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The last several years have seen a large number of mass poisonings in mainland China, particularly those caused by illicit rodenticides. One rat poison, tetramine (tetramethylene disulfotetramine) is responsible for a great percentage of death and injury in the People's Republic of China (PRC). Tetramine is an acutely toxic substance with human oral toxicity estimated as low as 0.1 mg/kg, and is widely available in open markets in mainland China--this despite being prohibited for manufacture or sale in the PRC. Being a GABA antagonist, and having an extremely potent effect on the brain stem, many victims can quickly fall into convulsions and die within hours following ingestion. With no known effective antidote at this time, clinical data from the PRC show that acute cases of tetramine poisoning are extremely difficult to treat. The widespread use of tetramine--including its reported sale at a Malaysian outdoor market in September 2002--could exacerbate its hazard to public health, particularly in those areas having large overseas Chinese populations.

Modern China has been linked with the proliferation of nuclear, chemical, and missile weapons technology to states of proliferation concern, and its compliance with arms control and disarmament is seen as key to the effectiveness of weapons of mass destruction (WMD) nonproliferation efforts. In this context, the answer to Gerald Segal’s question, “Does China really matter?” is most definitely, “Yes.” In the realm of chemical and biological weapons (CBW), Beijing’s role is closely linked to its view of the multilateral disarmament regimes for CBW, namely the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) and the Biological and Toxin Weapons Convention (BWC), and of related multilateral export control efforts. These views, in turn, depend on how CBW figure in China’s tactical and strategic posture, which includes a declared nuclear weapons (NW) capability and a strategic missile force. Where CBW proliferation is concerned, the key question today is not whether China matters, but whether the Chinese government is serious about eliminating both chemical and biological weapons—it maintains it never developed the latter—and preventing the proliferation of CBW-related technology. China has been an active participant (at least in the last two decades) in both chemical and biological disarmament and arms control negotiations. Outwardly at least—and with considerable diplomatic effort—China broadcasts its commitment to both the CWC and the BWC.

In the course of the twentieth century, dozens of nations have developed, a few have deployed, and fewer still have actually used CBW armaments. After the Armistice in 1918, the principal combatants were shattered and exhausted; they seemed to have little use for chemical weaponry Very broadly speaking, they agreed that “gas warfare” should never again have a place on the battlefield, and even as they began to rebuild their stocks of armaments over the next ten years, they focused on conventional armaments and new tools like airplanes and submarines—but not gas. In fact, for most of the half-century after World War I, the trend in military planning (with a few notable exceptions) was to move away from chemical warfare. And the same could be said for the trend in political thinking. Justly characterized as an era of unprecedented mass killing, the twentieth century had begun with a war in which gas munitions came to symbolize all that is horrible about modern warfare, and the end of the war brought numerous international calls for disarmament, and particularly for bans on the use of chemicals. The international community, at the political level—that is, at the level on which states made treaties with each other—was close to unanimous in its abhorrence of weapons that relied on poisons and pathogens.

We learn from history, but making predictions from history is another matter altogether. Almost exactly two months before the September 11, 2001, attack on the Pentagon and World Trade Center, a knowledgeable and deservedly respected expert on terrorism wrote a New York Times Op-Ed piece, “The Declining Terrorist Threat,” in which he said the following: ...Americans are bedeviled by fantasies about terrorism. They seem to believe that terrorism is the greatest threat to the United States and that it is becoming more widespread and lethal. They are likely to think that the United States is the most popular target of terrorists. And they almost certainly have the impression that extremist Islamic groups cause most terrorism. None of these beliefs are based in fact....1

We have defined biological warfare as the use of pathogens, that is, disease-causing bacterial and viral agents, or biologically derived toxins against humans, animals, or crops. The very word “toxin, from the Greek for “bow,” originated from the use of poisons on arrowheads,1 showing that humans have utilized disease and toxins in combat throughout history.

Whether it was the spread of plague following Mongol invasions, or the near eradication of Native Americans due to disease brought in from the Old World, disease has played a significant role in strategy and geopolitics. Of the many lives lost due to the violence of war throughout history, many more have succumbed to disease during battle rather than actual combat. Typhus (spread by lice), plague (via fleas and infected rats), and dysentery have caused enormous numbers of deaths in major wars as far back as one can go. For every one British soldier killed by Russian rifle or artillery, for example, at least ten died from dysentery during the Crimean War (1854–56). Ten years later during the American Civil War, infectious disease also took a disproportionate toll.

We generally think of chemical warfare as a modern phenomenon, but it has its precursors in ancient and medieval warfare, and especially siege warfare. Assaults on castles and walled cities could drag on for months or even years, so it is not surprising that a military commander would look for an innovative way to end a stalemate. Incendiaries and toxic or greasy smokes were common tools in both attacking and defending besieged castles.

Biological weapons have presented unique and vexing challenges to those who have wished to eradicate them. Disarmament has been particularly complicated because nearly all biological weapons technologies and agents have legitimate industrial uses and, consequently, BW programs can easily be hidden from even the most intrusive inspector. The most ambitious international effort to control the proliferation of BW, the Biological and Toxin Weapons Convention of 1972 (the BTWC), has so far been largely unsuccessful. The provisions of the 1993 Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) are enforced by an international monitoring body, the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), based in the Hague, and made up of those nations that have ratified the CWC. For the BTWC, there is no such organization, largely due to the continuing disagreements, even among those who have signed and ratified the convention, about how exactly many of its terms should be interpreted and enforced.