Putin’s Gas
Did Russia make the wrong call?
In H. G. Wells's 1933 The Shape of Things to Come, legions of airmen drop incapacitating "peace gas" on warring factions to rescue the world from strife-induced medieval barbarism. After pacifying every region of the globe they establish a socialist utopia in which war has no place and disputes are (for awhile) resolved peacefully. Nonlethal weapons make violence obsolete. Yet, as events in post-utopian Russia have recently shown, we have a ways to go to before "peace gas" lives up to its promise.
nationalreview.com
Vladimir Putin is certain to take a political hit for Saturday's hostage rescue mission, to the extent his system can inflict hits. The outcome could have been worse, but only by degree. The rescue left 117 hostages dead, all but two from the effects of the incapacitation gas used by the hostage rescuers, with 145 people still in intensive care, and perhaps more to succumb. In addition, not being forthcoming about the nature of the "special substance" is certain to raise the volume of complaint, especially from the families of the victims. The Russian government is not known for being forthcoming about its blunders, but then again few governments are. There is something viscerally repugnant about the use of gas as a weapon, nonlethal or otherwise. One thinks of gas in the context of World War I, the Holocaust, and the Kurds at Halabja. At base, gas is frightening. And it is hard to think of a substance that killed so many people as being "nonlethal."
Yet, under the circumstances, the Russian scheme made sense. Putin was trying to avoid the outcomes of prior hostage dramas. In June 1995, Chechen rebels seized a hospital in the city of Budyennovsk; the rescue operation left over 100 hostages dead and the rebels escaped. In January 1996 in the town of Kizlyar, Chechens took 2,000 people hostage, of whom 23 were killed before the rebels fled. This time the attack took place in Russia's capital instead of the frontier, so the symbolic stakes were higher. Casualties had to be minimized and, as importantly, the terrorists could not be allowed to get away. (Just to digress: The Chechens made a huge mistake in massing 50 of their fighters in one place, given their limited manpower pool. This was a foolish move that exuded desperation.)
The type of knockout gas used by the Russians is known in the trade as a "calmative," which includes any sedatives or sleep agents, frequently, though not exclusively, deployed in gaseous form. In theory a sleep agent is the ideal instrument for resolving a hostage situation. It can save the lives of both hostages and hostage takers, dramatically reduce the threat to the rescue team, and limit property damage. In this particular case, the Russians were faced with highly motivated terrorists who had stated that they expected to die and who had wired the whole building (as well as themselves) for detonation; a large number of hostages; an enclosed area; and access to the building through air ducts and the basement. The plan was sound — knock out the terrorists with gas as the rescue teams entered the building, dispatch any remaining threats, de-mine the building, and remove the hostages.
The gas was novel but not experimental. Russian chemical-weapon expert Lev Fodorov stated that the "special substance" had been produced during the Cold War, and "was tested on thousands — not dozens but thousands — of people, not cats or guinea pigs." After all, it was developed in Soviet days when "volunteers" were plentiful. However, tests do not always replicate or reveal the effects of weapons under actual conditions. Tear gas, for example, is mostly nonlethal, but when concentrated and ignited, it can cause uncontrollable blazes (as witnessed in the 1974 shootout with the SLA in Los Angeles or the 1993 Waco debacle). In this case too, the fog of war (no pun intended) came into play. The hostages were weak, hungry, dehydrated, some of them had asthma or other respiratory or heart conditions, and they were under psychological as well as physical stress. Ventilation was poor, and it took a long time to pull people to safety. Fodorov believes these factors were exacerbated by the insertion of a mega-dose of gas, enough to subdue the younger, stronger terrorists. "There may have also been the usual Russian way of thinking at play there," he said. "Pump in more gas than needed to make sure that it works."
And strangely, in that one very important respect, the gas did not work. The terrorists were not all incapacitated. Gunfire erupted almost immediately as the rescue mission began, and continued vigorously for several minutes. An Alpha Team member stated that many terrorists "were fully conscious, and we had to act in a coordinated and decisive manner." The rescuers were very decisive, judging by the results. Only three Chechens were taken captive. This raises interesting questions, such as whether terrorists who were incapacitated could legally be shot. In our country, clearly not, since someone who has been knocked out is no longer a threat. It is alleged that Chechen militant leader Arbi Barayev was executed after succumbing to the gas, not gunned down in a firefight as originally reported. Other issues concerning the timeline of events, the true threat to the hostages, and the willingness of the Chechens to negotiate will be raised in coming days, but one doubts that the terrorists would receive much post mortem compassion from the Russian public. More legal questions could arise in the context of the 1993 Chemical Weapons Convention, which outlaws the use of nonlethal gas except for purposes of crowd control, but that only demonstrates the conceptual limits of that particular agreement. A clever lawyer could probably argue that this falls within the crowd-control provision. In any case, the Russians can simply ignore it.
The United States has been developing nonlethal capabilities for years, most recently under the direction of the Joint Nonlethal Weapons Directorate created in 1997 under command of the Marine Corps. A wide range of weapons and methods are being investigated, such a lasers to temporarily blind, say, a sniper in a building, sticky goo for crowd control, slick polymers to render vehicles useless, or bee pheromones to send stinging swarms against enemy troops. As exotic as they sound, nonlethals are a useful humanitarian alternative to deadly force; they give commanders and law-enforcement officials a variety of options in the ambiguous situations that they increasingly face.
I have a great deal of sympathy for the Russians, especially the bereaved families and friends of the terror victims. One wonders how we would handle a similar hostage-taking incident, say with the Kennedy Center seized by suicidal fanatics, negotiations stalled, media coverage incessant, and killings commencing. We would be lucky to emerge much better than they did. Maybe we could try the bees.
— James S. Robbins is a national-security analyst & NRO contributor. |
