Depleted Uranium: Who put the balckout on US Media?

Shining Light in Dark Corners: "March 14, 2005 | Details on Depleted Uranium

The details about Depleted Uranium are emerging from the deep hole the US Department of Defense has put them. Rumor has it that the BBC will break the story over the next few days. If that happens, US mainstream media will likely pick up the story.

What I want to know is why its taken so long. Who put the blackout on US Media? I've found internet links to documents produced by the government as early as 1990 on DU and its potential consequences. There are extensive resources on-line on DU. There are also government commissioned studies that minimize it's risks. The Federation of American Scientists has a good set of links.
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DU along with the exposure of many troops to the traces of chemical weapons in southern Iraq early in the invasion when a munitions dump was burned probably accounts for much of the 56% disability rate in Gulf War II Veterans.

Explaining How

“The numbers are overwhelming, but the potential horrors only get worse,” Robert C. Koehler of the Chicago-based Tribune Media Services wrote in an article about DU weapons entitled “Silent Genocide.”

“DU dust does more than wreak havoc on the immune systems of those who breathe it or touch it; the substance also alters one’s genetic code,” Koehler wrote. “The Pentagon’s response to such charges is denial, denial, denial. And the American media is its moral co-conspirator.”

The U.S. government has known for at least 20 years that DU weapons produce clouds of poison gas on impact. These clouds of aerosolized DU are laden with billions of toxic sub-micron sized particles. A 1984 Department of Energy conference on nuclear airborne waste reported that tests of DU anti-tank missiles showed that at least 31 percent of the mass of a DU penetrator is converted to nano-particles on impact. In larger bombs the percentage of aerosolized DU increases to nearly 100 percent, Fulk told AFP.

DU is harmful in three ways, according to Fulk: “Chemical toxicity, radiological toxicity and particle toxicity.”