The Chemical Corps Regiment

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The Chemical Corps Regiment
The US Army Chemical Corps history began back in World War I as the Chemical Warfare Service. World War I came to be known as the “Chemists War” because of the first uses of chemical warfare agents (Fitzgerald, 2008). The use of chemical agents by Germany was said to have been initiated by the necessity of war fighters to develop new war strategies to offset trench warfare. German armies were complacent with trench warfare and could no longer rely on this method to ensure victory (Blodgett, 2009). Due to this uncertainty, the Germans unleashed what is known to be the first instance of chemical warfare use. In response to the German use of chemical warfare, other nations, particularly the French and the British began to manufacture poison gases as war weapons. The role that chemical weapons played took a forefront in the war efforts and demand for these new weapons was fastly increasing (Coleman, 2005).
In an effort by the US Armed Forces to level the playing field, the American Expeditionary Force was developed under the command of General John J Pershing and was deployed to Europe during World War I. The American Expeditionary Force fought in alliance with the French and the Italians. From the American Expeditionary Force, a gas service was created. The 30th Engineer Regiment (Gas and Flame) stood up in August of 1917. It would later be known as the First Gas Regiment in 1918. The First Gas Regiment’s mission was to support defensive and offensive military gas operations. Once again, in June 1918, the section was reclassified to encompass gas and chemical service operations and the Chemical Warfare Service was officially born. Major General William L Sibert was designated the first commander of the Ch...

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About.com. (2014). Us military chemical corps. Retrieved from http://usmilitary.about.com/library/milinfo/armybranches/blchem.htm Blodgett, Brian. (2009). Germany’s use of chemical warfare in world war I. Retrieved from http://firstworldwar.com/features/chemical_warfare.htm Butler, Jack. (1996). Chemical mortars and shells: The history of the 4.2” chemical mortar.
Retrieved from http://www.4point2.org/mortar42.htm
Chemical Corps Regimental Association. (2012). The us army chemical corps history.
Retrieved from http://ccrassn.org/
Coleman, K. (2005). A history of chemical warfare (11-100). New York, NY: Palgrave
MacMillan.
Fitzgerald, Gerald J. (2008). Chemical warfare and medical response during world war I.
Retrieved from http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2376985/

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