# Why Didn't Hitler Resort to Poison Gas? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [June 11, 2008, 6:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-didnt-hitler-resort-to-poison-gas/452601 "2008-06-11T18:31:11Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![ralph124c](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/8797f3/32.png) [@ralph124c](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ralph124c)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2008, 3:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-didnt-hitler-resort-to-poison-gas/452601/41 "2008-06-13T15:52:51Z")
Another aside: well into the 1960’s, the Army-Navy shops around Boston were full of US ARMY-issue gas masks. The government bought jillions of them!! The fact that they were never used is ironic-I can remember playing with one as a kid-gov. paid $500/each-for sale at al’s army-navy-$1.25 ---
**Author:** ![Wakinyan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wakinyan/32/352_2.png) [@Wakinyan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wakinyan)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2008, 9:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-didnt-hitler-resort-to-poison-gas/452601/42 "2008-06-13T21:49:45Z")
[QUOTE=Voyager] Oddly enough, the rules for POWs were followed pretty well. Russians were mistreated, but that was because Stalin did not follow the rules for POWs. [/QUOTE] This is not accurate and quite a terrible thing to say. The Nazis (Hitler inofficially, Goebbles officially) declared “total war” against the Russians, where the rules of war were explicitly put aside when waging war the “asians”. The atrocities committed by the Nazists against the Russian, Belarusians, Ukraininan peoples have nothing at all to do with how Stalin treated his own people. ---
**Author:** ![Wakinyan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wakinyan/32/352_2.png) [@Wakinyan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wakinyan)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2008, 10:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-didnt-hitler-resort-to-poison-gas/452601/43 "2008-06-13T22:06:02Z")
… or other peoples. There was no time for Stalin to treat any POW in any way until months after the German invasion, which was highly successful in the beginning, rounding up hundreds of thousands of Russian troops. ---
**Author:** ![OtakuLoki](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/ac8455/32.png) [@OtakuLoki](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OtakuLoki)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2008, 10:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-didnt-hitler-resort-to-poison-gas/452601/44 "2008-06-13T22:25:58Z")
**Wakinyan** , even before the beginning of Barbarossa, Stalin had shown how he would treat POWs. The execution of Polish officers during the [Katyn Massacre](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katyn_Massacre) shows a certain disregard for the rules of war. If German intelligence had any hint of that, prior to Barbarossa (I don’t know whether they did or not, but I will say that if anyone outside of Poland could know, they would have been the ones.) it would prove a certain lack of good faith on Stalin’s part. This is not meant to defend the record of the Germans pushing into Soviet territory. Just pointing out that it’s hard to paint Stalin as being unfairly maligned. ---
**Author:** ![Wakinyan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wakinyan/32/352_2.png) [@Wakinyan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wakinyan)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2008, 10:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-didnt-hitler-resort-to-poison-gas/452601/45 "2008-06-13T22:30:20Z")
[QUOTE=OtakuLoki] **Wakinyan** ,… Germans pushing into Soviet territory. Just pointing out that it’s hard to paint Stalin as being unfairly maligned. [/QUOTE] Were not talking about Stalin here, Utgårdaloke, and there is no person at this forum defending him. You’re missing the point entirerly, which most likely is due to my inability to express myself clearly, for which I beg your pardon. ---
**Author:** ![Loach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/loach/32/350_2.png) [@Loach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loach)\ **Post date:** [June 14, 2008, 1:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-didnt-hitler-resort-to-poison-gas/452601/46 "2008-06-14T01:41:59Z")
[QUOTE=Fish] Christy Mathewson, the pitcher for the New York Giants, was exposed to chemical weapons during a training exercise in WWI. He lived to age 45, although as a result of his exposure to the gas, he contracted tuberculosis. [/QUOTE] :dubious: Tuberculosis is an infectious disease caused by bacteria. What does mustard gas have to do with it? ---
**Author:** ![Cicero](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cicero/32/3594_2.png) [@Cicero](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cicero)\ **Post date:** [June 14, 2008, 3:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-didnt-hitler-resort-to-poison-gas/452601/47 "2008-06-14T03:09:27Z")
I guess you could say that Hitler did use poison gas. At Auschwitz Birkenau for instance. ---
**Author:** ![GomiBoy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/b2d939/32.png) [@GomiBoy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GomiBoy)\ **Post date:** [June 14, 2008, 8:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-didnt-hitler-resort-to-poison-gas/452601/48 "2008-06-14T08:25:58Z")
[QUOTE=Loach] :dubious: Tuberculosis is an infectious disease caused by bacteria. What does mustard gas have to do with it? [/QUOTE] Mustard gas weakens the lungs and the immune system? I dunno, was scratching my head over that one too. ---
**Author:** ![Fish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/bc8723/32.png) [@Fish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fish)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2008, 8:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-didnt-hitler-resort-to-poison-gas/452601/49 "2008-06-16T08:43:03Z")
[QUOTE=Loach] :dubious: Tuberculosis is an infectious disease caused by bacteria. What does mustard gas have to do with it? [/QUOTE] You got me. Tuberculosis seems to be a pretty common cause of death, back in the day; that’s what my great-grandmother died of. Ken Burns’ book _Baseball_ has nothing to say about tuberculosis: > [@Baseball by Ken Burns](#): > > Christy Mathewson, “the Christian Gentleman” of baseball, had never recovered from the aftereffects of the poison gas he had inhaled in France. He had tried to return to the game he loved after the war, first collecting evidence that helped uncover the Black Sox scandal, then as president of the Boston Braves. But he could not get enough air and coughed up blood. “Now Jane,” he told his wife toward the end, “I suppose you will have to go out and have a good cry. Don’t make it a long one. This can’t be helped.” > Mathewson died on October 7, 1925. John McGraw, his face even redder than normal with weeping, helped carry the coffin to the cemetery. “Why should God wish to take a thoroughbred like Matty so soon,” asked Judge Landis, “and leave some others down here that could well be spared?” [Historic Baseball](http://www.historicbaseball.com/players/m/mathewson_christy.html)’s website says > [@](#): > > In 1918, Mathewson enlisted in the Army and served overseas. He was gassed during a training exercise and developed tuberculosis. He returned to the Giants in 1919-1920 to serve as a coach, but most of his time was spent fighting tuberculosis. He served as part-time president of the Braves in 1923, and died two years later at the age of 47. which suggests he developed tuberculosis as an immediate aftereffect of the poison gas, and that he fought it for years (he died in 1925). Anyway, the point being, it (the gas) wasn’t instantly fatal. ---
**Author:** ![Mk\_VII](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Mk\_VII](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mk_VII)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2008, 9:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-didnt-hitler-resort-to-poison-gas/452601/50 "2008-06-16T09:43:14Z")
many people who had been gassed suffered from bronchial troubles for years afterwards, and to that extent it was a life-shortening injury. ---
**Author:** ![Pushkin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ee59a6/32.png) [@Pushkin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pushkin)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2008, 9:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-didnt-hitler-resort-to-poison-gas/452601/51 "2008-06-16T09:54:42Z")
I remember reading somewhere about gas in WWII, a German soldier interviewed was of the opinion that Germany moved too quickly on the advance and retreat so the conditions were never right for it. Churchill was concerned about the use of mustard gas on a city, but was told the amount needed to swamp a city was beyond the capabilities of Germany and the UK to quickly produce at the time. ---
**Author:** ![trotsky\_sicehammer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7bcc69/32.png) [@trotsky\_sicehammer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/trotsky_sicehammer)\ **Post date:** [August 31, 2014, 6:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-didnt-hitler-resort-to-poison-gas/452601/52 "2014-08-31T18:14:19Z")
So I just recently learned the real reason the Third Reich never used poison gas in combat a few weeks ago, and I’ve been making it my mission to go all over the place so people who give a darn about the juicy details of history learn this too. The Germans were using Buna rubber, which is made from synthetic petroleum. It is not useful for gas mask construction because it has microscopic holes unlike regular rubber, through which gas can pass. Therefore apart from a few gas masks they had from the “good” rubber made from Romanian oil, the Wehrmacht was unprotected against their own gas, much less against Allies retaliation. So the main reason they didn’t use it: they would have killed themselves in the process!! ---
**Author:** ![johnpost](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/f17d59/32.png) [@johnpost](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/johnpost)\ **Post date:** [August 31, 2014, 6:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-didnt-hitler-resort-to-poison-gas/452601/53 "2014-08-31T18:28:47Z")
the petroleum was not synthetic. rubber made from Romanium oil is synthetic. the Axis controlled nearly all the world’s natural rubber. ---
**Author:** ![naita](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/naita/32/5862_2.png) [@naita](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/naita)\ **Post date:** [August 31, 2014, 7:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-didnt-hitler-resort-to-poison-gas/452601/54 "2014-08-31T19:57:21Z")
> [@trotsky\_sicehammer](#): > > So I just recently learned the real reason the Third Reich never used poison gas in combat a few weeks ago, and I’ve been making it my mission to go all over the place so people who give a darn about the juicy details of history learn this too. > > The Germans were using Buna rubber, which is made from synthetic petroleum. It is not useful for gas mask construction because it has microscopic holes unlike regular rubber, through which gas can pass. Therefore apart from a few gas masks they had from the “good” rubber made from Romanian oil, the Wehrmacht was unprotected against their own gas, much less against Allies retaliation. So the main reason they didn’t use it: they would have killed themselves in the process!! cite? As johnpost writes, the Axis had control over most of the world’s natural rubber. Improvement in production of synthetic rubber was an important strategic effort in the US. [Synthetic rubber - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synthetic_rubber#World_War_II) So if you want anyone to take your newfound wisdom seriously, you better back it up with a good source for where you just learned it. ---
**Author:** ![naita](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/naita/32/5862_2.png) [@naita](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/naita)\ **Post date:** [August 31, 2014, 8:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-didnt-hitler-resort-to-poison-gas/452601/55 "2014-08-31T20:00:18Z")
Oh, and [this documentary](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dead_Snow) is particularly pertinent to the subject of this thread. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [August 31, 2014, 9:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-didnt-hitler-resort-to-poison-gas/452601/56 "2014-08-31T21:17:04Z")
> [@naita](#): > > cite? As johnpost writes, the Axis had control over most of the world’s natural rubber. Improvement in production of synthetic rubber was an important strategic effort in the US. [Synthetic rubber - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synthetic_rubber#World_War_II) The Japanese had control over most of the world’s natural rubber. The Germans didn’t. I don’t know that that’s relevant, though, since the Germans used Buna rubber for gasmasks during WWII. ---
**Author:** ![bob\_2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bob_2/32/3341_2.png) [@bob\_2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bob_2)\ **Post date:** [August 31, 2014, 9:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-didnt-hitler-resort-to-poison-gas/452601/57 "2014-08-31T21:23:06Z")
You are aware that many [most] of the troops assaulting the beaches on D Day had gas masks with them? > [@](#): > > Not all troops who landed on Normandy on June 6th were outfitted with the M7 bag and M5 gas mask. The initial assault troops, those who had the highest degree of probability of getting wet, were the ones issued with the M7/M5 combination. Soldiers landing in later waves were often issued the M3-10-6 gas mask, which was not designed to be waterproof. > [Saving Private Ryan: M7 Gas Mask Bag](http://www.sproe.com/g/gas-bag.html) British civillians and troops were required by law to carry gas masks at all times. ---
**Author:** ![Shakester](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/shakester/32/437_2.png) [@Shakester](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shakester)\ **Post date:** [September 1, 2014, 7:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-didnt-hitler-resort-to-poison-gas/452601/58 "2014-09-01T07:12:35Z")
Gas masks were part of the standard equipment for troops on all sides in WW2. The Germans had [a nice tin to carry them in](http://www.mp44.nl/equipment/gas_mask.htm) which you can see in any pic of German troops in full kit. Allied troops carried theirs in canvas bags so they’re less identifiable in pics, but they all carried them. I don’t know when the US stopped issuing gas masks as standard equipment, but European troops, West and East, carried gas masks as standard kit well into the Cold War era. ---
**Author:** ![sidecar\_jon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@sidecar\_jon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sidecar_jon)\ **Post date:** [September 1, 2014, 12:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-didnt-hitler-resort-to-poison-gas/452601/59 "2014-09-01T12:39:46Z")
The Bari harbour disaster is an interesting side line… " December 1943…105 German Junkers Ju 88 bombers of Luftflotte 2, achieving complete surprise, bombed shipping and personnel operating in support of the Allied Italian campaign, sinking 27 cargo ships…\*\* The release of mustard gas from one of the wrecked cargo ships added to the loss of life.\*\*… Liberty ship John Harvey—had been carrying a secret cargo of 2000 M47A1 mustard gas bombs, each holding 60–70 lb (27–32 kg) of the agent. According to Royal Navy historian Stephen Roskill, this cargo had been sent to Europe for retaliatory use if Germany carried out its threatened use of chemical warfare in Italy…" > **[Air raid on Bari](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_raid_on_Bari)** > > Invasion of Italy > Winter Line > Gothic Line ---
**Author:** ![naita](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/naita/32/5862_2.png) [@naita](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/naita)\ **Post date:** [September 1, 2014, 1:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-didnt-hitler-resort-to-poison-gas/452601/60 "2014-09-01T13:03:18Z")
> [@Shakester](#): > > Gas masks were part of the standard equipment for troops on all sides in WW2. > > The Germans had [a nice tin to carry them in](http://www.mp44.nl/equipment/gas_mask.htm) which you can see in any pic of German troops in full kit. > > Allied troops carried theirs in canvas bags so they’re less identifiable in pics, but they all carried them. I don’t know when the US stopped issuing gas masks as standard equipment, but European troops, West and East, carried gas masks as standard kit well into the Cold War era. I was issued a gas mask as a private in the Norwegian Air Force in 1999, but the guy who resurrected this thread isn’t saying they didn’t have gas masks, but that they issued them but knew they were insufficient, so they chose not to use gas. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-didnt-hitler-resort-to-poison-gas/452601.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-didnt-hitler-resort-to-poison-gas/452601.md?page=4)