Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
The most frequently used chemicals during World War I were tear-inducing irritants rather than fatal or disabling poison. During World War I, the French Army was the first to employ tear gas, using 26 mm grenades filled with ethyl bromoacetate in August 1914.
In 1923, Hans von Seeckt pointed the way, by suggesting that German poison gas research move in the direction of delivery by aircraft in support of mobile warfare. Also in 1923, at the behest of the German army, poison gas expert Dr. Hugo Stoltzenberg negotiated with the USSR to build a huge chemical weapons plant at Trotsk, on the Volga river.
Chemical warfare (CW) involves using the toxic properties of chemical substances as weapons.This type of warfare is distinct from nuclear warfare, biological warfare and radiological warfare, which together make up CBRN, the military acronym for chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear (warfare or weapons), all of which are considered "weapons of mass destruction" (WMDs), a term that ...
A chemical weapon agent (CWA), or chemical warfare agent, is a chemical substance whose toxic properties are meant to kill, injure or incapacitate human beings.About 70 different chemicals have been used or stockpiled as chemical weapon agents during the 20th century.
Australian infantry with gas masks, Ypres, 1917. The widespread use of chemical warfare was a distinguishing feature of the conflict. Gases used included chlorine, mustard gas and phosgene. Relatively few war casualties were caused by gas, [11] as effective countermeasures to gas attacks were quickly created, such as gas masks.
The Livens Projector was a simple mortar-like weapon that could throw large drums filled with flammable or toxic chemicals. [6]In the First World War, the Livens Projector became the standard means of delivering gas attacks by the British Army and it remained in its arsenal until the early years of the Second World War.
German gas attacks were made at night or in the early morning, when the wind was favourable and darkness made it difficult for the defenders to see the gas cloud. [20] [b] Phosgene made the gas cloud more poisonous and the Germans tried to increase the concentration of the gas by discharging it quickly, though this reduced the duration of the ...
The incident got its name from the bloodied, corpse-like appearance of the Russian combatants after they were bombarded with a mixture of poison gases, chlorine and bromine by the Germans. While coughing up blood and often pieces of their inner organs, the Russians covered their faces with cloths and managed to rout German forces.