Project Jefferson was a covert U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency program designed to determine if the current anthrax vaccine was effective against genetically-modified bacteria. The program's legal status under the 1972 Biological Weapons Convention (BWC) is disputed.[citation needed]
History[]
The operation[]
Project Jefferson began in 1997[1] and was designed to reproduce a strain of genetically-modified anthrax isolated by Russian scientists during the 1990s.[2] The goal was to determine whether or not the strain was resistant to the commercially available U.S. anthrax vaccine.[2]
Reportage[]
The project was disclosed in a September 4, 2001 article in The New York Times.[3][4] Reporters Judith Miller, Stephen Engelberg and William J. Broad collaborated to write the article.[3] It is presumed that the reporters had knowledge of the program for at least several months; shortly after the article appeared they published a book that detailed the story further.[3] The 2001 book, Germs: Biological Weapons and America's Secret War, and the article are the only publicly available sources[citation needed] detailing Project Jefferson and its sister projects, Bacchus and Clear Vision.[3]
Legality[]
Project Jefferson was operated by the Defense Intelligence Agency and reviewed by lawyers at the Pentagon.[4] Those lawyers determined that Project Jefferson was in line with the BWC.[4] Despite assertions from the and Bush administrations that the project, and its sisters, were legal, several international legal scholars disagreed.[2] Notable was the fact that the clandestine program was omitted from BWC confidence-building measure (CBM) declarations.[2] These measures were introduced to the BWC in 1986 and 1991 to strengthen the treaty, the U.S. had long been a proponent of their value and some asserted that these tests damaged American credibility.[2] U.S. desire to keep such programs secret was, according to Bush administration officials, a "significant reason" that Bush rejected a draft agreement signed by 143 nations to strengthen the BWC.[4]
References[]
- ↑ http://www.fas.org/sgp/news/2001/09/dod090401.html
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4 Tucker, Jonathan B. "Biological Threat Assessment: Is the Cure Worse Than the Disease?", Arms Control Today, October 2004. Retrieved January 6, 2009.
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 3.3 Enemark, Christian. Disease and Security: Natural Plagues and Biological Weapons in East Asia, (Google Books), Routledge, 2007, pp. 173-75, (ISBN 0415422345).
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 4.3 Miller, Judith, Engelberg, Stephen and Broad, William J. "U.S. Germ Warfare Research Pushes Treaty Limits", The New York Times, September 4, 2001. Retrieved January 6, 2009.
Further reading[]
- Miller, Judith, Engelberg, Stephen and Broad, William J. Germs: Biological Weapons and America's Secret War, (Google Books), Simon and Schuster, 2002, (ISBN 0684871599).
- Thor Duffin, The Jefferson Project, Steinwald Books, 2010, (ISBN 978-0615371276)
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The original article can be found at Project Jefferson and the edit history here.