Posted on 01/19/2004 11:00:30 PM PST by flamefront
[An extensive set of articles referred to lay out a definitive explanation on the source of the anthrax mailings.]
Link to story: http://www.anthraxandalqaeda.com
"Dad," he whispered. His Dad could barely hear him. "'I've been arrested, I'm being taken, I don't know where or why." Moazzam Begg was in the trunk of a car being taken away from his apartment in Islamabad. He had been picked up by Pakistan and US agents. The Britoner had come to Pakistan with his wife and children after the US strikes began in Afghanistan. It was February 2002. Months later, he would confess to being involved with an Al Qaeda plot to disperse weaponized anthrax using a drone. His name had been found on a money transfer in the one-room chemical bunker of Egyptian scientist Midhat Mursi at a camp in Afghanistan.
In early June 2003, a Central Intelligence Agency ("CIA") report publicly disclosed that the reason for Mohammed Atta's and Zacarias Moussaoui's inquiries into cropdusters was for the contemplated use in dispersing biological agents such as anthrax. An early September 2003 Newsweek article included a rumor by a Taliban source that at a meeting in April 2003 Bin Laden was planning an "unbelievable" biological attack, the plans for which had suffered a setback upon the arrest of Khalid Shaikh Mohammed ("KSM") the previous month in Rawalpindi, Pakistan. In November 2003, a report by a UN Panel of experts concluded that Al Qaeda is determined to use chemical and biological weapons and is restrained only by technical difficulties.
In November 2003, it was widely reported that a potential terrorist plot had been thwarted in late 2002 after a London-based group tried to buy half a ton of saponin. Saponin enhances the transmission of molecules through biological cell membranes. When combined with a potent toxin, it can ease the absorption of the poison through the skin, experts say. Midhat Mursi had worked on a chemical additive to increase skin absorption.
The CIA reportedly has been quietly building a case that the anthrax mailings were an international plot. This is old news. It's just no longer bureaucratically impolite to openly contest the FBI's (former) theory about a lone, American scientist. Many people have argued that a US-based Al Qaeda operative is behind the earlier Fall 2001 anthrax mailings in the US, and that the mailings served as a threat and warning. This would follow the pattern of letters they sent 1997 to newspaper branches in Washington, D.C. and New York City, as well as symbolic targets. The letters bombs were sent in connection with the detention of those responsible for the earlier World Trade Center bombing in 1993. Handwritten notes and files on a laptop seized upon the capture of KSM, Al Qaeda's #3, included a feasible anthrax production plan using a spray dryer and addressed the recruitment of necessary expertise. What your morning paper did not tell you, however, was that the CIA seized a similar disc from Ayman Zawahiri's right-hand, Ahmed Salama Mabruk, 5 years earlier. The computer disk was confiscated from him during his arrest by the CIA in Azerbaijan and reportedly handed over to the Egyptian authorities. Mabruk, at the time, was the head of Jihad's military operations. There is a risk that observers underestimate the time that Al Qaeda has had to make progress in such recruitment and research and development.
Some may still think that even in the final stages of the 9/11 plot, Zacarias Moussaoui was going to fly a 5th plane into the Capitol or White House. There is an e-mail by Moussaoui, however, dated July 31, 2001 indicating that he sought to take a crop dusting course that was to last up to 6 months. Moreover, in March 2003, Mohammed, reportedly said that Moussaoui was not going to be part of 9/11 but was to be part of a "second wave." Accused September 11 conspirator Zacarias Moussaoui told his trial judge that he had an al Qaeda mission that would have come after the terrorist attacks. KSM explained that his inquiries about crop dusters may have been related to the anthrax work being done by US-trained biochemist and Al Qaeda operative, Malaysian Yazid Sufaat. Al Qaeda's regional operative, Hambali, who was at a key January 2000 meeting and supervised Sufaat, has been captured. Hambali reportedly is cooperating. Zacarias Moussaoui, never the sharpest tool in the shed and thought by his superiors to be unreliable, has told the judge at his trial in a filing that he wants "anthrax for Jew sympathizer only."
Sufaat, according to both KSM and Hambali, did not have the virulent US Army Ames strain that would be used. That would require someone who had access to the strain. But if experience is any guide, nothing would stand in the way of Dr. Ayman Zawahiri's decade-long quest to weaponize and use anthrax against US targets that was described by one confidante to an Egyptian newspaper reporter. The islamist had been released from Egyptian prison and had known Zawahiri well for many years. Zawahiri was the leader of a faction of the Egyptian Islamic Jihad known as the Vanguards of Conquest. He was seeking to recreate Mohammed's taking of mecca by a small band through violent attacks on Egyptian leaders. By the mid-1990s, Zawahiri had determined that the group should focus on its struggle against the United States and hold off on further attacks against the Egyptian regime. A key question is how they acquired the anthrax strain first isolated by the Texas Veterinary Medical Diagnostic Lab in 1980. According to senior counterterrorism officials, both here and abroad, among the supporters of these militant islamists were people who blended into society and were available to act when another part of the network requested it.
A few days before Christmas 2003, after a renewed audiotape threat by Zawahiri of attacks, to include in the US homeland, the threat level was raised to orange or "high." According to some reports, Zawahiri is thought by intelligence to be Iran, on the border adjacent to Pakistan and Afghanistan. Wherever he is, authorities need to focus on the traceable connection between him and those he recruited.
First, Al Qaeda has had anthrax, the raw seed product in its unweaponized form, since at least 1997, when it was purchased by Bin Laden through the Moro Islamic Liberation Front ("Moro Front" or "MILF"). Zawahiri, Al Qaeda's #2, is head of Al Qaeda's biochemical program. The CIA has known of Zawahiri's plans to use anthrax for a half decade. The confidante and right-hand man of Dr. Ayman Zawahiri admitted that Zawahiri succeeded in obtaining anthrax and intended to use it against US targets. Another senior Al Qaeda member (a shura or policy-making council member no less) was working for the Egyptian intelligence services and he confirmed the report in a sworn lengthy confession. Even Zawahiri's attorney in 1999 said that Bin Laden and Zawahiri were likely to resort to the biological and chemical agents they possessed given the extradition pressure senior Al Qaeda leaders faced. A recently released islamist who had been a close associate of Zawahiri said that Zawahiri spent a decade and had made 15 separate attempts to recruit the necessary expertise to weaponize anthrax in Russia and the Middle East. The US Army recipe was not used, and obtaining the unprocessed Ames strain of anthrax used does not pose much of an obstacle or warrant the weight given it by some press accounts. There was lax control over the distribution of the Ames strain that was used, especially in light of the fact that transfers were not even required to be recorded prior to 1997. Significantly, the individual who isolated it nearly a quarter century ago (now retired), upon being contacted, does not report that he sent the only copy of the strain to Ft. Detrick.
Al Qaeda's anthrax production plans on Khalid Mohammed's computer did not evidence knowledge of advanced techniques in the most efficient biological weapons. At least according to the public comments by bioweaponeer experts William Patrick and Kenneth Alibek, under the optimal method, there is no electrostatic charge; in the case of the anthrax used in the mailings, there was an electrostatic charge. Although there was a dominance of single spores and a trillion spore concentration, there were clumps as large as 40 - 100 microns. (Spores must be no bigger than 5 microns to be inhalable.) As Kenneth Alibek, the former head of Russia's anthrax production program, explained on March 31, 2003 in response to a written question, "This anthrax wasn't sophisticated, didn't have coatings, had electric charge and many other things." Many point to the trillion spore concentration as extraordinary. It is far simpler, however, to achieve a trillion spore concentration in the production of a few grams than in industrial processing typical of a state sponsored lab. The "trillion spore" issue was at the heart of a lot of mistaken theories of the matter concluding that state sponsorship was necessarily indicated. The reported finding at Dugway undermines the argument of both the "bomb Iraq" crowd and the liberals focused on Dr. Steve Hatfill who object to US biodefense research because they view it as being useful for offensive purposes.
USDA employee Johnelle Bryant first told us, in sensational detail, of Atta's inquiries about purchasing and retrofitting a cropduster. Khalid Mohammed then told interrogators that Zacarias Moussaoui's inquiries about crop dusting may have related to Yazid Sufaat's anthrax manufacturing plans. Although the details of the documents on Mohammed's computer may (or may not) point to possible difficulties in aerial dispersal, they are fully consistent with the product used in the anthrax mailings. Al Qaeda had both the means and opportunity.
US-trained Malaysian biochemist Yazid Sufaat met with 9/11 plotters and two hijackers in January 2000. Sufaat was a member of Al Qaeda and a member of Jemaah Islamiah ("JI"). JI has ties with the Moro Front. Sufaat used his company called Green Laboratory Medicine to buy items useful to Al Qaeda. (Green symbolizes "Islam" and Prophet Mohammed's holy war). Zacarias Moussaoui, who had a crop dusting manual when he was arrested, stayed at Sufaat's condominium in 2000 when he was trying to arrange for flight lessons in Malaysia. Yazid Sufaat provided Moussaoui with a letter indicating that he was a marketing representative for Infocus Technologies and allegedly provided him $35,000. The crop dusters were to be part of a "second wave."
After 9/11, Yazid Sufaat traveled to Afghanistan and Pakistan to work for the Taliban Medical Brigade and to continue his work with anthrax. As described in US News, a former reporter from the Kabul Times apparently actually met Sufaat, without realizing it, while traveling near Kabul in October 2001, perceiving him as Filipino. The fellow was carrying papers from Zawahiri and bragging about his ability to manipulate anthrax. Sufaat was arrested in December 2001 upon his return to Malaysia. Newsweek reported that a "second wave" involving biological attacks had been thwarted upon the arrest of Al Qaeda members who had been intended to provide logistical support.
Various doctors, both foreign and American, are associated with Al Qaeda leaders or operatives, to include the doctors Abdul Qadoos Khan, a bacteriologist from Rawalpindi and Aafia Siddiqui, PhD, from Karachi. Microbiologist Abdul Qadoos Khan was charged along with his son, Ahmed, for harboring the fugitives. As of March 28, 2003, he was in a hospital for a cardiac problem and had been granted "pre-arrest bail." Yet all you read about at the time was the arrest of the son Ahmed Abdul Qadoos, who receives a stipend from the UN for being officially low-IQ due to lead poisoning.
It was Khalid Mohammed who told authorities about MIT-trained biologist Aafia Siddiqui, who at one time was thought to be traveling with a Florida "Atta level" pilot. All the Pakistani press reported that she was nabbed in Karachi after being spotted at the international airport on March 29. For the longest time, no US newspaper had yet reported that she was captured and instead stories continued to state that the FBI is seeking her for questioning. If the sources relied upon by these journalists did not even know (or would not reveal) that Aafia had been caught, why do these reporters think they know what's going on in the Amerithrax matter? Amerithrax is a confidential investigation. The Pakistan ISI and CIA rarely grant press interviews in connection with an ongoing manhunt. The CIA did not even allow the FBI access to KSM for 10 days after his arrest. As agent Van Harp, then head of the Amerithrax investigation said, the information coming from Khalid Mohammed is classified with the authorities releasing only certain limited information. According to the Pakistan reports, Aafia Siddiqui was spotted at the international airport and detained (after she was followed to a relative's house). Some reports say she was coming from abroad, but the original report the others are all copying say she was coming from "upcountry." (Karachi is in the south). The reports say she is suspected of having been a member of Al Qaeda's "Chemical Wire Group." Perhaps something got lost in the translation, but the phrase "Chemical Wire Group" has appeared in all the english Pakistan and India papers.
Officials have not publicly confirmed anything about the detention or interrogation. There still is a very hot pursuit of the "Atta-level" Florida pilot that Siddiqui is thought to have known and been assisting. He is said by one FBI agent to be "very, very, very" dangerous. The United States truly no longer has time for faulty analysis or politically-based preconceptions. In early June 2003, a CIA report concluded that the reason for Atta's and Zacarias Moussaoui's inquiries into cropdusters was in fact for the contemplated use in dispersing biological agents such as anthrax. It has long been known Osama Bin Laden was interested in using cropdusters to disperse biological agents (since the testimony of millennium bomber Ahmed Ressam).
The hijacker Ahmed Alhaznawi appears to have contracted cutaneous anthrax in Afghanistan. It's reasonable to credit his statement that he got the lesion after bumping into a suitcase he was carrying at a camp in Afghanistan. The lesion is further evidence of Al Qaeda's anthrax production program in Afghanistan.
One potential lead concerned a Fort Lee New Jersey $100,000 processor possibly of a type that could have been used to weaponize the anthrax. The processor was paid for in cash after a check-kiting scheme. The processor was delivered to a business front in Ft. Lee at 215 Main St. The address was 1 mile from pilot Nawaf al-Hazmi at 96 Linwood Plaza, one of the two hijackers who had attended the January 2000 meeting with anthrax technician Yazid Sufaat. Nawaf Al-hamzi and Khalid Almidhar stayed at Yazid Sufaat's condominium outside Kuala Lumpur. It eventually was determined that these two were on a level comparable to Atta for planning purposes.
The present evidence relating to Atta's travel to Prague does not warrant a conclusion that Al Qaeda obtained the Ames strain from Iraq. Iraq, however, remains a possible source of the Ames. Former Russian bioweaponeer Ken Alibek has said that a key Russian scientist assisted Iraq and that Russia had the Ames strain. Zawahiri traveled to Baghdad in 1998 with an entourage to attend the birthday party of Saddam's son. The papers found at headquarters of the Mukhabarat, Iraq's secret police, show that an entourage from Al Qaeda group was sent to the Iraqi capital in March 1998 from Sudan. According to at least some reports, Bin Laden rejected the suggestion of a closer alliance -- preferring to pursue his own concept of jihad. Two top Iraqi scientists, code named Charlie and Alpha, are helping the coalition to learn more about Iraqi's anthrax program, according to Dr. David Kay, head of the Iraq survey group in charge of the hunt for WMD. He has said that the Iraqis made surprising innovations in the milling and drying processes needed to weaponize anthrax.
Second, the media coverage has been seriously confused on the issue of motive and the reason Senators Daschle and Leahy would have been targeted -- tending to simplistically view them as "liberals." Zawahiri likely targeted Senators Daschle and Leahy to receive anthrax letters, in addition to various media outlets, because of the appropriations made pursuant to the "Leahy Law" to military and security forces. That money has prevented the militant islamists from achieving their goals. Al Qaeda members and sympathizers feel that the FBI's involvement in muslim countries like Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Indonesia, and the Philippines interferes with the sovereignty of those countries. Indeed, the "Leahy Law" had one of its most well-known applications in Indonesia. Senator Leahy was Chairman of both the Judiciary Committee overseeing the FBI and Appropriations Subcommittee in charge of foreign aid to these countries. In late September 2001, it was announced that the President was seeking a blanket waiver that would lift all restrictions on aid to military and security units in connection with pursuing the militant islamists. This extradition and imprisonment of Al Qaeda leaders, along with US support for Israel and the Mubarak government in Egypt, remains foremost in the mind of Dr. Zawahiri. At the height of the development of his biological weapons program, his brother was extradited and executed pursuant to a death sentence in the "Albanian returnees" case. It's hard to keep up with the stories about billion dollar appropriations, debt forgiveness, and loan guarantees to countries like Egypt and Israel and now even Pakistan -- and those appropriations pale in comparison to the $87 billion in a "Supplemental" appropriation relating to the invasion of Iraq. Al Qaeda had a motive in mind.
In his Fall 2001 book titled "Knights under the Banner of the Prophet," Zawahiri argued that the secular press was telling "lies" about the militant islamists -- to include the suggestion that the militant islamists were somehow the creation of the United States in connection with expelling the Russians from Afghanistan. Zawahiri argued instead that they have been active since the assassination of Anwar Sadat in Egypt because of the treaty between the Camp David Accord and the resulting peace treaty between Egypt and Israel. The anthrax letters were sent on the date of the Camp David Accord and then the date Anwar Sadat was assassinated as if to underscore the point to anyone paying attention. Most of the "talking heads" on television, however, knew only that Daschle and Leahy were liberal democrats and did not know anything of Al Qaeda beyond what they read in the newspapers. The FBI's profile includes a US-based supporter of the militant islamists. Attorney General Ashcroft has always said that an "either-or" approach is not useful. The media has tended to overlook the fact that when the FBI uses the word "domestic" the word includes a US-based, highly-educated supporter of the militant islamists.
There is an emerging consensus that anthrax was contained in a letter to AMI, the publisher of the National Enquirer -- in a goofy love letter to Jennifer Lopez enclosing a Star of David. A report by the Center for Disease Control of interviews with AMI employees (as well as detailed interviews by author Leonard Cole) supports the conclusion that there were not one, but two, such mailings containing anthrax. (The letters apparently were to different AMI publications -- for example, one may have been to the National Enquirer and another to The Globe.)
Third, this tactic of letters is not merely the modus operandi of these militant islamists inspired by Zawahiri, it is their signature. The islamists sent letter bombs in January 1997 to newspaper offices in New York City and Washington, D.C. in connection with the earlier bombing of the World Trade Center and the imprisonment of the blind sheik, Sheik Abdel Rahman. The former leader of the Egyptian Al-Gamaa al-Islamiya ("Islamic Group"), he was also a spiritual leader of Al Qaeda. The letter bombs were sent in connection with the treatment of the Egyptian islamists imprisoned for the earlier attack on the WTC and a related plot. The purpose of the letter bombs -- which resulted in minimal casualty -- was to send a message. (There is an outstanding $2 million reward). There was no claim of responsibility. There was no explanation. Once one had been received, the next ten, mailed on two separate dates, were easily collected. Sound familiar? Two bombs were also sent to Leavenworth, where a key WTC 1993 defendant was imprisoned, addressed to "Parole Officer" (a position that does not exist).
Abdel Rahman's son was captured in Quetta, Pakistan in mid-February 2003. That arrest in turn led to the dramatic capture of Khalid Mohammed, Al Qaeda's #3. Mohammed was hiding in the home of the Pakistani bacteriologist Dr. Abdul Qadoos Khan. Along with Zawahiri, Abdel Rahman and his two sons have long had considerable influence over Bin Laden. He reportedly treated them like sons. Zawahiri and OBL are Rahman's friends. The imprisoned WTC 1993 plotter Yousef was KSM's nephew. Thus, the leaders in charge of Al Qaeda's anthrax production program had a close connection to those imprisoned in connection with the earlier bombing of the World Trade Center. Osama Bin Laden had asked Iraqi intelligence for technical assistance in sending letter bombs a half year before the Al Hayat letters were sent.
A sender purporting to be islamist sent cyanide in both early 2002 and early 2003 in New Zealand and ingredients of nerve gas in Belgium in 2003. There's even a chapter titled "Poisonous Letter" in the Al Qaeda manual. Just because Al Qaeda likes its truck bombs and the like to be effective does not mean they don't see the value in a deadly missive. As Brian Jenkins once said, "terrorism is theater."
The mailer's use of Greendale School is revealing. Documents establish that Zawahiri used "school" as a code word for Al Qaeda in his correspondence. Green symbolizes Islam and was the Prophet Mohammed's color. By Greendale School, the anthrax perp was being cute, just as Yazid Sufaat was being cute in naming his lab Green Laboratory Medicine. "Dale" means "river valley." Greendale refers to green river valley -- i.e., Cairo's Egyptian Islamic Jihad or the Islamic Group. The sender is announcing that he is of either Egyptian Islamic Jihad, Egyptian Islamic Group or Jihad-al Qaeda, which is actually the full name of the group after the 1998 merger of the Egyptian Islamic Jihad and al Qaeda.
Fourth, as to opportunity, though seldom reported, there is a wealth of "open source" information about possible Al Qaeda or Egyptian Islamic Jihad or Islamic Group in the United States and Canada. The public information mostly relates to those suspected sleepers who have been detained or who are at large and are being sought. Zawahiri's mission in the United States in 1995 was to do spadework for terrorism, not fundraising. He traveled under an alias and was accompanied by a US Army sergeant anemd Ali Mohammed. What mosques exactly did they visit and who did they meet?
Whatever your political persuasion (mine is Naderite), the FBI and CIA deserve our support. We are, after all, in this together. First, the nature of such an investigation is that we lack sufficient information to second-guess (or even know) what the FBI is doing. Media reports are a poor approximation of reality because of the lack of good sources. Second, hindsight is 20/20. Third, with the "new age" Efrem Zimbalist, Jr. in charge of the investigation, it is not likely we could do better in striking the appropriate balance between due process and national security.
Finally, the "Hatfill theory" seems to have been exhausted or at least lost public favor. The "Hatfill theory" accusing Dr. Stephen Hatfill was always highly dubious. The suspicion was founded on many false premises, and there was no reliable evidence indicating his guilt. The FBI's fixation on Hatfill (at least as rumored by some reporters) may have stemmed from a warning by one Senator that careers hung in the balance. Leahy's chief of staff started with the strong predisposition that some right-winger was involved because two liberal democrats had been targeted. The Hatfill theory -- to include ongoing interviews and ongoing 7/24 surveillance by 8 surveillance specialists -- is now the subject of a pending civil rights claim of uncertain merit. The statute of limitation for the libel suit threatened against the New York Times expired in most jurisdictions the first week in July 2003. The Hatfill theory ironically may best be understood as an Al Qaeda theory, with a coincidental Malaysian connection adding to the other circumstances. Given the regrettable leaks that he was under suspicion, it is only fair that the FBI leak with equal enthusiasm the fact that Dr. Hatfill has now been dropped as a suspect.
Unlike you, I don't depend upon other people to do my thinking for me.
The data shows that the J-Lo letter could not have contained anthrax. Look at the floor charts again. There was very little anthrax around the area where the J-Lo letter was opened and examined. Stephanie Dailey tested positive for exposure to anthrax and she was on vacation when the J-Lo letter arrived. The J-Lo letter was passed around to several people besides Bob Stevens, yet none of the others tested positive for exposure.
If the data says one thing and if some official says another, I'll believe the data.
Ed
I was just looking at the evidence. You are saying the evidence means nothing because it doesn't fit your theory.
You say you are looking at all the evidence but you ignore the fact that the third floor where the J-Lo letter was opened and examined has less contamination than both of the other floors in the building. How do you twist the facts to explain that?
Ed
Once again you are manufaturing evidence to achieve a political goal.
Just to make certain I understand you correctly, let's go over this again.
Are you saying that it means nothing that the third floor - where the J-Lo letter was opened and passed around - has less contamination than any other floor in the AMI building? You still believe the J-Lo letter contained the anthrax?
And you are also saying that it means nothing that area around Stephanie Dailey's desk on the first floor is the most contaminated area in the building. And you're saying that and the fact that she tested positive for exposure to anthrax mean nothing.
If such tests mean nothing, why did the CDC make the tests?
And if the CDC did the tests and produced the charts, why do you accuse me of "manufacturing evidence"? Shouldn't you be accusing the CDC of "manufacturing evidence"?
I think we just need to hear you explain why the area where the J-Lo letter was opened and passed around shows almost no sign of anthrax. And why the area where the other letter was opened shows very high contamination from anthrax. If we can get your explanation on that, then we'll all understand your point of view and that will bring this discussion to an end.
We can all then just have a big laugh and move on.
Ed
Okay. So, you accept Stephanie Dailey's positive test as evidence. But she was on vacation for two weeks - from September 8 through September 23 - and that includes the date that the J-Lo letter was opened and passed around on the third floor. How did she get exposed? And how do you explain all the positive test results around her desk if the J-Lo letter contained the anthrax?
Thus you TOTALLY manufacture "evidence" - evidence which is simply meaningless and does not exist.
So, does that mean you are not going to try to explain why the third floor is the least contaminated floor in the building?
Or are you saying that negative results on that floor could actually be positive results because negative results have no meaning?
We just need to hear your explanation of why the area where the J-Lo letter was opened and examined is so free of contamination. That's all.
Ed
Yes, and so did nearly a hundred other places in the building. Were anthrax letters also opened in those other places? Or does the finding of a single spore or two mean nothing by itself?
The building was thoroughly contaminated. Finding a single spore or two in any specific place means little. It's where the spores were concentrated that means something.
look for where most of the anthrax ended up.
The CDC charts show where most of the anthrax ended up - on the first floor around Stephanie Dailey's desk. And that is the result of positive test results, which you say qualify as "evidence".
For all you know they vaccumed the first floor first then emptied their bags in the 3rd floor.
As usual, you are TOTALLY SPECULATING
You suggest that they may have vacuumed the first floor and emptied the bags on the third floor? Interesting. And that wouldn't be considered "speculation"? But how would that explain the fact that the first floor remained the most contaminated floor and the third floor remained the least contaminated floor?
Hint - It rises!
That's an interesting explanation of physics. So, you think that would mean that all the spores would be on the ceiling instead of the floor? Interesting.
According to Graysmith's book, the air conditioning vents were relatively free of anthrax. If spores act the way you suggest, shouldn't they have been filled with anthrax?
Have you forgotten that, according to the FBI, when Stephanie Dailey opened the anthrax letter she contaminated the copy paper near her desk, and the rest of the building was contaminated by people taking the copy paper to the many copy machines around the building. Are you saying that the FBI was wrong about that? I am. But I'm wondering if you are saying so, too.
Ed
Can you provide a source for this observation?
I'm curious how exposures can me measured if negative results don't prove negative exposure.
Ed
Ed
Where did I say the September 25 letter DIDN'T contain anthrax? On the contrary, I agree with the CDC official conclusions - there were TWO anthrax letters sent to AMI, one mailed to the Enquirer, and one mailed to Sun.
Okay. That just leaves the question of why all the evidence indicates that the J-Lo letter did not contain anthrax. No significant amount of anthrax was detected in the area where the letters was opened. None of the other people who opened and examined the J-Lo letter came down with anthrax.
"Early in the anthrax outbreak, nasal swabs were being used as an indicator of human exposure to aerosolized anthrax spores. While the intent was right, it became clear quickly that this methodology was highly flawed and was not a reliable predictor of exposure. Several of the individuals that died from inhalation anthrax had negative nasal swabs. The CDC readily acknowledged that a negative nasal swab did not mean that a person was not exposed."
It seems you have difficulty understanding this concept. Read the article I have linked to CAREFULLY!
It means that whilst positive nasal swab tests ARE a reliable indicator of exposure, negative tests ARE NOT a reliable indicator of NO exposure.
Okay. No problem. I suppose it is theoretically possible that everyone who examined the J-Lo letter could have had negative test results on their nasal swabs. But we still have the matter of no one else who examined the J-Lo letter coming down with anthrax. And, of course, the matter of very little anthrax being in the area where the J-Lo letter was opened and passed around. In the area where the actual anthrax letter was opened and then tossed into a waste basket without being passed around the entire area is very contaminated.
Are you still not prepared to tell us why you aren't following Meselson's advice? Here's what he wrote in his personal letter to you:
"You should insist on official confirmation of any claims of additives before believing there are any in the Daschle/ Leahy material."
If there is some "official confirmation" of additives being in the Daschle anthrax I haven't seen it. Are you referring to the AFIP article? It does NOT mention "additives" any more than it mentions "coatings". It merely says:
AFIP experts utilized an energy dispersive X-ray spectrometer (an instrument used to detect the presence of otherwise-unseen chemicals through characteristic wavelengths of X-ray light) to confirm the previously unidentifiable substance as silica.
Professor Meselson was referring to that fact when he wrote me. So, I'm still waiting for "official confirmation" of an additive. The AFIP article doesn't mention an additive, and it's been stated by bioweapons experts that the silica could have come from some drying method or from some aspect of the growth medium, the growth environment, etc. So, we don't know the source of the silica.
The fact that people read inaccurate reports in the newspapers that the newspapers and believed those reports is not "official confirmation". It is rumor.
No one who has actually SEEN the anthrax has said that there were additives or that the spores were coated. Everything about "additives" and "coatings" on the Daschle anthrax is just rumor and speculation.
All three messages answered. Time to move on.
Ed
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