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Individual differences |
Methods | Statistics | Clinical | Educational | Industrial | Professional items | World psychology |
Biological: Behavioural genetics · Evolutionary psychology · Neuroanatomy · Neurochemistry · Neuroendocrinology · Neuroscience · Psychoneuroimmunology · Physiological Psychology · Psychopharmacology (Index, Outline)
BZ is a glycolate anticholinergic compound related to atropine, scopolamine, hyoscyamine, and other deliriants. Dispersal would be as an aerosolized solid (primarily for inhalation) or as agent dissolved in one or more solvents for ingestion or percutaneous absorption.
Acting as a competitive inhibitor of acetylcholine at postsynaptic and postjunctional muscarinic receptor sites in smooth muscle, exocrine glands, autonomic ganglia, and the brain, BZ decreases the effective concentration of acetylcholine seen by receptors at these sites. Thus, BZ causes PNS effects that in general are the opposite of those seen in nerve agent poisoning. CNS effects include stupor, confusion, and confabulation with concrete and panoramic illusions and hallucinations, and with regression to automatic "phantom" behaviors such as plucking and disrobing.
Following World War II, the United States military investigated a wide range of possible nonlethal, psychoactive incapacitating agents including psychedelic drugs such as LSD and THC, dissociative drugs such as ketamine and phencyclidine, potent opioids such as fentanyl, as well as several glycolate anticholinergics.
One of the anticholinergic compounds, 3-quinuclidinyl benzilate, was assigned the NATO code BZ and was weaponized at the beginning of the 1960s for possible battlefield use. BZ was invented by Hoffman-LaRoche in 1951. The company was investigating anti-spasmodic agents, similar to tropine, for treating gastrointestinal issues when the chemical was discovered. In 1959 the United States Army began to show interest in using the chemical as a chemical warfare agent. The agent was originally designated TK but when it was standardized by the U.S. Army in 1961 it was designated BZ. The agent commonly became known as "Buzz" because of this abbreviation and the effects it had on the mental state of its casualties.
In February 1998, the British Ministry of Defence accused Iraq of having stockpiled large amounts of a glycolate anticholinergic incapacitating agent known as Agent 15. Agent 15 is an alleged Iraqi incapacitating agent that is likely to be chemically either identical to BZ or closely related to it. Agent 15 was reportedly stockpiled in large quantities prior to and during the Persian Gulf War. However after the war the CIA concluded that Iraq had not stockpiled or weaponised Agent 15.
In January 2013, an unidentified U.S. administration official, referring to an undisclosed U.S. State Department cable, claimed that "Syrian contacts made a compelling case that Agent 15, a hallucinogenic chemical similar to BZ, was used in Homs". However in response to these reports U.S. National Security Council spokesman stated "The reporting we have seen from media sources regarding alleged chemical weapons incidents in Syria has not been consistent with what we believe to be true about the Syrian chemical weapons program".
As stated in psychiatrist James Ketchum’s book Chemical Warfare: Secrets Almost Forgotten, work that evolved when a general envisioned a scheme to incapacitate an entire trawler with aerosolized BZ was dubbed Project DORK. This project was likely related to Project SHAD (Shipboard Hazard and Defense), a series of Cold War-era tests by the United States Department of Defense of biological weapons and chemical weapons related to Project 112. Exposures of subjects who include uninformed and unwilling humans during the testing to the test substances, particularly the exposure to United States military personnel then in service, has added controversy to recent revelations of the project while information about nine of the completed sub-projects of Project 112 has not yet been released.
Sources other than militaryEdit
BZ and related anticholinergic compounds can be synthesized in clandestine laboratories, but its recreational use is almost nonexistent, because of its unpleasant effects. 3-quinuclidinyl benzilate, called QNB in the scientific community, is used in pharmacology as a muscarinic receptor antagonist.
BZ is odorless. It is stable in most solvents, with a half-life of three to four weeks in moist air; even heat-producing munitions can disperse it. It is extremely persistent in soil and water and on most surfaces. It is slightly soluble in water; soluble in dilute acids, trichloroethylene, dimethylformamide, most organic solvents, insoluble with aqueous alkali.
Detection and protectionEdit
BZ is odorless and nonirritating with delayed symptoms several hours after contact. In the field the only immediate indications of its use may be the white smoke emanating from delivered weapons. Though detection methods have been developed for BZ, these have not been standardized for field use and are limited to laboratory analysis or specialized monitoring in industrial facilities (past).
Protection from BZ means blocking it from entry into the body. At dosages adequate for a lung effect there is little risk of absorption through the skin or contact hazards from aerosols that have settled out onto surfaces. The amount of BZ that may settle out on surfaces from an aerosol is too small to represent a hazard from secondary aerosols. Therefore, the most appropriate protective response is to don a protective mask with a good quality aerosol filter. Even improvised respiratory protection (e.g., several folded pieces of cloth over the nose and mouth) ma