Making the game harder

[LampCord]

First of all, I would say air / carier units are a bit overpowered vs. land units. While I totally agree that they should be able to lower morale and preparedness, I'm not so sure they should be able to inflict so many casualties. Take Iwo Jima for instance. In the real war, the US hammered that island for weeks with air and naval bombardment. But when all was said and done, they still had to send a very large land force to take it out in the end. No way it could be done by air power alone.

But in the game, I can just park 3-4 CV's off the coast and wipe out all the Jap units and then roll in a measly anti-air unit and take the island without casualties (other than landing casualties). That doesn't feel right.

Secondly, I like the idea of automatic garrison units. When you take control of of a country, why not automatically generate a low quality garrison unit in each city. No movement, 0 tech and maybe an initial strength of only 1 and a max strength of only 5. Then it would be up to the controling country as to whether to expend MPP's to crank them up later or leave them as is.

The reason I like this idea is that right now, as the Allies, its way too easy to liberate all of the islands. The Jap player does not have enough units to even come close to protecting all of the cities so you can just roll through them unopposed with spec forces and then amph transport them to the next location for very little cost. If there were garrison units in those cities, then the defending player could quickly crank them up to level 5 when invasion appeared imminent.

The Allies would still be able to take them but it would require some time, effort and casualties. And maybe in some cases, you would even have to commit an HQ to get the job done.

Anyway, just thought I'd throw those two out there for debate...

[Blashy]

You are looking at it too much from a tactical level. Remember SC is STRATEGIC in nature.

Iwo Jima is the best example. USA landed 110 000 troops on that Island and lost 6000, that is not allot in SC2 terms, those landing casualties are most of the time much higher than those 6000 losses.

Those losses represent resistance on the ground. So even after you killed the unit with carriers you still takes losses (again, higher than actual history most of the time). You might spend 2-3 turns before taking out that unit, overall it can take 3-5 weeks to take an Island with a unit on it, that is resistance.

To get a more tactical feel you would have to play the mini campaigns.

[LampCord]

You are looking at it too much from a tactical level. Remember SC is STRATEGIC in nature.

Iwo Jima is the best example. USA landed 110 000 troops on that Island and lost 6000, that is not allot in SC2 terms, those landing casualties are most of the time much higher than those 6000 losses.

Those losses represent resistance on the ground. So even after you killed the unit with carriers you still takes losses (again, higher than actual history most of the time). You might spend 2-3 turns before taking out that unit, overall it can take 3-5 weeks to take an Island with a unit on it, that is resistance.

To get a more tactical feel you would have to play the mini campaigns.

Right, I see your point in terms of Allied casualties. That part makes sense to me.

The problem is on the other end. You've INFLICTED massive casualties with your air units alone that could never have been done in real life. In one game, I wiped out an HQ, an INF and a Fighter unit with CV air only. How many casualties does that represent? And how does that jive with the real battle? If memory serves, the vast majority of Japanese casualties at Iwo Jima were inflicted by the land forces. In the game, I can do it all with air. In fact, I don't even really have to take the island, I can just wipe out the units. Those MPP's are hard to replace.

That's where I think there is an issue.

[AZGungHo]

This discussion reminds me of the old realism debates way back in my board gaming days. I remember lots of people were desperately trying to get every detail in a game right. Then John Hill came along with his philosophy of making the game "feel" right, even if the actual mechanics of the game weren't realistic.

Blashy is right, but so is Lampcord. It doesn't FEEL or seem right to be able to conquer Iwo or any island help by Japanese troops with just airpower alone. I know that's a tactical or operational issue and this is a strategic game. But that doesn't change how the experience feels to the player.

To me this is a case where some attention at least needs to be paid to how the experience feels to the player, to make sure the over all impact of the game leaves the player with the sense that he's experienced something strongly akin to the actual event.

Or, I could be wrong!! :-)

[Retributar]

Quote Problem Issue In Resolution!.

[Retributar]

...Blashy is right, but so is Lampcord. It doesn't FEEL or seem right to be able to conquer Iwo or any island help by Japanese troops with just airpower alone. I know that's a tactical or operational issue and this is a strategic game. But that doesn't change how the experience feels to the player...

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Good-Point's!!!,...Carrier's are 'Too-PowerFull!'. When Troops are embedded in HillSide Mountain-Caves...or...obscured in Dense-Jungle's,...'Carrier-Air-Power' should not be able to liesurely obliterate them as if Nuclear Weapon's Technology were being employed!.

Overall,...the Carrier's represent that particular weapon's system quite well!,...but...more 'fine-tuning!' is required,...to make it's contribution more realistic!.

Finally!,...the "FEEL" of the game need's to be addressed!,...as mentioned in previous comment's!. That aspect as well,...requires a little more 'fine-tuning!'.

[SeaMonkey]

We've had this discussion before, ie. airpower vs ground unit elimination. There are factors for adjustment such as mobility(AP), readiness, supply, and morale due to successful air attacks, just one problem with implementation.

We will have to have Hubert code amphib attacks from sea tiles, else successful landings will be largely impossible because your opponent will simply fill all the land tiles with units.

[Blashy]

You do not destroy all units because if you did you would take ZERO damage from landing amphibious units.

That damage you take is from resistance on the ground. It is simulated that way.

[xwormwood]

Wouldn't it be wise to make this a bit more obviouse?

Tell the player what is happening: his unit x fights and loses men and eqiupment in the landing.

Maybe a picture or soundclip here and there would help a bit.

[jon_j_rambo]

You want realism? So a bunch of Nips are living in a damp cave for 20 years with a handgun. What threat is that? Limited ammo, no good food, no medical, no spare parts, no communications, no nothing.

Life isn't like the movies. Getting your ass bombed for weeks isn't good for morale, let alone being able to counter attack with a bayonet.

[LampCord]

You want realism? So a bunch of Nips are living in a damp cave for 20 years with a handgun. What threat is that? Limited ammo, no good food, no medical, no spare parts, no communications, no nothing.

Life isn't like the movies. Getting your ass bombed for weeks isn't good for morale, let alone being able to counter attack with a bayonet.

There were 22,000 Japanese soldiers on Iwo Jima when the US landed. Dug in, supplied and ready to fight. This was after weeks of bombing and barrages from battleships. 20,000 of them fought to the death. It took 35 days of bloody hand to hand fighting to take the island.

Okinawa took 82 days. The Japs had over 100,000 men on the island and inflicted 50,000 casualties. Again, all the bombing in the world didn't take them out. Men had to go into caves with flame throwers and grenades.

That's real life. Not a movie.

[Bill101]

An excellent source on the battle of Iwo Jima is the official US Marine Corps history.

The section on the bombardments prior to the landing on Iwo Jima can be found in the following link, and it is rather illuminating:

http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/USMC/USMC-M-IwoJima/USMC-M-IwoJima-2.html

If you scroll down to Naval Activities, you will see that the actual naval bombardment prior to the landing was a lot smaller than we'll tend to operate in the game, and also that it didn't go on for very long.

Possession is of course the key, so even if the visible garrison has been destroyed, when landing your troops you may still suffer heavy casualties, and there is also a delay before you can use the facilities to their full potential due to scorched earth. This represents the time taken to mop up enemy resistance and to get everything working smoothly.

Carriers only have a soft attack value of 1. We did in beta testing experiment with a factor of 0 but it actually rendered their attacks totally useless. Basically it swung things too much the other way.

[jon_j_rambo]

There were 22,000 Japanese soldiers on Iwo Jima when the US landed. Dug in, supplied and ready to fight. This was after weeks of bombing and barrages from battleships. 20,000 of them fought to the death. It took 35 days of bloody hand to hand fighting to take the island.

Okinawa took 82 days. The Japs had over 100,000 men on the island and inflicted 50,000 casualties. Again, all the bombing in the world didn't take them out. Men had to go into caves with flame throwers and grenades.

That's real life. Not a movie.

Your answer is cute, but you're forgeting something else. Dropping men off in rubber boats like a Tarawa isn't the only strategy. At Tarawa, the person in charge only bombed for an hour. See, I have google, therefore I'm a self-declared historian: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Tarawa

See, I think for myself. THERE ARE OTHER STRATEGIES.

Pick your island, any island. I don't care if there are 10 or 10,000,000 Nips on the Island. If I'm the general who controls the water & air....then my plan is simple. Lets call my plan the Gran Torino.

1) Don't use island battles as political bait for the American people. Delcare to the people, would you rather get hasty against a cornered enemy and received a high death rate? Or option #2, do the job safer, which would take more time? This way, you cover your political end.

2) Cut off all supplies & shipping. Easily done by the Navy.

3) Let them starve.

4) Go get some chemical weapons and start dropping them on the rats. Mustard Gas & Pesticides.

Problem was, too many died in Island Hopping. The American Politicans got in a hurry. I'd rather starve them out over a year, then watch my men get butchered like Private Ryan on Omaha Beach. We won WW-2, for what? I'd walk slow & carry a big stick. Same opinion about Iraq, Korea, 'Nam, whatever. Just bomb them no stop. Could careless about "unconditional surrenders" and all those political words. A combination of Grant & Sherman of US Civil War. Starve out civilians at Vicksburg, because they are the one's supporting the troops. If you kill those feeding the troops with supplies, you are defeating the troops.

Think outside the US History book for strategies, if you don't wanna die on a beach.

[arado234]

Rambo I maynot agree with some things you say but in this case for the most part(I have a bit of a problem with the chemical weapons)you are right.You fight to win and to keep your losses as low as possible and tough for the other side.As far as civlians go,dam rights.They are a big part of any war effort so to me they are fair game.

The reason im not fond of chemical weapons is because even the Nazis didnt use them for a war weapon(no I didnt forget about what happened in the concentration camps) and they had them.Dont know if you want to go down that road.

[jon_j_rambo]

First of all, as Christian, I really don't care about wars, rumors of wars, and the history of war. We're all going to eternity, just a matter of what part of eternity, and when we go.

As an American, I could give two turds about the Japanese method of war. They tortured, starved, raped, and started the whole thing with the bombing of Pearl Harbor. They did not play by the "Geneva Convention"....they burned our countrymen alive....all kinds of sick stuff. So nuke 'em, spray them, starve them, bayonet them, whatever. For all you reading this and thinking "I'm out there". What's so holy about taking a flame thrower to another human being? What about a knife in the belly? A rock to the head? What's the difference? Why would I want to be the dummy charging the beach or the cave while the generals sit off shore? A better plan would have to made the war longer, despite public opinion. Starve the Japs, use chemical & nuclear weapons.

As a survivialist, does it really matter how you kill or get killed in a war? When a frickin' bullet goes thru your skull while in uniform on a beach are you going to say,"Well, at least I died by the rules".

That's what I find weird about this whole "Geneva Convention" type thinking, that there are rules in war. Good grief, people are trying to kill you. Is there some kind of "brotherhood" with a sniper on the other side?

I have no idea why the Germans didn't use chemical weapons. I'm guessing that they wouldn't helped that much. They used Blitzkreg not Sit-kreg.

Far as the here & now. I don't understand the liberal standpoint of no waterboarding and all that. Terrorism is real. It's not a matter of "IF" the USA will be attacked, it's a matter of "WHEN". I tend to follow the Jack Bauer 24 point of view. When you're fighting madness, there are no rules.

If you want to give some code of morality, the only one I believe in is the Lord Jesus Christ, not the Geneva Convention or Liberal Global Warming Magazine.

[xwormwood]

from wikipedia:

Speer, who was strongly opposed to the introduction of tabun, flew Otto Abros, I.G.'s authority on poison gas as well as synthetic rubber, to the meeting. Hitler asked Ambros, "What is the other side doing about poison gas?" Ambros explained that the enemy, because of its greater access to ethylene, probably had a greater capacity to produce mustard gas than Germany did. Hitler interrupted to explain that he was not referring to traditional poison gases: "I understand that the countries with petroleum are in a position to make more [mustard gas], but Germany has a special gas, tabun. In this we have a monopoly in Germany." He specifically wanted to know whether the enemy had access to such a gas and what it was doing in this area. To Hitler's disappointment Ambros replied, "I have justified reasons to assume that tabun, too, is known abroad. I know that tabun was publicized as early as 1902, that Sarin was patented, and that these substances appeared in patents. (...) Ambros was informing Hitler of an extraordinary fact about one of Germany's most secret weapons. The essential nature of tabun and sarin had already been disclosed in the technical journals as far back as 1902, and I.G. had patented both products in 1937 and 1938. Ambros then warned Hitler that if Germany used tabun, it must face the possibility that the Allies could produce this gas in much larger quantities. Upon receiving this discouraging report, Hitler abruptly left the meeting. The nerve gases would not be used, for the time being at least, although they would continue to be produced and tested.

from wikipedia:

Despite article 171 of the Versailles Peace Treaty and a resolution adopted against Japan by the League of nations on 14 May 1938, the Imperial Japanese Army frequently used chemical weapons. Because of fear of retaliation however, those weapons were never used against Westerners but against other Asians judged "inferior" by the imperial propaganda. According to historians Yoshiaki Yoshimi and Seiya Matsuno, the chemical weapons were authorized by specific orders given by emperor Showa himself, transmitted by the chief of staff of the army. For example, the Emperor authorized the use of toxic gas on 375 separate occasions during the battle of Wuhan from August to October 1938 They were also profusely used during the invasion of Changde. Those orders were transmitted either by prince Kotohito Kan'in or general Hajime Sugiyama.

The Imperial Japanese Army used mustard gas and the recently-developed blister agent Lewisite against Chinese troops and guerrillas. Experiments involving chemical weapons were conducted on live prisoners (Unit 731 and Unit 516). The Japanese also carried chemical weapons as they swept through Southeast Asia towards Australia. Some of these items were captured and analyzed by the Allies. Greatly concerned, Australia covertly imported 1,000,000 chemical weapons from the United Kingdom from 1942 onwards

Shortly after the end of World War I, Germany's General Staff enthusiastically pursued a recapture of their preeminent position in chemical warfare. In 1923, Hans von Seeckt pointed the way, by suggesting that German poison gas research move in the direction of delivery by aircraft in support of mobile warfare. Also in 1923, at the behest of the German army, poison gas expert Dr. Hugo Stolzenberg negotiated with the USSR to built a huge chemical weapons plant at Trotsk, on the Volga river. Collaboration between Germany and the USSR in poison gas continued on and off through the 1920s. In 1924, German officers debated the use of poison gas versus non-lethal chemical weapons against civilians. Even before World War II, chemical warfare was revolutionized by Nazi Germany's discovery of the nerve agents tabun (in 1937) and sarin (in 1938) by Gerhard Schrader, a chemist of IG Farben. IG Farben was Germany's premier poison gas manufacturer during World War I, so the weaponization of these agents can not be considered accidental. Both were turned over to the German Army Weapons Office prior to the outbreak of the war. The nerve agent soman was later discovered by Nobel Prize laureate Richard Kuhn and his collaborator Konrad Henkel at the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Medical Research in Heidelberg in spring of 1944.The Nazis developed and manufactured large quantities of several agents, but chemical warfare was not extensively used by either side. Chemical troops were set up (in Germany since 1934) and delivery technology was actively developed. Recovered Nazi documents suggest that German intelligence incorrectly thought that the Allies also knew of these compounds, interpreting their lack of mention in the Allies' scientific journals as evidence that information about them was being suppressed. Germany ultimately decided not to use the new nerve agents, fearing a potentially devastating Allied retaliatory nerve agent deployment.

William L. Shirer, in The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, writes that the British high command considered the use of chemical weapons as a last-ditch defensive measure in the event of a Nazi invasion of Britain.

On the night of December 2, 1943, German Ju 88 bombers attacked the port of Bari in Southern Italy, sinking several American ships – among them SS John Harvey, which was carrying mustard gas intended for use in retaliation by the Allies if German forces initiated gas warfare. The presence of the gas was highly classified, and authorities ashore had no knowledge of it – which increased the number of fatalities, since physicians, who had no idea that they were dealing with the effects of mustard gas, prescribed treatment improper for those suffering from exposure and immersion.

The whole affair was kept secret at the time and for many years after the war (in the opinion of some, there was a deliberate and systematic cover-up). According to the U.S. military account, "Sixty-nine deaths were attributed in whole or in part to the mustard gas, most of them American merchant seamen" out of 628 mustard gas military casualties. The large number of civilian casualties among the Italian population were not recorded. Part of the confusion and controversy derives from the fact that the German attack was highly destructive and lethal in itself, also apart from the accidental additional effects of the gas (it was nicknamed "The Little Pearl Harbor"), and attribution of the causes of death between the gas and other causes is far from easy.

from an essay of Dr. Heinrich Kahlert:

Hitlers Dilemma – why Hitler did not deploy Nerve Agent

The reason why Adolf Hitler did not order the deployment of nerve agents in WWII is still a subject of controversy. The most popular explanation for Hitler's apathy stems back to the previous World War where chemical warfare agents were used in combat (Hitler was temporarily blinded by mustard gas). Hitler had been victimized by these chemical agents and was unwilling to introduce new and more toxic agents.

According to Gellermann, the IG- Farben also worked unsuccessfully on the development of an effective protective filter against nerve gases. The absence of such a protection played an important role in the decision of Hitler and the army in the end not to use chemical weapons. Other aspects were: the chemical groups of the army, the support troops, were still in their infancy in 1939. Later it was hardly possible to withdraw regiments from the front and to convert them into chemical warfare and defence units which would have been necessary for gas warfare. With the defeat of the Luftwaffe, the most important possible means of deployment of gas warfare agents was finally lost.

Hitler's Minister of Production, Albert Speer39, said after the war, "All sensible army people turned gas warfare down as being utterly insane, since, in view of America's superiority in the air, it would not be long before it would bring the most terrible catastrophe upon German cities.40"

The May 15, 1943 meeting of Ambros with Hitler is often mentioned in literature, but lastly the content – Ambros didn’t recommend the beginning of chemical warfare (CW) - are based on affidavit of Ambros in the Nurnberg trial41 (see FN 43, Fig. 1042) which, historically speaking, should be taken with care. For the most "chemical warfare historians" the May 15, 1943 meeting applies as the "decisive conference”, whether to deploy nerve agent or not. This is described in details in Joseph Borkin's popular book “The Crime and Punishment of the IG-Farben”43:

[Albert] Speer, who was strongly opposed to the introduction of tabun, flew Otto Ambros, I.G.'s authority on poison gas [chemical warfare], as well as synthetic rubber [bUNA-Synthesis], to the meeting. Hitler asked Ambros, "What is the other side doing about poison gas?" Ambros explained that the enemy, because of its greater access to ethylene, probably had a greater capacity to produce mustard gas than Germany did. Hitler interrupted to explain that he was not referring to traditional poison gases: "I understand that the countries with petroleum are in a position to make more [mustard gas], but Germany has a special gas, tabun. In this we have a monopoly in Germany." He specifically wanted to know whether the enemy had access to such a gas and what it was doing in this area. To Hitler's disappointment Ambros replied, "I have justified reasons to assume that tabun, too, is known abroad. I know that tabun was publicized as early as 1902 [sic!, 1951], that Sarin was patented [sic! SARIN was not patented], and that these substances appeared in patents. (...) Ambros was informing Hitler of an extraordinary fact about one of Germany's most secret weapons. The essential nature of tabun and sarin had already been disclosed in the technical journals as far back as 1902 [sic!, essential nature were not known until 1940], and I.G. had patented both products in 1937 and 1938. Ambros then warned Hitler that if Germany used tabun, it must face the possibility that the Allies could produce this gas in much larger quantities. Upon receiving this discouraging report, Hitler abruptly left the meeting [although Hitler got before a memo from the HWA which decribed the opposite]. The nerve gases would not be used, for the time being at least, although they would continue to be produced and tested.

At the meeting with Council of State Dr Schieber, Dr. Ambros and Hitler on May , 1943, it was decided that as soon as possible, i.e. until at the end of 1944, the TABUN production in Dyhernfurth should be increased from 1000 to 2000 moto and the production of SARIN from 100 moto to 500 moto. It was stated that this enhancement should have a comparable right-of-way precedence like the tank program of Speer. Relating the question of the raw material situation it was stated by Dr. Mureck46 that for the production of TABUN around 40% of the German annual phosphorus production was already used (50000 t/a P2O5). Thus, the production had been clearly limited by the phosphorus supply47.

On March 1, 1944 Ambros (1901-1984) gave his second lecture to Hitler and others relating to the situation of the German CW program in the “Führerhauptquartier”. He explained that the decided amounts of 1000 ton per month (moto) TABUN of the meeting of 15 May 1943 were fulfilled to 70%. It was indented to fulfil the production target to 100 % in the next month. After this lecture Hitler enhanced the production quota to 2000 moto without considering that the amount of phosphorus did not exist in Germany. Almost 40 % of Phosphorus stock had already been used by the TABUN production, the great demand to Phosphorus was, however, the agricultural sector and Phosphorus could and can not be substituted by another material in both cases! In this lecture mentioned, Ambros referred to Hitler “about the demoralise impact, which were occurred by application of these types TABUN and SARIN, and the use of these stuffs was characterized as a means of very last decision. It was referred to the possibility, that the opponent [=allies] had drifted the development in a similar [bold author] direction. In literature is has been known, that – especially in America [=USA] - scientific investigations were carried out with matter related constitution

What Hitler understood presumably with the formulation “matter related constitution”? Or differently asked what kind of rhetoric effect of this chemical expert will be attained by such a chemical layman like Hitler as a listener? To my opinion, there might be only one answer: Hitler might or more probably had to get the impression that the opponent had the same quality of chemical weapons with nearly the same amount, but the allies did not have nerve agents as well known historical matter of fact and the allies noticed lately it, despite of ENIGMA, not until June 1943! This is an other example, like in the lecture before (May 15, 1943), what in colloquial called a “half truth”: When non-specialists like Hitler heard, what extent of the “constitution” (spatial arrangement of atoms in a molecule) was crucial for its toxicity, then Hitler would certainly not have doubled the TABUN production, because he would have realized that not enough Phosphorus would have been available. Otherwise, exaggerated formulated, Ambros lied "with the truth". It may have been correct that there were materials already published in "similar direction" - however for chemists this does not mean anything. For a greenhorn or layman it, however, suggested that production and/or an imitation of these materials can be copied easily, like during WWI with the compounds chlorine and phosgene. It cannot be forgotten when interpreting this lecture notes that Ambros was an outstanding chemist - he had attained a doctorate with the Nobel Prize winner Willstätter in Munich. That the “constitution” is decisive for its toxicity, this was a very well-known matter of fact also in this time. Last but not least Hitler wanted to increase the TABUN production to 2000 moto without considering that this was not possible because of the lack of Phosphorus. I think this was for Hitler only a detail, but for an expert this is crucial. Further Otto Ambros maintained before Hitler49 on March 1, 1944, “it would exist the fears that the opposing side would works also in this area [in the nerve agent production], so that also this deployment may not to be overrated”, i.e., Ambros speculated explicitly before Hitler upon (not existing) a secondary strike option of the allies with nerve agents, although all indicators were showing before that the allies possessed "only" agents of the WWI! Thus, it was clear also for Hitler that his special gas, Tabun, the monopoly had gone. Hitler did not have to think further about a deployment of this special gas or not. If he would have known, how weak the clues had been, which supported the Ambros` statement, and then he would have considered something else.

As we know today, this was a wrong statement of Otto Ambros. The patents, to which the chemist referred with Hitler, described very far chemical forerunners of TABUN and SARIN. To nerve agent materials they were only developed further in the IG- Farben labs by Gerhard Schrader, as I already pointed out. It is therefore easily understandable, if Paxman & Harris write that a substantial deployment of TABUN would have been war decisive for Germany. If Ambros would had been an equal vehement “chemical warfare fighter” like Fritz Haber (1868-1934) at WWI, would not be the following (hypothetical) formulation in this lecture with Hitler on May 15, 1943 more probable?

"I believe, my “Führer” that the early described organophosphorus compounds do not approach our toxicity of the Trilon family. Even if they could discover the chemical composition after our initial deployment of our volatile offensive nerve agents, they might need at least 3 years, in order to realize an industrial production of nerve agent too. Thus, my ”Führer”, we have a strategic superiority in relation to the enemy, which however will answering with other "conventional" chemical warfare agents. To circumstance this, we have to launch our weapons strategically against the Royal Air Force (RAF) for killing the pilots - the consequence would be a surrender of Great Britain "

In the 1980`s Ambros stated to Gellerman that “this perception of the experts of the chemical industry [on May 15, 1943 of Ambros] appears to have a certain impact to Hitler”, and Ambros had the following impression after the lecture “that Hitler and its environment felt relieved of a burden, need not to meet a decision in the chemical warfare area".

The scientists focused their attention to the fact that since the beginning of the war in American technical periodicals there had not been any reference to “nerve-agent-similar compounds” (what that ever means). This situation was repeated with the building of the atomic bomb. They pulled themselves to the correct conclusion that this was the result of the US-American censorship (the German censorship in scientific magazines however were not very strong!). What they did not realize, that it this happened at the secrecy of the insecticide DDT, which was developed straight forward and it is not relating to the nerve-agent-similar compounds which Paxman & Harris implicitly mean.

(43 Interrogation IG-Farben Process: On 15 May 1943, as the last conference, there was a discussion with Hitler and this concerned the treatment of the chemical warfare agents. Q. Were you alone? A. Shortly before this date I was notified by telegram by the Armament Ministry, and I was told to come to Berlin, and I was taken to the supreme headquarters in East Prussia by airplane. There were representatives of the General Staff, Speer, Schieber, and various directors of central committees from the armament industry. Q. And what did Hitler want from you? A. As the last point on the agenda of this conference there was a one-hour conference about the situation in the poison gas field. Mr. Speer and Mr. Schieber reported, first of all, about the military aspect, about the general situation, and then I was given the floor; and I showed, on the basis of a table: (a) the requirements of poison gases by the General Staff, ( the actual production, © the stocks. Thus, I discussed objectively all types and described the situation as it was. Q. Did Herr Hitler ask you — one could practically gather this — whether one could use poison gases, or what was the situation? A. The first reaction was a disappointment, since, in most types, not even half of the requirements of the General Staff had been met. There followed a discussion about the reasons for this, and he asked the question: "What is the other side doing?" Q. Before that, I would like to ask you a question. Did you have the impression as if Hitler wanted to use the poison gases? A. No, Hitler himself did not, but around him there were people who did. Q. Well, go ahead, please; describe to us what happened at this conference. A. He discussed the main types, always with a point of view of "How does it look on the other side?" and I reported objectively that, for example, in the Lost [mustard gas] field, countries which have a lot of ethylene would perhaps have the possibility to produce larger quantities of these substances than we could. Thereupon he said: "I understand that the countries with petroleum are in a position to make more, but Germany has a special gas, Tabun. In this we have a monopoly in Germany." At that moment I said: "I have justified reasons to assume that Tabun, too, is known abroad. I know that Tabun had been publicized as early as 1902, that Sarin was patented, and that these substances appeared in patents," and I said, "I am convinced that other countries, in case the German side might use these gases, would very shortly not only be able to imitate these special gases, but even produce them in much larger quantities. […] Mr. Ambros, before the recess we were talking about this conference with Hitler in May 1943. Is there anything important to say about this conference other than what we have already said? A. During this conference an expansion was also discussed which the OKH had suggested for Tabun. This plan was to be put into execution, but a few months later it was withdrawn. Q. Mr. Ambros, we can draw our own conclusions about your attitude at this meeting. I do not want to go into that much further. I have another question in this connection. You said that certain circles, or certain people in Hitler's entourage, would have been glad to use poison gas. Do you have any indications that after you took an objective point of view at that time you were not doing these people a favor and that later attempts were made to gain your assistance? A. In August [sic! 1. March]1944, I was called to Mr. Speer, and again there was a suggestion from the people who wanted gas warfare, but the situation was exactly the same, and my attitude was exactly the same again about the objective of a technical expert. Speer had the same attitude, and so it was again possible to prevent the use of this terrible weapon. Q. Mr. Ambros, for absolute clarity on this point: your point of view was objective? A. Yes. [sic! Certainly his recommendations were not objectiv] Q. In addition to that, did you tell the people who were in favor of gas warfare that you were against it, or was that not possible, or did you think it advisable not to do so in your own interests? A. Those who were in favor of it were Ley, Goebbels, and Bormann. I did not know any of these men. I did not speak to any of them, and I never spoke to Hitler again. " See http://www.mazal.org/archive/nmt/07/NMT07-T1044.htm pp.)

[arado234]

Rambo I think(especially now)there are rules to war(in a way it is kinda strange)is because the weapons that so many countries have are so deadly that if every weapon was used it assures total destruction of the Planet.Back in WW2 days im guessing people still thought you could be ''civilised'' and still destroy your foe,hence the Geneva convention.If there was no Geneva convention then you can bet there would be absolutley no hope for any P.O.W.s.even though I know how alot of them were treated.

[jon_j_rambo]

Agreed, man types of warfare, rules, & no-rules over the centuries. You could do a study just on this subject.