Ulf Schmidt. Secret Science. A Century of Poison Warfare and Human Experiments

The history of chemical warfare has been gaining more interest in the past few years in large part because of the centenary of the first major use of chemicals at the Second Battle of Ypres in 1915. Schmidt's book is a welcome addition to the literature and represents a view of chemical warfare that is focused on the medical and political side rather than the military aspects of the weapons. Before looking at some of the contents, however, it should be noted that the title of the book is a bit misleading. Although Secret Science. A Century of Poison Warfare and Human Experiments does, technically, cover the topic from 1915 to the present, only one chapter of ten looks at pre-World War II material. The focus is primarily on British work starting in World War II and ending with the settlement for human test subjects at Porton Down in 2008. There are side trips into German work—particularly chapter 3, “Research without Bounds” about the German gas program and why it did not use its chemical weapons during World War II, and later sections on American research during the Cold War—but these exist largely to provide context for the main investigation.

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