Re: First Large Scale Chlorine Release -- 1915

[Ferdinand.Engelbeen@ping.be (Ferdinand Engelbeen)]

>Mark Robinowitz wrote:

>On April 22, 1915, the German army released a huge chlorine cloud at
>Ypres, France, that killed over 5,000 'Allied' soldiers and injured 10,000
>more.  (It's possible that Germany would have won World War One if their
>troops took advantage of the chaos they caused.)
>
>Mustard gas and phosgene, two other chemical weapons used in WW I, are
>based on chlorine.  (Nerve gases are organic phosphorus compounds --
>malathion is a diluted version of these much more dangerous, but not
>bioaccumulative, poisons.)
>....................

For your information:

The gas bottles were filled with a liquid mixture of chlorine and nitrogen
peroxide and were brought in position by German Colonel Peterson and his
35th Engineers, called 'The Stinkpioneers'. They were meant to cover the
frontline with 200 liter gas per stretching meter (orders of the Supreme
commander General von Falkenhayn)!
Before that, experiments had been carried out by the German Professor Haber with
the brom-ethylacetate and chloracetone from the French grenades, later with
the xylilbromide of the British and chlorine in combination with 'shrapnell-
or splinter'-effect grenades. All these did not satisfy as had been shown by
tests e.g. on the Russian front in Lodz.
The 'chlorine' bottles were finally chosen because of their 'target': 'not
to kill but to immobilise temporarily and to ensure that the effect would be
gone after the short time needed by the own troups to break through the
infected area without harming the own soldiers'. Due to this 'inefficiency
to kill on the spot', the Germans replaced this weapon by phosgene and
mustard gas (contain also carbon, oxygen, hydrogen and/or sulphur), and
these really 'killed'! Thirty years later they have invented a still more
efficient gas to kill millions of jewish people: Zyklon (cyanide: hydrogen,
carbon and nitrogen, nothing to do with chlorine)!

On the 22nd of April 1915, at 5pm (6pm for the Germans), at the start of
what is known as the 'battle of the bridge at Steenstrate' (near Ypres - Ieper a
Flemish/Belgian town BTW), on the order "333" (which meant: prepare the
attack, move troups forward, forward ammunition; the order "8888" meant:
open the gasbottles), a certain number of gas bottles were opened under a
wind blowing towards the Belgian sector, creating a red-brown and darkgreen
cloud over the river and the trenches.
Corporal Declerck was the first Belgian soldier to be contaminated by the
gas while he was playing cards with his comrades.

The Belgian Major de Callatij brought the 1st Section of his Hotchkiss MG
Company, together with his 4th Company and the 2nd Company of the 'De
Kempeneer'-Batallion in the battle and, together with the MG of Sergeant
Duvivier created a massacre under the Germans. The German progress was
stopped and consequently a lot of German soldiers surrendered to the
Belgians because they were afraid of the ruthless French Zouaves.
The French President Poincaré declared:'The Grenadiers Regiment of the 6th
Belgian Division, elite-troups of the Belgian Army, has - through a heroic
hooked-attack - protected the French and British positions'.

Due to the fact that there has been a lot of confusion amongst the German
soldiers about the given orders, only a very small number of gasbottles were
actually opened. This also has very probably been at the origin of the
defeat of the Germans and the luck of the Belgians in this battle.

So far the historic facts.

Don't tell us what happened here: we live here and our fathers/grandfathers
where in the trenches (together with many other nationalities)!

Besides this, it is ETHICALLY TOTALLY UNACCEPTABLE to talk about
'bioaccumulation' and a sign of MACABRE CYNISM to use these many war victims
as an argument for this discussion about chlorine, which is not even on the
topics of this mailing-list.

We urge you to come and visit the huge war cemeteries in our region and to
claim your arguments against chlorine over here!


>..................................  Specfically, some organic chlorine
>compounds similar to those made by industry that are found naturally .....


There are hundreds: the organochlorine contamination of the Rhine is for 50-70%
due to natural organochlorines similar to the industrially produced. Inform
yourself, I am sure this is the same in the US!

>
>"500 million years of evolution can't be wrong, but it might be stopped if
>we don't change course"

Very true indeed, 500 million years of evolution can't be wrong! Learn
about nature!

Ferdinand Engelbeen
Chairman Chlorophiles

Ferdinand.Engelbeen@ping.be