Washington standard. [volume] (Olympia, Wash. Territory) 1860-1921, 1900-03-16
|LYDDITE IN WARFARE
SHOULD 1T BE BARRED AS AN
INHUMAN ACENT7

There is Nothing in the Laws of War O.
Comfy Of Nations to Prohibit Its Use
Seven Times as Powerful as Gunpo~der-
Some Other Newly Discovered Explosive.
of Tremendous Power-One of These. Thor
ite, the Invention of Seattle Man.
| Those who have made no particular
study of such matters as the laws oi
civilized warfare and international
agreements about methods Of mutual
killing and wounding have been some
what puzzled by recent dispatches
from the seat of war in South Africa,
in which it has been stated that Gen.
Joubert sent formal protest to Sir
George White against the use of the
new tangled "lyddite" as filling for
explosive projectiles. The natural
question is, Why should lyddite be
barred in civilized warfare?
This question was put to two prom
inent members of the United States
ordnance department. The first an
swered: "Probably because Gen. Jou-
bert has none and the British have
plenty" and the second simply said
that he had no idea on what grounds
the protest could have been made.
"The aim OF all these international
understandings" said the latter of
these two officers, ais to prevent the
infiiction OF unnecessary pain. Ex
plosive bullets for use in small arms
are forbidden, because they lacerate
the bodies of the wounded cruelty and
needlessly. In the same way one form
of the dun dunn bullet has been put
on the forbidden list, though another
form, which only increases the virtual
calibre OF the weapon-that is, gives
to a 3O-calibre bullet the effect of 40
calibre-is allowed. But in the mat
ter of artillery fire there is no limita-
tion as to the character of force of the
explosives used for filling shells.
"But," it was urged. as recorded by
the New York Tribune, they say that
at the battle of Omdurman, where
these lyddite shells were used, many
OF the Mahdi's men were killed 10y SUI
location"
"In the open air? Pooh"
The expert further pointed out that
there was nothing in the laws of war
or the comfy of nations to prevent
people killing their enemies by suffoca-
ton, if that should happen to be the
most effective means within reach.
There must be something, however,
at the bottom Of that suffOcation"
story which has survived from the
flaming days when the English papers
were full of Kitchener's victory over
" Fuzzy-Wuzzy" and his brethren.
What gave rise to the notion that this
explosive made vapor which either
poisoned or asphy xiated, seems to be
satisfactorily explained by an officer
connected with the United States War
Department, who was in New York
short time ago:
eff you could explode twenty or
thirty of those shells close together at
the same time, then, I dare say, those
OF the men who happened to be stand
ing at that spot and were not other
wise killed would be sufocated, even
in the open air. But with the inter-
walls OF time between the firing of the
successive rounds the carbonic oxide.
which is poisonous, and the carbonic
dioxide, which asphyxiates, would te
dissipated in the open air. In an in
closed space it might be different.
"What the correspondent really
meant, l suppose, by asphyxiation, or
suffOcation, was the effect of the shock
produced by the violent explosion OF
such mass. The bodies OF these poor
fellows would be found without a
scratch or bruise after the action, at
spots where shells had exploded, and
then it would be supposed that they
had died of suffocation by the dis.
charges OF gas, or their deaths would
be so described by war correspondent.
"It is not generally understood what
a tremendous conclusion of the atmo-
sphere is produced by the bursting of
shell charged with a composition of
many times as much explosive force as
that OF gunpowder. AS 1 understand,
the naval guns latterly employed in
the defense of Ladysmith throw a six
inch shell. In our ordnance a six
inch shell weighs 100 pounds. The
armor-piercing projectile is nineteen
inches long, the common kind twenty
inches. The latter is made of cast
iron and, of course, is filled with q
much more sensitive fuse than the
former, so that it will explode upon
contact with the earth or earthworks,
and this is the kind Capt. Lambton
must have used.
snow, I cannot speak of the effect
OF such shell except in the way of
conjecture, because this is almost the
first time it has been used in actual
warfare, and / was not present; but 1
should say that nothing within ra.
dius of 10 feet could survive the ex-
plosion, and many more wounds
would be inflicted beyond that radius
by the fragments. The conclusion
would be fatal within the lO.foot ra-