Pandora's Box • Remember the legend of Pandora's Box? • In the original version, from Hesiod, it was actually a jar, containing all the evil’s of the world • Pandora, the first woman, was told not to open it under any circumstances, which of course, she did… • Bullfinch tells us: > “Forthwith there escaped a multitude of plagues for hapless man,- such as gout, rheumatism, and colic for his body, and envy, spite, and revenge for his mind,- and scattered themselves far and wide.” • The legend finds a curious echo in the Old Testament, where the Ark of the Covenant becomes a Pandora's Box for the Philistines • The Philistines captured the Ark of the Covenant in the 12th Century BC, and took it to Ashdod • Plague soon struck the city, and the wretched survivors sent the Ark away • But wherever the Ark was taken, bubonic plague broke out in its wake • The First Book of Samuel, chapter 5 says: > But the hand of the Lord was heavy upon them of Ashdod, and he destroyed them, and smote them with emerods, even Ashdod and the coasts thereof. > And when the men of Ashdod saw that it was so, they said, The ark of the God of Israel shall not abide with us: for his hand is sore upon us, and upon Dagon our god. • The Philistines finally gave it back to the Israelites, who were immediately hit by the plague - was it divine wrath? • Was there a flea-infested cloth inside the Ark - or did one or more of its bearers carry the plague? • The Philistines paid a steep price for opening Pandora's Box, a lesson we have yet to learn… • Rather than follow the Brahmin Laws of Manu, and foresake biological weapons as immoral, we’ve chosen to emulate its counterpart, the Arthashastra… • This ancient Indian work was written between the 2d and 4th Century BC, and is the predecessor to Machiavelli’s The Prince • One chapter, “Means to Injure an Enemy”, includes a lengthy list of snake, insect, and plant poisons, including detailed instructions for their preparation and use • In 2002, the Indian Defence Ministry took another peek into Pandora's Box … • They sponsored a study to plumb the secrets of the Arthashastra for use in modern warfare • They insist that their current focus is on its more positive formulas, like those that claim to help night vision, and fight hunger and fatigue • But it’s only a matter of time before its ancient recipes for death are put to the test • We’ve always been intrigued by nature’s ability to kill, as we learned in our last lecture, when we traced the history of biological weapons, from antiquity through the second World War • In this lecture, we’ll look at the Cold War arms race, and learn how microbes have been used to sow fear and terror… • Following World War II, the US and the Soviet Union launched massive research programs in germ warfare • These programs were among the worst kept secrets of the Cold War • Both American and Russia, for example, developed an anthrax bomb… • The first US anthrax bomb was made in 1943, and consisted of a 500 pound bomb with 100 smaller anthrax-laden bomblets tucked inside • In March of 1944, at the height of the war effort, Winston Churchill approved an order for 500,000 US-made anthrax bombs • There is no evidence that any anthrax bombs were ever actually delivered, nor do we think that Churchill planned to use them • Churchill says that he: “…had most secret consultations with my Military Advisers. They consider, and I entirely agree, that if our enemies should indulge in this form of warfare, the only deterrent would be our power to retaliate” • After the War, the emphasis shifted from weapons production to research, especially field testing • In September of 1950, the US navy attacked San Francisco • Two navy minesweepers, cruising outside the Golden Gate Bridge, released clouds of supposedly harmless bacteria • They measured the progress of the bacteria through the city’s population • 117 square miles of San Francisco was contaminated in Operation Sea Spray, and everyone in the city was estimated to have inhaled up to 5,000 particles of the bacterium Serratia marcescens • This bacterium is very widely distributed – you might have seen it as a pink slimy coating in bathrooms and shower stalls • Until the 1950’s, it was thought to be entirely innocuous, a perfect choice for testing microbial dispersal in a mock attack • Unfortunately, we now know that it’s moderately harmful, causing a wide variety of low-level infections like conjunctivitis, and urinary tract infections • About 1.4% of all nosocomial infections are caused by this microbe, often picked up through the use of catheters • In a few cases, it can cause serious damage, leading to meningitis and pneumonia • Two days after the military exercise in San Francisco, hospitals in the Bay area reported 11 unusual cases of bacterial pneumonia due to Serratia • Edward J. Nevin died from his Serratia infection, the first official victim of US germ warfare • In 1980, Edward Nevin III sued the federal government for killing his grandfather, and leaving his grandmother to go broke paying the hospital bills • His lawsuit failed, but the resulting publicity, including a segment on TV’s 60 Minutes, put the secret project directly in the public eye • No one knows how many similar attacks were made, although in 1977 the US Army admitted to a Senate subcommittee investigation that the army had conducted 239 mock attacks • One of those attacks, in 1965, was made on our nation’s capitol… • The military released the bacterium Bacillus globiggii into the North Terminal at the DC National Airport • It would have made a good scene in a James Bond movie… • Secret agents wandered through the terminal, releasing the germs from aerosol sprays mounted in briefcases • As many as 130 passengers were exposed, carrying the bacterium to 39 cities in seven states • The Chemical Corps Special Operations Division staged a mock attack in New York City in 1966, using Bacillus subtilis • They dropped light bulbs filled with charcoal and bacteria through sidewalk gratings into the New York City subway system, to see how effectively commuters would spread the bacteria around the city • Each light bulb held an estimated 87 trillion bacteria • A 1968 report called A Study of the Vulnerability of Subway Passengers in New York City to Covert Attack with Biological Agents concluded that: “Similar covert attacks with a pathogenic [disease-causing] agent during peak traffic periods could be expected to expose large numbers of people to infection and subsequent illness or death.” • Once again, the species used was supposed to be harmless, but even benign species can pose a threat to the very young, the very old, or anyone whose immune system is under stress • A similar test was performed in the London Underground in 1963 • A railroad agent dropped a tin of bacteria onto the tracks between stations • Samples later collected by transit workers found that bacteria had spread as much as 10 miles from their release point • The US military also conducted open-air experiments using microbes, vectors, and toxins known to be genuinely dangerous • We attacked Florida and Georgia in 1956 and 1957 • The once top-secret report of this attack (still highly censored) has a rather bland title “An evaluation of entomological warfare as a potential danger to the United States and European NATO Nations” • It includes some cold-hearted calculations of the cost per death of delivering mosquito-borne diseases in combat • The Army was experimenting with dengue fever and yellow fever, and became curious about how effectively these diseases could be delivered through mosquito bombs • They released millions of uninfected Aedes aegypti mosquitoes in several southern cities • Under names like “Operation Big Buzz”, “Operation Big Itch”, and “Operation May Day”, the military’s targets included Key West and Savanna, Georgia • “Operation Dropkick”, mentioned in the movie Dr. Strangelove, was conducted in Avon Park, Florida, where over 600,000 mosquitoes were released • A secret report from the Army’s Chemical Corp in 1960 describes these operations in detail • Despite the claims of internet conspiracy theorists, there seems to be no hard evidence that the mosquitoes were actually infected with dengue and yellow fever • But there’s no doubt that this dangerous tropical vector got a nice boost in its range and its population density • The incidence of natural mosquito borne diseases increased sharply after these mock attacks, including several deaths that went unnoticed at the time • For most of the Cold War, the Army strictly denied performing open air experiments, at least until the disaster at the Dugway Proving Grounds in Utah in March 1968 • In 1968, a plane spraying VX nerve gas over the flats near Dugway released the nerve gas at too high an altitude • The gas was blown 35 miles off course, and killed over 6,000 sheep • When Congressional investigators finally opened Dugway’s library, they found an estimated 10,000 reports describing open-air testing of chemical and biological weapons! • Dugway, incidentally, also includes a black-ops area known only as … Area 51 • By the late 1960’s, both the US and Russia had stockpiled several tons of biological weapons • In 1972, a new international treaty was written to replace the 1925 Geneva Protocol, the Biological Weapons Convention or BWC • 163 countries have ratified it, although Israel still refuses to sign • The BWC declared that that “bacteriological methods of warfare” must be stopped, because using such weapons “would be repugnant to the conscience of mankind” • Unfortunately, it’s a pretty wimpy treaty… • It makes no provisions for inspections, for example, preferring to rely on the honor system! • And it didn’t take the Soviets long to violate it… • Dr.