Of course, you do note my continued emphasis on “public”, published etc.?
Not by accident that.
Well, much of that I attribute to bad information, some people’s knees jerking, confusion and a genuine lack of substantive knowledge as I outlined above in re my suspicion that prior assertions in re biotech bioterrorism were based on outdated tech baselines.
But I also suspect some disinformation is also occuring.
As Larry said, there is also quite a bit of sloppiness in the TV news reporting. Not just CNN IMO.
There is the connection I am willing to entertain. Note my prior comment, not an Arabic speaker.
True enough, I presume you’re retracting your earlier certitude? I certainly feel little certitude myself, other than I am convinced the Atta connection is a non-starter.
The fact that the target for the anthrax terrorists included top media personalities leads me to consider that the home grown right wing groups are not involved. I’ve never paid much attention to these people,but I understand that their enemy is the federal government and some ethnic groups, but not the media.
Secondly, to the best of my knowledge, no right wing group has claimed any responsibility, and I can’t see the logic in the terror unless it is accompanied by the message of why it occured. The predominant view expressed in the media certainly favours the foreign angle thus neutalizing the effect of their efforts.
Of course ObL and the lads have not claimed responsibility. This no doubt to address concerns in the mainline Muslim world and maximize the terror. But to the best of my knowledge they haven’t denied responsibility for September 11th or the Anthrax attacks.
By the way, if an al Qaeda cell is responsible
for the Anthrax attacks, and the members are American citizens, does the term domestic still qualify? My point is how can we be sure al Qaeda is entirely foreign?
· Pentagon hardliners press for strikes on Saddam
· Britain’s GPs put on full alert over deadly disease
War on Terrorism: Observer special
David Rose and Ed Vulliamy, New York
Sunday October 14, 2001
The Observer
------------ excerpt ------------
Scientists investigating the attacks say the bacteria used is similar to the ‘Ames strain’ of anthrax originally cultivated at Iowa State University in the 1950s and later given to labs throughout the world, **including Iraq. **
I dunno about that. Denunciations of the “Jewish-controlled” media seem pretty common in white supremacist circles.
I confess the “logic” of these actions somewhat eludes me as well. However, explicit claims of responsiblity seem to have gone out of style with your modern terrorist. No one formally claimed responsibility for the Sept. 11 attacks. Similarly, Timothy McVeigh never seems to have bothered to issue any manifestos, nor has the person (presumably Eric Robert Rudolph) behind the bombings at the Atlanta Olympics and the subsequent bombings in Atlanta (an abortion clinic, a gay bar) and a clinic in Birmingham.
Besides, the theory behind the “white supremacist” angle is that they are deliberate disinformation. The anthrax-laden letters do contain a claim of responsibility, on behalf of some sort of radical Islamism (“Death to America–Death to Israel–Allah is great”); the question is, do they do so convincingly?
From a white supremacist point of view, the idea(s) behind the anthrax attacks, I suppose, would be to kill or terrorize the “liberal” and “Jewish-controlled” media, liberal politicians (Daschle), the federal (“Zionist occupational”) government, and to get the whole thing blamed on Arab Muslim foreigners, thus fomenting war in general, and “race war” in particular.
It is a matter of record that there has recently been a white supremacist conspiracy to stage a biological attack with the intent that Iraq take the blame. Luckily, the FBI nipped that one in the bud, although the baddies are free today. These people have talked about using anthrax, and have stockpiled anthrax vaccine. Is it too hard to imagine the same people or others that are philosophically aligned with them, already in possesion of anthrax, and carrying out an existing plan at a serendipitously opportune time?
The U.N. weapons inspector said that Iraq’s weapons program used the “Vollum” strain. I figure he oughta know.
A few things: John Ashcroft confirmed today that the only additive to the anthrax was silica, which keeps the powder from clumping by making sure it stays dry. (So the culprit wouldn’t necessarily have to alter the electrical field of the particles after all. ;))
This article mentions that the infamous William Pierce had been talking about al-Qaeda anthrax attacks quite a bit:
If you don’t know what the man is about, look here. Not very sophisticated- Can you believe this old line still is still playing?
The article describes Larry Wayne Harris as a “follower” of Pierce. I haven’t heard this anywhere else yet. Interestingly, though, a 1997 article, THIS IS NOT A DRILL - ANTHRAX ATTACK MAY BE REAL -TAKE CAUTIONS, by a “spokesman” for the North Central Florida Regional Militia, show that Harris was spreading these rumours in 1997. Also, I found a nice Acrobat file of the criminal complaint from Harris’s 1998 arrest. Juicy stuff:
Collounsbury: Well yeah, after another couple days of ‘information’, I’d certainly have to downgrade my 100:1 odds that Iraq is involved. If I were a bookie I’d still be laying even money on Iraqi involvement. That doesn’t mean involvement in the sense that Hussein said, “Hey, let’s get in on the action and commit suicide by launching a bioterror attack against the most powerful nation on earth!”, which I agree doesn’t make much sense. A more likely scenario for Iraqi involvement would have been for them to slide some Anthrax to Bin Laden well before Sept 11, before they knew just how big a deal this was all going to be. Or perhaps he told them that he planned to use it just to threaten the U.S., or even that he was going to use it against someone else. Or he had convinced them that it could never be traced back to them.
However, I’d be happy to lay pretty good odds that this is NOT an attack by an unrelated domestic terrorist. It just doesn’t pass my Occam’s Razor test. To assume that a right-wing group just happened to have a quantity of anthrax available, in weaponized form, and just happened to be ready to mail it out just after the WTC attacks, doesn’t strike me as being very likely. And it also doesn’t fit their MO.
Some people thought it was suspicious that Daschle was targeted, and thought that that pointed towards right-wing nuts. I have a hard time seeing that, for several reasons. First, even right-wing nuts are probably rallying around the government now, and especially immediately after the WTC attack. Second, it now turns out that letters were sent to pretty much everyone in the government including the White House, the Supreme Court, and both houses of Congress. I’m not aware of any right-wing groups that particularly want Bush killed, especially not after Sept. 11.
As for the ‘coating’… After following up on this a bit, I think I know where the confusion may be coming from. Yes, it turns out that the special coating is Bentonite, a form of clay. Commonly found in Kitty Litter. So it’s nothing exotic, which may be what is prompting many people to say that anyone could use it.
However, from what I’ve also heard it’s not the bentonite that’s difficult to get, it’s the special processing required to get an extremely fine coating of it on an anthrax spore that takes the real expertise. I heard an expert on CNN talking about this, and he said that the minimum requirement for doing this would be ‘several million dollars’ in equipment, and someone with a Ph.D in microbiology. And also, they would have to invent the process, which took a long time to develop, unless they managed to learn it from secret government documents. That’s why some people are saying that only three countries in the world were capable of it, while others are laughing and saying it’s just clay and anyone could do it.
Here’s who I think might be responsible, in order of most to least likely:
[ul]
[li]Bin Laden agents, with assistance from Iraq[/li][li]Bin Laden agents, using Anthrax stolen from the old USSR[/li][li]Bin Laden agents, using Anthrax from another source[/li][li]Another radical Muslim group, like Hizbollah or Hamas[/li][li]Iraq[/li][li]Domestic Terrorists unrelated to Islamic Fundamentalists[/li][/ul]
But hey, most of this is speculation based on inductive reasoning. There’s just not a lot of hard evidence to date.
Well, if you were a bookie I’m fairly sure you’d get soaked, but the basic logic of your last two scenarios there don’t strike me as fundamentally wrong. Factually, given best knowledge in re what anthrax Iraq had/has, we have something of hiccup as they don’t match. Again, that’s best public knowledge, although the sources seem sound.
I’d be happy to bet you have even odds of geting soaked.
One of the annoying things about Zenster and you trotting out Occam’s Razor is the logical only works with solid information and good assumptions. Given your assumptions are … discussable I’d pause before using ‘occam’s razor.’ You can get cut that way. GIGO and all that.
Well, depends on how you cast the facts --I add in advance I myself am not really all that convinced on the right wing angle, but neither do I find your dismissal convincing on its logic or facts-- and assumptions.
If one regards our dear microbiologist and his apparent continued efforts to develop bio-terror, the concept that an extremist supremacist group was preparing its own (and his actions are recent) bio-terror along the blame-it-on-the-brownies line of thought and fell into a window of opportunity does not seem far-fetched. Tim McVeigh followed fairly close on the heels of WTC 1993, and I recall similar initial arguments.
As for the phrase, “weaponized form” don’t you think by now that we should all be a bit more careful about using it? It doesn’t seem terribly clear exactely what that means or what it actually implies in terms of the level of art required to achieve it. I don’t see it supporting any particular theory until more is know in re the requirements.
Again, Sam, I don’t know where you’re getting this from. It appears to fit the MO that our microbiologist was planning pretty darn well.
Again, while I am sure 90% of the militia folks did, that does not exclude the extreme of the extreme ZOG is already here and we’ve got a window to strike out sort. Just as it appears most of the ‘Left’ rallied – but the extreme fringe of the fringe siezed the opp to obsess in their particular way, I have no reason to believe that the ‘Right’ fringe of the fringe has not reacted similarly.
Sam, as I am led to understand by WP and NYT, there is a dearth of letters and a surfiet of anthrax. It is presently, again to my knowledge, unknown how much anthrax there is, how many letters, how much anthrax per letter might be required to cause the traces which are showing up here and there, etc. Cross contamination? False positives? Background positives due to related bacteria?
Before we get it into our heads that North America is drowning in anthrax or even DC and NJ, I suggest a bit of caution – like in the case of the crop dusters?
Sam, again, is there * confirmation * on the coating (and what one is actually refering to when using this term) because I’ve seen enough contradictory information I’m no longer sure what is speculation by “expterts” magically transformed into fact via repetiion and what is in fact, well, fact.
Ashcroft has said that the only additive found was silica, and Ari Fleischer has specifically said that there is no bentonite.
The article places an awful lot of credence on the assertions of “unnamed sources,” contradicting the Attorney General & WHPS. [sup]What’s up with that?[/sup]:rolleyes:
It’s not all that esoteric, and the technology was was developed in any ultra-secret weapons lab. It’s a fairly common process used for distributing pesticides.
Bentonite, for the record, is an aluminum silicate. As for the difficulty of the aerosolizing process, it seems pretty straight-forward: The powdered culture is thoroughly blended with finely powdered dessicant. The absense of aluminum means it’s not bentonite. My guess is that they used the most convenient dessicant preparation available-- hydrated magnesium silicate, finely milled to 30 micron grains. Shocklingly, there are no controls in place on the sale this vital precursor to Biological Agents, a dessicant powder fine enough to leak through a sealed paper envelope, (the pores of which are about 100 microns wide.) (It’s talcum powder.)
Perhaps some of the confusion on ‘weapons grade’ and ‘aerosolizing agents’ etc. comes from the fact that the U.S. shut down it’s biological weapons programs several decades ago. I personally consider this a Good Thing, but perhaps the US is now suffering locally from a lack expertise in this area: most or all of the scientists studying the anthrax samples have no expertise in biological weapons, and have no idea what they’re looking for, and hence all the conflicting reports we’re seeing about the structure and pedigree of the anthrax samples.
That is not quite right: http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=85527
And yes it is in Nevada were the “secret” research was going on. If you think about it, it is harder to make vaccines if one does not have the desease at hand to test them.
[paranoid theory]
FWIW finding bentonite could not have condemned Iraq automatically: http://www.bentonite.com
The major supplier of the stuff is Halliburton (name sounds familiar). It could be that the local terrorists needed only one extremist (on the inside?) to furnish them the materials.
The bentonite angle has been dropped just like the jet fuel angle in the McVeigh case. I guess it would be embarrassing to find out how it was that he got his hands on the fuel. Likewise, it could ruffle some big feathers if we find out that some materials for the current attacks might have come from local sources. I am not saying that the organizations and companies that might be involved are responsible, only that hate groups, who dislike the government to death, could have secret members located in a position that has access to the stuff. [/paranoid theory]
OTHA I think it is really silly to underestimate the capabilities of the local terrorists, Harry Mudd and others have already pointed to the lengths they are willing to go to incite chaos (or to make it worse).
The best possibility IMO is that the local terrorists put together the packages, with the unwilling help of a local company or organization.
I think I understand Phlospr’s gist. I think s/he means the handwritting does not look like someone from the english speaking world wrote.
Give me some lattitude here. My inlaws are from Germay and Been here over 36 years. The style of ABC’s and how they are written over in Germany when they were young ( and could still be written that way for all I know) is …uh…very Germanic (well, duh) Heavy styling on caplitazations and hard for the uninitiated to read.
To this day, after a dozen years of knowing them, it is virutally impossible for me to read an entire note from them without asking my husband to decipher.
Someone from a cyrllic alphabet world would have a distintive style of writing when writing english, so would anyone whose natural language is arabic, farsi or martian.
BACK to OP: From what I gathered from one news story about the letters, it looked as if the lettering was done in block style writing, " one of the hardest kinds of writing styles to trace" said the talking head on tv.
Which made me roll my eyes and think of the freebie info the moron just gave to all the copy cats out there.
Apparently, anthrax spores have also been found in letters sent to various offices of the Jang newspaper in Pakistan. The Jang is the largest Urdu-language newspaper in the country and therefore caters to a relatively conservative audience. It is not pro-U.S. (The English-language newspapers are seen as more “Western” and liberal.) These incidents have me baffled. It appears to me that the only motive anyone could have for choosing to target Jang is to get the most possible attention. But how is that a motive in itself?
The letter sent to the Quetta office merely said, “Anthrax gift for you and your staff”.
I’ve also heard reports that an international bank and a computer firm in Karachi have received letters containing anthrax spores, and that a bank executive has actually contracted the disease (this latter unconfirmed by BBC).
What exactly is the presence of bentonite supposed to prove? It’s a common substance, easily obtainable, with many legitimate uses. (I won’t elaborate on those uses, or where to get the stuff. Why give pointers to terrorists?)
