The Flaw in using Smallpox as a Weapon

11/15/02 | b.b.e.b.

[big bad easter bunny]

The two deterrents I see in using smallpox as a weapon are: a) When you infect any country it is just a matter of time before the virus will make it's way back to your country. If you happen to be a poor Muslim country odds are a lot more people will die than say America, where the medical system is far superior.

Secondly smallpox was one of the greatest scourges of man! You wouldn't want to be known as the country who re-infected an otherwise safe world.

[big bad easter bunny]

That is my Sundays 2 cents worth.

[chance33_98]

Sadly, the freaks we are dealing with are not rational, and thus rational thinking does not always win out.

[KarlInOhio]

Also, something like smallpox is likely to be a final strike on the way out. When Saddam is a few hours from being removed from power (and possibly life) is when he would release something like this. He would see the threat of this as a way of maintaining power.

Also, Saudi Arabia and others would blame it on Israel anyway.

[friendly]

If you happen to be a poor Muslim country odds are a lot more people will die than say America, where the medical system is far superior. Secondly smallpox was one of the greatest scourges of man! You wouldn't want to be known as the country who re-infected an otherwise safe world.

The problem is that al-Queda and Saddam are psychopaths. Human life has very, very little value to these madmen, especially the muslim extemists. Saddam may hold back due to his greed and desire to live in post-Bagdad spendor in a Libyan palace on the Mediterranean. Al-Queda would kill millions at the drop of a hat, given the opportunity. Given their track record in the one country they did rule for a while (Afghanistan) they care nothing if poor muslims die like dogs in the streets.

I am far, far more worried about al-Queda's access to small nukes, something they would not hesitate to use in a minute. I am certain they are planning this very moment to set one off in Washington, D.C. as soon as they get their hands on one.

[TrappedInLiberalHell]

If you happen to be a poor Muslim country odds are a lot more people will die than say America

Maybe their philosophy is 'Kill us all, and let Allah sort them out'.

[motexva]

a) When you infect any country it is just a matter of time before the virus will make it's way back to your country. If you happen to be a poor Muslim country odds are a lot more people will die than say America, where the medical system is far superior.

What does it matter to those savages if they infect the entire world - the believers will go to paradise as martyrs while the unbelievers burn in hell.

Your second assertion isn't even worth commenting on.

Don't ascribe any kind of rationality to these monsters - they would do anything to destroy us. We need to take reasonable precautions but more than anything - we need to kill them all first.

[alloysteel]

Nobody is saying that any organized government would use smallpox as a weapon. But a rogue non-government group could, and would for a two-fold reason: 1. it distracts the targeted country in their quest for the demise of the rogue agents, and 2. They have a supremely unshakeable faith in their own invulnerability. Of course, they do not CARE if other, poor Muslim populations, who may be less than fervent in the pursuit of jihad combat, are seriously decimated or worse. Only the warriors for Mohammed count, and the rest of the world is expendable cannon fodder or offal to be pushed out of the way.

[Free the USA]

How We Lost the High-Tech War of 2007 (re-post from 1996 - scenario is rapidly coming true)
The Weekly Standard ^ | January 29, 1996 | Charles J. Dunlap, Jr. (Col. USAF)
Posted on 12/14/2002 6:09 PM PST by Edward Watson
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/806682/posts

[ItisaReligionofPeace]

1) you assume that the nuts who would release this care about the lives of people in their country (let Allah sort them out attitude) 2) As if someone capable of doing something like this would give a rat's ass about their reputation in the world would be for reintroducing small pox. give me a break.

[templar]

Why does everyone assume that a smallpox attack is being engineered by muslims? The only people I hear talking about smallpox are American and british government leaders. They also seem to be wanting to initiate the nescessary prerequisite for the miitary use of small pox against an enemy. Namely, the innoculation of their own military forces first and their civilian population second. If an anonomous smallpox attack should occur this would give all the reason in the word to the various muslim countries to blame the US and Israel.

[ClearCase_guy]

Also, Saudi Arabia and others would blame it on Israel anyway.

Indeed. There are large numbers of urban US residents who believe AIDS was invented by Jewish doctors and then willfully injected into certain population groups. Some people will believe anything.

[gitmo]

The two deterrents I see in using smallpox as a weapon are: a) When you infect any country it is just a matter of time before the virus will make it's way back to your country. If you happen to be a poor Muslim country odds are a lot more people will die than say America, where the medical system is far superior.

How is that different than strapping a bomb to your chest? The terrorist gets the same destruction he's dishing out.

Secondly smallpox was one of the greatest scourges of man! You wouldn't want to be known as the country who re-infected an otherwise safe world.

These people don't mind getting the reputation of destroying thousands of innocent civilians on 9/11. Why should this bother them?

[kaylar]

This question came up on a thread yesterday. Here's what I said:

Original question:There is no logic to biowarefare (especially smallpox), since it would inevitably hurt Muslim countries and Muslim populations more than in the U.S.

Me: Consider this:

Why is it that Muslims who have to leave their home countries because they're unlivable hellholes so often want to turn around and turn their host countries into Islamic theocracies? They never seem to understand that it's because their home countries are theocracies that they are unlivable. Instead, the immigrants persuade themselves that all the problems in the Islamic world are the fault of "the west" , or it's because of "the Zionists" or "because the US supports the ruling house" . The fact that the Western world and secular Muslim states like Turkey are livable never seems to suggest anything to them. Instead, they proclaim that they will turn the UK or Denmark or France into "Islamic republics" under sharia law, gamely persuading themselves that THIS time they'll create "pure Islam" on earth-and never able to grasp that this would turn their new country into a replica of their homeland...ie, a new unlivable hellhole .

If they can't figure this out, why on earth should they be able to figure out that releasing the small pox virus would hurt the Third World far more than the developed west?

Besides, they can always persuade themselves that "allah" will see to it that only 'infidels' and 'unfaithful' Muslims are infected : "True" Muslims will be immune, and if they die, they just go to their Big Whorehouse in the Sky anyway, with the 72 virgins with the magical selfreplicating hymens. Why should they care?

If a terrorist group gets the smallpox virus, they will be very likely to try to use it.

[gg188]

Question is, does smallpox survive a temperature of, say, 50,000 degrees Farhenheit? (Isn't that about what it would be at ground zero?)

[LSUfan]

None of that would mean a damn thing to a psychopathic meglomaniac like Saddam Hussein or Osama Bin Laden.

[B4Ranch]

You and I think alike. Revenge can be so sweet.

[wretchard]

Most of America's wealth is tied up in it's people. If Osama Bin Laden could revert America to its primeval state, there would still be enough knowledge in the minds of Americans to rebuild spaceships, advanced drugs, particle accelerators, etc in a decade. The 3,000 Americans who died in the World Trade Center were economically worth far more than the buildings themselves. Collectively, they could have bought the buildings and paid for them in 20 years. On the other hand, the value of the Islamic world lies in its physical resources rather than its people. Once the oil runs out in Saudi Arabia, it will be back to herding camels.

Hence it makes sense for Islamists to uneleash a pox which may kill 100 or 1000 economically valueless Muslims for each American. I say "economically valueless", because human life cannot be measured in those terms. A little Muslim child is just a precious as any child, and I daresay that the illiterate mother making bread for her family is just as deserving of life as any other. But that is the calculus of people like Saddam and Osama Bin Laden, not Americans, who go through enormous trouble to spare even one innocent life.

The mullahs and radical imams don't really care about the lives of the innocent. The Ayatollahs sent groups of children across minefields to clear them. Hamas trains little boys to strap on bombs. Mohammed once asked a 9 year old boy to join his caravan raids. The child was munching on some dates. He chided the child, for letting a "handful of dates stand between you and Paradise." That is the Islam of the Bearded Ones, who in my opinion, are sad, sick and perverted old men.

[Righty1]

Saddam would act just like AH who on his way out ordered the complete destruction of doltland. El-Kidlums on the other hand would just do it, no Gotterdammerung necessary.

[Thud]

Check out this old thread here:

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/721787/posts

[The Great Satan]

There is very little evidence that Saddam has weaponized smallpox -- in actuality, there is very strong evidence against the notion (Hussein Kamel's 1995 testimony). Smallpox would make little sense as a MAD deterrent, anyway, since a safe, proven vaccine is available -- plus, as you point out, the blowback potential doesn't represent a plus point for a history-obsessed would-be Saladin.

No, smallpox is being talked up for the same reason other marginal or non-existent threats, such as VX gas, backpack nukes and dirty bombs, have been talked up. It's a way of preparing the public for the steps we have to take, without constantly mentioning the "A" word. Because, if we constantly mentioned the "A" word, pretty soon people would realize that the gaping hole in the New York skyline was put there by Saddam Hussein, and there's not a damn thing we can do about it. That's an epiphany the administration would like to put off until such time as we are rid of Saddam -- however long that might take.