VX: The Cold War's Nerve Agent Legacy
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 26 ก.ย. 2024
- In war, chemical warfare agents are never a pretty sight. Meet VX, an extremely toxic human-made chemical that devastated many, and you've probably never heard about it.
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As somebody once said, "The only difference between protecting your garden and a war crime is the size of the pest."
Yeah but bugs use venom and toxins against humans so they started it first.
My buddy's a young pilot who's first real work is looking to pilot those crop dusting jets that put down huge amounts of pesticides over huge fields. I told him he could add "chemical warfare" to his resume now
Who said that?
@@ma_junia Cropdusting Jets are a little rare since the PZL Belphegor went out of production.
@@allangibson8494 how do you know where @jun Len is ? Do you assume everyone is in your own country ?
I remember growing up in Arkansas, my grandma lived just a few minutes outside Pine Bluff. Like a lot of people, she had a refrigerator magnet with details about what different emergency siren patterns meant. There was a specific tone pattern for "there has been a breach at the Pine Bluff Arsenal, barricade yourself as tightly as possible." Curious, I asked my dad why you'd need to do something like that because something went wrong at the arsenal. That's when I learned not just what VX was, but that the Pine Bluff Arsenal had enough to easily kill every living thing in the state, if it managed to get fully dispersed. I don't know how accurate that claim was, but just the knowledge that the place I had fun at as a kid could, at any moment, be rendered virtually uninhabitable and horrifically toxic was...sobering.
Thankfully, the arsenal destroyed the last of its stocks around 2008.
I was born in Conway and lived there until 2005. Kinda dying to know why I never heard about this O_O
You didn’t mention agent orange. Several men exposed were treated at Noble Army Hospital at fort McClelland
I love learning about horrific things from you.
Haha. If I'm ever diagnosed w/an incurable disease😷 & only have days to live, I'd ask my doc to call Simon to break the news to me.😆
@@dodoubleg2356 This would be the number one request on my Cameo ;D
@@IntotheShadows you kinda left out it was more of a trade UK got hydrogen bombs while USA got VX gas
th-cam.com/video/U0ODgYxZP20/w-d-xo.html&ab_channel=tferg78
The Air Force killed a large herd of sheep with VX near Dugway Proving Grounds. They denied it for years. When I was going through safety training at the new nerve gas incinerator at Tooele South they explained what really happened. "Spray tanks" were designed to be slung under fighter jets that works like a ramjet. Doors opened at both ends, and the pressure from the slipstream would force the chemical out the rear. A Saber jet was testing a spray tank over Dugway and the rear door failed to fully open. He spread VX all the way back to the base, including most of the stuff over an area just off the base with sheep. The sheep were exposed over the following days and dropped dead.
VX is in an oily base and is intended to be persistent in the environment. It's an area denial weapon. "Nerve gas" is a more tactical version. They're basically the same chemicals but in different bases.
I still have an issue gas mask and antidote kit. Atropine as an immediate solution, and 2-PAM chloride for longer term treatment. But they only work in case of low-dose exposure. Anything beyond a runny nose and you're done.
VX smells like chrysanthemums, if case you're curious. When I worked on the base we were also told that the horrifying blister agent Lewisite smelled like garlic.....but so did a common Utah desert plant, when crushed by heavy equipment. Good times.
I once found a burst chemical warhead in the sagebrush, complete with green stripe. After the base was evacuated for a few hours the Army told us it was a "practice round." Obvious lie. The green stripe was there for a reason. Not a very pleasant place to work. More than once we'd be enjoying the cool shade of a bunker's King Tut wall and eating our lunch when a truck would roll up and a bunch of guys in full MOPP gear would shoo us away so they could deal with a "leaker" inside. It also sucked to be at the little cafe in the test incinerator complex when the gas alarm would sound, and we'd be staring at our "nerve gas burgers" though the goggles of our masks, unable to eat. Of course, the story was that it was always a "false alarm." A friend of mine went to work for the State as an environmental engineer whose responsibility included keeping an eye on the South Depot's operations. He noticed that the test incinerator personnel were chucking contaminated rages with nerve agent into the incinerator, which was not designed for that. The stack alarms were going off because NERVE GAS WAS GOING UP THE STACK. Duh. The sheer incompetence of the people in charge of the most dangerous chemicals ever designed is hard to overstate.
Incidentally, Utah had the world's largest stockpile of chemical weapons. They're all gone, and the incinerator has been dismantled and, itself, broken up and incinerated.
Chemical weapons fell out of fashion not because of some newfound humanitarian feelings, but because their value as weapons was proven to be limited. VX denies the area to EVERYONE, not just the enemy. Nerve gases and "mustard gas" depend on the whims of mother nature. When the wind shifts they're as likely to go after the user as the enemy. Such things simply don't work in a battle. What they ARE good for is killing civilians in large numbers.
Very interesting information since you worked at Tooele. Thanks for the first-person perspective.
@@mqbitsko25 precision weapons also have eliminated the desire by armies to own tactical nukes. They would rather have a small fleet of drones & guided bombs or rockets. Chemical weapons don't blow up bridges. Eventually ICBMs will become obsolete as well due to lasers. Lasers will eventually make ICBMs look like Napoleonic warfare.
It's not incompetence, those who've been running the show for years or decades naturally create a culture of casual interaction. They're like the kid who's job is to make pizza and he has done it so many times that you could tie him up to a chair and he would still make the pizza. The only solution is to keep the crews fresh by constantly swapping out old recruits with new recruits who would be scared of their own shadow around chemical weapons..
Thank you!! I used to teach these classes in the military. One thing that has bothered me since, is that for some reason we still spray pesticides all over, knowing that they are basically weak nerve agents. Considering the symptoms, I really wonder how many allergies are reactions to pesticides and herbicides.
Sidenote, for those who know: the goat is dead....the goat is alive....the goat is dead.
Allergies? How many kids have been diagnosed ADHD when it's really something else, and a mild nerve agent fits that bill almost too perfectly.
@@Chris-hx3om you want a little tin foil with your conspiracy?
@@derpinguin7003 No, it's not a conspiracy. I have just noticed that there was a period in the 80s and 90s where every second kid was being diagnosed with some form of attention disorder. Thankfully it appears normality has been restored, and the number of diagnosis of ADHD is back down again. Funny that, ah?
@@Chris-hx3om my adhd is very real thank you very much I was born with it and I will die with it
@@danjones4432 Congratulations, you are part of the 0.1% (or less) of the population who REALLY does have it.
0:55 - Chapter 1 - What is it ?
1:55 - Chapter 2 - How does it kills you ?
4:15 - Chapter 3 - Development
7:10 - Chapter 4 - Testing
9:55 - Chapter 5 - Deaths
12:30 - Chapter 6 - Who has VX ?
We had atropine injectors in Viet Nam in 67-68, they came with gas masks. Sure as hell hoped we never planned to use VX. Agent Orange survivor here.
Agent orange is a very different composition. While it is a very nasty chemical its effects on humans are almost never acute. You could compare the need for antropine with it with being allergic to bee stings.
Oh yeaaaah sure you're the survivor of it, not all those families who still have to live on the land where it was sprayed but *you're* the survivor right??
USA will come invade our countries and then 20 years later they start making movies about how killing all those innocent civilians made them so sad.
But yeah, keep on pretending like you're the survivor of it. Smh 🤦♂️
@@DavidGarcia-oi5nt not living somewhere doesn't mean you didn't suffer what occured. If my neighbor and I get out of my house when it's on fire, we both survived the fire. Stop being so petulant.
@@andiward7068 he was literally part of the army that dispersed the Agent Orange and received gas masks but yeah he's the survivor here, not the children that have birth defects. Yup he's the victim.
@@DavidGarcia-oi5nt again, one person can be both a victim and perpetrator at the same time. If your drunk ass drives into my car and you survive, you survived a drunk driving accident, whether or not you caused it does not change the end result.
I remember when going thru basic training we had to practice giving ourselves those shots. And that was only back in 2004.
Now imagine that as an actual threat in '98. You've never felt heat until you've donned your chem suit in 140f weather.
@@Evocatorum yeah my point was that even in 2004 it was such a threat that it was taught at the basic level and not the unit level.
Same
Oh, and try teaching this class to people who roll their eyes "iT WiLl nEvEr hApPeN tO mE".... just put your shit on and be glad there is a way to protect yourself JIC.
Before deploying for the 91 Gulf War we all got extra chem weapons training. Saddam had gassed his own citizens recently and we were all convinced that when the shooting started we were gonna get hit with that stuff. We took it pretty seriously.
As an old Chemical Operations Specialist (NBC) in the Army, I can verify this is nasty stuff. We did live training with it, and it was terrifying.
What does live training entail? Animal testing?
@@MrPrussianjester no, using a small amount to detect, decontamination, then checking the contamination to see that your decon worked.
There is an old training video (since banned) where the kill a goat multiple times, along with some birds.
At Leonard wood? Or the location it was before that?
@@unfortdork It shouldn't be banned its historical documentation. They just want to bury the evidence.
@@MrPrussianjester I am currently in this training, lots and lots of sitting in a classroom, some working in MOPP 4. And at the end of it they spray you with Sarin and VX while you're in MOPP 4, I get to do that in a few weeks. No animal testing, but they do show you a few videos of it
I live about an hour south of the Blue Grass Chemical Agent-Destruction Pilot Plant in Richmond, KY, which is in the process of neutralizing the VX and other chemical stockpiles there. Knowing the amount of destructive power on that base has always been a bit surreal whenever I went to Richmond.
Atropine being a treatment is interesting. Humans develop a nasty artificial poison and the treatment is a natural chemical produced by some plants in particular the one with the name deadly nightshade.
Yeah but ingest nightshade without VX and you’re gonna have a really, really unpleasant time
@@kierran5021 True most people react badly to datura, the atropine occuring with hyoscyamine n especially scopolamine, an extremely toxic compound that does have some use as a high risk "truth serum", high risk meaning you only want to give it to prisoners of war who it doesn't really matter if they die or not but the compound I guess makes a person feel like they're in a dream, really heavy delirium but atropine in tiny doses is a very effective antihistamine, people who have that just annoying watery eyes and runny nose it's all taken away almost completely by atropine, nowadays benadryl works just as well
@@kierran5021 So is VX a cure for Deadly Nightshade 🙂
@@boneav83 yes but if you want to get to the same orders of magnitude, you'd want agent BZ (3-quinuclidyl benzilate). It's ironic that an ultrapotent deliriant, a chem warfare agent itself would be an antidote for nerve agents!
My exposure to such things was a brief visit to Johnston Atoll in the early 80s, where massive quantities of VX and other chemical warfare agents were stored. Fortunately all that stuff has been safely destroyed now....at least on Johnston Atoll...
:*0
@@boneav83 *Short answer:* Technically yes, but the difference between an antidote dose and a lethal dose of VX is so tiny it's not practical to use. Other, weaker nerve agent compounds like the Calabar bean poison _Physostigmine_ or the chemically similar _Neostigmine_ are used pharmaceutically instead.
*Long answer.* Kind of: Compounds like Neostigmine or Physostigmine which have similar pharmacological effects to nerve agents but are far weaker in potency, are, among other pharmaceutical uses, used to treat atropine poisoning. These compounds, just like nerve agents, work by inhibiting the enzyme Acetylcholine Esterase, thus preventing breakdown of the neurotransmitter Acetylcholine and increasing parasympathetic nerve activity. If overdosed, this leads to convulsions and seizures, or death by paralyzing lung and heart muscle tissue.
Atropine, the poisonous substance in deadly nightshade, has the opposite effect and reduces parasympathetic nerve activity by blocking muscarinic Acetylcholine receptors.
"Real" nerve agents like VX, Sarin or Novichok are way too strong and too difficult to administer in doses leading to pharmacologically desired but no toxic effects.
If you still take suggestions, then i think i have a decent suggestion for something people know little about. During the second boer war, the british had a number of concentration camps during which many people perished. I think it could make a good subject, the concentrstion camps, or the second boer war itself.
A real *Holy Shit* moment was learning about how to properly use the EpiPen injector. They specifically tell us that our squadmate would probably be having a violent seizure when we tried to inject them, and to try and hold them down to keep them from breaking their bones from the flailing around.
You’re not supposed to hold them down, just scoot them away from or block their path to dangerous objects.
I hate action movie reali- bullsh*try stuff like "after your skin melts off" and "the only stuff hot enough to degrade VX is thermite plasma", PATENT action movie b*******try that finds its way into serious conspiracy theories, then you have Jesse Ventura claiming that the twin towers were brought down by "thermite", Jesse being a good guy to talk about "thermite" being a former action movie star LOL
Damn bro imagine having a nerve agent induced seizure then getting injected with epinephrine 💀 that would suck. Better than dying I guess.
@@tongpoo8985It's not epinephrine, but it is an auto injector filled with an atropine mix
@@tongpoo8985To counter nerve agent it’s not epinephrine, it’s atropine. Similar style injector which is why he said EpiPen.
Having been through specialized military training in chemical weapons protection and decontamination, there is nothing more terrifying than VX. Never knew what VX was the acronym of until now. Thanks for this video.
That charcoal powder and antidote kit was awesome, weren't they?
@@Nipplator99999999999 Sure glad we never had to find out if they worked.
@@dougbotimer8005 that and white phosphorus lead my biggest fears
Specialized? CBR training was a part of Navy Basic Training back when I was still in. Did something change in the past 20 years?
My grandfather best described it to ma as essentially insecticide for humans. Given that insecticide and nerve agents have similar mechanisms of action, it is assuredly not a pleasant death for the victims. I dislike using insecticides in the house as a result, as it’s not the sort of death I wish to inflict upon even household pests.
My uncle was a a medic with the 1st ID in Gulf War 1. He told me once how everyone constantly carried atropine one-use injections and gas masks. As a medic he had to practice giving the injection on himself, and there were a fair amount of times he had to get his gas mask on while in country.
He learned to inject himself in basic training. Like every other recruit in the US military the last 70 years
this guy releases new videos faster than i can watch them, unbelievable! how? simon, how do you do this? plz don't burn out or sth. ^^
i have been binging your channels for a week now and even when i go to bed, i queue up some casual criminalist podcasts. so good!
Mr. Whistler, I have to ask. Do you ever sleep? I've seen you host more channels than I can count on one hand.
He has a huge staff of editors and writers for each channel. He just films. Still a lot of work, but little enough to allow sleep. Lol
More than you can count in 2 hands
@@jessn.2665 That's a good point.
@@jessn.2665 And they're all held hostage in his basement
He makes Danny sleep for him together with doing the scripts. But Danny is only one of his basement slaves, there are hundreds of them hidden away like the woman in the 'Martyrs' film.
A city just up the highway from my city, Newport, IN, held a massive quantity of VX gas for a long time. My city was apparently on the Soviet nuclear target list =( I remember when it started to be known that VX was being destroyed. It took a really long time but there's none left. We're probably still on the nuke list though due to the sheer amount of ammunition the military stores nearby plus the Air Force base is now home to a lot of drone operators. Yay.....
Was waiting to see this. Crazy seeing how much more was stock piled and they made it seem like we had the only location with it. Remember September 11th is the day I learned about it. Was glad when it was away from here
So I grew up next to an army depot that was in charge of destroying part of our chemical weapon stockpile. I never knew how TERRIFYING that fact was until this video. We had regular drills in school in case of a leak at the plant… I’m gonna have nightmares now. thanks for that Simon haha
We still carry duodote autoinjectors on our fire apparatus which were distributed after 9/11. I've used one once in 20 years on a farm worker that had been spraying pesticides all day and was showing the classic SLUDGEM symptoms. Not the same potency as VX, but same effects (organophosphate ACE inhibitor).
My favorite example of biological warfare in antiquity are the flaming pigs used against war elephants.
The thing about the nerve agent scientists insisting on human experimentation sounds about right. Anyone who voluntarily develops these kinds of chemical horrors is probably not terribly empathetic and probably has some interesting stuff going on with self preservation
I remember the training myself and the extra part being exposed to “tear gas” with taking the mask off to know how it felt.
One of my Drill Sgts was stationed on Johnston Atoll where the US Army destroyed chemical agents. I deployed to Kuwait in '03 where we believed the scuds flying overhead were laden with WMD then we crossed the berm into Iraq in MOPP2 and I was the Co. NBC NCO. A few months down the line, based in Mosul and no longer considering WMD a threat I ended up with the Co.'s auto-injector kits under my cot.
The US started incinerating it's last stockpile of vx in 2003. I was assigned to guard the base while they were getting the furnaces up an running.
I spent a year on Johnston Atoll when the furnaces were being designed. An island paradise with the largest stockpile of nerve agent in the western world.
Great video! I attended Eastern Kentucky University (EKU) and one of the biggest U.S. stockpiles of VX was at the Bluegrass Army Depot. I remember driving around Richmond, KY, and seeing the huge air raid siren speakers all over the town. Every Friday, there was a test of the warning system. The gas stockpile has just recently been incinerated.
Hey Simon, I'd love to see you and your staff do a video on the Novichok agents. I do research online but can't seem to find any credible sources other than the defector that claims he invented them. Hope you and your staff have a wonderful holiday season. Love your work, helps pass the time at work!
@Tom Foster I done a delivery to the Salisbury a few days after it happened to a restaurant and even though not alot of people were out and about (being work time I guessed), there wasn't alot going on and I didn't see any signs of anything, was abit of an eerie, but normal? feeling at the time.. Now I'm not saying nothing happened but it seemed to just come and go without much more news...
@Tom Foster
Balls!
A-234 was the "novichok" (newcomer) used in the attack in Salisbury, UK.
In addition to DSTL Porton, it was also independently verified by four separate OPCW-licenced laboratories in other countries.
Last time I was this early, Simon only had 1 channel.
I grew up near Anniston Army Depot in Alabama and remember as a kid my family being given a kit to use to seal a room of out house with plastic film to wait for an all clear. This was because they were incinerating VX there, or so we were told.
I think it's interesting how North Korea is so obsessed with getting nukes, when they've shown they have access to nerve agents. Honestly, the amount of damage from a well built VX delivery mechanism can do way more damage than a nuke. Just build a ballistic missile with a chemical dispersal tip, and you're basically where you wanna be deterrent-wise....
maybe they already have it. But they don't talk about it.
Really enjoying the information presented in these videos, Simon!
Thanks ❤️
Forgot about civilian Dawn Sturgess dying from Novichok in 2018 - she was a great woman who deserved a mention- just saying.
I remember learning about the nerve gas attacks in tokyo subways many years ago, I remember going there as a young bloke and i had a terrible feeling of dread in the subway tunnels thinking about why would anyone do this to those poor peaceful people and having a feeling of not being able to escape was horrible. It worries me about what horrible things that powerful nations and rouge agents have in this day and age. Its scary.
I was in training at Edgewood Arsenal back in 2001. Large blocks of wooded land were fenced off with skull and crossbone signs. Former dilapidated buildings were fenced and also protected with concertina wire. We would run in formation during PT around base where drill sergeants would explain that the buildings were so contaminated that if they were demolished traditionally, we would die from exposure. Also, tons of chemical weapons were buried all around the base.
I was there for AIT in 05 and they told us the same thing, there were times running around that shithole they'd quick step us from the run, then rte step and zero talking in certain areas cuz the thumping from our shoes could disturb old chemical weapons buried all around that place. And the horses there were an early warning system in case of a leak, if they were found dead an evac of the arsenal would take place.
If Hitler had any redeeming features, however small, it is that he refused to use the huge stockpiles of chemical weapons the Nazis had near the end of the war. I think it was Josef Goebbels who said to Hitler “If we are ever to use this weapon it is now”, and Hitler refused.
Umatilla washington....Washington.... underground storage for everything from mustard gas to vx.
"The only known uses is insecticides and never agents"
Phosgene is used in tons of chemical processes.
Like Nic Cage said, it’s one of those things we wish we could disinvent.
NOT THE BEEEEEES!
Honestly speaking, when I saw The Rock my first question was how Atropine was supposed to keep his skin from blistering and his face from melting off. I mean, it's injected and it does strange and wondrous things to your cardiovascular system but it shouldn't be able to affect anything that's just wrecking your skin and flesh.
I remember arguing with my friend that had lent me the movie about it and his only comment was "Yes you're right, it shouldn't have kept his face from melting off."
Now I work in biomedicine and know better. Side note: There are toxins which are not nerve agents that can also kill you by being absorbed through the skin, and others which can carry things that shouldn't be able to kill you by just getting on your skin, through your skin (and gloves, if you're wearing the wrong kind.)
I love your videos, you make the horrific and the macabre sound so proper.
All those symptoms described meat loaf night
NileRed in 6 months: "Turning Forty-Eight Moths From My Porchlight Into 1 Gram of VX Gas"
"Research was continued by the apparently more responsible United States." ROTFLMAO 😄😂😌😁
;D
@@IntotheShadows hpjmo
Anyone that doesn't live here is a worse critic than we are... 🙄
@@jojohaj1087 jealousy of the empire. While their third world leaders are fucking little boys they look on at our empire and daydream. You don’t see people risking their lives to flee to their third world shit hole. 🤣🤣🤣
@@ZombiesAteMyGF well, I mean, if you've ever heard COVID-19 conspiracy theories involving something called USAMRIID (the US Army Medical Research Institue on Infectious Diseases) at a place called Fort Detrick in Maryland, there's good reason for that.
The facility was originally used for research into biological warfare. It still exists, but now they allegedly only work on bioterror defense measures. Quite a few people are understandably skeptical of the Army's assurances. I'm not one of the conspiracy theorists, but I can understand the skepticism. The US signed the Treaty banning chemical and biological weapons in the '70s but many people allege that the government never stopped working on them.
The US did not end it's chemical weapons program in 1969. It ended it's *biological* weapons program in 1969. The chemical weapons program remained until the US signed the Chemical Weapons Convention in the 1990s.
Makes me think of the scene in the 1st Black Ops where Dragovich, Krevcehnco and Dr. Steiner used Nova 6 on Dimitri Petrenko and 2 other red army soilders making Reznov watch as his friend and comrades die a horrific death
Dragovich !!!! Krevcehnco !!!! Steiner !!!! All Must Die!!!!
Myasthenia Gravis also affects Acetylcholine esterase. Symptoms are similar to what Simon describes. But over a considerably slower time frame. It is, however, progressive and fatal.
Venomous Agent X.
So punk rock.
The Rock was perfectly accurate on this point.
"It's one of those things we wish we could disinvent."
How the hell did they find out it was tasteless?
Atropine is a standard medication that is carried by paramedic ambulance crews and hospital emergency admissions departments. It is used to treat certain heart conditions. Says I who works at a hospital AND is very knowledgeable about Chemical Warfare Agents.
It is also one of three drugs used to treat organophosphorous poisoning (i.e. nerve agents). The other two being Oximes and Diazepam.
😌Ahhh.... 🙂 It can feel quite refreshing at times to be reminded that we are still on the path to our own demise.
Subscribed.😊 Best documentaries.
Was stationed at Edgwood Arsenal for 4 years. Learned all about vx, all the other stuff our military loves to play with. Unfortunately we still have it
The whole getting up when it was over thing was a nice touch
Simon, I'm jealous of your beard 😕
@@isaaclux2128 beat me to it.
His product line "Beard Blaze" is quite good. I would imagine that's what he uses.
Tf, why was my comment deleted?
@@isaaclux2128 WTF?
@@isaaclux2128 Did your comment got a link in it? Yeah TH-cam delete them comment automatically
Our CRUISE missiles can strike up to 3 separate targets, two of which could be gas/nerve agent weapons. North Korea has it's own CRUISE delivery systems, thanks to the Reagan administration. Yes, they outsourced manufacture of the guidance systems to South Korea. One year later North Korea began testing it's own CRUISE program...
Its not like SK is an ally of the US we want to keep independent or anything. It was probably stolen by Chinese government backed hackers or Russian ones. They just passed it along or sold it. Our cyber defense is quite shit.
Always has me thinking of “The Rock” with Connery and Cage. RIP Connery
Instead of aircraft for dispersing VX, think long range cruise missiles.
Fit cruise missiles with spray nozzles and tanks of VX (or anthrax, or smallpox), put them on bombers or submarines, and launch them just off the coast of the USA.
That's what the USSR was planning for employing these weapons strategically. Works far better than spray aircraft of course, as the missiles would be harder to detect and shoot down, and less of a loss to the USSR if they (or at least some of them) were shot down.
It is thought this delivery system reached prototype stage, but I've not been able to confirm that through other sources. That it was studied seriously however is certain.
Inaccuracy in the intro: Stainless steel was invented almost 100 years before WW1, and was commercialized circa 1840. First military use was circa 1850. WW1 just saw it popularized, and even more so on WW2.
I had a surgery once where the anesthetic wore off before the paralytic did. I lay there for 30 seconds unable to move or take a breath as panic started to set in. I literally have PTSD. I live in terror of drowning choking or getting a nerve agent that affects the acetylcholine system. God help us if stuff like this is ever used.
If you're wearing protective gear but are unsure if you're in a chemical environment, we were trained to ask the junior guy for his weapon, then tell him to unmask. Watch his pupils, and see if they constrict. If they don't, you're probably fine.
Consider that now we have drones and high precision computing devices.
You do not need an explosive tip on a missile. a missile is just a container with a rocket on it.
Sure Saddam had VX and other agents, it was sold to him by the US during his war with Iran. There is a picture of Defense Secretary Rumsfeld meeting with the leader in Irag, the subject of the meeting was reportedly finalizing the sale
@Tom Foster true
I also wondered why this FACT was excluded from the video. Most nations that got their VX got it DIRECTLY from the UK or US and both were happy to sell or gift to anyone who was deemed an ally. Others managed to get it via espionage or dubious channels and it was well known Iraq offered it to nations targeted by the West after the 1991 Gulf War to offer up a level of defence against endless accusations against countries who have desirable assets like gas, oil, various minerals (Afghanistan has all hence the last 20 years) or just plain theft of their assets. Some nations were selling their gas/oil in currencies other than the dollar, cutting the US/OPEC out of the deal and Saddam was selling his oil in Euro's since 2000 hence the invasion in 2003 with the usual 'we believe' crappy unsubstantiated cover story proposed by the US that was then supported by Poodle Force aka NATO.
The German scientists who developed Tabun and Soman moved to Syria. The recipes were however widely published after WW2.
@@reggiep75 bollocks. How do you transport the most toxic nerve agent in total secrecy and security? We sold Saddam fuck all. I got the patent for VX out of the library 30 years ago.
Redstone Arsenal in North Alabama was a major manufacturing site as was Pine Bluff Arsenal. Anniston Army Depot was weapons center
I've been a porton down Guinea pig for chemical weapon decontamination tests, it sucked big time!
The worst case scenario for VX would be an organized terror attack. Gas weapons have been used in terror movements before, a certain subway attack comes to mind...
There used to be a huge stockpile of VX right here in Indiana. The Newport Chemical Weapons facility. I used to live near there.
Holy shit, 11:49, a guy with a British/Aussie (“commonwealth”) accent said ‘THE hospital’ and not just “went to hospital” or whatever.
He reads scripts and those scripts are generally written by the creators of the channels that hire him, they are predominantly American.
I'm not sure why Americans find "go to hospital" so strange. After all, you say go to school, go to college, go to jail and similar.
@@dingo137just because we're used to "the hospital"
This all brings me back to my military days, back when "lay on the ground and pretend to convulse" was part of regular on-the-job training.
Haha I just got to be the seizure dummy for annual CBRNE training.
There's a disused chemical weapons storage facility and incinerator near Hermiston in NE Oregon. Some of the weapons date from WWII kept in storage for use on Japan in case the atom bomb didn't/couldn't be used. That's what I gleaned from various print and online sources, the usual suspects. So take some of the details, not the basic history, with a grain of salt.
I misread the thumbnail as venomous N and was like “crap, another one?”
Studying pharmacology I developed a morbid interest in these kind of compounds, and I find it fascinating how some drugs work basically the same as chemical warfare agents, just weaker and/or far better to control when administered. Some examples include:
1.) Parasympathomimetics, which work just like nerve agents by ihibiting acetylcholine esterase, and are used to treat glaucoma as well as deadly nightshade poisoning.
2.) Alkylating cytostatics of the Nitrogen mustard group, which work like mustard gas by alkylating DNA, and exploit the faster metabolism of tumor cells to treat many types of cancer (Chemotherapy).
3.) Botulinum toxin has the opposite effect of nerve agents, but is much more potent and among the most toxic substances known to mankind; and is used in extreme dilution (1 to 1 million or more) to treat muscle spasms and for cosmetic uses.
4.) Chlorine is both a dangerous respiratory poison and an excellent disinfectant.
I can not help but wonder which was used in Otto Warmbiers case.
Does nobody else see potential issues with filling ships with nerve agents, then putting holes in them and sinking them? Sushi anyone? 🍣
The best part is due to ocean currents and the fact things move around on the bottom the maps of where these are aren't accurate and some are lost completely.
The only thing worse than a ticking time bomb of nerve agents and poison gas is one you have no idea the location of
VX is, fortunately, rather bio degradable unlike DDT and the utterly stupid heavy metal compounds they liked to produce in that era.
@@andersjjensen That makes slightly more sense. Between radioactive materials, heavy metals, and other assorted toxins dumped in the oceans it seems bizarre to think.....phew! That's OK then. It's only VX!
@@stonewolf7850 It probably wouldn't be OK at all if, say, an old sunken sea mine blew a hole in the ship. But if the shit just slowly rusts away and seeps into the ocean over a hundred years only the occasional crab or lobster will take offence :P Toxicity is, after all, always a matter of dosage.
@@andersjjensen Any idea what the half-life is on VX? If it's something that accumulated in tissues, it's still potentially harmful. Secondary toxicity like mercury.
I almost spat out my drink when i heard Colonel S. Ketchum. How History changes when you are not exposed to Pocket Monster at Age 10...
"Eye contact" I know what he meant but imagine. Just looking at it kills you.
Credit to the scientists willing to experiment upon themselves I suppose.
love how you threw in the picture of epstien
When I was in the navy in Desert Storm, we were all assigned atropine along with 2-pam-cloride auto injectors. When we went into general quarters due to incoming scuds, which happened a lot, those were close by our side! We all feared the multiple air burst scuds that we encountered. I always felt bad for the guys up on the flight deck in CBN gear, holding testing equipment into the air looking for chemical weapons poisons. They were the canary for all of us hunkered down in hot, sweaty compartments! I'm so glad their sensors never went off!
the ballistic missle portion is incorrect, at least for theater missles they can survive by simply not having a standard warhead and rather open up a few hundred meters above, we train for this regularly in the south.
Please, Simon! Another channel!
Kills you by eye contact? Like the ark of the covenant?
Now that everything have a villain and a hero, i would love to know more about the anthrax and SEB. Maybe it wasnt deployed as the psycopaths wanted, but they tried, and about anthrax its cool, or terrible to know how "easy" it is to get it!
Diazepam (Valium) is also an auto injector carried to counter nerve agent. It's administered after the atropene.
The predecessor to VX was Amiton, an ICI industrial pesticide. But it was withdrawn from sale when ICI realised its mammalian toxicity. ICI gave information on Amiton to Porton Down, who then experimented with its molecular structure and came up with a series of "venomous" agents.
The most toxic and the most stable was VX.
Crude (impure) VX is an amber-coloured oily liquid. Purified VX is an oily liquid that has no colour.
Amiton is better known today as VG.
Human Beings are really great at developing terrible methods of killing other Humans. Nerve agents are an example of this.
Just learned this? Or repeating the same that's been talked about since the literal beginning of time
Vx makes you do the kickin chicken...
Pretty hard to fall asleep to this channel mate 😅😅🤣🤣
Between 1938-1960 RAF Harpur Hill in Derbyshire was an underground storage bunker for ordinance and captured German bombs and V2 warheads. Unit 28 also disposed of out of date explosives as well as stocks of mustard and chlorine gas.
2:21 I feel the same when the misses get back early from work....
I first heard of VX in world war z the book. Damn good read
What an interesting and well made video, kudos to you
I help build the filters to get rid of vx, and all the other crap they made. The filter units are huge as big a house.
i love this channel. i joined a gaming group named after vX we are good at games too 🤣 i didnt know what they named us til my buddy told me a while after. seeing this is insane
fun fact, calculators and any information read out that is red and have visible filaments have VX that reacts with the electrical charge
funny how you don't mention the other 3 countries who have it. Israel being one of them.
An offensive chemical agent is near tactically useless without an effective antidote. Hence Portman Down. As a territory denial weapon perhaps but little more.
As someone who live in Salisbury, I always double take when someone talks about Salisbury. Then remember novachok happened.
Basamid from BSAF, is a useful and interesting horticultural product with a deeply dark past!
Clicked on this thinking it was Vsause but this guys cool too