Weapons of Despire on the Oder

Reading Antony Beevor's The Fall of Berlin: 1945 and a short section of a chapter talked about Soviet preparations for chemical warfare. What if Hitler had given permission to use the Verzweiflungswaffen 'weapons of despair' against the Soviet bridgeheads on the Oder, or during their advance against Berlin.

Did the Wehrmacht's have enough chemical munitions or bombs to actually use on? If so, I would think this would have serious disrupted Zhukov's and Konev's attacks. From what was described in the book the Russian CW protection methods aside from gas masks didn't sound very effective. Would the Russians have been delayed enough, for Eisenhower to consider moving further west than he did OTL?

Even if he Ike doesn't go west, how does this change the battle of Berlin?

EDIT: Could the Soviets responded with their own CW attacks against Army Group Visuta and 9th Army?
 
Reading Antony Beevor's The Fall of Berlin: 1945 and a short section of a chapter talked about Soviet preparations for chemical warfare. What if Hitler had given permission to use the Verzweiflungswaffen 'weapons of despair' against the Soviet bridgeheads on the Oder, or during their advance against Berlin.

Did the Wehrmacht's have enough chemical munitions or bombs to actually use on? If so, I would think this would have serious disrupted Zhukov's and Konev's attacks. From what was described in the book the Russian CW protection methods aside from gas masks didn't sound very effective. Would the Russians have been delayed enough, for Eisenhower to consider moving further west than he did OTL?

Ah yes, those 'Weapons of Despair' - but Anthony Beevor himself provided us with the explaination why those weapons weren't used :

Reports reached Sweden that chemical weapons had been distributed to special troops in long boxes, with the inscription 'Can only be used on the personal order of the Führer'. The Swedish military attaché heard that only fear of killing everyone in the vicinity prevented them from being used
Chemical weapons are difficult to control, especially if the methods of deliverance are as flawed as 'long boxes'. At this time the 'personal order of the Fuhrer' was hard to get, since it took up to 24 hours for an order from Berlin to get to the front (see the chapter about Himmler)

Did the Germans have enough chemical weapons to use? Of course - by the end of the war the Allies captured 302,875 tons of chemical ammunition containing over 66,000 tons toxic substances. The Germans used them in Sevastopol, the Pripyat marshes, Brest-Litvosk and the Adzimushkai quarries in the Crimea. Also some early Pzb rifles had tear-gas on the catridges, and these were meant to explode once the shells got inside the armor. The Soviets also had the chemical warfare variant of the T-26.

So the result would be that more Germans and Soviets get killed. The Soviet gas protection procedures were poor, but they were better than nothing (some units didn't get their full share of gas masks or protective clothing) - and the wind might not be on the German's side.
 
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Would the Russians have been delayed enough, for Eisenhower to consider moving further west than he did OTL?
Nobody knew by May 1945 if Manhattan Project is gonna be successfull, so Americans need Red Army to fight Japanese. Ike can go all the way to Warsaw and Wienna, he'll promptly give the land to Stalin.

The Soviets also had the chemical warfare variant of the T-26.
You have to bear in mind that Soviets considered flamethrowers "chemical weapons" (to give control over unsafe substances to troops experienced in handling hazmat), so a lot of "chemical tanks" were actually flamethrower-equipped vehicles (Soviet also had tanks adapted to chemical warfare, with gas filters and pressurized crew compartments, but I'm not sure how widespread they were).
 

CalBear

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The Soviets, just like the Western Allies, had literally TONS of chemical weapons. All a first use by the Germans would achieve is even more dead and crippled German civilians, especially since the Red Army would see it to be an engraved invitation to use it against civilian concentrations in East Prussia.

Chemical weapons were/are not a magic bullet (as has been discussed on other threads here), just a pain in the neck for all sides. A first use causes the Soviets to recoil and then respond about 5-1 against the Germans. The German troops were no better protected than the Soviets overall, and many German troops were, if not green, certainly not hardened veterans and more liable to break when presented with a chemical attack. Chemicals are also more effective against defenders than attackers overall, thanks to the persistant effect of blistering agents.
 
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