Part Two: Military Training
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Chapter 8: Military Training Responsibilities of the Chemical Warfare Service
The military training responsibilities of the Chief of the Chemical Warfare Service were succinctly stated in the National Defense Act of 1920 as:
a. ... supervision of the training of the Army in chemical warfare, both offensive and defensive, including the necessary schools of instruction. ...
b. ... training ... of special troops. ...1
Although amplified by subsequent administrative regulations, these provisions furnished the basic pattern followed in CWS training during World War II.
War Department directives provided that chemical warfare training should cover the fields of smoke, incendiary, and gas; yet the primary concern of the CWS prior to World War II was unquestionably with gas. Since the service had been created by Congress as an answer to the military threat of toxic chemicals, the status of the CWS as an independent technical service could scarcely have been justified if it were not prepared to cope with this major menace. Fear of gas was largely fear of the unknown, and its antidote was, in large measure, to acquaint troops with toxic agents and how to counteract them. To impart such understanding was the primary training responsibility of the Chemical Warfare Service and the point of departure for the whole CWS mission.
The training of troops in protection against war gases can be approached with two differing objectives in view. One is training to insure mere survival of an enemy attack. The other is a more aggressive type of training,
intended to enable troops to advance through their own as well as the enemy’s gas attacks. One is essentially negative; the other, an essentially positive approach. Circumstances combined with events to determine eventually a positive U.S. attitude toward training for gas warfare. Chemical officers were generally aggressive-minded, although before the war their enthusiasm was often curbed by opposition within as well as outside the Army.2 Denied substantial funds for production and development of offensive matériel, CWS threw much energy into training channels, where such limitations were less hampering.
In addition to staff supervision of training of the entire Army in chemical warfare, the CWS was of course responsible for its own normal military and technical branch training. Since the number of CWS officers and troops was relatively small prior to 1940, this type of training presented no special problem. The National Defense Act appeared to give precedence to the more general training mission; and this was certainly the most challenging. By mutual agreement, chemical warfare training responsibilities in the early 1920s included training of the Navy and Marine Corps. The training activities of the CWS, therefore, came to reach, in some degrees, all elements of the armed forces.
Prewar Training of Chemical Warfare Service Personnel
The technical (branch) training of Regular and Reserve CWS officers and of CWS enlisted men conducted before the war, being necessarily limited, provided little procedural experience for solving complex training problems that were to confront the CWS after the beginning of hostilities. The duty strength of the officer corps of the Chemical Warfare Service had remained substantially unchanged for some years. In the month of the outbreak of war in Europe it included ninety Regular Army officers and approximately twenty-one hundred Reservists.3
Two factors tended to restrict the prewar training of Regular Army officers assigned to the CWS. One was the limited number of these officers; another, the diversified nature of their duties, some of which were highly technical. It was scarcely feasible to institute a sufficient number of courses to satisfy all the training requirements of CWS officers.
Because of the slow turnover of officers during the decade preceding the European war, the problem of indoctrinating those transferring to the CWS from other branches was never pressing. Their military education was usually well advanced when they entered the Chemical Warfare Service. Attendance at a Chemical Warfare School course was required immediately after transfer, following which on-the-job training largely served to familiarize new officers with the specialized duties of the service.
Professional training of officers of the regular establishment was furthered by assigning them to courses of instruction at general and special service schools according to quotas established by the War Department. Some advanced training was accomplished at civilian schools, especially in the form of postgraduate work at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the Harvard School of Business Administration. Seven officers were normally detached each year for duty as students at military and civilian schools.
In all, more than one third of the officers assigned to the CWS before World War II were on training duty. Besides 7 students, these included: 9 officers assigned to faculties of general and special service schools; 2 instructors of ROTC units; 9 company officers with chemical troop units; 4 division chemical officers; and 2 officers on duty with the Training Division, Office of the Chief, CWS. The twelve chemical officers assigned to corps areas and overseas departments also had considerable training responsibilities. Training represented a major activity of Regular Army CWS officers.
Before World War II the Chemical Warfare Service had developed a relatively strong corps of Reserve officers, which included two distinct components, the branch assignment group and the corps area assignment group. The branch assignment group comprised officers whose mobilization assignment called for duty directly under the chief of branch. It consisted largely of men whose civilian backgrounds indicated a technical military occupational specialty appropriate to the CWS. In 1939 it included approximately Boo officers. Premobilization training of this group was a direct responsibility of the Chief, CWS, although in practice this training was generally decentralized to corps area chemical officers. The corps area assignment group also included many Reserve officers with technical experience in chemical fields. However, members of this group were slated for assignment to military units rather than to technical or procurement installations. There were approximately 1,300 corps area assignment Reserve officers in 1939. Responsibility for their training rested with corps area
and department commanders, although the Chief, CWS, was vitally concerned with their readiness for war service.
The two principal means for training Reserve officers were army extension (correspondence) courses and associate training for 14-day periods with the Regular Army. These means were admittedly imperfect, yet nonetheless contributed measurably to the war preparation of the CWS Reserve. The extension course of the Chemical Warfare School offered in 1939 a total of eighteen subcourses prepared by the school for the instruction of CWS Reserve officers of all grades. One of these, Defense Against Chemical Warfare, was a required subcourse for study by Reserve officers of all arms and services. Associate training was, in theory, integrated with extension course training. A total of 453 Chemical Warfare Service Reserve officers were called to active duty for fourteen-day training periods during fiscal year 1939.4
For recruitment, the Reserves depended largely on the Reserve Officers’ Training Corps. The unit maintained at Massachusetts Institute of Technology provided many highly trained technical officers. In 1935 a second CWS unit was authorized at Texas Agricultural and Mechanical College, from which source splendid troop leaders were obtained. Before the war the junior class of each unit, funds permitting, was brought to Edgewood Arsenal annually for summer training. Enrollment in these two units stood at 326 on 30 June 1939.5
The Regular Army enlisted strength of the Chemical Warfare Service in September 1939 totaled 759,6 or less than two thirds of the number set by statute in 1920.7 Eighty percent of these men were assigned to the handful of understrength CWS troop formations. The remainder were scattered in small detachments from Manila to Governors Island. Their training followed in general the conventional pattern of Army peacetime field operations. Promotion to grades of staff, technical, and master sergeant was based on written examinations conducted under direction of the Chief, CWS. Occasional courses of instruction at the Chemical Warfare School were provided for men seeking promotion under this system. The turnover among senior enlisted men was so slow in the prewar years that NCO courses were conducted infrequently. The eight-week course ending 26
May 1939 was the first NCO course that had been conducted since 1933 It was inevitable that, with so few Regular Army officers assigned to the CWS, considerable responsibility should devolve in peacetime upon the senior noncommissioned officers of this branch. Many of these men were commissioned during World War II and served with distinction in grades up to and including that of colonel.
Training of Other Branches
Although the Chief, CWS, had a statutory responsibility for supervising the training of the entire Army in chemical warfare, “both offensive and defensive,” this fact was never taken by the War Department as a reason for relieving the unit commander of immediate responsibility for the readiness of his command for chemical combat.8 Instead, the chemical training program was developed so as to strengthen rather than weaken that responsibility. Thus the War Department from time to time established standards of readiness and indicated the scope of assistance to be rendered by the Chemical Warfare Service to field commanders in meeting these standards.9
An underlying doctrine in training for gas defense was that slack defense invited attack while superior defense deterred attack. Good gas discipline could be expected to deny military advantage to an enemy employing poison gas—and thus to discourage him from such use. And gas discipline depended on sound training supplemented by dependable protective equipment.
Organization within the Army for defense against chemical attack was based on the proposition that unit commanders at each echelon have on their staff specialists capable of assisting them in gas defense training. According to basic training doctrine, these specialists fell into two categories.10 The “chemical” officer was a CWS technical specialist assigned by superior authority to the staff of the commander of a division, corps, army, corps area, or department. At lower echelons the term “gas” officer (or noncommissioned officer) was used. Thus unit personnel were designated by unit commanders to serve as gas officers for regiments and
Basic Training, Camp Roberts. California. Trainees receive instruction in decontamination procedures
battalions and as gas noncommissioned officers for regiments, battalions, companies, or corresponding units of both ground and air troops.
After recruit instruction in use of the gas mask, training followed three well-defined phases: specialist training of unit gas officers and NCO’s; basic training of units under direction of their gas officers and NCO’s; and, finally, application of basic unit training in field problems involving gas situations.
The specialized training of unit gas officers and noncommissioned officers was therefore the starting point for the progressive training of combat forces in gas defense. This training was particularly the staff responsibility of chemical officers, who were charged with conducting special courses of instruction as frequently as necessary to insure that all units were provided with suitably trained gas officers and noncommissioned officers. The Basic Field Manual called for twenty-two hours of instruction for unit gas personnel. Opportunities were given for company grade line officers also to
Gas Training for Officers. Wearing masks, officers enter gassed area. Specialist training, Camp Beale, California
receive this type of training, in more detail, at the Chemical Warfare School. Thus the training of unit gas officers and noncommissioned officers was a staff responsibility of the Chief, CWS, who was concerned with the training of instructors; the utilization of such unit personnel (and also of staff chemical officers) in the training of combat troops was a responsibility of unit command.
Unit training of combat commands in gas defense, as distinguished from individual training, stressed collective protection. The field phase of this training was intended to test the ability of the unit to meet gas situations according to the tactical employment of the arm. The overall standard set by the War Department contemplated “opposing effectively any enemy employing chemical weapons.11 As head of a special staff section of the War Department, the Chief, CWS, was concerned with
how well gas discipline in the Army satisfied this standard and he accordingly advised the General Staff in matters pertaining to chemical warfare for inclusion in annual War Department training directives.12
Compared to the amount of organization and effort involved in defensive training, that devoted to offensive chemical warfare was relatively limited. Policy in this field was frequently reviewed by the War Department General Staff. Standard procedure was that chemical weapons developed for the U.S. Army should be produced “with a view to employment by one or more of the combatant branches”13 (that is, by Infantry, Field Artillery, Air Corps, etc.). For such matériel, the CWS was in theory a producer and supplier only. But the Chemical Warfare Service was never content merely to purvey. It took the view that the stocks of smoke, incendiary, and gas munitions were specialties, the merits of which might be overlooked if not adequately utilized. Hence an important function of CWS officers detailed to the faculties of special service schools and the Command and General Staff School was to further the introduction of chemical warfare situations into instructional problems and at the same time assist in the development of doctrine covering the employment of chemical munitions by the several combat arms. The Chief, CWS, selected instructors for assignment to those schools with the utmost care.
Not all chemical weapons were suited to employment by one of the older arms. Such weapons constituted the armament of “special gas troops” and the technique of their employment was taught at the Chemical Warfare School.
Chemical Warfare School
The Chemical Warfare School at Edgewood Arsenal was, before the war, the most important single training agency of the CWS. It was in effect the fountainhead of chemical warfare training for the Army and its teachings were closely followed in the Navy and Marine Corps. It was also to some extent a laboratory for the development of chemical warfare tactics and techniques.
The school taught, almost exclusively, the offensive and defensive aspects of gas warfare. The military employment of smoke was treated
briefly, and some consideration was given to incendiary warfare. Impracticability of biological warfare was accented. The faculty emphasized that gas was an important development in military science; that wide use of the gas weapon in the next war was inevitable; that American gas warfare matériel, offensive and defensive, was superior, and, when employed together with the gas discipline so essential to troop protection, would ensure the ability of the U.S. Army to stage gas attacks more effectively than its enemies.
The great majority of students attending the school were from arms and services other than the CWS. Most of them were expected after graduation to become instructors in gas defense in their organizations or to supervise some phase of chemical warfare operations. Accommodations available at Edgewood Arsenal limited the capacity of the school to approximately fifty students. Normally, only five classes were conducted during the school year. Their duration varied from three to twelve weeks, and they ran without overlap. In an average year, resident students attended the school thirty weeks out of the fifty-two. The total number of graduates, as of 30 June 1939, was 2,809.14 (Table 8)
Table 8—Chemical Warfare School Courses, School Year 1937–38
| Course | Length | Students |
| Total | *205 | |
| Field Officers | 5 weeks | 59 |
| Navy Fall | 3 weeks | 41 |
| Basic | 6 weeks | 34 |
| Line and Staff | 12 weeks | 36 |
| Navy Spring | 4 weeks | 35 |
* Regular Army-70 (includes 9 CWS officers); National Guard-19; Organized Reserves-15 (includes 11 CWS officers); Marine Corps-10; Navy-91.
Source: Class records, Chemical Corps School.
The Chemical Warfare School had a tendency toward extroversion, naturally acquired through many years of teaching its military specialty to other elements of the armed forces. During prewar years the school was notably successful in bringing a working knowledge of gas warfare to
a wide cross section of Army and Navy officers. It stood well among service schools on two counts: it had developed a liberal approach to military education, and it was held in high regard by its graduates.
Prior to 1939 three courses had been developed for the instruction of Army officers: the Basic, the Line and Staff, and the Field Officers’ Courses. The Basic Course was essentially an elaborate unit gas officers’ course which was attended in the late prewar years by an increasing number of National Guard and some Reserve officers. It was intended to strengthen the gas defense program by making available an increasing number of well qualified junior line officers to aid in unit training of ground and air forces. The Line and Staff Course (the longest prewar course conducted by the school) trained company grade officers, principally Regular Army, in both offensive and defensive chemical warfare. It presented a broad picture of gas warfare involving all combatant arms. The Field Officers’ Course was designed to acquaint senior officers with the general features of chemical warfare from the viewpoint of battalion and regimental commanders. This midsummer course was timed for the convenience of officers graduating from or detailed to attend other Army schools, especially the general service schools.
In addition to these three standard courses for Army personnel, a Navy Course was conducted each spring and fall, integrated with the naval program of professional schooling. In order to assist in this instruction, naval personnel stationed at Edgewood Arsenal were attached to the faculty of the CW School.
Training Situation in 1939
In the two decades preceding World War II the CWS had developed a training organization that was well designed to serve the primary purpose of maintaining within the armed forces a healthy attitude toward gas warfare. If in these years the use of chemical weapons other than gas was not stressed, the omission must be attributed to the fact that other chemical weapons were still largely unperfected.
The training activities of the branch engaged a large and possibly disproportionate number of CWS officers. Training was in fact an engaging occupation. Trainers at times developed an evangelical approach toward gas warfare. The subject was novel and often welcomed by troops as a change from monotonous military exercises. Despite limited allotments of training time, the military concepts of the Chemical Warfare Service were well disseminated at the close of the interwar period.
Considerable training had been accomplished in connection with the projected mobilization of chemical combat troops. The composition of these
troops and the tactics of their employment in conjunction with field armies were studied at service schools and in correspondence courses. The CWS expected that gas warfare would be resumed where it had left off in 1918; that the scale of gas casualties suffered by the American Army would be reduced because of improved defensive techniques; and that gathering momentum in the United States in the production of gas munitions during the final phases of World War I would quickly be regained in a new war so as to assure dominance in this field. In the view of the Chemical Warfare Service, at least, gas was a normal military weapon and, as a result of progressive training, the theory of its employment had become integrated into the main stream of Army tactical doctrine.
While no attempt was made to conceal training activities, every nation shrouded in secrecy its research and development in chemical warfare. The U.S. found it difficult to obtain precise information as to the size and scope of preparations for the offensive use of poison gas by other nations. Intelligence estimates were based to some extent on more readily obtainable information as to training activities in gas defense, which were generally accepted as an index to national intentions. The considerable attention given to chemical warfare defense in the United States Army was frequently noted by military attaches of the Washington embassies. As a result, both Germany and Japan came to a similar conclusion well before the outset of hostilities—the United States was making serious preparations for gas warfare.15
Actually the policy of President Roosevelt was to avert rather than to precipitate gas warfare. This policy was unmistakably announced in his veto message of 1937.16 Despite Presidential intent some veering in attitude toward gas warfare is discernible in the years immediately preceding 1939. This trend coincided with the steady deterioration of international conciliation as a means of avoiding war which followed the rise of Mussolini and Hitler to power. It was reflected within the War Department as early as 1930, when a noticeable shift in emphasis from strictly defensive training in gas warfare took place.17 The combatant status of the Chemical Warfare Service was reaffirmed in 1935 when Congress specified that the CWS,
as well as the combatant arms, be included in the allotment of Reserve officers called to extended active duty.18
Having weathered much controversy in the two decades of its existence, the CWS by 1939 confidently felt that its seasoned training doctrine would contribute substantially to the success of any war into which the nation might be drawn.