Gas!

This is coolbert:

In those years just prior to the outbreak of the Second World War [WW2], it was the fear of the British government that in case of conflict the German was prepared to conduct an aerial bombardment campaign of overwhelming intensity - - a bombardment to have included the use of poison gas on a widespread - - massive scale.

Chemical munitions dropped from aircraft in an indiscriminate manner on the British civilian populace, saturation bombing with conventional explosives augmented to a large degree by poison gas of an advanced nature development, gases having a lethality far exceeding the old-fashioned variety poisons as employed by the various combatants of the Great War [WW1].

CASUALTIES OF AN APOCALYPTIC AND MIND-BOGGLING NATURE WERE PREDICTED!!

Here from the Internet article:

"AIRMINDED"

"Airpower and British Society, 1908-1941" (mostly)"

"the widespread belief in the 1920s and 1930s was that at the beginning of the next war, a huge fleet of enemy bombers would suddenly strike at London and other cities and destroy them with high explosive bombs, incendiaries, and poison gas, causing hundreds of thousands of civilian casualties within a matter of hours or days, shattering essential infrastructure and leading to mass panic."

"British government officials in 1938 predicted [what] might happen if a war started in 1939 . . . over a million casualties per month, half of them fatalities, over only two months . . . you can see why everyone was so worried!"

MILLIONS OF CASUALTIES, HALF OF THE FATAL!! In all probability a high percentage of the casualties and death being from chemical munitions dropped from German bomber aircraft! NOTHING of the sort ever transpired, BUT THE FEAR OF SUCH A THING OCCURRING WAS IN THE MINDS OF THE GOVERNMENT AND AVERAGE CITIZEN BOTH!!

A fear - - even a paranoid malignant terror, to an extent exacerbated by a 1937 movie - - "Things To Come by H. G. Wells (1937)".

Persons already on the edge scared witless [?] by a movie showing in graphic detail a civilian population subjected to saturation bombing which INCLUDED THE WIDESPREAD AND INDISCRIMINATE USE OF GAS!

"The use of gas bombs is very much [a] part of the film . . . In real life, in the build-up to the Second World War, there was much concern that the Germans would use poison gas, which they had done during the Great War. Civilians were required to carry gas masks and were trained in their use."

"By 1939, these gases had been refined and had the potential for being far more effective . . . so it was believed was a military’s ability to deliver poison gas – and create new and more deadly versions [Tabun]".

"The use of poison gas in World War Two was a very real fear. Poison gas had been used in World War One and many expected that it would be used in World War Two. As a result people in Britain were issued with gas masks and gas mask drills became a routine."

During the blitz of London, 1940, as was the case in Israel, 1991, the civilian populace was equipped with gas masks, in anticipation of poison gas attack!

Such a thing did not occur, but the fear WAS there!!

coolbert.