International Network of Engineers and Scientists Against Proliferation

US Anthrax Attacks and Biodefense Research

Barbara Hatch Rosenberg, a research professor at the State University of New York and Chair of the Federation of American Scientists (FAS) Working Group on Biological Weapons, has been gathering information about the anthrax attacks that occured in the US in autumn 2001. Here are some extracts from her "Analysis of the Anthrax Attacks" posted at www.fas.org/bwc/news/anthraxreport.htm. (R.H.)

I. Commentary: Is the FBI Dragging Its Feet? (5 February 2002)

For more than three months now the FBI has known that the perpetrator of the anthrax attacks is American. This conclusion must have been based on the perpetrator's evident connection to the US biodefense program. [...]

This evidence permits a more refined estimate of the perpetrator's motives. He must be angry at some biodefense agency or component, and he is driven to demonstrate, in a spectacular way, his capabilities and the government's inability to respond. He is cocksure that he can get away with it. Does he know something that he believes to be sufficiently damaging to the United States to make him untouchable by the FBI? [...]

The press is increasingly questioning the situation, and other scientists have independently raised similar issues... Most importantly, the apparent lack of action is sending a dangerous message to potential bioterrorists. [...]

IV. Analysis of the Source of the anthrax attacks (17-31 January 2002)

1. The Present Situation

The FBI has surely known for several months that the anthrax attack was an inside job. A government estimate for the number of scientists involved in the US anthrax program over the last five years is 200 people. According to a former defense scientist the number of defense scientists with hands-on anthrax experience and the necessary access is smaller, under 50. The FBI has received short lists of specific suspects with credible motives from a number of knowledgeable inside sources, and has found or been given clues (beyond those presented below) that could lead to incriminating evidence.By now the FBI must have a good idea of who the perpetrator is. There may be two factors accounting for the lack of public acknowledgement and the paucity of information being released: a fear that embarrassing details might become public, and a need for secrecy in order to acquire sufficient hard evidence to convict the perpetrator. [...]

7. Comments

A recent report by the Congressional General Accounting Office, as well as many recent statements by military and non-governmental experts in the [bioweapons] field, holds that terrorists are unlikely to be able to mount a major biological attack without substantial assistance from a government sponsor. The recent anthrax attack was a minor one but nonetheless we now see that it was made possible by a sophisticated government program. It is reassuring to know that it was probably not perpetrated by a lone terrorist without state support.

It is not reassuring, however, to discover that secret US programs may have been the source of that support, and that security is so dangerously lax in military or defense contractor laboratories. [...]