Meselson, Professor Matthew

Julian Perry Robinson, Seth Cams and Professor Matthew Meselson were equally reassuring. Perry Robinson asserted that elements of the media and the Pentagon had overestimated the significance of Iraq s chemical stockpile. He maintained that its primary value was psychological, that the casualty effects of nerve gas would be blunted by its volatility in hot desert conditions, and that the Iraqi stockpile was far too small to be employed effectively over the potential size of battlefield. He also suspected that Iraq s air power - the most potent means of delivery -would not last long in a battle with coalition air forces, and that the SCUD missiles would prove too inaccurate to attack air bases systematically. Meselson affirmed that the Iraqi chemical attacks were never any more than marginally effective against forces with anti-chemical protective... 

In subsequent Congressional testimony Professor Deutch was even more emphatic the evidence is quite overwhelming, he argued, about their capability and their intent to use CW in a NATO war . Professor Matthew Meselson, in reviewing the Defense Science Board s report, questioned this fundamental assumption. Although he agreed that We know a considerable amount about Soviet antichemical protective posture. It is pervasive and well exercised. This,... 

Matthew S. Meselson, Ph.D., is Thomas Dudley Cabot Professor of the Natural Sciences, Department of Molecular and Cellular Biology, Harvard University. Dr. Meselson is a member of the NAS Committee on International Security and Arms Control and the Working Group on Biological Weapons Control. He served on the NAE Committee on Alternative Chemical Demilitarization Technologies and the Advisory Panel on the Chemical Research, Development and Engineering Center. Dr. Meselson is a member of both lOM and NAS. 

MATTHEW S. MESELSON, Thomas Dudley Cabot Professor of the Natural Sciences, Department of Molecular and Cellular Biology, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts... 

---