The destruction of weapons under the chemical weapons convention

Abstract

As the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) enters into force, countries with stocks of chemical weapons will begin the task of destroying them. In the U.S. whose stockpile consists of approximately 30,000 tons of nerve and blister agents at eight separate sites in the continental United States and at Johnston Atoll in the Pacific, the Army has designed a highly‐automated “baseline” system to dismantle and incinerate the weapons. Although researchers have identified potential alternatives to incineration, involving chemical neutralization and biodegradation, it appears that these techniques are likely to substitute for incineration at most, at two sites: Newport, Indiana, and Aberdeen, Maryland. The Russian destruction program is less advanced than that of the U.S. and probably cannot be carried out effectively without significant and technical assistance from abroad, an urgent requirement given that the Duma Defense Committee has described Russian Chemical weapons storage sites as insecure and unsafe.