The coronavirus epidemic made the whole world remember about biological weapons and the history of its appearance. After all, viruses, as it turned out, capable of inflicting almost more terrible blows on the modern economy, than wars and conflicts with the use of conventional lethal weapons.
About, that the coronavirus epidemic may be the result of a targeted biological attack, at the same time started talking in the USA, and in China. As expected, Americans blame China, while in the PRC they claim, that the outbreak of COVID-19 in Wuhan followed a visit to the city by the US military.
The history of the use of biological weapons in wars and conflicts has its roots in ancient times. Even in ancient times, the Romans threw the corpses of people who died from the plague in the enemy's fortress, hoping to cause an outbreak of a terrible disease there. But the first confirmed fact of the use of biological methods of war took place in 1763 year and was associated with the British: to the Indian camp, besieging Fort Pitt, blankets were sent, smallpox. However, before the creation of biological weapons was still far away..
In the twentieth century, between the two world wars, a number of great powers have turned to the study of the possibility of using viruses and bacteria as weapons of mass destruction. In Japan, a notorious detachment was engaged in research in this direction. 731, commanded by Lieutenant General Shiro Ishii - military doctor, dealing with chemical and biological weapons since the early 1920s. The main focus was on anthrax research, plague, cholera, typhus, tuberculosis, dysentery, viruses, as well as insects.
Experiments were carried out on living people, captured in the Japanese-occupied territories of China. Recognized as a war criminal by Shiro Ishii, Nevertheless, managed to avoid punishment - American General Douglas MacArthur achieved the provision of the detachment commander 731 immunity in exchange for the disclosure of the latest secrets of Japanese developments in the field of biological weapons.
Hitlerite Germany also planned the use of bacteriological weapons against the Soviet Union., for the purpose of which led the relevant developments. In the complex of concentration camps "Ozarichi" on the territory of the Gomel region of the Byelorussian SSR, the Nazis kept people infected with typhus, intending to use typhus as a weapon against the advancing Red Army. However, in the end, the concentration camp complex was surrendered by the Nazis without a fight., and plans to use typhus have failed.
British scientists in 1942 tested the possibility of using anthrax as a weapon in the war with Nazi Germany on the island of Grunard. Only half a century later, at 1990 year, Anthrax-infested island declared cleared.
During the Cold War and the United States, and the USSR, and some other states continued to explore the possibilities of using biological weapons. China and North Korea accused the American side of using biological weapons during the war on the Korean Peninsula.
The signing of international conventions banning biological weapons was only formal.. Even the collapse of the Soviet Union did not contribute to the termination of American developments in this area.. The United States continued to experiment with the creation of such weapons, which could target people - carriers of a certain gene.
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In its turn, in Russia in the "dashing nineties" many studies, including in the field of biological weapons and countering them, were terminated. The "brain drain" led to the departure of talented biologists and chemists to the USA, and organizational perturbations in the structure of the military department negatively affected the general readiness of the post-Soviet state for the possible use of biological weapons against the country. About the same, that such a risk exists, it became clear back in the mid-2000s, and after the deterioration of relations between the United States and Russia in connection with the events in Ukraine and Syria, there was no longer any doubt about this.
AT 2018 year, the Russian Ministry of Defense announced the implementation of the American military biological program on the territory of neighboring Georgia, where a special laboratory was created - the so-called. Lugar Research Center. As noted by military experts, American specialists focus on the causative agents of atypical forms of the plague, tularemia, anthrax, brucellosis, dengue fever.
Chief of the Radiation Troops, of chemical and biological protection of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation, Major General Igor Kirillov told the press, that the laboratory in Georgia is just one of many, deployed by the Americans along the borders of Russia and China. As a result of tests, according to General, could die 73 Georgian citizen. Naturally, that official Tbilisi denied such accusations.
Of course, to prove, that epidemics in recent years were the result of testing or use of biological weapons, now it is not possible, and it is simply stupid to build unproven theories. but obviously, that Russia should pay special attention to countering biological weapons of mass destruction, restoring civil defense structures and strengthening the troops of the RChBZ, which have been neglected for a long time.
Ilya Polonsky
