Copyright 2001
The Detroit News.
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 Associated Press
Fear of bioterrorist acts escalated with the disclosure that terrorists sought information about crop dusting airplanes that could be used to wage biological or chemical warfare. Crop dusting planes were briefly grounded.
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Fears of biological, chemical attack grow
Americans rush to buy gas masks, but many experts believe the threat is overrated
By Richard A. Ryan / Senior Washington Correspondent
WASHINGTON -- All the world is watching as President George W. Bush sends naval fleets, fighter planes and bombers, and American troops overseas in a massive military buildup to fight the United States' version of a war against terrorism.
But no one, except perhaps a handful of terrorists in the United States and abroad, knows how they will wage their war against America.
Those who study terrorism -- and many American citizens -- share a common fear that the next terrorist attack may involve the use of biological and chemical weapons that could include such deadly agents as anthrax, smallpox, plague, botulism, and sarin and VX nerve gases.
While the experts talk about their theories, citizens rush to stores and the Internet to purchase every available gas mask.
"This war will include action on American soil," declared Stephen Prior, research director for the National Security Health Policy Center at the Potomac Institute for Policy Studies. "The terrorist goal is to terrorize. They have no moral standards that need to be invoked. Killing is a way of terrorizing."
Prior thinks that a potential biological or chemical attack against the United States is "relatively low in the near future," but he is convinced that some new attack already has been planned.
"They didn't do what they did on Sept. 11 without knowing what they would do next," he said.
No one is certain what capabilities terrorists have to launch an attack involving biological or chemical weapons. But the fear of a bioterrorist act escalated with disclosure that terrorists sought information about crop dusting airplanes that could possibly be used to wage biological or chemical warfare. As a result, crop dusting airplanes were ground Sunday and Monday. They were able to resume flights Tuesday.
There is also fear that deadly germs contained in an aerosol could be sprayed from rooftops, trucks, into subway systems or into the duct work systems of major buildings. Guards also have been posted at water reservoirs around the country to guard against poisoning.
Indeed, Attorney General John Ashcroft on Tuesday told Congress that terrorists may be planning an attack using a truck carrying hazardous chemicals. Twenty people have been charged with trying to obtain fraudulent licenses to drive tanker trucks, officials said. Some of those may have connections to the hijackers, the Justice Department said.
Many experts, such as Amy Smithson, director of the Chemical and Biological Weapons Nonproliferation Project at Washington's Henry L. Stimson Center, believe the terrorists' ability to launch such attacks is vastly overrated.
There are, she says, great difficulties in producing the germs or chemicals and then finding an effective way to disperse them.
"I don't believe that citizens should be automatically alarmed that this is going to be the next thing that happens," she said. "I don't carry a gas mask and I use mass transit every day. I am not going to let fear of the vastly improbable stop me from living my life. If I do, the terrorists have won."
Awareness heightened
But other experts, such as Michael Osterholm, director of the University of Minnesota's Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy, thinks a biological attack on the United States at some point is inevitable.
"Many of us who are involved in studying the many aspects of bioterrorism believe that it is not a question of if such an event will occur, but rather when, as well as which agent will be used and how extensive the damage will be. Given the enormity of what is possible, we must prepare for a potential nightmare," Osterholm wrote two years ago.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is preparing for that nightmare. Only four hours after the two hijacked jets hit the World Trade Center two weeks ago, the Centers issued a "Health Alert," urging hospitals to "monitor for any possible unusual disease patterns" that might involve biological or chemical agents.
Dr. David Johnson, chief medical executive at the Michigan Department of Health, said the state's public health system has been preparing for an attack for the past two years. A lot of progress has been made, aided by a three-
year federal grant of $4.5 million, but "we have more progress to make," he said.
Yet Dr. Sandro Cinti, an infectious disease specialist at the University of Michigan, said the state is not ready for a major attack.
"We are not prepared for a large-scale bioterrorism attack," he said. "Up until last Tuesday, the concern about bioterrorism was virtually nil because people didn't think it could be done."
While the risk today of an attack is not great, Dr. Cinti said, it is imperative the state be prepared in the next five to 10 years when terrorists may have the capability to carry out massive biological or chemical attacks.
Attainability
At the moment, there is no evidence Osama bin Laden and his Al-Qaeda terrorist network have acquired the ability to wage bioterrorism. But there is ample evidence that he has tried.
In an interview with Newsweek Magazine in 1999, bin Laden said he did not consider it a crime to acquire nuclear, chemical or biological weapons. "Our holy land is occupied by Israel and American forces. We have the right to defend ourselves and to liberate our holy land."
At this point, nuclear weapons seem beyond the ability of the terrorists to obtain, assemble and deliver. But biological and chemical weapons may be more accessible. Iraq, an enemy of the United States, is known to have worked on developing chemical and biological weapons and could be a source for terrorists.
What makes the thought of such weapons so frightening is the secrecy and potential efficiency. An airplane flying over a crowded sports stadium dropping anthrax spores or smallpox could easily infect and kill thousands.
Anthrax, one of the most deadly germs, appears to be relatively easy to obtain. There are more than 450 repositories around the world. Symptoms of fever, fatigue, cough and chest discomfort usually appear within six days of exposure. Ninety percent of those infected will die.
Smallpox is the more insidious because it is contagious. A hundred people infected by smallpox can quickly spread it through a large population. Smallpox was officially declared eradicated in 1972. The last known case was in 1977 in Somalia. The only two known repositories are in the United States and Russia.
Vaccines can prevent smallpox. But the United States stopped vaccinating people in 1972. There are 7.5 million doses of vaccine left and the government has ordered the production of 40 million more. But the new doses are not scheduled to be available until 2004.
Jonathan Tucker, a chemical and biological weapons expert in the Washington office of the Monterey Institute and author of Scourge: The Once and Future Theat of Smallpox, said if terrorists were able to acquire the germ it would be difficult to turn it into a weapon.
But a low-tech approach, Tucker said, would be for a terrorist to infect himself and then walk around among crowds.
Sarin and VX nerve gases are also potential threats. Japan's Aum Shinrikyo cult tried to spread Sarin gas in the Tokyo subway system in 1995. The attack killed a dozen people and seriously injured hundreds more.
Stansfeld Turner, a retired Naval admiral and former CIA director, said because of their dissipation rate, he did not consider chemicals to be a major threat to the country.
Even so, he said, "they could be a very big threat to the thousands of people" who might be the target.
You can reach Richard Ryan at rryan@detnews.com or (202) 662-7379.
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