Western Europe

A German biologist threatens to contaminate water supplies with bacilli of anthrax and botulinum toxin unless he is paid $8.5 million.

During the first year of the Great Roman Civil War, Julius Caesar’s troops lay siege to the walled city of Massilia (modern-day Marseille, France) using siege towers, battering rams, and by digging “mines” or tunnels to undermine the city walls. Massilians defend their city with “dogged determination;” tactics included directing water through pipes to wash down on attackers, which the Romans counter by covering siege buildings with bricks and “several coatings of stucco.” Defenders also excavate a large basin inside…

During the mobilization of the Dutch at the beginning of World War II, 1939-40, the Dutch attempt to flood the Gelderse Vallei with the New Dutch Water Defence Line, which had been completed in 1885. During the German invasion in May 1940, large areas are inundated.

Hydroelectric dams routinely bombed as strategic targets during World War II.

Explosives are placed along a water supply pipeline by the Comité Régional d’Action Viticole in France. No injuries to people are reported.

In 1573 at the beginning of the eighty years war against Spain, the Dutch flood the land to break the siege of Spanish troops on the town Alkmaar. The same defense is used to protect Leiden in 1574. This strategy becomes known as the Dutch Water Line and is used frequently for defense in later years.

In July, workers at the Cellatex chemical plant in northern France dump 5,000 liters of sulfuric acid into a tributary of the Meuse River after they are denied workers’ benefits. A French analyst points out that this is the first time “the environment and public health were made hostage in order to exert pressure, an unheard-of situation until now.”

Louis XIV starts the third of the Dutch Wars in 1672, in which the French overrun the Netherlands. In defense, the Dutch open their dikes and flood the country, creating a watery barrier that is virtually impenetrable.