Here is an interesting post called When Chemists go to War. It is a good reminder of how our work can be taken to places where we ourselves wouldn’t go. Ever develop chemistry that has killed someone? What would you do if you developed a substance that was used for destructive purposes? Would it bother you? Some scientists from the Manhattan Project were troubled by their work on the bomb, but others slept quite well.
I suppose it could be considered similar to the situation with the inventor of the baseball bat. Could this inventor have forseen the use of the bat in committing violence? Probably didn’t cross his mind. But if you’re inventing new military explosives, how do you cope with the knowledge that your invention’s use is specifically for more precise application of killing power? The fact is that there are many scientists who have no difficulty with this at all. I’ve met a few of them and they are very sober folks. They know exactly what their invention does and they are eager to do even better.
I think it is this ability to stand behind the abstract technical details, sheltered from the blood and guts reality, that allows scientists to rationalize their work on killing technology. Scientists will never have to carry with them the olfactory battlefield memories of bomb smoke and shredded bowel. Weapons labs are relatively safe places to work. The weapons scientists biggest hazard, realistically, is the commute to and from the lab. Perhaps weapons designers and munitions manufacturers should have to clean up after a car bomb or carry bodies from the scene so as to emphasize the exact consequences of this work.
Maybe the most important thing we can do to honor soldiers lost and wounded in battle is to resolve that we will produce fewer dead and wounded soldiers. One approach embraced by many is to make war more effiicient and more automated. Send machines into battle rather than people. The other approach is to be a bit less warlike. Throttle back on weapons spending. Take the view that war isn’t really glorious, but rather that it is an uncivilized duty we are called upon to do on occasion.
Amassing huge armed forces presents the temptation to use them. The goal for our national leaders should be … lead us not into temptation.
Lamentations on Chemistry 
Clifford Hach, late founder of Hach Chemical (later Hach company) was ashamed of his work on the Manhattan Project and very few outside of his family knew of his involvement in it. He went on to invent dandy little colorimetric tests and turbidimeters that couldn’t be used to harm a fly if you tried.
I’m a bit behind in reading your blog, but I want to add a comment on this post. You may know them already, but I suggest three excellent books by two different writers.
The first is Louis Fieser’s semi-autographical volume, “The Scientific Method”. This inventor of napalm recounts some stories of his war years without a shread of qualm. The stories are fascinating. This book may be hard to find.
The two books by Thomas Hager, “The Demon Under the Microscope” and “The Alchemy of Air”, revolve around the events of World War I and the postwar years. The former recounts the discovery of sulfa drugs and the beginnings of modern antibiotics. The other volume is a biography of the ironic and tragic life of Fritz Haber, who discovered how to fix nitrogen (the Haber-Bosch process) that lead to both fertilizer and explosives. Great reads, both of them.
Thanks for the recommendations. I’m familiar with the discovery of sulfa and used it for story time in the organic classroom a number of times. Students often like to hear these tales.
I’m very disappointed in the rampant militaristic enthusiasm in US culture. We heap praise on our military and its exploits endlessly, and we throw vast amounts of national treasure at weapons systems and large troop numbers. But we seem unable to use that very same cleverness to avoid committing vast resources to the destructive arts. Fearfulness is non-linear.