In my previous life as a freelance writer, back in the 80's and early 90's, I did a lot of magazine articles on chemical weapons, particularly about the "binary nerve gas" controversy during the Reagan Administration, and the proliferation of chemical weapons in the 1980's to countries like Syria, Libya, Iraq, Thailand, and others. I had a couple sources in the Pentagon and in disarmament groups like SIPRI. I started work on a book manuscript on the subject, but in 1993, when the Chemical Weapons Convention was signed, interest in chemical weapons plummeted, and I never finished it. I stored it on a floppy disk and left it in a drawer.
Well, today, given the renewed interest in chemical weapons, I decided to look for it, and found it. So I spent the day today reading through it, doing some research to update the parts that need updating, and preparing it to be published.
So what I am going to do is post the entire rough draft manuscript here, in a series of diaries. I hope it will provide some useful background info on CBW that people can keep in mind when reading about the situation in Syria. I'd appreciate any feedback from folks, especially about parts that might not be clear or are hard to understand. Don't be shy--this is just a rough draft, and none of it is chiseled in stone.
Previous parts of manuscript here:
Introduction
http://www.dailykos.com/...
One: The History of CBW
http://www.dailykos.com/...
Two: The Debate Over Binary Chemical Weapons
http://www.dailykos.com/...
Three: Genetic Engineering and CBW
http://www.dailykos.com/...
(c) copyright 2013 by Lenny Flank. All rights reserved.
FOUR
CBW Proliferation
The United States was not the only nation to expand its chemical warfare capabilities during the 1980’s. The renewal of chemical weapons production in the US was dwarfed by an enormous expansion of chemical weapons proliferation in the Third World and an apparent increasing willingness to use them. The number of nations with a known or suspected chemical weapons stockpile exploded in the 80’s to at least twenty, including Iraq, Iran, Libya, Egypt, Syria, Israel, Pakistan, North and South Korea, Vietnam, South Africa, Taiwan, Thailand, and Burma. At least ten nations, including Iraq and Cuba, were known or suspected of working to develop prohibited biological weapons during the 80’s.
By the 1990’s, the end of the Cold War and the fading likelihood of large-scale conventional warfare in Europe, combined with the 1993 Chemical Weapons Convention outlawing the production of chemical weapons, raised hopes that CBW would at last be effectively banned. Nearly all nations have joined the Chemical Weapons Convention, and have destroyed their chemical arsenals. A handful, however, including a few with known or suspected chemical weapons capabilities, have not.
In the 1980’s, however, accusations of the use of chemical or biological weapons came from nearly every continent. In most cases, these accusations were unsubstantiated and were clearly made for purposes of political propaganda. In others, however, the charges appeared to have had more substance, and in some instances independent investigators were able to confirm the use of chemical weapons.
By far, the volatile Middle East was the scene of the most rapid expansion of the CBW arms race. There is not a city anywhere in the Middle East which was not within range of the weapons of some actual or suspected chemically-armed opponent.
Undoubtedly, the largest CBW arsenal of any Third World nation was built by Iraq. Before the 1991 First Gulf War (“Desert Storm”), Iraqi President Saddam Hussein built up a stockpile of several hundred tons of chemical agents, deployed in artillery shells and, it was believed, in modified SCUD-B ballistic missiles. At five suspected CBW research centers, the Iraqis had modified ordinary pesticide-production equipment, which had been legally purchased in Europe, to produce Tabun and Sarin nerve gases. The main Iraqi chemical center at Samarra was built with equipment provided by the Karl Korb AG company, and had an output estimated at 720 tons of mustard and 96 tons of nerve gas a year. Hussein, who had never ratified the 1972 Biological Weapons Convention, had also admitted carrying out “basic research” into biological warfare, and a BW center was built at Salman Pak. A number of SCUD missiles were widely assumed to have been fitted with warheads carrying anthrax and botulin toxin.
Iraq used chemical weapons extensively during its eight year war with Iran; over 175 separate attacks were documented by UN teams and foreign observers. UN teams also confirmed the use of chemical weapons against Kurdish guerrillas and civilians, who had supported Iran in the war. Iraqi troops delivered mustard and nerve gases using artillery shells, aerial bombs and Soviet-built SCALEBOARD tactical missiles. Unconfirmed reports also claimed that Iraqi troops used anthrax weapons in combat against the Iranians.
After the end of the Iran-Iraq War, Saddam Hussein continued to build up his CBW arsenal as a counter to Israeli and Syrian capabilities. In 1990, Hussein, claiming to have a supply of binary weapons, bluntly threatened to use them in retaliation for any Israeli use of nuclear or chemical weapons. Hussein also reportedly moved chemical weapons into occupied Kuwait to be used against the US-dominated coalition forces, but no chemical-armed missiles were fired and no chemical weapons were found in Kuwait.
In the brief but violent Desert Storm war, Iraqi chemical production and storage facilities were early victims of a massive air attack. The war virtually eliminated all of Iraq’s CBW capabilities and much of its military power. As part of the cease-fire agreement, Iraq was forced to eliminate all of its CBW research equipment. Investigators found some 1,000 tons of chemical agent being stored in occupied areas of Iraq, including a small number of crude binary chemical artillery shells. These were not “binary weapons” in the ordinary sense—they consisted of artillery shells that were half-filled with diflour, and, immediately prior to use, had an amount of isopropyl alcohol added, initiating a reaction that formed Sarin. The shell was then fired. The method was never workable, and seems to have been an attempt to combat the short shelf life of Iraqi nerve gas, which contained a lot of impurities (due to the poor manufacturing process) and degraded rather quickly.
Iraq also admitted it had produced a number of biological warfare munitions, but said it had destroyed them all by 1991. A UN report noted:
“Iraq further admitted that biological warfare agents had also been produced at two other civilian facilities, the foot-and-mouth disease vaccine plant at Al Dawrah and Al Fudaliyah. Iraq also declared that it had weaponized bulk agent but had unilaterally destroyed all bulk agents and biological weapons in 1991. The weapons included 25 special warheads for Al Hussein missiles and 157 R-400 aerial bombs, filled with biological warfare agents. With respect to weaponization, Iraq declared that warheads for Al Hussein missiles and R-400 aerial bombs had been filled with liquid biological warfare agents. Iraq also provided information on other types of aerial and artillery munitions used in field trials with biological warfare agents or simulants. . . In 1997, three bombs filled with liquid and chemically inactivated botulinum toxin were unearthed from the destruction site declared by Iraq and sampled. In addition, in 2003, bombs filled with chemically inactivated Bacillus anthracis in liquid form were also excavated and sampled.”
After the US invasion of Iraq in 2003 and the downfall of the Saddam Hussein regime, the new government of Iraq ratified the Chemical Weapons Convention and began the destruction of its remaining chemical weapons capabilities.
Iraq’s earlier opponent, Iran, also admitted that it possessed chemical weapons, and was accused of using them in its war with Iraq. Iran used technology and equipment from West Europe and China to build chemical plants capable of producing amounts of mustard and nerve gases, and was also believed to have an active BW program. Iran was thought to maintain a stockpile of chemical artillery shells, and the Iranian supply of SCUD-B missiles were suspected of having been fitted with CBW warheads. Iran ratified the Chemical Weapons Convention in 1997, and there are no indications that it currently has a chemical weapons capability.
Moammar Qadafi’s Libya was also suspected of building up a chemical weapons capability throughout the 80’s. In 1983, Libyan troops reportedly used chemical weapons during the brief border war with Chad, and in 1987, when the conflict flared up again, Libyan MiGs were accused of using aerial spray tanks to dump chemicals on the village of Aozou. Reports indicated that these chemicals had been obtained from Iran in exchange for a supply of Soviet-made anti-tank mines.
To obtain its own CBW capability, Libya began constructing a chemical factory at Rabtah, using equipment and technicians from five West German companies, including the industrial giants Imhausen-Chemis, Siemans and Salzgitter AG, a subsidiary of the huge SIG firm. Although the German companies later claimed that they thought they were helping to build a pharmaceuticals plant, they took elaborate steps to “launder” the equipment through intermediaries in Asia in order to hide the final destination and avoid export controls.
When the Rabtah plant first became operational in September 1988, international pressure forced the Libyans to close it down after a few test runs. When it reopened two years later, several nations, including Israel and the US, threatened to take military steps to insure that the plant would never begin full-scale production. On March 14, 1990, satellite surveillance indicated that a fire had broken out and crippled the plant. Later, however, intelligence analysts concluded that the fire may have been a hoax to attempt to fool international authorities, and that the plant was once again preparing for production. During test runs, the Rabtah plant produced an estimated 30 tons of mustard and a smaller amount of nerve gas. Libya soon began construction of a second chemical weapons plant at Tarhunah. In 2004, however, Libya began a policy of rapprochement with the West, ratified the Chemical Weapons Convention, and began destroying its chemical weapons capabilities and its remaining 11 tons of mustard gas.
The earliest country to introduce chemical weapons into the Middle East was Egypt. During the Yemen civil war in the early 1960’s, Egyptian troops used Soviet-supplied Soman and VR-55 to intervene on the behalf of leftist Republican rebels. After the downfall of Egyptian President Gamel Abdul Nasser, the Egyptian chemical program was allowed to languish, but was resurrected again in the 1980’s as a counter-force to Israeli nuclear and chemical weapons. The chemical plant at Abu Zaabal, said by the Egyptians to be a pharmaceutical factory, was suspected by many analysts of producing chemical agents. Egypt has not signed the Chemical Weapons Convention. Since the 1980’s, Egypt has received defensive chemical weapons equipment and training from the US (gas masks and detection devices), but it remains unclear whether Egypt still maintains a significant stockpile of chemical agents.
Syria has also apparently possessed a chemical stockpile for some time. After its disastrous defeat in the 1973 Yom Kippur War, Syria received a number of chemical munitions from the Soviet Union, Egypt, and Czechoslovakia. In the 1980’s, Syrian President Hafez Assad began to develop his own CBW capability using pesticide-production technology purchased from Europe. Since 1986, Syria has reportedly built up a stockpile of chemical artillery shells and medium-range SCUD-B ballistic missiles which can potentially be loaded with mustard and nerve agents. There have been some indications that the Syrian nerve gas contains impurities that degrade it over time, and that Syria, like Iraq, may store its ingredients separately in a crude “binary” configuration, and mix them just prior to use.
Damascus has never signed the Chemical Weapons Convention, though it did sign the 1925 Geneva Protocols outlawing the use of chemical weapons. In 2013, President Bashar Assad reportedly used Sarin nerve gas against rebels seeking to overthrow his regime. Earlier, the rebels were themselves accused of using nerve gas in combat.
Although Israel has never admitted possessing a chemical weapons stockpile, it was generally believed to possess a number of chemical artillery rounds, ballistic missiles, and aerial bombs. Unconfirmed reports accused Israel of using chemical weapons during the 1982 invasion of Lebanon. In the 1980’s, Israeli troops in the Occupied Territories did use large amounts of CS tear gas for controlling the Palestinian intifadah, and at least one fatality, a 70-year old Palestinian woman, was attributed to the use of tear gas. In March 1983, unsubstantiated reports accused the Israelis of using “war gases” in an incident involving a number of Palestinian schoolchildren. Israel has signed, but not yet ratified, the Chemical Weapons Convention. It is not known if its chemical stockpile has already been destroyed.
In Europe, the NATO alliance downplayed chemical weapons during the Cold War and was never very enthusiastic about them. West Germany objected to having any chemical weapons on its soil. France and the UK, on the other hand, manufactured their own chemical weapons.
The nation of Serbia, which carried out a genocidal war in Bosnia during the early 1990’s, is the only European nation suspected of developing the capability to produce Sarin nerve gas, which it had inherited from the former Yugoslavia. In 1993, there were reports that Muslim groups in Lebanon had stolen a number of chemical aerial bombs (presumably Syrian) and shipped them to Croatia. There are no indications, however, that any chemical weapons were used during the ethnic wars in the former Yugoslavia.
The jungles of Southeast Asia have also served as a reported chemical battleground on several occasions. Vietnam was suspected of having an arsenal of chemical artillery shells and rockets, and was accused of using them over a period of several years. In the late 1970’s, the US accused Soviet-supplied Vietnamese troops of using “yellow rain” bio-toxins on several occasions. In the 1979 border war with China, Vietnamese forces reportedly dropped large amounts of chemicals on Chinese troops. Between 1978 and 1985, Vietnam was accused of using a variety of “poisonous chemicals” and “choking gases” against Khmer Rouge and other Cambodian guerrillas. In February 1985, Thailand accused the Vietnamese of firing chemical rockets against targets in Cambodia near the Thai border. Thai officials reported that four rockets crossed the border and landed in Thailand. The rockets reportedly contained phosgene and hydrogen cyanide.
Thailand was itself suspected of maintaining a supply of chemical-filled 205mm artillery rounds. In February 1982, Vietnam accused the Thais of firing chemical shells over the border into Cambodia to aid rebels fighting near the military base at Phnom Melai.
In 1986, Shan separatist guerrillas accused Burma of using chemical defoliants and of killing several guerrillas with lethal chemicals. In 1984, the Philippine Army was accused of using chemical weapons in combat by guerrillas of the Moro National Liberation Front. In the same year, East Timor guerrillas accused the Indonesian Army of using chemicals against them.
Throughout the 80’s, China maintained a large supply of chemical artillery shells and medium-range ballistic missiles, most of which were deployed against Russian forces along the border. During the 1979 border war with Vietnam, Vietnamese forces accused the Chinese of dropping chemical weapons on them.
Taiwan, on the other hand, was believed to have a small stockpile of Sarin artillery shells for use in the event of a Chinese invasion. Because of its disputed political status, the UN has not allowed Taiwan to officially sign the Biological Weapons Convention or the Chemical Weapons Convention, but Taipei has announced that it will follow the terms of the treaties anyway, and has declared that any chemical weapons research it does is entirely defensive in nature.
Both North and South Korea are strongly suspected of having stockpiled chemical artillery shells and short-range missiles in the 80’s, to be potentially used in the event of another Korean War. In 1997, South Korea signed the Chemical Weapons Convention and began destroying its chemical arsenal. North Korea has not signed the Chemical Weapons Convention, and is assumed to still retain a significant chemical arsenal.
Japan does not possess any chemical weapons or production facilities, but in 2010, Tokyo accepted responsibility for a stockpile of mustard gas that had been abandoned by Japanese forces in China during the Second World War, and began their destruction.
In addition to its successful nuclear weapons efforts in the 1980’s, Pakistan reportedly began a chemical weapons program to counter the Indian nuclear capability, and was suspected of possessing chemical artillery shells and short-range rockets. However, when Pakistan signed the Chemical Weapons Convention in 1997, it declared that it did not have any remaining chemical weapons. India, which also signed the Convention in 1997, declared that it did have a small chemical stockpile of 1,000 tons of mustard, which it had already begun to destroy.
Several African nations have been accused of using CBW in a number of border wars and conflicts. During the colonial wars of 1969 to 1974, Portuguese forces dropped large amounts of chemical herbicides and tear gases on rebels in Mozambique, Angola and Guinea-Bissau. Many of these reports were confirmed by independent observers. Unconfirmed reports accused the Portuguese of also using nerve gas and biological weapons.
In the 1970’s and 1980’s, the apartheid regime in South Africa was suspected of maintaining a supply of chemical artillery shells. In 1978 and in 1982, United Nations investigators confirmed the use of a “paralyzing gas” by South African troops against forces from Angola. In 1984, South Africa was accused of using chemical herbicides and anti-personnel agents against SWAPO guerrillas in Namibia.
In 1985 and 1986, on the other hand, Angolan forces were accused of using chemicals against the South African-supported UNITA guerrillas. Unconfirmed reports asserted that three UNITA fighters were killed and several others injured by anti-personnel agents. Angola had previously accused UNITA of using chemicals against Angolan troops and against SWAPO and ANC guerrillas in Angola.
Ethiopia reportedly produced a number of chemical artillery shells for use in its conflict with Eritrean separatists and in its border fights with Somalia. In February 1982, guerrillas of the Eritrean People’s Liberation Front accused Ethiopian troops of using mortar shells that had been filled with nerve gases during fighting near the village of Trukruk. Unconfirmed reports by the EPLF charged the Ethiopians with killing over 3,000 people in mustard and nerve gas attacks between 1982 and 1986.
In August 1998, the United States launched a missile attack against a plant in Sudan in retaliation for a terrorist bombing. Sudan claimed the plant produced pharmaceutical supplies, but the US cited intelligence data claiming that the plant was used to produce components for VX. The US claimed Sudan was carrying out a chemical weapons program with the help of Iraq. When Sudan ratified the Chemical Weapons Convention in 1999, however, it did not declare any stockpile of weapons.
In Latin America, several unconfirmed accusations of CBW use have been made. In 1971, Cuba accused the United States of introducing African Swine Fever into the country and killing half a million hogs. Between 1978 and 1981, Castro charged, further attacks killed another 173,000 hogs. Castro also accused the US of producing an outbreak of Dengue fever that killed 156 people. The US denied the charges. In the mid-1970’s, Cuba reportedly obtained a supply of chemical artillery shells from the Soviet Union, and was suspected of working to develop a BW program.
The Sandinista government in Nicaragua also accused the US of using biological agents against them in the 1980’s. Managua accused the American CIA of attacking the Nicaraguan coffee crop with coffee blight organisms, and of causing an outbreak of Dengue fever that affected nearly half a million Nicaraguans in 1985. In the mid-1980’s, the Sandinista Army was given a supply of Soviet-made CBW protective equipment, including gas masks and decontamination equipment. During the Reagan Administration, the US-backed Contra rebels accused the Sandinistas of using chemicals against them.
While the government of El Salvador denied that it possesses any chemical weapons, in the 1980’s the FMLN guerrillas accused the US-supplied Salvadoran Army of using chemical and biological agents, including weapons containing sulfuric acid, against them and against unprotected civilians. In March 1983, the president of the Salvadoran Human Rights Commission, Marienella Garcia Villas, was killed in an Army attack as she was investigating the CBW charges.
Other Central American insurgents have also accused US-backed armies of using chemical weapons. In 1982, the Guatemalan URNG guerrillas charged, Guatemalan troops used chemical weapons against them on several occasions. Honduran troops were accused of using chemicals against guerrillas and civilians between 1985 and 1987.
In 1985, a group of industrial nations formed a loose association known as the “Australia Group” to attempt to place voluntary international restrictions on the sale of chemical weapons technology, and to halt the proliferation of CBW capabilities.
Western technology has been instrumental in introducing chemical weapons into the tinderbox in the Middle East. Iraq, Syria and Libya all got their nerve gas arsenals the same way—they purchased ordinary pesticide-manufacturing equipment openly and legally on the world market, and then modified that equipment to produce nerve gas instead of bug spray. Nerve gas and commercial insecticides both being chemically-similar organophosphates, the same equipment can be used to make either one. In addition, the ingredients for making chemical weapons are common industrial chemicals—including such innocuous things as sulfur powder, isopropyl alcohol (ordinary rubbing alcohol), thiodiglycol (used to make the ink in ballpoint pens) and flourides (which are used in plastics, glass etching, and disinfectants). Known in arms-control parlance as “dual use materials”, these chemicals are sold all over the world, by the ton. Thiodiglycol can be transformed into mustard gas in a single step by combining it with hydrochloric acid. Tabun nerve gas can be made from the chemical combination of phosphorus oxychloride, dimethyl amine, potassium cyanide and ethyl alcohol in a two-stage process, while Sarin is made by combining the chemical diflour with isopropyl alcohol. Many common industrial chemicals can themselves be used as military weapons, including phosgene and chlorine.
Since these were common (and entirely legal) industrial chemicals, they flowed freely to the Middle East. By 1989, some 42 businesses from West Germany alone had been involved in sales of chemical technology to Persian Gulf nations. Other sales of equipment and ingredients had come from companies in India, China, Hong Kong, Italy, Singapore, Japan and the United States. Syria, Libya and Iraq modified this equipment after they bought it, and used it to make their chemical weapons. But, because these are all common industrial equipment and chemicals with a myriad of innocent uses, the companies involved did not know that is what they were doing. (With some exceptions: some sales were made through cut-outs and were trans-shipped to hide their origin and destination—an indication that the company did know what the materials were to be used for.)
The danger of CBW proliferation, however, has not been limited to tiny unstable nations, but has also come from small groups of conspirators. The destructive potential and especially the enormous psychological impact of chemical or biological weapons makes them well-suited for terrorist attacks, whether by organized groups of militants or by solitary malcontents working alone. The technology for producing many chemicals and biological toxins is simple. The potent eye irritant acrolein, for instance, can be made in the kitchen using glycerin soap and toilet bowl cleaner. Another lachrymator, chloracetone (used by the French Army during the First World War), can be produced at home using chlorine bleach, nail polish remover and toilet bowl cleaner. A number of different recipes can be found on the Internet for manufacturing hydrogen cyanide, botulin toxin or ricin, all of which have been produced by the military establishment for use in BW weapons.
CBW weapons have already been linked to several terrorist incidents. The most deadly use of CBW by terrorists was, of course, the nerve gas attack on the Tokyo subway system. On March 20, 1995, members of the New Age religious cult Aum Shinrikyo (“Supreme Truth”), placed plastic bags containing a crude home-made version of Sarin at several spots in the Tokyo subway system. The resulting cloud of chemicals killed 12 people and sickened another 5500. The year before, the same group, in a “trial run”, had released Sarin in a subway in Matsumoto, killing 7 and injuring 200. A series of at least five other planned attacks were thwarted by technical difficulties with the home-made delivery devices. The group, with the help of several chemists and biology students, had built a secret production laboratory and had produced a supply of Sarin as well as small amounts of several biological toxins, including anthrax and botulin. Aum Shinrikyo had already laid plans to use their CBW arsenal to launch attacks in New York and Washington DC.
The Japanese cult is not the only fringe group to attempt to produce and use CBW weapons. In October 1981, a police raid on a safehouse belonging to the German Red Army Faction captured a number of flasks containing Clostridium botulinum organisms. Apparently, one of the members of the group was a medical assistant who planned to produce botulin toxin from the microbes. In 1983, two people were arrested in Massachusetts after they managed to produce almost an ounce of the biological toxin ricin, which they had stored in a 35mm film canister.
In 1993, an American neo-Nazi was stopped at the Canadian border with 20,000 rounds of ammunition and 13 pounds of gunpowder in his car. He also had a plastic bag containing a quarter pound of almost pure ricin. In 1995, a member of the white supremacist group Aryan Nations was arrested after he illegally obtained three vials of live bubonic plague bacteria through the mail. That same year, an anonymous threat was sent to Disneyland, in California, warning that a chemical attack would be carried out at the park unless demands were met. The threat was accompanied by a videotape showing a batch of chemicals being mixed. The extortionist was never caught. In 1997, a right-wing militia member in Oregon was found to have a stockpile of chemicals in his garage, including sodium cyanide and diisopropyl fluorophosphate, an ingredient in nerve gas.
Although in our post-9-11 world, “terrorists” are a primary target for military and law enforcement authorities, the actual potential for effective large-scale use of CBW by terrorist groups is a subject of hot debate among experts. Some argue that a small sophisticated group can gain a CBW capacity, especially with new developments in genetic engineering technology and chemical manufacturing, and that its successful use is only a matter of time.
Others conclude that the technical capacity to make military-grade chemical or biological weapons is beyond the ability of small groups and likely to remain that way for a long time; they cite Aum Shinrikyo, which had an extremely large budget (over $30 million) and professional chemists and microbiologists at its disposal, but was only able to produce a crude and relatively ineffective product. The Henry L Stimson Center’s Chemical and Biological Nonproliferation Project notes: “Two factors stand in the way of manufacturing chemical agents for the purpose of mass casualty. First, the chemical reactions involved with the production of agents are dangerous: precursor chemicals can be volatile and corrosive, and minor misjudgments or mistakes in processing could easily result in the deaths of would-be weaponeers. Second, this danger grows when the amount of agent that would be needed to successfully mount a mass casualty attack is considered. Attempting to make sufficient quantities would require either a large, well-financed operation that would increase the likelihood of discovery or, alternatively, a long, drawn-out process of making small amounts incrementally. These small quantities would then need to be stored safely in a manner that would not weaken the agent’s toxicity before being released. It would take 18 years for a basement-sized operation to produce the more than two tons of sarin gas that the Pentagon estimates would be necessary to kill 10,000 people, assuming the sarin was manufactured correctly at its top lethality . . . Effective delivery, which entails getting the right concentration of agent and maintaining it long enough for inhalation to occur, is quite difficult to achieve because chemical agents are highly susceptible to weather conditions.” The Center points out that, because of all these difficulties, “In 96 percent of the cases worldwide where chemical or biological substances have been used since 1975, three or fewer people were injured or killed.”
The relatively low level of damage that terrorists may be able to inflict with crude CBW, though, may be beside the point—the real effect of terror weapons is psychological and emotional, and few weapons can cause more sheer terror and panic than chemical or biological weapons, particularly when used against unprotected civilians. And this is what makes CBW so attractive to terrorist groups.