The Dawson news. (Dawson, Ga.) 1889-current, 1912-02-21
WARFARE WITH CHEMICALS
DEADLY GERMS, NOT BULLETS
TO DECIDE FUTURE CONFLICTS
The Fog SHELF and the Horrible
"Blindite" Also Under Consider
alton by England's War Board

alton by England's War Board.
me warfare of the future may be
a war between chemists. The ma
ton with the most ingenious chem
lists will be the nation to conquer.
Bullets, shells and explosives will he
replaced by a series of the most
death-dealing germs and poisons
known to science, says Parsons
Weekly.
First of all, a shell will he filled
with germs of cholera, typhoid or
smallpox. Fired into a besieged
town these dreadful shells will do
their deadly work far more effective
ly than any melanite, Iyddite or 9th
er explosive ever invented.
The thickest armor plate or the
heaviest guns in the world will be
useless against them. In week the
besieged city would be mere pest.
ilence-laden graveyard, which even
the enemy would think twice about
entering.
Germ warfare is only a part of the
new system of warfare that the Brit
ish admiralty is now considering
Another idea of the inventor is a
shell filled with a material that will
literally set the atmosphere on fire.
When this shell bursts over a town
or camp the air will be filed with
blazing red-hot specks that will set
tie down and burn everything with
in reach. The atmosphere itself will
become so heated that no living be-
ing would exist in it for more than a
few minutes.
The fog shell has long been the
dream Of the war offices of various
nations. uch a shell is now actu-
ally undo consideration.
When the fog shell explodes the
air for hundreds of yards around
the spot will be filled with a thick
dense fog worse than any London
particular.
The biggest dreadnought in the
world would be rendered useless
in few minutes with one of these
shells, and that without iniuring it
any wayi 1t would simply be shut
in by the fog, fog so thick that
no searchlight can penetrate it. A
few torpedo boats, once the fog shell
had been fired, could sink their huge
enemy with practically no danger
whatever to themselves.
Perhaps the most horrible part of
the new invention is "blindite.' AS
the name implies it is CHASTITY sub
stance which blinds anyone within
reach. Enough 'blindite" can be
put in an ordinary rifle bullet to
blind dozen people.
A shell filled with "blindite" will
blind everyone within 10 yards ra-
dius Such shell, exploding over
warship, would leave it as helpless as
q mouse in cats home.
This is not the first time that
chemical warfare has been suggest
ed. Edison brought forward the
idea just before the Spanish-Ameri-
can war. He suggested using a dia-
bolical gas, filling balloons with it
and letting them drift over the
heads of the enemy At the proper
moment the balloon would burst.
and the deadly fumes they contained
kill anyone within a radius of a half
| dozen miles.
Just about the same time as Edi-
son, DR.. Richard Cantle tried to in
duce the American government to
adopt a method of filing alright
shells with cholera microbes. The
U. S. A. authorities, however. turn
ed deaf ear to the idea as being
too inhuman
Now that such ideas are actually
being seriously considered it is to
be hoped that they will be carried
through and approved of. The very
| possibilities of the horrors that war
will bring in it's trail then will keep
nations at peace.