In terms of immediate effects, the 10,000,000+ civilian fatality floor figure in Scenario 2 represents a public health problem worse by an order of magnitude than that following the Bangladesh Cyclone disaster of 1970, and is likely to include synergistic effects well beyond the scope of this study. (Contract specifications specifically excluded investigation into bidecological effects from a major chemical exchange. While the difficulty associated with an in-depth examination of this subject is impossible at this writing to estimate, the reader is cautioned that such far-reaching effects are less easily dealt with than studied. It might be necessary, for example, to import tons of insect larvae before the simplest food crops can again flourish in Western Europe.) For the moment the ability even of organized armies to dispose of millions of civilian bodies in advanced stages of decomposition is not something to be taken for granted. And the civilians needed for the reestablishment of industrial production (under what are almost certainly optimistic estimates) will have been at the least decimated in the literal, classical sense.

An Analysis of the Effects of Chemical

Warfare in the European Theater Utilizing

Atmospheric Release Advisory Capability (ARAC) Prediction

Lawrence-Livermore National Laboratories

LLNL 88-2504* CR 8305/89/178

SIGMA 2

Specified External Distribution Only

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Johannes Bitner did not throw the report into his trash basket-he felt like washing his hands. Yet another similarity between East and West, he thought coldly. Their government reports are written by computers to be read by calculators. Just like ours. Just like ours.

"Herr Generaloberst." The Chief of the Communist Party of the DDR looked up at his Commander-in-Chief. He and another officer had come early in the morning-and in civilian clothes-to visit him at his plush private residence in Wandlitz, the enclave of the Party elite outside Berlin. They had delivered the document obtained only two days earlier through a highly placed DDR agent in West Germany's Ministry of Defense. "Just how accurate is this document?"

"Comrade Secretary, we cannot check their computer models, of course, but their formulae, their estimates for the persistence of Soviet chemical weapons, their predicted weather patterns-that is, all of the data which supposedly underlies this study-has been examined by members of my intelligence staff and rechecked by some chosen faculty members at the University of Leipzig. There is no reason to believe that it is anything but genuine."

"In fact," said Colonel Mellethin, director of Foreign Operations Analysis-he was a spare, austere man with eyes that clearly had not known sleep for some days-"the Americans understate the total quantities of munitions employed, because they consistently overstate the accuracy of Russian delivery systems." The other two men in the room noted at once that Russian had been substituted for Soviet.

"There is something else you wish to say, Mellethin?" Bitner asked sharply.

"Comrade Secretary, from the Russian point of view, what is the objective of this war?"

"The neutralization of NATO, and access to greater economic assets. Say what you have to say, Comrade Colonel," Bitner ordered.

"Comrade, success for the Warsaw Pact would leave a united Germany. I point out that a united Germany, even a united socialist Germany, would be viewed as a strategic threat by the Soviet Union-after all, we are better socialists than they, nicht wahr?" Mellethin took a deep breath before going on. Was he risking his life? Did it matter? The family name had once been von Mellethin, and unwavering loyalty to the State was not something that Communism had taught his line of professional soldiers. "Comrade Party Secretary, Soviet success in this operation will leave Germany, socialist and capitalist, as barren as the surface of the moon, a minimum of ten to thirty percent of our people dead, our land poisoned, even without Western chemical retaliation. Comrade, we learned today that the Americans have begun airlifting 'Bigeye' chemical aircraft bombs into their base at Ramstein. If our 'allies' use their chemical weapons, and then NATO retaliates in kind, it is entirely possible that our country-that German culture itself-will completely cease to exist. Such an objective is not militarily defensible, but I suggest, Comrade, that this could be an additional, political objective of the Russian plan."

Bitner's expression didn't change a whit, and his visitors couldn't see the chill that was enveloping their national leader. The meeting he'd had the previous week in Warsaw had been unsettling enough, but now the reason behind the greasy reassurances offered him by the Soviet leadership seemed all too clear.

"There is no way to protect our civilian population?" Bitner asked.