Posted on 07/01/2007 8:58:07 AM PDT by TrebleRebel
WASHINGTON — In the fall of 1992, Kanatjan Alibekov defected from Russia to the United States, bringing detailed, and chilling, descriptions of his role in making biological weapons for the former Soviet Union.
----------- Officials still value his seminal depictions of the Soviet program. But recent events have propelled questions about Alibek's reliability:
No biological weapon of mass destruction has been found in Iraq. His most sensational research findings, with U.S. colleagues, have not withstood peer review by scientific specialists. His promotion of nonprescription pills — sold in his name over the Internet and claiming to bolster the immune system — was ridiculed by some scientists. He resigned as executive director of a Virginia university's biodefense center 10 months ago while facing internal strife over his stewardship.
And, as Alibek raised fear of bioterrorism in the United States, he also has sought to profit from that fear.
By his count, Alibek has won about $28 million in federal grants or contracts for himself or entities that hired him.
The Los Angeles Times explored Alibek's public pronouncements, research and business activities as part of a series that will examine companies and government officials central to the U.S. war on terrorism -----------------------
(Excerpt) Read more at latimes.com ...
1. As for Timimi’s classified work, the excellent Atlantic Monthly article explains only:
“Some of the jobs required that Ali obtain a high-level
security clearance; one assignment was in response to a call
from the White House, which provided him with a letter of
commendation after his work was done. He later enrolled as
a doctoral candidate at George Mason University, in north-
ern Virginia, near where he then lived. The specialty he
chose was computational biology, a new field that contained
the promise of breaking fresh ground in medicine through
the advanced use of computers. “
“The school even hired Ali—though it let him
go after he came under suspicion by the FBI—”
http://muslimapple.files.wordpress.com/2006/08/the-education-of-ali-al-timimi.pdf
2. As for any classified work done by the Center for Biodefense, I have no idea what the work done for DARPA entailed — the webpages of the faculty members use big words and thus are of not much help to me. During the 2000-2002 period, DARPA funded the Center in the amount of $13 million, I believe. (But correct me if I’m wrong). There is a 2005 powerpoint presentation describing Dr. Alibek’s work relating to anthrax infection, listing his assistant and contact person. I don’t know whether such research is classified or not, but it doesn’t relate to a method of weaponization. I’m told by a government expert, however, whose lab knows enough to have been raided by the FBI, that the March 2001 patent does relate to a method useful in concentrating biological agents — and useful in weaponizing them. It involves silica in the growth medium. A simple method resulting in a sophisticated product concentrated beyond what otherwise would be the case. While GMU Center for Biodefense students such as yourself did not have accesss to ATCC facilities, the bioinformatics students did as explained on the university webpage. As to the details of Ali’s security clearance, and whether it was still in effect, I have no idea. But thanks very much for the clarification on the BL-3 as of 2004 — that’s the only way to progress to a correct understanding of the details.
3. Like I said, I credit Alibek as an expert and do not mean to suggest he or the Center did anything wrong.
4. The Viorst article says Ali published a half dozen articles while at GMU.
I can’t find more than a couple in case you are better at researching the literature. His published research I’ve seen involved cancer.
5. On the subject of computers, former CIA Director Deutsch used to email notes from classified Pentagon briefings to his home computer via his AOL account. It never pays to underestimate the ability of someone who hopes for the destruction of the United States to read one’s communications.
errata -
Nawaf’s friend from Saudi Arabia, Hani Hanjour, was not at the KL meeting.
He joined Nawaf in San Diego before they then moved to Falls Church — getting a speeding ticket en route in Oklahoma.
Then they moved to New Jersey.
Very interesting reading but unfortunately I have no more facts to offer as most everything described was from before my arrival at Mason. Cheers.
Dear Reader,
Because I am so disappointed that more people don’t take the time to write pleasant and inspiring articles about people rather than write articles showing the darkness and despair within humanity, I am going to tell you in this very public format about Dr. Ken Alibek, a man who I am very honored and privileged to call mentor and friend. If you want to know the truth about this man, keep reading.
Since I mentioned my lack of appreciation for articles that just show the darkness and despair within humanity, I would first like to briefly address David Willman’s July 1, 2007 article about Dr. Alibek. Since I am quite familiar with most everything Mr. Willman described, it made me absolutely furious to see such a biased article full of “inaccuracies” (to use a more polite term). Though I would dearly love to discredit the author and the newspaper, I won’t. I won’t engage the author and the newspaper simply because Dr. Alibek asked me to join him in forgiving them for printing such a biased story full of “inaccuracies” and I agreed to try. It will be exceedingly difficult for me to forgive them as I lack the incredible strength of character required to forgive such a heinous crime. Dr. Alibek does not suffer from the same insufficiency of character…he has already forgiven them.
My husband and I have had the pleasure of knowing this man for three years and we both know him to be an extraordinary individual possessing many fine qualities not apparent to people distracted by his previous work for the former Soviet Army. In fact, I’m confident I know him rather well and that his humility is going to keep him from enjoying this exposition should he ever learn of its existence. Yet I will take the chance of incurring his displeasure in order to tell you about him, someone who is very special in this world. I will preface the rest of my comments by offering forgiveness at this time to those who respond negatively to this posting and just extend my apologies to them as they haven’t had the opportunity my husband and I have had to know such a fine individual.
Yes, Dr. Alibek was highly skilled at making biological weapons for the former Soviet Union but what does that really mean?
1. People gasp when they hear the words chemical, biological, and nuclear weapons but why do they respond that way? It is because they are conditioned to respond that way to weapons of mass casualty or weapons of mass destruction. My perspective is a little different as I view them less passionately along with all of the other weapons man has created to take the life of an adversary…they are all unfortunate innovations. Though I don’t like them, I understand that they are just natural progressions in the development of more effective weapons for war and it makes no sense to vilify their developers any more than the developers of any other weapon. I don’t see the criticisms of those people who invented tanks, grenades, or machine guns. An easy example would be the M249 Light Machine Gun used by troops in our military as it can fire up to 1000 rounds per minute. I have no idea who invented it probably because a weapon with the potential to kill 1000 adversaries/minute doesn’t make the headlines yet its destructive power is obvious.
2. People don’t understand that the process to manufacture biological weapons is very similar to the process to manufacture biopharmaceuticals (but with some important differences). To manufacture biological weapons requires great expertise in biotechnology that can be applied to a variety of products. Dr. Alibek made major improvements to mass production capabilities in the biotechnology field but instead of focusing on what innovative knowledge he has to offer our biotech industry, people focus just on the one product that was of the greatest interest to the former Soviet government, a government at war, and forget that he also produced sera, antibiotics, vaccines, and interferon. He performed a vast amount of work to improve the health of people during those times and he does an unbelievable amount of work to improve the health and welfare of people now. “Dr. Ken Alibek producing biopharmaceuticals that could save the lives of millions of sick children” isn’t nearly as attractive a headline to the masses as “Selling the Threat of Bioterrorism” so you will never see it published anywhere…yet it is the truth. Regardless, he works twice as hard as men half his age in order to ease the suffering of the world’s people. He is a physician not only by training but also by nature.
Instead of discussing events at George Mason University that have been called into question, I will direct you to the information posted online by Ann Workman and ask you to decide for yourself if there is more to the story than what Mr. Willman published. Though I don’t like the use of the term “fascinating”, the documents provided are genuine though I know the information that had the most potential to damage the reputation of the University was removed before posting. Regardless, I believe the documents demonstrate the extreme integrity and motivations of Dr. Ken Alibek and give the reader some insights into the man himself.
You have very patiently waited for me to tell you about Ken Alibek, the man. “What is he like?” is a very common question asked of me and my husband and I will tell you what I tell everyone. First, Dr. Alibek really isn’t going to like that I do this for you because he is a very humble man but I know that he will forgive me.
In addition to his great capacity for forgiveness, the man truly is brilliant and innovative. One misconception I want to clear up right now is about whether or not ironing letters can kill anthrax (B. anthracis) spores. This thoughtful suggestion to people who were really panicked about the possibility of receiving a contaminated letter was discredited, but later Marc Roberge (a high school senior and son of a prominent CDC scientist) conducted an experiment that supported Dr. Alibek’s statement. Mr. Roberge’s experiment and results were to be published in a peer reviewed journal but I haven’t looked for the publication.
I already mentioned throughout this letter that Dr. Alibek is brilliant, innovative, humble, forgiving, strong, and hardworking. He is also very kind, generous, and thoughtful but as the saying goes - do not mistake his kindness for weakness. He is a consummate professional and a highly skilled businessman with noble intentions. He is absolutely dedicated to helping other people…a genuine philanthropist. Additionally, people who truly know him will tell you that he is a man of high integrity as well as a loyal and trustworthy friend. My husband and I are truly fortunate and proud to have him in our lives.
Dr. Debra Anderson
debra51704@yahoo.com
Debra,
My own sense of Ken, from following the heated debate since 2002 about the method of weaponization and the detection of silica, is that he has been generous, direct and what he has said squares with reality. The vitriol that arose, IMO, was due to the conflict between the detection of silica by Armed Force Institute of Pathology (”AFIP”), which found it a major component, and the report by Dr.Alibek and Dr.Meselson that they could not see it on the SEMS images they were shown. The two empirical observations, however, are in fact reconcilable as noted in the post above. Moreover, while some argued that the product was super-sophisticated, it was easier to achieve a trillion spore concentration in a small scale production than in industrial production (through repeated centrifugation). Bottom-line: Dr. Alibek was correct in his expert assessment of the technical characteristics of the anthrax and he never sounded a false note. See, for example, his online chat sponsored by the Washington Post. His argument merely has been that it is possible to achieve a sophisticated product using a relatively simple method. Zawahiri had a scientist, Rauf Ahmad, learning some tricks of weaponization from a scientist in connection with his attending conferences sponsored by the UK biodefense establishment in 1999 and 2000. See correspondence between Rauf Ahmad and Zawahiri. The name of the scientist consulted has been blacked out but the name was not anyone associated at GMU. The FBI has known the name since late 2001.
Dr. Alibek’s views were shared by Dr. William Patrick, who came to consult for the FBI, showing you that they seem to credit the view.
The article by FBI scientist Beecher, although the two sentences have been overinterpreted, also tends to support Ken’s characterization.
Ken’s main recommendation as to anthrax defense is to more widely distribute the already existing antibiotic stockpiles so as to permit more speedy distribution. See interview of Ken by Aton Edwards on YouTube. That seems very reasonable.
Debra,
My own sense of Ken, from following the heated debate since 2002 about the method of weaponization and the detection of silica, is that he has been generous, direct and what he has said squares with reality. The vitriol that arose, IMO, was due to the conflict between the detection of silica by Armed Force Institute of Pathology (”AFIP”), which found it a major component, and the report by Dr.Alibek and Dr.Meselson that they could not see it on the SEMS images they were shown. The two empirical observations, however, are in fact reconcilable as noted in the post above. Moreover, while some argued that the product was super-sophisticated, it was easier to achieve a trillion spore concentration in a small scale production than in industrial production (through repeated centrifugation). Bottom-line: Dr. Alibek was correct in his expert assessment of the technical characteristics of the anthrax and he never sounded a false note. See, for example, his online chat sponsored by the Washington Post. His argument merely has been that it is possible to achieve a sophisticated product using a relatively simple method. Zawahiri had a scientist, Rauf Ahmad, learning some tricks of weaponization from a scientist in connection with his attending conferences sponsored by the UK biodefense establishment in 1999 and 2000. See correspondence between Rauf Ahmad and Zawahiri. The name of the scientist consulted has been blacked out but the name was not anyone associated at GMU. The FBI has known the name since late 2001.
Dr. Alibek’s views were shared by Dr. William Patrick, who came to consult for the FBI, showing you that they seem to credit the view.
The article by FBI scientist Beecher, although the two sentences have been overinterpreted, also tends to support Ken’s characterization.
Ken’s main recommendation as to anthrax defense is to more widely distribute the already existing antibiotic stockpiles so as to permit more speedy distribution. See interview of Ken by Aton Edwards on YouTube. That seems very reasonable.
Richard Ebright’s views are interesting.
In an article supportive of Dr. Alibek’s technical claims about recombinant technology, Mark Williams interviewed scientists Popov, Meselson, Ebright and others. The article was “The Knowledge: Biotechnology’s advance could give malefactors the ability to manipulate life processes — and even affect human behavior” in The MIT Technology Review (March/April 2006). The article is based on interviews with Sergei Popov (an expert at GMU who had worked as a Russian bioweaponeer), University of Maryland researcher Milton Leitenberg, Harvard’s Matthew Meselson, Rutger’s Richard Ebright and others.
An excerpt:
“After last year’s bioterrorism conference in DC, I called on Richard Ebright, whose Rutgers laboratory researches transcription initiation (the first step in gene expression), to hear why he so opposes the biodefense boom (in its current form) and why he doesn’t worry about terrorists’ synthesizing biological weapons.”
‘There are now more than 300 U.S. institutions with access to live bioweapons agents and 16,500 individuals approved to handle them,” Ebright told me. While all of those people have undergone some form of background check — to verify, for instance, that they aren’t named on a terrorist watch list and aren’t illegal aliens — it’s also true, Ebright noted, that ‘Mohammed Atta would have passed those tests without difficulty.’ “
***
‘That’s the most significant concern,’ Ebright agreed. ‘If al-Qaeda wished to carry out a bioweapons attack in the U.S., their simplest means of acquiring access to the materials and the knowledge would be to send individuals to train within programs involved in biodefense research.’ Ebright paused. ‘And today, every university and corporate press office is trumpeting its success in securing research funding as part of this biodefense expansion, describing exactly what’s available and where.’”
In approaching the Amerithrax true crime problem, the analytical problem is that researchers tend only to focus on their narrow field. So an analyst focused on Al Qaeda may not know anything about US biodefense programs — an analyst knowledgeable about antibiotic or vaccine research may not know anything about Egyptian Islamic Jihad. The scientist may not care to know even though working in the area of biodefense. To knowledgeably address the issue of infiltration and the use of universities and charities as cover — which the documentary evidence shows Zawahiri planned to do and did in his anthrax weaponization program — requires a willingness to become knowledgeable and investigate the different substantive areas.
Are you the Debra Anderson who contributed to Saxton’s campaign along with Ken Alibek?
SAXTON, H. J (R)
Contributions for House of Reps
Campaigns: All Office: House of Reps
State: NJ
District: 3
Next Campaign: 2008
Alibek, Kenneth
Anderson, Debra
To put the Saxton contribution in better perspective here’s another exerpt from the LA Times article:
Alibek’s most reliable benefactor in Washington has been Rep. H. James Saxton (R-N.J.), a gravelly voiced former elementary school teacher and state legislator. Saxton says that for two decades, he has focused on the threat posed by Islamic terrorism.
For most of the last decade, Saxton chaired the House Armed Services Committee’s terrorism subcommittee and also headed the Joint Economic Committee, where Forrest landed as a senior aide.
On May 21, 2002, Saxton called a news conference to announce “a potential new defense against bioterrorism,” based on Alibek’s tests with mice. After being treated with an experimental product, the mice had survived doses of smallpox and anthrax.
Saxton at the time said that the results held hope for “lifting some of the burden of fear that haunts Americans.”
And, while fighting for an earmark of federal grant money for Alibek at a March 2004 hearing, Saxton upbraided Anthony Tether, the Bush administration’s director of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency.
“You need to be more on his side,” Saxton said of Alibek, adding: “I find it hard to believe that I have to fight as hard as I can to get a few measly bucks to keep him going.”
While I have the utmost respect for our country's higher educational establishment (still second to none in my humble opinion), it does have one glaring weakness which our country desperately needs to address: a shocking naivete when it comes to placing trust in foreigners, especially those from rather dubious locations when it comes to America's national security.
While I certainly don't know Ken Alibek personally, what I do know is that he comes from a background of the deep inner circles of the old Soviet government. And my personal life experiences have taught me that as a general rule, the Russians simply shouldn't be trusted. They are undisputed world masters at the Great Game.
One another name that I am certain you are familiar with is that of Dr. Ali Al-Tamimi, the doctor from George Mason University who was later found to be directly involved with our accursed and sizeable northern Virginia jihad community.
If there is anything that 9/11 and the recent London bombing attacks really should have taught us by now, it is that well-educated people from countries that are overtly hostile to America are being specifically trained to infiltrate the countries of the west under cover of science and academia, when their true purpose is really to gather intelligence on our capabilities, and in some cases to do even far greater damage.
I pray that our governments and academic institutions will someday pull their heads out of the sand and wake up to this reality before it is too late. If they do not, I fear for what eventually awaits us.
TrebleRebel,
Did you expect Osama perchance to be contributing instead?
It’s called the American campaign of election finance.
There was absolutely nothing inappropriate about Ken being a donor in fact it would be highly perplexing if he weren’t.
So the post was moderately rude.
You are hereby duly cautioned. I didn’t bring Debra to the party but I aim to make sure that no internet posting hooligans pass gas while she’s here at the dance. It’s a rare opportunity to learn something from someone with actual knowledge of the facts under discussion. Now if only you had the good manners of Shermy or Mitchell.
Why don’t you put the education your momma paid for to good use and explain to me why the patents I’ve referenced do not explain the AFIP’s detection of silica.
I realize you swoon over every word Ken says.
But make no mistake, Kenatjan Alibekov is one the masters of the great game. He led one of the most audacious misinformation campaigns of the cold war. It’s all outlined in Mangold and Goldberg’s “Plague Wars”:
CHAPTER NINE Incident at Sverdlovsk
Page 76:
The Soviets now went to extraordinary lengths to buttress their lies and make them supportable and credible worldwide. What had begun as a local cover-up in Sverdlovsk, now became an international fairy tale, a fiction of breathtaking audacity.
Amazingly, he wasn’t happy enough with the weaponized anthrax he created in the Sverdlovsk leak killing hundreds. Whilst lying to the West he secretly went on to continue to improve the powdered anthrax he had created:
http://www.cbc.ca/news/background/bioweapons/redlies.html
In the years since the Sverdlovsk accident, Alibek and a research team had taken the Soviet military’s anthrax and made it even more deadly. He developed a process to take ground up anthrax spores and coat each particle in plastic and resin. It kept the anthrax aloft four times longer, increasing its ability to infect people.
“The main idea was just to make it more efficient. Just, for example, using a pretty small amount of this weapon to cover as much as possible territory, populated territory, [ to kill as many people as possible.]” Alibek says.
Ping.
Look, James Dean Cubed,
Did a ballerina from a Russian ballet company fall off the stage and crush you as a child? Deal with the pertinent facts. Intercepts in 2002 show Salafist, Taliban-supporting, end of Western civilization-hoping Ali Timimi was working with Bin Laden’s sheik. Take out Gert’z BREAKDOWN on intelligence failures and look up al-Hawali in the index. He gives the example of the bombing in the mid-1990s where intercepts calling London and explaining to his colleague that it was all to get al-Hawali out of jail, only to take Ayman’s incoming call on the other line passing on his congratulations. Ali had a threatening letter to Congress hand-delivered to all members of Congress on the first anniversary of the anthrax mailngs. At 6:00 A.M. February 26, 2003, as part of the codenamed OPERATION IMMINENT HORIZON, the FBI not only raided al-Timimi’s townhouse looking for materials relating to WMD (see warrant) but conducted searches of two drying experts. So start focusing on some relevant questions and get over the ballerina incident. First, what mathematical support work did Al-Timimi do for the Navy in bioinformatics that required a high level security clearance. Second, is it true he had a room just two doors down from both Ken and the former USAMRIID head — both accomplished in anthrax weaponization? Third, don’t the patents I’ve described point to precisely the silica detected by the AFIP and the reason it very possibly did not appear on the surface of the spore? (having been removed by repeated centrifugation). Now, if you find out the SRA International work involved secret methods for cleaning out bilge water, or if you find he didn’t have the office I suggest he did, or if you conclude the patents (as used by someone “skilled in the art” to invoke the phrase from the patents) would not result in the product, then do tell me. I’m here to learn something. The same day they searched al-Timimi’s townhouse — at 6:00 A.M. EST , 100 federal agents came to my hometown and simultaneously interviewed 150 people before 9 A.M. The public may have been fooled, but I wasn’t. And neither was Ayman. And Ayman is one dangerous SOB. Think Godfather on a bad day. I’m not interested in spending another 4 years while Ed insists that the FACTS show the anthrax letters were written by a First Grader or others argue that just because a Japanese cult couldn’t get it right, it means Ayman couldn’t successfully infiltrate the US biodefense establishment.
Of course, if Ken told Ali over a vodka drinking game how to weaponize the anthrax, then we can hang him. But Ali doesn’t drink vodka so that theory is shot.
And of course the guy killed by polonium claimed Ayman was working for the FSB — that instead of being jailed for 6 months in 1996/97 without the jailers knowing his identity, his identity was actually known and he agreed to cooperate against the Chechen rebels in exchange for his freedom. But look where such talk got that Russian guy who ate the polonium.
If Ken has DARPA’s confidence, that’s good enough for me.
But Ali doesn’t have DARPA’s confidence, so let’s start with him.
Regarding the accident at Sverdlovsk - Dr. Alibek wasn't involved in that. Sverdlovsk was and still is a military facility. Dr. Alibek worked at civilian facilities only. It says in that same article you quote that he was just beginning his career at Biopreparat. Dr. Alibek worked at the Siberian branch of the Institute of Applied Biochemistry near Berdsk from 1976 to 1979 then transferred to the Eastern European scientific branch of the Institute of Applied Biochemistry near Omutninsk. After Omutninsk, he went to Stepnogorsk and then on to Moscow. He knows about the accident because of interactions with people from Sverdlovsk, not because he worked there. As far as the "improvements" to the Sverdlovsk anthrax formulation, the information you have listed is not correct. He did reduce the amount of formulation required as compared to the Sverdlovsk formulation but the way it was done has nothing to do with what you describe as far as plastic and resin. Enhancing "flyability" was something else he did but it isn't related to decreasing the amount of formulation required. As far as coating the spores in resin, that is incorrect too. Though for obvious common sense reasons I won't elaborate further, I'll just point out that coating spores in resin would increase their particle size and mass, decreasing their ability to "float". Sorry, don't know where you received your information but sadly much of what I have seen printed is incorrect. It is really frustrating to be somewhere, hear what he actually says, and then see how incorrect what actually gets printed is from what he said. jpl - thanks so much for that. I couldn’t agree with you more about the naivety within the university system as regards to foreign governments using our educational institutions to train their people. Iraq was especially guilty of this. One of our students actually wrote her dissertation about such vulnerability but during the defense, 2 of her committee members resigned from her committee allegedly due to fear of repercussions from the university administration. Regarding Dr. Alibek, it is natural that you don’t trust him because, as you volunteered, you don’t know him. Zacandpook - thanks for jumping in. All - I am having problems with my email address and will post a new one once they are resolved. Debra
First - check and see how long Dr. Bailey was head of USAMRIID and under what circumstances he came to that position and left that position. When learning that, take into consideration how the military works (I used to be an MP so I can say that).
second - USAMRIID is a lab like any other lab except that they have some hot agents. Just because a person works there doesn’t mean they know ANYTHING about biological weapons. It only means that they know about biological agents. Be careful on that assumption.
third - for those of you who don’t work in academia, people who are not involved in research projects do sometimes get listed on publications just because of their administrative responsibilities rather than their scientific expertise and contribution. Always ask the authors to tell you their contributions. If they can’t explain, then you know they are only on there either out of courtesy (it does happen) or because they inserted themselves before publication (that happens too).
Dr. Bailey is an entomologist and studied Rift Valley Fever (I believe) and probably some other microbes too but you’d have to ask him what they were. It does not make him a BW expert anymore than being the senior Mason biodefense education program administrator makes him a BW expert. In some areas, he has far more knowledge than I do and he has my respect in those areas but I seriously doubt that he knows how to make anthrax biological weapon much less any biological weapon. Why would he?
I gave the link where I got my information.
Alibek also described in detail to a number of journalists in 1998 how he created the Alibekov anthrax. Richard Preston was one of them, as well as the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation.
http://cryptome.org/bioweap.htm
Alibek has a Doctor of Sciences degree in anthrax. It is a kind of superdegree, which he received in 1988, at the age of thirty-seven, for directing the research team that developed the Soviet Union’s most powerful weapons-grade anthrax. He did this research as head of the Stepnagorsk bioweapons facility, in what is now Kazakhstan, which was once the largest biowarfare production facility in the world. The Alibekov anthrax became fully operational in 1989. It is an amber-gray powder, finer than bath talc, with smooth, creamy particles that tend to fly apart and vanish in the air, becoming invisible and drifting for miles. The Alibekov anthrax is four times more efficient than the standard product.
One day, Ken Alibek and I were sitting in a conference room near his office talking about the anthrax he and his research team had developed. “It’s very difficult to say if I felt a sense of excitement over this. It’s very difficult to say what I felt like,” he said. “It wouldn’t be true to say that I thought I was doing something wrong. I thought I had done something very important. The anthrax was one of my scientific results — my personal result.”
I asked him if he’d tell me the formula for his anthrax.
“I can’t say this,” he answered.
“I won’t publish it. I’m just curious,” I said.
“Look, you must understand, this is unbelievably serious. You can’t publish this formula,” he said. When I assured him I wouldn’t, he told me the formula for the Alibekov anthrax. He uttered just one sentence. The Alibekov anthrax is simple, and the formula is somewhat surprising, not quite what you’d expect. Two unrelated materials are mixed with pure powdered anthrax spores. It took a lot of research and testing to get the trick right, and Alibek must have driven his research group hard and skillfully to arrive at it. “There are many countries that would like to know how to do this.” he said.
I have it on good authority that the two unrelated materials used to coat the spores are a siloxane resin and silica nanoparticles. Contrary to your statement, although this coating would slightly increase the mass of each spore, the coating provides the spore with non-sticking properties. Caoted spores will not stick to other spores or surfaces. Thus the spores are aerosolizable.
This makes perfect sense — with Ft. Detrick in the business of vaccine research, for example, not research on aerosols.
Following his retirement from active duty, however, Dr. Bailey continued to have a very distinguished career — working for the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) where he was responsible for following the offensive biological warfare program of the former Soviet Union. He was the DIA representative to the intelligence community on issues related to bioterrorism. Beginning in 1997, he worked for Battelle with Ken. So I imagine he has considerable access to know how. So my concern would be that this graduate student coming over from computer sciences at George Washington (Ali) to GMU’s bioinformatics program co-sponsored by ATCC would be able to gain surreptitious access to his communications and documents, particularly given that he had a high security clearance at some point for work for the Navy in bionformatics. Les Baillie once lectured to a group of scientists in the UK that included Ayman Zawahiri’s man Rauf Ahmad on the importance of bioinformatics in understanding the medical response to anthrax. (I’m handicapped by not knowing anything about science beyond what is taught by Bill Nye the Science Guy. Truth be told, I don’t know even that).
In 2001, the Navy was doing simulations involving aerosolized anthrax attacks on ships, though I have idea whether that is what Ali’s work for SRA involved. Ali worked long hours. He presumably was in the building at night — by my estimation, a spitwad’s distance from both Ken and Charles though I’m still working on confirmation. I’ve listed the room numbers and link a floor map. So I don’t see why Trebel Rebel is being so thickheaded on the solution to Amerithrax. US-based supporters of Al Qaeda are responsible and the FBI and CIA have kicked butt in the matter for 5 years but just haven’t been able to take credit.
Ali moved from GWU to GMU in 2000. It was in 1999 that Ayman wrote AQ military planner Atef saying that he planned to use the cover of universities and charities for the specialists they needed to weaponize anthrax. Even upon his indictment, the two folks he mentions (one being Qutb) are the two deep thinkers that most influenced Ayman. See the history of the Movement published this month by Al Qaeda’s spymaster and head of the IG member who joined AQ. The author also wrote a treatise that included a discussion about Amerithrax. The actual key player in arranging things, I believe, was the brother of Sadat’s assassin, Islambouli. He had been in a cell with KSM for years.
If there is an aerosolized attack on DC or NYC, there will be the usual handwringing about the failure of intelligence. But the failure of intelligence, this time, is one of the public that isn’t connecting the dots right in front of it. ... just because there isn’t a press release by the FBI confirming it wasn’t a First Grader who wrote the letters. In a national security matter, a successful prosecution is secondary to disruption of the enemy and keeping the secret.
The rub here, is: are all the secrets being kept legitimate law enforcement priorities? Or is there a strong motivation on the part of DIA, DARPA, USAMRIID etc. to avoid embarrassment. I credit Postal Inspector Richter that there is no “cover up.” But, hey, youse guys, isn’t it time to raise the curtain?
http://www.anthraxandalqaeda.com
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.