Nerve Agent History WWII

First discovered accidentally during the 1930s by industrial chemists in Germany conducting pesticide research, the nerve agents Tabun (GA) and Sarin (GB) were developed into chemical weapons and stockpiled by the Nazi regime. Fortunately, Hitler did not order their use during World War II because German intelligence believed--incorrectly--that the United States and the Soviet Union had developed similar weapons. After the war, the victorious Allies competed among themselves for the secrets of the Nazi nerve agent program. In the early 1950s, British industrial scientists accidentally discovered a second generation of nerve agents that were even more toxic than Sarin and were dubbed "V agents" because of their venomous (skin-penetrating) properties. During the Cold War, the United States and the Soviet Union pursued a chemical arms race in which they produced and stockpiled various nerve agents in the thousands of tons. For a detailed history for the general reader of the discovery, development, proliferation, and control of nerve agents such as Tabun, Sarin, Soman, and VX, read the 2006 book, War of Nerves: Chemical Warfare from World War I to Al-Qaeda, By Jonathan B. Tucker. During the 1960s, ocean dumping, openpit burning, and land burials were the U.S. Armys method of destroying chemical weapons. In 1969, the National Academy of Sciences recommended that ocean dumping be avoided. In the late 1960s President Nixon halts the production of chemical weapons. In 1972, the Army formed the U.S. Army Materiel Commands Program Manager for Demilitarization of Chemical Materiel, headquartered at Picatinny Arsenal, near Dover, NJ. The Army developed chemical weapons disposal methods using incineration and chemical neutralization. Project Eagle incinerates six million pounds of mustard agent and neutralizes eight million pounds of nerve agent GB (sarin) at Rocky Mountain Arsenal, Colo. between 1972 and 1976. Today, The U.S. Army's Chemical Materials Agency (CMA) safely stores and destroys the nation's aging chemical weapons and recovers the nation's chemical warfare materials. The agency is based at the Edgewood Area of the Aberdeen Proving Ground in Maryland, while other managers and staff fulfill the agency's mission from weapons storage and disposal at locations across the county. For more on the CMA, link to their website at http://www.cma.army.mil/home.aspx . This clip is from the 1963 film, Nerve Agents, available at the national Archives. The film is from the U. S. Army Training Film series on the features and tactical use of GA (tabun), GB (sarin), and V-class nerve agents as munitions for chemical warfare. Explains how the nerve gas agents enter the human body and the symptoms of poisoning, and shows the protective and first-aid measures that may be taken against them.

Category:

Education

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• Nerve
• agent
• chemical
• warfare
• VX
• GA
• GB
• sarin
• WWII
• Germany
• US
• Army
• military
• history
• HazMat
• CBRNE
• WMD
• industrial
• hygiene
• Hazwoper
• OSHA
• DOD
• DOE
• NIEHS
• EPA
• worker
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• safety
• hazardous
• material
• disposal
• pesticide

[adelle0001]

delikado ito pra sa mga tao!

[ViLLaPiNoZ]

40 years laters those ships were found...dun dun dunn

[haarp35117]

sick bastards

[AltitudeWarrior]

From August 1943 Hitler ordered mass production of Tabun-B for planned nerve gas raids on England. Prototypes of V-1 and V-2 with nerve gas warheads were developed in Breslau, but Churchill ironically spooked by the spectre of a Nazi nuclear bomb threatened Hitler with retaliation by dropping anthrax all over Germany. Hitler backed off.

[idrobinhood]

I wonder if these nerve agents are slowly be releasing into the atmosphere today..