凝固汽油彈（英語：napalm），亦稱燒夷彈，是幾種武器用途的可燃液體之總稱，大多以膠狀汽油為主成份。「napalm」指的是凝固汽油彈中用來與汽油混合以產生膠質燃劑的黏稠劑成份。此詞是由它的研發者路易·菲塞（Louis Frederick Fieser）所領導的哈佛大學化學家團隊所命名，是naphthenic（環烷酸）與palmitic acid（棕櫚酸）的鋁鹽的混成詞，製造凝固汽油彈時會將這兩種成份加入可燃物質使其膠質化。凝固汽油彈早期主要被用來攻擊建築物，之後演變為對人員殺傷用武器，其主要通過黏附在人員表面持續燃燒來造成傷害。 Napalm is an incendiary mixture of a gelling agent and a volatile petrochemical (usually gasoline (petrol) 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. Napalm B is the more modern version of napalm (utilizing polystyrene derivatives) and, although distinctly different in its chemical composition, is often referred to simply as "napalm". 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 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 flamethrowers as well.
Napalm,
also known as incendiary bomb,
is
a general term for flammable liquids used in several weapons.
Most of them are mainly composed of colloidal gasoline.
They are mainly used to attack buildings and
then evolve into weapons for killing people. They are
mainly adhered to the surface of people.
Burning to cause damage The
early liquid fuels are easy to splash
and difficult to adhere to the target, and it is
difficult to achieve the purpose of concentrated killing. The
United States found that the use of colloidal gasoline was used
to improve the range and effectiveness of the flamethrower.
However, the production of colloidal gasoline
requires the use of a large amount of natural gas. Rubber,
but natural rubber is not only expensive, but the
output is low.
In the early days of World War II, the
Japanese army occupied
the main producing areas of natural rubber such as Malaysia, Indonesia, Vietnam, and Thailand.
Attracted the attention
of some researchers at DuPont Standard Oil and Harvard University.
After a lot of efforts, they
developed
synthetic rubber
that can be industrially produced on a large scale and can be used for
various purposes such as automobile tires, tanks, tracks and raincoats.
Harvard University in 1942 by the US military chemical
The team led by Professor Louie first developed
napalm that can be applied to synthetic rubber,
and in mid-April 1942
they developed a
new type of brown dry powder. The
powder itself is not
viscous but
becomes extremely viscous when mixed with gasoline. Thick and flammable
A colleague of Prof. Louie suggested
that adding phosphorus
to napalm would increase the lethality of
napalm so that napalm would penetrate the skin
and continue to burn
causing more severe burns
1965-1969
Dow Chemical Company
mass-produced for the U.S. military Napalm-B
uses benzene and polystyrene as viscous agents,
but when the
great harm of napalm-B was reported by the media,
Dow Chemical quickly stopped
the research and development of related products.
At the same time,
napalm-B became a
Vietnamese One of the hallmarks of war was the
use of napalm thickeners by the U.S. and other Allied militaries
to improve
the flammable liquid composition of flamethrowers and bombs.
They further developed a
formula for the mixing ratio of this viscous agent to gasoline
so that the mixture would
burn at a specified rate and adhere to the
Another useful
but dangerous effect of incendiary petrol bombs on objects is that they
rapidly consume oxygen in the nearby air
and produce large amounts of carbon monoxide
that suffocate nearby organisms. This effect
usually occurs when used in large-ton bombs.
This effect occurred
in the Vietnam War.
The U.S. military dropped 388,000 tons of napalm in the ten years from 1963 to 1973,
and various types of napalm weapons were used for a variety of purposes,
including the destruction of troops, personnel,
armored vehicles, buildings, jungles,
and railway tunnels.
Napalm in addition to causing physical damage to the enemy
It can also cause psychological trauma.
International law does not prohibit the use of
napalm against military targets,
but since direct attacks on civilians with any weapon
are prohibited by international law,
the use of napalm
against civilians is absolutely prohibited.
