Why the Chemical Weapons Convention is Irrelevant

In a word ... NOVICHOK.

The goal of the Soviet Foliant CW Program was to produce weapons NOT covered by the CWC and which could be produced using chemicals NOT regulated by the CWC.

Apparently that program was successful. So, even if the CWC is enforced to the letter, the world is still threatened by the existence of powerful chemical weapons. I suspect that Russia, the US, and possibly Israel know how to make the various forms of novichok. If it is ever deployed by anyone in the future, terrorists or otherwise, it will have come from one of these three countries.

You can find some background information about novichok in the following blog post:

http://sainthoward.blogspot.com/2013/05/were-chemical-weapons-used-during-first.html

By the way, the US Senate was aware of the Foliant Program and the existence of novichok when they ratified the CWC. They chose to ratify a fatally flawed treaty in spite of that knowledge.