Napalm

For other uses, see Napalm (disambiguation).

An Ecuadoran Air Force IAI Kfir airplane drops napalm on a target during "Blue Horizon", a US-Ecuador joint military exercise.

Napalm (naphthenic and palmitic acids) is a thickening/gelling agent generally mixed with gasoline or a similar fuel for use in military operations. The term napalm is a combination of the names of its derivatives (coprecipitated aluminium salts of naphthenic and palmitic acids). Colloquially, napalm is used as a generic reference to several flammable liquids used in warfare, often jellied gasoline. "Napalm B" is the modern variant of napalm and, although chemically different, is often referred to simply as napalm. Napalm B is not actually napalm but is a mixture of polystyrene and benzene and is used as a solvent to solidify the gasoline. Napalm B has a huge advantage over the original napalm its ignition can be well controlled. This was a great advantage to soldiers using it as there were many accidents with soldiers smoking around napalm often resulting in damage to ones own army. There are a number of other forms of napalm B. One of these types of napalm is Fallbrook napalm. It is a mixture of 46 parts polystyrene (a polymer of styrene C6H6CH2=CH2, a short chain of the polymer is illustrated below), 33 parts gasoline and 21 parts benzene. The agent was made famous in the Iggy and the Stooges song, "Search and Destory".

Development

Usage of fire in warfare has a long history; thickened burning compositions proved their advantages. The development of napalm was precipitated by the use of jellied gasoline mixtures by the Allied forces in World War II. The latex used in these early forms of incendiary warfare became logistically difficult to use in the Pacific theatre as natural rubber was in short supply; which prompted the researchers of chemical companies Du Pont and Standard Oil, as well as researchers at Harvard University, to engage in a government competition to develop a superior alternative. A team of chemists lead by Louis Fieser at Harvard were the first to develop napalm in 1942 for the U.S. Army.

Between 1965–1969, Dow Chemical Company manufactured napalm for the US government. After news reports of the weapon's effects the company experienced boycotts of its products and its recruiters faced virulent protests on college campuses. The company however decided that "its first obligation was the government". Meanwhile, napalm became a symbol of the Vietnam War.

Composition

Napalm bombs explode after being dropped from a Republic of Korea Air Force F-4E Phantom II aircraft during a live-fire exercise.

Napalm is composed of a mixture of salts of aluminum, naphthenic acids (produced from crude oil) and palmitic acids (found in palm oil or coconut oil) which create an "aluminum soap". When this "soap" is mixed with gasoline, aviation gasoline, JP-4, or JP-5, it produces a syrupy brown incendiary substance. The viscosity of the mixture can be adjusted by fuel/thickener ratio; flamethrowers require composition with lower viscosity while firebombs require thicker formulation. Thickened gasoline is less flammable, burns slower and at higher temperature and sticks to the target, allowing longer effect and therefore higher chance of ignition or thermal damage. The slower burn rate also means lower consumption of burning fuel en route to the target.

In the early 1950s, Norway developed its own napalm, based on fatty acids in whale oil. The reason for this development was that the American-produced thickening agent performed rather poorly in the cold Norwegian climate. The product was known as Northick II.

Modern napalm

Modern napalm is composed primarily of benzene and polystyrene, and is known as napalm-B, super-napalm, NP2, or also Incendergel. The commonly quoted composition is 21% benzene, 33% gasoline (itself containing about 1–4% benzene to raise its octane number), and 46% polystyrene. The mixture is difficult to ignite; a reliable pyrotechnic initiator, often based on thermite (for traditional napalm) or white phosphorus (for newer compositions), has to be used.

Original napalm burns 15–30 seconds, napalm-B can burn for up to 10 minutes.

Napalm 877 was used in flamethrowers and bombs by the US and Allied forces, to increase effectiveness of flammable liquids. The substance is formulated to burn at a specific rate and adhere to surfaces. Napalm is mixed with gasoline in various proportions to achieve this. Another useful (and dangerous) effect, primarily involving its use in bombs, was that napalm "rapidly deoxygenates the available air" and creates large amounts of carbon monoxide causing suffocation. Napalm bombs were notably used in the Vietnam War. Lesser known is the first defensive use of napalm during the Korean War at Outpost Harry on the night of June 10–11, 1953.

Alternative compositions exist for different uses, e.g. thickened pyrophoric agent based on triethylaluminium that ignites itself when exposed on air.

Effects

File:TrangBang.jpg

8 June 1972: Kim Phúc, center left, running down a road near Trang Bang after a South Vietnamese Air Force napalm attack. (Nick Ut /AP)

When used as a part of an incendiary weapon, napalm can cause severe burns (ranging from superficial to subdermal) to the skin and body, asphyxiation, unconsciousness, and death. In this implementation, explosions can create an atmosphere of greater than 20% carbon monoxide and firestorms with self-perpetuating windstorms of up to 70 mph.

One of the main features of napalm is that it sticks well to the naked skin, and hence it leaves no real chance for removing the burning napalm from the skin of the victim. The song Napalm Sticks to Kids remind us, that there were civil and even very young victims suffering from this feature of napalm.

Napalm is suitable for use against dug-in enemy personnel. The burning incendiary composition flows into foxholes, trenches and bunkers, and drainage and irrigation ditches and other improvised troop shelters. People even in undamaged shelters can be killed by hyperthermia/heat stroke, radiant heat, dehydration, suffocation, smoke exposition, or carbon monoxide poisoning. The firebombing raids on German cities, e.g. Hamburg, frequently caused death by this mechanism; the resulting deformation to the baked corpses was referred to as Bombenbrandschrumpfleichen (incendiary-bomb-shrunken bodies).

One firebomb released from a low-lying plane can damage area of 2500 sq.yards.

Historical use

The French Aviation navale drops napalm over Viet Minh guerrilla positions during an ambush (December 1953).

Napalm was first used as fuel for flamethrowers and went on to be used more prevalently in firebombs.

In 1942 after research at Harvard University scientist found that a jelly gasoline like substance burnt slower and thus was far more effective. They found that mixing an aluminum soap powder of naphthene and palmitate (hence na-palm), also known as napthenic and palmitic acids, with gasoline produced a brownish sticky syrup that burned more slowly than raw gasoline. This new mixture of chemicals was widely used in the Second World War in flame throwers and fire bombs. Napalm bombs burned out 40% of the area of Japanese target cities in the World War. Popular weapons continue to be developed, and napalm was no exception. With many more compounds available after World War II, a safer and just as effective napalm compound was developed.

On July 17, 1944, napalm incendiary bombs were dropped for the first time by 14 American P-38 Lightning aircraft of the 402nd Fighter Squadron / 370th Fighter Group on a fuel depot at Coutances, near St. Lô, France. Further use by the Allied forces occurred in the Pacific theater (warfare) against Japanese cities. In the Western theatre, the Royal Air Force and US Army Air Forces dropped several hundred thousand firebombs on the city of Dresden, destroying over 90% of the city center. Napalm was used in the siege of La Rochelle in April 1945 against German soldiers (and inadvertently French civilians) - about two weeks before the end of the war.

Napalm was also used in the Greek civil war Between the Greek govermental army and US against the communist rebels. At the last year of the civil war US increased their aid by suggesting a new weapon to finish the war. It was in 1949 when the first napalm test took place in the mountain Grammos, which was the communist stronghold.

Napalm was also used by US forces in the Korean War.

Usage in warfare

Riverboat of the U.S. Brown-water navy deploying an ignited napalm mixture from a riverboat mounted flamethrower in Vietnam.

The US Air Force and US Navy used napalm with great effect against all kinds of targets to include troops, tanks, buildings and even railroad tunnels. The demoralizing effect napalm had on the enemy became apparent when scores of Vietnamese troops began to surrender to aircraft flying overhead. Pilots noted that they saw surviving enemy troops waving white flags on subsequent passes after dropping napalm. The pilots radioed to ground troops and the enemy combatants were captured.

More recent uses include: by France during the First Indochina War (1946–1954) and the Algerian War (1954–1962), in Nigeria (1969), India & Pakistan (1965 & 1971), Cyprus (1964, 1974), by Morocco during the Western Sahara War (1973–1991), Iran (1980–88), Israel (1967, 1982), Brazil (1972), Egypt (1973), Iraq (1980–88, 1991, 2003–present), 1993 Angola, by Argentina during the Falklands War.

"Napalm is the most terrible pain you can imagine," said Kim Phúc, a napalm bombing survivor known from a famous Vietnam War photograph. "Water boils at 100 degrees Celsius. Napalm generates temperatures of 800 to 1,200 degrees Celsius."

Phúc sustained third-degree burns to half her body and was not expected to live after the attack by South Vietnamese aircraft. But thanks to assistance from South Vietnamese photographer Nick Ut and American doctors she survived a 14-month hospital stay and 17 operations. Subsequently, after the Communist take-over she was used as a propaganda tool by the Vietnamese Government.

Home-made napalm was used by peace activists to destroy draft records (see Catonsville Nine).

International law

International law does not prohibit the use of napalm or other incendiaries against military targets, but use against civilian populations was banned by the United Nations Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons (CCW) in 1980. Protocol III of the CCW restricts the use of all incendiary weapons, but a number of states have not acceded to all of the protocols of the CCW. According to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), states are considered a party to the convention, which entered into force as international law in December 1983, if they ratify at least two of the five protocols. The United States, for example, is a party to the CCW but did not sign protocol III.

See also

• Early thermal weapons
• Flame Fougasse
• Mark 77 bomb
• Phan Thị Kim Phúc
• Japanese village
• M-69 Incendiary cluster bomb
• White phosphorus
• Triethylaluminium

External links

• Hawker Tempest WW II testing including Napalm dropping d