Chemical Warfare During World War 1

Clouds of something that appeared to be smoke reached the line of soldiers waiting to fight. Immediately, the soldiers began to cough, gag and choke. Their eyes started stinging and watering, and they fell backwards into the trenches. The soldiers tried to duck and avoid the smoke in their dugouts, but it soon followed. Those who did not fall ran trying to abandon the clouds of smoke, but this was no regular smoke (Kennedy 53). It was chlorine gas that German forces used to initiate large-scale chemical warfare during World War I at the Second Battle of Ypres, which affected the use of chemical weapons and other weapons of mass destruction.
World War I began in Ypres on October 7, 1914, when German forces troops entered from the southeast through the Menin Gate and from the south through the Lille Gate. By 9 pm that night, about 10,000 troops filled the town. A few days later on October 13, 1914 the French and English armies entered the Ypres area, taking up defensive positions to limit the advance of the German army. Beginning in January 1915 there was a stalemate between the Allied and German armies. The Allies held their …show more content…
However, this debate was not new; it had been going on since the late 19th century. When “confronted with the immediate and undeniably horrific results of chemical warfare on the western front” (Warren 1), there was a large opposition towards the use of chemical weaponry. Following World War I and World War II, the use of chemical weapons spurred international and public opinion. Many people pushed for regulations or outright bans, while others pushed for continued used and development of poison gas. Chemical weapons were, on a large scale, used during the First and Second World Wars, “leaving behind a legacy of old abandoned weapons” (“History of CW Use” 1). Chemical weapons have since presented a problem for many