Source of Ames anthrax - still a question mark

29 june 2002

[Ordinary_American]

So why choose this strain? "Ames is certainly a challenge to any vaccine," Martin Hugh-Jones of Louisiana State University at Baton Rouge told New Scientist. When lab animals immunised with the vaccine now being given to thousands of American troops are exposed to anthrax, many are still killed by the Ames strain.

Alternatively, the attackers may simply have wanted a strain of proven virulence that's hard to trace, says Ken Alibek, former deputy head of the Soviet bioweapons programme. "If I were a terrorist I would certainly not use a strain known to be from my country," he told New Scientist.

The Soviets did not mass-produce Ames, says Alibek (Does that mean they had it?). Nor did the Iraqis. Like Britain in the 1940s, Iraq favoured the Vollum strain, isolated at Oxford in 1930, which has been identified in samples from its Al Hakam plant. And the White House reiterated last week that all anthrax mass-produced in the US was destroyed after 1969.

Despite this, Ames would not have been have been hard to find. Samples of the weapons strain were kept in the US and elsewhere. "The South African collection had hundreds of different strains," Alibek points out. (New Scientist, 25 October 2001)

South African Surgeon-General during apartheid Neils Knobel, the mid-wife of SA’s biowarfare program, said “Listen, we had to do some penetrations. So we penetrated the American biological program, we penetrated the Russion program, we penetrated the United Kingdom”.

Referring to Dr. Wouter Basson, former head of the South African bioweapons program (1982-1993), Knobel said: “He went to Porton Down, he got a tour in Porton Down. And he went to Fort Detrick. I’m telling you, he infiltrated them all”. (Plague Wars, Tom Mangold)

Basson's position in the military as well as his connections with top military officials allowed him to gain access to valuable information, services and products. He seldom presented himself as a military man, but rather posed as a draft-dodger, researcher or wealthy business man. Basson claims to have gained entrance into Porton Down, London and Fort Detrick, Maryland. Through the help of the South African government, Basson's fake passports and skill allowed him to infiltrate the intelligence services of Britain, France, Germany, Israel, Iran, Iraq, Libya, Taiwan, China, Pakistan and the United States.

Basson revealed that he was not only married to the sister of a Belgian business partner to get a passport and freedom of movement, but that he also married a Russian and a Bulgarian woman in 1988/89 for the same reasons. http://www.news24.com/News24/South_Africa/0,1113,2-7_1074876,00.html

His first task was to gather information and in 1984, Basson claims, he was introduced by a German industrialist named Blucher to the international "CBW Mafia", a group of experts in the field who met monthly to swop information and help one another acquire the lethal tools of their clandestine trade.

It was here, Basson claims, that he formed a relationship with Abdul Razak, a senior Libyan intelligence agent, an East German spy named Dieter Dreier and a mysterious Russian by the name of Vorobyov.

According to Dr. Basson, Libyan assistance was critical in South Africa’s acquisition of equipment and technology used in the production of chemical and biological weapons. Basson reportedly visited Libya after the fall of the apartheid government in 1994. Libya and the case against Wouter Basson (Mail & Guardian (Johannesburg), Marlene Burger, August 10, 2001).

According to a December 20th article in the New York Times, an Iraqi defector, Adnan Ihsan Saeed al-Haideri, personally worked on renovations of 20 secret facilities in Iraqi engaged in biological, chemical, and nuclear weapons research. While working at any of these sites, did Mr. al-Haideri see any Petri dishes marked “Anthrax – Ames strain?

[Mitchell]

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[Mitchell]

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