10/10/2023 0 Comments 1915 german gas maskFoulkes, the former British Director of Gas Services (1917–18), insisted that gas had “changed the whole character of warfare.” Gas, he observed, had seriously affected German morale during the last months of 1918, contributing “to the Allied victory”: it was of “increasing” importance towards the end of the war, and “might have played a decisive part in 1919” (Foulkes 1936, 334, 336, 345). Fries, an American engineer, who became Chief of the Chemical Warfare Service, described gas as “one of the most powerful means of offense with which the American troops had to contend” (Fries and West 1921, 386). Auld, a former Chemical Advisor, British Third Army, argued that “the use of poisonous and irritating gases is as fundamental as the introduction of gunpowder, and probably even more so,” and he extolled the effects of mustard gas during the last year of the war (Auld 1922, 58, 66). Only at the end of the war were several British and American gas officers able to comment on the impact of chemical warfare. Nevertheless, when they retaliated in kind, a reaction described “as just and necessary” (Brown 1968, 15), they did so without analyzing its effectiveness. The allies, eying the response in neutral United States (Peterson 1939, 63 Read 1941, 195–199), denounced the first use of chlorine gas as “an atrocious method of warfare” which would “fill all races with a new horror of the German name” ( The Times, April 29, 1915). It is a struggle for the initiative” (Lefebure 1921, 109–110).Īssessing the significance of this struggle has produced a wide array of judgments. The gas war, argued Major Victor Lefebure, became “one of continual attempts on both sides to achieve surprise and to counter it by some accurate forecast in protective methods. Like the British, they enhanced their methods of gas protection, and dispersed gas by various means, including cylinders, mortars, projectors, and gas shells. Although the French and Germans had used irritant agents before April 22 (Trumpener 1975, 461–465), they later employed lethal agents such as chlorine, phosgene, and, above all, mustard gas as the primary instruments of gas warfare. 5 and 6), the gas war expanded prodigiously as the main belligerents introduced new and more potent gases and sought to deliver them more efficiently. After the first major use of chlorine gas by German forces, when they dispersed chlorine from 5,730 cylinders along a 6-km front at Ypres on Ap(McWilliams and Steel 1985, Chaps. The onset of chemical warfare in the First World War produced not only major scientific, industrial, and military challenges to the principal belligerents but also a legacy that has been fiercely debated.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |