Shells, chemical enemy

By January Haber had a weapon ready to show the Army. Instead of filling the chemical into shells, he proposed to discharge it from cylinders. The chemical he chose was chlorine, a powerful asphyxiating gas which could be easily stored in the cylinders in liquid form on contact with the air it evaporated into a low-hanging cloud which, with a favourable wind, could be carried into the heart of the enemy s positions. In addition, there were large stocks of chlorine to hand. Even before the war, the IG was producing forty tons per day British production was less than a tenth of this. 

During the Crimean War, there were several proposals to initiate chemical warfare to assist the Allies, particularly to solve the stalemate during the siege of Sevastopol. In 1854, Lyon Playfair, a British chemist, proposed a cacodyl cyanide artillery shell for use primarily against enemy ships. The British Ordnance Department rejected the proposal as bad a mode of warfare as poisoning the wells of the enemy. 4(p22) Playfair s response outlined a different concept, which was used to justify chemical warfare into the next century ... 

Haber thought a chemical gas cloud would negate the enemy s earthworks without the use of high explosives. In addition, gas released directly from its storage cylinder would cover a far broader area than that dispersed from artillery shells. Haber selected chlorine for the gas since it was abundant in the German dye industry and would have no prolonged influence over the terrain. 

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