By Anthony Bell
Since early 2022, US-driven biological experiments have been drawing attention of various experts, political pundits, and activists. US officials decline any involvement of the country’s public and private companies in the development of potentially hazardous biological agents. However, biological activities initiated by Washington are still wrapped in secrets.
The issues of potentially hazardous biological developments being conducted at several dozen laboratories across the world with participation of U.S. experts are still of high importance. On August 16, the Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) published several pieces of new information regarding the US biological activities in Ukraine. It should be mentioned that these declarations and revelations should be taken with a grain of salt as Moscow is not a third party of the conflict in the East European country. However, this information should be thoroughly considered as Lt. Gen. Igor Kirilov, chief of Russian MoD’s Nuclear, Biological and Chemical Protection Troops (Voyska RkhBZ), who unveiled aforementioned info at a briefing, pulled the strings of partnership between US-based public and private companies in the creation of new (potentially hazardous) biological agents.
Despite the proclaimed targets of such biological programs (namely, monitoring of illness frequency and providing relief to the developing countries), Washington may conduct dual-use researches that violate the Biological and Toxin Weapons Convention (BTWC) signed in 1972 and ratified by 185 countries. Having entered force in 1975, the Convention dramatically limited any potentially hazardous biological activity.
According to Kirillov, Washington’s projects are aimed at the research of potential components of biological weapons, including anthrax, tularemia, coronaviruses, as well as agents of economically important infections (the pathogenic avian influenza and the African swine pest).
One could find a trend, according to which potentially hazardous biological agents having been researched by Pentagon, for instance, COVID-19, avian influenza, and the African swine pest, then turned into full-scale pandemics, with U.S.-based pharmaceutical manufacturers (the so-called Big Pharma) gaining profits and privileges, said Kirillov.
Big Pharma and the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) could have been involved in the outbreak of novel coronavirus (COVID-19), the chief of Russia’s CBRN Troops said. Key role in this process was played by the EcoHealth Alliance (EHA). EHA specialists had been researching bats since 2015; the organization had been also searching for new stems of coronaviruses and their transfer between human beings. More than 2,500 bats had been studied, Kirillov emphasized.
The military official also mentioned the Event 201 exercise having been conducted by John Hopkins University in October 2019 on the eve of the COVID-19 pandemics in China. During the exercise, the experts trained countering novel coronavirus, which had been brought to human beings by bats through the medium of a hog.
The US also established the Office of Pandemic Preparedness and Response Policy (OPPRP), Kirillov noted. The OPPRP is responsible for coordination of the executive office of the President of the United States internal response to public health threats that have pandemic potential. This includes ongoing work to address potential outbreaks and public health threats associated with COVID-19, monkeypox, polio, respiratory syncytial virus, avian, and human influenza. The Office is also set to direct and coordinate federal science and technology efforts related to pandemic preparedness. The OPPRP submits its periodic reports to Congress. The newly established structure will be headed by a prominent military leader, Maj Gen (Retired) Paul Friedrichs, who is set to serve as special assistant to the POTUS and senior director for global health security and biodefence at the National Security Council. The establishing of this very structure, coupled with searches for new coronaviruses, might point at an intention to launch a new wave of pandemics. The use of biologically protective actions to prevent ‘a new COVID-19’ might turn into offensive operations.
Kirillov also cited unspecified ‘documents obtained during the special military operation [in Ukraine]’ that ‘show that [an institute of Pentagon] is directly involved in the collection of dangerous pathogens in various regions of the world’. These activities might lead to a new outbreak of pandemic. However, the chief of Russia’s CBRN Troops did not reveal any document from this collection; the publication of these papers might take place later.
It should be mentioned that some claims made by Kirillov require more solid and unbiased evidence. At the same time, his speech raises a very annoying and disturbing question – what is being done at the US biological laboratories and various Pentagon’s institutes across the world?
The author is an independent military analyst.
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