[theowne]

I'm having a hard time finding resources for the views of chemists and scientists and their perspectives on chemical warfare and chemical weapons.  Anyone have any advice?

[english]

Be more specific.  Are you required to have primary sources?  Can they come from any available source?

The internet is a vast general resource.  Most of its material is difficult to trust, but a site's affiliation with a university or organization is a good indicator that the provided material is legitimate.  I'm sure it won't be difficult to find something on the internet.

[Ch3micat]

Wikipedia is no good for writing papers, but its a good place to look for information to find elsewhere. 
For example, I typed in Sarin, and came up with Gerhard Schrader as one of the makers.  Might try googling his name and the name along with chemical warfare, and do the same for others who discovered them....  Just a thought.

[Ψ×Ψ]

If you're looking for the views of specific famous chemists, I'm useless to you.  If you're looking for views of random anonymous chemists, I'm happy to give you an earful.

[kiwi]

If you want one extreme point of view, consider that of Fritz Haber (of Haber process fame). He gave birth to chemical warfare as we know it today. He advocated it, and even came up with things like Habers law to improve it.
His wife killed herself with his issue revolver at the dinner party celebrating the first attack, but he still didn't take the hint. He left the next morning to oversee gassing the russians on the eastern front. I doubt you'll find a more callous viewpoint than that.

[Sam (NG)]

If you want one extreme point of view, consider that of Fritz Haber (of Haber process fame). He gave birth to chemical warfare as we know it today. He advocated it, and even came up with things like Habers law to improve it.
His wife killed herself with his issue revolver at the dinner party celebrating the first attack, but he still didn't take the hint. He left the next morning to oversee gassing the russians on the eastern front. I doubt you'll find a more callous viewpoint than that.

Yet,  I'm sure the ammonia produced from The Haber Process has killed more people from (explosives manufacture) than the gases that Haber invented for warfare.

[theowne]

Be more specific.  Are you required to have primary sources?  Can they come from any available source?

Any available source.

If you're looking for the views of specific famous chemists, I'm useless to you.

They don't have to be famous.  Basically I just need to find the effect of chemical warfare in the science world and in scientific research, and how the scientific community has reacted to it.

[Ψ×Ψ]

If you want one extreme point of view, consider that of Fritz Haber (of Haber process fame). He gave birth to chemical warfare as we know it today. He advocated it, and even came up with things like Habers law to improve it.
His wife killed herself with his issue revolver at the dinner party celebrating the first attack, but he still didn't take the hint. He left the next morning to oversee gassing the russians on the eastern front. I doubt you'll find a more callous viewpoint than that.

Yet,  I'm sure the ammonia produced from The Haber Process has killed more people from (explosives manufacture) than the gases that Haber invented for warfare.

And let's not forget about all the anhydrous ammonia that gets used in meth labs.

[Ch3micat]

If you want one extreme point of view, consider that of Fritz Haber (of Haber process fame). He gave birth to chemical warfare as we know it today. He advocated it, and even came up with things like Habers law to improve it.
His wife killed herself with his issue revolver at the dinner party celebrating the first attack, but he still didn't take the hint. He left the next morning to oversee gassing the russians on the eastern front. I doubt you'll find a more callous viewpoint than that.

Ironically, wasn't Haber a Jewish man living in Germany, who developed Zyklon B as a pesticide, which was used by the Nazi regime as a method for gassing to death their undesirables?

[Sam (NG)]

Ironically, wasn't Haber a Jewish man living in Germany, who developed Zyklon B as a pesticide, which was used by the Nazi regime as a method for gassing to death their undesirables?

This is true.

[kiwi]

Ironically, wasn't Haber a Jewish man living in Germany, who developed Zyklon B as a pesticide, which was used by the Nazi regime as a method for gassing to death their undesirables?

This is true.

indeed. and even after renouncing judaism, he was still too jewish for the nazi regime, even after all he had done. Faust anyone?

[limpet chicken]

Come on people, zyklon B was hardly an innovation, its just HCN(aq), soaked into an inert carrier, chalk, or limestone as I recall, certainly something along those lines.

Now the russians, they are a people who are good at chemical weapons development, inventing things like the structural isomer of VX, VR, same stuff as its american counterpart, just a structural isomer, but with the advantage that it wouldn't register on conventional detection equipment for V-agents.

The russians came up with the novichok agents too, organoflurophosphorus oximes, which turned out to be extremely toxic anticholinesterases, somewhere around 5-10x as potent as Vx, and due to the oxime structure already being present on the molecule, irreversible by treatments for standard nerve agent toxicity.

I won't even get started on their use of ultra potent carfentanyl-ish thingies, as nonlethal chemical agents, if the government hadn't covered everything up as to what was used in the Chechen theatre incident, the strategy used would IMHO, have proved highly effective.

[Dude]

I remember reading a few books about chemical warfare.  One was part of a book called "Poor Man's James Bond part 2" and the other one was called "Silent Death" by a guy using the author pen name of Uncle Fester.  In a nutshell and as a pseudo-academic, my scientific opinion is:

1.  scientific curiosity as to the most effective "mg per pound" weapon available (i.e. ricin, nerve gases, etc.) and how and why the agents biologically work.

2.  a complete lack of interest in doing anything vaguely related to that work because I'm sure I would be dead via an inadvertent spill on my skin.

3.  In terms of body count, the most effective chemical warfare agents were rather mundane and non-interesting chemicals such as chlorine and mustard gas used in WWI.  Thus, I have a rather neutral to slightly negative view of chemical warfare.  As Limpet chicken indicated, most work was government sponsored and not widely published.  The work did not contribute, IMO, significantly to reaction mechanism understanding or industrial process development due to the secrecy.

[limpet chicken]

The most toxic by weight is almost universally acknowledged to be botulinum toxin, from Clostridium Botulinum (of botulism fame), the LD:50 is just insane, one figure quotes as 1ng/kg, and acts by blocking the release of acetylcholine at the nicotinic receptors (neuromuscular junction subtype)
which has the same end effects of neuromuscular blocking agents such as succinylcholine, suxamethonium, pancuronium and curare.

Does it long term too, which makes it useful in really, REALLY small dosages for cosmetic procedures.


Nerve agents (organofluorophosphate esters, including garden pesticides, G-agents, V-agents and novichok agents in increasing order of toxicity)
act by blocking the action of cholinesterase enzymes, acetylcholinesterase, and in the case of novichoks, acetyl- and butyrylcholinesterases, the G-agent soman, unlike most G, and V agents, also "age" the enzyme, within minutes, compared to days with VX, rendering oxime treatment to reactivate poisoned cholinesterase enzymes.

Novichok agents are worse, they cannot be treated with oximes.

Ricin is an interesting one, as its a protein (like botulinum toxin), known as a toxalbumin, and related to the more toxic abrin, and other toxalbumin type proteins present in mistletoe species, these nasties act by inactivating protein synthesis, via the ribosomes present in cells.

Vey slow, very lethal, and very unpleasant way to go too.

[hmx9123]

I bet more ammonia has been used as fertilizer than in all the explosives ever made combined.

Interestingly, the Germans made Sarin in the 30s as a pesticide.  I believe that Sarin is actually a composite acronym of ther inventors' names.  The only reason the Germans didn't use it on London in WWII is that Hiltler thought the Allies had it and would use it on them.

As for the rest of the crazy agents out there, there is a lot of push in the field today in terms of detection.  No one I know of advocates the use of chemical weapons, nor thinks they are a great idea.