U.S. Successfully Eliminates Weapons: In a sealed room behind a gantlet of armed guards and three rows of high barbed wire at the Armys Pueblo Chemical Depot in Colorado, a team of robotic arms was busily disassembling some of the last of the United States vast and ghastly stockpile of chemical weapons.
The Final Stages of Destruction
Thats the sound of a chemical weapon dying, said Kingston Reif, who spent years pushing for disarmament outside government and is now the deputy assistant secretary of defense for threat reduction and arms control. He smiled as another shell clanked into the dumpster.
A Historic Achievement
The destruction of the stockpile has taken decades, and the Army says the work is just about finished. The depot near Pueblo destroyed its last weapon in June; the remaining handful at another depot in Kentucky will be destroyed in the next few days. And when they are gone, all of the worlds publicly declared chemical weapons will have been eliminated.
The Shocking Scale of the American Stockpile
The American stockpile, built up over generations, was shocking in its scale: Cluster bombs and land mines filled with nerve agent. Artillery shells that could blanket whole forests with a blistering mustard fog. Tanks full of poison that could be loaded on jets and sprayed on targets below.
Chemical Weapons Usage and Destruction Efforts
American armed forces are not known to have used lethal chemical weapons in battle since 1918, though during the Vietnam War they used herbicides like Agent Orange that were harmful to humans.
The United States once also had a sprawling germ warfare and biological weapons program; those weapons were destroyed in the 1970s.
The United States and the Soviet Union agreed in principle in 1989 to destroy their chemical weapons stockpiles, and when the Senate ratified the Chemical Weapons Convention in 1997, the United States and other signatories committed to getting rid of chemical weapons once and for all.
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Challenges in Disposal
But destroying them has not been easy: They were built to be fired, not disassembled. The combination of explosives and poison makes them exceptionally dangerous to handle.
Defense Department officials once projected that the job could be done in a few years at a cost of about $1.4 billion. It is now wrapping up decades behind schedule, at a cost close to $42 billion 2,900 percent over budget.
Pride in Accomplishment
Its been an ordeal, thats for sure I wondered if I would ever see the day, said Craig Williams, who started pushing for the safe destruction of the stockpile in 1984 when he learned that the Army was storing tons of chemical weapons five miles from his house, at the Blue Grass Army Depot near Richmond, Ky.
This is the first time, globally, that an entire class of weapons of mass destruction will be destroyed, said Craig Williams.
Conclusion of U.S. Successfully Eliminates Weapons
Other powers have also destroyed their declared stockpiles: Britain in 2007, India in 2009, Russia in 2017. But Pentagon officials caution that chemical weapons have not been eradicated entirely. A few nations never signed the treaty, and some that did, notably Russia, appear to have retained undeclared stocks.
Nor did the treaty end the use of chemical weapons by rogue states and terrorist groups. Forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad of Syria used chemical weapons in the country numerous times between 2013 and 2019. According to the IHS Conflict Monitor, a London-based intelligence collection and analysis service, fighters from the Islamic State used chemical weapons at least 52 times in Iraq and Syria from 2014 to 2016.
Our Reader’s Queries
Has the US destroyed the last of its chemical weapons?
On July 7, this summer, the Blue Grass Chemical Agent-Destruction Pilot Plant in Kentucky successfully dismantled the final M55 rocket containing GB. This marked the complete elimination of the United States’ declared chemical munitions stockpile.
Has the US ever used chemical weapons?
Throughout the war, the Army employed offensive chemical weapons and delivery systems from foreign origins. American forces utilized British and French chemical rounds from 75-mm, 4.7-inch, 155-mm, and larger-caliber guns. The majority of these rounds were French shells containing CG and H, along with British shells filled with H and L.
Does the US stockpile chemical weapons?
In 1997, the United States officially committed to getting rid of its supply by approving the Chemical Weapons Convention. This global agreement prohibits the use of any chemical weapons and strives to eradicate them worldwide.
Do we still use poison gas today?
International law strictly prohibits the use and ownership of chemical weapons. Yet, many countries persist in operating chemical weapons programs, defying the global consensus against their use and the ongoing international campaigns to eliminate existing stockpiles.