While Germany introduced poison gas to the battlefield, Churchill became an enthusiast of its use against enemies of the empire. When the Iraqis resisted British rule in 1920, Churchill, as Secretary for War and Air, wrote Sir Henry Trenchard, a pioneer of air warfare: “I do not understand this squeamishness about the use of gas.… I am strongly in favor of using poisoned gas against uncivilised tribes [to] spread a lively terror.”
