Warfare Program Research Articles

South Africa's Chemical and Biological Warfare Programme: A Historical and International Perspective

This article describes important historical roots and factors that influenced the evolution of South Africa's past covert chemical and biological warfare (CBW) programme, Project Coast. Some of the complex international linkages developed under the auspices of Project Coast are also discussed. The conclusion discusses some of the characteristics of the programme that help to explain these widely varying assessments.

The role of professionals in the South African chemical and biological warfare programme.

This paper provides a short account of the South African Defence Force's chemical and biological warfare programme during apartheid, specifically during the period 1980 to 1994. It examines the circumstances of recruitment of the scientists and physicians and their retention in the programme; details the 'scientific efforts' of the programme and its aberrations; and explores ethical issues in relation to the involvement of scientists in the programme.

Killing 'without the distressing preliminaries': Scientists' defence of the British biological warfare programme.

This article presents historical cases in which British scientists, principally scientific advisors, have attempted to defend research on biological weapons. Although the historical record is scant, there is a degree of continuity in their justifications, and a number of themes can be identified. It was argued, that biological weapons research is morally justified because it produces humane weapons; that it is no different from medical or other research; and that is being performed for defensive purposes. It is argued that this defence is directed primarily towards other scientists working on germ warfare, and was formed part of the 'moral economy' of that secret community.

Denial and defiance: a socio-political analysis of AIDS in South Africa.

Denial and defiance: a socio-political analysis of AIDS in South Africa.

An educational imperative: The role of ethical codes and normative prohibitions in CBW-Applicable research.

This paper examines the role of ethics in research with potential applicability to chemical and biological warfare. If focuses upon biological warfare research, and examines the ethical dilemmas faced by those working with dual-use potential technologies. It discusses the normative, legal and ethical prohibitions against participation in chemical and biological warfare programmes from a Western perspective. It examines the motivations of individuals participating in CBW research and concludes with recommendations for increasing awareness about ethical and normative prohibitions. An appendix lists the results of a survey of ethical codes in relevant scientific disciplines conducted via the Internet.

The Rollback of South Africa's Chemical and Biological Warfare Program

The Rollback of South Africa's Chemical and Biological Warfare Program

History of the Development and Use of Biological Weapons

The United States began its BW program based on intelligence information and a very thorough evaluation of that information by a panel of scientists, engineers, medical personnel from a variety of areas including the military, other government agencies, industry, and the academic community. Initial efforts were directed toward defense against BW, but it soon became clear defense required a knowledge of offensive capabilities. The initial offensive studies started with a definition of what infectious organisms were available, how they could grow in quantities to support a munitions program, what kind of facilities were required, and where they could be positioned. Further studies were then initiated to design and evaluate testing sites and methodologies to evaluate the weapons. During all of these phases, concurrent medical and safety programs were studied, emphasized, and implemented. These studies resulted in the development of a number of vaccines, toxoids, treatments, therapies, and facility personnel management. The US program had one of the lowest, if not the lowest, personnel lost time because of personnel infections. The overall conclusion was that BW, offensive and defensive, was possible, and efficiencies could be obtained. The work accomplished by this group of very dedicated military and civilian personnel at military installations, universities, research institutes, and industrial organizations presented truly a combined operation with numerous achievements. Many of the detailed achievements were published in the open scientific, peer-reviewed journals, and many patents were obtained. The current defensive program is breaking new scientific ground and there is evidence indicating that very rapid detection and identification of BW agents is possible and will be instrumented.

Special Forces for Counter Revolutionary Warfare: The South African Case

Special Forces have long formed a central part of counter-revolutionary warfare. In the South African case, between 1974 and 1990, these were central to Pretoria's regional strategies. Serving as the primary tool for inflicting punishment on any Frontline State that allowed the ANC and its allies basing rights, the Special Forces conducted sabotage, raids, bombings and assassinations throughout the Frontline States, alongside the Special Tasks contra-mobilization programmes throughout the region and internally. When these tools proved insufficient - especially internally - the security forces turned to the medical Special Forces, who were at the centre of South Africa's chemical and biological warfare programme, for assistance in incapacitating and killing the state's opponents. Overall, these units worked under the banner of the state's 'Total Counter-Revolutionary Strategy' and in co-operation with the more covert elements of the security forces (such as the Civil Co-operation Bureau, the SAP's Koevoet and C1 counter-intelligence units, and the Directorate of Covert Collection) involved in the direct-targeting of the state's opponents.

America's Struggle with Chemical-Biological Warfare

Preface Demise of the Army Chemical Corps Swords or Shields: The Debate over WMDs The Chemical Corps Enters the Cold War The Chemical Corps Begins Its Fall Bad News Gets Worse Regaining CB Defense Capabilities The Renaissance Years Begin, 1979-1984 Changes in Doctrine and Training Reconnaissance, Detection and Identification Individual Protection Collective Protection Decontamination The Renaissance Years Fade, 1985-1990 Politics of Chemical Arms and Chemical Defense Reconnaissance, Detection and Identification - Part 2 Individual Protection - Part 2 Collective Protection and Decontamination - Part 2 Smoke, Radiacs and Medical Chemical Defense - Part 2 Current Events Iraq's NBC Warfare Program Operation Desert Shield/Storm Restructuring the DoD CB Defense Program Domestic Affairs Conclusions Bibliography Index

View the PDF document Defending against biological attack : Importance of biotechnology in preparadness (Review Paper)

danger of biological warfare has rightly received increasing attention during the past decade. Although 143 State Parties have signed the Biological and Toxin Weapons Convention (BTWC), there have been reports of around a dozen states possessing or seeking to possess biological weapons. There is even a view that the potential threat from biological and chemical weapons is greater than that from nuclear weapons. Biological warfare programme are also being considered for counter-insurgency use and tactical applications in the regional conflicts. Even small groups appear to have the means to launch a biological attack, an example of which was the attack with the nerve gas, sarin, in a Tokyo subway, in 1994, Defence against biological attacks has so far received little attention.This article begins with an assessment of the potential biological threat and considers the vulnerabilities of states facing such threat. It then considers the role of political-military coalitions in meeting the challenges of the aggressor and goes on to evaluate and identify the vulnerabilities of coalition partners. It also addresses the measures necessary to minimise those vulnerabilities, by active and passive defence, and examines the role biotechnology in such protective measures. It then briefly surveys the biological warfare defence capabilities of different countries. It concludes with a discussion of policy initiatives useful for addressing gaps by promoting cooperation among the interested parties. The key elements of protective measures against biological and toxin weapons attack are hazard assessment, detection, physical protection, identification and diagnosis, and medical countermeasures. Biotechnology is vital for further advances in all these areas for both civil and military requirements

The South African chemical and biological warfare program: An overview

(2000). The South African chemical and biological warfare program: An overview. The Nonproliferation Review: Vol. 7, No. 3, pp. 10-23.

Disdained by Generals

The Biology of Doom The History of America's Secret Germ Warfare Project. Ed Regis. Holt, New York, 1999. 267 pp. $25, C$37.50. ISBN 0-8050-5764-1. Regis offers an account of the biological warfare programs of the United States, Canada, Japan, and the United Kingdom. He is particularly interested in the question of why biological weapons have seen so little use.

Trends in American agriculture. Their implications for biological warfare against crop and animal resources.

Current trends in American agriculture have changed the vulnerability to use of biological weapons against plant and animal resources. The major effect has been a requirement to look again at the model of the U.S. BW program of widespread dissemination of agent and look to attack models requiring much lower levels of resources. The U.S. biological warfare program models must take the effects of these major trends into account when considering the possible widespread dissemination of a biological agent. The models must also acknowledge the lowered levels or resources required to make such attacks given the modern trends in American agriculture.

A De-programming Curriculum: Allied Reeducation and the Canadian-American Psychological Warfare Program for German POWs, 1943–47

The Canadian federal government, shut out of meaningful post-World War Two diplomacy by the United States, the United Kingdom, and the Soviet Union, found few avenues to assert its separate Canadian identity in the immediate postwar era. The Canadian psychological warfare program for German POWs--influenced by pent-up official frustration (1)--was an attempt by the government of Prime Minister Mackenzie King to register its mark on thousands of German prisoners of war who lived in Canadian-operated POW camps during and after the war. Astounding is the fact that some POWs, intentionally cut off from the outside world, asked on 8 May 1945 which side had won the war. (2) The United States and the United Kingdom sought to influence the thinking of the Germans following World War Two, especially because of German confusion about the causes of their defeat in World War One. In fact, Adolph Hitler promoted the deceptive stab-in-the-back theory that blamed Germany's democratic leaders for betraying a supposedly undefeated German army by surrendering in 1918. Since German militarism quickly reasserted itself after World War One, Allied postwar treatment of Germany's World War Two POWs brought home the message that the German nation had been defeated on 8 May 1945. Canada added its own dimension by implementing a psychological warfare program based on a similar American initiative. Colonel Henry Faulk, head of the British reeducation program, held that Canada undertook a limited re-educational effort that was far too intellectual to affect the rank and file of the POWs. (3) His harsh estimate of Canadian curriculum grew out of the POWs' strong expressions of Nazi loyalism when the Canadian-held POWs arrived in Britain in 1946-47 to begin an indefinite period of reparation labor. Faulk, who was quick to fault the Canadian reeducation program, did not consider that the Canadian-held POWs, just as those held by the U.S., resented their indefinite delay in Britain to such an extent that they briefly reasserted their adherence to Nazism in defiance. (4) This study explores the psychological factors affecting the POWs' postwar ideology by asking fundamental pedagogical questions about Canada's reeducation program: How did the military educators attempt to achieve the desired de-programming outcomes, and what factors impeded the prisoners' process? Was the entire program a useful exercise? Why did the Western Allies undertake a reeducation program that involved the indoctrination of POWs? The Mackenzie King government expended a significant military investment on the psychological warfare through an intense bombardment of accurate and uncensored Allied information. Canadian officials, looking at reeducation efforts in the United States, embraced John Dewey's pedagogy of learning by doing to liberate of the POWs' minds from Nazi control. Final interrogations of POWs in 1946 revealed that most prisoners abandoned aggressive Nazi tenets but refused to abandon Nazism in its entirety. Their bunker mentality and their lingering insecurities probably made them cautious students of an Allied world view. Psychological surveys in 1947 verified that POWs leaving Canada failed to embrace democratic principles. 8 May 1945 stood as a great divide in Allied reeducation efforts. Indeed, the historical context of the two periods plays a key role because only in the aftermath of the war did the Allied powers establish a victors' role over the vanquished POW enemy. Allied foreign policy goals also came into play, because the Allies sought to discredit Nazi ideology and German militarism. Canada, too, imposed strict military measures that involved withdrawing wartime POW privileges. Canadian influence on German POW matters grew out of Canadian acceptance of thousands of British-held prisoners of war. In May of 1940, just as Germany prepared to attack Britain, and Nazi U-boats menaced Canadian shipping in the Gulf of St. …

Simulants, stimulants and diseases: The evolution of the United States biological warfare programme, 1945–60

Details about the US biological programme have largely been based on information in the open literature. More revealing aspects of the programme are now available through documents released under the Freedom of Information Act. Annual reports of the activities of the US Army Chemical Corps from 1945 to 1959 have revealed significant increases in activity in biological warfare research. The Corps research activity progressed from work on anthrax in 1941, through anti‐crop agents in the mid‐1940s, to a wider range of animal, plant and human diseases by 1960. A number of disease organisms were investigated sufficiently to permit some standardisation and manufacture of munitions.

A magic sword or a big itch: An historical look at the United States biological weapons programme

In the late 1950s interest in entomological warfare increased, and literature describing the US biological warfare programmes on the use of the mosquito Aedes aegypti, the vector for transmitting yellow fever, has now been released. Yellow fever was considered as a suitable disease to use in southern regions of the former Soviet Union. The US destroyed its biological weapon stockpiles in the early 1970s. In addition to its offensive biological warfare programme, the US conducted extensive trials to assess its own vulnerability to biological attack. These trials and a later series of threat analyses indicate that biological agents could, indeed, affect large areas of the US if the attackers were allowed to proceed unmolested. Some of the threat analyses present highly questionable scenarios.

The Impact of the Development of Modern Biology and Medicine on the Evolution of Offensive Biological Warfare Programs in the Twentieth Century

The Impact of the Development of Modern Biology and Medicine on the Evolution of Offensive Biological Warfare Programs in the Twentieth Century

Biological warfare. A historical perspective

The deliberate use of microorganisms and toxins as weapons has been attempted throughout history. Biological warfare has evolved from the crude use of cadavers to contaminate water supplies to the development of specialized munitions for battlefield and covert use. The modern development of biological agents as weapons has paralleled advances in basic and applied microbiology. These include the identification of virulent pathogens suitable for aerosol delivery and industrial-scale fermentation processes to produce large quantities of pathogens and toxins. The history of biological warfare is difficult to assess because of a number of confounding factors. These include difficulties in verification of alleged or attempted biological attacks, the use of allegations of biological attacks for propaganda purposes, the paucity of pertinent microbiological or epidemiologic data, and the incidence of naturally occurring endemic or epidemic diseases during hostilities. Biological warfare has been renounced by 140 nations, primarily for strategic and other pragmatic reasons. International diplomatic efforts, including the 1972 Biological Weapons Convention, have not been entirely effective in preventing the enhancement and proliferation of offensive biological warfare programs. The threats posed by biological weapons are likely to continue into the future.

Biological Warfare

The deliberate use of microorganisms and toxins as weapons has been attempted throughout history. Biological warfare has evolved from the crude use of cadavers to contaminate water supplies to the development of specialized munitions for battlefield and covert use. The modern development of biological agents as weapons has paralleled advances in basic and applied microbiology. These include the identification of virulent pathogens suitable for aerosol delivery and industrial-scale fermentation processes to produce large quantities of pathogens and toxins. The history of biological warfare is difficult to assess because of a number of confounding factors. These include difficulties in verification of alleged or attempted biological attacks, the use of allegations of biological attacks for propaganda purposes, the paucity of pertinent microbiological or epidemiologic data, and the incidence of naturally occurring endemic or epidemic diseases during hostilities. Biological warfare has been renounced by 140 nations, primarily for strategic and other pragmatic reasons. International diplomatic efforts, including the 1972 Biological Weapons Convention, have not been entirely effective in preventing the enhancement and proliferation of offensive biological warfare programs. The threats posed by biological weapons are likely to continue into the future.

“DARPAesque” risk in biological warfare programs

“DARPAesque” risk in biological warfare programs