Edgewood-Aberdeen Military Trauma Experiments
The Edgewood-Aberdeen experiments were conducted at the US Army Laboratories at Edgewood Arsenal, Maryland. Between 1950 and 1975 an estimated 6,720 service members became test subjects in experiments conducted to learn how various dangerous agents would affect humans and what protective clothing could be used to combat those affects in case such agents were used against American troops.
Edgewood Arsenal had manufactured chemical weapons since 1918, and in 2003 the Edgewood area was designated as one of America’s most polluted military bases by the Baltimore Sun (Baltimore Sun, 2017). Many of the workers were exposed daily to toxins such as mustard gas and phosgene gas, but it was only later in the 1960s where this testing would be purposeful - thousands of enlisted men were exposed to sarin, nerve gas, carbamate pesticides, cannaboids, BZ, PCP, and LSD so the effects could be studied during the height of the Cold War.
Home to Operation Delirium - weapons of mass mental incapacitation were studied, the lives of soldiers put at risk with many suffering physical and psychological trauma as a result - chemical warfare as we understand it was born.
Volunteer soldiers signed consent forms which didn’t fully detail the nature of the experiments or the dangerous and debilitating nature of the agents involved, many of the testing being documented on film so that the incapacitating effects could be understood visually.
Sources:
Barber, J. (2022, June 7). Meet the veterans who survived the Army's Edgewood Experiments. Military.com. Retrieved April 3, 2023, from https://www.military.com/off-duty/television/2022/06/07/meet-veterans-who-survived-armys-edgewood-experiments.html
Edgewood/Aberdeen experiments. lovme. (2021, February 26). Retrieved April 3, 2023, from https://lovme.org/cold-war-era/cold-war-era-exposures/chemical-biological-warfare-exposures/edgewoodaberdeen-experiments/
The New Yorker. (2012, December 21). Secrets of Edgewood. The New Yorker. Retrieved April 3, 2023, from https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/secrets-of-edgewood
NPR. (2012, December 10). 'operation delirium:' psychochemicals and Cold War. NPR. Retrieved April 3, 2023, from https://www.npr.org/2012/12/11/166891159/operation-delirium-psychochemicals-and-cold-
war#:~:text=Throughout%20the%201950s%20and%20'60s%2C%20at%20the%20now%2Dcrumbling,on%20their%20brain%20and%20behavior
Rominiecki, Amanda. “A Chemical and Biological History.” APG News, 5 Jan. 2017, https://apgnews.com/special-focus/apg-100/chemical-biological-history/.
Tkacik, C. (2017, April 6). Chemical weapons testing at Edgewood Arsenal through the years. The Darkroom: Exploring visual journalism from the Baltimore Sun. Retrieved April 3, 2023, from https://darkroom.baltimoresun.com/2017/04/chemical-weapons-testing-at-edgewood-arsenal-through-the-years/#13
Va.gov: Veterans Affairs. Edgewood-Aberdeen Experiments. (2013, December 13). Retrieved April 3, 2023, from https://www.warrelatedillness.va.gov/education/exposures/edgewood-aberdeen.asp
YouTube. (2014). Psychochemical amidst the Cold War - Commentary - The New Yorker. YouTube. Retrieved April 3, 2023, from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B2Z0QAL6wmc.