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Syria-Lebanon-Iran
Syrian govt apparently used BZ gas on rebels
2013-01-18
Last week, the U.S. consul general in Turkey wired the conclusions of the investigation to Washington in a secret cable, and yesterday an anonymous Obama Administration official leaked the contents to Josh Rogin, of Foreign Policy magazine. The official’s comments were unexpected and confounding. Despite previous accounts suggesting the use of sarin or a similar compound, he told Rogin that the State Department had determined that the chemical used in Homs was not a nerve gas at all but, rather, an arcane drug with a formula that has never been publicly identified. “We can’t definitely say 100 percent, but Syrian contacts made a compelling case that Agent 15 was used in Homs on Dec. 23,” he said. This sensational claim only made matters murkier.
The link goes on to explain the difference between nerve gas and agents like BZ. Agent 15 = BZ gas. BZ was originally developed as an incapacitating gas, but ultimately discarded as results were never the same and thus unreliable as a weapon.

The Chetniks used BZ from chemical mortars to break up a column of retreating Bosnians in '95. This link is a bizarre, scary story. What do you do when a bunch of scared, armed men start hallucinating and hearing voices? It ain't pretty.

You know what roach spray is? You spray it, the bug runs off, starts twitching uncontrollably, rolls over, and dies? Sarin gas is the same thing, just with a few molecules twiddled here and there. High lethality towards insects, low lethality towards humans: bugspray. Low lethality towards insects, high lethality towards humans: sarin gas. Betcha didn't know that!
Posted by:gromky

#5  Same antidote you'll see on Raid.
Them must be some tiny little syringes.
Posted by: Shipman   2013-01-18 16:25  

#4  Some 39 hostage-takers (Islamists separatists) were killed and some 129 hostages were killed.

And it's been pretty quiet since then, too.
Posted by: gorb   2013-01-18 13:49  

#3  I understand it was a quick-acting, powerful sedative. IIRC, hospitals use it for surgeries. If the doctors who were subsequently mustered and sent in had known, it would have helped a lot.
Posted by: gorb   2013-01-18 13:44  

#2  Russian theater crisis. After a two-and-a-half day siege, Russian Spetsnaz forces pumped an unknown chemical agent (thought to be fentanyl, or 3-methylfentanyl) into the building's ventilation system and raided it. Wonder if this gas was similar? Some 39 hostage-takers (Islamists separatists) were killed and some 129 hostages were killed.
Posted by: JohnQC   2013-01-18 10:17  

#1  When I was in, the response if one of your buddies started doing the funky chicken was to shoot him with a couple of Atropine ampules, which were to be issued if going into gas country.
Same antidote you'll see on Raid.
Coincidence? I think not.
Posted by: Richard Aubrey   2013-01-18 09:08  

00:01