Lewisite Accusations

Last week we saw that some stories were circulating about Russia potentially having used Lewisite against Ukrainian troops in Bakhmut.

According to the reports found, of which there are very few, and predominantly from Ukrainian news sources, Col. Oleksiy Dmytrashkivsky a spokesman for the Ukrainian Defense Forces posted a video to social media July 4th saying that following an artillery strike near Bakhmut soldiers began to show symptoms including nausea, vomiting and in some instances loss of consciousness.

In the video Dmytrashkivsky outrightly states “During the artillery bombardments they use a chemical called lewisite”. His message has gone rather viral across social media, his claims are yet to be verified however. At the time of posting the video Dmytrashkivsky himself accepted this position saying that the identification of lewisite as the agent used was preliminary, and Ukrainian CW specialists were still investigating.

No major news outlets have reported on this story that we can find, and responses to posts about the alleged incident are being met with scepticism, with individuals posting responses regarding strange symptomology for lewisite, and calls for those reposting the story to verify facts before disseminating. Some of the social media posts falsely claim that green smoke from the shelling is evidence of CW use.

Disinformation, misinformation, or truth? There are many opinions on this, I think it is none of the above. I think Dmytrashkivsky believes he is saying his truth, that he saw something but it probably wasn’t lewisite. What has made him think it is? We have seen no evidence that any readings have been taken at the site yet, if there has, then there is no word on the type of device used and no readings disseminated. To say there has been lewisite detected is a bold claim, what is more likely to have happened is that a conventional shell has caused damage to an area that contains compounds that are an interferent for lewisite, such as arsine.

Arsenic is used as a dopant in many computer components using silicon chips, and an incident that causes acid to come into contact with circuit boards, semiconductors, LCD displays, microchips, and so on, would release small amounts of gas phase arsenic compounds into the air, which can set off the arsenic channel on detectors. That arsenic reading could lead someone to the conclusion that what they were detecting was lewisite, particularly in a conflict situation.

Devil’s advocate might suggest that if this was what was claimed then an old lewisite munition lost in an ammunition warehouse sometime in the 70s might have made its way to Ukraine, but even that is highly unlikely. Lewisite is primarily a vesicant and there has been no mention of blisters on those exposed. There also doesn’t seem to be mention of how many ‘victims’ of exposure there are. The symptoms quoted could belong to a vast range of things, including combat stress reaction.

What is telling about this story is how little traction it has gained with mainstream media. It is now July 11^th, and it only seems to be doing the rounds in the realms of social media, limited local media, and random small news sources such as a Greek online news site. It could be that the issue regarding Biden giving the green light to send cluster munitions to Ukraine has overshadowed this story, but as it has come from only one man, with no one else picking up a rallying cry of CW use, it is most likely this story is untrue, or at least incorrect.

The links we have found to some reports and posts are below

https://www.kyivpost.com/post/19108

https://twitter.com/NOELreports/status/1676489122637119489

https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/7/4/2179153/-More-Russian-ecocide-plus-Ukraine-says-Russia-is-using-chemical-weapons-at-Bakhmut