Chemical A. Li(ncoln) ...

5fish

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I argue if Lincoln would have had access to Chemical weapons he would have used them without hesitation. If you think not, think again. We are talking about a man who with the help of General Grant and General Sherman created "Total War". He and his general redefine what was fair and legal in war. Lincoln and his generals would have used chemical in a heart beat at Petersburg if they had them. There would have been no moral arguments just the use of new tech to win the war.

The worlds modern outrage that a government uses chemical weapons to defend itself in a civil war rings hollow. A government facing a civil war has the right defend itself at any cost for our civil war set the standard with the concept of "Total War". The concept of "Total War" was a far greater evil then "Chemical weapons" for it open made civilians targets of war.

..... and the world embraced it.
 

5fish

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I could argue Davis and Lee did not redefine what's fair in war but Lincoln and Grant did... I believe both sides would have used chemical weapons had they been available to them...
 

jgoodguy

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I argue if Lincoln would have had access to Chemical weapons he would have used them without hesitation. If you think not, think again. We are talking about a man who with the help of General Grant and General Sherman created "Total War". He and his general redefine what was fair and legal in war. Lincoln and his generals would have used chemical in a heart beat at Petersburg if they had them. There would have been no moral arguments just the use of new tech to win the war.

The worlds modern outrage that a government uses chemical weapons to defend itself in a civil war rings hollow. A government facing a civil war has the right defend itself at any cost for our civil war set the standard with the concept of "Total War". The concept of "Total War" was a far greater evil then "Chemical weapons" for it open made civilians targets of war.

..... and the world embraced it.
One has to assume that the prevailing wind is away from Union troops and horses or the CSA army waits a bit and then crosses over the corpses to victory.
 

5fish

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One has to assume that the prevailing wind is away from Union troops and horses or the CSA army waits a bit and then crosses over the corpses to victory.
You have to watch those winds of change... They had Chlorine and Quicklime and I guess array of other chemicals they could have used... the delivery I think would have been the issue... The tech would have came for if there a will to kill people the tech will find away...
 

rittmeister

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You have to watch those winds of change... They had Chlorine and Quicklime and I guess array of other chemicals they could have used... the delivery I think would have been the issue... The tech would have came for if there a will to kill people the tech will find away...
so if it is so easy, why did it take untill 1915 that anybody (the french) used some sort of gas in combat?

edit: wrong year 1914
 
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jgoodguy

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You have to watch those winds of change... They had Chlorine and Quicklime and I guess array of other chemicals they could have used... the delivery I think would have been the issue... The tech would have came for if there a will to kill people the tech will find away...
so if it is so easy, why did it take untill 1915 that anybody (the french) used some sort of gas in combat?
At first glance there is the delivery system, training the folks to deliver it, having protection for your own troops and then training them. While all that is going on, hope the enemy does not get wind of it and develop their own or countermeasures.
 

rittmeister

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Xylyl bromide is an irritant and lachrymatory agent. It has been incorporated in chemical weapons since the early months of World War I. Some commentators say the first use was in August 1914, when the French attacked German soldiers with tear gas grenades but the agent used in that incident was more likely to be ethyl bromoacetate, which the French had tested before the war
quick source
 

5fish

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a lot of people think that - we are kinda cast as the bad guys for these two wars
We can say the Germans were the first use chemical that killed on a gas attack... The French one seemed more like tear gas....
 

rittmeister

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We can say the Germans were the first use chemical that killed on a gas attack... The French one seemed more like tear gas....
it still broke the ice and as to that war: a lot of nations used things first because they had it combat ready first. tanks being different, though.
 

5fish

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Want believe this but I found a whole paper on Proposed Chemical weapon use in the civil war... They have union records on the topic that people ignored... I posted just two sections form the paper... the records just lying around... it is a short read and worth it...

Proposals for Chemical Weapons during the American Civil War


DISCUSSION The weapons ideas presented here are only a portion of those put forward by their innovators. Many letters to President Lincoln—and probably to other officials on both sides—were thought written by “dreamers and cranks” and discarded immediately.3 Others undoubtedly survive in dusty files unnoticed by historians. Northern proposals predominate because the relevant U.S. government records are more complete and easily searched than those of the Confederacy. Although the Confederacy appears to have made or tested at least two chemical weapons, no evidence has been found that any such implements were actually used. Nevertheless, a few points can be made about the ideas. They were more plentiful and varied than previously thought. Only one citizen had previously been mentioned as advocating cayenne pepper,3 but period sources reveal at least 11 additional proponents.4 –10,12–15 Ideas for using black pepper, snuff, mustard seed, veratria, hydrogen cyanide, and acids are described here for the first time. The constituents of the proposed weapons were generally commonplace substances. Almost all of them, including the MILITARY MEDICINE, Vol. 173, May 2008 503 Proposals for Chemical Weapons during the Civil War Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/milmed/article-abstract/173/5/499/4557756 by guest on 20 March 2020 plant-based materials, chloroform, acids—even chlorine, cyanide, strychnine, and arsenic— had medicinal uses.18 Weapons advocates described the toxic effects of the agents fairly accurately, yet physicians were ill-prepared to treat them effectively. Even today, treating toxic exposure to most of the agents would consist primarily of supportive care; exceptions include administering amyl nitrite, sodium nitrite, and sodium thiosulfate for cyanide poisoning and chelators for arsenic poisoning. John Doughty28 (chlorine) and Joseph Jones30 (hydrogen cyanide) notwithstanding, the proponents of chemical weapons generally showed little appreciation for important practical considerations, such as the safety and ease of handling the toxic agents and whether they could be deployed in effective concentrations. Little concern was expressed about protecting friendly troops from the agents. One probable hindrance to the adoption of chemical weapons by the United States was the Army’s Chief of Ordnance, Brigadier General James W. Ripley, who was notoriously hostile toward new weapons.3 Moreover, the use of poisons in war was commonly considered unethical, and an 1863 directive from the U.S. War Department (the “Lieber Code”) barred their use.65 Yet, just as some Northerners might have agreed with a snuff proponent from Vermont that “any mode of Warfare is honorable in putting down open rebellion,”16 some Southerners might have concurred with the Mississippian who argued that using strychnine and arsenic was justified against a foe “whose whole and sole aim is our destruction.”32 John Doughty considered the moral question of using chlorine and “arrived at the somewhat paradoxical conclusion, that its introduction would very much lessen the sanguinary character of the battlefield, and at the same time render conflicts more decisive in their results.”2 Confederate incendiaries expert John Cheves31 disapproved of poisoning and favored “stifling” the enemy “with the materials ordinarily used in war” as “more consonant with the spirit of the age” and “more practicable and quite as effectual.” He argued, “There is as much difference between poisoning and stifling as there is between throwing dust in a man’s eyes & putting his eyes out yet where only momentary blindness is wanted the first will do as well as the last.” The development of effective delivery methods has created modern counterparts of some of the seemingly quaint Civil War ideas. Pepper spray can be considered a descendant of D.A. Pease’s15 pepper-whiskey mixture, and snuff-filled bladders16 are not far removed from today’s “pepper balls,” frangible capsaicin-filled spheres fired by law enforcement personnel from devices resembling paintball guns.66 Doughty’s28 chlorine shells anticipated the release of the same gas from cylinders in World War I67; chlorine has also been used recently in terrorist bombings in Iraq.68 Other Civil War ideas have been used almost unchanged in more modern times. Joseph Jones’s30 idea of mixing a cyanide salt with hydrochloric acid has been employed to execute convicts in gas chambers, and his concept of placing those chemicals in adjacent glass vessels is strikingly similar to terrorist plans for devices to release hydrogen cyanide in public places.69,70 Nitric acid, another agent proposed during the Civil War,52 has been found among insurgents’ supplies in Iraq and thought possibly to be intended as a chemical weapon.71 The mores of the era, along with limitations in scientific knowledge and technology, helped preclude the use of chemical weapons during the Civil War. Changes in those factors, within a complex global milieu, have contributed to chemical agents being employed in more recent conflicts and becoming serious concerns in today’s war against terror.

CONCLUSIONS Civil War proposals for chemical weapons generally advocated using common agents, most often in explosive artillery projectiles. Although many were meant to temporarily disable the enemy, others may have been lethal if deployed in adequate concentrations. Some of the ideas have closely related modern counterparts.
 

5fish

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Here is an article that shows both sides if the had an advantage they use it... I like how the Union whined about Bio warfare but later used Total war to win the war...


Snip... Lincoln wanted new weapons he wanted to to Chemical A. Li....

But the most rapid innovation took place in the North. President Lincoln exhibited great interest in the development of new weapons technology. During the war, the president would often visit the Navy Yard and consult with John A. Dahlgren, head of the ordnance department of the Navy

Snip... Look what I found look General Order 100... it is the Lieber Code... is General Order 100...

Another approach to biological warfare was the contamination of drinking water by retreating soldiers. Maj. Gen. William T. Sherman reported that Confederate troops retreating from Vicksburg, Va., had driven animals into ponds and then shot them. In response, the Union War Department issued General Orders No. 100, on April 24, 1863, stating: “The use of poison in any manner, be it to poison wells, or food, or arms, is wholly excluded from modern warfare.”

SNIP...

The Civil War also saw significant use of chemical weapons, at least in an incipient form. Union forces used variants of Greek fire, essentially incendiary mixtures that were hard to extinguish and could, in some cases, float on water. “I classify Greek fire as a chemical weapon because the formulations, when ignited, released large volumes of noxious fumes, and this was considered a useful collateral effect,” said Guy R. Hasegawa, a Civil War researcher. Greek fire was used most notably during the sieges of Vicksburg, Miss., and Charleston, S.C.

Snip... there was a desire for chemical weapons in our ACW,,,

The Richmond Daily Dispatch noted: “It is well known that there are some chemicals so poisonous that an atmosphere impregnated with them, makes it impossible to remain where they are by filling larges shells of extraordinary capacity with poisonous gases and throwing them very rapidly into” an enemy position (in this case Fort Pickens, a holdout Union post along the Gulf Coast)

Snip...

In 1863, Dr. Luke Blackburn, a Southern sympathizer and later governor of Kentucky, plotted to infect clothing with the smallpox virus and sell it to Union troops in Washington. There may have been one Union victim of the scheme, a lieutenant in the 17th Vermont named Charles W. Randall, who believed he became ill after purchasing some undergarments from a store. Later, the store was identified as a possible recipient of an infected clothing consignment.
 

5fish

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Here is a page from a book shows Lincoln(Chemical A. Li) down at the ship yards showing a solid form of Greek fire being tested. It also tales the story of the navy using them to shell Vicksburg at night... page 21...

 

Jim Klag

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People had been using chemical and biological weapons for centuries. Poisoning wells, throwing diseased corpses (animal and human), so-called Greek fire, poison-dipped arrows and spears, and sulfur gas had all been used by the time of Alexander. Nothing needed to be invented and yet Lincoln ordered the use of none of these. As usual, you are as wrong as it is possible to be.
 

diane

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Lincoln would sure have to be somebody he wasn't to even have a passing thought about that!

Biological warfare was an old game with Indian agents. Smallpox blankets, strychnine in the bacon, kerosene in the firewater. Mainly it was to make money but sometimes the devil put on human skin and did his stuff. Ben Wright, the famed Knight of the West and an Indian agent, decided the only good Modoc was a dead Modoc and invited them to a poisoned barbecue. Got a bunch! That ignited the Modoc War.

Now, if Lincoln were such a man, would he not think...let's try that idea out on those pain-in-the-butt Indians out west. No sense wasting a perfectly good rebel or slave!
 
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