chemical/biological weapons — Bunk History

illustration including "Napalm Girl" photo and photo of the photographer

The View from Here

Fifty years on, Nick Ut’s Pulitzer Prize–winning photograph, “Napalm Girl,” still has the power to shock. But can a picture change the world?

by Errol Morris via Air Mail on June 4, 2022

Chemical lab buildings around American University campus.

The Dangerous Ghosts of WWI Research in Spring Valley

World War I saw the advent of chemical weaponry, and a mysterious chapter in the history of American University in Northwest DC.

by Fontana Micucci via Boundary Stones on February 25, 2022

C-123 “Provider” aircraft spray Agent Orange over Vietnam during Operation Ranch Hand, which took place between 1962 and 1971.

The People vs. Agent Orange Exposes a Mass Poisoning in Plain Sight

A new PBS documentary investigates the legacy of one of the most dangerous pollutants on the planet, an unsettling cover-up, and the fight for accountability.

by Jasper Craven via The New Republic on June 28, 2021

The ocean

Chemical Warfare’s Home Front

Since World War I we’ve been solving problems with dangerous chemicals that introduce new problems.

by Elizabeth Kolbert via New York Review of Books on February 11, 2021

A graphic featuring a plane dropping particles upon crouching people and a man looking into a microscope.

The Great Germ War Cover-Up

When Nicholson Baker searched for the truth about biological weapons, he found a fog of redaction.

by Daniel Immerwahr via The New Republic on July 13, 2020

US soldiers use tear gas to “flush” women and children from hiding in Vietnam, 1966.

Tear Gas and the U.S. Border

How did it come to pass that a weapon banned for military use was deployed against asylum-seekers on the U.S. border?

by Stuart Schrader via Process: A Blog for American History on December 6, 2018

WW1 soldiers wearing gas masks.

How World War I Became the First Modern War of Science

One hundred years ago, a group of U.S. academics and soldiers revolutionized warfare. We’re still seeing the results today.

by Theo Emery via Politico Magazine on November 12, 2018

Image of a person being affected by chemical weapons.

Why We Don’t Use Chemical Weapons

World War I exposed the world to the horror of gas attacks. But why do we draw the line there when other methods of killing prove so much more effective?

by Emil Friis Ernst via The Nib on July 30, 2018

The International Chemical Weapons Taboo

Our horror of chemical agents is one of the great success stories of modern diplomacy.

by Richard Price via Boston Globe on September 8, 2013

Photos and newspaper clippings connected with red string

How We Lost Our Minds About UFOs

No, aliens haven’t visited the Earth. Why are so many smart people insisting otherwise?

by Nicholson Baker via Intelligencer on January 31, 2024

Black and white photo of Pruitt-Igoe buildings being destroyed.

Pruitt-Igoe: A Black Community Under the "Atomic Cloud"

In the 1950s, the U.S. military conducted unethical radiological experiments on Black communities, including the Pruitt-Igoe public housing complex.

by Devin Thomas O’Shea via Protean on November 28, 2022

Image of army soldiers and weapons facing crowd of protestors holding signs

A Theater of State Panic

Beginning in 1967, the Army built fake towns to train police and military officers in counterinsurgency.

by Bench Ansfield via New York Review of Books on September 16, 2022

Panic at the Library

The sinister history of fumigating “foreign” books.

by Brian Michael Murphy via Lapham’s Quarterly on August 24, 2022

Men with guns in street

How Tear Gas Became a Staple of American Law Enforcement

In 1932, the “Bonus Army” of jobless veterans staged a protest in Washington, DC. The government dispersed them with tear gas.

by Lauren Vespoli via JSTOR Daily on June 24, 2020

How the U.S. Betrayed the Marshall Islands, Kindling the Next Nuclear Disaster

A close look at the consequences of nuclear testing.

by Susanne Rust via Los Angeles Times on November 10, 2019

Lab equipment in an abandoned building.

The Secret History of Fort Detrick, the CIA’s Base for Mind Control Experiments

Today, it’s a cutting-edge lab. In the 1950s and 1960s, it was the center of the U.S. government’s darkest experiments.

by Stephen Kinzer via Politico Magazine on September 15, 2019

Gerald Ford meets with the family of Dr. Frank Olson.

From Mind Control to Murder? How a Deadly Fall Revealed the CIA’s Darkest Secrets

Frank Olson died in 1953, but it took decades for his family to get closer to the truth.

by Stephen Kinzer via The Guardian on September 6, 2019

Ari Fleischer Lied, and People Died

The former Bush mouthpiece had more to do personally with the Iraq WMD catastrophe than he wants us to believe.

by Scott Ritter via The American Conservative on March 22, 2019

Organic chemistry graphic of burning tree

How the Benzene Tree Polluted the World

The organic compounds that enabled industrialization are having unintended consequences for the planet’s life.

by Rebecca Altman via The Atlantic on October 4, 2017

How One Man Helped Burn Down North Korea

The story of one of the most effective and brutal spymasters in U.S. history, and the beginning of an infamous love affair with napalm.

by Blaine Harden via Politico Magazine on October 2, 2017

The bombing of Baghdad during the US invasion of Iraq, March 21, 2003.

A Terrible Mistake

The long history of confusions, misconceptions, and miscalculations in the relationship between the US and Iraq, from 1979 to 2003.

by Charlie Savage via New York Review of Books on August 29, 2024

Death to Beauty book cover, featuring a gloved hand with a syringe.

The Eyes Have It: On Eugene M. Helveston’s “Death to Beauty”

Injecting the world’s deadliest toxin into one’s eye was always going to be a hard sell.

by Arvind Dilawar via Los Angeles Review of Books on March 30, 2024

U.S. Army soldiers stand guard near a portrait of Saddam Hussein while others search an Iraqi police station in March 2003.

Steve Coll’s Latest Shows Saddam Hussein’s Practical Side

‘The Achilles Trap’ reexamines the relationship between Hussein and four U.S. administrations.

by Spencer Ackerman via Washington Post on February 27, 2024

Old gas chamber, with two chairs

Execution By Gas has a Brutal 100-Year History. Now it’s Back.

An Alabama man faces execution by nitrogen gas—the first U.S. execution by gas in a quarter-century, 100 years after the practice began.

by Randy Dotinga via Retropolis on January 24, 2024

J. Robert Oppenheimer

Why the Fascination with Oppenheimer?

J. Robert Oppenheimer and the Manhattan Project scientists are a rare example of weapons designers who have gone down in history.

by Ryan Dahn via Physics Today on August 17, 2023

Nagaski after the atomic bomb.

Did We Really Need to Drop the Bomb?

American leaders called the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki our 'least abhorrent choice,' but there were alternatives to the nuclear attacks.

by Paul Ham via American Heritage on August 6, 2023

George w. Bush delivers a speech on the USS Abraham Lincoln under a banner reading "Mission Accomplished."

The Worst Crime of the 21st Century

The United States’ destruction of Iraq remains the worst international crime of our time. Its perpetrators remain free and its horrors are buried.

by Noam Chomsky, Nathan J. Robinson via Current Affairs on May 12, 2023

Montage of photographs from Operation Desert Storm.

How to Kill a Country

The 2003 invasion of Iraq was no turning point. It was a slow-burning tale of how Britain and the US armed a nation, and then betrayed it.

by Noah Kulwin via New Statesman on March 24, 2023

Censored text and George W. Bush with a black bar covering his eyes. Art by Alex Cochran.

What Really Took America to War in Iraq

A fatal combination of fear, power, and hubris.

by Melvyn P. Leffler via The Atlantic on January 23, 2023

Mushroom cloud of nuclear bomb.

Forgetting the Apocalypse

Why our nuclear fears faded – and why that’s dangerous.

by Daniel Immerwahr via The Guardian on May 12, 2022

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