Gas Training for Officers

Gas Training for Officers. Wearing masks, officers enter gassed area. Specialist training, Camp Beale, California. 

Unit training of combat commands in gas defense, as distinguished from individual training, stressed collective protection. The field phase of this training was intended to test the ability of the unit to meet gas situations according to the tactical employment of the arm. The overall standard set by the War Department contemplated opposing effectively any enemy employing chemical weapons, As head of a special staff section of the War Department, the Chief, CWS, was concerned with 

Compared to the amount of organization and effort involved in defensive training, that devoted to offensive chemical warfare was relatively limited. Policy in this field was frequently reviewed by the War Department General Staff. Standard procedure was that chemical weapons developed for the U.S. Army should be produced with a view to employment by one or more of the combatant branches (that is, by Infantry, Field Artillery, Air Corps, etc.). For such materiel, the CWS was in theory a producer and supplier only. But the Chemical Warfare Service was never content merely to purvey. It took the view that the stocks of smoke, incendiary, and gas munitions were specialties, the merits of which might be overlooked if not adequately utilized. Hence an important function of CWS officers detailed to the faculties of special service schools and the Command and General Staff School was to further the introduction of chemical warfare situations into instructional problems and at the same time assist in the development of doctrine covering the employment of chemical munitions by the several combat arms. The Chief, CWS, selected instructors for assignment to those schools with the utmost care. 

Not all chemical weapons were suited to employment by one of the older arms. Such weapons constituted the armament of special gas troops and the technique of their employment was taught at the Chemical Warfare School. 

The Chemical Warfare School at Edgewood Arsenal was, before the war, the most important single training agency of the CWS. It was in effect the fountainhead of chemical warfare training for the Army and its teachings were closely followed in the Navy and Marine Corps. It was also to some extent a laboratory for the development of chemical warfare tactics and techniques. 

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