Chemical Warfare Essay Research Paper Chemical Warfare10

Chemical Warfare Essay, Research Paper

Chemical Warfare

1.0 What are Chemical Warfare Agents.

Chemical weapons include any chemical substance, whether in a gaseous, liquid, or solid state, which can be used to cause loss of performance, permanent injury, or death in humans. These chemicals are commonly man-made toxicants, however, there is increasing research in the use of natural biological toxins as chemical warfare agents.

Many thousands of chemicals produced by humans are highly poisonous, however, only about seventy of these have been used in this century as chemical warfare agents. The reason for this lies in the criteria which a chemical must meet in order to be used as one of these warfare agents. These criteria include;

-the agent must be toxic enough to cause the desired effect, but must not be so toxic that it is too hard to handle,

-the agent should be able to be stored for relatively long periods of time without losing it s potency,

-it must be resistant to environmental conditions such as rain and oxygen,

-finally, it must be able to withstand a great deal of heat as the dispersal of these agents is usually accomplished with some type of bomb.

2.0 History of Chemical Warfare

The introduction of chemical warfare can be attributed to German chemist Fritz Haber who played a leading role in the development of poison gas during World War One. After much convincing he persuaded the Central Powers (i.e Germany, Turkey, etc.) to use chlorine gas to break through enemy lines. The Germans awarded him with an Officers rank and he went on to direct the first gas attack in War history. This attack which occurred on April 22, 1915, was the first of nearly 200 chemical attacks during the First World War. The Germans headed by Haber, discharged 180,000 kg of chlorine gas which either killed or caused the retreat of thousands of allied soldiers (Britian, France, Canada, etc.) thus creating a 8 km gap in the enemy line. Two days later in Ypres the Germans struck again with similar results, but this time on Canadian soldiers. Deaths over this two day period were estimated to be 5,000 with another 10,000 disabled.

In response to these gas attacks the allies called upon Major Charles Howard Foulkes of the Royal Engineers to develop a counter-attack. On September 25, 1915 the allies responded to German gas attacks with one of their own. Unfortunately the wind changed course and some of the gas made its way back to their own trenches, killing thousands of soldiers. The remaining gas however reached the German trenches proving lethal for numerous Germans as well. On December 9, 1915, with the winds again on their side, the Germans launched another gas attack on the Allied lines using chlorine gas and a new gas called phosgene. Phosgene was another chemical Fritz Haber and his colleges recognized as a effective weapon. Its lethal concentration was nearly 20 times as lethal as chlorine. Fortunately the Allies had anticipated the use of this chemical and had manufactured millions of gas masks referred to as P- Helmets. This foresight by the Allies saved millions of soldiers from inevitable death. Although several other types of gas were used chlorine and phosgene gas were the primary ones utilized by both the allies and central powers during the majority of the war.

It wasn t until July 12, 1917 that another prominent chemical weapon was introduced. The Germans attacked the Allies with what is commonly referred to as mustard gas . This weapon proved even more effective than the chlorine and phosgene and was the most lethal gas used during World War One. The Allies and Central Powers swapped gas attacks for the duration of the war killing nearly 100, 000 soldiers and injuring over a million others. The unfortunate part is neither the Allies or Central Powers gained any recognizable ground through usage of this war tactic.

3.0 Methods of Delivery

3.1 Charged Cylinders

The first poisonous gases utilized by Germany during the war were discharged from charged cylinders installed in their trenches. The success of such gas attacks depended upon a favorable wind which would carry the gas in high concentration slowly over the trenches of the unprotected allied troops. In order to discharge these gas filled cylinders soliders had to manually release the valve. Chlorine the first gas used, being denser than air, followed the topography of the land . Because of this hands on approach many self-contamination deaths occured using this delivery method.

3.2 Projectors

Projectors replaced the charged cylinder method. Explosives were put in the bottom of these cylinders and the gas placed on top. The cylinders were placed at an angle of 45 degrees in a trench or in some special area that offered protection. A large number of these projectors were placed in series and fired simultaneously using electricity. This permitted the discharge of a large quantity of poisonous gas on a relatively small target. A successful projector attack produced very serious results, and it could be carried out without much regard to wind velocity and direction. During nighttime attacks enemies could see the flash from the explosives thus giving ample warning to prepare by putting on gas masks and it also gave away the location of the attacker. Consequently, this method of using ga

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