The Battle of Ypres

Almost all decisions that have shaped our political arena, alignments, and the current political and societal tension event today can be traced from the alignment of the allied and the Nazis forces during this war. However, whereas many have focused on the war in terms of its ramifications and the recounting of the events, this paper focuses on a different issue. It explores the role of intellectual who are unsung villains (or heroes depending on the side they are fighting for) in almost all wars. The Great War made great use of chemists who advanced the way of chemical weapons which have continued to have their abhorrent effective today. In this practical case, we evaluate the role of Fritz Haber in his support of the Germany troops in the war of Ypres.

It is important to mention that Haber was a Nobel prize winner which bestows him a medium of ultimate honor for his work in the Haber process (Erisman 636). However, this depiction contrasts greatly with his role in the second and third wars of Ypres. No other soldier could have affected the same level of casualty on his own as Haber did. The history of chemical weapons in the battlefield started with the launching of tear gas canister men to distribute the opposing troops. They were used by the French army with little effect to the German troops. The retreats achieved mild benefits for the Germany army, but there were again faced by the fortification of the city and found a fierce resistance by the Allied army.

However, they managed to capture the Belgian city of Antwerp where they launched their offensive. The remaining Belgian army retreated to the Ypres where there together with the Allied forces staged their final combat. On October 1914, a fierce battle ensued with both sides appearing immovable in force and tactics. It was not until late November after a serious battle that nature intervened and the storms of the shell and heavy fire ceased. They were also good hiding places since bullets rarely curve. They were employed greatly in the Great War. Although synonymously with squalor fighting condition, the trenches were areas that shielded most of the enemy fire and this minimized casualties. However, the use of an agent like a gas that was thick enough to sink deeper in the trenches could change the odds of the war greatly.

It was with this in mind that the scientist set out to develop their devastating weapons. However, these battle have a major concentration in that they employed the advancement that had been made by Haber in a great way. This involved the use of Chemicals at the front of the battle which leads to many casualties. This second war was marked by the battle of Gravenstafel in the April of 1915. Haber had toyed with various chemicals before recommending the use of chlorine gas as a major deterrent and irritant in the body of a human being (Greenfield 45). This resulted in the deployment of 171 tons of Chlorine gas that were deployed over an area covering more than 6. This is due to the corrosion of the mucous membrane like the lungs and the nose and the damaged that the gas had on body tissues.

Most of the French soldiers were also flushed out b the irritating gas, and this left them vulnerable and defenseless to enemy fire. This battle did not abate as a result. The gap between the deployed gas and the retreating German army was a chance for the Canadian troops to put on a fierce stand. The Germans at this case unveiled another attack when they burned Sulphur chloride that they had set in front of their camp (Giannakoudakis 3). However, every advancement in science comes with counteractive measures. Word was spread that the use of chlorine although devastating could be counteracted by urea. This is a substance that is commonly found in urine and reacts with chlorine to mitigate the effects of the gas.

Thus, many of the troops were asked to urinate on cotton clothes and cover their mouth and noses with them (Woodward 77). Gas masks utilized these principles were also made although it took a while before they could good ones. The German troops advanced in a pincer movement that claimed many of the British troop's lives. However, with the aid of the Sutherland Highlanders, there were able to hold off the attack and retain their place in the trenches. Despite this valor, they were forced to retreats in a 1. 5 Km required to the North and the South of Ypres. The chemical war has an estimated 100,000 causalities who succumbed to the effects of gassing. These gas masks filtered most of the obnoxious fumes and thus protected the soldiers from the attacks (Freemantle 9).

However, some were unlucky, but majorities were able to keep in fighting and thus allowed tie for the casualties to be removed from the field. Goggles were also designed to prevent the effects of the gas n vision and the damage that it had on one's eyes. This led to stalemate n that the two forces were now at equal standing in terms of the use of the chemical gas. This led to the advancement of the gases used. In the December of 1915, they released about 88 tons of gas leading to 1069 casualties, and another 69 were left dead (Giannakoudakis et al. This introduced the war into post-Ypres warfare that was largely dominated by chemical weapons. A total of 190,000 tons of gas were manufactured and used during this time in 1916.

Given that this was only two years before the end of the war, it was the thickest and employed all the expertise that could be harvested from the scientist. In some instances, Austria used a combination of phosgene and chlorine gas which claimed thousands of Italian soldier. It resulted in untold casualties and rendered land useless for an extended period. The war claimed more casualties during these chemical attacks and indiscriminately shifted the odds of the war from the army with the most lethal gas or the most advanced counteractive measures. This is manifested in the first, second and the third battle of Ypres. Work Cited Beckett, Ian FW. The Great War: 1914-1918. Erisman, Jan Willem, et al. "How a century of ammonia synthesis changed the world.