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Pentagon Discusses Chemical Weapons To Calm Rioters
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Alpha-Omega
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Jul 30, 2003 17:12 PDT
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Pentagon Discusses Chemical Weapons To Calm Rioters
Critics Say Idea Is Illegal
POSTED: 6:59 p.m. EDT September 25, 2002
WASHINGTON -- The U.S. military is exploring ways to use drugs such as
Valium to calm people without killing them during riots or other crowd
control situations where lethal weapons are inappropriate.
Some critics say the effort violates international treaties and federal
laws against chemical weapons, an allegation the military denies.
"It's a rotten idea to drug rioters," said Edward Hammond of the
Sunshine Project, a chemical and biological weapons watchdog group that
is the program's chief critic. "Beyond being a horrible idea, it's
illegal."
The Pentagon has long tried to develop nonlethal weapons that would
incapacitate or repel people with little risk of killing them. The
effort intensified in the 1990s after hostile mobs confronted U.S.
troops during peacekeeping and humanitarian missions in places like
Somalia, Bosnia and Haiti.
Officials in the military's Joint Non-Lethal Weapons Directorate began
discussing whether it would be possible to develop drugs for use as
"calmatives," or chemical peacemakers. Those discussions continued at a
seminar with British military officials in 2000, according to a joint
report on the meeting.
"During war game scenarios, numerous participants expressed the desire
to have a NLW (non-lethal weapon) that could quickly incapacitate
individuals with little or no aftereffects," the report said.
Researchers at a Pentagon-funded institute at Pennsylvania State
University prepared a 50-page report that year saying that developing
calmative weapons "is achievable and desirable" and suggesting drugs
like Valium for further research.
One hurdle for using such drugs for riot control, the researchers wrote,
is finding a way to deliver the substances to large groups, such as in a
spray or mist. Another problem would be figuring out how to prevent
other injuries, such as by people falling down if they are knocked
unconscious, the researchers wrote.
That's as far as the military went, spokesmen for Pennsylvania State and
the military said. University spokeswoman Vicki Fong said the
researchers initiated the study themselves, not under a request from the
military.
"We decided to step back and make sure the use of calmatives would not
violate the Chemical Weapons Convention," said Marine Capt. Shawn
Turner, a spokesman for the Joint Non-Lethal Weapons Directorate. "There
are still questions, and until those are worked out, we're not going to
put any funding into it."
Hammond said the research itself may have violated the anti-chemical
weapons treaty and any use of calmatives would be illegal.
"If the U.S. is going to denounce countries around the world for
violating chemical and biological arms control treaties, it better make
sure its own house is in order first," said Hammond, whose group
obtained the Pennsylvania State study and hundreds of pages of other
nonlethal weapons documents under the Freedom of Information Act.
The chemical weapons treaty allows military and police forces to use
riot control agents, such as tear gas and pepper spray, that produce
temporary irritation. The treaty bans use of chemicals that incapacitate
people, however.
The report of the U.S.-British meeting said the American participants
agreed that research into calmatives "must be conducted in a manner
consistent with our obligations under international law, including the
law of war."
Copyright 2002 by The Associated Press. All rights reserved.
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