INTRODUCTION
On August 21, 2013, Syrian president Bashar al-Assad’s
army killed an estimated 1,400 people in Eastern Ghouta
with sarin gas. It was the rst use of chemical weapons in
the Middle East in 25 years, but not the last. As he battled a
dogged insurgency, Assad used sarin in another mass casu-
alty event; hehas used chlorine gas nearly 350 times.
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Following the 2013 Ghouta attack, international outrage
prompted eorts to eliminate Syria’s chemical arsenal with
Russia’s cooperation. Yet, accountability for war crimes
has faded from the international spotlight, as has Russian
cooperation to investigate and attribute chemical weap-
ons attacks in Syria. Assad won back most of his territory
and has reentered the Arab League. He transgressed inter-
national norms and survived. Assad’s success may push
adversaries and allies of the United States alike to consider
using chemical weapons as he did.
If such a thing happened, it would have a precedent.
During the Cold War, four Arab states embarked on chemi-
cal weapons programs, with Eypt taking a pioneering role
in both development and usage in the 1960s. The Eyp-
tian military used chemical weapons on Yemeni royalists
sheltering in caves in Yemen as early as June 1963, and it
eventually launched around 40 separate chemical weapons
attacks in the country.
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Libya, Syria, and Iraq subsequently
began chemical weapons programs, Iraq with Eyptian
THE ISSUE
■
The international community’s failure to deter or punish Syrian president Bashar al-Assad’s use of chemical weap-
ons risks incentivizing the use of chemical weapons by others.
□ Assad’s use of chemical weapons has highlighted their military eectiveness and undermined the norms pro-
hibiting their use.
■ Increasing multipolarity has made international accountability more challenging.
■ Actors are likely to challenge existing norms by gradually escalating their chemical weapons use from riot-control
agents to toxic industrial chemicals or pharmaceutical-based agents while spreading disinformation and impeding
evidence collection.
■
The United States should strengthen detection and accountability mechanisms to deter future chemi-
cal weapons usage.
□
It should work with allies and partners to prioritize the early detection and prevention of chemical weap-
ons development, develop backchannels to establish deterrence, and dene clear red lines against chemi-
cal weapons usage.
OCTOBER 2024By Natasha Hall
Emerging Trends in Chemical
Weapons Usage in the Middle East
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