Abstract
In the United States, rr is a depressingly familiar story: Military personnel were subjected to dangerous poison gases to test the efficacy of chemical weapons or to develop defenses against them.
But as it turns out, the United States was a Johnny-come-lately in this nasty business. The British undertook dangerous human experiments for far longer and with greater intensity. And because of Britain's fabled penchant for secrecy—which has been aided and abetted by its Official Secrets Act—far less is known about the British chemical weapons program. But thanks to Rob Evans, a journalist at the Guardian, many of Britain's activities at the Portón Down chemical and biological research center are now out in the open.
In Gassed, Evans provides a detailed look into the world's longest-running chemical warfare program. Based on some 100 interviews with former test subjects and those who ran the experiments, as well as on several previously classified government reports, the book explains why the tests were conducted, who the human “guinea pigs” were, what they experienced during the trials, and how Portón scientists felt about the experiments.
Set up in 1916 by Britain's War Department after Germany used chemical weapons during the early stages of World War I, Portón Down carried out human tests until 1989. During that time, according to Evans, nearly 30,000 servicemen were subjected to dangerous doses of mustard gas, nerve gas, tear gas, phosgene, and even lsd. The author claims that many of these tests were ethically dubious, and he raises disturbing questions about whether test subjects were genuine volunteers and if they were unnecessarily exposed to high doses.
At first, scientists at Portón Down believed the tests were necessary because of the potential benefits they might provide to the military during war. In fact, many of the early volunteers were Portón researchers. But by the mid-1920s, almost all the human subjects were military servicemen. (When, in mid-1940, Portón had difficulty enlisting soldiers for experiments, the United States came to the rescue, providing some 60 human guinea pigs.)
It is difficult to judge the early activities at Portón Down by current standards. After all, many of the experiments took place decades before the drafting of the Nuremberg code in 1947, which established the first universal set of ethics governing human experiments. But Evans persuasively argues that despite the pressures created by the two world wars, many of the experiments went too far. He quotes a former Portón doctor who, in a 1959 meeting, said that many of the human subjects “had no idea of the nature of the physiological tests for which they were volunteering.” Another scientist, who asked to remain anonymous, admitted to Evans that the ethical standards used at Portón were “very thorny” and “in retrospect, dicey.” According to Evans, the testimony of these scientists, along with other evidence, shows that the principle of informed consent was systematically violated at Portón Down. Written consent forms, he writes, were not introduced until the late 1980s.
The author demonstrates that, thanks in large part to the country's culture of secrecy, there were few external constraints or controls over the experiments. During the 1950s, for instance, as the number of test subjects increased precipitously, so did the dosages of nerve gas administered to them.
Gassed comes on the heels of several other high-profile cases regarding Portón Down. In August 1999 the police in Wiltshire, where Portón Down is located, opened an investigation into the case of Ronald Mad-dison, an airman who died after participating in a nerve gas experiment in 1953. The police are also investigating allegations that servicemen were duped into taking part in chemical experiments after being told that they were volunteering for research into a cure for the common cold.
The book and the investigations have created a stir in Britain, and several members of Parliament have called for investigations into Porton's test program. There is also increasing pressure on the government to compensate volunteers, many of whom continue to suffer as a result of the experiments.
One of the more compelling aspects of Gassed is that the author has a difficult time finding a specific villain. As with chemical weapons programs in other countries, Portón Down's activities were justified on the basis that the needs of the many outweighed the needs of the few. Portón serves as yet another example of how national security interests can be used to justify what in retrospect are unethical endeavors.