Page:"The next war"; an appeal to common sense (IA thenextwarappeal01irwi).pdf/71

 certain gas-generating compound] could cover an area of 100 feet wide and 7 miles long, and could deposit enough material to kill every man in that area by action on his skin. It would be entirely possible for this country to manufacture several thousand tons a day, provided the necessary plants had been built. If Germany had had 4,000 tons of this material and 300 or 400 planes equipped in this way for its distribution, the entire first American army would have been annihilated in 10 or 12 hours.”

Brevet Colonel J. F. C. Fuller this year won in England the Gold Medal of the Royal United Service Institution for his essay on the warfare of the future. All through, he avoids this topic of attacks on the civilian population; he is treating, like a true old-time military man, of armies alone. But Fuller says concerning the general possibilities of gas, which he believes to be the weapon of the future: “It is quite conceivable that many gases may be discovered which will penetrate all known gas armor. As there is no reason why one man should not be able to release 100 cylinders simultaneously, there is no reason why he should not release several million; in fact, these might be released in England today electrically by a one-armed cripple sitting in Kamchatka directly his indicator denoted a favorable wind.”

And Major-General E. D. Swinton, of the British army, said in discussing Colonel Fuller’s paper:

“It has been rather our tendency up to the