Baltica as a time bomb

2024 Author: Seth Attwood | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 15:55

Chemical weapons dumped in the Baltic Sea more than 70 years ago can come back to haunt with unpredictable consequences at any moment.

Swedish experts have found traces of "mustard gas" (mustard gas, blister agent) and diphenylchloroarsine (irritating agent) in shrimp caught in the North Sea. Experts suspect that this may be a leakage of chemical warfare agents from ships with chemical weapons sunk after the war.

WELL FORGOTTEN OLD?

The fact that the countries of the Baltic Sea seem to be sitting on time mines became known back in the late 80s of the last century, when the data on the mass burials of chemical munitions on the seabed were declassified and made public. Then in the media (both Russian and foreign) there were reports that if the shells of containers, shells and bombs were destroyed, the sea would die, and the health of 30 million people living on the shores of the Baltic would be irreparably damaged.

Even then, Russian experts predicted the possibility of massive emissions of toxic substances from dumped chemical munitions and contamination of the vast waters of the Baltic and North Seas. But little was heard of them. Listen, in the words of our president, now.

ENDS IN WATER

An important clarification: at that time no one not only did not raise, but did not even propose to raise the question of any responsibility of specific parties for burials. For they were produced by the countries of the anti-Hitler coalition in accordance with the recommendations of science of the 40s. Therefore, everything turned out to be a matter of technology.

Having signed an agreement on the destruction of chemical munitions in 1946, the USSR, Great Britain and the United States also chose the best option for their disposal - to take them out into the open sea and flood them. But to do it in the deep ocean, as planned, a storm prevented. As a result, 42 vessels with 130 tons of chemical reserves were sent to the bottom in the Skagerrak and Kattegat straits, connecting the Baltic to the Atlantic. As for the 35 thousand tons of chemical ammunition that the Soviet Union inherited, it scattered them in bulk along the seabed near the island of Bornholm and the port of Liepaja.

In total, the Allies dumped 270 thousand tons of chemical weapons after the war - a deadly "feeding" for fish and people at the same time. And although immediately after this secret operation, warning inscriptions-explanations appeared on nautical charts: "Flooding of chemical weapons", "Polygon", "Fishing is prohibited", etc., from time to time underwater "surprises" made themselves felt, and people who had the imprudence to come into contact with them for a long time were treated for non-healing wounds.

WHO IS BIGGER?

Polish specialists have their own account of deadly blanks. According to them, in the Little Belt area in 1945, the Wehrmacht sank 69 thousand tons of artillery shells with a herd and 5 thousand tons of bombs and artillery shells containing a herd and phosphine.

Eyewitnesses also testify that in 1946 more than 8,000 tons of chemical munitions were dumped in the area east of Bornholm by order of the British occupation forces. Presumably, there are floods along the Kaliningrad coast in the Gulf of Gdansk.

Several years ago, Vadim Paka, then director of the Atlantic Branch of the Institute of Oceanology. P. P. Shirshova, gave me the following figure: there are about 60 chemical dumps in the Baltic.

By the way, the vessels of this institute have repeatedly encountered the chemical heritage at the bottom of the Baltic. Working off the coast of Sweden near the port of Lysechil, the R / V "Professor Shtokman" discovered a large concentration of bottom accumulations of substances formed during the disintegration of toxic substances in their enclosing shells, which are hundreds of times higher than the standard level.

IT WILL NOT SHOW A LITTLE …

Studies by geneticists from different countries show that even an insignificant amount of poisonous substances such as mustard gas contained in water are not detected by modern devices, but when they enter a living organism, they can cause a change in the genetic code.

According to Professor Tarasov from the Institute of General Genetics of the Russian Academy of Sciences, even the ingress of individual mustard gas molecules into a living organism can lead to deformities and epidemics of cancer. According to the British geneticist Charlotte Auerbach, one or two molecules of mustard gas or lewisite can knock down a person's genetic code, which can cause mutations in two or three generations.

The properties of lewisite are similar to mustard gas, so that almost all products of its transformation are environmentally hazardous. In May 1990, tens of thousands of dead crabs and mussels, over 6 million starfish were found on the shores of the White Sea. Samples showed that almost all marine life died from mustard gas. The fact is that in 1950, several thousand captured chemical munitions of the German, Romanian and Japanese armies were sunk in the White and Barents Seas.

In Baltic water, corrosion eats up 0.1 mm of the shell of a chemical projectile per year. Over the past 70-odd years, containers of toxic substances have become practically a sieve. According to experts, about 4 thousand tons of mustard gas have already entered the sea water and bottom sediments.

WHAT TO DO?

Back in the last century, Vice Admiral Tengiz Borisov, head of the working group operating within the framework of the interdepartmental commission on disarmament, expressed the opinion that urgent work should be carried out to prevent chemical death that lies on the seabed. Otherwise, it can affect all the states of the Baltic basin, and not only it. Water streams are able to carry it through the Skagerrak Strait to the North Sea, the waters of which wash the shores of several other countries. Therefore, the problem of neutralizing buried chemical weapons concerns not one or several states, but at least the whole of Europe.

Unfortunately, experts still do not have a consensus on what needs to be done to avoid a chemical catastrophe in the Baltic. Some of them generally believe that one should not touch chemical munitions and interfere with the natural process of their decomposition.

The majority, believing in general that the rise of ammunition from the bottom is indeed fraught with dangerous consequences, are looking for a way to neutralize them. In this regard, Russian scientists went the farthest, who based their method on the experience of isolating the Komsomolets nuclear submarine that crashed in the Norwegian Sea.

When there was a danger of corrosion of the nuclear reactor and the nuclear warheads on board, Russian specialists began to develop measures to isolate the submarine. By that time, it was clear that lifting it was a laborious process, and most importantly, it did not guarantee that the hull of the boat would not fall apart. And then it was decided to cover "Komsomolets" with a special plaster. Research in recent years has shown that there are no leaks of radioactive elements from the nuclear-powered ship. Possessing real know-how and technologies, Russia has proposed to apply the same method with regard to chemical munitions.

20 years ago in Oslo, at an international meeting of experts on the disposal of chemical weapons, the Russian side presented to the representatives of 13 countries its vision of the problem of the disposal of chemical munitions at the bottom of the Baltic Sea, with an emphasis on environmental aspects. The Russian method was approved by the majority of specialists. But the question is hanging in the air due to the financing of the project.

Back in the last century, the Russian Center for Environmental Safety prepared the Skagen project for the elimination of chemical burials. It also got stuck due to funding. In the media, I found information that sarcophagi for sunken ships with chemical weapons can be created using an aquapolymer developed by American scientists for space needs. Its granules can, having absorbed water, increase 400 times. It is possible to introduce anti-corrosion substances into them, then pour into the housing, displace the water and cover everything with a glass cloth jacket. But again the question rests on finances.

The problem of eliminating chemical weapons in the Baltic in 1998 was estimated by experts at $ 2 billion. Today, all this probably costs a little more. But this is not an obstacle for the United States and the Baltic Sea countries, which spend fabulous sums on the military budget.

Apparently, the government circles of the Baltic Sea countries do not want to lose billions in profits from tourism and fishing, therefore they hide the true state of affairs from the population.

At the same time, Scandinavian doctors speak louder and louder about the increased incidence of cancer and genetic diseases in their countries. For example, one of the most environmentally friendly countries in the world - Sweden - came out on top in terms of cancer incidence. Isn't this a serious warning of danger lurking on the seabed ?!

ONLY NUMBERS

The Soviet military archives contain detailed information about what was found in the chemical arsenals of East Germany and dumped in the Baltic Sea:

71,469 mustard gas-filled 250-kilogram bombs;

14,258 500-kg, 250-kg and 50-kg aerial bombs equipped with chloroacetophenone, diphenylchloroarsine, adamite and arsine oil;

408,565 artillery shells of 75 mm, 105 mm and 150 mm caliber, filled with mustard gas;

34,592 landmines equipped with mustard gas, 20 kg and 50 kg each;

10 420 smoke chemical mines of 100 mm caliber;

1004 technological tanks containing 1506 tons of mustard gas;

8429 barrels containing 1030 tons of adamsite and diphenylchloroarsine;

169 tons of technological containers with toxic substances, which contained cyanide salt, chlorarsin, cyanarsin and axelarsin;

7860 cans of "Cyclone B", which the Nazis widely used in 300 death camps for the mass destruction of prisoners in gas chambers.