Who Said Chemical Warfare?: Riot Control Agents and U.S. Ratification of the Geneva Protocol, 1975

This article explores the Nixon administration's resubmission to the U.S. Senate of the Geneva Protocol: the 1925 treaty that prohibited use of chemical and biological weapons in warfare. Extensive use of Riot Control Agents (RCAs) and plant herbicides by U.S. forces in the Vietnam War had attracted much international criticism alleging that such substances were banned by the Protocol and contravened international law. The ratification initiative was broadly welcomed, but it ran into problems because of the Nixon administration's interpretation that these substances were exempted, contrary to the understanding of the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee and elements of civil society. The most complex arguments surrounded RCAs, whose status in warfare had long been ambiguous, exacerbated by new concerns pertaining to herbicides and environmental warfare. This episode, though swayed by the exigencies of the Cold War, illustrated how official bodies and civil society representatives spoke to their respective authorities concerning the utility and legality of certain weapons. The episode was also representative of the wider clash between the U.S. executive and legislative branches of government concerning oversight of foreign policy amid the escalation of the Vietnam War.