Biological weapon

Biological weapons are infectious or toxic agents used in warfare. In the Western world, they are banned under the Biological Weapons Convention of 1975 but some countries still have stocks of them. Biological weapons have the potential of a deadly threat against civilian populations.

China

China agreed to the Biological Weapons Convention in 1984, but both academics and government agencies have asserted that the regime is a world leader in bioweapon production.

James Giordano, a neurology professor at Georgetown University and senior fellow in biowarfare at the U.S. Special Operations Command, said China’s growing investment in bio-science, looser ethics around gene-editing and other cutting-edge technology and integration between government and academia raise the spectre of deadly pathogens being weaponized. In a 2015 academic paper Dany Shoham, a biological and chemical warfare expert at Israel’s Bar-Ilan University asserts that more than 40 Chinese facilities are involved in bio-weapon production.

SARS CoV-2

Leaked Chinese document.

See also: Coronavirus

COVID-19 was created in a laboratory by the Chinese People's Liberation Army and fine-tuned as a bioweapon. It was specifically designed to be highly contagious, but often asymptomatic, have low lethality, but produce uncontrollable variants and possessing characteristics providing plausible deniability as a bioweapon.

According to Chinese military doctrine, such bioweapons are used prior to a declaration of war for political or international strategic needs, where the use of which can be denied. The intent, according to leaked documents, being: "Even if the academic evidence, virological evidence, and animal experiment data could possibly prove (that the virus comes from the lab), we can just deny it, stop (investigation), suppress (scholars), make sure the international organizations and honest people’s work is futile.”

A fully formed sample of COVID-19 was ready for testing in early 2019, while a parallel vaccine program was underway.

Scientists from the Wuhan Institute of Virology were chosen to participate in non-human primate (monkeys) transmission testing, simulated coronavirus release and response exercises such as at Wuhan’s Tianhe airport in September 2019 and an actual test release of COVID-19 at the 2019 Military World Games from October 18–27, 2019.

History

Biological warfare is nothing new to Communist China. Indeed, the Peoples Republic of China was born out of a nation that had suffered biological warfare attacks. Biological warfare, and other advances in science and technology, is considered modern warfare under the Chinese Communist Party and the Peoples Liberation Army military doctrine.

Second Sino-Japanese War

See also: Second Sino-Japanese War

After the Japanese occupied the city of Shenyang (formerly Mukden in the Manchu language) in an event known as the Mukden Incident on Sept. 18, 1931, extending Japanese control over large areas in northeastern China, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) fought alongside Japanese invaders to defeat troops of the Republic of China (KMT).

The Japanese set up a covert biological and chemical warfare research and development unit in Harbin. Unit 731 and its affiliated units were involved in research, development and experimental deployment of epidemic-creating biowarfare weapons in assaults against the Chinese populace (both military and civilian) throughout World War II. Plague-infected fleas, bred in the laboratories of Unit 731 and Unit 1644, were spread by low-flying airplanes upon Chinese cities, including coastal Ningbo and Changde, Hunan Province, in 1940 and 1941. This military aerial spraying killed tens of thousands of people with bubonic plague epidemics. An expedition to Nanking involved spreading typhoid and paratyphoid germs into the wells, marshes, and houses of the city, as well as infusing them into snacks to be distributed among the locals. Epidemics broke out shortly after, to the elation of many researchers, where it was concluded that paratyphoid fever was "the most effective" of the pathogens.

At least 12 large-scale field trials of biological weapons were performed, and at least 11 Chinese cities were attacked with biological agents. An attack on Changda in 1941 reportedly led to approximately 10,000 biological casualties and 1,700 deaths among ill-prepared Japanese troops, with most cases due to cholera. Japanese researchers performed tests on prisoners with bubonic plague, cholera, smallpox, botulism, and other diseases. This research led to the development of the defoliation bacilli bomb and the flea bomb used to spread bubonic plague. Some of these bombs were designed with porcelain shells, an idea proposed by Ishii in 1938.

Due to pressure from numerous accounts of the bio-warfare attacks, Chiang Kai-shek sent a delegation of army and foreign medical personnel in November 1941 to document evidence and treat the afflicted. A report on the Japanese use of plague-infested fleas on Changde was made widely available the following year, but was not addressed by the Allied Powers until Franklin D. Roosevelt issued a public warning in 1943 condemning the attacks.

Anthrax

Anthrax has become known as a biological weapon. It became notable in the news in 2001, due to anthrax scares caused by anthrax found in letters written to several media personalities and politicians, including then-Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle. This occurred shortly after 9/11. Twenty-two people developed anthrax infections, and five of them died. Some of the survivors suffer from continuing serious health problems. The strain of anthrax used in the attacks was first developed in a U.S. Army facility in Fort Detrick, Maryland. The wife of one of the victims, Robert Stevens, is suing the U.S. government for lax security. She alleges that the anthrax came from the facility at Fort Detrick.

Russell Welch was an Arkansas State Police criminal investigator assigned to the Mena airport where he monitored air traffic and developed sources of information and methods to determine what drugs were being trafficked into the airport. Welch was exposed to military grade anthrax after he opened a letter which released electrostatically charged floating spores in his face, and his life was saved only after prompt diagnosis and treatment by a medical doctor. Later the doctor's office was burglarized and test results and correspondence with the Center for Disease Control in Atlanta were stolen.

Other events

Smallpox may have been used as a biological weapon in North America in the 18th century. During World War II Britain conducted experiments with anthrax as a biological weapon on Gruinard Island, Scotland.

See also

• CCP global pandemic
• Bioterrorism