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Puzzling
Evidence
. Puzzling
Evidence: True Stories
U.S. Evades
Bio-Weapons Treaty Most often in True Stories, we run
anecdotes that are a little incongruous, foibles and fragments of
less-than-logical events or statements. But this month's first True Story
is anything but. ...
For a companion piece to this one,
see this
month's Monthly Straw Poll ...
U.S. Germ Warfare Research Pushes Treaty Limits
That
was the headline that began a piece which appeared in the New York Times
on September 4th, a week before the attacks on the Pentagon and the World
Trade Center, and several weeks before anthrax began to become a household
word.
.
The Times article --
reported and written by Judith Miller, Stephen Engelberg and William J.
Broad -- began with a startling sentence: "Over the past several
years," they said. "The United States has embarked on a
program of secret research on biological weapons that, some officials say,
tests the limits of the global treaty banning such weapons." The
program was started under the Clinton administration, during which time the
CIA, in a number of projects umbrella'd under the name of Clear Vision, had
been trying to determine the characteristics of various delivery systems for
biological agents. Evidently, intelligence sources had learned that
the Soviets had built 'bomblet' for just such a purpose, allowing the
biological agents to be released in a fine mist over a precisely targeted
area. The word at The Agency was that the devices were actually being
sold overseas. But when CIA operatives were unable to purchase such a
mini-bomb from any sources, they took to building a model
themselves.
.
Around the same
time, another group from The Agency was busy at work in Nevada, constructing
a fairly sophisticated laboratory for the manufacture of biological weapons
out of commercially available materials, in order to show that it could be
done that easily. While some in the Clinton administration voiced
concern over the projects, which they may well have learned about only after
the projects were begun, if at all. The experiments were concluded in
2000. But an even more drastic measure is in the works under the Bush
administration, which plans on expanding the experimentation to include
genetic engineering of anthrax in order to develop a more virulent strain.
.
The
fruits of that project are supposed to help the U.S. then turn around and
develop a more potent anthrax vaccine. But many worry, including a
number of Gulf War veterans who have been suffering from a variety of
illnesses since being vaccinated during the war, that the new vaccine will
have at least some of the same pitfalls and drawbacks as the one currently
being used. But in addition, officials in both administrations,
including some in the State Department, have expressed strong reservations
from the start that these U.S. experiments are in violation of the 1972
treaty commonly known as the Biological Weapons Convention (BWC).
.
The
BWC had the parties to it agree to a variety of restrictions relating to the
development, production, acquisition, or stockpiling of any amounts or types
of biological agents for which there were no ''prophylactic, protective or
other peaceful purposes.'' The accord also required the
signatories not to develop or obtain any weapons or other equipment
''designed to use such agents or toxins for hostile purposes or in armed
conflict.''
.
While the earlier CIA
experiments with the bomblets were clearly not intended to be used for
"hostile purposes or in armed conflict," still, it is in the
nature of such devices that that is precisely what they are "designed
to" do. But lawyers at both the CIA and the White House
disagreed, insisting that, because the intent was to learn about the devices
and how to protect against them, the work was "defensive," and
therefore allowed under the terms of the treaty.
.
The
Bush administration's plan to proceed with the development of the more
virulent strain of anthrax is another matter. The administration
knows, as has been known for some time, that the Soviet Union had already
developed an enhanced strain of anthrax. In fact, there are stockpiles
of the bacteria on an island under the control of Uzbekistan which the
Soviets tried themselves, unsuccessfully, to destroy. But because the
U.S. has not been able to obtain any of the Soviet supply, the
administration says that its own development of a more virulent strain of
anthrax is necessary in order to then turn around and develop a more potent
vaccine.
.
But clearly, given the administration's own logic, it would
seem highly suspect that the move is not in violation of the BWC agreement,
since there cannot be as yet any "prophylactic [or] protective"
means in place. In any case, the former general counsel of the Arms
Control and Disarmament Agency, Mary Elizabeth Hoinkes,
speaking to the Times Judith Miller in a
related article which appeared on September 5th, has
voiced strong opposition to the plan, saying that the
administration's rationale of defensive purpose is a
"gross misrepresentation," and that it poses
great risks to the international accord that, until
recently, it looked like the U.S. had championed most
among the world's nations. Nevertheless, Agency and administration lawyers are
again claiming that, because of the defensive intent, the project is not in
violation of the treaty and are planning to go forward.
.
In addition to
all this, one of the key problems with the treaty from the start has been
that it has never provided adequate means for catching violators. This
was one of the problems when, for example, the U.S. and the U.N. wanted to
more closely monitor biological weaponry in Iraq. Much
more recently, however, the U.S. under the Bush administration has refused to
sign on to additional language that would plug that loophole, in large part
because it did not want to open up U.S. facilities to the international
inspections that would be required of any facility engaged in the production
of biological agents. According to the Times report, one such
facility the administration is eager to keep under wraps is the Battelle
Memorial Institute, a West Jefferson, Ohio, military contract lab,
that has been selected to create the genetically engineered anthrax.
.
With
more than 140 other nations already having signed on to the new proposals,
the Bush administration's refusal is not sitting well around the
world. It now has this refusal -- along with the collective sense
among the international community that the previous and the current
biological agent experiments are, in fact, in violation of the treaty which
already exists -- to put alongside its vocal opposition to what it has been
calling an outdated treaty against nuclear proliferation, a move intended to
clear the way for the resurrection of the Star Wars missile defense system
.
...
Call us crazy. But it would seem to us that the last thing we need is
a more virulent strain of anthrax, especially one that might fall into the
wrong hands.
For a companion piece to this one,
see this
month's Monthly Straw Poll ...
lmc
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