James Gibney, Columnist

What Did You Do During the Great Chemical War, Grandpa?

Assad's brutal attacks show why the Chemical Weapons Convention still matters.

May 1, 2017 at 3:44 PM UTC

James Gibney is an editor for Bloomberg Opinion. Previously an editor at the Atlantic, the New York Times, Smithsonian, Foreign Policy and the New Republic, he was also in the U.S. Foreign Service from 1989 to 1997 in India, Japan and Washington.

Humane?
Source: Hulton Archive/Getty Images

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You probably didn’t take a moment this weekend to toast the 20th anniversary of the global Chemical Weapons Convention. Maybe it slipped your mind. Or, given the horrific chemical weapons attack in Syria last month, maybe you felt any commemoration would ring hollow.

Yet the anniversary is worth honoring. The only international arms control treaty that bans an entire class of weapons, the CWC has been signed by 192 nations, and has resulted in the destruction of nearly 95 percent of the world's chemical weapons.