A chemical weapon (CW) is a specialized
munition that uses chemicals
formulated to inflict death or harm on humans. According to the
Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons
The Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) is an intergovernmental organisation and the implementing body for the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC), which entered into force on 29 April 1997. The OPCW, with its 193 member ...
(OPCW), this can be any chemical compound intended as a
weapon "or its
precursor
Precursor or Precursors may refer to:
* Precursor (religion), a forerunner, predecessor
** The Precursor, John the Baptist
Science and technology
* Precursor (bird), a hypothesized genus of fossil birds that was composed of fossilized parts of u ...
that can cause death, injury, temporary incapacitation or sensory irritation through its chemical action. Munitions or other delivery devices designed to deliver chemical weapons, whether filled or unfilled, are also considered weapons themselves."
Chemical weapons are classified as
weapons of mass destruction (WMD), though they are distinct from
nuclear weapons,
biological weapon
A biological agent (also called bio-agent, biological threat agent, biological warfare agent, biological weapon, or bioweapon) is a bacterium, virus, protozoan, parasite, fungus, or toxin that can be used purposefully as a weapon in bioterroris ...
s, and
radiological weapons. All may be used in warfare and are known by the military acronym NBC (for nuclear, biological, and chemical warfare). Weapons of mass destruction are distinct from
conventional weapon
The terms conventional weapons or conventional arms generally refer to weapons whose ability to damage comes from kinetic, incendiary, or explosive energy and exclude weapons of mass destruction (''e.g.'' nuclear, biological, radiological and ...
s, which are primarily effective due to their
explosive,
kinetic
Kinetic (Ancient Greek: κίνησις “kinesis”, movement or to move) may refer to:
* Kinetic theory, describing a gas as particles in random motion
* Kinetic energy, the energy of an object that it possesses due to its motion
Art and ent ...
, or
incendiary potential. Chemical weapons can be widely dispersed in gas, liquid and solid forms, and may easily afflict others than the intended targets.
Nerve gas,
tear gas and
pepper spray are three modern examples of chemical weapons.
Lethal unitary chemical agents and munitions are extremely
volatile and they constitute a class of hazardous chemical weapons that have been
stockpiled by many nations. Unitary agents are effective on their own and do not require mixing with other agents. The most dangerous of these are
nerve agent
Nerve agents, sometimes also called nerve gases, are a class of organic chemicals that disrupt the mechanisms by which nerves transfer messages to organs. The disruption is caused by the blocking of acetylcholinesterase (AChE), an enzyme that ...
s (
GA,
GB,
GD, and
VX) and
vesicant
A blister agent (or vesicant), is a chemical compound that causes severe skin, eye and mucosal pain and irritation. They are named for their ability to cause severe chemical burns, resulting in painful water blisters on the bodies of those affec ...
(blister) agents, which include formulations of sulfur mustard such as H, HT, and HD. They all are liquids at normal room temperature, but become gaseous when released. Widely used during the
World War I, the effects of so-called
mustard gas
Mustard gas or sulfur mustard is a chemical compound belonging to a family of cytotoxic and blister agents known as mustard agents. The name ''mustard gas'' is technically incorrect: the substance, when dispersed, is often not actually a gas, b ...
,
phosgene gas
Phosgene is the organic chemical compound with the formula COCl2. It is a toxic, colorless gas; in low concentrations, its musty odor resembles that of freshly cut hay or grass. Phosgene is a valued and important industrial building block, esp ...
and others caused lung searing, blindness, death and maiming.
During
World War II the
Nazi regime used a commercial
hydrogen cyanide blood agent
A blood agent is a toxic chemical agent that affects the body by being absorbed into the blood. Blood agents are fast-acting, potentially lethal poisons that typically manifest at room temperature as volatile colorless gases with a faint odor. T ...
trade-named
Zyklon B
Zyklon B (; translated Cyclone B) was the trade name of a cyanide-based pesticide invented in Germany in the early 1920s. It consisted of hydrogen cyanide (prussic acid), as well as a cautionary eye irritant and one of several adsorbents such ...
to commit industrialised
genocide against
Jews and other targeted populations in large
gas chambers
A gas chamber is an apparatus for killing humans or other animals with gas, consisting of a sealed chamber into which a poisonous or asphyxiant gas is introduced. Poisonous agents used include hydrogen cyanide and carbon monoxide.
History
...
. The
Holocaust resulted in the largest death toll to chemical weapons in history.
,
CS gas
The compound 2-chlorobenzalmalononitrile (also called ''o''-chlorobenzylidene malononitrile; chemical formula: C10H5ClN2), a cyanocarbon, is the defining component of tear gas commonly referred to as CS gas, which is used as a riot control agen ...
and pepper spray remain in common use for policing and riot control; CS and pepper spray are considered
non-lethal weapons. Under the
Chemical Weapons Convention
The Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC), officially the Convention on the Prohibition of the Development, Production, Stockpiling and Use of Chemical Weapons and on their Destruction, is an arms control treaty administered by the Organisation for ...
(1993), there is a legally binding, worldwide ban on the production, stockpiling, and use of chemical weapons and their precursors. However, large stockpiles of chemical weapons continue to exist, usually justified as a precaution against possible use by an aggressor. Continued storage of these chemical weapons is a hazard, as many of the weapons are now more than 50 years old, raising risks significantly.
The
United States is now undergoing measures to dispose of their chemical weapons in a safe manner.
Use
Chemical warfare involves using the
toxic properties
Toxicity is the degree to which a chemical substance or a particular mixture of substances can damage an organism. Toxicity can refer to the effect on a whole organism, such as an animal, bacterium, or plant, as well as the effect on a subst ...
of
chemical substance
A chemical substance is a form of matter having constant chemical composition and characteristic properties. Some references add that chemical substance cannot be separated into its constituent elements by physical separation methods, i.e., wit ...
s as weapons. This type of warfare is distinct from
nuclear warfare and
biological warfare
Biological warfare, also known as germ warfare, is the use of biological toxins or infectious agents such as bacteria, viruses, insects, and fungi with the intent to kill, harm or incapacitate humans, animals or plants as an act of war. B ...
, which together make up NBC, the military initialism for Nuclear, Biological, and Chemical (warfare or weapons). None of these fall under the term
conventional weapon
The terms conventional weapons or conventional arms generally refer to weapons whose ability to damage comes from kinetic, incendiary, or explosive energy and exclude weapons of mass destruction (''e.g.'' nuclear, biological, radiological and ...
s, which are primarily effective because of their destructive potential. Chemical warfare does not depend upon
explosive force to achieve an objective. It depends upon the unique properties of the chemical agent
weaponized.
A lethal agent is designed to injure, incapacitate, or kill an opposing force, or deny unhindered use of a particular area of terrain.
Defoliant
A defoliant is any herbicidal chemical sprayed or dusted on plants to cause their leaves to fall off. Defoliants are widely used for the selective removal of weeds in managing croplands and lawns. Worldwide use of defoliants, along with the ...
s are used to quickly kill vegetation and deny its use for cover and concealment. Chemical warfare can also be used against agriculture and livestock to promote hunger and starvation. Chemical payloads can be delivered by remote controlled container release, aircraft, or rocket. Protection against chemical weapons includes proper equipment, training, and decontamination measures.
History
Simple chemical weapons were used sporadically throughout antiquity and into the Industrial age. It was not until the 19th century that the modern conception of chemical warfare emerged, as various scientists and nations proposed the use of asphyxiating or poisonous gasses. So alarmed were nations that multiple international treaties, discussed below, were passed banning chemical weapons. This however did not prevent the extensive
use of chemical weapons in World War I. The development of
chlorine gas
Chlorine is a chemical element with the symbol Cl and atomic number 17. The second-lightest of the halogens, it appears between fluorine and bromine in the periodic table and its properties are mostly intermediate between them. Chlorine is ...
, among others, was used by both sides to try to break the stalemate of
trench warfare. Though largely ineffective over the long run, it decidedly changed the nature of the war. In many cases the gasses used did not kill, but instead horribly maimed, injured, or disfigured casualties. Some 1.3 million gas casualties were recorded, which may have included up to 260,000 civilian casualties.
The interwar years saw occasional use of chemical weapons, mainly to put down rebellions.
["Chemical Weapons" in ''Historical Dictionary of Ethiopia'', 2d ed. (eds. David H. Shinn & Thomas P. Ofcansky: Scarecrow Press, 2013).] In Nazi Germany, much research went into developing new chemical weapons, such as potent
nerve agent
Nerve agents, sometimes also called nerve gases, are a class of organic chemicals that disrupt the mechanisms by which nerves transfer messages to organs. The disruption is caused by the blocking of acetylcholinesterase (AChE), an enzyme that ...
s. However, chemical weapons saw little battlefield use in World War II. Both sides were prepared to use such weapons, but the Allied powers never did, and the Axis used them only very sparingly. The reason for the lack of use by the Nazis, despite the considerable efforts that had gone into developing new varieties, might have been a lack of technical ability or fears that the Allies would retaliate with their own chemical weapons. Those fears were not unfounded: the Allies made comprehensive plans for defensive and retaliatory use of chemical weapons, and stockpiled large quantities.
[Paxman and Harris]
Churchill's plans 'to drench Germany with poison gas' and anthrax - Robert Harris and Jeremy Paxman
p132-35.[Callum Borchers]
Sean Spicer takes his questionable claims to a new level in Hitler-Assad comparison
''The Washington Post'' (April 11, 2017). Japanese forces used them more widely, though only against their Asian enemies, as they also feared that using it on Western powers would result in retaliation. Chemical weapons were frequently used against
Kuomintang
The Kuomintang (KMT), also referred to as the Guomindang (GMD), the Nationalist Party of China (NPC) or the Chinese Nationalist Party (CNP), is a major political party in the Republic of China, initially on the Chinese mainland and in Tai ...
and Chinese communist troops. However, the Nazis did extensively use poison gas against civilians in
The Holocaust. Vast quantities of
Zyklon B
Zyklon B (; translated Cyclone B) was the trade name of a cyanide-based pesticide invented in Germany in the early 1920s. It consisted of hydrogen cyanide (prussic acid), as well as a cautionary eye irritant and one of several adsorbents such ...
gas and carbon monoxide were used in the
gas chambers of Nazi extermination camps, resulting in the overwhelming majority of some three million deaths. This remains the deadliest use of poison gas in history.
[Patrick Coffey, ''American Arsenal: A Century of Weapon Technology and Strategy'' (Oxford University Press, 2014), p. 152-54.][James J. Wirtz, "Weapons of Mass Destruction" in ''Contemporary Security Studies'' (4th ed.), ed. Alan Collins, ''Contemporary Security Studies'' (Oxford University Press, 2016), p. 302.]
The post-war era has seen limited, though devastating, use of chemical weapons. Some 100,000 Iranian troops were casualties of Iraqi chemical weapons during the
Iran–Iraq War. Iraq used mustard gas and nerve agents against its own civilians in the 1988
Halabja chemical attack.
[On this day: 1988: Thousands die in Halabja gas attack](_blank)
BBC News (March 16, 1988). The
Cuban intervention in Angola
The Cuban intervention in Angola (codenamed Operation Carlota) began on 5 November 1975, when Cuba sent combat troops in support of the communist-aligned People's Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA) against the pro-western National Un ...
saw limited use of
organophosphates.
The Syrian government has been alleged to use
sarin, chlorine, and mustard gas in the
Syrian civil war. Terrorist groups have also used chemical weapons, notably in the
Tokyo subway sarin attack and the
Matsumoto incident.
[Seto, Yasuo.]
The Sarin Gas Attack in Japan and the Related Forensic Investigation.
The Sarin Gas Attack in Japan and the Related Forensic Investigation. Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, June 1, 2001. Web. February 24, 2017. See also
chemical terrorism
Chemical terrorism is the form of terrorism that uses the toxic effects of chemicals to kill, injure, or otherwise adversely affect the interests of its targets. It can broadly be considered a form of chemical warfare.
Incidents
Use by LTTE in ...
.
International law
Before the Second World War
International law
International law (also known as public international law and the law of nations) is the set of rules, norms, and standards generally recognized as binding between states. It establishes normative guidelines and a common conceptual framework for ...
has prohibited the use of chemical weapons since 1899, under the
Hague Convention: Article 23 of the Regulations Respecting the Laws and Customs of War on Land adopted by the First Hague Conference "especially" prohibited employing "poison and poisoned arms".
A separate declaration stated that in any war between signatory powers, the parties would abstain from using projectiles "the object of which is the diffusion of asphyxiating or deleterious gases".
The
Washington Naval Treaty
The Washington Naval Treaty, also known as the Five-Power Treaty, was a treaty signed during 1922 among the major Allies of World War I, which agreed to prevent an arms race by limiting naval construction. It was negotiated at the Washington N ...
, signed February 6, 1922, also known as the Five-Power Treaty, aimed at banning chemical warfare but did not succeed because France rejected it. The subsequent failure to include chemical warfare has contributed to the resultant increase in stockpiles.
The
Geneva Protocol, officially known as the ''Protocol for the Prohibition of the Use in War of Asphyxiating, Poisonous or other Gases, and of Bacteriological Methods of Warfare'', is an International treaty prohibiting the use of chemical and
biological weapon
A biological agent (also called bio-agent, biological threat agent, biological warfare agent, biological weapon, or bioweapon) is a bacterium, virus, protozoan, parasite, fungus, or toxin that can be used purposefully as a weapon in bioterroris ...
s. It was signed at
Geneva June 17, 1925, and entered into force on February 8, 1928. 133 nations are listed as state parties
to the treaty.
Ukraine is the newest signatory, acceding August 7, 2003.
This treaty states that chemical and biological weapons are "justly condemned by the general opinion of the civilised world". And while the treaty prohibits the use of chemical and biological weapons, it does not address the production, storage, or transfer of these weapons. Treaties that followed the Geneva Protocol did address those omissions and have been enacted.
Modern agreements
The 1993
Chemical Weapons Convention
The Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC), officially the Convention on the Prohibition of the Development, Production, Stockpiling and Use of Chemical Weapons and on their Destruction, is an arms control treaty administered by the Organisation for ...
(CWC) is the most recent
arms control
Arms control is a term for international restrictions upon the development, production, stockpiling, proliferation and usage of small arms, conventional weapons, and weapons of mass destruction. Arms control is typically exercised through the u ...
agreement with the force of
International law
International law (also known as public international law and the law of nations) is the set of rules, norms, and standards generally recognized as binding between states. It establishes normative guidelines and a common conceptual framework for ...
. Its full name is the ''Convention on the Prohibition of the Development, Production, Stockpiling and Use of Chemical Weapons and on their Destruction''. That agreement outlaws the production, stockpiling and use of chemical weapons. It is administered by the
Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons
The Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) is an intergovernmental organisation and the implementing body for the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC), which entered into force on 29 April 1997. The OPCW, with its 193 member ...
(OPCW), which is an independent organization based in
The Hague.
The OPCW administers the terms of the CWC to 192 signatories, which represents 98% of the global population. , 66,368 of 72,525 metric tonnes, (92% of chemical weapon stockpiles), have been verified as destroyed.
The OPCW has conducted 6,327 inspections at 235 chemical weapon-related sites and 2,255 industrial sites. These inspections have affected the sovereign territory of 86 States Parties since April 1997. Worldwide, 4,732 industrial facilities are subject to inspection under provisions of the CWC.
Countries with stockpiles
In 1985, the
United States Congress passed legislation requiring the disposal of the stockpile chemical agents and
munitions
Ammunition (informally ammo) is the material fired, scattered, dropped, or detonated from any weapon or weapon system. Ammunition is both expendable weapons (e.g., bombs, missiles, grenades, land mines) and the component parts of other weapo ...
consisting of over 3 million chemical weapons, adding up to 31'000 tons of chemical weapons needing to be disposed of.
This was ordered because a timely and safe disposal of chemical weapons is far safer than chemical weapon storage.
Between the years of 1982 and 1992, the
United States army reported approximately 1,500 leaking chemical weapons munitions, and in 1993 a 100-gallon chemical spill was reported at the
Tooele Army Depot
Tooele Army Depot (TEAD) is a United States Army Joint Munitions Command post in Tooele County, Utah. It serves as a storage site for war reserve and training ammunition. The depot stores, issues, receives, renovates, modifies, maintains and dem ...
in Utah consisting of
mustard agents.
When chemical weapons are leaked or spilled into the ground, an insidious process follows where the condition of the agent is unknown.
This occurs because the process of chemical agents degrading in soil is a complex process that is affected by many factors such as
temperature,
acidity
In computer science, ACID ( atomicity, consistency, isolation, durability) is a set of properties of database transactions intended to guarantee data validity despite errors, power failures, and other mishaps. In the context of databases, a sequ ...
,
alkalinity
Alkalinity (from ar, القلوي, al-qaly, lit=ashes of the saltwort) is the capacity of water to resist acidification. It should not be confused with basicity, which is an absolute measurement on the pH scale.
Alkalinity is the strength o ...
, meteorological conditions, and the types of organisms present in the soil.
This complexity causes persistent agents such as
sulfur mustards to be harmful for decades.
Manner and form
There are three basic configurations in which these agents are stored. The first are self-contained munitions like projectiles, cartridges, mines, and rockets; these can contain propellant and/or explosive components. The next form are aircraft-delivered munitions.
Together they constitute the two forms that have been
weaponized and are ready for their intended use. The U.S. stockpile consisted of 39% of these weapon ready munitions. The final of the three forms are raw agent housed in one-ton containers. The remaining 61%
of the stockpile was in this form.
Whereas these chemicals exist in liquid form at normal room temperature,
the sulfur mustards H and HD freeze in temperatures below . Mixing lewisite with distilled mustard lowers the freezing point to .
Higher temperatures are a bigger concern because the possibility of an explosion increases as the temperatures rise. A fire at one of these facilities would endanger the surrounding community as well as the personnel at the installations.
Perhaps more so for the community having much less access to protective equipment and specialized training.
The
Oak Ridge National Laboratory conducted a study to assess capabilities and costs for protecting civilian populations during related emergencies,
and the effectiveness of expedient,
in-place shelters.
Disposal
At the end of
World War II, the
Allies
An alliance is a relationship among people, groups, or states that have joined together for mutual benefit or to achieve some common purpose, whether or not explicit agreement has been worked out among them. Members of an alliance are called ...
occupied
Germany and found large stockpiles of chemical weapons that they did not know how to dispose of or deal with.
Ultimately, the
Allies
An alliance is a relationship among people, groups, or states that have joined together for mutual benefit or to achieve some common purpose, whether or not explicit agreement has been worked out among them. Members of an alliance are called ...
disposed large quantities of these chemical weapons into the
Baltic Sea
The Baltic Sea is an arm of the Atlantic Ocean that is enclosed by Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Germany, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Russia, Sweden and the North and Central European Plain.
The sea stretches from 53°N to 66°N latitude and from ...
, including 32 000 tonnes of chemical
munitions
Ammunition (informally ammo) is the material fired, scattered, dropped, or detonated from any weapon or weapon system. Ammunition is both expendable weapons (e.g., bombs, missiles, grenades, land mines) and the component parts of other weapo ...
and chemical warfare agents dumped into the
Bornholm Basin, and another 2000 tonnes of chemical weapons in the
Gotland Basin.
The majority of these chemical munitions were dumped into the sea while contained in simple wooden crates, leading to a rapid proliferation of chemicals.
Chemical Weapons being disposed in the ocean during the 20th century is not unique to the
Baltic Sea
The Baltic Sea is an arm of the Atlantic Ocean that is enclosed by Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Germany, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Russia, Sweden and the North and Central European Plain.
The sea stretches from 53°N to 66°N latitude and from ...
, and other heavily contaminated areas where disposal occurred are the European, Japanese, Russian, and United States coasts.
These chemical weapons dumped in the ocean pose a continual environmental and human health risk, and chemical agents and breakdown products from said agents have been recently been identified in ocean sediment near historical dumping sites.
When chemical weapons are dumped or otherwise improperly disposed of, the chemical agents are quickly distributed over a wide range.
The long term impacts of this wide-scale distribution are unknown, but known to be negative.
In the
Vietnam War of 1955-1975, a chemical weapon called
agent orange
Agent Orange is a chemical herbicide and defoliant, one of the "tactical use" Rainbow Herbicides. It was used by the U.S. military as part of its herbicidal warfare program, Operation Ranch Hand, during the Vietnam War from 1961 to 1971. It ...
was widely used by
United States forces
The United States Armed Forces are the military forces of the United States. The armed forces consists of six service branches: the Army, Marine Corps, Navy, Air Force, Space Force, and Coast Guard. The president of the United States is the ...
.
The
United States utilized
agent orange
Agent Orange is a chemical herbicide and defoliant, one of the "tactical use" Rainbow Herbicides. It was used by the U.S. military as part of its herbicidal warfare program, Operation Ranch Hand, during the Vietnam War from 1961 to 1971. It ...
as a type of 'tactical herbicide', aiming to destroy
Vietnamese foliage and plant life to ease
military access.
This usage of
agent orange
Agent Orange is a chemical herbicide and defoliant, one of the "tactical use" Rainbow Herbicides. It was used by the U.S. military as part of its herbicidal warfare program, Operation Ranch Hand, during the Vietnam War from 1961 to 1971. It ...
has left lasting impacts that are still observable today in the
Vietnamese environment, causing
disease,
stunted growth
Stunted growth is a reduced growth rate in human development. It is a primary manifestation of malnutrition (or more precisely undernutrition) and recurrent infections, such as diarrhea and helminthiasis, in early childhood and even before birth, ...
, and
deformities
A deformity, dysmorphism, or dysmorphic feature is a major abnormality of an organism that makes a part of the body appear or function differently than how it is supposed to.
Causes
Deformity can be caused by a variety of factors:
*Arthritis an ...
.
United States
The stockpiles, which have been maintained for more than 50 years,
are now considered obsolete.
Public Law 99-145, contains section 1412, which directs the
Department of Defense Department of Defence or Department of Defense may refer to:
Current departments of defence
* Department of Defence (Australia)
* Department of National Defence (Canada)
* Department of Defence (Ireland)
* Department of National Defense (Philipp ...
(DOD) to dispose of the stockpiles. This directive fell upon the DOD with joint cooperation from the
Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA).
The Congressional directive has resulted in the present Chemical Stockpile Disposal Program.
Historically, chemical munitions have been disposed of by land burial, open burning, and ocean dumping (referred to as
Operation CHASE Operation CHASE (an acronym for "Cut Holes And Sink 'Em") was a United States Department of Defense program for the disposal of unwanted munitions at sea from May 1964 until the early 1970s.Kurak, Steve "Operation Chase" ''United States Naval Instit ...
).
However, in 1969, the
National Research Council (NRC) recommended that ocean dumping be discontinued. The Army then began a study of disposal technologies, including the assessment of incineration as well as chemical neutralization methods. In 1982, that study culminated in the selection of incineration technology, which is now incorporated into what is known as the ''baseline'' system. Construction of the
Johnston Atoll Chemical Agent Disposal System
Johnston Atoll Chemical Agent Disposal System (JACADS) was the U.S. Army's first chemical munitions disposal facility. It was located on Johnston Island, at Johnston Atoll and completed its mission and ceased operation in 2000.
Background
Prior ...
(JACADS) began in 1985.
This was to be a full-scale prototype facility using the baseline system. The prototype was a success but there were still many concerns about CONUS operations. To address growing public concern over incineration, Congress, in 1992, directed the Army to evaluate alternative disposal approaches that might be "significantly safer", more cost effective, and which could be completed within the established time frame. The Army was directed to report to Congress on potential alternative technologies by the end of 1993, and to include in that report: "any recommendations that the
National Academy of Sciences makes ..."
In June 2007, the disposal program achieved the milestone of reaching 45% destruction of the chemical weapon stockpile.
The
Chemical Materials Agency (CMA) releases regular updates to the public regarding the status of the disposal program.
By October 2010, the program had reached 80% destruction status.
Lethality
Chemical weapons are said to "make deliberate use of the toxic properties of chemical substances to inflict death".
At the start of World War II it was widely reported in newspapers that "entire regions of Europe" would be turned into "lifeless wastelands".
However, chemical weapons were not used to the extent predicted by the press.
An unintended chemical weapon release occurred at the port of
Bari
Bari ( , ; nap, label= Barese, Bare ; lat, Barium) is the capital city of the Metropolitan City of Bari and of the Apulia region, on the Adriatic Sea, southern Italy. It is the second most important economic centre of mainland Southern Italy ...
. A
German
German(s) may refer to:
* Germany (of or related to)
**Germania (historical use)
* Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language
** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law
**Ge ...
attack on the evening of December 2, 1943, damaged U.S. vessels in the harbour and the resultant release from their hulls of mustard gas inflicted a total of 628 casualties.
The U.S. Government was highly criticized for exposing American service members to chemical agents while testing the effects of exposure. These tests were often performed without the consent or prior knowledge of the soldiers affected.
Australian service personnel were also exposed as a result of the "Brook Island trials"
carried out by the British Government to determine the likely consequences of chemical warfare in tropical conditions; little was known of such possibilities at that time.
Some chemical agents are designed to produce mind-altering changes; rendering the victim unable to perform their assigned mission. These are classified as incapacitating agents, and lethality is not a factor of their effectiveness.
Unitary versus binary weapons
Binary munitions contain two, unmixed and isolated chemicals that do not react to produce lethal effects until mixed. This usually happens just prior to battlefield use. In contrast, unitary weapons are lethal chemical munitions that produce a toxic result in their existing state.
The majority of the chemical weapon stockpile is unitary and most of it is stored in one-ton bulk containers.
See also
*
1990 Chemical Weapons Accord
On June 1, 1990, Presidents George H. W. Bush and Mikhail Gorbachev signed the bilateral U.S.–Soviet Chemical Weapons Accord; officially known as the "Agreement on Destruction and Non-production of Chemical Weapons and on Measures to Facili ...
*
CB military symbol
*
General-purpose criterion
*
List of chemical warfare agents
*
Riot control
References
Further reading
* Glenn Cross, ''Dirty War: Rhodesia and Chemical Biological Warfare, 1975–1980'', Helion & Company, 2017
External links
Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical WeaponsHome page
by
Santiago Oñate Laborde
Santiago Oñate Laborde (b. Mexico City, 1949) is a Mexican lawyer and politician affiliated with the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI).
Oñate Laborde graduated as lawyer from the Law Faculty in the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de Méx ...
entitled ''The Chemical Weapons Convention: an Overview'' in th
Lecture Series of the United Nations Audiovisual Library of International Law*
*
*
{{Authority control
Chemical warfare
Chemical weapons demilitarization
Weapons of mass destruction