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by andybak 4141 days ago
I find Churchill's words to be fascinating when read closely: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alleged_British_use_of_chemica...

The wording is callous and shocking to my modern ears but - if you start with the premise that you are already in a violent conflict (I'm not addressing the issue of colonialism here - just the debate about the comparative ethics of bullets and explosives vs chemicals) then this sentence stands out: "It is sheer affectation to lacerate a man with the poisonous fragment of a bursting shell and to boggle at making his eyes water by means of lachrymatory gas."

We have some ridiculous Hollywood-fed beliefs that bullets and explosions create clean deaths and painless injuries.