The Strasbourg Agreement of 1675 was the first international treaty to prohibit the use of chemical weapons in warfare.
Key Facts
- Date signed
- 27 August 1675
- Signatories
- France and the Holy Roman Empire
- Trigger event
- Siege of Groningen (1672)
- Prohibited weapon
- Poisoned bullets
- Next major agreement
- Geneva Protocol, 1925
By the Numbers
Location
Cause → Event → Consequence
During the Franco-Dutch War, Christoph Bernhard von Galen, Bishop of Münster, employed poisoned bullets during the Siege of Groningen in 1672. This use of chemical weaponry alarmed the belligerents and prompted diplomatic action between France and the Holy Roman Empire to restrict such methods of warfare.
On 27 August 1675, France and the Holy Roman Empire signed the Strasbourg Agreement, the world's first international treaty explicitly banning the use of chemical weapons. The accord was a direct response to the deployment of poisoned bullets and sought to establish a norm against such armaments in armed conflict.
The Strasbourg Agreement established an early precedent for arms-control diplomacy. It was followed by the Hague Convention of 1899, which barred asphyxiating projectiles, and the 1925 Geneva Protocol. The prohibition on chemical weapons eventually became a distinct and independently recognized principle of international humanitarian law.
Political Outcome
First international ban on chemical weapons use formally agreed between France and the Holy Roman Empire.