Choctaw Code Talkers 1918 in XR360º

Chemical warfare with chlorine gas was first deployed by German troops on April 22, 1915, resulting in the deaths of 1,100 Allied soldiers and injuring many more. Eyewitness accounts vividly described the horrifying effects, with one soldier recalling a "burning sensation in the head, red-hot needles in the lungs, the throat seized as by a strangler." By the time the U.S. entered the war, gas masks equipped with chemical absorbents had been developed to mitigate the devastating effects of chloride gas. These masks, though a crucial advancement, underscored the constant threat soldiers faced. Their survival depended not just on weapons and tactics, but on the protection of the most basic human functions against a new, invisible form of warfare.