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[av_heading heading=’BENEATH & BEYOND | Sarin in Syria’ tag=’h3′ style=’blockquote modern-quote’ size=” subheading_active=’subheading_below’ subheading_size=’15’ padding=’10’ color=” custom_font=”]
BY SONIA D. DAQUILA
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Sunday, April 16, 2017
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DID YOU ever spray pesticide to cockroaches, flies or rats, and watch them twitching and instantly dying or temporarily paralyzed? That was exactly the case of the victims of those who were exposed to a chemical nerve agent known as Sarin in Syria.
Sarin is not a natural product of the environment. It is a concoction of varied chemicals. In 1936 German chemist Gerhard Schrader, “the father of the nerve agent”, developed the first organophorous nerve agents. These were Tabun, Soman and Sarin. Sarin is also known as GBand was first developed as a pesticide.
In its original form, Sarin is clear, odorless and tasteless. It evaporates and easily spreads in the environment.
Sarin is the most toxic, rapidly acting warfare agent, more potent and harmful than organophosphate pesticides, and 20 times more potent than cyanide.
The world will never ever forget the use of the gas chamber by Adolf Hitler and his mass killing of millions of Jews in 1942. The gas used was Zyklon B (a modified version of Zyklon). In the 1950s Great Britain discovered VX nerve agent, 10 times more potent than Sarin. This was commercially known as Amiton. It was exported as a pesticide but was later on retrieved from the market because of its extremely harmful effects.
Chemical and bacteriological warfare will surely end all wars. Superpowers avowed learning lessons from World War II and realized the impending threat of total annihilation should chemical or bacteriological warfare be used in international conflict, yet in the Cold War that followed, the United States had a large scale production of VX, and its counterpart, Russia its VR or VX.
Thus subsequent to the Chemical Weapons Convention of 1997, all VX groups were banned and chemical weapons signatories claimed to have destroyed their respective stockpiles.
Infamous dictators of the world, however, registered frightening mass killings through poison attacks. In 1988, dictator Saddam Hussein in Iraq was held responsible for killing more than 5,000 people; the Sarin gas released by the Japanese doomsday cult Aum Shinrikyo in a subway station in Tokyo in 1995;in 2013 Syrian attacks during the civil war; on Feb. 13, 2017 Kim Jong Nam (half-brother of Korean ruler Kim Jong Un) was murdered at the Korean Airport when two young women which seemingly played a prank used a handkerchief to smear Kim Jong-Nam’s eyes and face with a VX nerve agent. Kim Jong Nam died in a matter of minutes due to suffocation.
The latest was on April 4, 2017 when the rebel-held town of Sheikhoun, province of Idlib in Syria had a Sarin gas attack killing around 100 people.
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad (the claimed Russian-Hezbollah puppet) was accused of having used Sarin while the Syrian government calls it a USA propaganda to justify the sending of US cruise missiles hitting 59 out of its 60 target son the airfield in Syria to prevent more chemical attacks.
From a hands-off policy on Syrian politics, USA aims at the possible ouster of Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad. Russia condemned President Donald Trump and warned of a strained relationship.
As part of the war game, no one admitted the use of lethal gas as weapon. Now, the conversation between and among the dominant powers is in the form of cruise missiles and gas attacks. Who will win? Nobody will, in the end. For mankind, there is nowhere to go.
Yesterday was Black Saturday in the Christian world – a time to reflect on our humanity and our final destination. A reflection on Sodom and Gomorrah, Abraham, Moses, Ramses, John, Peter, the ark of Noah, Pontius Pilate – these area few fitting examples from the Bible how mankind turned wicked after they were given everything to enjoy in this temporal home, the earth; how God destroyed the people who pursued their predilection for power, for the earth to start anew.
It could be in the form flood, tornadoes, earthquakes, tsunamis, war or by a slow and painful death through chemical and bacteriological warfare. These remind us of Jesus, the focal point of the season of Lent. (delsocorrodaquila@gmail.com/PN)
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