Nukes!

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Thus why wy don't want them to have nukes.

They all hate Israel. Getting them to target the US, or Egypt, or Germany may be hard, but getting them to target Israel would be a piece of cake.

Why do you assume that any retaliation would be directed against Iran?

Iran signed the Non-Proliferation Treaty. Israel didn't.

Here's the thing, though. Chemical weapons are notoriously unpredictable. You can't use them on the battlefield unless you have protection from them and your enemy doesn't, which isn't exactly commonplace these days. You could use them as long-range weapons, but then you have no idea where they'll go after their initial deployment. They actually work best as assassination tools, and you don't need mass-produced warheads for that. I'm not at all surprised so many agreed to give up chemical weapons. It's the nuclear ones that people don't want to give up.

 

Wartime use of chemical weapons actually has quite a history, and your claims of unpredictability are not really true - maybe back in WWI, but agents have come a long way since then. Most chemical agents only remain toxic in a given area for about an hour now, before they are dispersed to less than lethal concentrations.

Of course, most chemical agents take at least that long to take effect anyway - some take as long as 12 hours - and so you'd wait that time period out anyway. Combat use of chemical agents would normally be done hours prior to a ground invasion, to minimize the risk to your own troops. You definitely wouldn't use chemical agents in the midst of a battle.

That said, there's still a lot of nasty stuff that you can hold onto that isn't covered by the treaty. Unsurprisingly, the treaty defines what a chemical agent is. In layman's terms, it's basically any chemical that doesn't have an industrial use - in other words, if you can use it for something other than killing people, it's not a chemical agent. So something like a paralytic nerve agent is in fact considered a chemical agent (many nerve agents paralyze all your muscles, including the ones in your diaphram, so you suffocate). However, something like chlorine, which can be used to make chlorine gas isn't covered by the treaty, because it has uses other than killing people - like preventing algae from growing in your swimming pool. Tear gas is another example of something that isn't banned by the treaty, and neither are battelfield obscurants.

While the treaty is a good thing overall, it does have its shortcomings. Remember, just because something isn't classified as an agent doesn't mean it's less deadly than an agent - it just means that it has an idustrial use. Chlorine and mustard gas will both burn the inside of your lungs when inhaled, and both can cause death a short time later, but mustard is an agent, while chlorine isn't.

 

Re: Chlorine, will not burn, but corrode. It can react with the water in the lungs and eyes and the membranes of the respiratory tract to hydrochloric acid.

NOG,
you'll get a full answer later, I can it sum up already in writing that you're wrong, and that you still cling to assertions.

Besides, chemical weapons are relatively predictable with our current understanding of meteorology. The problem is that they usually just slow down a protected enemy by forcing him to take protective measures (training; gear; dedicated countermeasures units). The Iraqis for instance used gas quite successfully against the Iranians because of Iranian shortcomings in that regard. The use of CW can be best compared to using mines, see them as a deadly obstacle. Typically a minefield, or any other obstacle, is under observation and covered with fire, that is to say: CW augment conventional warfare. They are not a surrogate for it. CW would be used to poison supply points slowing down or interdicting enemy supplies, to hit material depots so units couldn't get to their gear, to poison terrain so it becomes impassable for unprotected units, to hit an artillery unit (especially when drawn) so they have to decontaminate their gear etc pp.

CW do have a strong morale effect. I was told that because of that the Russians would send out NBC detection troops with officers for reliability (where in western armies NCOs and conscripts would suffice). I understand why, NBC detection exercises are still about the eeriest ever thing I have experienced in my life. CW also significantly complicate casualty treatment, since the casualties themselves are contaminated. The Iraqis managed to keep their troops safe with training, protective gear, effective decontamination and atropine auto-injectors - NATO standard gear that is. In a military context, unless you surprise an unprotected enemy, CW just aren't that effective. I recall reading that the Royal Navy held the policy that in case their ships got hit by CW, they would just operate under protective measures and decontaminate after war. They would have hampered them, but not kept them from operating.

You only use CW effectively when you target unprotected enemies or civilians as the Spanish did in North Africa in the 1920s, the Japanese in China and the Iraqis to the Kurds. In a military context there are more cost effective ways to kill than to use CW, not to mention the stigma of use, which is why the US and the Russians didn't mind that much to see these weapons abandoned. As an added benefit, it also simplified procedures and logistics.

Ah yes, the merry scenarios of the Cold War ... on a related note, I was told that the Russians had aimed twenty plus nukes at my garrison town. What a prospect.

 

Not to be too picky Ragusa, but hydrochloric acid does burn - it's even called an acid burn, because of the heat released when HCl reacts with water. I remember the safety video we produced for our students back when I was teaching chemistry lab. We took a beaker of HCl, and poured a little bit of water in it - the reaction is so exothermic the water actually BOILED.

Acid can corrode, but that term is used for when it comes in contact with metal. When it contacts skin/lungs/person, burn is the more appropriate term.

 

Then there is a linguistic difference between the terms in English and German. We differentiate clearly between Verätzung (i.e. chemical burn) and a Verbrennung (i.e. ~ purely 'thermal' burn). Of course, with hot acid ... but alas, this is then a misunderstanding more than a disagreement. Having forgotten so much, I don't stand a chance against a chem teacher any more anyway, so I yield to your superior knowledge ...

 

It's been a while since my chemistry, but if I remember correctly, acids work by oxidizing what they react with, which is actually the same type of reaction as fire (thus the exothermic nature of the reaction). In a sense, it is literally the same reaction.

And I stand corrected on the use of chemical weapons.

 

Aldeth, you reminded me that some time back I ran across that a "Gay" chemical weapon was being developed or at least under study. It was a while ago so I don't recall the exact details.

I do recall my reaction. I am a visual oriented person and actual see scenes in my mind. I am not at all sure what the developers thought they would accomplish. The chemical was to be aimed at the enemy, bomb or something causing them to have homosexual tendencies. I found this utterly hilarious because I guess the enemy would immediately begin humping each other rather than fighting. There our soldiers could just walk in and round them up.

At least it would be nicer than most of what is developed. We seek our own destruction when we seek to destroy.

 

What would happen if the enemy was already gay?

 

ROTFLMAO Too bad for our soldiers.

 

Although never funded, the gay bomb was not a joke. In the late 1990s the Pendtagon had been making progress on ARCAD (Advanced Riot Control Agent Device); it was terminated because, in 1992, the Pentagon determined that it would violate the Chemical Weapons Convention. Research on chemical weapons didn't end however, as indicated by that the gay bomb funding request from 1994.

It the wake of 9/11 the Bush administration renewed their interest in 'less lethal' chemical weapons (or simply took the opportunity to revive old pet programs, make your pick), giving the chemical weapons development in US labs new funding and a new purpose - develop 'non lethal weapons', fighting terrorism, and chem defence. One of the backer of such programs was apparently Paul Wolfowitz. More from the (now defunct) Sunshine Project (who are IMO have been doing a far better if far more low key job that Wikileaks).

The gay bomb sure matches the eccentricity of the more esoteric projects from the cold war era.

On a related note, I think it is very consistent for someone like Wolfowitz would support chemical non lethal weapon programs, since he is also a fervent believer in the Revolutions of Military Affairs - the notion that technological progress has revolutionised war - i.e. he is a firm believer in the technological quick fix for war. For instance, soldiers not fighting because they have been overcome by sudden gayness (or by falling unconscious) would be a revolution in war in its own right. I would be surprised if then US didn't conduct research in order to at least duplicate if not to best the Russian agent used in the Moscow theatre incident.

 

Hey, maybe this is why Congress and the Pentagon are pushing to repeal DADT! Maybe someone else already has teh Gay Bomb (just had to misspell 'the' like that here), and this is a pre-emptive defense. After all, if they're already gay, they won't notice, right?

 

I'm a McCain fan, but ADM Mullin's response to McCain was awesome.

If you could do a simultaneous strike of a gay bomb and The Nude Bomb we would never have war again ... or perhaps we would be constantly going to war and requiring more such strikes....

I wonder, would the two bombs together (gay bomb and nude bomb) be considered a WAD (weapon of ass destruction)?