![]() A century after their first use, these weapons still have the power to terrify, in part because civilian populations are so vulnerable. "We have now verified the destruction of about 80 percent of all the chemical weapons stockpiles that have been declared to us," says Michael Luhan, spokesman for the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, which oversees enforcement of the treaty.īut that success has not removed chemical weapons from the list of global threats. The end of the Soviet Union paved the way for a historic step: the 1993 treaty that banned the production, stockpiling and use of these weapons. and the Soviet Union produced massive quantities of chemical and biological weapons. Adolf Hitler, himself a victim of gas in World War I, never used his stockpiles on the battlefield.īut during the Cold War, the U.S. In World War II, their use was extremely limited. By 1925, the League of Nations had approved the Geneva Protocol, which banned the use of chemical weapons. Reaction to those deaths and injuries was swift. "That meant, for example, in America, there were tens of thousands of people who were scarred by exposure to mustard agent in World War I." ![]() " meant painful lung diseases, a lot of people blind for the rest of their lives," he says. Troops Train For Possible Mission To Secure Syrian Chemical Agents But as Greg Thielmann of the Arms Control Association notes, it left a frightening legacy in the form of a million survivors. Better to take your chances in the open rather than stay in the hollows and low places where the vapors settle."ĭespite the horrific injuries, gas caused only a small percentage of the war deaths. Paul Baumer, the protagonist of Erich Maria Remarque's All Quiet on the Western Front, recalls some of the horrors associated with gas in World War I: "We remember the awful sights in the hospital, the gas patients who, suffocating, cough up their burnt lungs in clots. Poisoned gas was described as "the most feared, the most obscene weapon of all." (two) Advantages and disadvantages of poison gas in WWI 'Weapons for Attack - World War 1 - Class 6.' Weapons for Attack - World War 1 - Class 6. ![]() a wave of asphyxiating gas released from cylinders embedded in the ground by German specialist troops smothered the Allied line on the northern end of the Ypres salient, causing panic and a struggle to survive a new form of weapon. ![]() In World War I, trench warfare led to stalemates - and to new weapons meant to break through the lines. Citations German soldiers wearing gas masks in 1916. Military History First Usage of Poison Gas Collections Spotlight On Apat 5 p.m. The answer can be traced back to the early uses of poison gas nearly a century ago. But why this focus on chemical weapons when conventional weapons have killed tens of thousands in Syria? President Obama has said that the use of chemical weapons could change the U.S. Following the first poison gas attack by German forces at Ypres in 1915, gas masks became vital equipment for Allied forces during World War I. Soldiers with the British Machine Gun Corps wear gas masks in 1916 during World War I's first Battle of the Somme. ![]()
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