The First World War

through the misty panes and thick green light. 

British Expeditionary Force (BEF) assumed it must land in France within days of war being declared for it to be effective. These plans show the extent to which strategists committed themselves to the view that standing on the defensive would lead to destruction. These strategic calculations, however, proved to be ill-founded and the end of 1914 locked the armies on the Western Front in a deadly, static form of trench warfare and about to experience the nightmare intensification of the industrialised battlefield. 

Considered uncivilised prior to the First World War, it could be argued that the development and use of chemical warfare was necessitated by the requirements of wartime armies to find new ways of overcoming the stalemate of unexpected trench warfare.5 Old gases such as chlorine were used, and newer gases such as mustard were developed, and successfully used, as a terror weapon meant to instil confusion and panic amongst the enemy prior to an offensive. 

The beginning of the development of chemical weapons during the First World War was haphazard. The impetus came from chemists who had become aware of the noxious effects of certain chemicals in their laboratories, and who felt that these efforts could be exploited to assist national war efforts. Certainly from 1914 onwards, attempts were being made in several academic laboratories throughout Europe to convert 

To find a more effective means of employing gas on the battlefield, the German High Command turned to Professor Fritz Haber, the world-famous chemist who had developed a crucial process for extracting nitrates from the atmosphere (Nitrogen Fixation). This process was used 

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Historically, the outbreak of the first World War provided a stimulus for the industrial preparation of large amounts of synthetic phenol, which was needed as a raw material to manufacture the explosive picric acid (2,4,6-trinitrophenol). Today, more than 2 million tons of phenol is manufactured each year in the United States for use in such products as Bakelite resin and adhesives for binding plywood. 

After his doctoral graduation, Helferich became Emil Fischer s personal assistant for two years, and, from 1913 onwards, a teaching assistant. Together with Fischer, he published a series of papers on glycoside synthesis during this period. His scientific career was then interrupted by the First World War, in which he served as an officer throughout. 

The catalyst was reformulated by Alwin Mittasch, who synthesized some 2500 different catalysts and performed more than 6500 tests. They arrived at a triply promoted catalyst consisting of a fused iron catalyst, with AI2O3 and CaO as structural promoters and potassium as an electronic promoter. The process was first commercialized by BASF, with the first plant located in Oppau in Germany producing 30 tons per day in 1913. The plant initially produced ammonium sulfate fertilizer, but when the First World War broke out it was redesigned to produce nitrates for ammunition. The plant was expanded and in 1915 it produced the equivalent of 230 tons ammonium per day. 

The use of plant extracts for insect control dates into antiquity the use of Paris green as an insecticide for control of the Colorado potato beetle in 1867 probably marks the beginning of the modern era of chemical control of injurious insects. The development of lead arsenate followed later in the nineteenth century for gypsy moth control. The commercial production of nicotine insecticides, the production of calcium arsenate at the time of the first world war, and the use of fluorine, arsenical, and cyanide compounds, as well as other inorganic chemicals for insect control, were important steps in pest control. These chemicals were applied largely by dilute high pressure sprays or dusts. 

She shakes her head. I kind of can t imagine it. I mean, you see all the stuff on the TV, and movies. Probably more than they— you—ever saw then. But it s... in the streets you know. People you know. Some of the older ones where I work, they ve got amazing memories, even when they ve no idea what day it is. There s one old lady did nursing in the First World War, in the trenches and stuff. We had a hundredth birthday party for her not so long ago, and she s all there. Remember that series on the TV— Testament of Youth7. She says they got it all wrong. ... 

Ludwig Fritz Haber. The Poisonous Cloud Chemical Warfare in the First World War. Oxford Clarendon Press, 1986. An authoritative history of chemical warfare by Fritz and Charlotte Haber s son. Source for Ypres Haber s responsibility for poison gas his authoritarianism during World War I and failure of poison gas as weapon. 

Since bacterial cellulose from all suitable carbohydrate substrates i8 identical with natural cellulose, its industrial importance20 is obvious. Relatively large amounts of bacterial cellulose were produced in Germany during the first World War. More recently products similar to parchment, mercerized cotton, cellulose nitrate,21 acetate14 and viscose rayons have been produced from bacterial cellulose. 

The First World War interrupted his brilliant ascent as a scientist. He served as lieutenant in the field artillery, in France and on the Russian front. In 1917, he was called by Fritz Haber to the Kaiser-Wilhelm In-stitut in Berlin-Dahlem, as associate professor to work on problems of chemical warfare. He formed a lasting friendship with Haber. His stay in Berlin-Dahlem was also of personal importance, for there he met his wife. 

In international law, as in domestic law, criminal liability requires two essential elements — action and state-of-mind. This court is being called upon to enforce the doctrine of international penal law — bom centuries ago, accepted by all major nations after the first World War, and first judicially applied by the International Military Tribunal — that the deliberate planning and waging of aggressive war is a crime. 

The I.G. was a great factor in German commercial pohcy. A statesman once coined the words, "Without the I.G. and without coal, I can have no foreign pohcy." We were always concerned with a mutual exchange of experiences and aims.. . . Since the first World War I beheved that in international science and understanding lay the solution to the economic illnesses of Europe and Asia. 

A. 1 cannot judge the thought processes of the general staff I can speak only as a layman. Perhaps the general staff intended to rely on pure defense in the West, similar to that of the first World War, and to have mobile warfare in the East — a different type of defense. 

A. The statesman was Stresemann, no doubt the most competent foreign minister we had in Germany after the first World War. Perhaps his statement was just a politeness to Farben.. . . Stresemann was certainly thinking about economic policy. 

The early practical application of antioxidants was connected with the development of rubber production. The rubber is easily oxidized in air, and the first antioxidants were empirically found and used to stabilize it [1]. Empirical search for antioxidants was performed by Moureu and Dufresse [2] during the First World War. These researchers successfully solved the problem of acrolein stabilization by the addition of hydroquinone. They explained the retarding action of the antioxidant in the scope of peroxide conception of Bach and Engler (see Chapter 1). They proposed that the antioxidant rapidly reacts with the formed hypothetical moloxide and in such a way prevents the autoxidation of the substrate. 

Haber, Ludwig Fritz. The Poisonous Cloud Chemical Warfare in the First World War. Oxford Clarendon Press, 1986. 

It has been commonly understood that the carnage and tragedy of the First World War and the economic crises that followed it steered Soddy into economics (Merricks 1996, 108). Other notable public figures, such as Ezra Pound, followed a similar path for like reasons—though Pound s political sympathies moved him into fascism, while Soddy remained on the Left. As we shall see, however, Soddy s alchemical interests helped him connect chemistry to monetary theory. He would eventually cast that relationship as both moral and scientific. 

While Soddy wrote his major economic and monetary pamphlets and books after the First World War, his alchemical musings on the nature of the elements invariably led him to consider the role of gold in the world economy before the War and before his involvement with the monetary reformers. In 1912, long before he had struck up a friendship with Arthur Kitson, Soddy... 

But if we accept that plutonium is chemically toxic, then we must also recognize that the extent of its toxicity will depend on how the plutonium is bonded chemically, i.e. in what redox and chemical form it is present. As an example, note how soldiers were poisoned with chlorine gas during the First World War (when it was called Mustard Gas), but chloride in table salt is vital for life. Some plutonium compounds are more toxic than others. 

The Barberini Collection comprises 24 various scientific instruments, supposedly put together by the Barberini family in Florence - particularly Maffeo Barberino (1568 1644), later Pope Urban VIII, and more particularly Cardinal Francesco Barberino (1597-1679). Unfortunately, only one piece of this magnificent collection can be definitely traced back to Francesco Barberino -a large concave burning mirror. The first complete list of the collection dates only to the First World War, and it was purchased by Michel and Landau of Paris in the 1930s, and some of it was exhibited at the Descartes Exhibition at the Bibliotheque Nationale in Paris in 1936. The complete collection was finally purchased by the National Maritime Museum in 1949 (Shaw, 1973). 

During the first World War, the Corn Products Refining Company attempted to improve the methods of manufacturing dextrose to obtain a pure product at low cost. A process was developed in 1918 by Porst which produced chemically pure dextrose but cost of production was still high. 

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