The Pentagon used potentially dangerous chemical and biological agents
in 50 secret tests involving US military personnel in a decade-long
project to measure the weapons' combat capabilities, according to Pentagon
findings.
The tests were done between 1962 and 1973 and involved 5,842 service
members. Many were not told of the tests, some of which involved releases
of deadly nerve agents in Alaska and Hawaii.
The information released today disclosed eight new tests that primarily
used non-lethal bacteria and in some cases caustic chemicals. It revealed
for the first time experiments to find ways to use submarines to
distribute biological weapons.
"Project 112" and "Project SHAD" were developed in 1961 to study the
combat uses of biological and chemical weapons and methods to protect
American troops from such attacks. Initially it was believed that only
simulated agents were used, but last year the Defence Department admitted
for the first time that some of the tests used real chemical or biological
weapons.
Most of the tests made public today used the benign bacterium bacillus
globigii to simulate how biological weapons agents would spread through
the hold of a ship.
One test, called "Blue Tango", entailed spraying two types of bacteria,
including E. coli, in a rainforest in Hawaii in 1968 to gauge how they
bacteria would linger in the vegetation.
Another, "Folded Arrow", involved spraying bacillus globigii from a
submarine over part of Oahu, Hawaii, and over several boats off the coast
in 1968 to gauge how Venezuelan equine encephalitis would be carried by
wind.
"It bespeaks the time, the early '60s, when we were in the Cold War,
and we were concerned that Russia and perhaps China had chemical and
biological capabilities that could be used against American troops and
against us in the homeland," said Dr Michael Kilpatrick, deputy director
of the Defence Department's Deployment Health Support Directorate.
The United States scrapped its biological weapons program in the late
1960s and agreed in a 1997 treaty to destroy all its chemical weapons.
Tests were conducted in Hawaii, Alaska, Maryland, Florida, Utah,
Georgia, Panama, Canada, Britain and aboard ships in the North Atlantic
and Pacific oceans.
None of the tests were done to gauge the human response to chemical or
biological weapons, Kilpatrick said. In each test, military personnel were
protected from the agents by shelter, protective clothing or vaccinations.
Ships' logs had reported no outbreaks of illness at the time,
Kilpatrick said, but to date 260 service members have reported illnesses
to the Veterans Administration that they believe are related to their
presence at the test sites.
Steven Aftergood, an expert on government secrecy with the Federation
of American Scientists, said even if none of the military personnel were
harmed, there were ethical questions about conducting tests on unwitting
soldiers.
"If there were no illnesses caused, which I think is still an open
question, then it is a matter of luck, and one of the reasons government
accountability and transparency are so important is to prevent initiatives
of this kind," Aftergood said.
Congressman Mike Thompson, a Democrat from California, and several of
his colleagues had sent a letter to Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld
today, arguing it would be premature to close the book on investigations
into Project 112 and Project SHAD.
"Veterans who may have been exposed during these tests deserve to know
all the facts," Thompson said. "The Department of Defence's decision to
close its investigation may unfairly deny them that right."
The inquiry began three years ago after several Navy veterans reported
health problems they believed might have been caused by their involvement
in the tests. Research into the classified project found more tests had
been conducted and many more veterans had been present, expanding the
scope of the investigation.
Kilpatrick said the Veterans Administration was working to notify the
5,842 veterans who were present at the tests.
AP
