As of: March 29, 2024, 9:06 p.m
By: Karsten Hinzmann
Comments
Press
Split
Left defenseless: Especially inside a bunker, the Ukrainian soldiers have no chance against gas; Russia is now increasingly relying on chemical warfare agents. (Archive photo) © Michael Brochstein/dpa
The gas has returned to the battlefield – here to stay. Several media outlets accuse Russia of deliberately attacking positions with tear gas.
Orichiw - The First World War had already been history for more than ten years when the author Erich Maria Remarque put it back on the agenda in 1928; with a chapter that should actually be closed again: “A surprise gas attack takes many people away. We find a shelter full of blue heads and black lips. They released the masks too early in a funnel; They didn't know that the gas lasts the longest at the bottom; When they saw others upstairs without masks, they tore them off too and swallowed enough to burn their lungs. Their condition is hopeless, they are strangling themselves to death with hemorrhages and suffocation attacks.”
Chemical weapons – death from the laboratory. More than nine decades later he is said to have reported back again: in the Ukraine war. Released by Vladimir Putin's troops. “The other day the enemy threw a gas grenade into the shelter of an infantry battalion. However, the soldier nicknamed Yaryi reacted immediately and threw the grenade outside,” reads the statement from the Northern Operational Command of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, which is now reported by
RBC-Ukraine
magazine . According to the statement, the Russian occupiers threw a gas grenade from a drone at the positions of the Ukrainian Defense Forces. The grenade was filled with gas that compromised the respiratory system.
In doing so, Russia would have violated the laws of war. The Geneva Protocol on the “prohibition of the use of asphyxiating, poisonous or other gases and bacteriological agents in war” has been in effect since June 1925. The protocol, which is still valid today, prohibits the use of chemical and biological weapons in war; However, developing, producing and owning them is just as permitted as using them for retaliatory purposes. The Geneva Protocol is one of the international regulations on warfare that have been constantly developed since 1864. The Hague Land War Code of 1899 already contained a ban on “poison or poisoned weapons”.
Deadly use: Russia ended a hostage situation with gas in 2002 - almost 180 people died
Nevertheless, chemical and biological weapons of mass destruction were developed and distributed on an ever-increasing scale at the beginning of the 20th century. Germany was the first country to use this weapon on a large scale during World War I. The end of the East-West conflict finally led to a final chemical weapons convention in 1993, which came into force in 1997 and was also ratified by Russia. Previously, for example, the United States used chemical weapons during the Vietnam War to defoliate the impenetrable forests; and the Russian armed forces last used them in 2002 to end a hostage-taking in Moscow's Dubrovka Theater against around 50 Chechen rebels - the attempted liberation failed, and all of the hostage-takers and 129 of 850 hostages died. Chemical weapons are also said to have been used in Syria.
RBC
had already reported at the beginning of the year that, according to the Institute
for the Study of War (ISW),
Russian troops were even increasing the use of chemical weapons in Ukraine. According to
ISW
, the General Staff of Ukraine had
previously reported that Russian troops had used a new type of special grenade containing CS gas since mid-December. CS gas stands for “2-chlorobenzylidenemaloniconitrile” and is a white, crystalline, toxic and flammable solid with a pepper-like odor; The CS weapon is known as “tear gas”. When dust from the compound is whirled up, explosive mixtures with air are formed. Although CS gas mainly causes irritation to the eyes and respiratory tract outdoors and then subsides, studies have clearly shown that the gas can cause death indoors.
“We ran out of the ditch and the gas suddenly caught fire. The ditch was on fire. This gas burns, makes you blind, you can't breathe, it shoots straight down your throat. We didn’t even have a second.”
Anonymous Ukrainian soldier on CNN about a Russian gas attack
My news
Meloni takes action: Italy cancels the “super bonus” read
Cheese recall: Federal Office warns of health risks – according to the RKI, three groups are particularly susceptible to focus reading
F-16 fighter jets shot down: Putin threatens to attack NATO airfields
Resignation on his birthday: German ski ace ends his career
After rocket attacks on Ukraine, Poland launches fighter jets in the middle of the night
Quake in the construction industry: Read the bankruptcy of a large German real estate company
It is possible that Russia has been using gas for a long time and is now trying to bring dynamism to the deadlocked trench warfare - that would also be similar to the First World War, when gas had to be used as a last resort.
According to the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI), the state-controlled Russian broadcaster
Channel 1
reported in early May 2023
that Russia was using counterinsurgency assets as a means of warfare. The footage was part of a report that claimed Russian troops had recaptured the village of Spirne. The battalion commander interviewed in the television report and identified by
Meduza
magazine
as Vladislav Vodolazsky claimed to have used drones to drop K-51 grenades containing a toxic substance apparently extracted from cherry blossoms onto Ukrainian positions. Vodolazsky called the chemical tear gas and said it was used to "smoke out" Ukrainians who tried to use gas masks to protect themselves; but without success.
Increased deployment: 346 Russian gas attacks this year
Various sources provide numerical evidence that the use of grenades containing CS gas by Russia is now apparently increasing. Up to ten grenades are said to appear somewhere every day, Ukrainian reports speak of 626 registered cases, including 51 cases in January 2024 alone, and a total of 346 gas attacks in the entire first quarter, as
n-tv
claims. The dynamics of the deployment are apparently actually increasing. According to
RBC,
the Ukrainian military is talking
about grenades like the K-51 that are dropped from drones - the size and shape are reminiscent of hand grenades. However, improvised explosive devices containing irritants are also expected to be used, as are full-blown artillery shells.
In recent weeks, cases have emerged in the Zaporizhzhia region near Orikhiv in which a corrosive and flammable gas was dropped from drones on Ukrainian soldiers, reported the US television channel
CNN:
Two soldiers showed
CNN
medical reports after an alleged gas attack that they had been poisoned. “First I saw smoke,” one of the soldiers told
CNN
. “We ran out of the ditch and the gas suddenly caught fire. The ditch was on fire. This gas burns, makes you blind, you can't breathe, it shoots straight down your throat. We didn't even have a second." The second soldier added: "You breathe it in twice and then you can't breathe anymore."
Risky mission: US President Biden warned Putin at the beginning of the war – “Don’t. Not. Not."
The men said they suffered injuries, including burns and welts on their faces, mouths and throats,
according to
CNN
. Both men showed the journalists the redness on their faces as evidence of their injuries. The
RUSI
judges that from a technical point of view, protection against tear gas is possible without any problems and that most modern chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear gas masks offer more than adequate protection against such substances. However,
RUSI
has long viewed the use of gas as structured, as evidenced by the offensive demonstration of its use via its own media alone.
US President Joe Biden warned Russia against the use of chemical weapons
shortly after the start of the Ukraine war on US broadcaster
CBS
- when Russia had to cope with the first setbacks during the invasion. Biden said: “Don’t. Not. Not. They will change the face of war unlike anything since World War II.” The production and threat of use of chemical weapons was the United States and Britain's justification for their war against Iraq in 2003 and the overthrow of Saddam Hussein's regime. This justification has been widely questioned internationally; The weapons inspectors, experts and politicians commissioned by the United Nations contradicted the American government statements before the war and cast doubt on the sources. No weapons of mass destruction were found in Iraq, either before or after the fall of the Iraqi dictator
In this context, the then Green Party Foreign Minister Joseph “Joschka” Fischer became world famous during the Munich Security Conference when, as the
Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung
wrote, “theatrically slightly trembling with excitement, he called out to the American Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld in English: 'Excuse me, I am not convinced.'”
(kh)