napalm
Sign in to savethumb|upright=1.35|North American F-100 Super Sabre dropping napalm in a training exercise
AI overview
Napalm is a flammable liquid mixture that was developed as a weapon and dropped from aircraft, as shown in this image of a military jet releasing it during a training exercise. It was historically used in warfare to create large fires over wide areas, making it a significant and controversial element of military history.
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Article
12 sectionsContents
- Development
- Military use
- World War II 1939–1945
- Korean War 1950–1953
- Vietnam War 1955–1975
- Others
- Antipersonnel effects
- International law
- See also
- Notes
- References
- External links
thumb|upright=1.35|North American F-100 Super Sabre dropping napalm in a training exercise
Napalm is an incendiary mixture of a gelling agent and a volatile petrochemical (usually gasoline or diesel fuel). The name is a portmanteau of two of the constituents of the original thickening and gelling agents: coprecipitated aluminium salts of naphthenic acid and palmitic acid. A team led by chemist Louis Fieser originally developed napalm for the US Chemical Warfare Service in 1942 in a secret laboratory at Harvard University. Of immediate first interest was its viability as an incendiary device to be used in American fire bombing campaigns during World War II; its potential to be coherently projected into a solid stream that would carry for distance (instead of the bloomy fireball of pure gasoline) resulted in widespread adoption in infantry and tank/boat mounted flamethrowers as well.