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From: moscom!jaw@cs.rochester.edu (Jim Watson)
Newsgroups: sci.military
Subject: Re: Chemicals weapons in Iraq
Message-ID: <1990Aug17.023643.1234@cbnews.att.com>
Date: 17 Aug 90 02:36:43 GMT
References: <1990Aug8.030444.25822@cbnews.att.com> <1990Aug12.214422.2463@cbnews.att.com>
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From: moscom!jaw@cs.rochester.edu (Jim Watson)


>From: wilson@b11.ingr.com (Jon Wilson)
>
>What chemical weapons options are available to the U.S. should Iraq use them
>in the Persian Gulf?
>One assumes the usual spray tanks on tactical aircraft, but are any surface-
>to-surface missiles available with chemical warheads? 
>
   Delivery options are limited only by the twisted imaginations of those
wonderful people who work for defense contractors.  Spray from planes,
artillery, mines (yes MINES! :-{), ground based dispensers (assuming of
course that your target is down wind), sabatoge (contaminating water
supplies by whatever means), etc.   I don't envy a combatant in a chemical
warfare environment.

>In article <1990Aug12.214422.2463@cbnews.att.com> cga66@ihlpy.att.com (Patrick V Kauffold) writes:
>
>From: cga66@ihlpy.att.com (Patrick V Kauffold)
>I suited up in 1986 at Quantico in October (temp ~85F) and it was damned
>difficult and uncomfortable. . .
   That's putting it mildly.  I had the pleasure of wearing one of these
things in Camp LeJeune N.C.  End of July, 95 deg or so.  The instructors
(and our CO :-}) didn't think it was good enough to just put the thing on
and sweat, we went for a little nature walk!  You sweat continually.  In
less than 5 Min the soles of my boot seemed like I had walked through a
sizeable puddle and I could feel another pool forming in the "chin-cup"
of my mask.  It was VERY uncomfortable.  However it was surviveable.  I've
had worse experiences with a normal flak jacket and helmet.  I believe
that someone could function - sort of - in the suite for a limited period
of time.  I was extremely thankful to the influential individual who decided
that the charcol impregnated suites were worth the extra money over those
rubber monsters.

>BTW, the Soviets use weakened version of live agents in their training.
>Motivation.
   MOTIVATION !!  US troops use plain old CS (tear gas).  It's not too
threatening and after a while, you build up a tolerence to it.  We did,
however, come up with our own little concoction that seemed to work
well.  Take a normal smoke grenade and strap a heat-tab (trioxane tablet)
to the exhaust hole.  There's no getting used to that !!  I suppose it's
toxic or causes some sort of cancer, so you didn't here that from me.

Jim Watson
Sgt USMC Jan 84 -  Jan 90
(I suppose I'll have to re-up and kill a few rag heads :-})

>Pat Kauffold ATT-BL Naperville