Despite their use being subsequently banned by the Geneva Convention, countries continued to stockpile the weapons until the treaty calling for their destruction. will provide cluster munitions to Ukraine as part of a new military aid packageĬhemical weapons were first used in modern warfare in World War I, where they were estimated have killed at least 100,000. is officially underscoring that these types of weapons are no longer acceptable in the battlefield and sending a message to the handful of countries that haven’t joined the agreement, military experts say. The munitions being destroyed in Kentucky are the last of 51,000 M55 rockets with GB nerve agent - a deadly toxin also known as sarin - that have been stored at the depot since the 1940s.īy destroying the munitions, the U.S. 30 deadline to eliminate its remaining chemical weapons under the international Chemical Weapons Convention, which took effect in 1997 and was joined by 193 countries. It’s also a defining moment for arms control efforts worldwide. The weapons’ destruction is a major watershed for Richmond, Kentucky and Pueblo, Colorado, where an Army depot destroyed the last of its chemical agents last month. “Though the use of these deadly agents will always be a stain on history, today our nation has finally fulfilled our promise to rid our arsenal of this evil. “Chemical weapons are responsible for some of the most horrific episodes of human loss,” McConnell said in a statement. Workers at the Blue Grass Army Depot in Kentucky destroyed rockets filled with GB nerve agent, completing a decadeslong campaign to eliminate a stockpile that by the end of the Cold War totaled more than 30,000 tons. (AP) - The last of the United States’ declared chemical weapons stockpile was destroyed at a sprawling military installation in eastern Kentucky, Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell announced Friday, a milestone that closes a chapter of warfare dating back to World War I.
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