Arms control history

The entry into force of the 1993 CWC on 29 April 1997 was unique in the history of arms control. This agreement both banned an entire class of weapons and simultaneously addressed chemical proliferation concerns. It was not, however, the attention to non-proliferation that made the Convention unique, rather that the CWC incorporated an elaborate international system for verification of compliance.1... 

Harms van den Berg, The Fatal Fallout from El A1 Flight 1862, Jerusalem Report (21 December 1998), pp. 16-21. For a comprehensive review of Israel s chemical and biological weapons programme, see Avner Cohen, Israel and Chemical/Biological Weapons History, Deterrence and Arms Control, The Non-Proliferation Review, Fall-Winter (2001), pp. 27-53. 

Cohen, Avner, Israel and Chemical and Biological Weapons History, Deterrence and Arms Control, Non-Proliferation Review (Fall-Winter 2001). 

Traditionally, chemical weapons arms control had been dealt with together with the control of what today we call biological weapons. That reflected the close association of these two types of weaponry in history... 

Cohen, A. (2001). Israel and chemical/biological weapons History, deterrence, and arms control. The Nonproliferation Review, 8(3), 31. 

Hylton AR. The History of Chemical Warfare Plants and Facilities in the United States. US Arms Control and Disarmament Agency Midwest Research Institute 1972 4 59-75. ACDA/ST-197. 

Unusually in the history of multilateral arms control, the 1899 Hague Convention had anticipated the brutal impact of chemical weapons before it came to be experienced. It was an uncommon instance of diplomats and lawyers successfully defining inhumane weapons, and seeking to prevent them from being used, before they had actually made their debut on the scale that they did. 

More than two decades since it was concluded, the Chanical Weapons Convention ranains the most comprehensive disarmament and non-proliferation treaty in the history of multilateral arms control. 

Trevor N. Dupuy and Gay M. Hammerman (eds.), A Documentary History of Arms Control and Disarmament (New York R. Bowker, 1973), 95. 

Convention on the Prohibition of the Development, Production, and Stockpiling of Bacteriological (Biological) and Toxin Weapons and on Their Destruction in US ACDA, Arms Control and Disarmament Agreements Texts and History of Negotiations (Washington DC, 1977), pp. 117-20. 

Arms Control and Disarmament Agency, Arms Control and Disarmament Agreements, Texts and History of Agreements, Washington DC, 1977. 

Susmel, E. and D. (eds.). Opera Omnia di Benito Mussolini. Florence, 1951-U.S. Arms Control and Disarmament Agency. Arms Control and Disarmament Agreements. Texts and History of Negotiations. Washington D.C., 1977. 

Underlying these issues is the crucial historical context which has done so much to shape perceptions about CBW. The first part of this book is therefore concerned with the history of chemical warfare up to the present day. The second part discusses contemporary problems - the threat, modernisation of the US CW capability and arms control. My primary concern is with chemical rather than biological weapons, but because of the close relationship between the two -despite their many differences - the subject of BW is also touched upon. The remainder of this chapter attempts to provide some basic but essential definitions and facts about CBW. This material is included here in the first chapter because it is fundamental to a proper analysis of the subject and an appreciation of the issues. 

The history of CBW provides no easy answers. The subject remains confused, the evidence contradictory. Decisions involving arms control are rarely easy, but they still have to be taken, making the best sense possible out of the contradictions which can arise between public demands, moral concerns, economic and political imperatives and the requirements of national security. 

Healey, Time of My Life, pp. 193-4, 198-9, 224-48, 252 Broadbent, Military and Government, p. 30. Broadbent was Healey s private secretary. For the development of the Ministry of Defence, see Peter Nailor, The Ministry of Defence, 1959-70 , in P. Smith (ed.). Government and the Armed Forces, pp. 9-248, and Adrian Smith, Command and control in postwar Britain defence decision-making in the United Kingdom, 1945—1984 , Twentieth Century British History, 2 (1991), 291-327. 

Boyle refocused the study of chemistry in two important ways. First, he shifted attention away from questions surrounding the source and history of a material to its identity and purity. Second, he redirected the interest in desired byproducts to an examination of the chemical reaction itself In doing this, Boyle promoted the use of chemical identity tests and a control arm in an experiment. Among the measures of identity and purity were color, specific gravity, crystal shape, flame tests, solubifity, precipitates, and reaction to standardized reagents. In these ways, Boyle helped frame the important questions for succeeding chemists until the seminal work of Antoine-Laurent Lavoisier, see also Alchemy. 

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