Turning the page of history on chemical weapons

Horrendous stories emerged from World War I’s battlefields of young men choking to death as their blistered lungs filled with fluid and of soldiers’ bodies covered in painful chemical burns — the tell-tale injuries inflicted by a foul-smelling brownish gas that would creep over the trenches, penetrate through clothing, pollute the ground for many days and, even among survivors, cause cancer and genetic illnesses.

Mustard gas proved such an awful weapon that the revamped Geneva Conventions outlawed its use in 1925, although rogue nations continued using it such as the Japanese Empire against China in the 1930s, Saddam Hussein’s Iraqi army against Iran in the 1980s and, reportedly, Bashar alAssad’s air force against civilians in today’s Syrian war.

Yet some 780,000 projectiles filled with the lethal gas have sat about 20 miles east of Pueblo for decades, while plans to dismantle the shells and neutralize the chemicals languished as the Army dithered over how to decommission the weapons and Congress squabbled over funding. The work finally started this month, but the effort represents just the beginning of the truly difficult mission to rid of the world of such weapons.

By the 1990s, thoughtful international leaders ratified a treaty that should have forever banned the sinister weapons, with the United States pledging to dismantle its chemical arsenal by 2012. That deadline proved elusive as politics repeatedly delayed the destruction of the nation’s remaining chemical weapons, including those stored at the U.S. Army’s depot east of Pueblo. Bickering also erupted inside the Army over which method to use to destroy the chemicals and therefore which unit would get funding and continue to exist. The people of Pueblo, though, did not want the projectiles incinerated but instead pushed for an equally effective method that would comport with the community’s modern image. The Denver Post supported Pueblo’s efforts with editorials calling for a thorough and efficient dismantling of the weapons.

This month, at a $4.5 billion plant about 20 miles east of Pueblo, the Army began using human-controlled robots to dismantle the shells, wash out the mustard agent with water under high pressure, then neutralize the mustard agent with caustic solution and hot water. Microbes then eat the byproduct, hydrolysate, breaking it down into brine. The facility recycles the water while crews ship the resulting salt cakes for disposal at a permitted facility. Full operations won’t start, though, until the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment issues a final permit, which should come in January.

Much work remains. Destruction of the weapons near Pueblo is slated to finish by 2020, but then a multi-year process to shut down and cleanse the decommissioning facility will begin. Meanwhile, at the other remaining chemical weapons depot in Kentucky, the Army plans to start destroying chemical weapons shells and rockets in 2020.

But in a larger sense, the world will still confront the horrors of chemical weapons, which are far easier to manufacture than nuclear bombs and have been deployed far too often despite international laws banning their use. While the start of the long-delayed work at the Pueblo depot is laudable, Congress must continue funding that project and similar efforts in Kentucky. Meanwhile, the international community must recommit itself to preventing the use of such awful armaments anywhere.