WI: Chemical weapons used in 1944 - by the Allies

Now, through a series of decisions it is decided that the Western Allies will use chemical weapons from D-Day onwards. This is justified in public by exposition of German cruelties (pick your favorite, there's plenty of them). The second, private argument by Churchill is that the inevitable German counter-strikes will delay Soviets.

So, what will be the effect if chemical weapons will be used against front-line troops? IMHO, the effect on Germans will be quite devastating due to Allied air superiority and dependence upon horses.
 

Sachyriel

Banned
Hitler throws the large amounts of his own chemical weapons against the Allies. I mean, he as using them on civilians in chambers specially designed to kill people using gas, and was wounded himself in WW1 from gas. Wouldn't be that big of a leap from 'I don't like it' to 'fuck it, let them have it'.
 
The Allies only just started looking into nerve gas production while Germans had serious stockpiles of sarin and tabun, and first production of even more deadly fluorophosphates such as soman. A couple V-2 with distance detonator and half a ton of nerve gas each over London will result in many thousands of casualties (sarin can linger for up to a week, and soman is designed to stay in wind-protected locations for up to 4 weeks, with vapour concentration high enough to be deadly on skin contact). The Allies would mostly respond with large quantities of blistering agents such as mustard gas and lewisite, since this is what they are geared to produce in large quantities.

Concerning the outcome, add a million or two mostly civilian casualties on the german side and half a million casualties on the Allied side. Otherwise, nothing changes in the outcome of the war except maybe a couple more people are hanged in Nuremberg.
 
The Allies only just started looking into nerve gas production while Germans had serious stockpiles of sarin and tabun, and first production of even more deadly fluorophosphates such as soman. A couple V-2 with distance detonator and half a ton of nerve gas each over London will result in many thousands of casualties

Using Sarin and Tabun to strike London sounds like a good idea but in practice is hard to implement as the gas warheads were not developed in OTL and will take much time to develop (too long for V-1, I guess, and for V-2 the process is much more difficult especially as Germans did not have proximity fuzes.)

Sarin and Tabun would be used against Allied troops in Normandy and especially against Soviet troops in Eastern Front where it would be particularly effective.

Concerning the outcome, add a million or two mostly civilian casualties on the german side and half a million casualties on the Allied side. Otherwise, nothing changes in the outcome of the war except maybe a couple more people are hanged in Nuremberg.

I think the effect would be that the breakthrough from Normandy would be much faster as the German troops would be vastly more vulnerable to gas use than Allied troops. Then again, Soviet casualties would delay their advance in the East.
 
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