Radiological, biological, chemical. Sarin, chlorine, mustard gas. The terms seem familiar enough, usually accompanied with a story of some Middle Eastern dictator using it on his own people.
Chemical warfare was first used in strategic mass quantities in World War I by the Germans against the French in the Belgian town of Ypres. Resulting in over 5,000 deaths. War in any capacity is horrid, but the use of chemical weapons is a tortuous, agonizing death. The survivors carried on with debilitating side effects in their shortened lives. By the end of the first World War the death count by chemical weapons reached 91,000 — 10% of total deaths.
Recognizing the depravity of these weapons, the major powers — countries like the US, UK, France, Italy and Japan — agreed after the war to prohibit the “Use in War of Asphyxiating, Poisonous or other Gases, and of Bacteriological Methods of Warfare” during the 1925 Geneva Protocol.
Even after prohibiting the use of these weapons, the signatories continued to research, stockpile, and use chemical weapons. In speaking about controlling Iraqi and Kurdish uprisings Winston Churchill said:
“I do not understand this squeamishness about the use of gas… I am strongly in favor of using poisoned gas against uncivilized tribes.”
The argument was made — from a prominent military commander standpoint at the time — that stockpiling and studying these weapons was a necessary defense tactic in case an enemy decided to unleash chemical warfare first. However, this line of logic is circular, and only encourages other powers to justify the continued stockpile of chemical weapons in the future. Normalizing this logic perpetuates the exact problem that needs to be ended.
The 1925 Geneva Protocol had the right intentions, but lacked any real prohibition powers. They say “the road to Hell is lined with good intentions,” and the effects of these weapons are just that, Hell.
The Cold War era saw a major increase in stockpile of not only nuclear weapons by the United States and Soviet Union, but also of chemical weapons by over 25 different countries, including China, India, Iran, Israel, Libya and Egypt.
Fast forward to 1980 — over fifty years after the Geneva Protocol — and the real effects of chemical warfare were on display for the world to see in the nearly decade-long Iraq and Iran War. The Iraqi forces used multiple forms of chemical weapons, specifically nerve agents and mustard gas.
These terms are often heard, but rarely understood.
Nerve agents are extremely lethal compounds that disrupt basic nerve function, leading to loss of motor skills, convulsions, defecation, asphyxiation and death. Sarin is the most common nerve agent used, as well as a lesser known, Tabun. However, sarin is twice as deadly as Tabun. These weapons can be used in conjunction with artillery shells for spreading or via aerosol delivery in extremely effective manners.
Mustard gas, on the other hand, is actually a sulfur based toxin that is dispersed in a fine mist that moves in a cloud like form. The term “mustard” is derived from the pungent, mustard-garlic odor of the gas. Effects include skin and eye irritation, blisters, second degree burns, lifelong illnesses, to death.
Official estimates range from 50,000 to 100,000 deaths of Iranian soldiers and civilians from the combination of the aforementioned chemical weapons. The secondary effects felt by survivors, such as chronic bronchitis, pulmonary fibrosis and a litany of cancers, are much more difficult to measure but certainly higher and more wide ranging than the official estimates.
In the horrifying aftermath of the Iraq and Iran War, people are quick to blame the horrid tactics on the constant violence of the populations in the Middle East. But evidence released in 2009 has revealed how the Reagan administration not only allowed, but assisted in Saddam Hussein’s chemical attacks on Iran.
Rick Francona, who’s resume includes rising to Air Force Colonel, spent time at the CIA, NSA and DIA (Defense Intelligence Agency) in roles ranging from lead Arabic interpreter to an advisor to high ranking generals. Francona revealed to military focused media outlet Foreign Policy, evidence and accounts of the CIA and the Reagan regime’s assistance to Iraq with the knowledge that they would use chemical weapons.
Clearly the United States knew — as far back as 1984 — that the Iraqis had been producing and using chemical weapons. The following documents were declassified between 2007 and 2009 when they were quietly put into the National Archive. They went unreported on until 2013.
The document below demonstrates the obvious knowledge of the depravity of these weapons but also how Iraq could use it in offensive and defensive capacities.
The foreknowledge of the use of sarin and mustard gas displays the United State’s passive endorsement of such heinous tactics.
That passive role soon morphed into an active role.
In 1987, US satellite imagery showed concentrations of Iranian troops on the Fao Peninsula. When this intelligence was shown to President Reagan in an intel brief, he, according to Francona, wrote to the US Secretary of Defense Frank C. Carlucci, saying “An Iranian victory is unacceptable.”
The US military from that point supported Saddam’s chemical attacks with “targeting packages” of Iranian troop positions and movements. Francona visited the aftermath of the Fao Peninsula attack and collected syringes with remnants of atropine. Atropine was used by the Iraqi military to counteract the effects of their own sarin gas on themselves, showing clear evidence of sarin gas use.
The Iraqi military did not target just Iranians. The Kurdish region in Northern Iraq was also victim to the devastation of chemical attacks. In the closing weeks of the war the deadliest chemical attack was cemented into history, aptly named Bloody Friday.
The horrific manner in which these weapons display their effects coupled with the complete lack of discrimination for it’s victims has shown the utter barbarism of war that humans are capable of. These injustices were so blatant that the world came together to try to end it.
In 1992, a negotiated framework for the elimination and inspection of chemical weapons was agreed to in Geneva. The Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) has been agreed to by 189 countries comprising 98% of the world population. For context, Egypt, North Korea and South Sudan have not signed onto the agreement at all. Israel has signed the agreement but has yet to ratify it.
From the CWC came the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW)
Like 98% of the population, I also endorse the stated aim and framework originally set by the OPCW. Below is an excerpt from their outline:
“The Convention aims to eliminate an entire category of weapons of mass destruction by prohibiting the development, production, acquisition, stockpiling, retention, transfer or use of chemical weapons by States Parties. States Parties, in turn, must take the steps necessary to enforce that prohibition in respect of persons (natural or legal) within their jurisdiction.
All States Parties have agreed to chemically disarm by destroying any stockpiles of chemical weapons they may hold and any facilities which produced them, as well as any chemical weapons they abandoned on the territory of other States Parties in the past. States Parties have also agreed to create a verification regime for certain toxic chemicals and their precursors (listed in Schedules 1, 2 and 3 in the Annex on Chemicals) in order to ensure that such chemicals are only used for purposes not prohibited under the Convention.
A unique feature of the Convention is its incorporation of the ‘challenge inspection’, whereby any State Party in doubt about another State Party’s compliance can request a surprise inspection. Under the Convention’s ‘challenge inspection’ procedure, States Parties have committed themselves to the principle of ‘any time, anywhere’ inspections with no right of refusal.”
But as it too often happens, the centralization of power and oversight into an institution has been taken advantage of by corrupt, powerful actors.
OPCW Douma Reports
The Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons has been the latest group to have compromising information revealed by Wikileaks. The OPCW in their mission statement says their aim is “..to achieve a world permanently free of chemical weapons and to contribute to international security and stability..” However, in the 2018 chemical attack in Douma, Syria — where chlorine gas attacks were said to have been unleashed on civilians — Wikileaks reveals the OPCW engaging in destruction of evidence and legitimizing a staged attack in order to implicate the Syrian government.
Chlorine weapons are water soluble, targeting the eyes and lungs specifically with effects ranging from irritation to vomiting to lung inflammation — and at higher concentrations — death.
The following excerpt is from Wikileaks’ analysis of the event.
(Note: Wikileaks analysis in italics, OPCW communications in bold, my commentary in standard font)
One of the documents is an e-mail exchange dated 27 and 28 February between members of the fact finding mission (FFM) deployed to Douma and the senior officials of the OPCW. It includes an e-mail from Sebastien Braha, Chief of Cabinet at the OPCW, where he instructs that an engineering report from Ian Henderson should be removed from the secure registry of the organisation:
“Please get this document out of DRA [Documents Registry Archive]… And please remove all traces, if any, of its delivery/storage/whatever in DRA”.
The main finding of Henderson, who inspected the sites in Douma and two cylinders that were found on the site of the alleged attack, was that they were more likely manually placed there than dropped from a plane or helicopter from considerable heights. His findings were omitted from the official final OPCW report on the Douma incident.
As the Chief Cabinet of the OPCW, Sebastian Braha attempted to push the investigation to a preconceived conclusion instead of going where the facts led them. Further communications reveal his attemt to purge any evidence that did not fit the chosen narrative.
The following picture is from the alleged chemical attack in Douma where Henderson pointed out the inconsistency in wreckage caused by the gas containers being said to of been dropped from helicopters.
Another leaked document contains the commentary of an internal investigation that displays the OPCW’s awareness that their public conclusion is at odds with the truth.
“With respect to the consistency of the observed and reported symptoms of the alleged victims with possible exposure to chlorine gas or similar, the experts were conclusive in their statements that there was no correlation between symptoms and chlorine exposure”.
The OPCW team members wrote that the key “take-away message” from the meeting was:
“the symptoms observed were inconsistent with exposure to chlorine and no other obvious candidate chemical causing the symptoms could be identified”.
The OPCW’s publicly released report omitted any evidence that dismissed use of chlorine, while endorsing the narrative of its role in the attack. Below is an excerpt from their public findings.
“Regarding the alleged use of toxic chemicals as a weapon in Douma, the evaluation and analysis of all the above-referenced information gathered by the FFM provide reasonable grounds that the use of a toxic chemical as a weapon has taken place on 7 April 2018. This toxic chemical contained reactive chlorine. The toxic chemical was likely molecular chlorine.” OPCW 1 March 2019
The OPCW’s “reasonable grounds” are anything but grounded in reason.
“likely one or more chemicals that contain a reactive chlorine atom. Such chemicals could include… the major ingredient of household chlorine-based bleach. Purposely singling out chlorine gas as one of the possibilities is disingenuous.”
This is said to overstate the case. According to the e-mail:
“They were, in most cases, present only in parts per billion range, as low as 1–2 ppb, which is essentially trace quantities.”
Based on the OPCW’s conclusion, one could surmise that there is ample evidence of a chlorine gas attack in your laundry room. Not to mention the “reasonable grounds” for large scale chemical attacks in your local laundromat.
Damning evidence continues to come to light on this blatant coverup.
The evidence of a subsequent cover up has been recently reported on by Aaron Mate of The Grayzone:
“OPCW Director General Fernando Arias has claimed that the first inspector, South African chemical engineering and ballistics expert Ian Henderson, “was not a member” of the Douma investigative team and only played a “minor supporting role.”
However, contemporaneous communications from the OPCW’s Douma Fact-Finding Mission (FFM) directly contradict Arias. They show that Henderson was indeed a Douma team member, and that OPCW leadership directed him to lead its most critical inspections. They also show that Arias, rather than acknowledge that Henderson was an FFM member, offered up a false explanation for why Henderson was in Syria at the time of the probe.” https://thegrayzone.com/2020/05/06/opcw-douma-whistleblower/
Mate’s full story and accompanying documents can be seen by following the link.
Each level of the OPCW’s Douma investigation has been littered with deception and attempted cover ups. They clearly are able to be used as a tool of Western military powers to manufacture a narrative to justify military action and regime change.
The move to attack civilians with chemical weapons did not make any strategic sense at the time. Syrian forces were making major advances across rebel and ISIS controlled areas and the path to victory for Assad was clear. The sentiment of Western military forces to exit the country was gaining real momentum. A chemical attack on civilians provided the ideal pretext to keep occupying forces there.
I can only imagine why the Western powers needed an excuse to stay in the country.
It is beyond concerning when the authoritative organization of such an important geopolitical issue can be corrupted. The OPCW didn’t just cover up corruption — they were able to meticulously craft a counter narrative, that was parroted by the mainstream media and resulted in approximately $83 million worth of Tomahawk missiles being unconstitutionally used to attack a Syrian air base.
The following clip is Brian Williams of MSNBC, who for a decade was the most watched man in news. He infamously lied on air multiple times about being shot down in a helicopter while reporting in the Middle East, but that doesn’t disqualify him in the eyes of mainstream media. Note the fetishization of weapons of war being launched unconstitutionally based on a corrupt investigation. I couldn’t script a better display of the current state of affairs.
UNCONFIRMED SOURCES have said that when Brian Williams forgets to refill his Viagra prescription his wife just turns on a highlight tape of war crimes.
Psst, I’m the unconfirmed source.
One would expect there to be pushback from the “anti-war” left or from the “constitutional” right, but if there is one thing the two major parties that control our government can agree on it is perpetual war in the Middle East.
The whores at the major media outlets echoed the beat of our politicians’ war drums in unison.
An assessment of major newspaper editorials by FAIR (Fairness & Accuracy in Reporting) showed out of 47 outlets who ran editorials, 39 favored the strike, 7 were ambiguous and only one — the Houston Chronicle — opposed. It’s noteworthy that the Houston Chronicle’s decision was based on constitutional limits, not moral or investigative grounds.
The following clip of CNN’s Fareed Zakaria one day after the Syrian missile strike shows the media’s endorsement of such acts:
I have to agree with Zakaria here — you aren’t truly President until you unconstitutionally attack a country in the Middle East based on lies.
