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Thehistory of chemical warfare dates fromantiquity.Chemical weapons have been a part ofwarfare in most societies for centuries.[1] However, their usage has been extremely controversial since the 20th century.[2]
Chemical warfare is recorded in theancient periods of Greece,Rome,Carthage,India,China, andSouth Africa.[3] Soldierspoisoned arrows,water supplies, or dispersed toxic smokes.
Chemical weapons were first used on a large scale by most major powersin World War I, employing the gasesmustard,phosgene, andchlorine, and others, causinglung scarring,blindness, and death. DuringWorld War II,Nazi Germany used a commercialhydrogen cyanideblood agent namedZyklon B to commit industrialisedgenocide againstJews and other populations ingas chambers.[4] TheHolocaust resulted in the largest death toll to chemical weapons in history.[5] TheEmpire of Japan alsoused chemical warfare in China during theSecond Sino-Japanese War, including mustard gas andlewisite.
Nazi Germany discoverednerve agents during the war, but did not use them forfear of Allied retaliation. In theCold War, many countries stockpiled chemical weapons. TheSoviet andUnited States chemical weapons programs became the first and second largest in world history, focusing onsarin,VX/VR, and mustard, primarily for battlefield use in Europe. The use of chemical weaponsin the Iran–Iraq War andin the Syrian civil war saw thousands killed by nerve agents andblister agents.
At the end of the Cold War, the 1993Chemical Weapons Convention sought a legally binding, worldwide ban on the production, stockpiling, and use of chemical weapons and theirprecursors. Large-scale stockpile destruction efforts followed, with theUS eliminating its arsenal by 2023. As of 2025[update] the treaty has193 state parties;Syria andRussia are widely believed to have violated its prohibitions on stockpiling and use whileIsrael andNorth Korea remain non-parties. Small research quantities are treaty-permitted as part ofCBRN defense.
Ancient Greek myths aboutHeracles poisoning his arrows with the venom of theHydra monster are the earliest references to toxic weapons in western literature. Homer's epics, theIliad and theOdyssey, allude to poisoned arrows used by both sides in the legendaryTrojan War (Bronze Age Greece).[6][page needed]
Some of the earliest surviving references to toxic warfare appear in theIndian epicsRamayana andMahabharata.[7] The "Laws of Manu," a Hindu treatise on statecraft (c. 400 BC) forbids the use of poison and fire arrows, but advises poisoning food and water.Kautilya's "Arthashastra", a statecraft manual of the same era, contains hundreds of recipes for creating poison weapons, toxic smokes, and other chemical weapons. Ancient Greek historians recount thatAlexander the Great encountered poison arrows and fire incendiaries in India at theIndus basin in the 4th century BC.[6][page needed]
The earliest recorded use of gas warfare in the West dates back to the fifth century BC, during thePeloponnesian War betweenAthens andSparta. Spartan forces besieging an Athenian city placed a lighted mixture of wood, pitch, and sulfur under the walls hoping that the noxious smoke would incapacitate the Athenians, so that they would not be able to resist the assault that followed. Sparta was not alone in its use of unconventional tactics in ancient Greece;Solon of Athens is said to have usedhellebore roots to poison the water in an aqueduct leading from theRiver Pleistos around 590 BC during the siege ofKirrha.[6][page needed]
The earliestarchaeological evidence of gas warfare is during theRoman–Persian wars. Research carried out on the collapsedtunnels atDura-Europos in Syria suggests that during thesiege of the town in the third century AD, theSasanians usedbitumen andsulfur crystals to get it burning. When ignited, the materials gave off dense clouds of chokingsulfur dioxide gases which killed 19 Roman soldiers and a single Sassanian, purported to be the fire-tender, in a matter of two minutes.[8][9][10][11]
Quicklime may have been used in medieval naval warfare, including to use of "lime-mortars" to throw it at enemy ships.[12] Scottish historianDavid Hume, in his workThe History of England, recounted how during the reign ofHenry III of England the English navy destroyed an invading French fleet by attacking it with quicklime.[13]
Chinese writings from 1000 BCE contain recipes for the production of poisonous or irritating smokes for use in war along with numerous accounts of their use. These accounts describe anarsenic-containing "soul-hunting fog."[3][14] Literary sources of Chinese history mention that in 559 BCE thepredynastic Qin state poisoned theJing River, poisoning men and horses and forcing the retreat of other warring states such as theJin andLu.[15] In the second century BC, writings of theMohist sect inChina describe the use of bellows to pump smoke from burning balls of toxic plants and vegetables into tunnels being dug by a besieging army.[14] Chinese writings also describe the use of finely divided lime dispersed into the air to suppress a peasant revolt in 178 AD.[16]
Various Chinese sources from eleventh to seventeenth centuries describe mixtures of "poison gunpowder" suitable for creatinggrenades ortrebuchet-launched bombs. This has includedarsenic andcrotonaldehyde, and is described in theHuolongjing andTiangong Kaiwu.[15]
In the late 15th century, Spanishconquistadors encountered chemical warfare on the island ofHispaniola whenTaíno threw gourds filled with ashes and ground hot peppers at the Spaniards to create a blinding smoke screen before launching their attack.[17]
The people ofPernambuco province used pepper smoke during sieges; they would wait till the wind was blowing towards the enemy, and light a bonfire filled with peppers.[18]
Leonardo da Vinci proposed the use of a powder of sulfide, arsenic andverdigris in the 15th century:
It is unknown whether this powder was ever actually used.[citation needed]
In the 17th century duringsieges, armies attempted to start fires by launchingincendiaryshells filled withsulfur,tallow,rosin,turpentine,saltpeter, and/orantimony. Even when fires were not started, the resulting smoke and fumes provided a considerable distraction. Although their primary function was never abandoned, a variety of fills for shells were developed to maximize the effects of the smoke.[citation needed]
In 1672, during his siege of the city ofGroningen,Christoph Bernhard von Galen, theBishop of Münster, employed several different explosive and incendiary devices, some of which had a fill that includedbelladonna, intended to produce toxic fumes. Just three years later, August 27, 1675, theFrench and theHoly Roman Empire concluded theStrasbourg Agreement, which included an article banning the use of "perfidious and odious" toxic devices.[citation needed]
PirateCaptain Thompson used "vast numbers of powder flasks, grenade shells, and stinkpots" to defeat two pirate-hunters sent by the Governor of Jamaica in 1721.[19]
TheQing dynasty usedstinkpots in naval operations.[20] Those earthenware incendiary weapons were in part filled with sulphur, gunpowder, nails, and shot, while the other part was filled with noxious materials designed to emanate a highly unpleasant and suffocating smell to its enemies when ignited.[20] During theWar of 1812, theRoyal Navy used stinkpots in a bombardment ofStonington, Connecticut on 9 August 1814.[21]
The modern notion of chemical warfare emerged from the mid-19th century, with the development of modern chemistry andassociated industries. The first recorded modern proposal for the use of chemical warfare was made byLyon Playfair, Secretary of theScience and Art Department, in 1854 during theCrimean War. He proposed acacodyl cyanide artillery shell for use against enemy ships as way to solve the stalemate during the siege ofSevastopol. The proposal was backed by AdmiralThomas Cochrane of theRoyal Navy. It was considered by the Prime Minister,Lord Palmerston, but the British Ordnance Department rejected the proposal as "as bad a mode of warfare as poisoning the wells of the enemy." Playfair's response was used to justify chemical warfare into the next century:[22]
Later, during theAmerican Civil War,New York school teacher John Doughty proposed the offensive use ofchlorine gas, delivered by filling a 10-inch (254 millimeter) artillery shell with two to threequarts (1.89–2.84liters) of liquid chlorine, which could produce many cubic feet of chlorine gas. Doughty's plan was apparently never acted on, as it was probably[23] presented to Brigadier GeneralJames Wolfe Ripley, Chief of Ordnance.[clarification needed]
In March 1868, during theWar of Triple Alliance, the Paraguayan troops threw lit tubes full of asphixiating mixtures in their attempt to board Brazilian ironclads with canoes. The attack failed since the tubes were easily put out by the defenders.[24]
In June 1898, during theSpanish–American War, Spanish inventors Manuel Daza andAntonio Meulener tested thetóxpiro ortóspiro, a chemical artillery grenade of unknown composition. They fired it from the battleshipPelayo against a barge loaded with eight farm animals, killing all of them without damaging the barge. Despite this, the Spanish government was not interested.[25]
A general concern over the use of poison gas manifested itself in 1899 at theHague Conference with a proposal prohibiting shells filled with asphyxiating gas. The proposal was passed, despite a single dissenting vote from the United States. The American representative, Navy CaptainAlfred Thayer Mahan, justified voting against the measure on the grounds that "the inventiveness of Americans should not be restricted in the development of new weapons."[26]
The French were the first to use chemical weapons during the First World War, using the tear gasesethyl bromoacetate andchloroacetone. They likely did not realize that effects might be more serious under wartime conditions than inriot control. It is also likely that their use of tear gas escalated to the use of poisonous gases.[27]
TheHague Declaration of 1899 and theHague Convention of 1907 prohibit the firing of any projectiles "the sole object of which is the diffusion of asphyxiating or deleterious gases."[28] Germany exploited this loophole by opening canisters filled with poison gas into the wind and letting it carry it towards the enemy lines, instead of launching it in artillery rounds. One of Germany's earliest uses of chemical weapons occurred on October 27, 1914, when shells containing the irritant dianisidine chlorosulfonate were fired at British troops nearNeuve-Chapelle, France.[29] Germany used another irritant,xylyl bromide, in artillery shells that were fired in January 1915 at the Russians nearBolimów, in present-day Poland.[30] The first full-scale deployment of deadly chemical warfare agents during World War I was at theSecond Battle of Ypres, on April 22, 1915, when the Germans attacked French,Canadian andAlgerian troops withchlorine gas released from canisters and carried by the wind towards the Allied trenches.[31][32][33][34]
A total 50,965 tons of pulmonary, lachrymatory, and vesicant agents were deployed by both sides of the conflict, includingchlorine,phosgene, andmustard gas. Historians have reached a wide range of estimates on gas casualties, ranging from 500k to 1.3 million casualties directly caused by chemical warfare agents during the course of the war. A minimum of around 1300 civilians were injured due to the use of the weapons, and at least around 4000 were injured during weapon production.[35]
World War I-era chemical ammunition is still found, unexploded, at former battle, storage, or test sites and poses an ongoing threat to inhabitants of Belgium, France and other countries.[36]Camp American University where American chemical weapons were developed and later buried, has undergone 20 years of remediation efforts.[37][38]
After the war, the most common method of disposal of chemical weapons was to dump them into the nearest large body of water.[39] As many as 65,000 tons of chemical warfare agents may have been dumped in theBaltic Sea alone; agents dumped in that sea includedmustard gas, phosgene,lewisite (β-chlorovinyldichloroarsine),adamsite (diphenylaminechloroarsine),Clark I (diphenylchloroarsine) andClark II (diphenylcyanoarsine).[40][41][42] Over time the containers corrode, and the chemicals leaked out. On the sea floor, at low temperatures, mustard gas tends to form lumps within a "skin" of chemical byproducts. These lumps can wash onto shore, where they look like chunks of waxy yellowish clay. They are extremely toxic, but the effects may not be immediately apparent.[39]
During theinterwar period, chemical agents were occasionally used to subdue populations and suppress rebellion. In 1925, 16 of the world's major nations signed theGeneva Protocol, thereby pledging never to use chemical weapons in interstate warfare again. Notably, while theUnited States delegation under presidential authority signed the Protocol, it was not ratified until 1975. The Protocol does not ban the development or production of chemical weapons nor it applies to non-international armed conflicts.
During theNorth Russia intervention in 1919, British forces usedadamsite (DM) in form of improvised bombs dropped fromDH.9 bomber aircraft against theRed Army.[43]
It has been alleged that the British used chemical weapons in Mesopotamia during theIraqi revolt of 1920.Noam Chomsky claimed thatWinston Churchill at the time was keen on chemical weapons, suggesting they be used "against recalcitrant Arabs as an experiment", and that he stated to be "strongly in favour of using poisoned gas against uncivilised tribes".[44][45]
According to some historians, includingGeoff Simons andCharles Townshend, the British used chemical weapons in the conflict,[46][47] while according toLawrence James andNiall Ferguson the weapons were agreed by Churchill but eventually not used;[48][49] R.M. Douglas ofColgate University also observed that Churchill's statement had served to convince observers of the existence of weapons of mass destruction which were not actually there.[50]
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Lenin's Soviet government employed poison gas in 1921 during theTambov Rebellion. An order signed by military commandersTukhachevsky andVladimir Antonov-Ovseyenko stipulated, "The forests where the bandits are hiding are to be cleared by the use of poison gas. This must be carefully calculated, so that the layer of gas penetrates the forests and kills everyone hiding there."[51][52]
In the 1930s, theSoviet Union used mustard gas deployed from planes againstBasmachi rebels inCentral Asia.[53]
During theSoviet invasion of Xinjiang in 1934,Ma Zhongying'sNew 36th Division put up a fierce resistance at theBattle of Dawan Cheng, but was forced to retreat after Soviets delivered mustard gas from planes.[54]
A chemical arms race developed during theWarlord Era. The first chemical weapons were imported by a minor Hunan warlord, who bought two small cases of "gas-producing shells" in August 1921. MarshalCao Kun, approached a British-owned chemical company inTianjin in 1923; he attempted to order gas bombs, but as far as is known they turned down his proposal. In 1925,Zhang Zuolin had a chemical plant built inMukden and hired German and Russian experts to produce chlorine, phosgene and mustard gas, in the same yearFeng Yuxiang also set up a ‘special arsenal’ to produce chemical weapons designed by Soviet and German experts. All of these efforts appear to have failed. There was one reported incident of chemical warfare when Zhang Zuolin's aircraft dropped gas bombs’ on the forces ofWu Peifu; who branded the use of these bombs as inhumane.[55]
Combined Spanish and French forces dropped mustard gas bombs againstBerber rebels and civilians during theRif War inSpanish Morocco (1921–1927). These attacks marked the first widespread employment of gas warfare in the post-WWI era.[56] The Spanish army indiscriminately usedphosgene,diphosgene,chloropicrin andmustard gas against civilian populations, markets and rivers.[57][58] Although Spain signed the Geneva Protocol in 1925, it only prohibited the use of chemical and biological weapons in international conflicts, instead of non-international conflicts like the Rif War.[58]
In a telegram sent by theHigh Commissioner of Spanish MoroccoDámaso Berenguer on August 12, 1921, to the Spanish minister of War, Berenguer stated: "I have been obstinately resistant to the use of suffocating gases against these indigenous peoples but after what they have done, and of their treacherous and deceptive conduct, I have to use them with true joy."[59]
According to military aviation generalHidalgo de Cisneros in his autobiographical bookCambio de rumbo,[60] he was the first warfighter to drop a 100-kilogrammustard gas bomb from hisFarman F60 Goliath aircraft in the summer of 1924.[61] About 127 fighters and bombers flew in the campaign, dropping around 1,680 bombs each day.[62] The mustard gas bombs were brought from the stockpiles of Germany and delivered toMelilla before being carried on Farman F60 Goliath airplanes.[63] HistorianJuan Pando has been the only Spanish historian to have confirmed the usage of mustard gas starting in 1923.[59] Spanish newspaperLa Correspondencia de España published an article calledCartas de un soldado (Letters of a soldier) on August 16, 1923, which backed the usage of mustard gas.[64]
Some have cited the chemical weapons used in the region as the main reason for the widespread occurrence of cancer among the population.[65] In 2007, the Catalan party of the Republican Left (Esquerra Republicana de Catalunya) passed a bill to theSpanish Congress of Deputies requesting Spain to acknowledge the "systematic" use of chemical weapons against the population of the Rif mountains;[66] however, the bill was rejected by 33 votes from the governingSocialist Labor Party and the opposition right-wingPopular Party.[67]
Italy usedmustard gas and other "gruesome measures" againstSenussi forces inLibya (seePacification of Libya,Italian colonization of Libya,Libyan genocide (1929–1934)).[68] Poison gas was used against the Libyans as early as January 1928[69] The Italians dropped mustard gas from the air.[70]
Beginning in October 1935 and continuing into the following months,Fascist Italy usedmustard gas against the Ethiopians during theSecond Italo-Abyssinian War in violation of the Geneva Protocol. Italian generalRodolfo Graziani first ordered the use of chemical weapons at Gorrahei against the forces ofRas Nasibu.[71]Benito Mussolini personally authorized Graziani to use chemical weapons.[72] Chemical weapons dropped by warplane "proved to be very effective" and was used "on a massive scale against civilians and troops, as well as to contaminate fields and water supplies."[73] Among the most intense chemical bombardment by the Italian Air Force in Ethiopia occurred in February and March 1936, although "gas warfare continued, with varying intensity, until March 1939."[72]J. F. C. Fuller, who was present in Ethiopia during the conflict, stated that mustard gas "was the decisive tactical factor in the war."[74] Some estimate that up to one-third of Ethiopian casualties of the war were caused by chemical weapons.[75]
The Italians' deployment of mustard gas prompted international criticism.[71][74] In April 1936, British Prime MinisterStanley Baldwin told Parliament: "If a great European nation, in spite of having given its signature to the Geneva Protocol against the use of such gases, employs them in Africa, what guarantee have we that they may not be used in Europe?"[74][76] Mussolini initially denied the use of chemical weapons; later, Mussolini and Italian government sought to justify their use as lawful retaliation for Ethiopian atrocities.[71][72][74]
After theliberation of Ethiopia in 1941, Ethiopia repeatedly but unsuccessfully sought to prosecute Italian war criminals. TheAllied powers excluded Ethiopia from theUnited Nations War Crimes Commission (established in 1942) because the Allies feared that Ethiopia would seek to prosecute Italian commanderPietro Badoglio, who had ordered the use of chemical gas in the Second Italo-Ethiopian War but later "became a valuable ally against the Axis powers" after thefall of the Fascist regime in Italy, serving as a senior officer in theItalian Co-belligerent Army.[71] In 1946, Ethiopians rulerHaile Selassie again sought "to prosecute senior Italian officials who had sanctioned the use of chemical weapons and had committed other war crimes such as torturing and executing Ethiopian prisoners and citizens during the Italian-Ethiopian War."[71] These attempts failed, in large part because the Western Allies wished to avoid alienating the Italian government at a time when Italy was seen as key tocontaining the Soviet Union.[71]
Following World War II, the Italian government denied that Italy had ever used chemical weapons in Africa; only in 1995 did Italy formally acknowledge that it had used chemical weapons in colonial wars.[77]
Shortly after the end ofWorld War I, Germany's General Staff enthusiastically pursued a recapture of their preeminent position in chemical warfare. In 1923,Hans von Seeckt pointed the way, by suggesting that German poison gas research move in the direction of delivery by aircraft in support of mobile warfare. Also in 1923, at the behest of theGerman army, poison gas expert Dr.Hugo Stoltzenberg negotiated with the USSR to build a huge chemical weapons plant at Trotsk, on the Volga river.
Collaboration between Germany and the Soviet Union in poison gas research continued on and off through the 1920s. In 1924, German officers debated the use of poison gas versus non-lethal chemical weapons against civilians.
Chemical warfare was revolutionized byNazi Germany's discovery of thenerve agentstabun (in 1937) andsarin (in 1939) byGerhard Schrader, a chemist ofIG Farben.
IG Farben was Germany's premier poison gas manufacturer duringWorld War II, so the weaponization of these agents cannot be considered accidental.[78] Both were turned over to the German Army Weapons Office prior to the outbreak of the war.
The nerve agentsoman was later discovered by Nobel Prize laureateRichard Kuhn and his collaboratorKonrad Henkel at theKaiser Wilhelm Institute for Medical Research inHeidelberg in the spring of 1944.[79][80] The Germans developed and manufactured large quantities of several agents, but chemical warfare was not extensively used by either side. Chemical troops were set up (in Germany since 1934) and delivery technology was actively developed.
Despite the1899 Hague DeclarationIV, 2 – Declaration on the Use of Projectiles the Object of Which is the Diffusion of Asphyxiating or Deleterious Gases,[81] Article 23 (a) of the1907 Hague ConventionIV – The Laws and Customs of War on Land,[82] and a resolution adopted against Japan by theLeague of Nations on May 14, 1938, theImperial Japanese Army frequently used chemical weapons. Because of fear of retaliation, however, those weapons were never used against Westerners, but against other Asians judged "inferior" by imperial propaganda. According to historiansYoshiaki Yoshimi and Kentaro Awaya, gas weapons, such as tear gas, were used only sporadically in 1937 but in early 1938, the Imperial Japanese Army began full-scale use of sneeze and nausea gas (red), and from mid-1939, used mustard gas (yellow) against bothKuomintang and Communist Chinese troops.[83]
According to historiansYoshiaki Yoshimi and Seiya Matsuno, the chemical weapons were authorized by specific orders given by EmperorHirohito himself, transmitted by thechief of staff of the army. For example, the Emperor authorized the use of toxic gas on 375 separate occasions during theBattle of Wuhan from August to October 1938.[84] They were also profusely used during theinvasion of Changde. Those orders were transmitted either byPrince Kan'in Kotohito or GeneralHajime Sugiyama.[85] TheImperial Japanese Army had usedmustard gas and the US-developed (CWS-1918)blister agentlewisite against Chinese troops and guerrillas. Experiments involving chemical weapons were conducted on live prisoners (Unit 731 andUnit 516).
The Japanese also carried chemical weapons as they swept throughSoutheast Asia towards Australia. Some of these items were captured and analyzed by the Allies. Historian Geoff Plunkett has recorded how Australia covertly imported 1,000,000 chemical weapons from the United Kingdom from 1942 onwards and stored them in many storage depots around the country, including three tunnels in the Blue Mountains to the west of Sydney. They were to be used as a retaliatory measure if the Japanese first used chemical weapons.[86] Buried chemical weapons have been recovered at Marrangaroo and Columboola.[87][88]
Duringthe Holocaust, a genocide perpetrated by Nazi Germany, millions of Jews, Romani, Slavs, homosexuals, people with disabilities, and other victims were gassed withcarbon monoxide andhydrogen cyanide (includingZyklon B).[89][90] This remains the deadliest use of poison gas in history.[89] Nevertheless, the Nazis did not extensively use chemical weapons in combat,[89][90] at least not against the Western Allies,[91] despite maintaining an active chemical weapons program in which the Nazis used concentration camp prisoners asforced labor to secretly manufacturetabun, a nerve gas, andexperimented upon concentration camp victims to test the effects of the gas.[89]Otto Ambros ofIG Farben was a chief chemical-weapons expert for the Nazis.[89][92]
The Nazis' decision to avoid the use of chemical weapons on the battlefield has been variously attributed to a lack of technical ability in the German chemical weapons program and fears that the Allies would retaliate with their own chemical weapons.[91] It also has been speculated to have arisen fromAdolf Hitler's experiences as a soldier in the German army duringWorld War I, where he was injured by a British mustard gas attack in 1918.[93] After theBattle of Stalingrad,Joseph Goebbels,Robert Ley, andMartin Bormann urged Hitler to approve the use of tabun and other chemical weapons to slow theSoviet advance. At a May 1943 meeting in theWolf's Lair, however, Hitler was told by Ambros that Germany had 45,000 tons of chemical gas stockpiled, but that the Allies likely had far more. Hitler responded by suddenly leaving the room and ordering production of tabun and sarin to be doubled, but "fearing some rogue officer would use them and spark Allied retaliation, he ordered that no chemical weapons be transported to the Russian front."[89] After theAllied invasion of Italy, the Germans rapidly moved to remove or destroy both German and Italian chemical-weapon stockpiles, "for the same reason that Hitler had ordered them pulled from the Russian front—they feared that local commanders would use them and trigger Allied chemical retaliation."[89]
Stanley P. Lovell, deputy director for Research and Development of the Office of Strategic Services, reports in his bookOf Spies and Stratagems that the Allies knew the Germans had quantities of Gas Blau available for use in the defense of theAtlantic Wall. The use of nerve gas on the Normandy beachhead would have seriously impeded the Allies and possibly caused the invasion to fail altogether. He submitted the question "Why was nerve gas not used inNormandy?" to be asked ofHermann Göring during his interrogation after the war had ended. Göring answered that the reason was that theWehrmacht wasdependent upon horse-drawn transport to move supplies to their combat units, and had never been able to devise a gas mask horses could tolerate; the versions they developed would not pass enough pure air to allow the horses to pull a cart. Thus, gas was of no use to the German Army under most conditions.[94]
The Nazis did use chemical weapons in combat on several occasions along theBlack Sea, notablyin Sevastopol, where they used toxic smoke to force Soviet resistance fighters out of caverns below the city, in violation of the 1925Geneva Protocol.[95] The Nazis also used asphyxiating gas in the catacombs of Odessa in November 1941, following theircapture of the city, and in late May 1942 during theBattle of the Kerch Peninsula in easternCrimea.[95] Victor Israelyan, a Soviet ambassador, reported that the latter incident was perpetrated by the Wehrmacht's Chemical Forces and organized by a special detail ofSS troops with the help of a field engineer battalion. Chemical ForcesGeneral Ochsner reported to German command in June 1942 that a chemical unit had taken part in the battle.[96] After the battle in mid-May 1942, roughly 3,000Red Army soldiers and Soviet civilians not evacuated by sea were besieged in a series of caves and tunnels in the nearbyAdzhimushkay quarry. After holding out for approximately three months, "poison gas was released into the tunnels, killing all but a few score of the Soviet defenders."[97] Thousands of those killed around Adzhimushkay were documented to have been killed by asphyxiation from gas.[96]
In February 1943, German troops stationed inKuban received a telegram: "Russians might have to be cleared out of the mountain range with gas."[98] The troops also received two wagons of toxin antidotes.[98]
TheWestern Allies did not use chemical weapons during the Second World War. The British planned to use mustard gas and phosgene to help repel aGerman invasion in 1940–1941,[99][100] and had there been an invasion may have also deployed it against German cities.[101]GeneralAlan Brooke,Commander-in-Chief, Home Forces, in command ofBritish anti-invasion preparations of the Second World War said that he "...had every intention of using sprayedmustard gas on the beaches" in an annotation in his diary.[102] The British manufactured mustard,chlorine,lewisite,phosgene andParis Green and stored them at airfields and depots for use on the beaches.[101]
The mustard gas stockpile was enlarged in 1942–1943 for possible use byRAF Bomber Command against German cities, and in 1944 for possible retaliatory use if German forces used chemical weapons against theD-Day landings.[99]
Winston Churchill, theBritish Prime Minister, issued a memorandum advocating a chemical strike onGerman cities usingpoison gas and possiblyanthrax. Although the idea was rejected, it has provoked debate.[103]In July 1944, fearing that rocket attacks onLondon would get even worse, and saying he would only use chemical weapons if it were "life or death for us" or would "shorten the war by a year",[104] Churchill wrote a secret memorandum asking his military chiefs to "think very seriously over this question of using poison gas." He stated "it is absurd to consider morality on this topic when everybody used it in the last war without a word of complaint..."
The Joint Planning Staff, however, advised against the use of gas because it would inevitably provoke Germany to retaliate with gas. They argued that this would be to the Allies' disadvantage in France both for military reasons and because it might "seriously impair our relations with the civilian population when it became generally known that chemical warfare was first employed by us."[105]
In 1945, theU.S. Army'sChemical Warfare Service standardized improved chemical warfare rockets intended for the new M9 and M9A1 "Bazooka" launchers, adopting the M26 Gas Rocket, acyanogen chloride (CK)-filled warhead for the 2.36-in rocket launcher.[106] CK, a deadly blood agent, was capable of penetrating the protective filter barriers in some gas masks,[107] and was seen as an effective agent against Japanese forces (particularly those hiding in caves or bunkers), whose gas masks lacked the impregnants that would provide protection against the chemical reaction of CK.[106][108][109] While stockpiled in US inventory, the CK rocket was never deployed or issued to combat personnel.[106]
On the night of December 2, 1943, GermanJu 88 bombersattacked the port ofBari in Southern Italy, sinking several American ships—among them theSS John Harvey, which was carrying mustard gas intended for use in retaliation by the Allies if German forces initiated gas warfare. The presence of the gas was highly classified, and authorities ashore had no knowledge of it, which increased the number of fatalities since physicians, who had no idea that they were dealing with the effects of mustard gas, prescribed treatment improper for those suffering from exposure and immersion.
The whole affair was kept secret at the time and for many years after the war. According to theU.S. military account, "Sixty-nine deaths were attributed in whole or in part to the mustard gas, most of them American merchant seamen"[110] out of 628 mustard gas military casualties.[111]
The large number ofcivilian casualties among the Italian population was not recorded. Part of the confusion and controversy derives from the fact that the German attack was highly destructive and lethal in itself, also apart from the accidental additional effects of the gas (the attack was nicknamed "The Little Pearl Harbor"), and attribution of the causes of death between the gas and other causes is far from easy.[112][113]
Rick Atkinson, in his bookThe Day of Battle, describes the intelligence that prompted Allied leaders to deploy mustard gas to Italy. This included Italian intelligence thatAdolf Hitler had threatened to use gas against Italy if the state changed sides, andprisoner of war interrogations suggesting that preparations were being made to use a "new, egregiously potent gas" if the war turned decisively against Germany. Atkinson concludes, "No commander in 1943 could be cavalier about a manifest threat by Germany to use gas."
AfterWorld War II, theAllies recovered German artillery shells containing the three German nerve agents of the day (tabun, sarin, and soman), prompting further research into nerve agents by all of the former Allies.
Although the threat of globalthermonuclear war was foremost in the minds of most during theCold War, both the Soviet and Western governments put enormous resources into developing chemical andbiological weapons.
In the late 1940s and early 1950s, British postwar chemical weapons research was based at thePorton Down facility. Research was aimed at providing Britain with the means to arm itself with a modern nerve-agent-based capability and to develop specific means of defense against these agents.
Ranajit Ghosh, a chemist at the Plant Protection Laboratories ofImperial Chemical Industries was investigating a class oforganophosphate compounds (organophosphateesters of substituted aminoethanethiols),[114] for use as apesticide. In 1954, ICI put one of them on the market under the trade nameAmiton. It was subsequently withdrawn, as it was too toxic for safe use.
The toxicity did not go unnoticed, and samples of it were sent to the research facility atPorton Down for evaluation. After the evaluation was complete, several members of this class of compounds were developed into a new group of much more lethal nerve agents, the V agents. The best-known of these is probablyVX, assigned the UKRainbow CodePurple Possum, with theRussian V-Agent coming a close second (Amiton is largely forgotten as VG).[115]
On the defensive side, there were years of difficult work to develop the means of prophylaxis, therapy, rapid detection and identification, decontamination and more effective protection of the body against nerve agents, capable of exerting effects through the skin, the eyes and respiratory tract.
Tests were carried out on servicemen to determine the effects of nerve agents on human subjects, with one recorded death due to a nerve gas experiment. There have been persistent allegations of unethicalhuman experimentation at Porton Down, such as those relating to the death of Leading AircraftmanRonald Maddison, aged 20, in 1953. Maddison was taking part insarin nerve agent toxicity tests. Sarin was dripped onto his arm and he died shortly afterwards.[116]
In the 1950s, the Chemical Defence Experimental Establishment became involved with the development ofCS, a riot control agent, and took an increasing role in trauma and wound ballistics work. Both these facets of Porton Down's work had become more important because of the situation in Northern Ireland.[117]
In the early 1950s, nerve agents such as sarin were produced— about 20 tons were made from 1954 until 1956.CDE Nancekuke was an important factory for stockpiling chemical weapons. Small amounts of VX were produced there, mainly for laboratory test purposes, but also to validate plant designs and optimise chemical processes for potential mass production. However, full-scale mass production of VX agent never took place, with the 1956 decision to end the UK's offensive chemical weapons programme.[118] In the late 1950s, the chemical weapons production plant at Nancekuke was mothballed, but was maintained through the 1960s and 1970s in a state whereby production of chemical weapons could easily re-commence if required.[118]
In 1952, the U.S. Army patented a process for the "Preparation of ToxicRicin", publishing a method of producing this powerfultoxin. In 1958 the British government traded their VX technology with theUnited States in exchange for information onthermonuclear weapons[citation needed]. By 1961 the U.S. was producing large amounts of VX and performing its own nerve agent research. This research produced at least three more agents; the four agents (VE,VG,VM,VX) are collectively known as the "V-Series" class of nerve agents.
Between 1951 and 1969,Dugway Proving Ground was the site of testing for various chemical and biological agents, including an open-air aerodynamic dissemination test in 1968 that accidentally killed, on neighboring farms,approximately 6,400 sheep by an unspecifiednerve agent.[119]
From 1962 to 1973, theDepartment of Defense planned 134 tests underProject 112, a chemical and biological weapons "vulnerability-testing program." In 2002, the Pentagon admitted for the first time that some of tests used real chemical and biological weapons, not just harmless simulants.[120]
Specifically underProject SHAD, 37 secret tests were conducted in California, Alaska, Florida, Hawaii, Maryland, and Utah. Land tests in Alaska and Hawaii used artillery shells filled withsarin andVX, while Navy trials off the coasts of Florida, California and Hawaii tested the ability of ships and crew to perform under biological and chemical warfare, without the crew's knowledge. The code name for the sea tests was Project Shipboard Hazard and Defense—"SHAD" for short.[120]
In October 2002, the Senate Armed Forces Subcommittee on Personnel held hearings as the controversial news broke that chemical agents had been tested on thousands of American military personnel. The hearings were chaired by SenatorMax Cleland, former VA administrator and Vietnam War veteran.
In December 2001, theUnited States Department of Health and Human Services,Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC),National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), andNational Personal Protective Technology Laboratory (NPPTL), along with theU.S. Army Research, Development and Engineering Command (RDECOM),Edgewood Chemical and Biological Center (ECBC), and theU.S. Department of CommerceNational Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) published the first of six technical performance standards and test procedures designed to evaluate and certify respirators intended for use by civilian emergency responders to a chemical, biological, radiological, or nuclear weapon release, detonation, or terrorism incident.
To date NIOSH/NPPTL has published six new respirator performance standards based on a tiered approach that relies on traditional industrial respirator certification policy, next-generation emergency response respirator performance requirements, and special live chemical warfare agent testing requirements of the classes of respirators identified to offer respiratory protection against chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear (CBRN) agent inhalation hazards. These CBRN respirators are commonly known as open-circuit self-contained breathing apparatus (CBRN SCBA), air-purifying respirator (CBRN APR), air-purifying escape respirator (CBRN APER), self-contained escape respirator (CBRN SCER) and loose- or tight-fitting powered air-purifying respirators (CBRN PAPR).
Due to the secrecy of the Soviet Union's government, very little information was available about the direction and progress of the Soviet chemical weapons until relatively recently. After thefall of the Soviet Union,Russian chemistVil Mirzayanov published articles revealing illegal chemical weapons experimentation in Russia.
In 1993, Mirzayanov was imprisoned and fired from his job at the State Research Institute of Organic Chemistry and Technology, where he had worked for 26 years. In March 1994, after a major campaign by U.S. scientists on his behalf, Mirzayanov was released.[121]
Among the information related by Vil Mirzayanov was the direction of Soviet research into the development of even more toxic nerve agents, which saw most of its success during the mid-1980s. Several highly toxic agents were developed during this period; the only unclassified information regarding these agents is that they are known in the open literature only as "Foliant" agents (named after the program under which they were developed) and by various code designations, such as A-230 and A-232.[122]
According to Mirzayanov, the Soviets also developed weapons that were safer to handle, leading to the development ofbinary weapons, in which precursors for the nerve agents are mixed in a munition to produce the agent just prior to its use. Because the precursors are generally significantly less hazardous than the agents themselves, this technique makes handling and transporting the munitions a great deal simpler.
Additionally, precursors to the agents are usually much easier to stabilize than the agents themselves, so this technique also made it possible to increase theshelf life of the agents a great deal. During the 1980s and 1990s, binary versions of several Soviet agents were developed and designated "Novichok" agents (after the Russian word for "newcomer").[123] Together with Lev Fedorov, he told the secret Novichok story exposed in the newspaperThe Moscow News.[124]
The first attack of theNorth YemenCivil War took place on June 8, 1963, against Kawma, a village of about 100 inhabitants in northern Yemen, killing about seven people and damaging the eyes and lungs of 25 others. This incident is considered to have been experimental, and the bombs were described as "home-made, amateurish and relatively ineffective". The Egyptian authorities suggested that the reported incidents were probably caused bynapalm, not gas.
There were no reports of gas during 1964, and only a few were reported in 1965. The reports grew more frequent in late 1966. On December 11, 1966, fifteen gas bombs killed two people and injured thirty-five. On January 5, 1967, the biggest gas attack came against the village of Kitaf, causing 270 casualties, including 140 fatalities. The target may have been Prince Hassan bin Yahya, who had installed his headquarters nearby. TheEgyptian government denied using poison gas, and alleged that Britain and the US were using the reports as psychological warfare against Egypt. On February 12, 1967, it said it would welcome a UN investigation. On March 1,U Thant, the thenSecretary-General of the United Nations, said he was "powerless" to deal with the matter.
On May 10, 1967, the twin villages of Gahar and Gadafa in Wadi Hirran, where Prince Mohamed bin Mohsin was in command, were gas bombed, killing at least seventy-five. The Red Cross was alerted and on June 2, 1967, it issued a statement in Geneva expressing concern. The Institute of Forensic Medicine at the University of Berne made a statement, based on a Red Cross report, that the gas was likely to have been halogenous derivatives—phosgene, mustard gas, lewisite, chloride or cyanogen bromide.
Evidence points to a top-secretRhodesian program in the 1970s to useorganophosphate pesticides and heavy metalrodenticides to contaminate clothing as well as food and beverages. The contaminated items were covertly introduced into insurgent supply chains. Hundreds of insurgent deaths were reported, although the actual death toll likely rose over 1,000.[125]
During theCuban intervention in Angola,United Nations toxicologists certified that residue from both VX and sarin nerve agents had been discovered in plants, water, and soil where Cuban units were conducting operations againstNational Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA) insurgents.[126] In 1985, UNITA made the first of several claims that their forces were the target of chemical weapons, specificallyorganophosphates. The following year guerrillas reported being bombarded with an unidentified greenish-yellow agent on three separate occasions. Depending on the length and intensity of exposure, victims suffered blindness or death. The toxin was also observed to have killed plant life.[127] Shortly afterwards, UNITA also sighted strikes carried out with a brown agent which it claimed resembledmustard gas.[128] As early as 1984 a research team dispatched by theUniversity of Ghent had examined patients in UNITA field hospitals showing signs of exposure to nerve agents, although it found no evidence of mustard gas.[129]
The UN first accused Cuba of deploying chemical weapons against Angolan civilians and partisans in 1988.[126]Wouter Basson later disclosed thatSouth African military intelligence had long verified the use of unidentified chemical weapons on Angolan soil; this was to provide the impetus for their own biological warfare programme,Project Coast.[126] During theBattle of Cuito Cuanavale, South African troops then fighting in Angola were issued with gas masks and ordered to rehearse chemical weapons drills. Although the status of its own chemical weapons program remained uncertain, South Africa also deceptively bombarded Cuban and Angolan units with colored smoke in an attempt to induce hysteria or mass panic.[128] According to Defence MinisterMagnus Malan, this would force the Cubans to share the inconvenience of having to take preventative measures such as donningNBC suits, which would cut combat effectiveness in half. The tactic was effective: beginning in early 1988 Cuban units posted to Angola were issued with full protective gear in anticipation of a South African chemical strike.[128]
On October 29, 1988, personnel attached to Angola's 59 Brigade, accompanied by six Soviet military advisors, reported being struck with chemical weapons on the banks of the Mianei River.[130] The attack occurred shortly after one in the afternoon. Four Angolan soldiers lost consciousness while the others complained of violent headaches and nausea. That November the Angolan representative to the UN accused South Africa of employing poison gas near Cuito Cuanavale for the first time.[130]
Technically, the reported employment oftear gas byArgentine forces during the1982 invasion of the Falkland Islands constitutes chemical warfare.[131] However, the tear gas grenades were employed as nonlethal weapons to avoid British casualties. The barrack buildings the weapons were used on proved to be deserted in any case. The British claim that more lethal, but legally justifiable as they are not considered chemical weapons under theChemical Weapons Convention,white phosphorus grenades were used.[132]
There were reports of chemical weapons being used bySoviet forces during theSoviet–Afghan War, sometimes against civilians.[133][134]
There is some evidence suggesting thatVietnamese troops usedphosgene gas againstCambodian resistance forces inThailand during the1984–1985 dry-season offensive on the Thai-Cambodian border.[135][136][137]
Chemical weapons employed bySaddam Hussein killed and injured numerousIranians andIraqi Kurds. According to Iraqi documents, assistance in developing chemical weapons was obtained from firms in many countries, including the United States,West Germany, theNetherlands, the United Kingdom, andFrance.[138]
About 100,000 Iranian soldiers were victims of Iraq's chemical attacks. Many were hit by mustard gas. The official estimate does not include the civilian population contaminated in bordering towns or the children and relatives of veterans, many of whom have developed blood, lung and skin complications, according to the Organization for Veterans. Nerve gas agents killed about 20,000 Iranian soldiers immediately, according to official reports. Of the 80,000 survivors, some 5,000 seek medical treatment regularly and about 1,000 are still hospitalized with severe, chronic conditions.[139][140][141]
According to theForeign Policy, the "Iraqis used mustard gas and sarin prior to four major offensives in early 1988 that relied on U.S. satellite imagery, maps, and other intelligence. ... According to recently declassified CIA documents and interviews with former intelligence officials like Francona, the U.S. had firm evidence of Iraqi chemical attacks beginning in 1983."[142][143]
In March 1988, the IraqiKurdish town ofHalabja was exposed to multiple chemical agents dropped from warplanes; these "may have includedmustard gas, the nerve agents sarin, tabun and VX and possibly cyanide."[144] Between 3,200 and 5,000 people were killed, and between 7,000 and 10,000 were injured.[144] Some reports indicated that three-quarters of them were women and children.[144] The preponderance of the evidence indicates that Iraq was responsible for the attack.[144]
TheU.S. Department of Defense andCentral Intelligence Agency's longstanding official position is that Iraqi forces under Saddam Hussein did not use chemical weapons during thePersian Gulf War in 1991. In a memorandum in 1994 to veterans of the war, Defense SecretaryWilliam J. Perry and GeneralJohn M. Shalikashvili, thechairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, wrote that "There is no evidence, classified or unclassified, that indicates that chemical or biological weapons were used in the Persian Gulf."[145]
However, chemical weapons expertJonathan B. Tucker, writing in theNonproliferation Review in 1997, determined that although "[t]he absence of severe chemical injuries or fatalities among Coalition forces makes it clear that nolarge-scale Iraqi employment of chemical weapons occurred," an array of "circumstantial evidence from a variety of sources suggests that Iraq deployed chemical weapons into the Kuwait Theater of Operations (KTO)—the area including Kuwait and Iraq south of the31st Parallel, where the ground war was fought—and engaged in sporadic chemical warfare against Coalition forces."[145] In addition to intercepts of Iraqi military communications and publicly available reporting:
Other sources of evidence for sporadic Iraqi chemical warfare include U.S. intelligence reports on the presence of Iraqi chemical weapons in the KTO; military log entries describing the discovery by U.S. units of chemical munitions in Iraqi bunkers during and after the ground war; incidents in which troops reported acute symptoms of toxic chemical exposure; and credible detections of chemical-warfare agents by Czech, French, and American forces.[145]
Nerve agents (specifically, tabun, sarin, and cyclosarin) and blister agents (specifically, sulfur-mustard and lewisite) were detected at Iraqi sites.[145]
The threat itself of gas warfare had a major effect onIsrael, which was not part of the coalition forces led by the US. Israel was attacked with 39Scud missiles, most of which were knocked down in the air above their targets byPatriot missiles developed byRaytheon together with Israel, and supplied by the US. Sirens warned of the attacks approximately 10 minutes before their expected arrival, and Israelis donned gas masks and entered sealed "safe" rooms, over a period 5 weeks. Babies were issued special gas-safe cribs, and religious men were issued gas masks that allowed them to preserve their beards.[146][147][148]
In 2014, tapes from Saddam Hussain's archives revealed that Saddam had given orders to use gas against Israel as a last resort if his military communications with the army were cut off.[149]
In 2015,The New York Times published an article about the declassified report of Operation Avarice in 2005 in which over 400 chemical weapons including many rockets and missiles from the Iran-Iraq war period were recovered and subsequently destroyed by the CIA.[150] Many other stockpiles, estimated by UNSCOM up to 600 metric tons of chemical weapons, were known to have existed and even admitted by Saddam's regime, but claimed by them to have been destroyed. These have never been found but are believed to still exist.[151][152]
On September 22, 1991, during the criticalBattle of Šibenik, theFederal Secretary for National Defense sent a letter to thePresident of the Republic of Croatia accusing the Croatian forces of employing non-lethal chemical agents in combat. The charge alleged that Croatian troops used tear gas as a tactical weapon to successfully storm and seize the Yugoslav naval base located in the city's main harbour.[153]
Duringinvasion of Iraq, American service members who demolished or handled older explosive ordnance may have been exposed to blister agents (mustard agent) or nerve agents (sarin).[154] According toThe New York Times, "In all, American troops secretly reported finding roughly 5,000 chemical warheads, shells or aviation bombs, according to interviews with dozens of participants, Iraqi and American officials, and heavily redacted intelligence documents obtained under the Freedom of Information Act."[155] Among these, over 2,400 nerve-agent rockets were found in summer 2006 atCamp Taji, a formerIraqi Republican Guard compound. "These weapons were not part of an active arsenal"; "they were remnants from an Iraqi program in the 1980s during the Iran-Iraq war".[155]
Sarin, mustard gas, and chlorine have been used during the conflict. Numerous casualties led to an international reaction, especially the2013 Ghouta attacks.A UN fact-finding mission was requested to investigate alleged chemical weapons attacks. In four cases the UN inspectors confirmed use ofsarin gas.[156] In August 2016, a confidential report by theUnited Nations and theOPCW explicitly blamed the Syrian military ofBashar al-Assad for dropping chemical weapons (chlorine bombs) on the towns of Talmenes in April 2014 and Sarmin in March 2015 andISIS for using sulfur mustard on the town of Marea in August 2015.[157] In 2016,Jaysh al-Islam rebel group had usedchlorine gas or other agents against Kurdish militia and civilians in theSheikh Maqsood neighborhood of Aleppo.[158]
Many countries, including the United States and the European Union have accused the Syrian government of conducting several chemical attacks. Following the 2013 Ghouta attacks and international pressure, Syria acceded to theChemical Weapons Convention and thedestruction of Syria's chemical weapons began. In 2015 the UN mission disclosed previously undeclared traces of sarin compounds[disputed –discuss] in a "military research site".[159] After the April 2017Khan Shaykhun chemical attack, the United States launched its firstattack against Syrian government forces. On 14 April 2018, the United States, France and the United Kingdom carried outa series of joint military strikes against multiple government sites in Syria, including theBarzah scientific research centre, after achemical attack inDouma.
For manyterrorist organizations, chemical weapons might be considered an ideal choice for a mode of attack, if they are available: they are cheap, relatively accessible, and easy to transport. A skilled chemist can readily synthesize most chemical agents if the precursors are available.
In July 1974, a group calling themselves the Aliens of America successfully firebombed the houses of a judge, two police commissioners, and one of the commissioner's cars, burned down two apartment buildings, andbombed thePan Am Terminal atLos Angeles International Airport, killing three people and injuring eight. The organization, which turned out to be a single resident alien namedMuharem Kurbegovic, claimed to have developed and possessed a supply of sarin, as well as four unique nerve agents named AA1, AA2, AA3, and AA4S. Although no agents were found at the time Kurbegovic was arrested in August 1974, he had reportedly acquired "all but one" of the ingredients required to produce a nerve agent. A search of his apartment turned up a variety of materials, including precursors forphosgene and a drum containing 25 pounds ofsodium cyanide.[160]
The first successful use of chemical agents by terrorists against a general civilian population was on June 27, 1994, whenAum Shinrikyo, an apocalyptic group based inJapan that believed it necessary to destroy the planet, released sarin gas inMatsumoto, Japan, killing eight and harming 200. The following year, Aum Shinrikyoreleased sarin into the Tokyo subway system killing 12 and injuring over 5,000.
On December 29, 1999, four days after Russian forces began an assault of Grozny, Chechen terrorists exploded two chlorine tanks in the town. Because of the wind conditions, no Russian soldiers were injured.[161]
Following theSeptember 11 attacks on the U.S. cities ofNew York City andWashington, D.C., the organizationAl-Qaeda responsible for the attacks announced that they were attempting to acquire radiological, biological, and chemical weapons. This threat was lent a great deal of credibility when a large archive of videotapes was obtained by thecable television networkCNN in August 2002 showing, among other things, the killing of three dogs by an apparent nerve agent.[162]
In an anti-terrorist attack on October 26, 2002,Russian special forces used a chemical agent (presumablyKOLOKOL-1, anaerosolizedfentanyl derivative), as a precursor to an assault onChechen terrorists, which ended theMoscow theater hostage crisis. All 42 of the terrorists and 120 out of 850 hostages were killed during the raid. Although the use of the chemical agent was justified as a means of selectively targeting terrorists, it killed over 100 hostages.
In early 2007, multiple terrorist bombings had been reported inIraq using chlorine gas.These attacks wounded or sickened more than 350 people. Reportedly the bombers were affiliated withAl-Qaeda in Iraq,[163] and they have used bombs of various sizes up to chlorine tanker trucks.[164]United Nations Secretary-GeneralBan Ki-moon condemned the attacks as "clearly intended to cause panic and instability in the country."[165]
TheProtocol for the Prohibition of the Use in War of Asphyxiating, Poisonous or other Gases, and the Bacteriological Methods of Warfare, or the Geneva Protocol, is an international treaty which prohibits the use of chemical and biological weapons between signatory nations in international armed conflicts. Signed intointernational law atGeneva on June 17, 1925, and entered into force on February 8, 1928, this treaty states that chemical and biological weapons are "justly condemned by the general opinion of the civilised world."[166]
The most recent arms control agreement ininternational law, theConvention of the Prohibition of the Development, Production, Stockpiling and Use of Chemical Weapons and on their Destruction, or the Chemical Weapons Convention, outlaws the production, stockpiling, and use of chemical weapons. It is administered by theOrganisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), anintergovernmental organisation based inThe Hague.[167]
Chemical warfare agents have been in existence for centuries. They are substances which have toxic properties used to kill, injure, or incapacitate humans. Broadly, they are categorized into two groups: chemical or biological.
Durante la guerra del Rif (1921–1927), la última pesadilla colonial, España fue una de las primeras potencias en utilizar armas químicas contra población civil.
Tras tan estrepitosa derrota, el ejército español no tuvo reparos en utilizar productos como fosgeno, difosgeno, cloropicrina o el mismo gas mostaza contra la población civil.
Juan Pando en su reciente libro Historia secreta de Annual han documentado su uso
I want the matter studied in cold blood by sensible people
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