Chlorine gas as a defoliant.

[Red Beret]

Last weekend when doing some testing with quantities of chlorine gas, I noticed that shortly after I had packed up, some plants in the area had started to wilt. Over the course of the next few days, these leaves died and fell off.

I'm wondering if chlorine has any potential as a basic defoliant? Yes, I know, one could buy weed killer from the store, but chlorine has the advantage of being cheaper, easier to apply (you don't have to spray all the plants you want dead), and more fun ;-).

I used only a small amount of chemicals and quite a bit of garden was destroyed. What's your opinion/experience with this? Uses are pretty obvious...

[Bugger]

Chlorine was used as a war gas in the Great War by the Germans, but it was soon superseded by COCl2 and mustard gas, probably because it was too volatile and not sufficiently toxic.

[PAC]

In "Meyer: Der Gaskampf und die chemischen Kampfstoffe" is this effect from chlorine on plants described. There are even pictures of chlorine clouds bleaching the ground.
After 1-2 hours of beeing treatened with 0,5 % Chlorine in the air the most plants loose their foliage through plasmolysis. The more Chlorine is in the air the faster is this reaction.

If you understand german, I can scan the pages.