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Call me a believer in conspiracy theories, but I still don't think the Iraq and Prague track has been properly investigated.
This is just a re-hash of old theories about "weaponization" that were debunked nearly ten years ago.
It has been shown conclusively that the silicon in the attack spores had nothing to do with "weaponization." The silicon was absorbed into the spore coats when the spores were formed. It was NOT added later as part of some "weaponization" process.
But, there are still some unanswered questions.
1. Investigators don't know exactly what method Bruce Ivins used to create the spores, so they can't reproduce his results exactly.
2. The New York Post powder evidently contained some clumps of material that had a high percentage (10% or so) of silicon. How that high percentage occurred can only be a educated guess.
The educated guess is: The material in the NY Post powder had been centrifuged, and, as a result, loose silicon in the "matrix material" (the slime left behind when the mother germ dissolves and releases the spore) and in the growth media concentrated as a layer in the centrifuge tube. The material was then dried and chopped up or ground up to produce the powder. The silicon layer is the material that tested as being 10% or more silicon.
There's nothing difficult about it. But, since no one can state with certainty that that is the true and only explanation for the silicon concentration, the conspiracy theorists can continue to argue that the silicon concentration is proof of some highly-sophisticated weaponization process that can only be done by some super lab run by some large government.
The conspiracy theories are total nonsense. But how can anyone conclusively prove they're nonsense? And how do you get the conspiracy theorists to accept the proof?
And how do you get reporters to debunk things that are told to them by scientists with perfect credentials?
Reporters need to be able to tell the difference between scientists with beliefs and scientists with facts. The scientist cited in this article had other theories about weaponization that were totally debunked. This is just his latest theory.