6th Century B.C.

Assyrians poison the wells of their enemies with rye ergot.

6th Century B.C.

Solon of Athens poisons the water supply with hellebore (skunk cabbage), an herb purgative, during the siege of Krissa.

184 B.C.

During the naval battle against King Eumenes of Pergamon, Hannibal's forces hurled earthen pots filled with serpents upon enemy decks. Hannibal won as the Pergamene were forced to fight against man and snake.

1346

During the siege of Kaffa, the Tartar army hurls its plague-ridden dead over the walls of the city. The defenders are forced to surrender.

1422

At the battle of Carolstein, bodies of plague-stricken soldiers plus 2000 cartloads of excrement are hurled into the ranks of enemy troops.

15th C

It has been said that during Pizarro's conquest of South America, he improved his chances of victory by presenting to the natives, as gifts, clothing laden with the variola (smallpox) virus.

1710

Russian troops hurl the corpses of plague victims over the city walls of Reval during Russia's war with Sweden.

1763

Captain Ecuyer of the Royal Americans, under the guise of friendship, presents to the native Americans two blankets and a handkerchief contaminated with smallpox.

1767

During the French and Indian War, the English general, Sir Jeffrey Amherst, gives blankets laced with smallpox to Indians loyal to the French. The epidemic decimates the tribes, arguably, resulting in a successful British attack on Ft. Carillon.

1797

Napoleon attempts to force the surrender of Mantua by infecting the citizens with swamp fever.

1860-1865

W.T. Sherman's memoirs contain an account of Confederate soldiers poisoning ponds by dumping the carcasses of dead animals into them.

1914-1917

Allegations are made against the Germans that during WWI they attempted to spread cholera in Italy, plague in St. Petersburg, and biological bombs over Britain.

1915

Allegedly, a German-American, Dr. Anton Dilger, grows cultures of Bacillus anthracis and Pseudomonas mallei (Glanders), supplied by the German government, in his Washington D.C. home. The agents and an inoculation device are given to sympathetic dockworkers in Baltimore to infect 3000 head of horses, mules, and cattle, destined for the Allied troops in Europe. It is also alleged that several hundred troops are additionally affected.

1924

A subcommittee of the Temporary Mixed Commission of the League of Nations reports that, although Germany was guilty of chemical warfare, there is no hard evidence that she ever employed biological warfare tactics.

1925

The Geneva Protocol bans biological weapons on June 17. It is the first multilateral agreement that extends the prohibition of chemical agents to biological agents. Japan refuses to approve the ban

1931

In 1994, according to Prince Mikasa of Japan, Japanese military officials attempted to poison the League of Nations investigatory commission who was investigating Japan's siege of Manchuria. They poisoned the fruit with cholera. No one fell ill, however.

1932

As Japanese troops invade Manchuria, Shiro Ishii, a physician & army officer, begins experiments on biological warfare.

1936

Unit 731 is formed. An actual bio-warfare unit masquerading as a water-purification unit. Ishii constructs a 150 building complex just outside of Harbin, Manchuria for experimental purposes. Over 9000 test cases eventually die there. Another biological warfare site was also developed near Changchun named Unit 100. Ishii field-tests biological warfare on the Chinese, soldiers and civilians alike. Tens of thousands die as a result of plague, cholera, anthrax, etc. One method was overflying Manchuria and China. Infected fleas would be dropped with grain. The grain attracted rats. The rats became infected from the fleas (they can regurgitate up to 24,000 organisms in a single feeding) and brought the disease deeper into the human population.

1940

On October 4, the Japanese releases plague bacteria at Chuhsien resulting n the deaths of 21 people.

1940

On October 29, plague is dropped by Japanese planes at Ninpo, causing 99 deaths.

1940

On November 28, Japanese planes drop biological bombs at Chinhua, but there are no deaths.

1941

In January, plague is introduced by the Japanese in Suiyuan and Ninghsia provinces. A serious epidemic follows.

1941

The British are experimenting with anthrax off the Scottish coast.

1941-1943

US launches its own studies surrounding the use of and defense from biological agents. The Army (Chemical Warfare Service) develops Camp Detrick, Frederick, MD into a site for biological R&D.

1943

Camp Detrick in Maryland becomes operational. Field-testing is established in Mississippi.

1944

Dugway Proving Grounds in Utah replaces Mississippi's testing facilities.

1945

Unit 731 is blown up by the Japanese in the final days of WWII. Investigations by US officials begin. There is also speculation that over 3000 American, Korean, British, Australian, Soviet, and Mongolian POWs were used as guinea pigs.

1945-1949

The US Bio-program devolves to research capabilities only.

1946

US announces its involvement in BW research to the world.

1946

The initiation of an alleged deal between the US and 731 leaders. Germ warfare data were to be exchanged for immunity from war crimes prosecution.

1949

A Soviet military tribunal tried twelve Japanese POWs for preparing and using bacteriological weapons.

1950s

Mau Maus use plant toxins to kill livestock.

 1950

The US BW program gears up during the Korean War.

1951

A BW bacterial production facility is started at the Pine Bluff Arsenal in Arkansas.

1952

An international group of scientists conducts an investigation concluding that biological weapons were used on the North Koreans and the Chinese. The Americans deny using germ warfare. China and North Korea refuse another investigation by the International Red Cross.

1953

Biological R&D capabilities expand at Camp Detrick. Studies concentrate on defensive measures.

1954

Pine Bluff Arsenal provides Brucella suis for antipersonnel BW cluster bombs.

1955

Pine Bluff Arsenal begins the production of large quantities of Francisella tularemia.

1956

U.S.S.R.'s Marshal Zhukov announces that Soviet forces, in the future, will have the capability of using chemical and biological warfare agents.

1956

USAMRIID (known then as the Army Medical Unit) becomes operational.

1960s

The Vietcong use fecally contaminated spear traps during the Vietnam war.

1961

Kennedy administration reassesses BW.

1962

The Desert Test Center is established at Ft. Douglas, Utah. One of its missions is the testing of BW weapons and defense systems.

1964

Pine Bluff Arsenal constructs a Virus and Rickettsiae Production Plant.

1966

Pine Bluff Arsenal becomes the storehouse of active BW weapons. The munitions are used for testing purposes only.

1966

A simulated covert BW attack, with a benign agent, in the subway system of NYC reveals that large numbers of Americans can be exposed with just one release.

1967-1969

The US BW program experiences a continual decline in funding and an upsurge in adverse publicity.

1969

The World Health Organization issues a report that describes the unpredictability of BW weapons and associated risks due to lack of complete control.

1969

The Army Medical Unit officially becomes the US Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID).

1969

On November 25, President Nixon renounces BW and limits future research to defensive measures only. Toxins are not expressly mentioned.

1970

On February 14, President Nixon closes a loophole when he prohibits the weaponization of toxins and limits its research to defensive purposes only.

1970

Allegedly, the Weathermen, a group opposed to American imperialism and the Vietnam war, attempts to obtain biological agents to contaminate the water supply systems of US urban centers.

1971

From May 10 to May 1, 1972, there is the total destruction of antipersonnel BW agent supplies and munitions in the US.

1972

Members of the right-wing "Order of the Rising Sun" are arrested in Chicago. They possess 30-40 kg of typhoid cultures that are to be used to poison the water supply in Chicago, St. Louis, & other mid-west cities. The 2 arrested are betrayed by recruits. It was felt that had the detailed plan succeeded it would have caused no problem due to chlorination of the water supplies.

1972

Biological Weapons Convention (a.k.a. Convention on the Prohibition of the Development, Production, and Stockpiling of Bacteriological and Toxin Weapons and on their Destruction). It is eventually signed by 103 nations.

1975

On January 22, President Ford signs the Biological Weapons Convention.

1975-1983

The countries of Laos and Kampuchea come under attack by planes and helicopters that deliver multi-colored aerosols ("Yellow Rain") over the population. Both man and animal are affected and some die. There is no definitive evidence that these aerosol attacks were examples of biological warfare, but there is a belief among many that, at least some of these attacks, involved T-2 mycotoxins.

1978

On September 7, Bulgarian exile Georgi Markov, in London, is injected in the leg with a steel ball impregnated with ricin via a specially constructed umbrella. He feels immediate pain at the injection site and within 5 hours becomes weak and dizzy. Fifteen to 24 hours later, Markov is febrile, nauseated and vomiting. He is admitted into a hospital 36 hours after the attack where he is found to be febrile, tachycardic, and with swollen lymph glands near the injection site. About 2 days after the attack, he becomes suddenly hypotensive. By the third day he is anuric and begins vomiting blood. He also is in complete heart block and eventually succumbs. The reason for the area of induration and redness on his leg is unknown to Markov or his doctors until the necropsy. This represents, in recent history, the first example of state-supported bioterrorism. The assassination is carried out by the communist Bulgarian government with technology supplied by the Soviet Union. The platinum-iridium pellet is the size of the head of a pin and cross-drilled with 0.016-inch holes to contain the toxin. Only 10 days earlier, a similar assassination attempt was made against Vladimir Kostov in Paris. Only heavy clothing prevented the steel ball from entering any farther than Kostov's subcutaneous tissue. After he learned of his comrade's death, he went in for an examination and the pellet was found before any of the toxin was absorbed.

 1979

In April, in the city of Sverdlovsk, USSR, an explosion from Military Compound 19 results in a toxic release. Over the next several days, citizens downwind are stricken with high fevers, difficulty breathing, and death. There are over 40 fatalities. Some believe the estimated death toll approaches 1000. While local doctors announce an outbreak of inhalational anthrax, the government blames the situation on anthrax-contaminated beef. The military takes over a hospital to attend to these victims exclusively. The official cause is made known by President Boris Yeltsin in 1992 when he states that it was an accidental release of anthrax spores in a BW program

1981

Dark Harvest spreads dirt contaminated with anthrax.

1981

John Powell, former publisher of a Shanghai magazine, exposes the deal between the U.S. and leaders of unit 731 in the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists.

1982

LAPD and FBI arrest a man who was preparing to poison the city's water supply with a biological agent.

1983

FBI arrests 2 brothers who had manufactured an ounce of pure ricin.

1984

On August 29, Rajneeshee cultists give water laced with S. typhimurium to 2 county commissioners. Both get sick, 1 hospitalized. No criminal investigation done.

1984

In September, the Rajneeshee cult, an Indian religious cult, contaminates salad bars of The Dalles, OR & Wasco County, OR with Salmonella typhimurium. Over 750 are poisoned and 40 hospitalized. The purpose is to influence the outcome of a local election. It is only discovered a year later when members of the cult turned informants. Two were arrested eventually. Sheela, the chief of staff for Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh serves 21/2 yr. and then is deported.

c. 1980s (early)

There is the reported discovery in a Red Army Faction "safe house" in Paris, of a primitive laboratory said to have contained a bathtub filled with flasks of Clostridium botulinum. The report is later repudiated by the German government.

1985

A former Lt. Colonel, Dr. Murray Sanders, who served as an advisor on bio-warfare, claims he persuaded Gen. Douglas MacArthur to approve the immunity deal with members of Unit 731.

1989

CIA Director, William Webster, announces that "at least 10 countries" are developing biological weapons

1991

It is alleged that members of the Minnesota Patriots Council attempt to harm an IRS official, local law enforcement, & a US deputy marshal with ricin. They extracted the toxin from castor beans they received from a mail order house. The plan is to deliver the ricin through the skin with DMSO & aloe vera and by aerosol. Four members are arrested when the group is infiltrated by the FBI.

1991

The Iraqi government announces that it has conducted research into a number of biowarfare agents. Only a number of these R&D facilities are destroyed during the Persian Gulf war.

1992

In October, Soko Asahra, head of the Aum Shinrikyo cult, with 40 followers, travels to Zaire in order to assist victims of the Ebola virus. According to an October 31, 1995 report by the US Senate's Permanent Sub committee on Investigations, the cult's real motive was to obtain virus samples to be used for biological attacks.

 1995

With the defection of Iraqi General Hussein Kamal Hassan, evidence continues to grow that the Iraqi biological warfare program is more advanced than previously believed. The Iraqi authorities acknowledge that at the time of the war they had 100 botulinum toxin, 50 anthrax, and 16 aflatoxin bombs, 13 botulinum toxin, 10 anthrax, and 2 aflatoxin Scud missile warheads, and 122-mm rockets filled with anthrax, botulinum toxin, and aflatoxin

1995

According to sources cited by the Office of Technology Assessment and at US Senate committee hearings, there are 17 countries suspected of manufacturing biological weapons (Iran, Iraq, Libya, Syria, North Korea, Taiwan, Israel, Egypt, Vietnam, Laos, Cuba, Bulgaria, India, South Korea, South Africa, China, Russia).

1995

It is reported that on at least 10 occasions Aum Shinrikyo attempted to disperse anthrax, botulinum toxin, Q fever, & Ebola against the mass population and authority figures in Japan. No reported infections occur.

4/90 - Outfitted car to disperse botulinum toxin through an exhaust system and drove car around parliament building.

6/93 - Attempted to disrupt the wedding of Prince Naruhito by spreading botulinum in downtown Tokyo via an auto.

6/93 - Spread anthrax in Tokyo via a sprayer system from the roof of a building. Done over 4 days.

3/15/95 - Planted 3 briefcases designed to release botulinum in a Tokyo subway. The attack was averted when a cult member substituted a non-toxic agent instead.

1995

On May 5, a lab tech from Ohio (Larry Wayne Harris), orders the plague bacterium from a Maryland biomedical supply firm, American Type Culture Collection. 3 vials of Yersinia pestis (plague) are mailed to him using no more than a credit card and a false letterhead. Spurred on by his impatience in receiving the order and in his apparent ignorance in lab techniques, the company contacts federal authorities. An investigation reveals that he is a member of a white supremacist organization. In November, the lab tech from Ohio pleads guilty to mail fraud.

1997

In April, the Counter Holocaust Lobbyists of Zion allegedly send a package claiming that it contains anthrax.

1997

The FBI opens 74 investigations involving the acquisition or use of NBC agents. The vast majority are hoaxes.

1998

The FBI opens 181 investigations involving the acquisition or use of NBC agents. The vast majority are hoaxes.

1998

On February 18, Larry Wayne Harris, a microbiologist said to have been linked to white-supremacist groups, is arrested after he, allegedly, threatened to release anthrax in Las Vegas. The strain in his possession is a harmless veterinary vaccine strain.

 1999

According to the Monterey WMD Terrorism Database, in 1999 there have been 175 reports involving NBC incidents. This represents over 25% of the incidents that have been reported since 1900 and 35% of the incidents that have occurred since 1990. Of the 175 incidents in 1999, 104 have occurred in the US (81 involved anthrax threats). The vast majority are hoaxes.

1999

It has been reported that Osama bin Laden has attempted to acquire biological weapons in Sudan and Afghanistan

1999

In Nakhon Nayok, China, a widow of a man who died of AIDS tries to infect 20 policemen and several politicians with HIV.

1999

On January 6, a perpetrator tries to rob a currency exchange office in Zadar, Croatia using a syringe allegedly containing HIV as a weapon.

1999

On August 17, a bag of medical waste bearing a swastika is found outside of a synagogue in Stamford, CT.

1999

On August 19, a bag of medical waste is found outside of a synagogue in Norwalk, CT.

1999

On August 24, a man, armed with a syringe claimed to be filled with HIV-infected blood, attempts to hold up 3 people.

1999

On October 17, Russian soldiers discover plans to use biological weapons on the bodies of Chechans killed during fighting in Dagestan.

1999

On November 5, James Kenneth Gluck is arrested for threatening to poison 2 Colorado judges with ricin. The raw materials for making the toxin are found in his Tampa home.

Reference

Eitzen EM, Takafuji ET: Historical Overview of Biological Warfare. In: Textbook of Military Medicine, Medical Aspects of Chemical and Biological Warfare, 1997. Published by the Office of The Surgeon General, Department of the Army, USA. Pages 415-424.