Did the developed countries not experience the same pollution incidents as China when they were developing?
Up to the early 1990s most older houses in Berlin’s working class districts were heated with coal (the wealthier people moved to oil or gas starting in the 1950s, as it is less dirty in the house, or newly built post war districts often used waste heat from nearby electric power stations), mostly lignite coal, which often came from the East German open pit coal mines around Leipzig (“Rekord” Briketts), because they were cheaper than the West German “Union” briketts from the region around Cologne. The East German coal contained a lot of sulphur and got banned following re-unification.Every winter the air in those districts was smelling of coal smoke and sulphur, mixed with the exhaust gases of the cars (in East Berlin additionally most cars were two stroke, so they would exhaust a lot of oil fumes). We often had smog conditions and you could barely see through the mix of smoke and fog.The high content of sulphur dioxide in the air caused acid rain, leading to forest trees dying.The major rivers in Germany were heavily polluted, in the West the Rhine (as so many rivers flow into it and there is a lot of chemical industry located on its banks, from Switzerland all the way to Holland), Ruhr, Emscher (the last ones running through the heavy industry Ruhr region and then into the Rhine), the Main (chemical industry and leather processing around Frankfurt and Offenbach), the Elbe (mainly due to the East German chemical industry around Bitterfeld and Leipzig) and the Weser due to salt mines dumping their waste water into the Werra, one of the tributaries of the Weser. Those rivers were effectively dead until an environmental conscience set in in the 1970s and polluters were either closed down or forced to clean up their waste waters. By now the rivers are ok again and have wildlife in them.There were some major scandals, e.g. the Pintsch waste oil reprocessing plant in West Berlin in the 1980s, where it was discovered that they had dumped hundreds of tonnes of waste oil into the soil, endangering West Berlin’s drinking water supply. The clean up cost the state millions, as the owner of the factory declared bankruptcy. They had to dig out the soil to a level of ten meters below the surface and wash it in a especially designed plant to remove the oil, which also contained highly toxic PCBs and dioxines from old transformer oil.
Yes, the process of destruction was finished in 2017(September 27[1] , to be precise)Footnotes[1] Историческое событие: Россия досрочно уничтожила все химическое оружие
Why won't the U.S. admit the use of chemical weapons during the Vietnam War?
What do you believe the US used during Vietnam that was considered a chemical weapon at the time?2,4-dichlorophenoxyacetic acid and 2,4,5-trichlorophenoxyacetic acid 2,3,7,8- with trace amounts of tetrachlorodibenzo-p-dioxin?The mixture wasn't considered an chemical weapon at the time and the US has never denied using it. It was banned after it was shown on television.I know men who have been compensated by the US government for exposure to it just being on the same ship it had been on. You can easily look up the ships and whether you qualified.Will the US compensate the victims of exposure that don't have US citizenship? Probably not. It wasn't banned at the time.So problem with the premise of your question, it's misleading at best.
Should the flamethrower be banned as a weapon of war?
Well this is based on personal preference. But here's a few things you should consider-The flamethrower was a gruesome, horrendous weapon in WWII and Vietnam. Whatever it lacked in range it made up for with the uncanny ability to BURN ANYONE AND ANYTHING ALIVE.There were some instances where the flamethrower was made even more gruesome by attaching a bayonet to the muzzle. Once the stab has been made the operator would unleash hells fire right into the wound, burning said victim from the inside. Making for a slow, horrible death.To me, flamethrowers seem a little cruel and unusual. So it makes sense that the military isn't using flamethrowers anymore.Besides it paints a big target on the operator because they'd have to carry a big tank of gas on their back. Any kind of puncture and spark to the tank and you are as good as dead.In some cases even, the unlucky bastard on the business end of a flamethrower actually threw themselves, while still smoldering in fire, at another soldier or even the flamethrower operator. Again, good as dead.Now we still need to burn things in the field, like ammo, guns, drugs, money, whatever. So we would use white phosphorus (I'm a mortarman, and we used white phosphorus to burn a pile of AKs and ammunition in a secure spot so the enemy can't use them).I dont think there's a law against flamethrowers being used as a weapon of war. I think it's all just common sense.
What are the major environmental destructions?
There are innumerable environmental destructions in the 20th and thus far in the 21th century. Here are a few of the largest ones.The biggest environmental destruction during this period is probably deforestation. Agriculture is the main cause of deforestation; farmers cut forests to plant crops or graze livestock. At the current rate of deforestation, the world’ rain forests could completely vanish in a hundred years. The negative impacts of deforestation include loss of habitat for millions of species and speeding up of climate change. Without trees, many former forest lands can quickly become barren deserts.The Tangshan earthquake (China), occurred on July 28, 1976, is believed to be the largest earthquake of the 20th century by death toll, which was estimated to be 650,000.The 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake occurred on 26 December. It triggered a series of devastating tsunamis (up to 30 meters high) along the coasts bordering the Indian Ocean, killing 230,000–280,000 people in 14 countries (including Indonesia, Sri Lanka, India, and Thailand).The Chernobyl nuclear disaster (Ukraine) occurred on 26 April 1986. Its radioactive release had caused widespread contaminations. This accident could be traced to reactor design flaws and human errors.The tsunami (reaching 13 meters high) following the Tohoku Earthquake on 11 March 2011 caused the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster (Japan). Destruction of some of nuclear reactors caused the release of radioactive material. Chernobyl and Fukushima are the only two Level 7 event classified based on the International Nuclear Event Scale.We cannot finish this list, although partial, without mentioning wars. Wars always cause major environmental destructions. The most notable example is probably the use of Agent Orange in the Vietnam War. In addition to its damaging environmental effects, the chemical has caused major health problems. Up to 4 million Vietnamese were exposed to the chemical, with around 1 million now suffering serious health issues. The chemical is capable of damaging genes, resulting in deformities among the offspring of exposed victims.Even though recent natural disasters like Hurricane Katrina, Sandy, Harvey, and Irma, and the California wildfire are still vivid in our memory, they did not reach the level of environmental destruction compared to the ones mentioned above.