Chemical Corps Document:

"Summary of Major Events and Problems"

(Fiscal Year 1955)

Formerly "Secret" Report from the military's center for bio, chemical, and radiological warfare


Acrobat document, part one
(PDF format | 83 pages | 7.8 meg)

Acrobat document, part two
(PDF format | 83 pages | 8 meg)

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Report was issued as one document, but has been divided
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>>> Issued December 1955 by the Historical Office, within the Office Chief Chemical Officer, US Army Chemical Corps. Originally "Secret" with "Restricted Data (Atomic Energy Act 1954)"; all but restricted/secret data was downgraded to unclassified on 8 Jan 1990; secret/restricted data was declassified on 24 August 1995. Completely unredacted. Obtained and kindly given to The Memory Hole by Susan L. Maret, PhD.

From page 44: "The funds obligated for research and development (R&D) came to $43,850,000. Of this $20,879,00 was spent on CW - RW, and $22,966,000 on BW."

Page 47 of the document mentions the extremely obscure nerve agent VP, which the Corps had synthesized and designated as a "candidate" for chemical warfare.

From page 48-9: "In May 1955 the Corps established a new subproject, '4-08-03-016-05, Psychochemical Agents,' with the short title, MM-1605, to uncover and develop promising agents [capable of affecting the mind].... Under this subproject, compounds were to be synthesized, and then screened to ascertain their value in causing symptoms of delusion, hallucination, mania, delirium, psychosis, depression, suicidal tendencies, paralysis, incoordination, convulsions, listlessness, weakness, headache, nauea, diziness, defects in hearing, sight, or judgment, and cutaneous disorders like urticaria."

From page 59: "During FY 1955 three new organisms were chosen for screening. These were the virus of Japanese type B. encephalitis, Richettsia rickettsii, the cause of Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever, and Variola virus, the cause of smallpox. The screening of Rickettsia prowazeki, the cause of epidemic typhus, was completed. The two most promising agents in the screening program were Coccidioides immitis, the cause of coccidioidmycosis, and Malleomyces pseudomallei, the cause of meliodosis. In the laboratory phase of investigation was Pasteurella pestis, which will probably be the next agent transferred to the Process Development and Pilot Plant. In the pilot plant at Camp Detrick, B. tularense was under investigation. This agent was being studied for large scale production at Pine Bluff Arsenal. (SECRET)"

From page 60: "Final research tests were conducted on a pathogen for rice and a pathogen for potatoes. (SECRET)"

From page 62: "One of the most important defensive measures which the Corps investigated as the protection of civilians and soldiers by means of a smoke screen against the intense heat evolved during the explosion of an atom bomb"

From page 138: "The production of GB nerve gas remained as the top priority Chemical Corps project throughout the fiscal year."

From page 141: "Total agent [GB] production for the fiscal year was approximately 898,000 gallons."

Other substances mentioned: VG, VE, VM, chemical smoke, fog oil smoke, Agent E11, incendiaries, anthrax vaccine, Agent N (anthrax).

 

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posted 11 Aug 2005
original text and site copyright 2002-5 Russ Kick