On Thursday, March 9, the U.S. undersecretary of state for political affairs stated that there was biological research taking place in Ukraine. Then, in a follow-up question by Sen. Marco Rubio, she stated emphatically that if any biological material from that lab were used in an act of biological warfare, it would surely come from Russia. While there is a distinction between biological research and biological warfare research, the very fact that the answer and follow-up question alluded to using material from that lab in a biological attack shows that the pathogens in that lab can be weaponized.

Further, we know that biological weapons of mass destruction were proposed to the U.N. way back in 2002 by then-Secretary of State Colin Powell as an excuse for invading Iraq.  So, the admission that there is a biological research lab that has material that could be used as bioweapons could easily be used as an excuse by Russia for invading Ukraine.  However, it cannot be used as justification for the war crime of Russia’s bombing a maternity hospital or other atrocities that are already taking place. Nevertheless, despite disclaimers that might come -- that the facility is not a bio-weapons developmental facility -- we can say if it looks like bio-weapons, sounds like bio-weapons, and kills like bio-weapons, it is a bio-weapons facility (despite disclaimers).  

In an article going back to June 2010 entitled “Biolab Opens In Ukraine,” the author, Tina Redlup, wrote, “The level-3 bio-safety lab, which is the first built under the expanded authority of the Nunn-Lugar Cooperative Threat Reduction program, will be used to study anthrax, tularemia and Q fever as well as other dangerous pathogens.”  Additionally, Sen. Richard Lugar stated that “the facility began in 2005 [during the Bush administration] when he and then-Senator Barack Obama entered a partnership with Ukrainian officials.”  How and why U.S. senators are involved in setting up a biological lab in Odessa rather than health or defense officials of the executive branch of government is still a mystery to this writer.

To many people going about their lives, it may seem that having such a lab supported by the U.S. from its inception is not troubling. To those people, the world is a dangerous place, and we owe it to the American citizenry to stop biowarfare if it originates with the bad guys, but if the “good guys” are doing it, it’s O.K.  In that case, it may be perceived as a purely defensive measure to alert the bad guys that what’s good for the goose is good for the gander.  It’s a species of the idea that the best offense is a good defense. So, if there are bad actors in the world they have to know that whatever cruel measures they dish out will be dished out doubly or triply to them.

However appealing this might be to masses who tend to think in terms of I’ll get him worse than he gets me, it does not conform to international law.  Biological warfare is not treated the same as “stand your ground” laws where the threatened or endangered party may use deadly force to defend himself or herself.  No.  Rather, regarding biological weapons, there is a comprehensive convention against the use of biological weapons that entered into force in 1975.  It has the long and weighty title “The Convention on the Prohibition of the Development, Production and Stockpiling of Bacteriological [Biological] and Toxin Weapons and on their Destruction.”  This document has been signed and ratified by 183 countries worldwide including Ukraine and the U.S. in 1975.  The convention bans “biological agents” that have “no justification for prophylactic, protective or other peaceful purposes.”  

One could easily see how that strange breed of diplomatic word parsers in the State department or smart, ivy league cookies in high places could weasel around the Convention by stating that there were “protective or peaceful purposes” in the research in the Odessa lab (or Wuhan for that matter) as a way of evading the aggressive and evil implications of the work being done there.

Further, the Convention states that each State “undertakes to destroy, or to divert to peaceful purposes, all agents, toxins, weapons, equipment and means of delivery which are in its possession or under its jurisdiction or control (Art. 11).”  This writer can easily see how the U.S. can distort the intent of this restriction by sending research of this kind to territories other than the U.S., like Odesa, Ukraine, or Wuhan, PRC.  Thus, we arrange to fund (my italics) this kind of devilish research in other venues in order to posture before the world that we have “clean hands” because we do not do this work in the U.S.  This would explain why the research being done in Wuhan was stopped on U.S. soil by the National Institutes of Health, yet substantial funding was sent to the lab at Wuhan. The U.S.-based EcoHealth Alliance received $3.7 million from the NIH, $600,000 of which was given to the Wuhan Institute of Virology.  And, similarly, Obama and Lugar undoubtedly funded the lab in Odessa, although the actual funding amounts are not known to me as of this writing.

At the same time, we cannot say unequivocally that the U.S. or Ukraine or even China are directly in violation of the Convention on biological weapons by having these labs.  As a matter of fact, there are 59 maximum biosafety level-4 facilities planned, under construction or in operation across the world, spanning 23 countries including the U.K., U.S., China, India, Gabon, and Côte d’Ivoire. 

Thus, there is a fine line sometimes between intentionally wishing to attack and harm or, conversely, simply playing with fire.  Despite the 1975 Convention which clearly forbids bioweapons and was clearly a caution to the entire world, perverse humanity, including many U.S. leaders in the 47 years since the Convention was ratified has continued to expand its involvement in research that can, too easily, be weaponized. To this writer, no matter what the intentions of the participants in these bioweapon researches, the expansion of these programs displays devilish intentions that do not bode well for humanity.  While some hyped-up “greenies” are worried about global “climate change,” we should be a lot more concerned about global suicide-by-germs.

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