Fox News: Anthrax Attacks Came From Government Labs

[8bitagent]

Ususally Fox News is the bastion of neocon propaganda...but here, they actually are doing their job. Hot off the press:
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,342852,00.html

WASHINGTON — The FBI has narrowed its focus to "about four" suspects in the 6 1/2-year investigation of the deadly anthrax attacks of 2001, and at least three of those suspects are linked to the Army’s bioweapons research facility at Fort Detrick in Maryland, FOX News has learned.

Among the pool of suspects are three scientists — a former deputy commander, a leading anthrax scientist and a microbiologist — linked to the research facility, known as USAMRIID.

The FBI has collected writing samples from the three scientists in an effort to match them to the writer of anthrax-laced letters that were mailed to two U.S. senators and at least two news outlets in the fall of 2001, a law enforcement source confirmed.

The anthrax attacks began shortly after the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks, further alarming a nation already reeling from the deaths of 3,000 Americans. Five people were killed and more than a dozen others were infected by the deadly spores in the fall of 2001.

A leading theory is that the anthrax was stolen from Fort Detrick and then sealed inside the letters. A law enforcement source said the FBI is essentially engaged in a process of elimination.

Much of the early public focus fell on a Fort Detrick scientist named Steven Hatfill, who is suing federal authorities for identifying him as a person of interest. Now the FBI is focusing on other scientists at the facility.

"Fort Detrick is run by the United States Army. It's the most secure biological warfare research center in the United States," a bioterrorism expert told FOX News.

Asked to comment on the likelihood that the anthrax originated at the facility, the expert said:

"It's not suprising, except that it would underscore that there was serious security deficiencies that existed at one time at Fort Detrick — the ability of researchers to smuggle out some type of very sophisticated anthrax weapon and in some quantity. And, nevertheless, it was possible."

In December 2001, an Army commander tried to dispel the possibility of a connection to Fort Detrick by taking the media on a rare tour of the base. The commander said the Army used only liquid anthrax, not powder, for its experiments.

"I would say that it does not come from our stocks, because we do not use that dry material," Maj. Gen. John Parker said. The letters that were mailed to the media and Sens. Tom Daschle and Patrick Leahy all contained powdered anthrax.

But in an e-mail obtained by FOX News, scientists at Fort Detrick openly discussed how the anthrax powder they were asked to analyze after the attacks was nearly identical to that made by one of their colleagues.

"Then he said he had to look at a lot of samples that the FBI had prepared ... to duplicate the letter material," the e-mail reads. "Then the bombshell. He said that the best duplication of the material was the stuff made by [name redacted]. He said that it was almost exactly the same … his knees got shaky and he sputtered, 'But I told the General we didn't make spore powder!'"

Asked for comment, an Army spokeswoman referred all calls to the FBI. The FBI would not comment about the pool of suspects, but a spokeswoman said the investigation clearly remains a priority.

Now what a coinkydink that the anthrax attacks(you all remember them right?)
came from US government high level security labs.

See, because a week before September 11th, it was reported that the US government was secretly conducting anthrax tests using scientists to use the deadliest spores imaginable on the american public:
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.h ... A9679C8B63
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.h ... A9679C8B63

Kind of reminds me how on leading up to, and on the morning of 9/11 NORAD was running war game exercises of "Osama" forces hijacking planes and crashing them into the World Trade Center and Pentagon

But thats not all!

Turns out Bush, Cheney and the White House staff were put on strong anti anthrax vaccinations 2 weeks before the anthrax attacks:
http://www.judicialwatch.org/archive/ne ... 802k.shtml

WHAT a coinkydink!

Oh and whats this? The FIRST victim of the anthrax attacks was the SAME Tabloid company that hosted the 9/11 hijackers in a Florida condo weeks before the attack?
The same guy that was killed by anthrax was going to the same tiny flight school at the same time as Mohamed Atta?
http://www.sptimes.com/News/101501/Worl ... to_t.shtml

Yeah, lots of coinkydinks.

Whats NOT a coinkydink is that it was the two senators who OPPOSED the Patriot Act that got sent the anthrax letters...no shocker, the USA Patriot Act was rushed through immediately there after.

[Ben D]

Ususally Fox News is the bastion of neocon propaganda...but here, they actually are doing their job. Hot off the press.

They may be doing their job, but I'm not convinced it is the public they are serving.

[NaturalMystik]

They may be made the scapegoats but I'll doubt they'll ever turn up hard evidence linking them. Obviously the anthrax was ordered by whoever has that kind of authority. And surely it was well enough planned that the boys doing their jobs on the inside won't be punished.

[Nordic]

Don't forget this (something I wrote over at DK:)

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/ ... 221/280489

The U.S. government's "growing bioterror programs represent a significant emerging danger to our own population."
-- Dr. Jonathan King, Professor of Molecular Biology at M.I.T. and a founder of the Council for Responsible Genetics

Dr. Francis A. Boyle is a scholar in the areas of international law and human rights whose distinguished career includes the drafting of the legislation for the Biological Weapons Convention, known as the Biological Weapons Anti-Terrorism Act of 1989, that was approved unanimously by both Houses of the U.S. Congress and signed into law by President George H.W. Bush.

Here is what he is now saying:

"I believe the FBI knows exactly who was behind these terrorist anthrax attacks upon the U.S. Congress in the Fall of 2001, and that the culprits were US government-related scientists involved in a criminal US government biowarfare program," Boyle said.

Boyle is quoted in the article:

Although only a "handful" of scientists had the ability to perpetrate the crime, the culprit among them may never be identified as the FBI ordered the destruction of the anthrax culture collection at Ames, IA., from which the Ft. Detrick lab got its pathogens ...
(snip)
and that destruction of the Ames anthrax "appears to be a cover-up orchestrated by the FBI.

These allegations are forthcoming in a new book by Boyle, Biowarfare and Terrorism, published by Clarity Press, Inc., of Atlanta, GA. His previously published titles include, Foundations of World Order, The Criminality of Nuclear Deterrence, and Destroying World Order. Boyle holds a Doctor of Law Magna Cum Laude and a Ph.D. in political science, both from Harvard.

In googling around for this diary, I also found an article that Boyle wrote way back in 2003, where he seems to first make these allegations. This is a short but fascinating article summarizing the history of the United States' own biological weapons. He makes it clear that it was Ronald Reagan and his Republican cronies who facilitated the United States' plunge into this WMD-type of dangerous biological weapons-making, which quickly grew into an illegal operation:

The administration of President Ronald Reagan came to power in 1980. The Reagan administration took the position that the US was going to exploit its superior technology with regard to all types of weapons. This also included the new technologies of gene splicing and genetic engineering. Massive amounts of money, hundreds of millions of dollars, were poured into researching and developing what were claimed to be "defensive" biological agents.

The way the Reagan administration did this was by investigating every exotic disease one could imagine for the purpose of developing vaccines. In this way, the US operated within the exceptions of the BTWC. Of course, the technology used to get the vaccine is exactly the same technology used to create the agent. In fact, the agent is usually created first in order to then produce the vaccine. After one creates the agent, one creates the vaccine and then a delivery device. The result is a biological weapon.

The tip-off in many of these government contracts is that they call for the development of an aerosol delivery device.

Much of the research for these biological weapons was being done at universities around the country. The tip-off in many of these government contracts is that they call for the development of an aerosol delivery device. This is important because most biological warfare agents are delivered through the air.

I wish I could quote more of this article because it's quite fascinating.

Ultimately, Boyle's contention is that the cover-up is due to the fact that the entire R&D operation behind the development of these strains was, and still is, completely illegal, both domestically and internationally. I'll quote him one last time from the 2nd article linked:

I believe that the FBI knows exactly who was behind these attacks and that they have concluded that the perpetrator was someone who was or is involved in illegal and criminal biological warfare research conducted by the US government (the Pentagon or the CIA) or by one of the government’s civilian contractors. For that reason, the FBI is not going to apprehend and indict the perpetrator. To do so would directly implicate the government in conducting biological warfare research. So this is where we are today. The FBI says that they are working on it, but of course, that is ridiculous.

An he's not shy about suggesting the motive for the attacks in the first place:

"Could it truly be coincidental," he continued, "that two of the primary intended victims of the terrorist anthrax attacks - Senators Daschle and Leahy - were holding up the speedy passage of the pre-planned USA Patriot Act ... an act which provided the federal government with unprecedented powers in relation to US citizens and institutions?"

Hopefully Leahy, one of the Democratic Senators who was on the receiving end of this stuff, will get somes answers out of the F.B.I., who thus far have have been less than open about their supposed investigation. Maybe this is one reason that Leahy said Bush should be "terrified" that he's about to be the head of the Senate Judiciary Committee.

[Gouda]

If only the US Government had implemented similar good practices before 2001...


http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/a ... ge_id=1770

M15 in terrorist checks on 800 killer virus labs

MI5 and anti-terrorist police are carrying out secret background checks on thousands of scientists amid fears that Al Qaeda is trying to infiltrate British research laboratories to obtain deadly viruses.

The vetting, which includes checks on family backgrounds, political views and associates, is part of a review of some 800 laboratories in hospitals, universities and private firms where staff have access to incurable viruses such as ebola.

...

Dr Paul Logan, of its Biological Agents Unit, told a Commons sub-committee on biosecurity: "We work very closely with the security services. We advise them on toxins and pathogens.

"They are looking at very different things at the moment in terms of vetting of staff, looking at physical security and how easy it is to break into premises and the wider security issues."

The HSE licences about 340 organisations to work with material, classified "Containment level 3", which can cause severe human disease, may be spread to the community - but can be treated.

It also oversees eight organisations allowed to work with substances classified "Containment level 4" - so-called "Doomsday viruses" which can spread quickly through the population but cannot be treated.

[MinM]

THE HIDDEN ANTHRAX LETTERS SUSPECT

ANTHRAX COVER-UP?
Scientist Is Paid Millions by U.S. in Anthrax Suit

[orz]

Ususally Fox News is the bastion of neocon propaganda...but here, they actually are doing their job.

Funny isn't it how they occasionally interrupt their usual schedule to provide sensational one-off pieces backing up conspiracy theories and deep politics and then return to their saturday morning cartoon bad guy level of discourse.

"Without air, the sky is black, so where are the stars?"

[hava1]

Is this somwhow connected to the law suit filed in Israel regarding the anthrax vaccine experimentation ? Prof Schaferman, head of Biological warfare center is implicated in donig those experiments and selling the results to international croporation in the USA. It appears that if anyone had an interest to send the spores it would be someone who benefits from the vaccine development. Maybe people like him and similar in the US started a little private enterprise...and needed a "boost" for the business.
But from what I see, re the Israelis who are involved they are immune and their immunity comes from the USA. Namely, there is no intention in the USA to actually investigate those matters, maybe to find a scapegoat and frame someone and bury this deep in the ground. MOst of the Israeli scientists who "sell" Israelis for experimentation or for "courier" jobs, get american citizenship and disappear. The witnesses are spearated and so there cannot be investigation either here or there. It would be convenient for the American partners to frame someone from Israel, and then present it as "an Israeli scam", wouldn't it ? I don't know, but it seems there is some "raiding" of the Israeli side of it, but not very thorogh.

[Hugh Manatee Wins]

The Fox article is very suspicious what with Fox being the sole source for an alleged email that exonerates the Army's lies by putting vague focus on perhaps lying scientists who *mislead* the Army general into misleading the public and FBI.

Ohhh. Dang scientists. Allegedly the cause of a "Six and a half year investigation."
Yah. Right.

This looks like just a shellgame device to counter news of Hatfill's lawsuit.
The cartoony image of how "his knees got shaky and he sputtered" is overplaying the psyops to achieve a propaganda asset called VIVIDNESS.

"I would say that it does not come from our stocks, because we do not use that dry material," Maj. Gen. John Parker said. The letters that were mailed to the media and Sens. Tom Daschle and Patrick Leahy all contained powdered anthrax.

But in an e-mail obtained by FOX News, scientists at Fort Detrick openly discussed how the anthrax powder they were asked to analyze after the attacks was nearly identical to that made by one of their colleagues.

"Then he said he had to look at a lot of samples that the FBI had prepared ... to duplicate the letter material," the e-mail reads. "Then the bombshell. He said that the best duplication of the material was the stuff made by [name redacted]. He said that it was almost exactly the same … his knees got shaky and he sputtered, 'But I told the General we didn't make spore powder!'"

Hunh? The FBI had prepared "lots of samples?" This is nonsense.