The U.S. Army said yesterday that half of all U.S. chemical weapons agent stores have been destroyed since an international ban on stockpiled chemical weapons took effect 10 years ago (see GSN, June 21).
When the Chemical Weapons Convention entered into force on April 29, 1997, the United States possessed about 30,000 tons of nerve and blister agents, the Army said.
Weapons disposal has been completed at the Johnston Atoll Chemical Agent Disposal System, about 800 miles southwest of Hawaii, and at the Aberdeen Chemical Agent Disposal Facility in Maryland.
The five operating chemical weapons disposal sites operated by the U.S. Army Chemical Materials Agency are expected to destroy more than 78 percent of the U.S. chemical weapons agents by 2017. Combined with work at the two closed facilities, that would eliminate 90 percent of the U.S. stockpile.
The remaining weapons agents are slated for destruction under a separate Defense Department program at sites now being prepared in Pueblo, Colo., and outside of Richmond, Ky.
The Chemical Weapons Convention requires the United States to complete disposal efforts by April 29, 2012 (see GSN, Dec. 11, 2006).
"Last June, we met the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) 45 percent destruction milestone of the agent that was in the U.S. stockpile when the treaty entered into force in 1997 for the United States," acting CMA chief Dale Ormond said in a statement.
"Reaching the 50 percent agent destruction mark shows that the Army's chemical weapons demilitarization program has truly hit its stride in destroying chemical agent safely and efficiently," he said (U.S. Army Chemical Materials Agency release, Dec. 10).