FIGHTING WITH FUMES
The Germans opened the war using projectiles seventeen inches in diameter. They closed it using projectiles one one-hundred millionth of an inch in diameter. And the latter were more effective than the former. As the dimensions were reduced from molar to molecular the battle became more intense. For when the Big Bertha had shot its bolt, that was the end of it. Whomever it hit was hurt, but after that the steel fragments of the shell lay on the ground harmless and inert. The men in the dugouts could hear the shells whistle overhead without alarm. But the poison gas could penetrate where the rifle ball could not. The malignant molecules seemed to search out their victims. They crept through the crevices of the subterranean shelters. They hunted for the pinholes in the face masks. They lay in wait for days in the trenches for the soldiers' return as a cat watches at the hole of a mouse. The cannon ball could be seen and heard. The poison gas was invisible and inaudible, and sometimes even the chemical sense which nature has given man for his protection, the sense of smell, failed to give warning of the approach of the foe.
The smaller the matter that man can deal with the more he can get out of it. So long as man was dependent for power upon wind and water his working capacity was very limited. But as soon as he passed over the border line from physics into chemistry and learned how to use the molecule, his efficiency in work and warfare was multiplied manifold. The molecular bombardment of the piston by steam or the gases of combustion runs his engines and propels his cars. The first man who wanted to kill another from a safe distance threw the stone by his arm's strength. David added to his arm the centrifugal force of a sling when he slew Goliath. The Romans improved on this by concentrating in a catapult the strength of a score of slaves and casting stone cannon balls to the top of the city wall. But finally man got closer to nature's secret and discovered that by loosing a swarm of gaseous molecules he could throw his projectile seventy-five miles and then by the same force burst it into flying fragments. There is no smaller projectile than the atom unless our belligerent chemists can find a way of using the electron stream of the cathode ray. But this so far has figured only in the pages of our scientific romancers and has not yet appeared on the battlefield. If, however, man could tap the reservoir of sub-atomic energy he need do no more work and would make no more war, for unlimited powers of construction and destruction would be at his command. The forces of the infinitesimal are infinite.
The reason why a gas is so active is because it is so egoistic. Psychologically interpreted, a gas consists of particles having the utmost aversion to one another. Each tries to get as far away from every other as it can. There is no cohesive force; no attractive impulse; nothing to draw them together except the all too feeble power of gravitation. The hotter they get the more they try to disperse and so the gas expands. The gas represents the extreme of individualism as steel represents the extreme of collectivism. The combination of the two works wonders. A hot gas in a steel cylinder is the most powerful agency known to man, and by means of it he accomplishes his greatest achievements in peace or war time.
The projectile is thrown from the gun by the expansive force of the gases released from the powder and when it reaches its destination it is blown to pieces by the same force. This is the end of it if it is a shell of the old-fashioned sort, for the gases of combustion mingle harmlessly with the air of which they are normal constituents. But if it is a poison gas shell each molecule as it is released goes off straight into the air with a speed twice that of the cannon ball and carries death with it. A man may be hit by a heavy piece of lead or iron and still survive, but an unweighable amount of lethal gas may be fatal to him.
Most of the novelties of the war were merely extensions of what was already known. To increase the caliber of a cannon from 38 to 42 centimeters or its range from 30 to 75 miles does indeed make necessary a decided change in tactics, but it is not comparable to the revolution effected by the introduction of new weapons of unprecedented power such as airplanes, submarines, tanks, high explosives or poison gas. If any army had been as well equipped with these in the beginning as all armies were at the end it might easily have won the war. That is to say, if the general staff of any of the powers had had the foresight and confidence to develop and practise these modes of warfare on a large scale in advance it would have been irresistible against an enemy unprepared to meet them. But no military genius appeared on either side with sufficient courage and imagination to work out such schemes in secret before trying them out on a small scale in the open. Consequently the enemy had fair warning and ample time to learn how to meet them and methods of defense developed concurrently with methods of attack. For instance, consider the motor fortresses to which Ludendorff ascribes his defeat. The British first sent out a few clumsy tanks against the German lines. Then they set about making a lot of stronger and livelier ones, but by the time these were ready the Germans had field guns to smash them and chain fences with concrete posts to stop them. On the other hand, if the Germans had followed up their advantage when they first set the cloud of chlorine floating over the battlefield of Ypres they might have won the war in the spring of 1915 instead of losing it in the fall of 1918. For the British were unprepared and unprotected against the silent death that swept down upon them on the 22nd of April, 1915. What happened then is best told by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle in his "History of the Great War."
From the base of the German trenches over a considerable length there appeared jets of whitish vapor, which gathered and swirled until they settled into a definite low cloud-bank, greenish-brown below and yellow above, where it reflected the rays of the sinking sun. This ominous bank of vapor, impelled by a northern breeze, drifted swiftly across the space which separated the two lines. The French troops, staring over the top of their parapet at this curious screen which ensured them a temporary relief from fire, were observed suddenly to throw up their hands, to clutch at their throats, and to fall to the ground in the agonies of asphyxiation. Many lay where they had fallen, while their comrades, absolutely helpless against this diabolical agency, rushed madly out of the mephitic mist and made for the rear, over-running the lines of trenches behind them. Many of them never halted until they had reached Ypres, while others rushed westwards and put the canal between themselves and the enemy. The Germans, meanwhile, advanced, and took possession of the successive lines of trenches, tenanted only by the dead garrisons, whose blackened faces, contorted figures, and lips fringed with the blood and foam from their bursting lungs, showed the agonies in which they had died. Some thousands of stupefied prisoners, eight batteries of French field-guns, and four British 4.7's, which had been placed in a wood behind the French position, were the trophies won by this disgraceful victory.
Under the shattering blow which they had received, a blow particularly demoralizing to African troops, with their fears of magic and the unknown, it was impossible to rally them effectually until the next day. It is to be remembered in explanation of this disorganization that it was the first experience of these poison tactics, and that the troops engaged received the gas in a very much more severe form than our own men on the right of Langemarck. For a time there was a gap five miles broad in the front of the position of the Allies, and there were many hours during which there was no substantial force between the Germans and Ypres. They wasted their time, however, in consolidating their ground, and the chance of a great coup passed forever. They had sold their souls as soldiers, but the Devil's price was a poor one. Had they had a corps of cavalry ready, and pushed them through the gap, it would have been the most dangerous moment of the war.
A deserter had come over from the German side a week before and told them that cylinders of poison gas had been laid in the front trenches, but no one believed him or paid any attention to his tale. War was then, in the Englishman's opinion, a gentleman's game, the royal sport, and poison was prohibited by the Hague rules. But the Germans were not playing the game according to the rules, so the British soldiers were strangled in their own trenches and fell easy victims to the advancing foe. Within half an hour after the gas was turned on 80 per cent. of the opposing troops were knocked out. The Canadians, with wet handkerchiefs over their faces, closed in to stop the gap, but if the Germans had been prepared for such success they could have cleared the way to the coast. But after such trials the Germans stopped the use of free chlorine and began the preparation of more poisonous gases. In some way that may not be revealed till the secret history of the war is published, the British Intelligence Department obtained a copy of the lecture notes of the instructions to the German staff giving details of the new system of gas warfare to be started in December. Among the compounds named was phosgene, a gas so lethal that one part in ten thousand of air may be fatal. The antidote for it is hexamethylene tetramine. This is not something the soldier—or anybody else—is accustomed to carry around with him, but the British having had a chance to cram up in advance on the stolen lecture notes were ready with gas helmets soaked in the reagent with the long name.
The Germans rejoiced when gas bombs took the place of bayonets because this was a field in which intelligence counted for more than brute force and in which therefore they expected to be supreme. As usual they were right in their major premise but wrong in their conclusion, owing to the egoism of their implicit minor premise. It does indeed give the advantage to skill and science, but the Germans were beaten at their own game, for by the end of the war the United States was able to turn out toxic gases at a rate of 200 tons a day, while the output of Germany or England was only about 30 tons. A gas plant was started at Edgewood, Maryland, in November, 1917. By March it was filling shell and before the war put a stop to its activities in the fall it was producing 1,300,000 pounds of chlorine, 1,000,000 pounds of chlorpicrin, 1,300,000 pounds of phosgene and 700,000 pounds of mustard gas a month.
Chlorine, the first gas used, is unpleasantly familiar to every one who has entered a chemical laboratory or who has smelled the breath of bleaching powder. It is a greenish-yellow gas made from common salt. The Germans employed it at Ypres by laying cylinders of the liquefied gas in the trenches, about a yard apart, and running a lead discharge pipe over the parapet. When the stop cocks are turned the gas streams out and since it is two and a half times as heavy as air it rolls over the ground like a noisome mist. It works best when the ground slopes gently down toward the enemy and when the wind blows in that direction at a rate between four and twelve miles an hour. But the wind, being strictly neutral, may change its direction without warning and then the gases turn back in their flight and attack their own side, something that rifle bullets have never been known to do.
© International Film Service
GERMANS STARTING A GAS ATTACK ON THE RUSSIAN LINES
Behind the cylinders from which the gas streams are seen three lines of German troops waiting to attack. The photograph was taken from above by a Russian airman
© Press Illustrating Service
FILLING THE CANNISTERS OF GAS MASKS WITH CHARCOAL MADE FROM FRUIT PITS IN LONG ISLAND CITY
Because free chlorine would not stay put and was dependent on the favor of the wind for its effect, it was later employed, not as an elemental gas, but in some volatile liquid that could be fired in a shell and so released at any particular point far back of the front trenches.
The most commonly used of these compounds was phosgene, which, as the reader can see by inspection of its formula, COCl2, consists of chlorine (Cl) combined with carbon monoxide (CO), the cause of deaths from illuminating gas. These two poisonous gases, chlorine and carbon monoxide, when mixed together, will not readily unite, but if a ray of sunlight falls upon the mixture they combine at once. For this reason John Davy, who discovered the compound over a hundred years ago, named it phosgene, that is, "produced by light." The same roots recur in hydrogen, so named because it is "produced from water," and phosphorus, because it is a "light-bearer."
In its modern manufacture the catalyzer or instigator of the combination is not sunlight but porous carbon. This is packed in iron boxes eight feet long, through which the mixture of the two gases was forced. Carbon monoxide may be made by burning coke with a supply of air insufficient for complete combustion, but in order to get the pure gas necessary for the phosgene common air was not used, but instead pure oxygen extracted from it by a liquid air plant.
Phosgene is a gas that may be condensed easily to a liquid by cooling it down to 46 degrees Fahrenheit. A mixture of three-quarters chlorine with one-quarter phosgene has been found most effective. By itself phosgene has an inoffensive odor somewhat like green corn and so may fail to arouse apprehension until a toxic concentration is reached. But even small doses have such an effect upon the heart action for days afterward that a slight exertion may prove fatal.
The compound manufactured in largest amount in America was chlorpicrin. This, like the others, is not so unfamiliar as it seems. As may be seen from its formula, CCl3NO2, it is formed by joining the nitric acid radical (NO2), found in all explosives, with the main part of chloroform (HCCl3). This is not quite so poisonous as phosgene, but it has the advantage that it causes nausea and vomiting. The soldier so affected is forced to take off his gas mask and then may fall victim to more toxic gases sent over simultaneously.
Chlorpicrin is a liquid and is commonly loaded in a shell or bomb with 20 per cent. of tin chloride, which produces dense white fumes that go through gas masks. It is made from picric acid (trinitrophenol), one of the best known of the high explosives, by treatment with chlorine. The chlorine is obtained, as it is in the household, from common bleaching powder, or "chloride of lime." This is mixed with water to form a cream in a steel still 18 feet high and 8 feet in diameter. A solution of calcium picrate, that is, the lime salt of picric acid, is pumped in and as the reaction begins the mixture heats up and the chlorpicrin distils over with the steam. When the distillate is condensed the chlorpicrin, being the heavier liquid, settles out under the layer of water and may be drawn off to fill the shell.
Much of what a student learns in the chemical laboratory he is apt to forget in later life if he does not follow it up. But there are two gases that he always remembers, chlorine and hydrogen sulfide. He is lucky if he has escaped being choked by the former or sickened by the latter. He can imagine what the effect would be if two offensive fumes could be combined without losing their offensive features. Now a combination something like this is the so-called mustard gas, which is not a gas and is not made from mustard. But it is easily gasified, and oil of mustard is about as near as Nature dare come to making such sinful stuff. It was first made by Guthrie, an Englishman, in 1860, and rediscovered by a German chemist, Victor Meyer, in 1886, but he found it so dangerous to work with that he abandoned the investigation. Nobody else cared to take it up, for nobody could see any use for it. So it remained in innocuous desuetude, a mere name in "Beilstein's Dictionary," together with the thousands of other organic compounds that have been invented and never utilized. But on July 12, 1917, the British holding the line at Ypres were besprinkled with this villainous substance. Its success was so great that the Germans henceforth made it their main reliance and soon the Allies followed suit. In one offensive of ten days the Germans are said to have used a million shells containing 2500 tons of mustard gas.
The making of so dangerous a compound on a large scale was one of the most difficult tasks set before the chemists of this and other countries, yet it was successfully solved. The raw materials are chlorine, alcohol and sulfur. The alcohol is passed with steam through a vertical iron tube filled with kaolin and heated. This converts the alcohol into a gas known as ethylene (C2H4). Passing a stream of chlorine gas into a tank of melted sulfur produces sulfur monochloride and this treated with the ethylene makes the "mustard." The final reaction was carried on at the Edgewood Arsenal in seven airtight tanks or "reactors," each having a capacity of 30,000 pounds. The ethylene gas being led into the tank and distributed through the liquid sulfur chloride by porous blocks or fine nozzles, the two chemicals combined to form what is officially named "di-chlor-di-ethyl-sulfide" (ClC2H4SC2H4Cl). This, however, is too big a mouthful, so even the chemists were glad to fall in with the commonalty and call it "mustard gas."
The effectiveness of "mustard" depends upon its persistence. It is a stable liquid, evaporating slowly and not easily decomposed. It lingers about trenches and dugouts and impregnates soil and cloth for days. Gas masks do not afford complete protection, for even if they are impenetrable they must be taken off some time and the gas lies in wait for that time. In some cases the masks were worn continuously for twelve hours after the attack, but when they were removed the soldiers were overpowered by the poison. A place may seem to be free from it but when the sun heats up the ground the liquid volatilizes and the vapor soaks through the clothing. As the men become warmed up by work their skin is blistered, especially under the armpits. The mustard acts like steam, producing burns that range from a mere reddening to serious ulcerations, always painful and incapacitating, but if treated promptly in the hospital rarely causing death or permanent scars. The gas attacks the eyes, throat, nose and lungs and may lead to bronchitis or pneumonia. It was found necessary at the front to put all the clothing of the soldiers into the sterilizing ovens every night to remove all traces of mustard. General Johnson and his staff in the 77th Division were poisoned in their dugouts because they tried to alleviate the discomfort of their camp cots by bedding taken from a neighboring village that had been shelled the day before.
Of the 925 cases requiring medical attention at the Edgewood Arsenal 674 were due to mustard. During the month of August 3-1/2 per cent. of the mustard plant force were sent to the hospital each day on the average. But the record of the Edgewood Arsenal is a striking demonstration of what can be done in the prevention of industrial accidents by the exercise of scientific prudence. In spite of the fact that from three to eleven thousand men were employed at the plant for the year 1918 and turned out some twenty thousand tons of the most poisonous gases known to man, there were only three fatalities and not a single case of blindness.
Besides the four toxic gases previously described, chlorine, phosgene, chlorpicrin and mustard, various other compounds have been and many others might be made. A list of those employed in the present war enumerates thirty, among them compounds of bromine, arsenic and cyanogen that may prove more formidable than any so far used. American chemists kept very mum during the war but occasionally one could not refrain from saying: "If the Kaiser knew what I know he would surrender unconditionally by telegraph." No doubt the science of chemical warfare is in its infancy and every foresighted power has concealed weapons of its own in reserve. One deadly compound, whose identity has not yet been disclosed, is known as "Lewisite," from Professor Lewis of Northwestern, who was manufacturing it at the rate of ten tons a day in the "Mouse Trap" stockade near Cleveland.
Throughout the history of warfare the art of defense has kept pace with the art of offense and the courage of man has never failed, no matter to what new danger he was exposed. As each new gas employed by the enemy was detected it became the business of our chemists to discover some method of absorbing or neutralizing it. Porous charcoal, best made from such dense wood as coconut shells, was packed in the respirator box together with layers of such chemicals as will catch the gases to be expected. Charcoal absorbs large quantities of any gas. Soda lime and potassium permanganate and nickel salts were among the neutralizers used.
The mask is fitted tightly about the face or over the head with rubber. The nostrils are kept closed with a clip so breathing must be done through the mouth and no air can be inhaled except that passing through the absorbent cylinder. Men within five miles of the front were required to wear the masks slung on their chests so they could be put on within six seconds. A well-made mask with a fresh box afforded almost complete immunity for a time and the soldiers learned within a few days to handle their masks adroitly. So the problem of defense against this new offensive was solved satisfactorily, while no such adequate protection against the older weapons of bayonet and shrapnel has yet been devised.
Then the problem of the offense was to catch the opponent with his mask off or to make him take it off. Here the lachrymators and the sternutators, the tear gases and the sneeze gases, came into play. Phenylcarbylamine chloride would make the bravest soldier weep on the battlefield with the abandonment of a Greek hero. Di-phenyl-chloro-arsine would set him sneezing. The Germans alternated these with diabolical ingenuity so as to catch us unawares. Some shells gave off voluminous smoke or a vile stench without doing much harm, but by the time our men got used to these and grew careless about their masks a few shells of some extremely poisonous gas were mixed with them.
The ideal gas for belligerent purposes would be odorless, colorless and invisible, toxic even when diluted by a million parts of air, not set on fire or exploded by the detonator of the shell, not decomposed by water, not readily absorbed, stable enough to stand storage for six months and capable of being manufactured by the thousands of tons. No one gas will serve all aims. For instance, phosgene being very volatile and quickly dissipated is thrown into trenches that are soon to be taken while mustard gas being very tenacious could not be employed in such a case for the trenches could not be occupied if they were captured.
The extensive use of poison gas in warfare by all the belligerents is a vindication of the American protest at the Hague Conference against its prohibition. At the First Conference of 1899 Captain Mahan argued very sensibly that gas shells were no worse than other projectiles and might indeed prove more merciful and that it was illogical to prohibit a weapon merely because of its novelty. The British delegates voted with the Americans in opposition to the clause "the contracting parties agree to abstain from the use of projectiles the sole object of which is the diffusion of asphyxiating or deleterious gases." But both Great Britain and Germany later agreed to the provision. The use of poison gas by Germany without warning was therefore an act of treachery and a violation of her pledge, but the United States has consistently refused to bind herself to any such restriction. The facts reported by General Amos A. Fries, in command of the overseas branch of the American Chemical Warfare Service, give ample support to the American contention at The Hague:
Out of 1000 gas casualties there are from 30 to 40 fatalities, while out of 1000 high explosive casualties the number of fatalities run from 200 to 250. While exact figures are as yet not available concerning the men permanently crippled or blinded by high explosives one has only to witness the debarkation of a shipload of troops to be convinced that the number is very large. On the other hand there is, so far as known at present, not a single case of permanent disability or blindness among our troops due to gas and this in face of the fact that the Germans used relatively large quantities of this material.
In the light of these facts the prejudice against the use of gas must gradually give way; for the statement made to the effect that its use is contrary to the principles of humanity will apply with far greater force to the use of high explosives. As a matter of fact, for certain purposes toxic gas is an ideal agent. For example, it is difficult to imagine any agent more effective or more humane that may be used to render an opposing battery ineffective or to protect retreating troops.
Captain Mahan's argument at The Hague against the proposed prohibition of poison gas is so cogent and well expressed that it has been quoted in treatises on international law ever since. These reasons were, briefly:
1. That no shell emitting such gases is as yet in practical use or has undergone adequate experiment; consequently, a vote taken now would be taken in ignorance of the facts as to whether the results would be of a decisive character or whether injury in excess of that necessary to attain the end of warfare—the immediate disabling of the enemy—would be inflicted.
2. That the reproach of cruelty and perfidy, addressed against these supposed shells, was equally uttered formerly against firearms and torpedoes, both of which are now employed without scruple. Until we know the effects of such asphyxiating shells, there was no saying whether they would be more or less merciful than missiles now permitted. That it was illogical, and not demonstrably humane, to be tender about asphyxiating men with gas, when all are prepared to admit that it was allowable to blow the bottom out of an ironclad at midnight, throwing four or five hundred into the sea, to be choked by water, with scarcely the remotest chance of escape.
As Captain Mahan says, the same objection has been raised at the introduction of each new weapon of war, even though it proved to be no more cruel than the old. The modern rifle ball, swift and small and sterilized by heat, does not make so bad a wound as the ancient sword and spear, but we all remember how gunpowder was regarded by the dandies of Hotspur's time:
And it was great pity, so it was,
This villainous saltpeter should be digg'd
Out of the bowels of the harmless earth
Which many a good tall fellow had destroy'd
So cowardly; and but for these vile guns
He would himself have been a soldier.
The real reason for the instinctive aversion manifested against any new arm or mode of attack is that it reveals to us the intrinsic horror of war. We naturally revolt against premeditated homicide, but we have become so accustomed to the sword and latterly to the rifle that they do not shock us as they ought when we think of what they are made for. The Constitution of the United States prohibits the infliction of "cruel and unusual punishments." The two adjectives were apparently used almost synonymously, as though any "unusual" punishment were necessarily "cruel," and so indeed it strikes us. But our ingenious lawyers were able to persuade the courts that electrocution, though unknown to the Fathers and undeniably "unusual," was not unconstitutional. Dumdum bullets are rightfully ruled out because they inflict frightful and often incurable wounds, and the aim of humane warfare is to disable the enemy, not permanently to injure him.
From "America's Munitions"
THE CHLORPICRIN PLANT AT THE EDGEWOOD ARSENAL
From these stills, filled with a mixture of bleaching powder, lime, and picric acid, the poisonous gas, chlorpicrin, distills off. This plant produced 31 tons in one day
Courtesy of the Metal and Thermit Corporation, N.Y.
REPAIRING THE BROKEN STERN POST OF THE U.S.S. NORTHERN PACIFIC, THE BIGGEST MARINE WELD IN THE WORLD
On the right the fractured stern post is shown. On the left it is being mended by means of thermit. Two crucibles each containing 700 pounds of the thermit mixture are seen on the sides of the vessel. From the bottom of these the melted steel flowed down to fill the fracture]
In spite of the opposition of the American and British delegates the First Hague Conference adopted the clause, "The contracting powers agree to abstain from the use of projectiles the [sole] object of which is the diffusion of asphyxiating or deleterious gases." The word "sole" (unique) which appears in the original French text of The Hague convention is left out of the official English translation. This is a strange omission considering that the French and British defended their use of explosives which diffuse asphyxiating and deleterious gases on the ground that this was not the "sole" purpose of the bombs but merely an accidental effect of the nitric powder used.
The Hague Congress of 1907 placed in its rules for war: "It is expressly forbidden to employ poisons or poisonous weapons." But such attempts to rule out new and more effective means of warfare are likely to prove futile in any serious conflict and the restriction gives the advantage to the most unscrupulous side. We Americans, if ever we give our assent to such an agreement, would of course keep it, but our enemy—whoever he may be in the future—will be, as he always has been, utterly without principle and will not hesitate to employ any weapon against us. Besides, as the Germans held, chemical warfare favors the army that is most intelligent, resourceful and disciplined and the nation that stands highest in science and industry. This advantage, let us hope, will be on our side.