Chemical warfare





Chemical warfare is the use of non-explosive chemical agents (that are not
themselves living organisms, that being biological warfare) to cause injury
or death. The main types of agents used in chemical warfare are:

History

The first major use of chemical warfare agents was during World War I, with
the use of various agents including chlorine, mustard gas, and phosgene gas
by the German army. Other armies quickly responded with chemical weapons of
their own. They were not extensively used during World War II due to the
fear of retalitation and because chemical weapons are of limited use in a
mobile front in which their use would slow the advance of one's own troops.
In addition chemical warfare requires supply from railroads which was
available in the fixed fronts of World War I, but not the mobile fronts of
World War II.

Chemical weapons were also extensively used by both sides during the
Iran-Iraq War and were used by Iraq against Kurdish civilian populations.

The use of chemical weapons is generally abhored in international law, and
there are many rules to discourage or make difficult their acquisition and
use. Of these the most important is the Chemical Weapons Convention.

Nuclear, Biological, and Chemical weapons were usually considered morally
equivalent and referred to collectively by the phrase "NBC weapons", until
this phrase was replaced by weapons of mass destruction, due to confusion
about the line between chemical and biological weapons (e.g. prions which
are not organisms but simple single-molecule proteins, and could thereby be
considered either chemical or biological), concerns about genetic
manipulation of biological entities, or nanotechnological methods to
generate new molecules with lifelike characteristics, or to exude dangerous
chemicals, and the danger of weapons using artificial intelligence and
robotics, all of which could conceivably get beyond human control.

By comparison to these threats, the danger of chemical weapons is not
considered to be extreme. Even such potential attacks as poisoning of an
urban center's water supply (very common in the history of warfare) with a
chemical agent, e.g. botulin, are assumed to be containable.

On April 4, 1984 President Ronald Reagan called for an international ban on
chemical weapons.