History $24.95 JOEL A. VILENSKY is Professor of A riveting history of America’s World War I In 1919, when the Great War was over, the Anatomy and Cell Biology at Indiana project to develop a deadly chemical weapon. VILENSKY New York Times reported on a new chemi- University School of Medicine. He has cal weapon with “the fragrance of geranium blossoms,” a poison gas that was “the climax taught Medical Gross Anatomy at its Fort “Dr. Vilensky raises important concerns regarding the threats Wayne campus for the past twenty- ve of this country’s achievements in the lethal posed by lewisite and other weapons of mass destruction. As he Dew of years. His interest in the history of lewis- Dew of arts.” e name of this substance was lew- describes, non-proliferation programs are a vital component in isite and this is its story—the story of an ite stems from research on the history of the War on Terror. I am pleased that the Nunn-Lugar program American weapon of mass destruction. Wilson’s disease, which was rst successfully is working tirelessly around the world, to ensure that lewisite Discovered by accident by a graduate treated using British Anti-Lewisite in 1951. and other weapons of mass destruction do not fall into the student and priest in a chemistry labora- hands of terrorists.” tory at American University, lewisite was —Richard G. Lugar, United States Senator developed into a weapon by Winford Lewis, who became its namesake. A er a powerful “Vilensky has written a fascinating history of lewisite, one of the Death German counterattack in the spring of 1918, earliest chemicals ever designed for weapons of mass destruc- the government began frantic production of tion. He gives us a unique glimpse of the American World War I lewisite in hopes of delivering 3,000 tons of experience, while describing the threat of lewisite to the natural the stuff to be ready for use in Europe the environment and post-9/11 security. Exhaustively researched, The Story of following year. e end of the war came just Dew of Death also shows how lewisite can be connected to the as the rst shipment was being prepared. It development of synthetic rubber and even the atomic bomb.” was dumped into the sea, but not forgotten. —Eric Croddy, author of Chemical and Biological Warfare Death Lewisite, Joel A. Vilensky tells the intriguing story of the discovery and development of “Joel Vilensky’s book . is a detailed and immensely useful this weapon and its curious history. During account of the development and history of one of the major America’s World War II, the United States produced chemical weapons. [W]e will always know how to make lew- more than 20,000 tons of lewisite, testing isite, the ‘Dew of Death,’ but that does not mean that we should it on soldiers and secretly dropping it from be compelled to accept such weapons in our lives.” World War I airplanes. In the end, the substance was —from the foreword by Richard Butler, former head of abandoned as a weapon because it was too United Nations Special Commission to Disarm Iraq unstable under most combat conditions. But Weapon a weapon once discovered never disappears. It was used by Japan in Manchuria and by of Mass Iraq in its war with Iran. e Soviet Union was once a major manufacturer. Strangely INDIANA enough, although it was developed for lethal Destruction purposes, lewisite led to an eff ective treat- University Press ment for a rare neurological disease. Bloomington & Indianapolis Vilensky recounts these stories with de- tail and skill. Dew of Death makes fascinat- ing reading for anyone concerned about the http://iupress.indiana.edu 1-800-842-6796 JOEL A. VILENSKY terrifying uses of technology in warfare. With the assistance of Pandy R. Sinish INDIANA Foreword by Richard Butler Jacket illustration courtesy National Museum of Health and Medicine, Washington, D.C. Dew of Death JOEL A. VILENSKY With the assistance of Pandy R. Sinish Foreword by Richard Butler Dew of Death The Story of Lewisite, America’s World War I Weapon of Mass Destruction indiana university press Bloomington and Indianapolis This book is a publication of Indiana University Press 601 North Morton Street Bloomington, IN 47404-3797 USA http://iupress.indiana.edu Telephone orders 800-842-6796 Fax orders 812-855-7931 Orders by e-mail [email protected] © 2005 by Joel A. Vilensky All rights reserved No part of this book may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. The Association of American University Presses’ Resolution on Permissions constitutes the only exception to this prohibition. The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI Z39.48-1984. Manufactured in the United States of America Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Vilensky, Joel A., date- Dew of death : the story of lewisite, America’s World War I weapon of mass destruction / Joel A. Vilensky ; with the assistance of Pandy R. Sinish; foreword by Richard Butler. p.cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-253-34612-6 (cloth : alk. paper) 1. Lewisite (Poison gas)—History. 2. Organoarsenic compounds—Toxicology. I. Sinish, Pandy R. II. Title. UG447.5.L48V35 2005 358′.3482—dc22 2005001678 1 2 3 4 5 10 09 08 07 06 05 This book is dedicated to my father, Abe Vilensky, who is always there when I need him. Grandma smelled geranium, Started feeling kind of bum. Sure you guessed the trouble, right— Grandma whiffed some Lewisite. From How to Tell the Gases, by Major Fairfax Downey, United States Field Artillery Branch Contents Foreword by Richard Butler ix Acknowledgments xv Introduction xix 1. 1878: Two Stars Are Born 1 2. The Poisonous Yellow Cloud and the American Response 13 3. The Hunt for a New King 19 4. The American University Experimental Station 29 5. Willoughby: The Chemical Warfare Service’s Ace in the Hole 37 6. The Inter-War Years 56 7. Military Biology and BAL 73 8. World War II: The Gas War That Never Happened 86 9. Lewisite Production, Use, and Sea Dumping after World War II 108 10. Lewisite Stockpiles and Terrestrial Residues 118 11. Human and Environmental Toxicology 143 12. Lewisite, Terrorism, and the Future 154 Appendix 1. Lewisite’s Chemical and Physical Properties 161 Appendix 2. Lewisite Production 163 Appendix 3. Lewisite Degradation 165 Notes 167 Bibliography 188 Index 210 Foreword A little more than a century ago, international law was made seeking to prevent the use of “asphyxiating gases” in warfare. Less than twenty years later those weapons—chemical weapons—were used during the First World War. That use, ¤rst by the Germans but later by the Allies, broke interna- tional law. More dramatically, it appalled people throughout the world. The stories of the choking, blistering, pain, and convulsions suffered by victims were heard with horror. So the community of nations went back to the legal drawing board and made further law—the 1925 Geneva Convention. This Convention sought to strengthen the prohibition on any use of chemi- cal weapons. Whereas it is dif¤cult to de¤ne very precisely what constitutes a weapon of mass destruction, chemical weapons have been seen as such for the past one hundred years, and they are unique in the extent to which they have attracted international consensus that they should be outlawed. But chemical weapons have also had a seductive history. Simultaneously with efforts to outlaw them, they have repeatedly been the subject of re- search, manufacture, weaponization, deployment, and use. The story of lewisite encapsulates the key elements of the history of chemical weapons and their continuing seductive power. That power, at its simplest, has been the notion that rather than suffer the rigors and losses of direct combat, an army could vanquish adversaries by spraying them with substances from the air or blowing a cloud of poison in their direc- tion. From the First World War to the present time, in countries and situa- tions across the globe, attempts have been made to produce the droplets or gases that would grant this power. Throughout this period, lewisite has al- ways been involved. The fantasy of chemical weapons has never approached reality. From the beginning there have always been problems of use and safe disposal of chemical agents. This book records the repeated instances of injury and accident associated with lewisite use, and the decisions taken against using lewisite, partly because there was uncertainty whether its use would also, in fact, harm the user. In addition to such complications, ethical and legal issues needed to be addressed. As is typical in arguments about war, there were always those voices advocating that any means that would help our side win were justi- ¤able. Early in the history of lewisite, arguments were advanced to the ef- fect that it was actually a humane weapon. Death or injury from a good dose of lewisite was presumed to be less agonizing than that from bullets and bayonets. There were, of course, also arguments that any weapon that brought a war to its end sooner rather than later should be viewed as bene- ¤cial and admissible. In this context, Winford Lee Lewis argued that knowl- edge of the planned use of lewisite by the Allies was an important factor promoting Germany’s sudden agreement to an armistice. Joel Vilensky’s book, Dew of Death, is a detailed and immensely useful account of the development and history of one of the major chemical weapons of our time.