departments Customs that collects duty on the corpses and keeps watch to prevent epidemics.