通過閱讀學(xué)詞匯CET-6（16）

UNIT SIXTEEN

The Eco-War

　　The military lexicon needs a new term:"eco-war". What better way to describe the acts of environmental slaughter committed last week in the Persian Gulf, where the air is thick with the smoke from burning oil wells and a wide stripe of crude petroleum is fouling the water and devastating wildlife?

　　What is certain is that the oil spill has delivered a devastating blow to the ecology of the Persian Gulf. "Massive oil spills could turn this body of water into a virtual dead sea." says Brent Blackwelder, vice president of Friends of the Earth.

　　But last week's fires and oil spills could be just a prelude of future environmental disasters wrought by the war with Iraq. Among the areas of greatest concern:

　　THE GULF. Because it is virtually an enclosed basin, with an outlet to the sea only 55 km wide at the Strait of Hormuz, the gulf is especialy vulnerable to oil spills. In a body of water badly contaminated by tankers and garbage, a disastrous spill of the kind that Iraq caused last week could destroy nesting areas for endangered sea turles while poisoning fish which are vital to local fishermen.

　　BURNING OIL FIELDS. Saddam is assumed to have mined all or most of Kuwait's 360 operating oil wells. If he throws the switch, the resulting fires could send forth a vast cloud of dense black smoke that would foul the sir and darken skies as far east as Afghanistan and northern India. After 30 days, smoke could cover an area half the size of Europe. But because oil gushes naturally to the surface in most Kuwaiti wells, with no need of pumping, it will go on feeding a blaze until someone puts it out -- months or years later, depending on how long the war lasts.

　　The worst possibility is that the immense smoke could lower temperatures in the Indian subcontinent a few degrees, disru

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