Biological and Chemical Weapons | Introduction
In 1998 police nationwide received reports from abortion clinics concerning mysterious envelopes that had arrived in the mail. Clinic personnel notified authorities immediately when they found that the envelopes contained stained pieces of paper bearing the message: “Anthrax. Have a nice death.” Though terrified at first, the recipients of the envelopes calmed when lab tests determined the letters showed no trace of anthrax, a virulent disease that plagues livestock and can be equally fatal to humans. Authorities and clinic employees were convinced of a mass hoax, but subsequent sightings of these envelopes still prompted emergency phone calls. No one wanted to be the first victim of a “real” terrorist act. Hazardous material (hazmat) teams responded to every call, costing cities huge sums of money to address what was widely considered to be an empty threat.
The new threat
Journalists T. Trent Gegax and Mark Hosenball, in their Newsweek article, “The New Bomb Threat,” maintain, “The specter of bioterrorism forces law-enforcement officials to take such nonsense very seriously.” Bioterrorism is the popularized term for terrorist attacks using weapons of a biological nature, typically disease-causing pathogens that can spread easily throughout a concentrated population. The desire of perpetrators may be to disable the victims or kill them outright. The fear associated with these types of weapons is that a large population can be infected by doses small enough (a few spores, perhaps) that they could be easily concealed. Furthermore, many people believe that since the germs are common, they could be obtained or even grown with little technical expertise or equipment. Some experts, however, disagree. Gegax and Hosenball note that “Though anthrax is deadly, it isn’t easy to transform the spores into a usable weapon.” Still, the possibility exists, and the public, its fears fueled in part by popular novels that portray the horrifying potential of such terrorist acts, feels vulnerable.
The fear, of course, is not only a byproduct of science fiction scenarios. In 1995 the Aum Shinrikyo cult in Japan released sarin nerve gas in a Tokyo subway, killing twelve people and contaminating thousands more. Like biological agents, sarin gas is relatively easy to manufacture and conceal, making it an ideal weapon for terrorists. The nerve gas was carried on board the subway in plastic bags. With the possibility that chemical or biological weapons could be transported or delivered anywhere, the fear of vulnerability may be justified.
Coupled with the fear of clandestine manufacture and movement of chemical or biological agents is a growing apprehension of terrorists’ enigmatic motivations. Traditionally, terrorist groups shun mass killings because the backlash may cast a negative light on their political cause. But many of today’s terrorist groups like the Aum Shinrikyo may be acting without a political agenda. The Aum Shinrikyo, for example, were religious fanatics apparently acting out part of a larger doomsday plot; other groups may simply want the celebrity of media attention that results from such attacks. As Ron Purver, a strategic analyst for the Canadian Security Intelligence Service, argues, “What makes these groups especially dangerous is that they may not be constrained by some of the political disincentives—fear of alienating potential supporters or of unleashing massive government retribution, etc.—that may have operated in the past in the case of more traditional terrorist groups.”
Exaggerated fears?
Once the sarin gas attack was public knowledge, some officials predicted that the floodgates had been opened and that other copycat attacks would take place. No such attacks have yet materialized, however. And analysts who believe the fear of chemical and biological terrorist attacks is exaggerated point out that few attacks involving these weapons have ever been attempted and, of the significant attempts, most have been thwarted by authorities. In fact, the most infamous terrorist attack in recent decades was the bombing of the Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City and that involved a traditional explosive device. Marie Isabelle Chevrier, a member of the Federation of American Scientists Working Group on Biological and Toxin Weapons Verification, asserts the “hopeful” prophecy that the Oklahoma City bombing “demonstrates how effective, and visually riveting, relatively simple explosive devices can be. Perhaps one of the unintended but nevertheless welcome consequences of that bombing is that terrorists need not turn to C/B [chemical/biological] weapons to command the public’s undivided attention or to produce high casualties.”
The irony of Chevrier’s conclusion is certainly not humorous. Those who refute the doomsayers argue that the reasons for not using chemical and biological weapons are so strong that most terrorist groups would refrain. To these individuals, the disincentives that Ron Purver calls outdated— fear of alienating supporters or attracting government retribution— are in fact still holding terrorist groups in check. Moreover, evidence shows that the groups who have tried to implement chemical or biological agents have either failed to carry out the threat or—in the case of the successful poisonings—failed to produce mass death.
The fear, however, remains. The deadly potential of a nuclear device carried in a rocket payload has been shrunk to a biological weapon that some alarmists claim could fit in a pocket. In the case of a biological or chemical attack, no radar or early warning device could foretell of the coming doom, and it is that unpredictability that worries government officials and ordinary citizens alike. Millions of dollars are now funding measures to deter, detect, and respond to chemical and biological weapons threats in the United States. Both sides of the bioterrorism debate are forced to concede that only time will tell if it is money well spent.
