The 1918 Spanish Flu: A Different Perspective

Was it Chemical Poisoning?

Given the current environmental disaster in Eastern Ohio/Western Pennsylvania, I thought it would be interesting to post information that I wrote as part of my book, “FOWL! Bird Flu is Not What You Think” for an additional perspective on the impact of environmental chemicals have played on our health for more than 100 years. The past is predictive of the present. I also wrote a previous substack on environmental chemicals here for your review.

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The Globalist’s cornerstone argument for pushing to sign an international treaty on pandemic prevention and preparedness is based on a supposed similarity between the contrived Covid-19 Plandemic and the Spanish Flu of 1918.

“It happened in the past; we MUST prevent it from happening again.”

However, little attention has ever been given to the correlation between the massive use of chemicals during World War I (1915 to 1917), just prior to an outbreak of what has been labeled The Great Influenza Pandemic.

The Leavenworth Papers, published by the Combat Studies Institute for the U.S. Army at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas in 1984, is a collection of monographs regarding military history and strategy. One paper in particular, Leavenworth Paper No. 10, chronicles the introduction of chemical agents in World War I, the U.S. Army’s marginal preparations for gas warfare prior to entering the war, and the experience of the AEF (Air Expeditionary Force) with gas on the Western Front.

Let’s explore this ‘pandemic’ from a different perspective: Chemical poisoning.

The Chemicals

The following information is summarized from the lengthy Leavenworth paper:

During World War I, chemists on both sides investigated more than 3,000 chemical substances for potential use as weapons. Of the thirty agents used in combat, about a dozen achieved the desired, deadly military results. The war gases and chemicals were grouped according to their effects on the human body. The most widely used by both sides, the one that had the most harmful and deadly effects, was mustard gas. It was said to be responsible for 1,205,655 non-fatal injuries and 91,198 deaths.

Strictly speaking, mustard gas (dichlorethyl-sulfide) is not a gas, but a liquid, which slowly vaporizes at normal ambient temperatures. It could be removed from dugouts, trenches, and equipment by sprinkling the surfaces with powdered chlorine bleach. Mustard gas was toxic in concentrations that could not be detected by smell. The person felt no discomfort when exposed to the gas but hours later, would experience choking, severe burning, and mucosal blistering. Mustard gas penetrated all types of ‘protective’ clothing and was remarkably persistent over time in the environment - soil, leaves, and grasses.

[An interesting aside is that in 1942 mustard gas was one of the first chemicals to be used as a cancer drug.]

From 1915 forward, the Germans held a huge advantage in the area of gas warfare. New agents were introduced that could be deployed using long-range shells instead of short-range canisters. With the use of heavy artillery, soldiers didn’t have to rely on the direction of the wind to deliver the payload correctly or rely on ‘direct hits’ to be effective. For example, in May 1916 they began to use shells filled with diphosgene, a strong lung irritant. Later that year, shells were filled with a mix of 75 percent phosgene and 25 percent diphosgene. Phosgene was responsible for a large number of deaths by choking, inability to breathe, and heart failure.

By July 1917, both sides were using three different mixtures of phosgene, diphosgene, and diphenylchlorosine, a chlorine powder laced with arsenic dust. In field trials, arsenic powder proved extremely effective because it penetrated all types of filters used in the rudimentary masks. But it was the “Yellow Cross” (mustard gas) that gave the Germans a distinct advantage in chemical warfare. When mustard gas was coupled with explosives, it spread over wide areas and remained airborne for an extended time.

Fast Forward: The Explosion in East Palestine, Ohio

The train that derailed in Eastern Ohio consisted of 151 cars, was 9,300 ft long (nearly two miles), and weighed 18,000 tons (36 million pounds). According to information provided to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) by the rail operator, 20 of the train’s cars were carrying hazardous materials. Of the list of chemicals released into the environment and burned into the air, vinyl chloride has gotten the most attention and is apparently the most concerning.

When vinyl chloride burns, it releases hazardous chemicals such as phosgene and hydrogen chloride into the air. Phosgene is a colorless gas with a pungent odor that can cause vomiting and breathing difficulties. It was once used as a weapon in World War I. Phosgene is not found naturally in the environment.

According to the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), a division within the WHO, vinyl chloride increases the risk for several liver conditions. The IARC, the Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS), and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) all agree that there is ‘sufficient evidence’ to conclude that exposure to vinyl chloride can cause angiosarcoma of the liver and hepatocellular carcinoma [liver cancer]. The overall classification of vinyl chloride is a Class 1 human carcinogen.

At room temperature (70°F), phosgene is a poisonous gas. It has been known since the 1930s that even short-term exposure to vinyl chloride can be toxic to the liver. In 1972, Maltoni, another Italian researcher for the European vinyl chloride industry, found liver tumors (including angiosarcoma) from vinyl chloride exposures as low as 250 ppm (250 mg) for four hours a day. [REF: Maltoni, C. "Cancer Detection and Prevention" Presented at the Second International Symposium on Cancer Detection and Prevention. Bologna, April 9–12, 1973.]

Many researchers over nearly the last 100 years have concluded that the liver is the most sensitive organ to the toxicity of vinyl chloride. Protecting the liver against cancer from this chemical exposure will also protect against possible cancer.

For my core set of chemical detox recommendations go here.

Back to WWI: The Army’s Idea of “Protective” Equipment

Personal protection was a serious problem for the troops. It wasn’t until the closing months of 1915 that German armies began to use self-contained respirators. Unlike the Germans, the British, and the French, the Russians devoted few resources to protective equipment. Consequently, they suffered the greatest number of chemically inflicted casualties in the War.

• As an example, unprotected Russian troops were subjected to 536,000 pounds of chlorine gas when 12,000 cylinders were fired by the Germans under one attack; almost all of the Russian troops died.

When the U.S. declared war on Germany on April 6, 1917, no one in the American military had much knowledge about the chemical warfare being used by the Germans. The Army lacked protective equipment for chemical warfare and had no concrete plans to develop gas masks or any other type of equipment to protect the troops.

By the summer of 1917, when U.S. troops began to arrive at French ports, none of the troops had any training in chemical warfare, even though chemical warfare had been commonplace for their European counterparts for nearly two years. On the eve of the American intervention, more than 12,000 troops were moved to within thirty miles of the front lines, all without gas masks. And, even if gas masks had been available, the Army men had no idea how to use them.

It wasn’t until January 1918 that the U.S. military established gas training camps. By the summer of 1918, all recruits were required to go through “standardized chemical warfare training.”

The training consisted of a brief lecture followed by a one-hour gas mask drill, five days a week, under the supervision of British instructors. The training included putting the masks on and off while sitting in a chamber filled with chlorine gas. Next, the troops were moved into a chamber filled with a tear agent where they practiced masking and unmasking for five to ten minutes. More than 2,000 men per day were put through this initiation. It is unknown how many troops were sickened and perhaps died from this ‘training’ prior to deployment.

Advanced Training included a minimum of three surprise gas attacks every day as ‘practice drills.’ To test the alertness of sentries and correct the ‘carelessness of leaving their masks out of reach,’ attacks were often launched at night while the troops were asleep. These drills were designed for troops to practice the difficulty of putting on a mask while under attack and to acquaint them with the challenges of firing a weapon while masked. During night marches, men were subjected to random gas attacks to ‘teach them how to overcome confusion.’ Other drills included officers ordering men to walk through clouds of gas spraying from opened cylinders to ‘instill confidence in their training and equipment.’

Soldiers were transported between locations in tight, unhealthy conditions. During the day, three men were crammed into double seats on the trains, and in the sleeping cars, one man slept in the upper bunk and two in the lower. The cramped quarters experienced by the naval recruits were no better.

What did the intense physical training, poor-quality food, chemical exposures, extreme stress of surprise attacks, and lack of sleep do to their immune system?

The Spanish Flu of 1918-1919

On August 27, 1918, the first case of what was called ‘the flu’ occurred in Boston at the Navy’s Commonwealth Pier. Within two weeks, 2,000 officers and men of the First Naval District were sick. By the end of September, influenza-like illness had struck navy bases as far-flung as Louisiana and San Francisco, and was rampant in army camps from Massachusetts to Washington State.

While most of the men were suffering from fever, cough, and aches, 10 to 20% had symptoms that often proved fatal — high fever, chills, vomiting, delirium, and blood spurting from the nose, eyes, and ears. Autopsies on patients who died within 48 hours of contracting the disease revealed lungs so full of blood that they sank when placed in water.

The outbreak of influenza-like illness received very little attention in Europe. Urban dwellings across the continent were crowded, dirty, and poorly ventilated with little or no modern-day sanitation. Lethal epidemics had been part of their lives for centuries. Most had experienced, or had heard stories about, deaths from infectious outbreaks for generations. Learning that another infectious outbreak was ‘sweeping the world’ had little effect on those who had already survived centuries of plague, cholera, typhoid, yellow fever, and malaria, and had lived through several years of chemical warfare.

In 2006, I had the opportunity to review what may have been one of the last remaining print copies of The Stars and Stripes newspaper. Written by the men in the American Expeditionary Forces (AEF) in the United States Army service, it was a military newspaper published by the United States government. Many writers had been career journalists before going to the war theater. Published exclusively in France during its 17-month run - from February 8, 1918, to June 13, 1919 - it documented the experience of American soldiers during wartime.

The pages were friable and I had to use a wooden yardstick to turn them. I spent hours going through this remarkable historical document. I found very few articles regarding a global pandemic that was spreading around the world in 1918-1919.

Death from a virus? Not so fast…

Many different estimates have been published regarding the number who actually died as a result of the ‘Spanish Flu’ pandemic. The death toll among the U.S. military was reported to be 650,000; the Russians, 450,000; the Italians, 375,000; and the British, 228,000. Military documents found that soldiers were dying in France as early as 1916 from this illness. Many soldiers died shortly after they returned home from the battlefield.

Toward the end of the offensives, sweeping influenza-like illness was said to play a significant role in overall mortality; it even swung the outcome of some significant battles. The effect on military-age men was so great that the American draft was suspended in October 1918. When dead persons were evaluated and the cause of death was tallied, victims who died suddenly and had a bluish-purple discoloration to their lips or skin were said to have died from the Spanish Flu. [REF: “History of Epidemics and Plagues”]

Does this sound familiar? Those who died in the hospital over the last 2-3 years were said to have died from Covid, irrespective of the real cause of death, including medical malpractice, a ruptured appendix, or even a gunshot wound.

Although the Leavenworth Papers do not specifically list Fort Riley as a gas training camp, it is a strong possibility that enlisted men participated in gas training exercises prior to arriving at Fort Riley—the location cited to be the start of the 1918 influenza pandemic.

As the ‘influenza’ outbreak began, chemical-laden, malnourished, exhausted military troops were transported to Europe and other parts of the world. Did they die from an aggressive influenza virus? Or did they die from chemical poisoning?

For years prior to the first reported ‘flu’ outbreak in Kansas, thousands of tons of explosives had been used to send millions of pounds of toxic liquids and poisonous gases into the air across Europe. The suspended chemicals could have traversed the globe, contaminating civilians in diverse places, increasing their risk of a fatal outcome from a mild infection from a garden-variety influenza virus.

The idea of phosgene, mustard gas, chlorine gases, and the thirty-odd other chemicals released into the environment during three years of daily explosions could find their way around the globe and cause health problems thousands of miles from their place of origin is not an improbability; in fact, it’s not as outrageous as it may sound.

Pollen has been discovered deep in the ice of Antarctica. Dust from China was found in the U.S. after several massive wind storms. Smoke and particulates from extensive fires in Indonesia were measured in the air halfway around the world. Satellite instruments showed that sulfur dioxide released during the eruption of Mt. Pinatubo in 1991 circumnavigated the globe within three weeks, then slowly dispersed to cover much of the Earth over the next two years. [REF: Sparks, et. al. “Super-eruptions: global effects and future threats,” The Geological Society of London, June 2005]

Gone Suddenly

The end of the war came swiftly; the Germans requested a ceasefire on October 3, and on November 11, 1918, an armistice had been signed. Interestingly, by December 1918, only a few months after the flu-like epidemic began, the outbreaks stopped and the illness “mysteriously” disappeared.

Can there be any doubt that thousands of tons of war chemicals—chlorine gas, phosgene, mustard gas, etc.—could have resulted in a massive cytokine storm with a fatal outcome? Historical records reported that people without symptoms could be ‘struck suddenly and rendered too feeble to walk within hours.’ Many would die the next day. A key symptom was the presence of cyanosis, a blue discoloration of the face, due to the rapid accumulation of fluid and blood in the lungs. Doctors noted this to be a characteristic feature of the illness: if a patient developed a lavender-gray hue over their face and ears, death was imminent due to suffocation caused by inflamed lungs.

Does that sound like a case of the flu?

­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­Only a moderate amount of research would be required to establish the connection between environmental chemicals and future illness. We don’t need a WHO Preparedness Treaty and we don’t need worthless jabs that simply add more chemicals to the body.

We need to stop believing their lies and do our best to stay chemical-free.