Chemical warfare

**Chemical warfare** means using poisonous chemical compounds to injure or kill people in a war.

Chemical warfare has been used since the Stone Age. Since 1899, several international laws have made it illegal to use chemical weapons. Still, chemical weapons have been used in wars since then.

About 70 different chemicals have been used or stockpiled (saved up) as chemical warfare agents during the 20th century. The Chemical Weapons Convention says that all of these chemicals should be destroyed.

## Definition

Chemical weapons are different than regular weapons (like bombs) or nuclear weapons because they do not explode. Some chemical weapons are meant to kill people by poisoning them. Other chemical weapons are meant to "incapacitate" people (make them unable to fight back). They do this by causing pain, injuries, or sickness.

### Chemical vs. biological warfare

Chemical warfare does not include using living organisms (like anthrax bacteria) to make people sick. That is called biological warfare.

However, some living organisms make toxins (poisons). These toxins are not alive. For example, botulinum toxin is made by a bacteria, and ricin is made by the castor oil plant. Because botulinum toxin and ricin are not alive, using them to make people sick is called chemical warfare.

This is explained in the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC). The convention also says that any toxic chemical is a chemical weapon unless it is used for legal reasons.

### Chemical Weapons Convention

The Chemical Weapons Convention lists three different groups of chemicals. These are chemicals that are poisonous enough to be used as chemical weapons, or chemicals that may be used to make chemical weapons.

#### Schedule 1 Substances (Chemicals)

These chemicals can be used for nothing but chemical weapons (or for very few other things). Nerve agents, ricin, lewisite, and mustard gas are all Schedule 1 substances.

According to the Chemical Weapons Convention, Schedule 1 chemicals may only be made or used for a few things:

- Research
- Medicine
- To make medications or antidotes
- For protective reasons (for example, to test chemical weapons sensors, which can tell when a chemical weapon is nearby, or to test protective clothing).

If a country makes over 100 grams of any of these chemicals, they must report it to the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW). A country may have a stockpile of no more than one ton of these chemicals.

#### Schedule 2 Substances

These chemicals have some specific uses other than chemical warfare, but not many. For example, dimethyl methylphosphonate can be used to make sarin, a nerve agent. But it is also used as a flame retardant.

Another example is Thiodiglycol, which can be used to make mustard gas. But it is also widely used as to make inks.

#### Schedule 3 Substances

These chemicals have many uses other than chemical warfare. One example is phosgene.  It can be used as a chemical weapon, but it is also an important chemical used to make plastics.

Another example is chloropicrin, which has also been used as a chemical weapon, but is also used as a fumigant (for example, to kill insects in a house).

The OPCW must be told of, and may inspect, any company that makes more than 30 tons of these chemicals in a year.

## Technology

|style="border-right:1px solid #aaa; border-bottom:2px solid #aaa;"||style="border-right:1px solid #aaa; border-bottom:2px solid #aaa;"|***Chemical Weapons Used***|style="border-right:1px solid #aaa; border-bottom:2px solid #aaa;"|***How Were They Used?***|style="border-right:1px solid #aaa; border-bottom:2px solid #aaa;"|***How Did People Try to Protect Themselves?***|style="border-right:1px solid #aaaaa; border-bottom:2px solid #aaa;"|***How Did People Recognize the Weapon?***|
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
|style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"|**1914**|style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"|Chlorine Chloropicrin Phosgene Mustard gas|style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"|The chemicals were spread by wind|style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"|Gas masks Gauze that had been urinated on|style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"|Smell|
|style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"|**1918**|style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"|Lewisite|style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"|Chemical shells (projectiles filled with chemicals)|style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"|Gas mask Rosin oil clothing|style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"|Smell of geraniums (a type of flower)|
|style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"|**1920s**|style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"||style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"|Projectiles with central bursters|style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"|CC-2 protective clothing|style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"||
|style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"|**1930s**|style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"|G-series nerve agents|style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"|Bombs dropped from airplanes|style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"||style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"|Blister agent detectors Color change paper|
|style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"|**1940s**|style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"||style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"|Missiles filled with chemicals warheads Spray tanks|style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"|Protective ointment (mustard) Collective protection Gas mask with Whetlerite|style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"||
|style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"|**1950s**|style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"||style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"||style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"||style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"||
|style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"|**1960s**|style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"|V-series nerve agents|style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"|Aerodynamic|style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"|Gas mask w/ water supply|style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"|Nerve gas alarm|
|style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"|**1970s**|style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"||style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"||style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"||style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"||
|style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"|**1980s**|style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"||style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"|Binary weapons (once fired, two chemicals inside mix to make the chemical weapon)|style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"|Improved gas masks (better protection, fit, and comfort)|style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"|Laser detection|
|style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"|**1990s**|style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"|Novichok nerve agents|style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"||style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"||style="border-right:1px solid #aaa;"||

## History

Although very basic chemical warfare has been used in many parts of the world for thousands of years, "modern" chemical warfare began during World War I.

Since then, countries have tried to research and make chemical weapons.  They have had four main goals:
1. To make new, more deadly chemical weapons
1. To create ways of delivering chemical weapons that will hurt or kill even more people
1. To come up with better protections against chemical weapons
1. To create better ways of detecting chemical weapons (realizing that chemical weapons are nearby)

### Ancient history

Chemical warfare was first used during the Stone Age. Stone Age people used poisoned arrows and spear-tips. These were dipped in poisons, like venom from snakes or scorpions. Sometimes they used poisonous plants.

The Ancient Chinese used different forms of poisonous smokes, when they besieged a city to try to take it over.

The Ancient Greeks used a form of burning wood, pitch from plants, and sulphur.

### World War I

Poison gas was first used in World War I (WWI). France was the first country to make it, but Germany was the first to use it in battle. On March 15th, 1915, they used tear gas against French soldiers. They simply opened containers of chlorine upwind of enemy soldiers, so that the wind would carry the chlorine gas to their enemies. Soon after this, the French started using chemical weapons too.

#### Types

There were three types of gas used in WWI. The first was chlorine gas (tear gas). It makes people cough, have trouble breathing, and go blind until the tear gas wears off.

The second type of gas was phosgene, a very deadly chemical weapon. It caused people to cough and choke, much worse than tear gas.  Historians think about 100,000 people died in World War I from chemical weapons.  They also think that 85% of these people (85,000 people) were killed by phosgene.

Mustard gas was the third type of gas used in WWI. It was almost impossible for soldiers to protect themselves against it. It caused terrible, painful sores on the outside and inside of the body.

#### Delivery

At first, the armies used very basic ways of spreading poison gases. Even so, many soldiers could be hurt or killed in gas attacks. This was partly because World War I was fought using trench warfare. This meant groups of soldiers were together in the same place at the same time, and escaping from poisonous gases was very hard.

The French army began filling artillery projectiles with phosgene and fired them at the Germans. This was a much more effective way of using chemical weapons. It would become the most common way of delivering chemical weapons during World War I.

### Modern use

Chemical weapons were not used very much in World War II, except by the Japanese army during the invasion of China. This was because everybody was afraid that the other side would use weapons like theirs. Also, chemical weapons were not easy to use. They took time to use, and this made it harder for soldiers to move quickly. Also, the raw materials needed to make chemical weapons were not easy to get. This was because World War II was fought in areas which were not connected well by railroads.

During the Iran-Iraq War, Iraq used chemical weapons (Iran did not). Many people believe that Iraq used chemical weapons against the Kurdish people.

It has been reported that many other countries, like the People's Republic of China, Cuba, Egypt, Iran, Israel, North Korea, Pakistan, Sudan, Syria, Taiwan, and Serbia and Montenegro, have chemical weapons.

## Laws about chemical weapons

According to international law, it is wrong to use chemical weapons. Since 1899, there have been many rules that make it illegal to make, import, and use chemical weapons.

The first international law to make chemical warfare illegal was the Hague Convention in 1899.

After World War I, the Geneva Protocol of 1925 made it illegal to use chemical or biological weapons in any interstate wars. It does not apply to stockpiling or transferring chemical weapons, nor does it apply to armed conflicts within a single country.

In 1997, the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) was created.  As of the end of 2015, 192 countries had agreed to follow the CWC.  According to the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, as of October 2015, 90% of the world's chemical weapons stockpiles had been destroyed.

## Chemical agents

The main types of agents used in chemical warfare are:
- Nerve agents, like sarin or VX
- Mustard agents
- Hydrogen cyanide-based agents
- Arsines, like lewisite
- Toxins, like _Botulinum_ toxin
- Incapacitating agents (chemicals that make large numbers of people unable to fight back, but without permanently hurting or killing them), like tear gases and pepper spray.

If people use chemicals (like Agent Orange or glyphosate) to destroy plants, sometimes human beings suffer side effects. But this is not chemical warfare. Chemical warfare covers only direct attacks on human life.