WEBVTT - The MDMA Cook Who Tried To Commit Genocide 0:00:03.080 --> 0:00:08.600 It's podcast and time podcast Sno's damn it. I am 0:00:08.760 --> 0:00:11.440 Robert Evans hosted Behind the Bastards, trying to find a 0:00:11.440 --> 0:00:14.200 new UH strategy for introducing the show because I got 0:00:14.200 --> 0:00:16.959 tired of the old ways and I that was not 0:00:17.040 --> 0:00:22.799 a success. It was a miserable failure. UM and UH today, though, 0:00:23.000 --> 0:00:25.840 my guest is not a miserable failure. It's Mr Billy 0:00:25.840 --> 0:00:31.639 Wayne hon Airhorn Airhorn, How you doing, Billy? Good? Was 0:00:31.680 --> 0:00:36.839 that good? I liked? That was fine. I think a 0:00:36.840 --> 0:00:39.440 lot of people who have their their car stereos up 0:00:39.520 --> 0:00:41.600 high in the early part of the show are maybe 0:00:41.600 --> 0:00:43.560 frustrated with you. You might have caused a car record 0:00:43.560 --> 0:00:50.120 to aggressive apologize. I was just excited. Yeah, it's okay. 0:00:50.920 --> 0:00:52.880 I'm trying to find a new way to introduce my show, 0:00:53.080 --> 0:00:56.560 and I'm clearly terrible at it. Uh. Notes. You know 0:00:56.600 --> 0:01:01.760 you're a professional introducer. I know. I'm mean, it's basically 0:01:01.800 --> 0:01:04.360 I like the way you were doing it before because 0:01:04.360 --> 0:01:07.920 it was like the what's X in my wise? Yeah, yeah, 0:01:08.120 --> 0:01:12.240 it's catchy, and I mean it's exhausting to come up 0:01:12.280 --> 0:01:15.560 with a new one every time, but it is I 0:01:15.640 --> 0:01:18.720 do like when I feel it My favorite part is 0:01:18.760 --> 0:01:21.240 when you can feel you making it up as you go. 0:01:22.200 --> 0:01:26.120 Mm hmm. Yeah, yeah, that's definitely the case. Every time 0:01:26.360 --> 0:01:28.319 I was I'm debating as to whether or not to 0:01:28.400 --> 0:01:32.400 stick to a format though, but one he won't use 0:01:32.440 --> 0:01:34.960 the one I wrote as a format. You wrote one? Yeah, 0:01:35.319 --> 0:01:39.360 what did you write? I said, what's salty my ex boyfriends? 0:01:39.480 --> 0:01:42.640 It's great? Right, no, nobody, all right, continue with your show. 0:01:43.520 --> 0:01:51.080 What's the salting your Okay? What's salt peppers? Already takes 0:01:51.120 --> 0:01:52.960 you in a direction you do not want to go 0:01:53.280 --> 0:01:57.800 off the bat. We're like, wait, what is that issue? Okay, 0:01:57.800 --> 0:02:01.000 because I don't I don't know what salting your ex boyfriends. 0:02:01.000 --> 0:02:04.000 I do know what's cracking my peppers. It's the pepper 0:02:04.200 --> 0:02:08.240 cracker that I have. Also, buy that shirt on t public. 0:02:08.280 --> 0:02:11.519 It's cute. Okay. Yeah, So we have some old business 0:02:11.560 --> 0:02:13.840 before we get into the episode today, Billy Uh. One 0:02:13.840 --> 0:02:16.160 of those pieces of old business is that a couple 0:02:16.360 --> 0:02:19.000 of of our fans found you at a comedy show 0:02:19.080 --> 0:02:23.000 and gave you a wonderful gift for me. It's in 0:02:23.040 --> 0:02:26.560 an odd gift. They did contact me and us before 0:02:26.840 --> 0:02:31.480 on Twitter, which was nice and very thoughtful because it 0:02:31.639 --> 0:02:35.800 is nice to know to expect this gift. And yeah, 0:02:35.840 --> 0:02:37.519 it's not a kind of gift you'd want to receive 0:02:37.560 --> 0:02:40.920 at random, no God, and especially at this show was 0:02:40.960 --> 0:02:46.560 like in a house basement in Louisville, So like, the 0:02:46.600 --> 0:02:48.959 show is in this guy's these people's basement. And then 0:02:49.639 --> 0:02:53.880 I was selling T shirts and just meeting people afterwards 0:02:54.000 --> 0:02:58.239 in their living room basically. And then yeah, these people 0:02:58.360 --> 0:03:00.440 stood in line very patiently and there like, hey, we 0:03:00.480 --> 0:03:02.160 like about a T shirt. That was cool, and then 0:03:02.200 --> 0:03:05.119 they're also here you go, and I was like, it's 0:03:05.200 --> 0:03:09.639 real and and what what what was this gift? Billy? 0:03:09.680 --> 0:03:16.560 It was it's a brown shirt, Uh, Nazi dagger and 0:03:16.639 --> 0:03:22.080 it's it's legit and uh. They reached out to us 0:03:22.120 --> 0:03:24.160 on Twitter beforehand and explained that it was like a 0:03:24.200 --> 0:03:26.760 family heirloom they didn't want to have anymore. And he 0:03:26.800 --> 0:03:30.280 was a brother and sister. Um that was so happy 0:03:30.360 --> 0:03:34.359 to give it to me. And I don't really know 0:03:34.400 --> 0:03:36.920 what to do with such a thing. Um, it is 0:03:36.960 --> 0:03:40.760 a piece of history, uh, and and an interesting one 0:03:40.800 --> 0:03:44.880 at that. Um. Definitely not the kind of thing you 0:03:44.880 --> 0:03:47.000 want to have out just in your living room because 0:03:47.040 --> 0:03:50.040 people will make the wrong conclusions. About it, and my 0:03:50.120 --> 0:03:52.960 wife and mother in law we're at my house when 0:03:52.960 --> 0:03:55.800 I opened it because I shipped it because I didn't 0:03:55.840 --> 0:03:58.120 want to fly with it. Yeah. Also I have blonde 0:03:58.120 --> 0:04:00.080 hair and blue eyes and I just family with it 0:03:59.760 --> 0:04:05.080 the yea. Yeah. So yeah, well, and it's the fact 0:04:05.160 --> 0:04:07.040 that it's a family heirloo of there's reminds me of 0:04:07.080 --> 0:04:10.440 one of my weird family moments. But my my dad's 0:04:10.520 --> 0:04:15.120 dad did something spooky for the US government, Like he 0:04:15.200 --> 0:04:17.880 was doing he was always over in Vietnam during the war, 0:04:18.000 --> 0:04:20.880 and nobody seems to know precisely what he was up to, 0:04:21.000 --> 0:04:22.880 Like there's like the thing that he said he was doing, 0:04:22.920 --> 0:04:25.560 but everybody in the families like, yeah, but it was anyway, 0:04:25.920 --> 0:04:30.279 and he was never dirty, do you know what I mean? No, no, 0:04:30.400 --> 0:04:32.440 I mean it was it was so like that was 0:04:32.560 --> 0:04:35.200 what he did in like the sixties. But he was 0:04:35.279 --> 0:04:39.239 in Germany right after the war. Um. And years after 0:04:39.320 --> 0:04:41.880 he died, we found like a little box that was 0:04:41.920 --> 0:04:45.400 just full to the brim with like Hitler youth arm 0:04:45.480 --> 0:04:48.000 bands and like penance and stuff like that, like a 0:04:48.080 --> 0:04:51.200 whole lot of them. Um. And it was always like, 0:04:51.480 --> 0:04:53.880 what the what's the story here? Like I'm certain it was. 0:04:53.960 --> 0:04:55.600 Just like he was in Germany after the war, they 0:04:55.600 --> 0:04:57.920 found a bunch of knots. He was like, oh, we 0:04:57.960 --> 0:05:00.720 should put this in a box. But it's weird. It's 0:05:00.720 --> 0:05:03.479 a weird thing to like find, right, like to find 0:05:03.520 --> 0:05:06.719 a bunch of them. Yeah, like fund and one. You're like, 0:05:06.720 --> 0:05:08.800 I could see about someone just I won't take that. 0:05:08.800 --> 0:05:11.760 That's pretty weird. But fund a bunch of them, Like 0:05:12.080 --> 0:05:15.919 did you do something with a bunch of them? And 0:05:16.040 --> 0:05:19.000 I don't think so, but it was. It's a strange. 0:05:19.120 --> 0:05:21.640 It's a strange thing to come across um. And I'm 0:05:21.640 --> 0:05:24.200 gonna guess it was something like that for our fans 0:05:24.279 --> 0:05:28.760 where that some somebody's grandpa was over in Germany and 0:05:28.920 --> 0:05:31.599 shoot some guy or is in some house. They're like, okay, 0:05:31.640 --> 0:05:35.599 I guess this is what I'm taking back it. Yeah, 0:05:35.680 --> 0:05:42.599 it was, I mean, I uh yeah, it's haunted for sure. Well, Billy, 0:05:42.960 --> 0:05:47.240 speaking of Nazis and speaking of racists, today's episode is 0:05:47.279 --> 0:05:50.920 about the racist chemical weapons engineer who probably cooked up 0:05:50.920 --> 0:05:53.040 the M D M A that you've used if you've 0:05:53.080 --> 0:05:59.760 done him. Yeah, So, I mean it's it's a fun one. 0:05:59.800 --> 0:06:03.159 He's doctor, so it's on brand for us. But I mean, yeah, 0:06:03.200 --> 0:06:07.599 I'm sure he is a doctor. But I mean I 0:06:07.680 --> 0:06:11.200 always assume when you're doing certain types of drugs, like 0:06:11.240 --> 0:06:15.520 there's just there's bad people who have touched this, like 0:06:15.560 --> 0:06:19.520 cocaine for sure. Um, like m d M A is 0:06:19.560 --> 0:06:21.520 made in a lot of different places. Like I've known 0:06:21.600 --> 0:06:24.520 some people who were, like what mad cooked m d 0:06:24.640 --> 0:06:27.000 M A in their like college lab while they were 0:06:27.040 --> 0:06:30.920 getting their PhD. Um and like I feel fine about that, 0:06:31.040 --> 0:06:34.360 you know, uh yeah, but I mean I just mean 0:06:34.440 --> 0:06:38.520 on the black market period, Yeah, there's always there's when 0:06:38.560 --> 0:06:40.560 you go to the black market, you're like, there's just 0:06:41.600 --> 0:06:44.200 that you have to accept. There's a persuage of like 0:06:44.400 --> 0:06:49.440 bad is involved in this, yeah, and bad people. You know. 0:06:49.520 --> 0:06:53.799 It's how like most good people accidentally do bad stuff. 0:06:53.839 --> 0:06:59.760 It sounds like this bad guy accidentally did some good stuff. Yeah. Yeah, 0:07:00.000 --> 0:07:03.760 And it's like, so the extent to which this guy 0:07:04.160 --> 0:07:06.440 was selling m d m A is such that if 0:07:06.520 --> 0:07:11.080 you did ecstasy in the nineteen nineties during the height 0:07:11.120 --> 0:07:13.600 of the rave scene, or probably in the early two thousands, 0:07:14.000 --> 0:07:17.440 there's a very good chance you did this guy's ecstasy. 0:07:17.480 --> 0:07:19.760 Like if if you were if you were raving in like, 0:07:19.880 --> 0:07:23.680 n uh and you did. You came across a batch 0:07:23.720 --> 0:07:27.120 of fucking awesome e Like, there's like the odds are 0:07:27.160 --> 0:07:29.880 really good that it was cooked by this dude, Walter Bassan. 0:07:30.120 --> 0:07:34.240 So that's the guy we're talking about today. Um, and 0:07:34.280 --> 0:07:37.640 we're not talking about his mostly about his career making ecstasy. 0:07:37.720 --> 0:07:40.560 We're talking about his career as a chemical weapons engineer 0:07:40.600 --> 0:07:47.880 trying to exterminate the black race. Always boy. Yeah, I 0:07:47.920 --> 0:07:54.000 was like, I don't know, he sounds pretty fun. Okay, okay, okay, 0:07:54.120 --> 0:08:00.400 he's he's he's a genocider attempted genocider. Yeah. Um, So 0:08:00.680 --> 0:08:03.520 it's the story of Walter Basson is a really fucked up, 0:08:03.520 --> 0:08:06.880 an interesting one. But but to actually like tell it, Uh, 0:08:06.920 --> 0:08:09.040 there's a lot of background that I think people need 0:08:09.120 --> 0:08:11.280 about the history of chemical weapons. So we're going to 0:08:11.360 --> 0:08:13.120 talk about that a little bit. First. Do you a 0:08:13.200 --> 0:08:17.960 chemical weapons fan, Billy? No, I mean I understand them. 0:08:19.120 --> 0:08:21.880 You know, I've like all military stuff on some levels 0:08:21.920 --> 0:08:25.360 of right into it, but some of it gets real 0:08:26.400 --> 0:08:31.560 horrific so quick. Yeah, like in the yeah, torture kind 0:08:31.600 --> 0:08:34.920 of way, do you know what I mean? Yeah, Like 0:08:35.040 --> 0:08:37.959 it's like I can enjoy, like I can I can 0:08:38.000 --> 0:08:41.000 both understand, like the horror of trench warfare in World 0:08:41.000 --> 0:08:44.400 War One and how much artillery played into that and appreciate, 0:08:44.520 --> 0:08:46.640 like looking at a piece of artillery and how it 0:08:46.720 --> 0:08:49.600 functions in the way the mechanics work. And part of 0:08:49.640 --> 0:08:51.719 that is because like you can see, like you can 0:08:51.720 --> 0:08:53.880 go to a war reenactment, you can see canons being 0:08:53.960 --> 0:08:56.560 used and they're not hurting anybody. There's there's none of 0:08:56.559 --> 0:08:59.679 that with chemical weapons like that, there's no like displaying them, 0:08:59.679 --> 0:09:03.319 there's no appreciating the mechanics of it, Like it's purely 0:09:03.880 --> 0:09:08.559 designed to not just kill people, but to do it horribly, horribly, 0:09:09.200 --> 0:09:12.200 Like with firearms they do horrible things too, but we 0:09:12.280 --> 0:09:15.320 also get like fireworks out of that genealogy, Like there's 0:09:15.360 --> 0:09:20.920 fun things associated with Yeah, not with chemical weapons, Like 0:09:20.960 --> 0:09:23.679 this makes your insides be on your outside and you're 0:09:23.920 --> 0:09:27.960 just yeah, blow somebody up, man, come on, yeah, honest 0:09:28.080 --> 0:09:35.439 god fearing how it's er. Yes, there's just an instant death. Yeah, yeah, 0:09:35.520 --> 0:09:38.679 instant death, and like death in a way that you know, 0:09:38.720 --> 0:09:41.000 we've been doing for a lot, Like people have always 0:09:41.360 --> 0:09:44.520 blown each other up in war and they've kept different 0:09:44.520 --> 0:09:48.640 ways of doing it. Yeah, but this chemical weapons are 0:09:48.679 --> 0:09:51.120 like pretty new. Um, and this is actually something like 0:09:51.160 --> 0:09:54.080 we talked about in the Fritz Haber episodes, And whenever 0:09:54.120 --> 0:09:56.040 I talk about like the birth of chemical weapons, like 0:09:56.080 --> 0:09:57.440 a whole bunch of people are gonna hit me up 0:09:57.440 --> 0:09:59.280 on Twitter and be like, no, the first use was this, 0:09:59.360 --> 0:10:01.040 and the first use is that. And at those stories 0:10:01.080 --> 0:10:04.880 about like mongols catapulting plague victims over walls or like 0:10:05.000 --> 0:10:08.520 something like that, and I get what they're saying. I 0:10:08.559 --> 0:10:12.240 don't think that stuff really counts, um, because like sickness 0:10:12.280 --> 0:10:14.520 has always been a part of war, and like cunning 0:10:14.559 --> 0:10:17.760 commanders have always found ways to spread illness among their enemies, 0:10:17.760 --> 0:10:21.800 because it makes sense. Chemical weapons in the modern sense 0:10:21.840 --> 0:10:26.079 are something really different. I think, um, just one immune 0:10:26.160 --> 0:10:33.079 mongol just running with the plague, so the first forefare 0:10:33.200 --> 0:10:36.760 over there. Yeah, there's a difference between that and like 0:10:36.880 --> 0:10:41.360 gassing a town with Sara in my view, Um, yes, yeah, 0:10:41.360 --> 0:10:43.720 because yeah, that's just more of like, hey, this is 0:10:43.880 --> 0:10:47.600 wish works. But being like yeah, someone in that their 0:10:47.720 --> 0:10:49.720 army being like we're going to gas them. You're like 0:10:49.760 --> 0:10:54.439 wait what, no, what Yeah, it's it's it's I mean, 0:10:54.520 --> 0:10:56.560 and this is like a personal line for everybody. So 0:10:56.600 --> 0:10:59.160 people may disagree with me, but I can we It's 0:10:59.200 --> 0:11:03.839 like it's complicated when you tried to talk about like 0:11:03.880 --> 0:11:06.040 where it all started. Like the first formal treaty that 0:11:06.080 --> 0:11:09.160 forbade something that you could call chemical warfare was probably 0:11:09.160 --> 0:11:12.400 the Franco German Treaty of sixteen seventy five, But that 0:11:12.480 --> 0:11:14.720 just banned the use of poison in war. So it 0:11:14.760 --> 0:11:18.200 wasn't really like like chemical weapons. It was more like 0:11:18.320 --> 0:11:21.240 you can't rub shit on your bullets and the shoot people. 0:11:21.480 --> 0:11:25.560 That's bad, you know. I's like that sort of thing. Yeah. 0:11:26.160 --> 0:11:29.880 Uh in eighteen seventy four, bunch of I mean you 0:11:29.960 --> 0:11:32.960 can and ship's gonna get in your bullet wounds anyway, 0:11:33.120 --> 0:11:35.360 because there's poop everywhere and war. That's one of the 0:11:35.360 --> 0:11:39.400 eternal truths of war is all the poop. Um. Yeah. 0:11:41.120 --> 0:11:44.440 And the what in a festival like a music festival, Yes, 0:11:44.520 --> 0:11:48.439 yet music festivals in warfare have a lot in common. Um. 0:11:48.480 --> 0:11:51.160 I'm actually more okay with the use of chemical warfare 0:11:51.200 --> 0:11:53.840 on music festivals, but I'm not a big fan of 0:11:53.880 --> 0:12:02.000 bonaru so no, it's la nation um so. In eighteen 0:12:02.040 --> 0:12:05.199 seventy four, about a dozen European states signed the Brussels Declaration, 0:12:05.240 --> 0:12:07.880 which banned poison gas and other poisons as weapons of force. 0:12:07.960 --> 0:12:09.920 It was the first time like a modern chemical weapon 0:12:10.000 --> 0:12:13.120 was banned. As eighteen seventy four UM and the Brussels 0:12:13.160 --> 0:12:16.319 Declaration was never ratified, But in eighteen nine the Hague 0:12:16.320 --> 0:12:18.520 Convention on the Laws of War was signed by every 0:12:18.559 --> 0:12:21.760 major European power and they agreed universally to avoid the 0:12:21.840 --> 0:12:25.640 use of poison. The convention included a declaration on asphyxiating 0:12:25.720 --> 0:12:30.000 gases and explicitly forbade the use of projectiles designed solely 0:12:30.040 --> 0:12:33.840 for gas warfare. Now, the first modern chemical weapons attack 0:12:34.240 --> 0:12:37.040 on a huge scale occurred at Ipra in Belgium on 0:12:37.160 --> 0:12:41.000 eighteen April nineteen fourteen. We talked about this on the 0:12:41.000 --> 0:12:44.120 Fritz Hyper episode. German soldiers emptied cans of chlorine gas 0:12:44.160 --> 0:12:46.040 and trusted the wind to carry them into the foe 0:12:46.600 --> 0:12:51.400 um and there were similar experiments wrong on that day. 0:12:51.400 --> 0:12:54.959 It was great, yeah, but afterwards it didn't work out 0:12:55.000 --> 0:12:59.760 so well for anybody. UM, So yeah, it's um. That 0:12:59.880 --> 0:13:03.160 was like the first kind of like modern chemical weapon attack, 0:13:03.200 --> 0:13:04.600 and by the end of World War One there's been 0:13:04.600 --> 0:13:07.560 a grand total of three thousand different chemical agents tested 0:13:07.600 --> 0:13:10.520 as potential weapons, so every side was guilty of this, 0:13:10.600 --> 0:13:12.600 even though they had signed a thing saying they wouldn't 0:13:12.600 --> 0:13:15.320 do it. Um. Something like a hundred and twenty four 0:13:15.400 --> 0:13:18.080 thousand metric tons of chemical weapons were delivered via sixty 0:13:18.080 --> 0:13:20.240 six million artillery shells over the course of the war, 0:13:20.360 --> 0:13:23.640 causing around a million casualties, and as you might notice, 0:13:23.720 --> 0:13:27.000 this clearly violates the letter and spirit of the Hague 0:13:27.000 --> 0:13:30.120 Convention Um. The way all the powers got around this 0:13:30.240 --> 0:13:33.360 was by arguing that their poison gas shells didn't violate 0:13:33.400 --> 0:13:36.640 the letter of the Hague convention Um because the the 0:13:37.000 --> 0:13:40.559 explosive shells they delivered them in didn't just kill people 0:13:40.559 --> 0:13:43.760 with gas since they exploded. They still killed people through 0:13:43.800 --> 0:13:46.000 explosions too, So their argument was like, well, the Hague 0:13:46.000 --> 0:13:50.000 Convention just banned shells that only dispersed chemical weapons, since 0:13:50.000 --> 0:13:56.960 our shells explode to technically technically we also, yeah, I 0:13:57.000 --> 0:14:00.880 hate you guys so much. It's so fucking shit. Yeah, 0:14:01.080 --> 0:14:02.920 And it reminds me like, as a kid, I was 0:14:02.960 --> 0:14:04.600 a war gamer, Like I played a lot of those 0:14:04.600 --> 0:14:07.480 little games with models, and like the rules lawyering that 0:14:07.520 --> 0:14:10.360 you encounter in that hobby. It's just weird to realize, like, oh, 0:14:10.400 --> 0:14:12.480 the same thing happens in real war. Like there were 0:14:12.520 --> 0:14:15.959 a bunch of like overweight, shitty assholes standing around a 0:14:16.040 --> 0:14:18.480 table being like, no, it doesn't break the rules, because 0:14:18.640 --> 0:14:22.240 this is amazing. Just a just a bunch of bearded 0:14:23.000 --> 0:14:25.440 dudes who have never been near a battlefield yelling about 0:14:25.520 --> 0:14:27.920 like what doesn't break the letter of the law, will 0:14:28.040 --> 0:14:30.400 like actual soldiers get gassed. It's amazing. That's what I 0:14:30.400 --> 0:14:33.120 was thinking, Like while you were saying that there's every war, 0:14:33.240 --> 0:14:35.840 it sounds like there comes to a point where like, okay, okay, 0:14:35.880 --> 0:14:39.440 you can't do that anymore, God damn stop doing that. 0:14:40.320 --> 0:14:43.640 Like every war there's like something like wait, humans just 0:14:43.680 --> 0:14:46.560 figure out like okay, okay, what about this? And then 0:14:46.760 --> 0:14:48.680 it comes to the point where but it's like all right, 0:14:48.800 --> 0:14:51.680 it's just we gotta stop. You can't do that. Oh God, 0:14:52.160 --> 0:14:56.880 what what is that? Stop that? Every time? It's fun? 0:14:59.800 --> 0:15:03.600 So yeah, it it. World War one was ship chemical 0:15:03.640 --> 0:15:06.560 weapons made it worse. In the nine the Great Powers 0:15:06.600 --> 0:15:10.840 signed the Geneva Protocol and Asphyxiating, Poisonous and Other Gases UM, 0:15:10.920 --> 0:15:13.840 which would have banned all chemical weapons in warfare, like 0:15:13.920 --> 0:15:17.520 without any sort of exceptions in it um. The only 0:15:17.600 --> 0:15:21.160 two major powers who did not ratify the proposal where 0:15:21.200 --> 0:15:24.160 the United States in Japan, which is interesting. The US 0:15:24.200 --> 0:15:26.880 has a long history of advocating for rules in warfare, 0:15:26.920 --> 0:15:29.800 but then forbidding or refusing to sign onto them because 0:15:29.800 --> 0:15:33.800 it will limit what we can do with war. Um. Yeah, yeah, 0:15:33.840 --> 0:15:37.880 we should. We it's probably a good thing to sign. Um. 0:15:38.000 --> 0:15:41.120 I should say that, Like, the Geneva Convention was kind 0:15:41.160 --> 0:15:43.960 of bullshit um in some ways, just because like there 0:15:44.000 --> 0:15:46.200 was an exemption in it that if you were attacked 0:15:46.200 --> 0:15:48.880 with chemical weapons by a state, you could use chemical 0:15:48.920 --> 0:15:51.880 weapons in defense of your country. And there was another 0:15:51.960 --> 0:15:54.840 provision that allowed chemical weapons to be used on any 0:15:55.040 --> 0:15:58.720 states or groups that had not signed the Geneva Protocol um, 0:15:58.800 --> 0:16:01.800 which meant that colonial hours could continue to deploy mustard 0:16:01.800 --> 0:16:04.680 gas against their tribal enemies. So it was like, we 0:16:04.720 --> 0:16:09.920 can't use chemical weapons on other white people. Yeah, yeah, yeah, 0:16:10.000 --> 0:16:12.480 that's that's that's basically the law that they agree on 0:16:12.520 --> 0:16:17.480 after World War One. We're not barbarians, but we're going 0:16:17.520 --> 0:16:20.240 to keep doing this to the people we call barbarias. 0:16:20.280 --> 0:16:24.160 We do need to keep some order because yeah, the 0:16:24.240 --> 0:16:27.880 Geneva protocols also made it legal to stockpile chemical weapons, 0:16:27.920 --> 0:16:31.920 so it's like you can't use them, but you can 0:16:32.000 --> 0:16:34.720 build up an arsenal of them, and you can use 0:16:34.760 --> 0:16:36.760 it if you're attacked or if you need to suppress 0:16:36.800 --> 0:16:40.840 people who don't have a country. So that's cool. That's 0:16:40.840 --> 0:16:43.680 like they've just given people like poker chips or you 0:16:43.720 --> 0:16:47.360 can't spend them unless you like really need it, unless 0:16:47.360 --> 0:16:50.360 you really want to. You kind of that's kind of 0:16:50.360 --> 0:16:54.640 always how rules about warfare are. Like nobody, it's it's 0:16:55.240 --> 0:16:57.360 I guess in part because it's usually not people who 0:16:57.360 --> 0:17:00.840 have are faced those weapons who are like signing onto 0:17:00.840 --> 0:17:03.280 the conventions about them at a bunch of politicians being 0:17:03.320 --> 0:17:06.680 like yeah, in generals, all sort of like debate, but well, okay, 0:17:06.680 --> 0:17:08.719 but what if we need to well then we'll have 0:17:08.760 --> 0:17:10.679 this exception and that we can still use them if 0:17:10.720 --> 0:17:14.600 we need to. Um. Yeah, but it is that, I mean, 0:17:14.640 --> 0:17:16.439 that is their job is to think like that. So 0:17:16.600 --> 0:17:19.440 so it's like that weird, yeah, yeah, and yeah they're 0:17:19.440 --> 0:17:22.679 all a bunch of lawyers. Now. The first nation to 0:17:22.760 --> 0:17:25.680 break with the protocols was fascist Italy and their colonial 0:17:25.720 --> 0:17:28.800 war with Ethiopia UM, which was a state at that 0:17:28.840 --> 0:17:32.639 point in time, Mussolini's troops dropped mustard gas bombs and 0:17:32.680 --> 0:17:36.119 mass on Ethiopian villagers and thirty six, killing and wounding 0:17:36.160 --> 0:17:39.280 more than fifteen thousand people. Mussolini's actions were a clear 0:17:39.359 --> 0:17:41.960 violation of the protocol, but the League of Nations refused 0:17:41.960 --> 0:17:44.080 to do anything. This would prove to be the last 0:17:44.119 --> 0:17:47.000 time an international organization failed to take action against a 0:17:47.040 --> 0:17:51.480 fascist gassing civilians. So that's good. It's never happened again, never, 0:17:51.760 --> 0:18:00.160 not not not once. Now. No, that's what's great out 0:18:00.200 --> 0:18:04.639 international governance is that it's a thing that really happens. 0:18:03.480 --> 0:18:08.040 It's not theater. Yeah, it's not at not at all theater, 0:18:08.600 --> 0:18:14.320 totally a real thing. Um. So, World War two wasn't 0:18:14.320 --> 0:18:16.640 a great time for anybody, um But one of its 0:18:16.640 --> 0:18:18.919 few bright spots is that in the European theater, at 0:18:18.960 --> 0:18:21.679 least chemical weapons were not deployed. Uh. This did not 0:18:21.880 --> 0:18:24.560 stop both the Axis and the Allies from manufacturing huge 0:18:24.640 --> 0:18:27.400 quantities of them um. And the failure of either side 0:18:27.400 --> 0:18:29.879 to use chemical weapons was not due to high minded 0:18:29.880 --> 0:18:32.640 ideals on anyone's part, but more due to a balance 0:18:32.680 --> 0:18:35.520 of terror that kept bare minimums of human decency in 0:18:35.600 --> 0:18:39.120 place in this one specific field of war. Um I'd 0:18:39.119 --> 0:18:41.000 like to quote from a Carnegie Council paper on the 0:18:41.080 --> 0:18:44.000 Rise and Fall of Chemical weapons about this quote. While 0:18:44.040 --> 0:18:47.280 the Allies refined older model gases like false gene and mustard, 0:18:47.480 --> 0:18:50.800 the Germans invented a new, far deadlier category of chemical weapons, 0:18:51.040 --> 0:18:53.720 nerve agents, in one of the greatest intelligence coups of 0:18:53.760 --> 0:18:56.359 the war. The Nazis successfully kept this development secret from 0:18:56.359 --> 0:18:58.760 the Allies until their surrender. If they had chosen to 0:18:58.840 --> 0:19:00.920 use these weapons on Allied true they might have altered 0:19:00.960 --> 0:19:03.760 the course of history once again. Germany had its superior 0:19:03.800 --> 0:19:06.600 chemical industry to thank. Chemists from I. G. Farban, then 0:19:06.600 --> 0:19:09.159 one of the world's largest corporations, stumbled on compounds of 0:19:09.200 --> 0:19:13.200 extraordinary potency while trying to develop potential insecticides for commercial use. 0:19:13.480 --> 0:19:16.479 What became Sarah Taboon and so Man All nerve gases 0:19:16.480 --> 0:19:19.639 which caused the cascading failure of body functions, including the 0:19:19.640 --> 0:19:22.679 body forgetting to breathe and then rapid death, were developed 0:19:22.680 --> 0:19:26.560 by German scientists working with their very mocked counterparts I. G. Farban. 0:19:26.640 --> 0:19:30.800 By the way, it's bear today, So that's cool. That's cool. Yeah, 0:19:30.840 --> 0:19:33.520 you're aspirin is made by the people who invented saren cool. 0:19:33.640 --> 0:19:38.399 I mean they know what they're doing. They do, you know, 0:19:38.800 --> 0:19:41.199 I would I would argue that Sarah works better at 0:19:41.240 --> 0:19:45.440 its intended application than aspirin. Yes, yeah, I can attest 0:19:45.480 --> 0:19:50.600 to that from what I've seen and experience. But aspirin 0:19:50.680 --> 0:19:54.760 doesn't do like when you're worth like as you develop that, 0:19:55.280 --> 0:19:57.680 did you just go home and your wife's like, how 0:19:57.760 --> 0:20:03.240 was today? You're like it was in chance. Yeah. I 0:20:03.080 --> 0:20:05.840 imagine a lot of scientists like sitting out with a 0:20:05.880 --> 0:20:08.920 beer watching the sunset, like staring at their kids playing 0:20:08.960 --> 0:20:14.159 in the yard, and just like shaking their heads. I 0:20:14.200 --> 0:20:18.720 don't think we should have done that. This might go 0:20:18.880 --> 0:20:22.679 bad places just gonna buy us in the ass. I 0:20:22.720 --> 0:20:26.080 feel like there's all the best scientists wind up feeling 0:20:26.119 --> 0:20:27.960 like that at some point, Like we had a whole 0:20:28.000 --> 0:20:30.480 generation of them on the Manhattan Project who must have 0:20:30.520 --> 0:20:33.000 just gone home. You get this reading them where they're 0:20:33.000 --> 0:20:35.720 just sitting around being like, oh boy, maybe I shouldn't 0:20:35.720 --> 0:20:40.400 have done that, Probably shouldn't be doing this job. Yeah, 0:20:40.480 --> 0:20:43.920 they just know just enough of the I don't I 0:20:44.320 --> 0:20:47.720 think we should do this? You get okay, all right, 0:20:47.760 --> 0:20:53.280 I'm just not Okay, Yeah, it's like everybody spreads that 0:20:53.359 --> 0:20:57.000 Oppenheimer like that that anecdote about him reciting that line 0:20:57.040 --> 0:20:59.000 from the Bog of a Gida, I become Death, the 0:20:59.040 --> 0:21:02.080 destroyer of world. And I feel like, when you're talking 0:21:02.080 --> 0:21:04.280 about when you need to change your career, if you 0:21:04.400 --> 0:21:07.239 feel the need to quote that un ironically about what 0:21:07.280 --> 0:21:11.560 you're doing, maybe you need a new job. Yeah, maybe 0:21:11.600 --> 0:21:13.879 you're not in the right field. I'm like, I'm in 0:21:13.960 --> 0:21:16.880 over my head. I'm in over your head now. I'm 0:21:16.920 --> 0:21:21.800 gonna I just like science, that's all. I just like science. 0:21:23.320 --> 0:21:26.120 I bet his resume was fun, just like nineteen forty 0:21:26.160 --> 0:21:28.960 three to nineteen forty five. I became Death, destroyer of 0:21:29.000 --> 0:21:35.080 World's nine about me. You may have heard about me, 0:21:37.000 --> 0:21:39.320 you know, the guy who will ultimately be responsible for 0:21:39.359 --> 0:21:42.080 the end of human civilization. That was my day jobs. 0:21:42.200 --> 0:21:47.000 I figured it out. It was a problem, and I 0:21:47.040 --> 0:21:53.760 got it first. I got it right. Ah damn it. 0:21:55.600 --> 0:21:57.920 That is I mean when most scientists, I know, it's 0:21:57.960 --> 0:21:59.800 that the whole thing is like we don't know, so 0:22:00.000 --> 0:22:03.760 we're just honestly trying to figure out everything. Is like, oh, 0:22:03.840 --> 0:22:06.800 we don't really know, and that's what happens is like 0:22:06.920 --> 0:22:10.960 you guys keep asking questions. Man, Yeah, it's like doing 0:22:11.000 --> 0:22:15.880 too many drugs. Sometimes I don't go down that Hallwaite man. Yeah, 0:22:15.920 --> 0:22:17.520 you're gonna go too far and you're not gonna be 0:22:17.560 --> 0:22:21.479 able to come back. But at least when people do 0:22:21.560 --> 0:22:24.400 that on acid, like it just leads to them following 0:22:24.440 --> 0:22:29.840 fish around for seven years when the military doesn't weaponize it. Yeah, 0:22:30.080 --> 0:22:34.600 not yet tried, That's for sure. They have tried. It's 0:22:34.680 --> 0:22:38.040 just hard to so. After World War Two, the US 0:22:38.080 --> 0:22:40.320 and the Soviet Union embarked on a dark and secret 0:22:40.400 --> 0:22:43.480 arms race to build more varied stockpiles of chemical weapons. 0:22:43.840 --> 0:22:46.919 In By seven, the U s stockpile of saren was 0:22:46.960 --> 0:22:49.359 so vast that we started developing a new series of 0:22:49.400 --> 0:22:53.639 nerve gases. The V for Venomous Agents VX nerve gas 0:22:53.760 --> 0:22:56.160 is probably the most famous of these. It's three times 0:22:56.160 --> 0:22:58.720 as toxic as saren when inhaled, and a thousand times 0:22:58.720 --> 0:23:02.240 as toxic when absorbed through the skin or the other. 0:23:02.320 --> 0:23:06.479 We gotta make it worse. I just make sure, and 0:23:06.480 --> 0:23:09.000