18.01.2018 Author: Henry Kamens
Richard
E. Lugar: Body of Evidence Suggests New US Biological Warfront Opening
Column: Politics
Region: Caucasus
Country: Georgia
Many
in Russia and Arab countries suspect that they are likely the target of such
research. Russian Senator Klintsevich claims that “It is no secret that
different ethnic groups react to biological weapons in different ways and that
is why the West is meticulously collecting material all across Russia.”
In
short, this and other labs, in Kenya, Thailand and Ukraine are not preparing
weapons for future use by its favoured terrorists but by stockpiling them for a
rainy day: using them itself: conducting its own biological terrorism against
its friends rather than its enemies. It is no accident that it partners with
the Army Medicine’s US Army Medical Research and Materiel Command in carrying
out infectious disease surveillance and research, purportly develop better
diagnostics, treatments and vaccines. Naturally all this is in violation of the
Bio Weapons Convention, but that is a moot issue when the research is
outsourced to Grey Zones as Georgia, under the flimsy guise of human and animal
health.
Each
State Party to this Convention undertakes
never in any circumstances to develop, produce, stockpile or otherwise acquire
or retain:
Microbial or other biological agents, or toxins whatever their origin or method
of production, of types and in quantities that have no justification for
prophylactic, protective or other peaceful purposes Weapons, equipment or means
of delivery designed to use such agents or toxins for hostile purposes or in
armed conflict.
One
of the people who ended up in a hospital for investigating what is going on in
the Richard E. Lugar Centre is Jeffrey Silverman, who has lived in Georgia for
over 25 years, and thought he had seen it all until the nature of this lab
became clear. He has contributed some of his thoughts and experience to the
book “Putin’s
Praetorians”, written by NEO and Veterans Today contributor Phil
Butler.
Silverman
has brought to our attention a message he received from someone who apparently
wrote to him out-of-the-blue. He recognised this message as the action of
someone with a story to tell, who may have difficulty making the right people
hear it.
Given
the contents, this might be surprising in some countries, but not in Georgia.
Killing
Hope – “Survival is Insufficient”
The
message is from one Per Have. It reads:
“Dear
Mr. Silverman,
I
am writing to you after having read Putin’s Praetorians, and in particular your
chapter.
Being
a retired veterinarian specialising in animal virus diseases I am particularly
interested in the spread of the devastating virus disease of pigs known as
African Swine Fever (ASF). This infection had its origin in warthogs and other
indigenous pigs in Sub-Saharan Africa.
ASF
was introduced into Portugal and Spain around 1960, but has since been
eliminated from the Iberian Peninsula. Quite surprisingly, it then surfaced in
Cuba and other Caribbean islands at the beginning of the ’70s, where it proved
to be detrimental to pig farming and the livelihood of poor people. It was
suspected that it was introduced to cause economic damage by anti-Castro rebels
supported by CIA (as mentioned in W, Blum, and “Killing Hope”).
In
2007 ASF appeared in Georgia, and has since spread to Russia, Ukraine, Belarus
and most recently several Eastern EU countries. It is currently the greatest
threat to pig production in the EU, because it is maintained in the wild boar
population, which is expanding in Europe and in which it is practically
impossible to control.
It
does not stop there, and as in the US, where there is compelling evidence that
the CIA released whooping-cough bacteria into the open air in Florida, followed
by an extremely sharp increase in the incidence of the disease in the state
that year. The following year, another toxic substance was disseminated in the
streets and tunnels of New York City (Blum).
Officially,
it is assumed (but not proven) that the virus was brought to Georgia via swill
unloaded from ships in Black Sea harbours. The [apparent] fingerprints of the
virus trace it back to South-East Africa. Having read your accounts on the
biological warfare activities in Georgia, the question which comes to mind is
whether the introduction of ASF was entirely accidental?
I
don’t know the answer to this question, but I have also not seen anyone try to
answer it. I wonder if you might have any info which could shed more light on
these events.“
Silverman
responds:
I
have read your message, and I think the question is very well worth the effort
of asking. I will present it to the so-called experts in the Georgian Ministry
of Health and Science, and to the Lugar Lab via the mainstream media in
Georgia.
What
went on in Cuba, based on your materials is going on in Georgia, such as Task
33, a “Plan for Incapacitation of Sugar Workers,” as part of a scheme to
develop a plan for incapacitating large sections of the sugar workers by the
covert use of BW [biological weapons] or CW agents, and I suspect the loses in
the hazelnut industry in Western Georgia is a pilot for what is planned for
Turkey next.
There
is no coincidence that the US military is involved, and how such attacks are
backstopped by the bio warfare experts from Fort Detrick, Maryland. BTW, I too
have a background in agriculture, spending much of my youth on a farm, having a
BSc and MSc in vocational agriculture, and I even worked on the university
swine farm in my student days.
Based
on the information I have had access to, material from insiders working in the lab
and my own background in bio and chemical weapons, US Army, there is little
doubt in my mind that ASF was intentionally released as an experiment to play
havoc on the Russian economy. I will be looking into this, and will see what
kind of literature review I can come up with, as Georgia is mostly surrounded
by Muslim countries, and Turkey may be the next target, and the virus did not
affect the wild pigs in Georgia as it did the domestic herds.
DNA
Specific Weapons
But
how the hell can one prove one version or the other? DNA strain – South East
Africa, which could be Mozambique, not well known for its pork production
“husbandry” – or for having the facilities to identify or weaponise any virus,
and even if it was South Africa, who may well have the facilities and know how,
I very much doubt there is the political appetite to get involved in this kind
of adventure. Then too there is the theory that various strains of diseases are
being designed to deal with Russians and Middle Eastern populations.
I
am nearly always drawn to the cock up theory. I know a friend who spent some
time looking at a story about strain of mildew that affected heroin harvests in
Afghanistan – reducing it by as much as 80 percent. The Soviets had [allegedly]
developed it in Abkhazia and at other plant warfare
facilities in Georgia after the Soviet invasion.
More
recently, it turned out that neither the Brits nor Americans would touch it as
it would be biological warfare and set a precedent. If they wouldn’t do it in
Afghanistan where there was a kinetic war, partly funded by heroin and the arms
trade, then I doubt anyone would do it to get a very minor economic
advantage—at least in a world when better minds make the decisions.
Ways
out at the front
It
will be interesting to see what response, if any, Silverman and Have get to
their questions once this information is shared with the Georgian media. What
we do know already is that Donald Trump took office stating that he wanted to
cut US military commitments, after its people have long supported
ever-increasing spending on being the self-appointed policeman of the world.
All
Trump has actually done so far is threaten all kinds of wars and make US
military action ever more likely, all bark and not bite. But he knows, as do
his military brass, that the US war machine is being stretched too thin. Simply
in order to maintain its existing influence the US has to find another way to
project force. With some of its former allies now looking at other protectors,
in tandem or as replacements, the US needs more conflict simply to stand still.
During
the Cold War one of the issues frequently talked about was that although both
sides had nuclear weapons, the West would have had to use them first, due to
the size of the Soviet Bloc’s conventional forces. The West didn’t want to do
that, which is why the various disarmament treaties such as SALT were largely a
Western initiative. Nuclear arms limitation would bring parity, and thus peace,
because it would stop the West from having to resort to such weapons, and
this—being in itself a warlike gesture.
We
do not live in the Cold War world now, but we are witnessing the rise of China
and a gradual loss of US influence which its own behaviour has brought upon
itself. US allies are increasingly less willing to sign up to US regime change
schemes, such as the Syrian conflict, and then be told by The White House that
they need to pay for a greater portion of them themselves. Nor do they
appreciate being told who else they can talk to if they are friends of the US,
or that they are harbouring terrorists just because the US isn’t arming and
paying that particular bunch of terrorists today, though it might next week.
The
US is losing the conventional power game. But it still doesn’t want to nuke
everyone, merely to threaten to, by putting ever more missiles in ever more
bases. So the US needs biological warfare to do what it can’t do in any other
way. It can destabilise its enemies, and keep its allies under control, in the
biological sphere when it can’t project other types of force.
In
effect, this is what Trump said on the campaign trail, as it provides the way
he can square the circle of threatening all kinds of countries and still
cutting conventional military expenditure, the things people see, like men and
tanks. Other countries will also have to pay for a share of a US/NATO
biological warfare programme, but how much of it will be on the books?
There
are different degrees of classified information, and the secrecy surrounding
the work of the Lugar lab and other research facilities in Georgia, which are
supposed to be a “scientific institutes”, suggests that whatever goes on there
is not being fully accounted for, or properly audited, because it can’t be.
Trump’s business career demonstrates that he knows effective ways to save money
on paper, whatever the reality.
Pigs
do fly
At
least the US is consistent. Whenever its actions are called into question
anywhere, you can find parallels with previous US actions which give an idea of
what is really going on, and even which intelligence training schools the
perpetrators went to. For example, regime change has a long history of prior
analogies.
Back
in 1977 the San Francisco Chronicle reported on its front page that anti-Castro
terrorists introduced African Swine Fever into Cuba in 1971, just as Per Have
suggests, despite the fact he probably never read this article.
As in the more recent case in Georgia, the virus entered Cuba by boat through
friendly ports and halted pork production, thereby damaging the Cuban economy.
Those
involved in transmitting the virus may not have been aware of what it was, but
they were well paid for doing the job, much better than they would have been
for ordinary cargo. As in the Georgian case, the US did not admit involvement,
and could not have done, as the Nixon White House had banned chemical warfare
at this time. But no one else could have developed the virus, introduced it in
the matter they did and paid the operatives so well to do it.
Following
the international embarrassment of the ironically-named Bay of Pigs fiasco, the
US had few offensive options in Cuba in 1971. Military action was off the
table, and propaganda wasn’t working with the very people it should have, those
who were suffering privation from the Castro regime but were enchanted by the
promise of the riches some exiles were making. When all else had failed, the US
used pigs to try and ruin the country.
The
present Georgian government, though pro-US, is not as compliant as the criminal
gang which preceded it. It wants to run more of the show itself, and move away
from the dirty deeds of the previous regime. So it needs to be shown who’s
boss, without scaring other partners. Sending a deadly virus which ruins the
pork industry was as good a way of doing this as the previous Georgian
government’s favourite method, which was cutting the domestic electricity at
strategic times when the country was actually exporting electrical energy.
A
plus B
The
US ostensibly moved its biological facilities into Georgia to study new strains
of disease which were naturally occurring in livestock, and under control. The
real reason however, to take control of the left over stocks of especially
dangerous pathogens storied there, under the veil of threat reduction.
This
may explain why the Lugar Centre has not produced public research papers – it
can’t find naturally occurring bio agents, only ones it put there and
researches. But as always, Georgia has been used as the template for the region
– what happens there will be rolled out in other friendly regional states
sooner or later, if the US sees an advantage in it—and the timing is right.
Testing
biological agents on the population through takes time and a willing government
that will turn a blind eye. Furthermore, you have to keep at least some of the
effects quiet. Poisoning of pigs can be blamed on the virus itself, the
transmission can be claimed as a natural accident or the work of hostile
powers, and the effects can be broadcast to the skies so everyone goes running
to their protectors.
If
you were a military man who couldn’t achieve the same objectives by sending
troops in, which second option would you choose? It is all about finishing the
job and making the World Safe for Democracy, US-styled Democracy.
One
only needs to take a look Emily St. John Mandel, and her work of fiction, Station Eleven, where
99 percent of the World’s population has been wiped out within hours and days
of spread of the mysterious Georgia Flu, unknowingly brought to the United
States via virus-carrying airline, naturally filled with passengers from
Russia.
Enough
similarities abound with the fictitious Georgia Flu/Lugar Bio Weapons Lab
and/or “the real-life Ebola virus to challenge the interest of conspiracy
theorists. Any level-headed reader will raise an eyebrow and wonder what if …
could this?”
Henry Kamens, columnist,
expert on Central Asia and Caucasus, exclusively for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook”.
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