Russia using phosphorus bombs in Ukraine? incendiary weapons & its use

Russia using phosphorus bombs?

Ukraine has accused invading Russian troops of using phosphorus bombs - incendiary weapons whose use against civilians is banned under an international convention but allowed for military targets.

Phosphorus weapons, which leave a signature white trail in the sky, were deployed against a village in the Lugansk region and at Irpin outside Kyiv, Ukrainian officials including President Volodymr Zelensky have claimed.

It was not immediately possible to verify the allegation. "Russia has never violated any international convention," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov retorted.

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Convention on Chemical Weapons

Phosphorus, a substance that catches fire on contact with the air, "is not classified as a chemical weapon, it's available to many of the world's armies," Olivier Lepick, a researcher with France's Foundation for Strategic Research (FRS), told broadcaster LCI on Thursday.

It is used to create smoke screens to hide troop movements, illuminate the battlefield or destroy buildings by fire -- but can "cause absolutely horrific damage, extremely large burns" if it hits people, he added.

As an incendiary, it is not covered by the Convention on Chemical Weapons which entered into force in 1997.

However it does fall under the 1983 Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons, which restricts fire weapons without forbidding their use altogether.

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World War I & the use of incendiary weapons

Both Russia and Ukraine are considered signatories, as parts of the former Soviet Union.

The use of incendiaries against civilians and non-military targets is "prohibited in all circumstances" as well as their deployment against military targets near civilians.

But phosphorus is not covered by the convention when used for smoke screening or battlefield illumination.

World War I saw the first widespread use of incendiary weapons, just as the air force  began to play a significant military role.

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German Zeppelin airship

In May 1915, a German Zeppelin airship dropped fire bombs on London.

White phosphorus shells were widely used in World War II, especially by American troops fighting German armoured forces in the European theatre.

Invented in 1942, napalm -- a form of thickened petrol -- was widely used by US forces against Vietcong guerilla fighters in the Vietnam war, with widespread civilian casualties.

Then-colonial power France had earlier used the fire weapons in its own battles in Indochina.

After the turn of the millennium, US forces were accused of using phosphorus bombs in their 2004 assault on the Iraqi city of Fallujah.

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'Legitimate tool of the military'

Then-military chief Peter Pace said that targeting insurgents with the weapons was a "legitimate tool of the military".

"It is not a chemical weapon. It is an incendiary. And it is well within the law of war to use those weapons" for smoke screens and illumination, he insisted.

The head of the UN's aid ageny for Palestinians accused Israel of using white phosphorus in Gaza in 2009.

And Syrian observers charged that Russia used incendiaries in Syria against Eastern Ghouta, a rebel stronghold near Damascus -- which Moscow denied.

The Kremlin has itself accused Ukraine's army of phosphorus use in 2014, against Russia-backed separatists in the eastern Donbas region.

And Armenia and Azerbaijan each accused the other of bombing civilian areas or using banned phosphorus weapons in their war over Nagorny Karabakh in 2020.

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Russia's Tsar Bomba

Russia's most powerful nuclear weapon was produced during the Soviet era called the Tsar Bomba. It is believed the bomb was the most powerful weapon of mass destruction which was developed in 1961 during the Cold War.

The bomb when it was tested in Novaya Zemlya Island in the Arctic Ocean was reportedly visible from 1,000 kms away. Reports claim the explosion rose to a height of 67 km.

It was the most powerful human-made explosion ever recorded, according to reports. It was 3,800 times the strength of the US nuclear bomb dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945. The bomb was also known as RDS-220.

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Tsar Cannon

The Tsar bomba exploded about 4 km above the ground and reportedly produced a mushroom cloud 60 km high. The bomb destroyed an uninhabited village 55 km from Ground Zero with damage to buildings seen from 100 kms away.

Reports say a seismic shock wave which was equivalent to 5.0 on the Richter Scale was measured around the world.

However, the bomb was never put to operational use and wasn't developed as a ballistic missile. It was widely seen as a "propaganda" weapon at the height of the Cold War.

The "Tsar Cannon" was tested in the same year as the Cuban missile crisis in 1961.

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More powerful than the bomb dropped on Hiroshima

Bulava is a Submarine Launched Ballistic Missile(SLBM) which can deliver six independently targeted warheads, each equivalent to 150 kilotons of TNT.

Each missile is between 50 and 60 times more powerful than the bomb dropped on Hiroshima, which was approximately 15 kilotons.

The Bulava has an estimated range of over 8,300 kilometers.

(Photograph:AFP)