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. US rejects German napalm bombing report 08/08/03: COLOGNE - US forces used dozens of napalm-like MK-77 fire bombs during the Iraq war, according to a German television news report. Later Thursday, US defence officials in Washington disputed the German report. The US destroyed its entire napalm stockpile in 2001, and the MK-77 has a completely different chemical composition than napalm, the Pentagon said. The report on ARD public television's "Monitor" current-affairs magazine show said the bombs are an outgrowth of incendiary bombs used in Korea and Vietnam by American forces. Fire bombs rupture on impact and spread burning fuel gel onto surrounding objects. The 500-pound MK-77 device is the only fire bomb now in service with the U.S. military. In the 1991 Gulf War, about 500 MK-77 fire bombs were dropped by Marine Corps planes to ignite oil-filled Iraqi fire trenches, which were part of barriers constructed in southern Kuwait. ARD had reported that confirmation of their use in this year's Iraq war came from US Marine Corps Colonel Joseph Boehm in San Diego. He was quoted as saying that 30 MK-77 canisters were dropped during a 30-day period in the invasion of Iraq, primarily by AV-8 Harriers from relatively low altitudes. DPA
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