When the U.S. Military Considered Making a “Gay Bomb”

In the 1990s, the United States military delved into the concept of developing a chemical weapon aimed at inducing homosexuality among its targets. This initiative, strangely aligning with the mantra “make love, not war,” contemplated the deployment of a “gay bomb”. The plan was to disperse potent substances with aphrodisiac effects, potentially altering the sexual orientation of enemy soldiers to diminish their aggressiveness in favor of mutual attraction.

The project was outlined in a document titled “Harassing, Annoying, and ‘Bad Guy’ Identifying Chemicals,” requesting $7.5 million in funding for the development of this unconventional weapon. Other proposals included using chemicals to attract and agitate animals against enemies and applying non-lethal but marking substances on individuals.

The Pentagon seriously considered the proposal, submitting it to the National Academy of Sciences in 2002 for evaluation. The Department of Defense confirmed the review of the project, highlighting its commitment to researching and developing non-lethal weapons to support the armed forces. However, the project never materialized.

This initiative earned the Wright Laboratory, located in Dayton, Ohio, the Ig Nobel Peace Prize in 2007, a parodic award recognizing unusual or trivial achievements in scientific research. The laboratory did not graciously accept the honor, opting not to participate in the award ceremony. This prize was shared with other peculiar research efforts of that year, including a study on the side effects of sword swallowing and the extraction of vanilla flavor from cow feces.

This story represents a peculiar chapter in American military engineering, where innovation met absurdity in the continuous quest for unconventional means to dominate or destabilize the enemy.