Naval War College Review Volume 54 Article 17 Number 3 Summer

2001 Chemical-Biological Defense: U.S. Military Policies andDecisions in the Gulf War, Pietro D. Marghella

Follow this and additional works at: https://digital-commons.usnwc.edu/nwc-review

Recommended Citation Marghella, Pietro D. (2001) "Chemical-Biological Defense: U.S. Military Policies andDecisions in the Gulf War,," Naval War College Review: Vol. 54 : No. 3 , Article 17. Available at: https://digital-commons.usnwc.edu/nwc-review/vol54/iss3/17

This Book Review is brought to you for free and open access by the Journals at U.S. Naval War College Digital Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Naval War College Review by an authorized editor of U.S. Naval War College Digital Commons. For more information, please contact [email protected]. 172 NAVALMarghella: WAR COLLEGE Chemical-Biological REVIEW Defense: U.S. Military Policies andDecisions

Comparative analysis should instead gen- go-to-war effort on behalf of the U.S. eralize, with rigor, about similarities and armed forces. The consistent premise differences with respect to common phe- throughout this work is that no one in nomena. This book is, however, a valu- the Department of Defense (with the ex- able addition to the complex body of ception of the Army’s Chemical Corps) literature on strategy, national security, was even remotely prepared for an en- and comparative political and military counter with chemical or biological dynamics. agents as it readied for war with Iraq. Convinced at the onset of Operation K. A. BEYOGHLOW Marine Corps Command and Staff College DESERT SHIELD that Saddam Hussein would indeed use WMD against U.S. and coalition forces, the Pentagon began what Mauroni describes as a “mad scramble” to train and equip U.S. forces

Mauroni, Albert J. Chemical-Biological Defense: to operate in the presence of WMD U.S. Military Policies and Decisions in the Gulf War. agents. He reviews the preparation to de- Westport, Conn.: Praeger, 1998. 226pp. $59.95 fend against exposure to these agents, and assesses U.S. efforts to protect its Although we lived with the dangerous forces against a highly lethal asymmetri- specter of nuclear attack for more than cal threat. In addition, Mauroni devotes a fifty years during the Cold War, concerns chapter to the issue of “Gulf War illness,” about the proliferation of weapons of providing a fairly meticulous and forth- mass destruction (WMD) have virtually right discussion of this controversial sub- exploded into our consciousness in the ject. He concludes with substantive past decade. Since the demise of the for- recommendations on where the future mer Soviet Union—once referred to as focus of U.S. efforts to deal with the bur- our “malefactor partner in the concept of geoning threat of chemical and biological mutually assured destruction”—our fears agents should lie. At a minimum, seem to focus far less on the threat of nu- Mauroni’s work at dissecting the policies clear holocaust, and more on the threat and decisions of the Gulf War is impor- of attack by chemical or biological tant if only as a lesson that the United agents. The logical point of departure for States must never again be so fundamen- this shift in focus seems to be the Persian tally ill prepared to operate in the asym- Gulf War, when the world learned of a metrical environment. rogue nation seemingly bent on prolifer- ating these weapons of mass terror. There are criticisms to be made of this book, however. At the surface level, In this book, Albert J. Mauroni attempts Mauroni uses far too many acronyms for a historical recounting of U.S. efforts to the book to be easily decipherable for the deal with chemical and biological warfare non-Army (and especially nonmilitary) agents on the modern battlefield. Mauroni, reader. Although he includes a list of a former U.S. Army Chemical Corps officer abbreviations at the beginning to assist who currently works as a management with the veritable “acronym soup” of ab- consultant specializing in Department of breviations, it becomes confusing and Defense chemical and biological defense tiresome to refer back constantly to a programs, provides a detailed look at what was essentially a “cold start”

Published by U.S. Naval War College Digital Commons, 2001 1 Naval War College Review, Vol. 54 [2001], No. 3, Art. 17 BOOK REVIEWS 173

glossary to understand what one is of WMD agents, and certainly contradic- reading. tory to U.S. efforts at counter-proliferation Additionally, Mauroni’s use of the term throughout the Department of Defense. “chemical-biological” can lead one who Although we have taken steps to deal is uneducated in the specific characteristics with the possibility of chemical exposures of chemical and biological agents to be- among our operational forces (which lieve that there is no readily discernable should be construed as tactical events in difference between the two types of the scope and scale of their effects), call- WMD agents. In reality, there is nothing ing a biological agent a “weapon of mass farther from the truth. Chemical and bio- disruption” ignores its potential for stra- logical agents are so different in their tegic impact. The World Health Organi- properties and potential effects on the zation (which currently offers the most human physiology that discussions about widely accepted casualty estimates for bi- countering or mitigating their effects ological agents) predicts that the United should remain separate. By consistently States could incur more than 250,000 ca- lumping them together, Mauroni gives sualties in a targeted population of the reader the impression that the mea- 500,000 from only fifty kilograms of sures taken for defense and consequence weaponized anthrax; such an event could management against chemical-agent ex- hardly be usefully characterized as a posure will be essentially the same as “disruption.” those for coping with a biological threat. There are other places where the reader Of greater concern, however, are state- may take exception to Mauroni’s state- ments made by the author in the first ments—most notably, his comment in chapter. He describes his purpose in chapter 3 that in 1990 the “official U.S. writing the book: “Only if CB weapons policy was to reduce the likelihood of en- were used on civilians and population emy chemical weapons use by threaten- centers would they truly be ‘weapons of ing retaliation with similar munitions.” mass destruction.’ On the military battle- The United States never considered the field, these weapons, shorn of the ridicu- use of chemical weapons in the Gulf War, lous air of menace given to them by since it had long before decided not to politicians and the media, are merely an- use chemical weapons as retaliation in other tactical-operational factor like en- kind. The author’s footnote in chapter 4 emy air attacks or unforeseen terrorist regarding the requirement for a company attacks; military forces can and do take of bakers to augment a medical unit is steps to minimize the effects of chemi- flatly derogatory to the medical profes- cal-biological contamination. If a military sionals who did so much to ensure that force invests a small amount of time and health-protection measures were in place funds in planning, defensive equipment during the Gulf War. His claim that the and training, the immediate threat of medics were ill trained and ill prepared mass casualties is avoided, and chemi- to deal with contaminated casualties cal-biological weapons become merely since “these practical issues had never ‘weapons of mass disruption’ [his italics] surfaced in the minds of the medical instead of destruction.” community” is patently false. Several hundred volumes published since the I find these comments both naïve and First World War deal with the medical dangerously out of touch with the reality https://digital-commons.usnwc.edu/nwc-review/vol54/iss3/17 2 174 NAVALMarghella: WAR COLLEGE Chemical-Biological REVIEW Defense: U.S. Military Policies andDecisions

handling of chemically contaminated American military planning and casualties. operations. The fifteen chapters provide In the end, this work comes off as not a useful review of the dangers and oppor- much more than a “hoo ah” for the Army tunities that information technology Chemical Corps, who are billed as having presents to U.S. military forces. While redeemed the Department of Defense’s originally intended for the Air Force, the collective ineptitude with respect to work should interest a wider professional chemical or biological attack. While audience, especially because it includes a Mauroni does offer an accurate overall broad spectrum of views, ranging from accounting of the Army Chemical techno-optimists to info-war pessimists. Corps’s efforts to deal with the asymmet- The editors are well regarded authorities: rical threat of chemical and biological Zalmay Khalilzad is a former assistant agents on the battlefield, he gives little deputy under secretary of defense for more than a passing nod to the overall ef- policy planning, and John White is a for- forts of the other services and their col- mer deputy secretary of defense. Many of lective attempts to counter or mitigate the articles were written by well-known this omnipresent threat. Readers familiar writers on strategy and information war- with the subject of WMD should be cau- fare, and the foreword is by Andrew W. tioned that there is much with which to Marshall, Director of Net Assessment, find exception in this work. Readers un- Office of the Secretary of Defense; he is familiar with the subject should be care- considered by many to be among the ful not to conclude that the capabilities foremost thinkers in the U.S. government of the Department of Defense are so uni- on future threats and strategies. formly one-sided. However, roughly half the articles cover

PIETRO D. MARGHELLA ground familiar to anyone who has been Lieutenant Commander following the discussion in recent years Medical Service Corps, U.S. Navy about the importance of information in warfare and the dangers of computer warfare. These chapters might be useful, for example, to someone looking for a re- view of the various ways computer hack- Khalilzad, Zalmay M., and John P. White, eds. ers can disrupt military operations. But The Changing Role of Information in Warfare. Santa because so much has been written on this Monica, Calif.: RAND, 1999. 452pp. $25 constantly changing topic, the more tech- Is there need for yet another book on the nical chapters do not cover much new role of the military in the information territory and are already slightly outdated. age? To judge by this volume, a collection The chapter on information-age terrorism, of essays published under RAND’s Project for instance, warns that future terrorist Air Force, the answer is yes—but this may attacks may take the form of “cybotage” be twice the book we need. In this case, aimed at information infrastructure. This more than enough is not necessarily better. may be true, although it hardly is a new The Changing Role of Information in War- idea; moreover, so far in the information fare is part of RAND’s Strategic Appraisal age, old-fashioned terrorism remains domi- series, and it primarily addresses the ef- nant, as the attack on the USS Cole re- fects of information technology on minded us.

Published by U.S. Naval War College Digital Commons, 2001 3