Geneva Gas Protocol

The United States does not recognize riot control agents as chemical warfare agents as defined in the Geneva Convention of 1925. The Geneva Gas Protocol of 1925 was ratified by the United States on 22 January 1975. At that time, the United States interpreted the protocol as prohibiting the first use of lethal chemicals, but not of nonlethal ones such as riot control agents or herbicides. 

The Secretary of State was among the first to raise a question as to the U.S. attitude toward gas warfare in World War II. In January 1942, Secretary of State Cordell Hull queried Secretary of War Stimson on the advisability of a unilateral declaration by the United States of its intention to observe the terms of the 1925 Geneva Gas Protocol prohibiting the use in war of poisonous gases. ... 

WRI Greenhouse Gas Protocol, World Business Council for Sustainable Development, Geneva and World Resources Institute, Washington, DC, USA, 2011. 

Precaution became an increasing national concern. The Italian use of mustard gas was a further harbinger of concerns that steadily increased, not least because Italy was a signatory to the Geneva Protocol. 

The United States had never ratified the Geneva Protocol, but nevertheless, President Roosevelt considered poison gas a barbarous weapon. Indeed, he had no intention, unlike his British counterpart, of authorising its use, much to the disappointment of the American Chemical Warfare Service. The American chemical weapons programme only thrived because of the fear of Japanese chemical warfare efforts indeed, American newspapers often printed reports of Japanese use of chemical warfare against the Chinese. Despite his reservations, Roosevelt issued a... 

The ban on the use of chemical weapons, as codified in the 1925 Geneva Protocol, was considered to constitute international law, applicable to all states. Yugoslavia had ratified the protocol and at no time indicated any desire to repudiate its treaty obligations. In earlier years certain countries, including the United States which used massive quantities of tear gas in the Vietnam War, maintained the protocol did not ban the use of riot control agents. However, incapacitating agents, like BZ, were not included in this apparent exception. 

During the Vietnam War, the United States used nonlethal riot control gas in tactical situations, claiming that these harassing types of agents do not qualify as war gases prohibited by the Geneva protocols. 

Clearly the threat of chemical warfare is still very real, and research continues into defensive technology such as nerve gas vaccines and chemical sensors. The Chemical Weapons Convention came into effect in 1997 and it has taken the Geneva Protocol... 

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