WWI Website

I found this website interesting particularly in the use of poisonous gas as a weapon. Although it was initially used as a distraction, such as tear gas, the French first developed a gas capable of being used against German forces. Using these tactics, the French hurled grenades full of a tear gas mixture in order to disrupt the Germans in the fog of trench warfare. After the French had used this new weapon however, Germany picked up on it also, and expanded the level of poisonous gas based warfare. The type of tear gas used by the French, Xylyl Bromide, was the basis for a gas Germans later created, by the name of Zyklon Bromide. In trench warfare, soldiers began wearing gas masks in order to defend themselves from the assault of poison in the air. With the emergence of modern warfare, the use of posionous gas has been declared illegal by international law.
This article seemed particularly interesting because it shows one of the many creative ways that people have found to kill each other during wartime. Not only this, but it also demonstrates how war serves to hasten the development of technologies in a country, and how these technologies can end up being something completely different from anything else that the world has seen before.