Military and terrorist attacks against chemical weapons sites and the prospect of a Syrian War Syndrome

TL;DR

This paper uses Sarin dispersion simulations to assess the devastating effects of attacks on chemical weapons sites, highlighting potential health crises like a Syrian War Syndrome similar to Gulf War Syndrome.

Contribution

It provides a novel analysis of the potential consequences of chemical weapons site attacks, including the first discussion of a possible Syrian War Syndrome.

Findings

Explosive releases of Sarin could cause widespread lethal effects.

Military strikes on Syrian sites could lead to serious health crises.

Simulations suggest large-scale impacts from small Sarin quantities.

Abstract

Sarin explosive dispersion simulations indicate that the effects of military, terrorist and accidental explosions on Sarin storage areas could be devastating at large distances from ground zero as they would practically amount to gigantic lethal chemical weapon explosions. As a case study, the April 14, 2018 military strikes on the alleged Syrian chemical weapons sites are investigated due to their high relevance and similarity to the Sarin releases occurred in the US demolition operations at the Khamisiyah Pit in Iraq (1991) believed to have been a possible source of the Gulf War Syndrome. The results show that even if a few kilograms of Sarin had been explosively released from the alleged chemical weapons sites targeted in Syria then hundreds to thousands of people would have experienced lethal or serious irreversible health effects in Syria. The prospect of the appearance of a Sarin-induced Syrian War Syndrome is also discussed for the first time.