Test Tube Republic: Chemical Weapons Tests in Panama

by FOR

TEST TUBE REPUBLIC:

Chemical Weapons Tests in Panama and U.S. Responsibility

I. Introduction

In early 1998, the United States went to the brink of war with Iraq over the latter country's refusal to comply with United Nations resolutions regarding inspections for chemical weapons facilities on Iraqi soil. The United States accused the Iraqi government of deception and violation of international law in its handling of the inspections issue.

Chemical weapons represent a serious threat to the world community's safety and well-being. A single bomb filled with VX nerve agent, of the kind Iraq has been accused of maintaining, has enough lethal doses to kill millions of people, though it is only four or five feet long.

For this reason the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC), an international treaty which entered into force on April 29, 1997, is a major advance in turning back the threat of chemical weapons. The Convention requires the destruction of all chemical weapons, both stockpiled and abandoned munitions, within ten to fifteen years.

In the small isthmian nation of Panama, the United States had an active chemical weapons program from at least 1930 until 1968. From 1930 to 1946, this program focused on canal defense. From 1943 until 1968, the program aimed to test chemical munitions under tropical conditions. Dozens of tons of mustard gas and phosgene were stockpiled at a number of sites in Panama, particularly from the 1930s to the 1950s. Unused and dud chemical munitions were also abandoned in Panama.

Today, Panama is undergoing major transitions. Like many other countries, it is experiencing rapid urban growth, focused on the canal area, where half of Panama's entire population now lives and works. The growth is accompanied by major road projects to address traffic congestion. While many lands in the canal area are being settled or developed, other projects are attempting to reforest lands that have been denuded by timber interests and slash-and-burn agriculture.

The turnover of properties pursuant to the 1977 Panama Canal Treaties is accelerating these transitions. Lands on military bases to which most Panamanians have never had formal access will come under Panamanian jurisdiction by December 31, 1999. Without a national military or the United States' geostrategic interests, the lands will be transformed to fit Panama's emerging identity.

In these circumstances, it is critical that Panamanians gain an understanding of the legacy which they are receiving. It is also crucial that the United States cooperate to ensure that the transition does not leave behind dangers to human and environmental health and safety, and that it transfer documents on the histories of lands being turned over to Panama. The CWC and the 1977 Panama Canal treaties comprise the main treaty obligations relevant to chemical weapons in Panama.

II. History of Chemical Weapons Programs in Panama

A. The Panama Canal Defense Project

Chemical weapons were a component of U.S. canal defense tactics from the canal's early years. The canal was completed only days before the outbreak of the World War I, in August 1914, the war in which mustard gas was used for the first time ever in battle. General William Sibert, the Army engineer who had designed the Gatun locks in Panama, commanded the first division of American troops to go overseas in the war, sailing for France in June 1917. Without gas masks of its own and with chemical warfare activities fragmented in four departments, the United States was not well prepared to face massive gas attacks.

Within a year, Sibert was made director of a newly consolidated Chemical Warfare Service. A "staunch advocate of all forms of chemical warfare,"1 Sibert brought the agency's disparate activities together, so that by the end of the war the United States was producing more lethal gas than all the other belligerents combined.

After the war Sibert became a vocal proponent of the continued development of chemical weapons. "When the armies were provided with masks and other defensive appliances, something less than four percent of the gas casualties were fatal," Sibert ruminated. "These figures, I think, meet one of the chief objections brought against the use of gas -- that of humanity. So far from being inhumane, it has been proved that it is one of the most humane instruments of warfare, if we can apply the word humane to the killing and wounding of human beings."

In 1921 the Chemical Warfare Service, like the Army's seven other supply arms and services, was told to draw up plans for defense of the Canal Zone and other U.S. outlying possessions.2 The first chemical defense plans were thus drawn up in 1923 and would be updated every year through at least 1946. "As unusually favorable conditions exist in Panama for the employment of chemical agents in defense of the canal, maximum use of chemical and anti-gas equipment is anticipated," according to the doctrine. The plan involved bombing with mustard gas the trails and routes that led inland from landing beaches on both the Atlantic and Pacific coasts, spraying the beaches, and firing chemical mortars at military targets as well.

Another chemical weapons supporter, Major General Preston Brown, came to the helm in Panama in 1930. At this time the military maintained a chemical company of two officers and 77 men. "I have long been of the opinion that the hot, damp, breathless tropical jungle offers ideal conditions for the use of persistent gas," Brown wrote to Washington in March 1931. Brown believed that in case of a land invasion, troops could use gas defensively as they retreated through the jungle. His belief had been demonstrated by a two-week set of maneuvers by the First Chemical Company in La Chorrera -- 30 miles east of the Canal -- in February 1931. Troops employed chemical simulants, not live chemical agents, in the exercises.3

The United States' entry into World War II both increased military sensitivities to the Canal's vulnerability to attack, and brought with it whole new areas of responsibility and control.

Besides defending the canal using chemical munitions, the military planned to use smoke pots which burned oil or chemical blends in order to visually screen the canal should enemies attack the canal by air. Several hundred of the smoke pots were sent to the Canal Zone in 1942, where they were operated by Chemical Warfare Service troops.4

B. The San Jose Project

The United States, Great Britain and Canada collaborated closely in the 1940s on testing and development of chemical weapons. The collaboration included sharing data from test sites in Australia, India, the Canadian province of Alberta, and Bushnell, Florida. Anticipating possible defensive or offensive use of chemical weapons against the Japanese, the Allies sought an understanding of how chemical weapons could be used in case of further invasions of the Japanese-occupied Pacific islands. Field data were then analyzed by the tri-partite Advisory Committee on the Effectiveness of Gas Warfare Materiel in the Tropics.5

In searching for a jungle testing ground for chemical weapons, the Chemical Warfare Service sought a jungle site with "lack of human habitation, safety distances to nearby islands, tropical jungle, good water, absence of disease and poisonous snakes," and accessibility to nearby airfields controlled by the U.S. military. In October 1943, Colonel Robert McLeod searched up and down the coasts of Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Peru, Panama, and the Galapagos Islands of Ecuador. Discarding Panama's penal colony on Coiba Island because the presence of prisoners might have "complicated our problems," and other areas because of the distance from airfields, McLeod settled on San Jose Island, the second largest island of Perlas group in Panama Bay.6

An internal military history offers insight into how the military understood the tropical terrain they were entering. Acknowledging that historians had written little about San Jose, and that the story "may or may not be true," the Army recounted the following "frankensteinian folklore":

Some eighty years ago, around 1857, an Englishman with his wife and young daughter built a homestead on the island, bringing also a stock of hogs. Indians came across the water from Darien and "scalped" the man and woman, but somehow the girl managed to escape into the jungle, where she was found soon afterward, white-haired and demented, by some kindly negroes from the neighboring island of Pedro Gonzales. Taking her along with them, they set sail for Panama, but she died en route. From that time on the island was unofficially marked "haunted", and natives could not be persuaded to return there.7

For the military, the story pointed up the dangers of entering a jungle "beset by gnarled and venomous manchineel trees," an "island of mystery" whose "beautiful little bays" and "kindly negroes" belied potential revenge and dementia. Brigadier General Egbert F. Bullene, who had been tapped to run the San Jose Project, paid a personal visit to the island in November 1943, and reaffirmed it as a site. But in a twist on environmental values, the Army's General Staff delayed approval of San Jose Island as a site for chemical experiments until they were assured that they would not harm rare flora or fauna. The National Museum testified that no rare wildlife existed on San Jose, after which the General Staff gave its go-ahead.8

The military acted quickly. On December 20, 1943, the U.S. Consul proposed to conduct "certain chemical warfare tests under existing jungle conditions" for 60-day renewable periods on San Jose Island. The agreement had to be made with both the government of Panama and the island's private owners, a Panama City firm called Huertematte & Co. A rental fee of $15,000 a year was agreed. The United States also sought Panama's consent to build trails and wharves, and to incorporate the agreement into the 1942 base agreement signed the year before.

The project formally began on January 6, 1944, two days after Panama gave permission to the United States to conduct "chemical warfare tests" on the island.9 Within days hundreds of Army engineers arrived on the island to clear roads and an airstrip and build the many buildings for operations and housing the project would use. More than 400 enlisted men were stationed on the island by mid-1945, as well as nearly 200 officers and civilians (from the United States, Panama and other countries). Many of the Army troops were Puerto Rican soldiers.10 We describe the tests carried out on San Jose below.

C. Chemical Weapons Programs in the 1950s

From February 1953 through February 1957, the Tropical Test Team, a Chemical Corps unit under the command of the Dugway Proving Ground's Environmental Test Laboratories in Utah, conducted tests of distilled mustard gas every three months in Panama. The tests included pressure tests of one-ton containers of mustard, as well as freezing of the distilled mustard.11

The test team included 20 personnel, who arrived in Panama in November 1952. The team conducted most tests of toxic materials in Curundu, as well as some on a knoll on the Chiva-Chiva Trail. Toxic materials were stored in a large open building in Cerro Tigre, while munitions were kept nearby in igloo-type magazines. Non-hazardous test materials were kept in Building 1004 of Curundu. According to the report:

The chemical demolition area, located on a knoll on the Chiva-Chiva Trail, is utilized for large-scale testing of screening smoke devices and for a few tests of hazardous materials. This section, which is also used for the disposal of all materials of a hazardous nature, is restricted and well marked to prevent the entry of unauthorized persons. [Emphasis added.]12

The report clearly indicates that tests included detonation of chemical mines. The report added that "The toxic gas building at Cerro Tigre is used for limited testing of toxic gases and liquids."13 Today, this area apparently is no longer either restricted or well marked. A visit to Cerro Tigre in April 1998 showed that the area was grown up with vegetation, without fences or signs. In 1961, the U.S. Army Chemical Corps participated in a transport exercise called Swamp Fox I, which took place primarily in the Darién region of Panama, not far from Colombia. The exercise involved firing 58 CN tear gas grenades in the jungle, though the report obtained for this study did not specify exact locations."14

A second Swamp Fox exercise, sponsored by several Army agencies, was carried out in Panama in 1964.15 The U.S. Army Tropic Test Center used a site on Empire Range to test tear gas grenades in 1965, according to an assessment of the active ranges. "The U.S. military also constructed a chemical test site at this approximate location during the same period," according to the assessment.16

D. Nerve Agent Tests

Documents show at least four tests in Panama with live chemical munitions from 1964 to 1968 (VX gas mines, rockets and projectiles, and sarin (GB) rockets).17 The tests were part of a range of tests under Arctic, desert and tropical conditions to which chemical munitions were usually subjected. In the case of the VX-filled M-23 mines, the test aimed "to determine the effects of environment on the storage and functioning of the ABC-M23 mine in the climates represented by the Arctic, Desert, Temperate and Tropic Test Sites." Twenty-four VX mines were shipped to each site in late 1963 or early 1964 after undergoing engineering tests at Dugway Proving Ground.

The M23 mine is five inches high and 13 inches in diameter, weighing 23.75 pounds when unfuzed, including 10.5 pounds of VX agent. Since ten milligrams of VX agent constitutes a lethal dose, each of these VX mines had enough nerve agent for nearly half a million lethal doses.

The mines were stored outdoors on pallets during the test; storage cycles ranged from 30 days to more than two years, depending on the "storage cycle" assigned to each mine. Monitoring of the mines during storage included periodic sampling and analysis of VX agent and leak tests of the mines. Finally, each mine was detonated.

The report available indicates that the VX mines may have been detonated with live agent inside. The report states:

During each cycle, three mines (VX or simulant-filled) will be subjected to a firing test to determine the functionability of mines and components. The procedure will be as follows: a. The mine (with full complement of firing components) will be electrically fired through the side burster, using an M1 activator and an adapter...

DISPOSITION OF TEST ITEMS: At the conclusion of each cyclic test, the area contaminated by the detonation of the mines will be decontaminated and the munition remnants will be disposed of in accordance with References 9, 10, and 11, Annex B.18

Despite the reference to simulant, the materials list for this test does not include any simulant. Some warheads may have been shipped to test sites with simulant, as a control on the experiment. "If this work plan was implemented, one can feel sure that 24 VX rounds were studied and detonated in this test," according to Theodore Henry, a toxicologist with experience analyzing reports of chemical weapons tests.19

Other tests from 1964 to 1968 included "environmental tests" of VX- and sarin-filled M55 rockets. "Environmental tests" include subjecting munitions or equipment to specific environmental conditions (usually tropic, desert, Arctic or temperate) for specific periods of time to understand how those climates affect the materials. The tests don't necessarily include firing of munitions.

The United States discontinued production of VX agent, as well as the M55 rocket, in 1968. Sarin production ceased in 1957, but it has remained in the U.S. stockpile until the present day.20

E. Post-1968 Activity

We have no found documentation of the storage or testing of live lethal chemical agents in Panama since 1968. On November 19, 1969, Congress passed Public Law 91-121, which prohibited deployment, storage or disposal of lethal chemical or biological agents outside the United States unless the host country was first notified. For overseas locations under U.S. jurisdiction, the law required prior notice to Congress.21

There is one exception to the use of chemical agents in Panama since 1968: tear gas. The U.S. military has acknowledged "limited, controlled laboratory testing of some tear gas agents" in Panama since 1979.22

At chemical test sites, Army policy since 1980 requires the use of only simulants, which appears to have been the case at the "NBC-12" site on Empire Range, along Road K6, the only known post-1980 site for chemical activities.23 "NBC" stands for nuclear, biological and chemical. In the 1980s, chemical activities included tests of protective equipment and defensive exercises. A 1985 project conducted by the Tropic Test Center tested the "AH-64 Chemical Biological (CB) Protective Mask."24

In 1987, the Army's 193d Infantry Brigade conducted a training exercise in Panama called "NBC Stakes," designed to prepare soldiers for potential chemical combat. Soldiers had to pass through simulated contamination by chemical agents and nuclear radiation while keeping their gas masks and other protective gear on. The exercise was probably carried out on one of the range's maneuver areas.25

The Tropic Test Center (TTC) continues in the 1990s to test equipment designed to detect and defend against chemical agents under tropical conditions. "There has been a significant increase over the past two years in testing of this type of equipment," the TTC wrote in July 1997. The TTC emphasized that "testing of this type of equipment involves no use of actual agents," but uses simulants instead.26

1 Donald Richter, Chemical Soldiers: British Gas Warfare in World War I, (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 1992), p. 195. 2 Leo P. Brophy, Wyndham D. Miles and Rexmond C. Cochrane, The Chemical Warfare Service: From laboratory to field, Washington: Department of the Army, Office of the Chief of Military History, 1959, p. 227. 3 Brown to Army Adjutant General, March 13, 1931, in National Archives (hereafter cited as NARA), RG175/290/3/16/2-3, Box 159. 4 Ibid., pp. 208-209. 5 Minutes of meetings of the Advisory Committee on the Effectiveness of Gas Warfare Materiel in the Tropics, March 4, 1944, May 17, 1944, July 19, 1944, and December 7, 1944, in NARA, RG 175, 290/3/28/142. 6 Robert D. McLeod, Jr., "In the wake of the Golden Galleon," Armed Forces Chemical Journal, IX (March-April 1955), pp. 36-39. 7 "A Historical Record of the San Jose Project," c. 1945, NARA (RG 338/290/40/17/2, Box 1), p. 1. 8 Leo P. Brophy and George J.B. Fisher, The Chemical Warfare Service: Organizing for War, Washington: Department of the Army, Office of the Chief of Military History, 1959, p. 136. 9 Exchange of diplomatic notes, cited in Herasto Reyes, "Contaminaciones militares en Panamá: El caso de la isla de San José," La Prensa, July 3, 1997. 10 Headquarters, San Jose Project, "General Order Number 11," 6 July 1944, report on San Jose Project, in NARA, College Park, MD. 11 "Chemical Corps Tropical Test Team, Fort Clayton, Canal Zone," Dugway Proving Ground, January 25, 1956, p. 33. 12 Ibid., pp. 9, 11, 13. 13 Ibid., p. 11. 14 U.S. Army Test and Evaluation Command, Dugway Proving Ground, "Chemical Corps Participation in Project Swamp Fox I," November 1962, p. 6. 15 U.S. Army Test and Evaluation Command, Dugway Proving Ground, "Chemical Corps Participation in Project Swamp Fox I," November 1962 (AD #896503); Army Ballistic Research Lab, Aberdeen Proving Ground, "Swamp Fox II, Republic of Panama, Volume VIII, Target Acquisition," April 1964 (AD #440862). 16 PRC Environmental Management, Inc., "Unexploded Ordnance Assessment of U.S. Military Ranges in Panama: Empire, Balboa West and Piña Ranges," January 1997, p. 25. 17 Ibid.; list of Tropic Test Center tests, with report numbers, compiled by Rick Stauber, EOD specialist, while under contract with PRC Environmental Management, Inc. for the study cited here. 18 Ibid., pp. 9, 11. The references were not available for review at the writing of this report. 19 Communication to author from Theodore Henry, Managing Director of the Community Health Assessment & Public Participation (CHAPP) Center, July 17, 1998. 20 Ibid. and Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, Chemical Disarmament: New Weapons for Old, (New York: Humanities Press, 197_), pp. 81. 21 Public Law 91-121, November 19, 1969, as Amended, paragraph 1513. 22 Letter from Col. Michael Debow, Co-chairman, Environmental Subcommittee, Joint Committee, to Lic. Ramiro Castrejón, Co-chairman, Environmental Sub-committee, DEPAT, August 18, 1997. 23 PRC Environmental Management, Inc., op.cit., p. 25. 24 R.H. McIntosh, et al, "Development Test II (Prototype qualification test-government (Tropic Environmental Phase) of AH-64 Chemical Biological (CB) Protective Mask," May-Dec. 1985. (AD# B102800) 25 Cpt. Jerzell L. Black, "NBC Stakes in Panama," CML, Army Chemical Review, September 1987, pp. 32-35. 26 Graham Stullenbarger, "Proposal for Tropic Test Center Membership in the City of Knowledge," July 21, 1997, p. B-2.

III. Storage of Chemical Agents and Munitions

In 1930, when Major General Preston Brown was promoting chemical weapons for canal defense, the military kept a supply of 30 tons of persistent gas in Panama.

By 1940, the United States had 84 tons of mustard gas, 10 tons of phosgene, 800 phosgene shells, 900 Livens projectors, 647 chemical cylinders, and 2,377 4.2 inch mustard-charged mortar rounds on hand in the Canal Zone.27 From July of that year until the following May, the Chemical Warfare Service (CWS) acquired expanded space in Panama -- code named "Mercury" -- and received shipments of gas masks.28 The space included chemical munitions storage magazines in seven bases: Camp Paraiso, Fort Clayton, Corozal Post, Albrook Field, Howard Field, Rio Hato, France Field, and Fort Gulick. The chemical magazines ranged in size from 8 feet by 12 feet in Camp Paraiso, Clayton, Albrook, Gulick and Rio Hato, to a 30' by 45' magazine in France Field that included bombs.29

Most chemical munitions before the San Jose Project was established, however, were stored at Cerro Tigre, where a monorail hoist had been installed to move munitions. Some of the munitions were kept outdoors. "At the upper end of the row of sheds, a set of mustard gas drums are placed in a niche in the side of the hill," wrote Lt. Col. Homer Saint-Guadens in the Spring of 1941. But Cerro Tigre was subject to earth slides, including one that had destroyed a magazine in 1935, prompting selection of a different site when storage areas for conventional ammunition were expanded in 1938.30

Chemical munitions flown into San Jose Island were stored at Rio Hato. (See photo in Annex F.) "All air munitions intended for drop tests were stored in field dumps in the vicinity of the runway," according to an Army film made about the San Jose Project.31 In 1946, a chemical officer was sent to inspect the San Jose ammunition dump (i.e., storage area) in Rio Hato "following an inspection by a non-technical officer who painted a terrible picture of conditions."32

Rio Hato, like San Jose Island, was evacuated in January 1948 after Panama rejected the Filos-Hines Agreement for continued use of those and a dozen other military sites.

In the 1950s, chemical munitions continued to be stored at Cerro Tigre. Nerve agents tested from approximately 1964 to 1968 were also stored at Cerro Tigre.33

27 Acting Chief of Staff Colonel Wallace C. Philoon, "Chemical Annex to Panama Canal Defense Project," December 1, 1940, NARA, RG 338. 28 Brophy, Miles and Cochrane, op.cit., pp. 263, 265, 375. 29 Lt. Gen. Daniel Van Voorhis, to Adjutant General, August 1, 1941, in NARA, RG338, 290/40/17/3-6, Box 60. 30 "Camouflage problems in the Canal Zone: Report on a survey of camouflage requirements in the Canal Zone made on March 25-April 8," [1941], NARA, RG338, 290/40/16/7-18; Lt. Col. S.C. Godfrey, "Cerro Tigre Drainage Project," memo to Dept. Ordnance Officer, August 21, 1936, NARA, RG98, 471.88, Box 6; "Installation of Utilities at Cerro Tigre Ammunition Depot," March 17, 1938, from PCD Dept. Engineer to Ordnance Officer, Ibid. 311 U.S. Army Signal Corps, "The San Jose Project," film available in NARA, College Park, MD, circa 1945. 32 Officer of the Chemical Officer, Hq Panama Canal Department, to Lt. Col. J.C. Prentice, Office of the Chief, Chemical Corps, 10 December 1946, in NARA RG 338.

33 Interview with Roy Blades by the author, June 24, 1998.

IV. Chemical Weapons Tests

A. Fort Clayton, 1941 The first chemical weapons test using live agent known to be carried out in Panama occurred on Fort Clayton before the United States' entry into World War II.

Jack Cadenhead had enlisted in the Army in Greenville, South Carolina in 1940 to escape the Depression and an oppressive job in the local cotton mill. Sent to the Canal Zone, he and others in the 33rd Infantry Regiment were taken to a long narrow building on Fort Clayton one day in July 1941. There they were given gas masks, exposed to a form of tear gas and told to lift their masks and sniff it. Then the officers running the experiment asked for ten volunteers.

"They said they wanted some men who didn't smoke," Cadenhead recalled. He raised his hand. "It's hot, close to a hundred degrees in Panama, with no air conditioning, especially in those chambers. They would drop stuff in a container, and it would fog up."

The operators had gas masks on, Cadenhead said, but "they didn't tell us a thing, they just run us through there pretty fast." The building was long, so long that the men were forced to breathe in the mustard as they ran. The men quickly developed problems breathing, and were rushed on stretchers to nearby Gorgas Hospital. "The guy with me, Bill Hansard, almost choked to death when we got to Gorgas," Cadenhead remembered. "I was in ahead of him. He was blue around his mouth. They said, 'We need to get him in here.' It was one of the medical aides, I think, and he asked the doctor, 'What's wrong with them?' And the doctor said, 'It's that damn mustard gas!'"

"Mustard gas loves wet low places, that's where it hangs out. It's the same on your body, where you sweat or it's humid," said Cadenhead, who has had health problems ever since. It permanently affected his speech, blisters would come up on his feet as big as a half-dollar, and the end of his penis turned white. "I thought I had leprosy for awhile," Cadenhead said. More than fifty years later, he still has problems breathing. When he wrote to the Veterans Administration, they wrote back saying that his records from Gorgas Hospital had been destroyed.

"We were all just kids, we didn't know what was going on. After I got older and wiser, I felt we were used as guinea pigs."34

Cadenhead's experience may have reflected the decision of one or two field commanders, since widespread use of human subjects by the United States for tests of mustard and lewisite, in Panama or elsewhere, did not begin until 1943.

In June 1943, the Chemical Warfare Service, together with Army and medical units, also tested protective clothing in Panama, but it is unclear whether chemical agents were used in these tests.35

B. San Jose Project Tests

More than 130 tests were conducted on San Jose Island between May 1944 and the end of 1947.36 Many of the tests were "drop tests" involving aircraft that dropped chemical munitions into target areas. Others required troops to fire chemical mortars into the test areas, and still others involved more controlled use of munitions. In a very few cases, project reports indicate the use of chemical simulants, but in most live agent was employed.

The project divided the island into eleven areas, six of which were laid in grids for target areas. The three largest target areas, made up of overlapping squares, were about one square mile each in size. The chemical agents tested (and their military codes) included: mustard gas and distilled mustard (H, HD), phosgene (CG), cyanogen chloride (CK), hydrogen cyanide (AC), and Butane.37 One participant remembers that Lewisite was also tested.38

From available documents, the number of munitions tested are known for 18 of the 130 tests conducted on San Jose Island. Some 4,397 chemical munitions were fired in these 18 tests, for an average of 244 munitions fired in each test. Most of the munitions fired - 3,816 - were 4.2" mortars charged with Cyanogen Chloride, mustard, or phosgene, but the chemical munitions also included bombs from 100 pounds to 1,000 pounds in weight and 105mm Howitzer shells.

The San Jose Project also tested chemical munitions on the sea off of Panama in order to determine whether chemical warfare could be effective against enemy ships.39 In addition, according to a military map drawn up in 1946, tests included chemical spray on Iguana Island, which was also used as a conventional bombing range.40

A later military summary stated that "no nerve agents were tested" in San Jose.41 One participant in the project, however, tentatively asserted that nerve agent was tested there. Eugene Reid, a professional chemist by training, was drafted into the Chemical Warfare Service and served in Florida, Dugway Proving Ground and Edgewood Arsenal, as well as on San Jose. "Besides mustard, they were also testing newer things. Nerve gases, that was the hot thing then," Reid said in 1997. When subsequently asked for confirmation, he was less certain whether nerve agents were tested on San Jose. "I suspect very much that they were, but I can't say for sure they were used," he said.42

While neither the United States nor Great Britain had developed nerve agents of its own by 1945, the Allies had captured significant quantities of nerve agent from the Nazis as Germany receded before advancing Allied troops in the Spring of 1945, which is when Reid arrived in San Jose. The British felt that some of the stocks of captured German nerve agent should be "retained for possible use in the Far East" should the Allies invade Japan, an eventuality for which the San Jose Project was preparing.43

C. Notes on Tests with Human and Animal Subjects

Many of the tests on San Jose Island used rabbits or goats to observe how lethal various methods of attack or how effective gas masks were. "They brought goats from Ecuador," said José Alsola, a Peruvian who worked on San Jose in 1946 clearing vegetation for paths and an airstrip. "They put those gases on them. The skin fell off the animals, they died, and they ended up cooked. The animal was red, red! Like it was cooked, burnt."44

The Signal Corps' 1945 film about the project shows a comparative test with three goats -- one with an American gas mask, one with a Japanese gas mask, and one without any gas mask. With the goats tethered to stakes and the camera running, the area is gassed with mustard. Two of the goats writhe and fall, while the goat with the American gas mask survives "unharmed." One of the apparent purposes of the film is to reassure the soldiers viewing it that in case of gas warfare with the Japanese, the United States would not only win, but with few casualties.

But military and civilian researchers had long believed that tests on non-human animals alone were inadequate. "In toxic warfare, the most critical point in the evaluation of an item is its toxic effects upon enemy troops," wrote the Chemical Corps' medical chief, Colonel John R. Wood shortly after the war. "Where possible, in field trials, enemy troops are represented by human test subjects."45 A civilian scientist, writing about tests conducted in 1943 with blistering agents such as mustard, said that because in animals "the reactions of the skin vary so greatly from species to species... it was soon found that the only constantly reliable test object was man."46

Several of the San Jose Project tests involved human subjects, in all cases military troops. These included "patch tests," which called for applying drops on a soldier's forearms, often after protective ointment had been put on one of them. "They had volunteer soldiers," one project participant recalled. "They dropped live bombs. They would contaminate the area with gas. The volunteer soldiers would go into the area, after of course, with full protective garments... They would have a cut-out area on their forearm or wrist. They would test the effect of protection against the blistering gases."47

One of the San Jose tests, carried out between August 9 and August 15, 1944, sought "to determine if any difference existed in the sensitivity of Puerto Rican and Continental U.S. Troops to H gas [mustard]." A preliminary test involved ten Puerto Rican troops and ten "continental" (i.e., Anglo-Saxon) troops, which was followed by a fuller test involving 45 Puerto Rican soldiers and 44 "continental" soldiers. The men, who were "unfamiliar with the use of chemical agents," were "given a stiff course in gas discipline and the significance of H [mustard] lesions to casualty production." The tests involved applying liquid mustard to the under-surface of the forearms of each subject, then observed for three days. A summary of the test produced by Defense Secretary William Cohen in April 1998 implied that some men were hospitalized after they "sustain[ed] severe body burns or eye lesions." Men with less severe burns were simply returned to their barracks and expected to meet company formations.48

D. Post-1950s Tests

Reports on four tests of nerve agent-filled warheads were obtained for this study.49 The U.S. Army Tropic Test Center (TTC) conducted the tests between 1964 and 1968 "to determine the effects of environment on the storage" -- and, in two of the tests, on the operation -- of the warheads. Three of the tests were for VX agent weapons: 24 2-gallon mines, 29 115-millimeter rockets, and 29 155-millimeter shells. The fourth test concerned 29 sarin (GB) 115-millimeter rockets. The weapons were to be stored for approximately two years, "outdoors on pallets under ventilated cover," and periodically tested for leaks, pressure, visual defects, and integrity of the agent. The three tests of M-55 rockets and VX rockets and projectiles were accompanied by 120 simulant-filled weapons for each test series.

However, the M55 rockets filled with nerve agent had a serious defect: they leaked. "The M55 rockets are considered the most dangerous items in the current [U.S. chemical] stockpile for a variety of reasons," according to a 1992 report by the U.S. Office of Technology Assessment. "The M55 rockets are... the source of the greatest number of leaking munitions," the report went on.50

In the VX tests, leaking weapons were not replaced, according to the test plans, but monitored and the surface wiped clean with caustic ethanol. In the sarin test, "all warheads that show positive evidence of vapor leakage will be removed from the test program" and "used for samples of GB." The plan does not require removal of the leaking rocket from Panama. In all cases, if the location of a leak could not be found, testers were to drain the agent from the warhead, decontaminate it, and destroy the liquid nerve agent.

Other activities involved small amounts of live chemical agents such as mustard and sarin, which were probably kept in glass vials in laboratories. From November 1960 to February 1962, the Chemical Corps' Tropic Test Activity in Panama tested 20 kits designed to detect contamination of food by chemical agents, including sarin, mustard and cyanogen chloride. The toxic agents were dissolved in a drop of acetone to be used in the test.51

The nerve agent tests were most likely conducted somewhere within the canal area, since from 1964 to 1968 the only site outside the canal area controlled by the U.S. military was Rio Hato. A former TTC project manager believes the detonation tests of VX mines were conducted on either Empire or Piña Ranges.52 Although the TTC used a site at Rio Hato, it used 54 other sites as well, all within the canal area, while Rio Hato mostly served as an air base. One of the canal area sites is identified on a list of TTC sites as "Empire Range (Chem Grid)" and on a 1997 map as "Old Chemical Site."53

34 Letter from Jack Cadenhead, November 1997; interview with Jack Cadenhead by author, May 24, 1998. 35 F.I. Diehl et al, "Report on Tests of Protective Clothing - Phase III: Tropical Zone Tests (Panama), June 1943, cited in Major R.C. Carlisle and Capt. F.I. Diehl, "The stability and irritancy of permeable protective clothing and the irritancy of ointment, protective, M5, in tropical wearing trials (Southwest Pacific Area), May 4, 1945, in NARA, San Jose Project files. 36 Capt. Jay S. Stockhardt, "San Jose Project," Armed Forces Chemical Journal, January 1948, p. 34. 37 HQ, San Jose Project, "General Order Number 11," op.cit. 38 Interview of Weldon Guest by the author, September 3, 1997. 39 U.S. Army Signal Corps, 1945, op.cit. 40 "A Long Term Strategic Plan for the Defense of the Panama Canal, 1946," RG 338, NARA. The map is marked: "Iguana Island Range - High Level Bombing, Strafing, Chemical Spray". For comments on the island's use for conventional munitions, see Betty Brannan Jaén, "De la contaminación en Isla Iguana," La Prensa, July 16, 1997. 41 LTC Grant S. Green, Jr., memorandum to Jeffrey Farrow, White House Counselor on Territorial Policy, December 19, 1979. 42 Interviews with Eugene Reid by author, September 16, 1997 and June 7, 1998. 43 Robert Harris and Jeremy Paxman, A Higher Form of Killing: The secret story of chemical and biological warfare, New York: Hill and Wang, 1982, pp. 137-138. 44 Herasto Reyes, "La siembra de la contaminación," La Prensa, July 29, 1997. The Signal Corps film says the goats were shipped from New Orleans. 45 Col. John R. Wood, "Work of the CC Medical Division," Armed Forces Chemical Journal, January 1948, p. 7. 46 Marion B. Sulzberger, "Protection and treatment of the skin exposed to blister gases," in E.C. Andrus, et.al., editors, Advances in Military Medicine, (Boston: Little, Brown), 1948, p. 591. 47 Interview with Dr. Morton Galdston with author, September 21, 1997. 48 "San Jose Project Report No. 24 Summary," in letter from Secretary of Defense William Cohen to U.S. Representative José Serrano, April 7, 1998. 49 Dugway Proving Ground Test Plan 704, "Surveillance Test (Environmental) of Mine, Gas Persistent, VX, 2-Gallon, ABC-M23" (USATECOM Project No. 5-3-9504-1); Dugway Proving Ground Test Plan 719, "Surveillance Test (Environmental) of Projectile, Gas Persistent, VX, 155mm, M121A1" (USATECOM Project No. 5-4-9503-1); Dugway Proving Ground Test Plan 723, "Surveillance Test (Environmental) of Rocket, Gas Persistent, VX, 155mm, M55" (USATECOM Project No. 5-4-9502-1); and "Change to Surveillance (Environmental) Plan for Rocket, Gas Nonpersistent, GB, 115mm, M55" (USATECOM Project No. 5-4-9501-01). Obtained through the Freedom of Information Act. All data obtained from these reports unless otherwise noted. 50 U.S. Congress, Office of Technology Assessment, Disposal of Chemical Weapons: Alternative Technologies-Background Paper, OTA-BP-O-95 (Washington, DC: US GPO, June 1992), p. 7. 51 U.S. Army Test and Evaluation Command, Dugway Proving Ground, "Environmental Field Test: Food Testing and Screening Kit, Chemical Agents, ABC-M3," December 1962, pp. 12, 21-23. 52 Blades interview, op.cit. 53 "Locations and Coordinates of Tropic Test Center Test Sites," no date. Obtained through the Freedom of Information Act; and PRC Environmental Management, Inc., 1997, op.cit, Empire Range map.

V. Disposal of Chemical Munitions

Less information is available on the disposal of chemical munitions stockpiled or used in tests in Panama than on tests themselves. As one San Jose Project participant commented, "We didn't worry too much about things like that at that time."54 Disposal should be examined in two categories: non-stockpiled munitions, such as those fired on San Jose, and stockpiled munitions and agent.

Stockpiled munitions, such as those stored at eight continental U.S. sites and on Kalama Island in the Pacific, are kept in a controlled, contained manner where they can be continuously monitored and re-packaged if a munition is in danger of leaking. Non-stockpiled weapons are those weapons which are no longer part of the stockpile. They have not been contained or monitored, nor have they been kept safely away from public access areas. Non-stockpile weapons also include chemical agents that have contaminated land or water even though a munition is no longer present.

All chemical munitions, like conventional munitions, include a certain number of duds -- that is, munitions that are fired or dropped but do not detonate. On impact areas, these unexploded ordnance (UXO) are typically what cause accidents to persons who unsuspectingly pick up, step on or play with them. According to one explosives expert, the rule of thumb in the community of explosives disposal professionals is a ten percent dud rate.55

On San Jose Island, thousands of chemical mortars and bombs were fired or dropped into eleven target areas, mostly on the north side of the island. For the 18 tests for which we have obtained records, 4,397 mortars and bombs were used. If other tests averaged the same number of munitions fired or dropped, it would mean that 31,267 chemical munitions were used on San Jose. At a dud rate of ten percent, that would leave 3,126 chemical UXO on San Jose Island.

Regarding stockpiled munitions, the San Jose post diary records a barge shipment which took chemical munitions out to sea on March 11, 1947.

Barge left SJP 0645 with 12 EM [enlisted men] taking a load of munitions out to sea to be destroyed. Tug towed barge out approximately 30 miles before munitions were destroyed. Party returned SJP approximately 2345.56

Another barge-load of munitions was dumped at sea on August 19, 1947. The military's evacuation of the San Jose Project in early 1948 was carried out with haste, on a five-week deadline received from headquarters. "Beating the deadline was not accomplished by working union hours," two officers wrote sardonically.57 Another barge was loaded with chemical munitions which were then dumped at sea on January 12, 1948.

Again, the post diary: "Technical munitions to be disposed of at sea in accord with evacuation instructions." The following morning, the diarist added: "Barge #1897 towed by tug ST872 returned after accomplishing mission of dumping munitions at sea, Barge returned this Project ETA 0500R."58

A summary of the San Jose Project written by the military for the Carter White House in 1979 said that "known munitions were destroyed and detoxified" when the island was evacuated. But the reported added: "In some tests, complete functioning of munitions could not be verified because of the jungle and marsh environment."59 In other words, the United States was aware in the 1970s that chemical munitions remained on the land at San Jose Island.

Chemical munitions which the military still hoped to use were moved into the Canal Zone. Two of the project's officers wrote:

The materiel owned by San Jose was stored wherever space could be found. Some of it was placed in the basements of barracks, more in an abandoned motor pool, and a toxic yard was established at the mouth of the Chagres River on the Fort Sherman Reservation.60

They did not elaborate on this alarming declaration. The toxic materials at Fort Sherman were stored there for "rehabilitation," according to a later account, which may have meant leaks from munitions in need of repair.61 We have found no records documenting what the United States did with chemical bombs stored at Rio Hato, which also was evacuated in January 1948.

The San Jose Project found a new home on St. Thomas of the Virgin Islands in April 1948. Twenty-seven soldiers who had been stationed at Fort Sherman "on Technical Activities" joined the project on May 14, and were followed on May 21 and May 26 with tugs from Panama towing three barges of "Technical Equipment," often a euphemism for munitions.62 Based on National Archives documents that he saw while working for military contractor PRC on a study of the active ranges in Panama, bomb expert Rick Stauber asserts that the United States established a chemical burial site at France Field in the 1930s. The documents Stauber found indicated that 30-lb bombs that leaked mustard were involved, and that there were both land burial and sea dumping of these munitions. According to Stauber, the same documents stated that a storage magazine at France Field had been contaminated by leakage of mustard agent.63

A version of this statement was featured on the front page of a Panamanian newspaper on April 13, 1998.64 In an implicit admission of this claim, the Department of Defense told officials of Panama's Interoceanic Region Authority (ARI) that toxic gases buried at France Field have dissipated. A published account of this admission is worth quoting:

Information in an official document emphasizes that a spokesman for the U.S. Department of Defense, whose identity was not disclosed, informed the ARI that there is no danger of contamination by toxic gases in France Field, since the materials buried there by U.S. troops in World War II have already dissipated.

According to the report, before the transfer of the area in 1979, when the Panama Canal Treaties entered into force, the U.S. Defense Department evaluated the need to remove the airstrip of the then-existing airport to remove the material buried there in the 1940s.

But the U.S. Defense Department experts concluded that the effort was not justified, since the gases in question did not represent then or now any risk, considering that their useful life is less than ten years.65

The Army has also implicitly recognized that there are chemical burial sites in Panama by refusing to release part of a document listing "suspected overseas burial sites" produced by the U.S. Army Chemical and Biological Command in 1993. If there were no burial sites of chemical agent or munitions in Panama, the Command presumably would have said so in declining to release the document. However, even without the list of burial sites, the locations may eventually be uncovered by souvenir seekers, erosion and development. As noted earlier, Chiva Chiva Trail was a demolition and disposal site for toxic munitions from 1952 to 1956.

Laboratory tests using chemical weapons, conducted in the 1950s and 1960s, pose additional questions about disposal of the agents. In Panama, "there could be the situation where laboratory wastes, such as glass vials, could be present in the environment," according to toxicologist Theodore Henry. "For instance, an intact glass vial of VX was found in the ground at [Aberdeen Proving Ground]. Such lab wastes are more sensitive to environmental release, and cannot be detected from the surface, as... munitions [can]."66

For nerve agent tests from 1964 to 1968, disposal included destruction of VX on-site by putting it in water in a 55-gallon drum, and adding sodium hydroxide and ethanol until the mix became a solution of sodium hydroxide. If VX mines were detonated for tests while still filled with live agent, this would have contaminated an area for several weeks, before the agent hydrolyzed into relatively harmless compounds. During those weeks, however, the area would have been highly dangerous for people.

U.S. Army South's Colonel Michael DeBow, who is responsible for carrying out the military's base clean-up programs in Panama, flatly told a Panamanian journalist that chemical munitions had not been used on the currently active firing ranges, and that "really" the Panamanian government should not be worried. But he added that "if there is a specific concern, we can explore and we are open to doing it."67 Similar claims made about Aberdeen Proving Ground, in Maryland, later proved to be erroneous. For years, nearby citizens were told that no chemical rounds had been fired on Aberdeen Peninsula, until a new a records search showed that they had indeed been fired on Aberdeen Peninsula.68

54 Reid, op.cit. 55 Interview with Rick Stauber by the author, June 26, 1998. 56 "San Jose Project Post Diary, 1947," in NARA, San Jose Project files. 57 Capt. Jay S. Stockhardt & 1st Lt. Stephen D. Noyes, "The San Jose Project Moves," Armed Forces Chemical Journal, January 1949, p. 53. 58 "San Jose Project Post Diary, 1 Jan 48-31 Dec 1948," in NARA, San Jose Project files. 59 Green, op.cit. 60 Stockhardt and Noyes, op.cit., p. 54. 61 "Survey and Analysis Report," Draft version, April 1993. 62 1948 Post Diary, op.cit. 63 Letter from Rick Stauber to author, July 18, 1998. 64 "EU enterró municiones," El Panamá América, April 13, 1998, p. 1. 65 "Esperan que EU informe a Panamá sobre uso de campos de tiro," La Prensa, May 4, 1998. 66 Communication from Theodore Henry to author, July 13, 1998. 67 Rafael Pérez Jaramillo, "Panamá: ¿laboratorio de armas químicas?" El Panamá América, April 19, 1998, p. A2. 68 Communication from Theodore Henry, University of Maryland Toxicology Program, July 13, 1998.

VI. Potential Long-Term Dangers Posed by Abandoned Chemical Weapons

Health effects of chemical munitions can be long-lasting, as demonstrated by continuing burns of Chinese people by chemical munitions that were abandoned by the Japanese army in China during World War II. As one study of chemical munitions abandoned in China notes, abandoned chemical weapons (ACW):

pose much greater hazards to civilians than military stockpiles of chemical weapons, such as those stored in depots in the United States and Russia. Military stockpiles are stored in special bunkers under lock and key, so that barring a catastrophe, ordinary citizens face no immediate threat. Since the location of many ACW is not known and civilians lack an understanding of their hazards, they risk being accidentally exposed to these weapons.69

China asserts that Japan abandoned two million chemical munitions on its territory, most of them in Jilin Province. As recently as 1987, over 200 people were injured when workers attempted to set fire to a barrel of liquid mustard in order to determine what it was. In 1991, twenty people experienced dizziness, nausea and breathing problems after leaking phosgene mortars were discovered at a junior high school.70 Closer to home, World War II-era chemical rounds recovered at Edgewood Arsenal, Maryland in 1994 were still able to detonate, despite their age. In that case chemical rounds were misidentified as conventional munitions, which when detonated released 11 pounds of mustard agent into the environment.71

DOD treaty implementation director Richard McSeveney made a striking claim about chemical munitions -- "they have a short shelf life."72 His statement echoes another military officer's reported statement to Panamanian officials that chemical agent or munition in burial sites has "dissipated." However, neither official offered any substantiating data or precedent for their assertions.

Chemical agent that has been sprayed or exploded does dissipate, but agent that is stored or abandoned in canisters or drums can survive for decades. "Where nerve and other [chemical warfare] agents hydrolyze quite readily," writes John Hart, an expert on abandoned chemical weapons, "mustard does so only very slowly. Instead a hardened, protective gel forms around its exterior. The mustard in the interior can remain active for decades." This is why fishermen in the Baltic Sea are still sometimes injured by chemical weapons dumped there more than 50 years ago which they catch in their nets.73

According to Colonel Edmund W. Libby, the U.S. Army's Project Manager for Non-Stockpile Chemical Materiel:

Historical experience indicates that chemical warfare agents dispersed in the environment, as through detonation of chemical weapons, lose their unique agent toxic effects essentially completely over a period ranging from minutes to weeks or months, depending on the agents, weather, soil, and other factors. Stable agent breakdown products may remain, however, in generally very low concentrations, which may in turn retain some much lower level of toxic effects associated with their chemistry (as for industrial chemicals, organic solvents, etc.).

Our experience indicates, however, that chemical warfare agents which remain in storage containers or munitions, or which are otherwise retained in bulk quantities, can retain essentially all of their toxic agent properties for many years. Even unexploded munitions recovered from the World War One era are often found to contain chemical warfare materiel that has been but little degraded in its toxic effects by the passage of time. For this reason, recovered suspect chemical warfare munitions and containers must be treated with extreme care, and handled and disposed of only by properly trained authorities.74

Moreover, when chemical warfare agents degrade, they often turn into compounds that are also very toxic to humans, particularly if exposed to drinking water. Finally, chemical munitions typically contain conventional munitions to burst the chemical filling. Buried or dud chemical rounds or bombs with these explosives can be as hazardous as other unexploded ordnance.

On San Jose Island, hazards from unexploded chemical rounds still remain. The island's owner in the 1970s, the inventor Earl Tupper, discovered this himself. "An [Explosive Ordnance Disposal] team was contacted by Mr. Tupper's son in 1974 with [a] report that one of the their workmen had been burned and requested assistance," the Pentagon wrote in 1979.75 Glenn Tupper recently confirmed that a worker on the island "suffered some sort of sever[e] skin irritation that seemed unrelated to commonly known rashes caused by local plants and/or insects."76

In addition to the acute symptoms from exposure to live chemical agents, ranging from temporary burns to death, exposure can cause chronic and delayed effects as well. Long-term injuries from exposure to mustard agents include respiratory and skin cancers, leukemia, asthma, chronic bronchitis, emphysema, chronic laryngitis, eye problems, conjunctivitis, traumatic stress disorder and sexual dysfunction. "There is no doubt that the long-term health consequences of exposure to mustard agents or Lewisite can be serious and, in some cases, devastating," the Institute of Medicine reported in 1993.77 In addition, because no one knows definitively the health effects of low-level exposure to chemical agents, the United States may not assume that burial sites are harmless.

69 Hongmei Deng and Peter O'Meara Evans, "Social and Environmental Aspects of Abandoned Chemical Weapons in China," The Nonproliferation Review, Spring-Summer 1997, p. 102. 70 Ibid., pp. 102-103. 71 Ted Henry, University of Maryland Program in Toxicology, note to author and PINS accuracy data for suspect munitions, June 23, 1998. 72 Richard McSeveney, interview with FOR and CEASPA, April 24, 1998. At the conclusion of the same meeting, Mr. McSeveney's technical assistant, Navy Commander Hulin Davis, turned to the author and said, "You mentioned something, the Chemical Weapons Convention. What is that?" 73 John Hart, "Some historical, legal and technical aspects of disposal of old and abandoned chemical weapons," presented in Budapest, Hungary, 2-4 April 1997, p. 12. 74 Communication from Col. Edmund W. Libby to author, July 20, 1998. 75 Green, op.cit., p. 2. 76 Letter from Glenn Tupper to the author, June 22, 1998. 77 Constance M. Pechura and David P. Rall (eds.), Veterans at Risk: The Health Effects of Mustard Gas and Lewisite, (Washington: National Academy Press, 1993), pp. 2-8.

VII. Information and Documents on Chemical Weapons: The U.S. Record

The complete transfer of canal-area lands under the Panama Canal Treaties by December 31, 1999, creates a key historical moment. Panamanians will soon have full sovereignty over and responsibility for these properties. Because the lands have been under United States control for more than 90 years, most Panamanians have little or no idea of their history of use, especially the history of military activities, which have typically been kept secret. A responsible reversion of these lands must include the transfer by the United States government to Panama of all historical documents related to activities that have had impacts on canal area lands.

The record of information transfers to date falls considerably short of that goal.

According to Panamanian officials and records, the Government of Panama has repeatedly and formally requested documents from the United States on chemical weapons tests in Panama. On January 28, 1997, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs requested a series of documents including one on "Detection Chemical Agent, Nerve Vapor." Project numbers were noted in the request. On August 1, 1997, the Ministry broadened its request for information to documents on chemical weapons tests generally.78 The Ministry also requested relevant portions of a list of "suspected overseas burial sites," which was written as an annex to the November 1993 "Survey and Analysis Report on all U.S. Non-Stockpile Chemical Materiel sites."79

But according to Foreign Ministry officials, the United States had not given Panama a single document on chemical weapons programs conducted in Panama -- until July 1998, as this report was in preparation.80 At that time, the United States released to Panama copies of the four nerve agent test reports cited above. In all other cases, U.S. military officials have responded with brief letters describing chemical warfare activities in general terms. In response to the ministry's August 1, 1997 request, for example, Colonel Debow wrote two paragraphs on tear gas and VX nerve agent tests.81

In June 1997, the Fellowship of Reconciliation also requested portions of the 1993 annex listing suspected overseas chemical munitions burial sites. The request, made for the section of the document that dealt with suspected sites in Panama, was denied. The denial was appealed in July 1997, and the appeal was denied in May 1998.82

The reasons given for denying the annex on "suspected overseas burial sites" are instructive. The Army General Counsel's Office stated that the document is correctly classified "because the requested material contains information concerning weapons systems and information of a foreign government, and the information could assist in the development or use of weapons of mass destruction."83 In other words, the Army may be conceding that the chemical agents abandoned in Panama have not simply "dissipated" into a harmless state or even into a militarily useless condition.

If persons with bad intentions obtained still-usable chemical munitions from burial sites or other chemical dumps in Panama, they could cause havoc. But this offers an equally compelling reason for the United States to disclose to Panama the locations of chemical agents or munitions, in order to forestall the possibility of accidents.

The U.S. military has already disclosed information on locations of other suspected burial sites, including in the United States. For example, the second edition of the Survey and Analysis Report includes a 13-page chapter on Water Island, located in St. Thomas and the site of the San Jose Project after it left Panama, from 1948 to 1950. The report lists a likely burial site, three suspected burial sites, and two possible burial sites, and includes a map of the sites.84

The Department of Defense's problems with disclosing historical information about its activities are systemic. Dugway Proving Ground, located in Utah, served as headquarters for chemical weapons field tests (and was the controlling agency for chemical weapons programs in Panama in the 1950s). During the course of this study, Dugway's technical library conducted a "key-word search" of documents referring to Panama, Tropic Test and several other key-words or phrases. The result was 2252 documents referring to Panama in either their titles or abstracts. To both facilitate and narrow our search for documents, the Fellowship of Reconciliation sought permission to visit the Dugway library. Although Dugway's legal and intelligence offices approved the request, the base commander subsequently denied it, citing "extremely heavy testing and troop training ongoing at Dugway."85

Aberdeen Proving Ground, in Maryland, which served as headquarters for U.S. chemical warfare programs for many years, also has a technical library and historical office. According to a former project manager of the Tropic Test Center who has been contracted by the Defense Department to research TTC's projects in Panama, the Aberdeen library is open only two hours a day, and his request to use the library was denied as well. His research, and delivery to Panama of its results, are likely to be delayed months by Aberdeen's restrictions.86

In other words, the U.S. military's current operations -- at least in this case -- take precedence over the historical research necessary to be held accountable for the military activities in the past.

78 Letters from Lic. Ramiro Castrejón, Co-chairman, Environmental Sub-committee, DEPAT, to Col. Michael Debow, Co-chairman, Environmental Sub-committee, U.S. Army South, on January 28, 1997 (CCj-053-97) and August 1, 1997 (CCj-388-97). 79 Interview with author, Lic. Sayda de Grimaldo, Regional Interoceanic Authority, June 24, 1998. 80 Dr. Rodrigo Noriega, Director for International Affairs, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, note to author, June 8, 1998; and interview with Lic. Ramiro Castrejón, June 1998; communication from Fernando Manfredo, Jr. to author, July 20, 1998. 81 Debow, op.cit. 82 Letter from Fellowship of Reconciliation to U.S. Army, April 25, 1997; denial letter from U.S. Army Chemical and Biological Defense Command, May 13, 1997; appeal of denial by Fellowship of Reconciliation, July 19, 1997; phone conversation between Suzanne Council, Office of the Army General Counsel, and the author, Fellowship of Reconciliation, May 1, 1998; denial letter of appeal from Army Principal Deputy General Counsel, Lawrence M. Baskir, May 20, 1998. 83 Lawrence M. Baskir, Principal Deputy General Counsel, Department of the Army, letter to author, May 20, 1998. 84 U.S. Army Program Manager for Chemical Demilitarization, "Survey and Analysis Report, Second Edition," December 1996, pp. VI-1 to VI-13. 85 Col. John A. Como, Commanding Officer, letter to the author, June 24, 1998. 86 Blades interview, op.cit.

VIII. Legal Obligations

The major obligations of the United States regarding chemical weapons in Panama are spelled out in the Chemical Weapons Convention and the Panama Canal Treaty.

The Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) entered into force on April 29, 1997, only days after the United States joined 109 other states in ratifying it. The CWC requires party states to destroy all chemical weapons it owns or controls within ten years (15 years in exceptional cases). The CWC also requires party states to "assign the highest priority" to protection of the environment. Nations that have abandoned chemical weapons on other nation states' territories are obliged to declare those weapons within 30 days of their ratification of the Convention. The declaration must include "all available relevant information concerning the abandoned chemical weapons." Once the affected nation ratifies the CWC, the nation that abandoned the weapons must destroy them, in cooperation with the affected nation. "For the purpose of destroying abandoned chemical weapons, the Abandoning State Party shall provide all necessary financial, technical, expert, facility as well as other resources."87

The Convention excludes from its definition of abandoned chemical weapons any munitions which were buried before January 1, 1977, and which remain buried, and chemical weapons dumped at sea before January 1, 1985. However, a state party must still declare chemical weapons which were buried or dumped at sea after these dates. The CWC defines abandoned chemical weapons as those which were produced after 1946, or those produced between 1925 and 1946 which have been determined to be "usable."

The United States submitted declarations to the Organization for the Prevention of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), established by the CWC, within 30 days of the Convention's entry into force in April 1997. However, the U.S. declaration did not include any declaration of chemical weapons abandoned in other countries.88 Since at the very least the United States abandoned chemical munitions on San Jose Island in Panama, this means that the United States is violating the Chemical Weapons Convention's requirement to declare chemical weapons abandoned in other countries.

The U.S. Army South, in its plan for transfer of active firing ranges to Panama, claims that the United States will completely fulfill the Canal Treaty's provisions. The plan makes no mention of the Chemical Weapons Convention, and curiously defines "chemical munitions" as follows:

Those inert munitions or items used to disperse smoke compounds, white and red phosphorous, and riot control agents. Excluded from consideration are chemical warfare materials and chemical compounds which, through its [sic] properties, produce hazards to human health, life or safety.89

Regardless of how the US Army might define chemical munitions for its own internal purposes, the CWC applies to all chemical weapons as defined in the treaty and irrespective of whether they were abandoned in the lands covered by the Canal Treaty or elsewhere. The application of the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC), on the other hand, is not restricted to chemical munitions abandoned on lands covered by the Canal Treaty. In addition, the CWC imposes reporting requirements on countries which ratify it. On July 7, 1998, Panama's Legislative Assembly ratified the Chemical Weapons Convention.90 Once President Ernesto Pérez Balladares signs the legislation, and the ratification is deposited with the United Nations, both Panama and the United States will face a series of obligations to implement the Convention.

As noted above, the United States is obliged to "provide all necessary financial, technical, expert, facility, as well as other resources" for the destruction of the chemical weapons it has abandoned in Panama. Panama must provide the cooperation necessary to facilitate such destruction.

Panama also has reporting obligations. Within 30 days of entry into force of the Convention for Panama, it must submit all relevant information about abandoned chemical weapons known to be on its territory. If it later discovers other such weapons, Panama must supplement its submission within 180 days.91

In addition to identifying abandoned chemical weapons of which it is aware, Panama must make the fullest efforts to ensure that these weapons are removed from its territory not later than one year after the Convention has entered into force.92 To this end, Panama has the right to request that the United States enter into consultation to create a mutually-agreed plan for the destruction of the weapons. Within 180 days of Panama's request, the plan must be submitted to the CWC's Technical Secretariat.93

Compliance with the provisions of the CWC is monitored by a Conference of States Parties to the Convention. If the United States fails to fulfill either its reporting obligations or to remove chemical weapons that it abandoned in Panama or that are in any area in Panama within its jurisdiction or control, Panama may request the Conference to provide assistance in the destruction of the weapons.94 In addition, the Conference may restrict or suspend the United States' rights and privileges under the CWC until it performs its obligations. If such violations are found be "of particular gravity," the Conference may bring the issue to the attention of the United Nations General Assembly and the United Nations Security Council.95

The 1977 Panama Canal Treaty, as noted in the 1997 report "Environment Injustice on United States Bases in Panama,"96 applies to all lands within the former Canal Zone. These lands include Chiva Chiva, Cerro Tigre, France Field, and Fort Clayton, but not areas outside the former Zone, such as San Jose Island and Rio Hato. The Canal Treaty stipulates:

At the termination of any activities or operations under this Agreement, the United States shall be obligated to take all measures to ensure insofar as may be practicable that every hazard to human life, health and safety is removed from any defense site or military area of coordination or any portion thereof, on the date the United States Forces are no longer authorized to use such site. Prior to the transfer of any installation, the two governments will consult concerning: (a) its condition, including removal of hazards to human life, health and safety; and (b) compensation for its residual value, if any exists.97

Although it appears the U.S. Army South has attempted to define chemical munitions as those chemicals that do not cause human harm, the reality is that buried chemical munitions (as normally defined) can cause both human harm and environmental harm, which in turn can cause human harm. Accordingly, the Panama Canal Treaty requirements regarding protection of the natural environment and the requirements regarding protection of human life, health and safety should apply with full force to buried chemical munitions within the Canal area. Thus, under article VI of the main Canal Treaty, the U.S. government must fulfill its obligation to implement the Treaty "in a manner consistent with the protection of the natural environment of the Republic of Panama." That obligation specifically includes the duty to "consult and cooperate" with the government of Panama to make sure that both governments "give due regard to the protection and conservation of the environment." Because chemical munitions pose a risk to the environment, the two governments must consult and cooperate. Any meaningful consultation and cooperation must begin with full disclosure regarding the location and extent of buried chemical munitions.

Under the Agreement on Implementation of Article IV of the Panama Canal Treaty, the U.S. government must "take all measures to ensure insofar as may be practicable that every hazard to human life, health and safety is removed from any defense site or a military area of coordination or any portion thereof," by the time the U.S. returns control of the bases to the government of Panama. That means the U.S. government must take action to remove buried chemical munitions from bases in Panama before those bases are transferred to Panamanian control.

Irrespective of any attempt by the U.S. Army South to define the problem of buried chemical munitions out of existence, the Canal Treaty and related implementing agreements impose stringent obligations to consult with the Panamanian government about environmental hazards and hazards to human life, health and safety and to remove any such munitions that pose a threat to human health, life and safety.

In addition to its obligations under the Canal Treaty, international law gives the United States affirmative obligations to protect the environment. The obligations derive from treaties, customary international law, and general principles of international law. They begin with the obligation not to harm the environment of another state. Having failed to fulfill that duty, the United States must nonetheless comply with other international legal obligations. Thus the United States must gather and provide information concerning environmental hazards caused by its activities in Panama, it must consult and cooperate with the government of Panama in addressing those hazards, it must carry out environmental impact assessment, and it must facilitate public participation. The United States has not fulfilled these obligations either. U.S. obligations also include the duty to clean up environmental hazards and the duty to provide compensation for irremediable environmental damage. The unremedied, uncompensated contamination and environmental damage at US bases in Panama stands in flagrant opposition to these obligations.98

The United States also appears to be in violation of international legal requirements that regulate particular types of environmental problems, such as hazardous wastes, and activities that endanger biological diversity. The failure of the United States to provide complete and accurate information about environmental conditions, however, makes it impossible to gauge the full scope of other violations.

The United States has also disregarded the substantial body of international law relating to protection of human rights and the environment, which lays out the rights of the Panamanian people and government, as well as obligations of the U.S. government. Some of this law has been codified in treaties that directly bind the United States, some can be gleaned from state practice and other sources of customary international law, and some is found in the writings of jurists and scholars. All of these authorities are recognized sources of international law.

The environmental problems associated with U.S. military bases in Panama may violate a range of international human rights principles. Environmental contamination interferes with the right to a secure, healthy and ecologically sound environment, the right to life, the right to health, the right to personal security, the right to safe and healthy food and water, the right to safe and adequate housing, and the right to self-determination (including sovereignty over natural resources). The U.S. government's apparent disregard for the rights of Panamanians, present and future, also suggests violations of the right to non-discrimination (including the right to environmental justice) and the rights of future generations to inherit a habitable environment. The United States' failure to provide meaningful opportunities for public participation in relevant decision making also implicates the right to environmental information and the right to participation. The U.S. government's refusal to clean up the bases prior to transfer and its denial of post-closure responsibility also violate the right to a remedy.

Because Great Britain and Canada also participated in the San Jose Project, and both are also State Parties to the Chemical Weapons Convention, both nations also have some obligations to dispose of munitions from the San Jose Project. In particular, Great Britain produced an undetermined number of 4.2" chemical mortars charged with mustard which were fired on San Jose Island.

87 Convention on the prohibition of the development, production, stockpiling and use of chemical weapons and on their destruction (CWC), Part IV(B) of the Verification Annex, para. 15. 88 United States Arms Contrl and Disarmament Agency, "Primary Declaration Identification for the Submission of Initial Declarations in accordance with Articles III, VI and the Verification Annex," May 29, 1997. 89 "USARSO's Range Closure Plan: Empire and Piña Ranges," 23 January 1998, p. 1. 90 Carlos Anel Cordero, "Aprueban convenio que obligaría sanear bases," El Panamá América, July 8, 1998. 91Verification Annex, Art.IV(B). 8, 9, 15. 92 Art. IV.11. 93 Verification Annex, Art.IV(B). 13, 14. 94 Art. IV.11. 95 Art. XII. 2, 4. On matters of substance, the Conference acts where possible by consensus; where consensus is not possible, the Conference acts by a two thirds majority. 96 Published as J. Martin Wagner and Neil A.F. Popovic, "Environment Injustice on United States Bases in Panama: International Law and the Right to Land Free from Contamination and Explosives," Virginia Journal of International Law (Vol. 38, No. 3, Spring 1998), pp. 403-506. 97 Agreement in Implementation of Article IV of the Panama Canal Treaty, art. IV(4). 98 The bases for and ramifications of these obligations are set out in much greater details in Wagner and Popovic, op.cit.

IX. Biological Warfare Programs

During World War II, the military developed an increased interest in biological warfare, both defensive and offensive. The first action of the War Research Service, which was established in 1942 to investigate a variety of unconventional weapons, was to set up antibiological warfare programs in the United States and abroad -- including the Canal Zone and Puerto Rico -- under the auspices of the Surgeon General's office. These programs instructed medical and military officers in defensive measures against biological weapons.99

In late 1947, the British Navy proposed to use U.S. facilities on San Jose Island to support biological warfare trials at sea, beginning in October 1948. Under the plan, the United States would provide 20 technicians, care for animals used in the experiments, and "shore base facilities" for recreation and ship maintenance. The military's Joint Strategic Plans Committee favored the experiments because they would "facilitate the obtaining of essential basic research data in the BW [biological warfare] field." But with the evacuation of San Jose Island in January 1948, the plan for using that island was scuttled. The experiments may have been carried out instead on Parham Sound in Antigua, which was considered as an alternate site.100

Since plans for the military use of biological agents focused on their transmission through aerial spray techniques, studies of aerosol spray patterns in Panama may have been designed to explore how biological agents could be used there. Dugway Proving Ground's technical library lists a number of such studies.101 However, chemical sprays and smoke devices also rely on aerial and meteorological data.

The National Institutes of Health's Middle America Research Unit (MARU) actively used biological agents in Panama. MARU was established in the 1950s, and worked closely with the Gorgas Memorial Laboratory. Located in a building in Ancon Heights, MARU "handled some of the deadliest and most infectious diseases known to medicine at the time," according to Carl J. Peters, a scientist who worked there in the 1960s. Peters emphasized the measures taken to contain the agents that the MARU technicians were working on, but noted that one lab technician accidentally contracted Bolivian hemorrhagic fever at the lab and died within a few days.

One disease in particular that MARU worked with was Venezuelan Equine Encephalitis (VEE), a naturally-occurring virus which incapacitates but generally does not kill its human victims. Instead, VEE begins abruptly with high fever, chills and aches and an intense aversion to light, then typically is gone within a week or two. In Central America in the 1960s, VEE attacked horses and mules, leaving many dead, and MARU sought to stem the disease's migration toward the United States through development of a vaccine. But Peters writes:

Nobler designs aside, however, the U.S. government had other reasons to be interested in VEE. The symptoms in humans are so incapacitating that VEE had been seen as a potential biological weapon. The army wanted to develop different categories of biological warfare agents: incapacitators as well as killers. With a relatively short incubation period of two to three days, VEE could be an ideal incapacitator: neutralizing an enemy population right before a battle without risk of killing innocent civilians or committing wartime atrocities. With that as a plan, the army had developed a vaccine to protect our troops in case an enemy tried to use it on them, or presumably in case the wind blew the wrong way the day they tried to use it on someone else.102

The army authorized MARU to test a live-attenuated vaccine on horses in the field, and Peters describes such tests on Costa Rica's Pacific coast. The Gorgas Memorial Laboratory also studied VEE among humans in Almirante from 1960 to 1962 and in Darién and the urban communities of Patoistown and Zegla in 1968, as well as in laboratory animals during the same periods. The studies included testing live vaccines of VEE on animal subjects.103 Exercises to test the military usefulness of VEE were carried out in Vietnam in the 1960s and on deserted islands in the Pacific, according to one account, but were put aside because allied troops could not be protected.104

VEE has persisted for long periods in Panama. Troops training at Fort Sherman in 1981 contracted it, an exposure that was linked to VEE in 1970, when the military was actively experimenting with VEE. The Walter Reed Army Institute of Research reported:

An outbreak of Venezuelan Equine Encephalitis (VEE) occurred in a unit of military personnel who had gone to Panama for jungle training in 1981. Exposure was linked to training in October in an area of Fort Sherman that was previously implicated over ten years ago. An intensive serological survey identified five cases presenting with fever, chills and headaches. VEE remains a threat to U.S. forces deployed to specific areas of Central America.105

In addition, 1977 news accounts cited intelligence sources who claimed that in 1971 U.S. intelligence agents brought Swine flu from Fort Gulick (Espinar) in Panama to Cuba, where the flu apparently contaminated a large number of pigs. The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization called the epidemic of swine flu that hit Cuba in 1971 the "most alarming event" of that year. According to the accounts, an intelligence agent was given a sealed unmarked container and instructed to deliver it to an anti-Castro group in Panama. Cuban exiles interviewed for the report said they received the container off Bocas del Toro in Panama and brought it to contacts to the small island of Navassa, whence it was shipped to Cuba in late March 1971. The first Cuban pigs contracted the flu on about May 6.106 Cuban authorities slaughtered half a million pigs in order to contain the epidemic.107

Apart from the above information, however, we have not located documentation of current contamination by military biological agents in Panama. We also have not found documents indicating the testing or use of Agent Orange or other defoliants in Panama, though we do not discount the possibility that defoliants may have been tested there.

In November 1969, President Nixon issued an executive order renouncing the use of all biological warfare agents, effectively ending any lawful development of the agents. The declaration led to the 1972 Biological Weapons Convention, which outlawed efforts to "develop, produce, stockpile, or otherwise acquire or retain" any biological weapons. The United States became one of the first parties to the convention. The U.S. military subsequently converted stockpiled biological agents into harmless fertilizer.

99 Brophy, Miles and Cochrane, op.cit., p. 105. 100 Report by the Joint Strategic Plans Committee, "Biological Warfare Trials at Sea," CCS 578/12, 9 Dec. 1947, in NARA, RG 165, ABC files. 101 U.S. Army Dugway Proving Ground library, printout, June 25, 1998. 102 C.J. Peters, M.D. and Mark Olshaker, Virus Hunter: Thirty Years of Battling Hot Viruses Around the World, (New York: Anchor, 1997), pp. 65-71. 103 Annual Report of the Gorgas Memorial Laboratory for the Fiscal Year Ended June 30, 1965, p. 1; and Annual Report of the Gorgas Memorial Laboratory for the Fiscal Year Ended June 30, 1968, pp. 4-5. See also Grayson and Galindo, "Epidemilogic studies of VEE in Almirante, Panama," American Journal of Epidemiology, v. 88, pp. 80-96. 104 Harris and Paxman, op.cit., pp. 170-171. 105 "Venezuelan Equine Encephalitis: Report of an Outbreak Associated with Jungle Exposure," produced for the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research, November 1984. 106 Drew Fetherston and John Cummings, "CIA linked to infecting of Cuban swine," Newark Star-Ledger, January 9, 1977, p. 38. The article appeared in Newsday the same day. 107 Alexander Cockburn, "From Pearls...", The Nation, March 9, 1998, p. 9.

X. Conclusions and Recommendations

In 1979, the United States was prepared -- if requested by the Government of Panama -- to conduct a survey of San Jose Island to "determine the bounds of chemical contamination on the island and assess the feasibility of returning it to a 'safe for normal habitation' condition." The survey plan, developed by the Pentagon, would have taken eight to ten days, followed by an assessment of "an unspecified longer period dependent upon survey findings." 108 Panama did not request the survey.

At non-stockpile chemical weapons sites across the United States, including sites of buried chemical munitions, the U.S. government has been prepared to not only assess contamination left by chemical weapons activities, but to conduct clean-up of those sites. These are not technically impossible tasks. The United States can and should carry them out in Panama.

The CWC is a brand new legal instrument, whose driving force is the elimination of all chemical weapons. The United States, Panama, the private sector, and ordinary states all will benefit from the Convention's success. In that spirit, the United States should avoid an overly technical application of the convention's provisions in favor of a forward-looking approach. The United States has a unique historical opportunity to demonstrate its good faith and leadership in ridding the world of chemical weapons.

In addition, both the United States and Panama, as well as investors and communities in Panama, have a stake in ensuring that the former chemical sites in the canal area, San Jose Island and Rio Hato are safe areas for people to live and work. Without such an assurance, the transition to the successful Panamanian management of the canal area will be hindered by doubt and potential hazards to human health and safety.

Recommendations:

To the Government of the United States: 1) That the United States State Department fully disclose to the Government of Panama all information relating to sites where chemical munitions and agents, including duds, may have been abandoned. The information should include copies of original documents, where possible, and address chemical agents on the land surface, dumped at sea or buried underground, both inside and outside the Panama Canal area.

2) That the United States commit the resources necessary to safely and promptly dispose of chemical weapons and agents it abandoned in Panama. This disposal should include San Jose Island as well as burial sites, especially those sites within the canal area which fall under the requirements of the Panama Canal Treaty. Such sites are a time bomb awaiting road construction, housing developments, reforestation, or other activities that lead people to excavate areas where the U.S. has left live chemical munitions.

3) That the United States increase resources, including budget and qualified staff, for the documentary history of chemical weapons programs operated by the United States, and make such resources accessible under reasonable conditions to representatives of civil society. This should include, for example, increased staff for the technical libraries and funds for preservation of documents at Aberdeen and Dugway Proving Grounds, expansion of Aberdeen Proving Ground's technical library hours, and cooperation with the National Archives and Records Administration and with researchers in gaining access to these sources.

To the Government of Panama: 1) That the Government of Panama follow ratification of the Chemical Weapons Convention with a report within 30 days to the Organization for the Prevention of Chemical Warfare, as required by the CWC.

2) That the Panamanian government promote and support the establishment of a repository of resources and documents on the history of use of U.S. military sites in Panama. The Panamanian government should make these documents available to the Panamanian public, possibly through the University of Panama, Technology University, or the Catholic University (USMA).

To potential investors in Panama: That potential investors support Panama's aspirations for a safe and healthy environment by investing in dignified work by Panamanians in the interoceanic region and by supporting Panamanian diplomatic efforts for decontamination of areas affected by past chemical warfare programs.

To the Governments of the United Kingdom and Canada: That the British and Canadian governments disclose to Panama documents on chemical weapons activities in Panama (particularly on San Jose Island), as a contribution to implementation of the CWC.

Annex A: Chemical Weapons Activities of United States in Panama, by Site

San Jose Island Site of extensive tests of chemical munitions from 1944 through 1947. Target areas likely to contain hundreds or thousands of unexploded munitions. See section IV-B.

Cerro Tigre Storage area for bulk chemical agent beginning in 1930s and through at least 1956, in both open areas and igloo-type magazines.

Chiva Chiva A knoll on the "Chiva Chiva trail" used as a test and disposal site for chemical munitions in 1950s.

Curundu Site for storage and tests of toxic materials at "demonstration area" from 1952-1956. Reportedly site for Tropic Test Center's analysis and decontamination of VX nerve agent in 1960s tests.

Fort Clayton Site of mustard gas tests on soldiers in 1941. Included 8 ft. x 12 ft. magazine for storage of chemical munitions in 1941. Also the headquarters for the Chemical Corps Tropical Test Team in 1956.

Rio Hato Site near airstrip was storage area for chemical bombs and munitions carried by aircraft for San Jose Project, 1944-1947.

France Field Included 30 ft. x 45 ft. magazine for storage of chemical bombs and munitions in 1941. Reportedly a burial site for chemical agents or munitions from World War II era.

Empire/Balboa West Range Probable site for detonation tests of VX nerve agent mines (with or without live agent) in 1960s. All Tropic Test chemical tests were probably conducted at either 9.988 deg. x 6.408 deg. (Old Chemical Site, Balboa West), or 9.931 deg. x 6.516 deg. (NBC-12 site, Empire).

Iguana Island Site for "chemical spray" tests during the San Jose Project, 1944-1947.

Fort Sherman Mouth of Chagres River was site for storage and "rehabilitation" of four barges of chemical munitions in 1948, after evacuation of San Jose Island.

Pacific waters Chemical munitions dumped from barges as close as 30 miles from San Jose Island in 1947-48. Also, sites for tests of chemical tests at sea, 1944-45.

Fort Gulick Included 8 ft. x 12 ft. magazine for storage of chemical munitions in 1941.

Howard Field Included 16 ft. x 20 ft. magazine for storage of chemical munitions in 1941.

Camp Paraiso Included 8 ft. x 12 ft. magazine for storage of chemical munitions in 1941.

Corozal Included two magazines for storage of chemical bombs and munitions in 1941, one 8 ft. x 12 ft., another 20 ft. x 30 ft. Also the headquarters for the Chemical Corps Tropical Test Team in the 1950s.

Albrook Field Included 8 ft. x 12 ft. magazine for storage of chemical munitions in 1941.