280 CHAPTER EigHT ■ War and Strife
the Middle East would be dramatically reduced. If Sagan is right, even if Iran meets
these minimal conditions (of which Sagan’s argument is skeptical), the Middle East
will be in increased danger of a nuclear exchange, an accidental launch or detona-
tion, or perhaps an unauthorized launch. The Iran nuclear deal discussed below
attempts to make sure that neither Sagan nor Waltz are correct.
Chemical and biological weapons, together with nuclear weapons, make up the
more general category of weapons of mass destruction (WMD). The key factor that
separates WMD from conventional weapons is that by their very nature, their destruc-
tive effects cannot be limited in space and time. This is why they are often called “indis-
criminate” weapons, a feature they share with antipersonnel land mines, depleted
uranium munitions, and cluster bombs. Chemical and biological weapons have existed
for many more years than nuclear weapons have. Although surreptitious testing and use
of such weapons have persisted, many technical difficulties in their effective delivery
persist. As noted earlier, chemical weapons were actually used on a large scale in World
War I, but they proved useless strategically, and instead, only increased the suffering of
war. Benito Mussolini’s invasion of Ethiopia through Eritrea in 1935 must count as
the only recent example of the effective use of chemical weapons in war; the aerial
spraying of mustard gas on the mostly barefoot Ethiopian troops caused their rapid
defeat. In that case, the Italians faced an adversary who had no possibility to retali-
ate in kind. In addition, the oily chemical tended to float on water and remained
lethal on vegetation and bare ground for weeks. As a result, Fascist Italy’s use of
mustard gas killed and maimed thousands of Ethiopian noncombatants. For its part,
Mussolini’s government went to great lengths to hide its violation of the 1923 Geneva
Accords’ prohibition of the use of chemical weapons, in many cases, actually violating
other laws of war to do so; the actions included strafing field hospitals marked with the
red cross to eliminate evidence that Italy had used mustard gas. Possibly as a result of
these costs, and of the likelihood of soon facing adversaries armed in kind, neither Fas-
cist Italy nor any of the other belligerents used chemical weapons in World War II. Yet
evidence suggests the use of chemical weapons by one or both adversaries during both
the Iran- Iraq War during the 1980s, and by the Assad government in the current
Syrian civil war.
Biological weapons—in par tic u lar, mutated strains of formerly common diseases
such as plague and smallpox— have always suffered from the possibility that not only
an adversary’s troops and people but also one’s own troops and people could be victims.
In addition, their use as a weapon comes with the cost of a high probability of violat-
ing the norm of noncombatant immunity, something few states want to do. Today, most
observers are more concerned with the possibility that rogue states or terrorists might
obtain and deploy biological or other weapons of mass destruction; they are less con-
cerned that states with rational leaders will do so.