Another first for the Bush regime? Combining biological and economic warfare

["Nello Margiotta" <animarg at tin.it>]

http://www.onlinejournal.com/Special_Reports/050303Madsen/050303madsen.html

Another first for the Bush regime?
Combining biological and economic warfare

By Wayne Madsen
Online Journal Contributing Writer

May 3, 2003-Evidence is mounting that the Bush administration may be
engaging in a new form of warfare: bio-economic attacks against countries
that either opposed the U.S. war on Iraq or were showing signs of surpassing
the United States in economic vitality and growth. Revelations that the
Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) does not occur naturally and that
anthrax may have been introduced onto an Egyptian merchant vessel bound for
Canada from Brazil has raised eyebrows among biological warfare experts.

The use of bio-economic warfare as a weapon of mass destruction was first
suggested by Dr. Edgar J. DaSilva, the Director for the Division of Life
Sciences of the UN Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization
(UNESCO). Da Silva stated in a 1999 article in the Electronic Journal of
Biotechnology that bio-economic warfare-"the undermining and destruction of
economic progress and stability"-can be traced to "the development and use
of biological agents against economic targets such as crops, livestock and
ecosystems." DaSilva also noted that such warfare can often be perceived by
the public as naturally-occurring because "such warfare can always be
carried out under the pretexts that such traumatic occurrences are the
result of natural circumstances that lead to outbreaks of diseases and
disasters of either endemic or epidemic proportions."

The United States, particularly the Central Intelligence Agency-through its
joint efforts with the U.S. Army's biological warfare laboratory at Fort
Detrick, Maryland-has pioneered in the field of bio-economic warfare. In the
1970s, the CIA directed a bio-economic warfare campaign against Cuba. In his
book, Biological Warfare in the 21st Century, author Malcolm Dando describes
the Cuba campaign as involving the use of blue mold against the nation's
tobacco crop, cane smut against the sugar crop, African swine fever against
the livestock population, and a hemorrhagic strain of dengue fever against
the human population. These attacks were designed to destabilize Cuba's
agricultural based economy. The Cuba operations were conducted after
President Richard Nixon, in a 1969 Executive Order, banned the use of
biological warfare agents. Nixon's order and his 1972 signing of the
Biological and Toxin Weapons Convention with Britain and the Soviet Union
outlawing bio-weapons were systematically ignored by the CIA and Pentagon.

Almost at the same time that Western financial institutions were forecasting
a record growth in China's gross domestic product-estimates ranged from 7.5
to 7.6 percent-the country's southern Guangdong Province experienced its
first outbreak of SARS. After the disease began spreading and Chinese
officials scurried to deal with the virus, the economic cost to mainland
China was devastating-$2.2 billion according to the Far Eastern Economic
Review. In addition, SARS cost Hong Kong $1.7 billion. For the Bush
administration, which was experiencing America's worst economic downturn in
10 years and was spending billions on the war against Iraq, the idea of a
booming Chinese economy did not sit well. In addition, China was in the
final stages of planning its first manned space launch at a time when the
United States lost its second space shuttle due to incompetence. The
contrasts between a economically vitalized China and a United States caught
in the malaise of recession, war, and technological failure could not have
been more stark. Then we heard about the first outbreak of SARS.

In January 2002, the Hartford Courant reported that Fort Detrick had lost
several specimens of deadly viruses and bacteria. These included the Ames
strain of anthrax bacteria (the same strain used to terrify the Congress
during its deliberations over the USA PATRIOT Act in late 2001), Hanta
virus, Ebola virus, simian AIDS and two "unknown" specimens-agents that were
actually classified as "Secret" by the military and CIA. Based on recent
suggestions by Russia's top biological warfare experts, SARS may have been
created as a bio-economic weapon of mass destruction.

Nikolai Filatov, the head of epidemiological services for Moscow, told
Russia's Gazeta newspaper that he thought SARS was man-made. Russian Academy
of Medicine member Sergei Kolesnikov agreed with his colleague. He was
quoted by the RIA-Novosti news agency that SARS is a "cocktail" of mumps and
measles. He added that such a mixture could never appear naturally.

Considering the fact it was a right-wing group known as the Minutemen that
originally planned on conducting a bio-terrorism campaign involving the
distribution of an unknown virus in major airline terminals throughout the
United States, the culpability of the United States government in the SARS
outbreak must be seriously considered. A number right-wing extremists,
including those with ties to racist and religious zealot organizations, have
found high-level jobs within the Bush administration. The Minutemen plot was
the idea of Robert DePugh, the leader of the organization who also happened
to own a veterinary drug firm called Biolab Corporation, headquartered in
Norborne, Missouri.

In 1972, members of an extreme right-wing group, the "Order of the Rising
Sun," were arrested in Chicago after it was discovered they were going to
contaminate the water supplies of Chicago, St. Louis, and other Midwestern
cities with 30 to 40 kilograms of typhoid bacteria cultures. In May 1995,
Larry Wayne Harris, a member of the neo-Nazi Aryan Nations, was arrested for
a probation violation when he told a police informant that he had enough
anthrax to wipe out the entire population of Las Vegas. The FBI discovered
that Harris's car contained several bags containing a strain of anthrax that
was not dangerous to humans.

Another right-winger, Dr. Larry Ford, a Mormon gynecologist with the
University of California at Los Angeles, maintained a close relationship
with the director of South Africa's bio-weapons program, Dr. Wouter Basson.
According to CourtTV.com, Ford was often accompanied on his trips to South
Africa by Dr, Jerry Nilsson, a fellow Mormon and UCLA colleague. A former
lab assistant of Ford's told The New York Times in November 2002 that she
saw Ford carry a vial on the plane to South Africa. She said the vial
contained a deadly bacteria that could have endangered everyone on the plane
had it leaked. The vial was turned over to a South African official. Two FBI
informants reportedly attended a 1986 meeting in South Africa with Niels
Knobel, South Africa's Surgeon General, and Ford. The agents reported that
Knobel received toxins from Ford and Nilsson. These toxins were later used
in South Africa's deadly top secret bio-weapons program, code-named Project
Coast. On February 28, 2000, James Patrick Riley, Ford's partner in the firm
Biofem Pharmaceuticals, was shot and critically wounded at its Irvine,
California headquarters. After one of Ford's friends was charged in the
shooting, Ford committed suicide at his Irvine home. Canisters later dug up
in Ford's backyard were discovered to contain cultures of cholera,
salmonella, botulism, and typhoid fever. When reports emerged that Ford
worked for the CIA, FBI agent Doug Baker confirmed the story but later
quickly recanted.

An April 20, 2003 article in The Washington Post revealed that Don Mayes, a
retired CIA officer, acted as a go-between between Daan Goosen, a former
employee of Basson, and the CIA and FBI. Goosen was trying to sell the CIA
and FBI a pathogen that genetically fused the genes of an ordinary
intestinal bacteria with those that result in lethal gas gangrene. Some
samples of the pathogen were actually shipped to the United States via the
CIA in a toothpaste tube. The tube was delivered to the FBI's Key West
office by Robert Zlockie, another retired CIA officer. The CIA and FBI
eventually declined Goosen's offer to sell them his deadly bugs as well as
his offer to work in the United States on biowar defenses. Prior to the
breakdown in negotiations between Goosen and the CIA and FBI, the Pentagon
set up a meeting between Goosen and Bioport, the Michigan-based firm that
provides anthrax vaccines to the military. Bioport has refused to comment on
reports that The Carlyle Group, a controversial international investment
firm on whose board former President George H. W. Bush sits, owns shares of
stock in Bioport.

The Washington Post also reported that Zlockie was given a receipt on FBI
letterhead acknowledging that it had taken custody of "one toothpaste tube
containing one ampul of E. coli genetically coded with epsilon toxin." The
tube was then sent to Fort Detrick, which concluded that Goosen's pathogen
was a legacy from Project Coast, the same program on which Ford and Nilsson
worked. Against the wishes of some in the CIA and Defense Department, the
FBI declined to play ball with Goosen and it alerted the South African
police to the fact that Goosen had attempted to sell virulent strains of
bacteria and viruses to the United States. The South Africans declined to
prosecute Goosen. In addition, in April 2002, a South African court cleared
Basson, Goosen's one-time boss, of 46 criminal charges, including attempted
murder of anti-apartheid activists. Earlier, Basson was cleared of 15
charges, including murder and attempted murder.

In October 2002, the Sunday Mirror of Zimbabwe reported that FBI agents
traveled to Zimbabwe and South Africa to examine Dr. Steven Hatfill's role
during the 1970s in the Rhodesian Selous Scout's biological warfare program
and South Africa's bio-war program. Hatfill, a native of Missouri who was
briefly a Marine Corps reservist, emigrated to Rhodesia at a time the United
Nations and United States imposed severe sanctions against the breakaway
minority government of Ian Smith. However, Hatfill claims he served in the
Army, Army Reserve, and National Guard from 1975 to 1981 at the same time he
claimed to have been in the Rhodesian military. In an article in The
American Prospect, writer Laura Rosen postulates that Hatfill may have been
a double agent, working for both the Selous Scouts and the U.S. Army
Institute for Military Assistance in Fort Bragg. In fact, Hatfill bragged to
his colleagues about being a double agent.

The idea that the CIA and the U.S. Special Forces could have been running
Hatfill as an agent in Rhodesia is all the more troubling when considering
that the Rhodesian bio-war program targeted black Zimbabwean rebels with
anthrax during the 1970s. Hatfill's resume claims he served in the South
African Defense Forces after leaving Rhodesia. The FBI was particularly
interested in Hatfill's work for Project Coast, a program that included
experiments on applying anthrax to the gummed flaps of envelopes sent
through the mail.

In the late 1990s, Hatfill worked at Fort Detrick as a U.S. Army employee
and later as a contractor for Science Applications International Corporation
(SAIC), a company with a number of CIA and Pentagon classified contracts.
Later, Attorney General John Ashcroft called Hatfill a "person of interest"
in the investigation surrounding the 2001 anthrax mailings. Hatfill
graduated from the University of Zimbabwe Medical School in 1983. In July
2002, South Africa's Daily News reported that in 1987 or early 1988, Hatfill
trained elite Aquila Brigade members of neo-Nazi leader Eugene
Terre'blanche's Afrikaner Weerstandsbeweging (AWB), a notorious paramilitary
group.

After Hatfill was identified by the FBI as a "person of interest," Pat
Clawson became the scientist's spokesman. According to The Baltimore Sun,
Clawson is a close associate of Oliver North, the right-wing politician, Fox
News reporter, talk show host, and convicted Iran-contra criminal. In fact,
Clawson is a program director for North's radio show. Also coming to
Hatfill's defense was National Review writer Joel Mowbray, a right-wing
defender of the Likud government of Ariel Sharon and Bush administration
policies in Iraq. Mowbray, who is quite content with Ashcroft's anti-Arab
and anti-immigrant policies, uncharacteristically criticized Ashcroft for
leaks to the press about the investigation of Hatfill. Bill Kristol's Weekly
Standard reported that much of the "evidence" against Hatfill emanated from
the Jewish Defense Organization, a radical offshoot of the extreme
right-wing Jewish Defense League.

After Fort Detrick and SAIC severed their ties with Hatfill, he wound up
working for Louisiana State University's Academy of Counter-Terrorist
Education, an entity that receives most of its funding from U.S. government
grants, and, interestingly, SAIC, Hatfill's one-time employer at Fort
Detrick. When Hatfill's name surfaced as a continuing "person of interest"
for the FBI, LSU fired him. Ironically, during his stint at LSU, Louisiana
suffered a huge outbreak of West Nile virus, which, according to New African
magazine, was one of the pathogens weaponized by South Africa's Project
Coast, the program that the FBI was investigating for its prior links to
Hatfill.

There is definitely a right-wing element involving scientists, military,
intelligence, and government contractor personnel in the study, production,
and distribution of biological weapons, including anthrax, gas gangrene,
Dengue fever, and other pathogens. As the right-wing in the United States
calls for retaliation against countries that failed to support America's war
on Iraq, it may be more than coincidental that SARS has broken out in China
and the virus has been transmitted to Canada via the busy travel routes
existing between China, Hong Kong, and major Canadian cities like Toronto
and Vancouver due to Canada's large Asian population. Not only has China's
economy drastically suffered but Toronto, Canada's most populous city, is
facing an economic disaster. After the SARS outbreak in Canada, it is
discovered that an Egyptian vessel carrying bauxite from Brazil to an Alcan
aluminum plant in Saguenay, Quebec, suffered the death of its first mate
from anthrax just prior to departing Brazil for Canada. The Brazilian police
have reported that the man contracted anthrax when he opened up a suitcase
containing the bacteria. Fortunately, Canadian authorities were alerted
before the ship docked in Quebec, whose majority French-speaking population
has been just as outspoken against America's war policies as their kinfolk
in France.

Considering Dr. DaSilva's warnings about bio-economic warfare, the world
should be on guard against a deliberate policy by the right-wing elements
that populate the Bush administration to use bio-weapons to punish countries
for failure to cooperate with the United States. Considering that the CIA
and Pentagon considered buying genetically-fused bacteria and viruses from
South African freelance bio-war scientists and Russian scientists now claim
that SARS is a similarly genetically-fused mumps and measles pathogen, an
immediate investigation of Fort Detrick's stockpiles and their points of
origin should be initiated by the Congress, which has shown an amazing lack
of oversight for all the questionable activities of the Bush administration,
including 9-11, Enron, and even the anthrax mailings that targeted two of
the Senate's top leaders.

Although the Bush administration contends that the anthrax mailings, like
the hijacking of commercial planes and turning them into virtual cruise
missiles, were unprecedented and a surprise, history refutes such claims. In
1988, the Foundation on Economic Trends warned that Fort Detrick and the
Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta were shipping some of the "deadliest
diseases known to man" through the U.S. postal system. One such shipment in
1987 from the CDC to Fort Detrick contained the Crimea-Congo virus, a deadly
pathogen carried by ticks. The shipment was "lost" somewhere in the main
Philadelphia post office.

In 1988, Postmaster General Anthony Frank banned U.S. government bio-toxin
shipments through the mail after the U.S. Army said it would increase its
postal shipments to its new bio-war laboratory at Utah's Dugway Proving
Grounds, a facility that has the only aerosolized anthrax laboratory in the
United States. The Army also wanted to ship anthrax, botulism, Q fever, and
dengue fever through the mail, a frightening idea considering the reports
that Fort Detrick was missing several pathogenic strains after the
commencement of the anthrax mailings.

Unless Congress begins asking the tough questions, we will never know what
went missing from Fort Detrick. Could the missing "bugs" have been West Nile
virus, AIDS, bubonic plague (there have been several recent "mysterious"
outbreaks of this disease in India, Kazakhstan, Libya, Congo, and Brazil),
or even SARS? Why can't the American people expect a full investigation of
and accounting for America's supposedly "banned" bio-weapons program?

The U.S. Congress, which is now in the hands of some of the most right-wing
and venal ideologues in its history, will probably not want to delve into
America's secret labyrinth of bio-weapons progenitors and dispensers,
especially since it involves a number of their ideological soul mates. The
vitriol spewing from the mouths of the congressional leadership is strictly
reserved for gays, African Americans, the French, Hollywood liberals, the
drug addicted, and abortion rights advocates. As far as the right-wing
leadership is concerned, there is no questioning the military, Justice
Department, or the intelligence agencies. Those who dared are no longer in a
position to do so. Senators Graham and Shelby are off of the Senate
Intelligence Committee. They have been replaced by dupes and yes-men for
Langley and Detrick.

China and Canada are now suffering from the SARS virus. Quebec almost
received a possible deadly blow from ship-born anthrax spores. The Bush
administration is now deciding how best to punish France, Germany, Russia,
and other countries for their lack of support. Nothing, including the use of
bio-economic warfare, should be put past the Bush administration. In the
absence of an independent U.S. Congress, the world should demand that UN
inspectors be given access to all U.S. bio-weapons laboratories. There is
still no evidence that Saddam Hussein used bio-weapons but there is a lot of
actual and circumstantial evidence that the United States has and continues
to do so with possibly disastrous consequences for the entire world.

Wayne Madsen is a Washington, DC-based investigative reporter. He was also
the Operations Officer at Naval Facility Coos Head, Oregon from 1980 to 1982
and assisted the FBI and NIS in the investigation as a temporary special
agent.