The Riddle of the Rhine:
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Victor LeFebure >> The Riddle of the Rhine:
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Need for a Balanced View of Chemical Warfare.--The facts of chemical
warfare have probably been less ventilated than those of any other
important war development. Yet no subject has aroused more general and
intense feeling. Tanks, aircraft, the different campaigns, enemy memoirs,
and a variety of war subjects, have received a considerable measure
of publicity, some more than full measure. Grave questions are pending
in which the chemical aspect of national defence is a prominent factor.
However willing the individual concerned, he cannot make a sound judgment
on the brief technical or popular garbled versions which have appeared.
One searches in vain for balanced and detailed statements on the question.
This may be due in no way to lack of intention, but to lack of opportunity.
Therefore, no excuse is needed for this contribution, but rather
an apology for the obscurity which has so far surrounded the subject.
What is the cause of this emotional or almost hysterical background from
which a clear definition of the matter is only now beginning to emerge?
Circumstances are to blame; the first open act of chemical warfare
decided the matter.
This event, the first German cloud gas attack at Ypres, arriving at
the peak of allied indignation against a series of German abuses,
in particular with regard to the treatment of prisoners,
left the world aghast at the new atrocity. Further, its use
against entirely unprotected troops was particularly revolting.
The fact that such a cloud of chlorine would have passed the 1918
armies untouched behind their modern respirators, could not be
known to, nor appreciated by the relatives of the 1915 casualties.
But the emotion and indignation called forth by the first use of gas
has survived a period of years, at the end of which the technical
facts would no longer, of themselves, justify such feeling.
We would hesitate to do anything which might dispel this emotional
momentum were we not convinced that, unaccompanied by knowledge,
it becomes a very grave danger. If we felt that the announcement
of an edict was sufficient to suppress chemical warfare we would
gladly stimulate any public emotion to create such an edict.
But therein lies the danger. Owing to certain technical peculiarities,
which can be clearly revealed by examination of the facts,
it is impossible to suppress chemical warfare in this way.
As well try to suppress disease by forbidding its recurrence.
But we can take precaution against disease, and the following
examination will show clearly that we can take similar precautions
against the otherwise permanent menace of chemical war.
Further, backed by such precautions, a powerful international
edict has value.
It is, therefore, our intention to present a reasoned account of the
development of poison gas, or chemical warfare, during the recent war.
But to leave the matter there would be misleading and culpable,
for, however interesting the simple facts of the chemical campaign,
they owed their being to a combination of forces, whose nature
and significance for the future are infinitely more important.
The chief cause of the chemical war was an unsound and dangerous
world distribution of industrial organic chemical forces.
Unless some readjustment occurs, this will remain the "point faible"
in world disarmament. We, therefore, propose to examine the relationships
between chemical industry, war, and disarmament.
Some Preliminary Explanation.--The chemistry of war, developed under
the stress of the poison gas campaign, is of absorbing chemical
and technical interest, but it has none the less a general appeal.
When its apparently disconnected and formidable facts are revealed
as an essential part of a tense struggle in which move and counter-move
followed swiftly one upon the other, its appeal becomes much wider.
Therefore, in order not to confuse the main issue in the following
chapters by entering upon tiresome definitions, it is proposed to conclude
the present chapter by explaining, simply, a number of chemical warfare
conceptions with which the expert is probably well acquainted.
"Poison Gas" a Misleading Term--Poison gas is a misleading term, and.
our subject is much better described as "chemical, warfare."
Let us substantiate this by examining briefly the types of chemicals
which were used. In the first place they were not all gases;
the tendency during the war was towards the use of liquids and solids.
Even the chemicals which appeared as gases on the field of battle
were transported and projected as liquids, produced by compression.
As the poison war developed, a large number of different
chemicals became available for use by the opposing armies.
These can he classified, either according to their tactical use,
or according to their physiological effects on man.
The British, French, American, and German armies all tended to the final
adoption of a tactical classification, but the French emphasised
the physiological side. Let us use their classification as a basis
for a review of the chief chemicals concerned.
The French Physiological Classification;--Asphyxiating Substances;--
Toxic Substances;--Chemicals or poison gases were either asphyxiating,
toxic, lachrymatory, vesicant, or sternutatory. It is perfectly true
that the asphyxiating and toxic substances, used during the war,
produced a higher percentage of deaths than the other three classes,
but the latter were responsible for many more casualties.
The so-called asphyxiating gases produced their effect by producing lesions
and congestion in the pulmonary system, causing death by suffocation.
The best known substances of this type was chlorine, employed in the liquid
state in cylinders on the occasion of the first German gas attack,
but the most formidable were phosgene (an important substance required
in the manufacture of dyes), diphosgene, chlor-picrin, made from bleaching
powder and picric acid, brom-acetone, which was also a powerful lachrymator,
and diphenylchlorarsine, known as sneezing gas, the first sternutatory
or sneezing compound to appear on the front in large quantities.
The toxic compounds were so called because of their specific effect upon
particular parts of the organism such as, for example, the nervous system.
The chief example, with regard to the military value of which there
has been much dispute, was prussic, or hydrocyanic, acid. The French
had definite evidence of the mortal effect of this compound upon
German gunners, but it was doubted by other Allies whether French gas
shell produced a sufficient concentration of gas to be of military value.
It was a kill or cure compound, for recovery was rapid from any
concentration which did not produce death.
A prominent Cambridge physiologist, in the heat of the controversy
on this matter, made a very brave and self-sacrificing experiment.
He entered a chamber of prussic acid which was sufficiently
concentrated to cause the death of other animals which were present.
They were removed in time, and he escaped because the concentration
was not a mortal one for man. This was, in a sense, an _experimentum
crucis_ and, although it did not disprove the extreme danger
of prussic acid, if employed in high concentrations, it showed,
on the other hand, that it was difficult to gauge the military
value by field experiments; battle results were necessary.
The Germans' disappointment with the use of arsenic compounds
confirms this need for battle evidence.
Lachrymators.--There is hardly need to dwell on the next class,
the lachrymator. These compounds were employed on a large scale
to produce temporary blindness by lachrymation, or weeping.
We give later some interesting examples of their use on the front.
It is an arresting thought that even as early as 1887
Professor Baeyer, the renowned organic chemist of Munich,
in his lectures to advanced students, included a reference
to the military value of these compounds.
Vesicant or Blistering Compounds.--It was the introduction of
the fourth, the vesicant class, which revealed, more than any other
enemy move, the great possibilities inherent in chemical warfare.
These compounds, the chief of which was mustard gas, produced vesicant,
or skin burning, effects, which, although rarely mortal,
were sufficient to put a man out of action for a number of months.
Mustard gas resulted from pure scientific investigation as early as 1860.
Victor Meyer, the famous German chemist, described the substance in 1884,
indicating its skin-blistering effects. There is evidence of further
investigation in German laboratories a year before the outbreak of war,
and whatever the motive for this work, we know that mustard gas
must have received the early attention of the German War Office,
for it was approved and in production early in 1917.
Although the Medecin aide-major Chevalier of the French services
drew attention to its importance in 1916, the French had no serious
thought of using mustard gas, and did not realise its possibilities
until the German battle experiment of July, 1917. It is not
generally known, however, that other vesicant compounds were employed,
notably some of the arsenic compounds, and the Germans were researching
on substances of this nature which gave great promise of success.
Mustard gas provides a striking example of the organic way
in which chemical warfare is bound up with the dye industry.
The compounds required for its manufacture were those which had been
made on a large scale by the I.G. for the production of indigo.
World indigo monopoly meant possession of a potential mustard gas
surprise on the outbreak of war.
Sneezing or Sternutatory Substances.--The last class,
the sternutatory substances, produced the familiar sneezing
effect which was accompanied by intense pain and irritation
of the nose, throat, and respiratory channels. They were mostly
arsenic compounds and were not only sternutatory but also toxic,
producing the after effects of arsenic poisoning.
The Tactical Classification.--From the point of view of our account
of chemical warfare, however, the physiological classification
of these substances is not so important as the tactical and,
indeed, once this grouping of the substances is understood,
a profound knowledge of their chemical nature is not necessary.
Persistent Substances.--Two main classes exist from the tactical
Point of view. There are those "persistent" substances which
remain for a long time on the soil or on the object on which they
are sprayed by shell, while retaining their dangerous effect.
Mustard gas was the chief example, but some of the lachrymators
were just as persistent. By their use it is possible to render
ground uninhabitable or ineffective for military movement.
The combination of the vesicant and persistent properties of mustard
gas rendered it a powerful military factor.
Non-Persistent Substances.--On the other hand, there are the relatively
volatile substances, such as phosgene, which can be used immediately
before an attack. The chief sternutatory compound, diphenylchlorarsine,
although not volatile, could also be used in this way, for, being a solid
and in a very finely pulverised state, its presence on the ground was
not a distinct danger, and it invited chemical decomposition.
Penetrants.--The Germans introduced an additional tactical group.
This comprised pulverised substances able to penetrate the mask
on account of their existence as minute particles. The Germans
expressed these tactical conceptions by their shell markings.
The familiar Green Cross represented the slightly persistent,
volatile, lethal compounds, such as phosgene and diphosgene.
The German gunner had no need to know the content of his gas
shell so long as he could identify the cross. Yellow Cross,
representing mustard gas, was the most highly persistent type.
It is interesting to speculate whether a new persistent compound,
whose military value was due to some other property than the blistering,
would have been grouped under Yellow Cross. Logically, this should
have been done. Blue Cross covered the arsenic group of compounds,
which were non-persistent and were expected to penetrate the mask.
So strong was this tactical conception that the Allies were on
the verge of adopting a uniform shell marking based on this
principle throughout their armies.
Special Gas Weapons and Appliances.--It is a popular misconception
that gas was only discharged from cylinders in huge clouds,
or used as artillery shell. A number of special weapons developed,
which were particularly adapted for gas. Thus, the Livens projector,
which was a great Allied advance, produced a gas cloud a long distance
from the point of discharge, while the Stokes and other short range
guns were used for rapid fire of large numbers of gas shell.
The primary conceptions with regard to protection have been brought
home to so many, through the fact that the mask was a part of the
equipment of every soldier, that we need not dwell on them here.
It is not generally realised, however, that every modification
introduced by either side was a vital and direct counter to some enemy
move planned to render the protection of the opponent ineffective.
Gas Shell.--A word is necessary to define the use of gas shell.
The point which must be realised is that gas, and in
particular gas shell, fulfilled a special purpose in warfare,
from which it was much more suitable than explosives.
The use for neutralising batteries, cross roads, and rendering
whole areas uninhabitable, is developed fully in our reference
to the great German attacks in 1918.
With this brief sketch to clear the ground, we can embark more freely
upon the account of chemical warfare which follows. CHAPTER II
THE GERMAN SURPRISE
Ypres, April, 1915, to the Somme, August, 1916.
The First Cloud Gas Attack.--The critical factor of surprise in war
was never nearer decisive success than on April 22nd, 1915.
Of this, the occasion of the first German gas attack
at Ypres, Field-Marshal Sir J. D. P. French Stated:
"Following a heavy bombardment, the enemy attacked the French Division
at about 5 p.m., using asphyxiating gases for the first time.
Aircraft reported that at about 5 p.m. thick yellow smoke had
been seen issuing from the German trenches between Langemarck
and Bixschoote. What follows almost defies description.
The effect of these poisonous gases was so virulent as to render
the whole of the line held by the French Division mentioned above
practically incapable of any action at all. It was at first
impossible for any one to realise what had actually happened.
The smoke and fumes hid everything from sight, and hundreds of men
were thrown into a comatose or dying condition, and within an hour
the whole position had to be abandoned, together with about fifty guns.
I wish particularly to repudiate any idea of attaching the least
blame to the French Division for this unfortunate incident."
The Element of Surprise.--The enemy just missed colossal success rendered
possible by the use of an entirely new war method; one contrary to engagements
entered into by them at the Hague Convention.
There were elements in this first gas attack which were absent
even from the situation created by our first use of tanks.
Unfamiliarity amongst the troops, or the staff, for that matter,
created an atmosphere of unparalleled confusion.
Men attempted to protect themselves by burying their mouths
and nostrils in the loose earth. Those chemists, on the spot,
not immediately struck down, made frantic efforts to bring up
supplies of any suitable and available chemical or material
which might assist resistance and movement in the affected zone.
Paying every homage to the heroic sacrifices and brave actions
which characterised the Allied resistance, we cannot ignore
the fact that morale must have been very severely shaken locally,
and that a general disquiet and uneasiness must have permeated
the whole front until measures were known to be effectively
in progress, not only for protection, but for retaliation.
The enemy had but to exploit the attack fully to break through
to the channel ports, but failed to do so. The master mind
behind this new and deadly attack was not, let us remember,
that of a soldier. It was very strongly rumoured that this
monstrous conception and its execution were due to one or,
at the most, two renowned German Professors. The first hammer
blow in the enemy chemical campaign was a two-party conspiracy,
led by world-famous scientists and the powerful I.G. with the German
army unconvinced but expectant, little more than a willing dupe.
Lord Kitchener's Protest.--In his spirited protest in the House
of Lords, Lord Kitchener stated: "The Germans have, in the last week,
introduced a method of placing their opponents _hors de combat_
by the use of asphyxiating and deleterious gases, and they
employ these poisonous methods to prevail when their attack,
according to the rules of war, might have otherwise failed.
On this subject I would remind your Lordships that Germany was
a signatory to the following article in the Hague Convention:
" `The Contracting Powers agree to abstain from the use of projectiles
the object of which is the diffusion of asphyxiating or deleterious gases.'
"
This protest circulated amongst neutrals prompted numerous
attempts at vindication in the German Press. In several cases we
find important newspapers arguing that the German attack was not
contrary to the Hague Convention, while others admitted the breach,
but claimed that the Germans merely followed Allied example.
The main technical excuse was that the effect of the German gas was
merely stupefying (_Colniche Zeitung_, June, 1915). It is incredible
that the German nation was, or could allow itself to be, so hoodwinked.
Scientific Germany was certainly aware of the true nature of the gases used.
Even scientific neutrals in Berlin at the outbreak of war, and during
the ensuing winter, were aware of the German poison gas work,
which commenced, in an organised way, almost as soon as war broke out.
The Germans have argued that they only entertained the idea of gas
after Allied use. The facts revealed below are a sufficient answer.
Whatever legal arguments may be involved, there is no doubt as
to German intention.
We do not wish to enter into a comprehensive examination of the legal aspect
of the first use of cloud and shell gas by Germany. Whatever complicated
arguments may turn upon the strict reading of a phrase in the records
of the Hague Convention, we have no doubt whatever as to the desires
and intentions of the Assembly, and we regard Germany (and the Allies)
as morally engaged not to venture upon the series of chemical
enterprises which she openly commenced with the Ypres cloud attack.
The Versailles Treaty also renders fruitless any such discussion.
Article 171, accepted by Germany, is deliberately based on her breach
of International Convention.
German Preparations.--A significant phrase occurs in the
Field-Marshal's despatch. "The brain power and thought which has
evidently been at work before this unworthy method of making
war reached the pitch of efficiency which has been demonstrated
in its practice shows that the Germans must have harboured
these designs for a long time." This is a most important point.
It was argued by many generous and fairminded people in April, 1915,
that the German use of gas was the result of a sudden decision,
only arrived at in a desperate effort to terminate the war.
This point of view would give us maximum hope for the future.
But the actual truth? What do we know about German preparations,
and how far back do they date? Any preparations which occurred
must have covered research on the compounds to be employed and on
the protection required for the German troops, their training
for the cloud attack, and the design and production of the special
appliances to be used. Finally, the production of the chemicals
themselves had to be faced.
Research.--We have obtained an insight into the German research
preparations, which leaves no doubt as to their intention.
There is evidence that the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute and
the physico-chemical institute near by were employed for this
purpose as early as August, 1914. Reliable authority exists
for the statement that soon after this date they were working
with cacodyl oxide and phosgene, both well known before the war
for their very poisonous nature, for use, it was believed,
in hand grenades. Our quotations are from a statement
by a neutral then working at the Institute. "We could hear
the tests that Professor Haber was carrying out at the back
of the Institute, with the military authorities, who in their
steel-grey cars came to Haber's Institute every morning."
"The work was pushed day and night, and many times I saw
activity in the building at eleven o'clock in the evening.
It was common knowledge that Haber was pushing these men
as hard as he could." Sachur was Professor Haber's assistant.
"One morning there was a violent explosion in the room
in which most of this war work was carried out. The room
was instantly filled with dense clouds of arsenic oxide."
"The janitors began to clear the room by a hose and discovered
Professor Sachur." He was very badly hurt and died soon after.
"After that accident I believe the work on cacodyl oxide
and phosgene was suspended and I believe that work was carried
out on chlorine or chlorine compounds." "There were seven
or eight men working in the Institute on these problems,
but we heard nothing more until Haber went to the Battle
of Ypres." Rumours to this effect circulated in 1915.
Production.--Preparations, for production can easily be imagined.
The Germans first used chlorine for cloud gas, and certain
lachrymators for shell. The chlorine was readily available.
At about this time British liquid chlorine capacity had a
maximum daily output of about one ton, while along the Rhine
alone the production was more than forty times greater.
The question of German chlorine production was, therefore,
already solved. The lachrymators were mainly raw materials
and intermediates of the dye industry submitted to a process,
the technique of which the German dye factories readily mastered.
Here, again, production presented no real difficulties.
Cylinders were also probably available from the industry.
Field Preparations.--There remains the last question of gas attack
technique and personnel. Those of us who remember the difficulties
involved in creating our own organisation in the summer of 1915
have no illusions on the question of German preparation.
Giving the Germans every credit for their technical and military
efficiency, some months must have been occupied in establishing
and training the special companies required, and in arriving
at a satisfactory design for the discharge appliances.
Schwarte's book, _Die Technik Im Weltkriege_,[1] tells us "specially
organised and trained troops" were required for the purpose.
Prisoners taken later revealed the German methods. Gas officers
and N.C.O.'s, after making a careful survey of the front line trench,
organised the digging of deep narrow trenches at suitable places
below the surface of the main trench, just underneath the parapet.
The heavy gas cylinders, weighing as much as ninety pounds,
were carried to the front line by the unfortunate infantry.
The discharge valves were carefully protected by domes which screwed
on to the cylinder. The latter were introduced into the holes,
tops flush with the trench bottom, and covered by a board
on which reposed the "Salzdecke," a kind of long bag stuffed
with some such material as peat moss and soaked in potash
solution to absorb any slight gas leakages. Three layers of
sandbags were built above the salzdecke to protect the cylinder
from shell fragments and to form a firestep for the infantry.
This concealed the cylinders so efficiently that, in our own trenches,
I have often found the new occupants of a sector ignorant
of the presence of gas cylinders under their own firesteps.
On the favourable night the dome was removed and a lead pipe
was connected to the cylinder and directed over the parapet
into No Man's Land, with the nozzle weighed down by a sandbag.
The pioneers stood by the batteries of twenty cylinders each
and let off the gas a fixed few minutes after a rocket signal,
at which the infantry retired to leave the front line free
for the pioneers, who not only ran the risk of gassing from
defective appliances but were subjected to almost immediate
violent bombardment from the opposing artillery. When surprise
was complete artillery retaliation was very late in developing.
This gives a faint idea of the elaborate preparations required.
They must have been doubly arduous and lengthy on the very first
occasion of cloud gas attack.
[1] _Die Technik Im Weltkriegre_. Publisher: Mittler, Berlin, 1920.
German Opinion of Results.--We can now regard the chlorine attack
of April 22, 1915, as the first and successful result of a huge
German experiment on a new method of war, the pioneer work
of which actually began at (if not before) the outbreak of war.
Quoting again from Schwarte: "G.H.Q. considered the attack near
Ypres to he a successful experiment. The impression created
was colossal and the result not inconsiderable, although it
was not fully utilised from the tactical point of view.
It was obvious that we had gained a great advantage;
the enemy was not sufficiently prepared with defensive measures
against gas." Indeed, we were absolutely unprepared, so much so,
that after the German attack nearly every household in England
contributed to our first inefficient and improvised mask.
Is not this suggestion of our preparation a deliberate attempt
to deceive the German public? They seem to have been as easily
hoodwinked on gas questions as on many others.
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