What ever happened to the ANTHRAX case?

Last i heard the anthrax was of a such a quality that it could only have come from a short list of places. What ever bacame of this 'terrorist' event?
It almost seems as tho it has been swept under the rug.
Anybody have any thoughts?

The investigation is still ongoing, believe it or not.

The judge instructed Justice Department lawyers to brief him privately on the investigation's progress July 6, so that he can determine whether the investigation is moving ahead in the way they expected.

Authorities said they expect to get results in June from a sophisticated battery of tests, which the FBI hopes will identify the laboratory that produced the anthrax used in mailings that killed five people and sickened 17 others in the fall of 2001.

...

Investigators have narrowed the likely source to a short list of labs, including Fort Detrick, the Dugway Proving Ground in Utah and Louisiana State University, according to law enforcement sources who spoke on the condition that they not be named, citing government rules.

www.washingtonpost.com...

[Edited on 24-4-2004 by AceOfBase]

Thanks.
I bet we never find anything out on this.

Originally posted by aware
Thanks.
I bet we never find anything out on this.

this is one of the subjects that you will never find anything about it

Originally posted by aware

When the trail led back to US military labs the case went strangely cold.

Dr. Steven Hatfill has been hammered by those who wish to frame him for it.

The anthrax used was of such a weaponised grade that it could have only come from 4 places. Strangely enuff, and this is just an aside, 2 of those places are colleges that (a) I went to [Northern Arizona University]and (b) was my second choice. [LSU/Louisiana State University] What are the odds of that?! Too bizarre.

Question: Why was Bush & Co. taking Cipro, specifically, before the Anthrax attack? What a coincidence!

Did you all know that b/c of the Anthrax scare, our government ordered massive quantities of CIPRO from the Bayer Corp., which bailed them out of near bankruptcy? It's a fact. And by the way, certain pharmeceutical companies are run by fascists with ties to Bush's grandfathers and Nazi Germany. It's worth looking into if you've never known that.

Anthrax attack a terrorist attack? Try: INSIDE JOB.

I think the attack also served as a stout warning to members of congress to play along, or suffer the consequences.

I have not yet read this book, but I have read earlier works by the same author. He wrote the excellent "Clouds of Secrecy" which examined the US Armys Chemical/ Biological warfare experiments carried out in many cities.

Last year he brought out this book on the Anthrax investigation.

www.amazon.co.uk...=1082816586/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_0_1/202-1342969-6104605

zero lift

Thanks for sharing Zerolift.

Here's the synopsis.


On October the 3rd 2001, Robert Stevens became the first fatal victim of bioterrorism in American, when, barely conscious, he entered a hospital emergency room with a fever and nausea. The medical staff had no idea what was making him sick, yet it was these doctors and the public health officials who solved the mystery - it was anthrax. Already shocked by the September 11 attacks, America panicked. Birthday cards, postcards and monthly bills were all regarded with suspicion and the US postal service became a deadly place to work. Yet behind the investigations of the police and the FBI, the medical and scientific detective work that is the frontline of any bioterrorism defence, was being carried out in hospitals and laboratories by incredibly dedicated and expert staff. Leonard A. Cole has personally interviewed every one of the surviving inhalation anthrax victims, along with relatives, friends and associates of those who died, in addition to public health officials, scientists, researchers, hospital workers and treating physicians. Speaking through their voices, "The Anthrax Letters" is a minute-by-minute account of the events, told by the very people that found themselves at the centre of the whirlwind. It is a testament to the untold and crucially important work of the scientists, doctors and researchers performing life-saving work under intense pressure and public scrutiny. It shows how the work of medical staff like these is any country's best chance in the event of a bioterrorist attack, and highlights just how vulnerable the world is to such warfare.

It definetly came from a US lab. This anthrax was a trillion spores per gram, which is special weapons grade, and it had a special treatment to eliminate electrostatic charges, allowing it to float in the air. There's no way this stuff was made in some makeshift lab in afghanistan. It could have only been current or former DoD or CIA employees doing biowarfare work, with access to a lab, which there are only a few in the country. It would also involve quite a lot of equipment and safety precautions to transport the stuff anywhere in the country. Soon after, the FBI determined it to be the Ames-strain anthrax, and destroyed the whole supply in Ames, Iowa.

The AMES strain of anthrax that has been claimed to have been US "military grade" is bunk.
The US military has never used the AMES strain in its bioweapons. The AMES strain was used and is used only for developing vaccines.
The US bioweapons stocks used the Vollum strain.
The Anthrax Letters: A Medical Detective Story

Anyone seen this article:
Saddam Behind Anthrax Attacks?

In a major development, potentially as significant as the capture of Saddam Hussein, investigative journalist Richard Miniter says there is evidence to indicate Saddam�s anthrax program was capable of producing the kind of anthrax that hit America shortly after 9/11. Miniter, author of Losing bin Laden, told Accuracy in Media that during November he interviewed U.S. weapons inspector Dr. David Kay in Baghdad and that he was "absolutely shocked and astonished" at the sophistication of the Iraqi program.

What is also revealed is this mentioning by who else, Dr. Kay:

Miniter said that Kay told him that, "the Iraqis had developed new techniques for drying and milling anthrax�techniques that were superior to anything the United States or the old Soviet Union had. That would make the former regime of Saddam Hussein the most sophisticated manufacturer of anthrax in the world." Miniter said there are "intriguing similarities" between the nature of the anthrax that could be produced by Saddam and what hit America after 9/11. The key similarity is that the anthrax is produced in such a way that "hangs in the air much longer than anthrax normally would" and is therefore more lethal.

Anyone know what Dr. Kay has to say on this today, hmmm?



seekerof

[Edited on 24-4-2004 by Seekerof]

Gee, Seekerof.. who gave Saddam that Anthrax capability? Hmmm?

WE DID.

Blaming Saddam for everything is beyond worn out. Ya'll are gonna have to be a bit more creative with the disinfo.

Originally posted by Seekerof
The AMES strain of anthrax that has been claimed to have been US "military grade" is bunk.
The US military has never used the AMES strain in its bioweapons. The AMES strain was used and is used only for developing vaccines.
The US bioweapons stocks used the Vollum strain.

Umm...yea, ok. Only several other sources much more reliable than the two you listed have reported it was Ames strain. The whole reason it was easy for someone to get a hold of Ames strain IS because it was listed for use as a vaccine, so it was shipped to many more places, and wasn't being watched as carefully. I guess just because the US intended for it to be used as a vaccine, then someone with bad intentions would say "oh wait I can't use this, it's labelled for use as a vaccine only". Yea, ok. It's still anthrax, and has been identified as that used in the attacks.

[Edited on 24-4-2004 by Shoktek]

Do you read?
Do you seriously have an open mind or is it tuned only to one channel?
How about instead of running your propaganda 'show', try reading the book I just mentioned and debunk him.
"Disinfo' is purely subjective in this matter. Why? Because you still have missed what I just mentioned and have NOT debunked what the book says:

The AMES strain of anthrax that has been claimed to have been US "military grade" is bunk.
The US military has never used the AMES strain in its bioweapons. The AMES strain was used and is used only for developing vaccines.
The US bioweapons stocks used the Vollum strain.

Again, the book is entitled: The Anthrax Letters
I would encourage that if you are seeking the truth instead of continuing to call others information "disinfo", as yours may as well be classified, you might want to certainly read the book, that is if your channel remote can handle another channel, being it is stuck only one? Even if you don't opt to read the book, debunk what the book says, k?



seekerof

In much of the analysis done on this, the issue is:

....analysts in the U.S. Army detected silica coatings on the anthrax sent to the U.S. Senate and that special chemicals were used to enhance its ability to form a lethal aerosol. One of those was a super-specialized binder chemical used to keep the silica particles in place on the surface of the spores.

And this:

"The real key to finding out who did it is not the DNA analysis, but the analysis of the coatings that were used.

This is a pretty objective site on the anthrax incidents:
Analysis of the Anthrax Attacks

I guess my effort here is to say that the US military or public bio-laboratories were not the only ones with such 'special' capabilites. I would be interested in what material anyone can find on the "coating process" that conclusively says and indicates that the US government had a hand in perpetuating this event/incident.



seekerof

[Edited on 24-4-2004 by Seekerof]

Seekerof, that works both ways, ok? I have never called anyone else's opinion "disinformation" so I don't know where you got that from. Wow, one guy in ONE book reports something different. I think YOU are the one who needs to be "open" to other "channels". Everyone can see how you hopelessly defend this government to the death, even when you have absolutely no ground to stand on. Frankly, it is a joke. If nothing else, this provides me with a good laugh on many posts. You are saying that the Vollum strain, not the Ames strain, was used in the attacks, even though many scientific studies have genetically proven that it is an Ames variety...ok



"When the attacks began last fall, investigators hoped to identify the source of the bacteria by comparing it with a collection of nearly 100 anthrax strains gathered from around the world and curated by Dr. Martin E. Hugh-Jones at Louisiana State University and Dr. Paul Keim of Northern Arizona University.

Dr. Keim, Dr. Hugh-Jones, Dr. Paul J. Jackson of the Los Alamos National Laboratory and other scientists also developed a genetic identification test for anthrax strains, similar to the DNA fingerprinting test used in human forensic cases. They discovered eight markers, or points of genetic difference, that they made the basis for distinguishing one anthrax strain from another.

When Dr. Keim, working for federal authorities, analyzed samples of the attack germs, all turned out to belong to the Ames strain, named after Ames, Iowa, where the bacterium was thought to have arisen."

www.ph.ucla.edu...



"Last week, Tom Ridge, President Bush's Homeland Security adviser, stated that the anthrax sent to Florida, NBC and Senator Tom Daschle were all the same strain. An FBI spokesman in Florida confirmed that this was the Ames strain."

www.newscientist.com...



"The newspaper said the discovery came about through an effort to decode the full DNA or genome of the Ames strain of anthrax, first isolated in Iowa and maintained by the U.S. Army since 1980 for testing purposes.
Ames anthrax was used in tainted letters that were sent to two U.S. senators and media outlets in New York and Florida in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States."

abcnews.go.com...



I simply don't know how someone could test the anthrax used in the attacks, conclusively say that it is of Ames-strain, and then you somehow believe it is not...talk about turning your back on the facts...go ahead and believe whatever you want to believe. That's great for you.



"Although Vollum was the main strain stockpiled by the US during WWII, the search undoubtedly continued for better strains. The US BW program and biodefense program apparently switched to the Ames reference strain because of its high virulence."

www.anthraxinvestigation.com...



Now Ames is classified as being used for vaccination purposes...it is still more potent than vollum, and more effective. BTW, how does the US govt. create so many more biological weapons? They say they are trying to find the cure for it, so they develop the problem first.



"Q Doesn't the very fact that, as General Parker said, this is free and floaty anthrax that was sent to Senator Daschle, aerosolized, show that it is a very sophisticated operation that produced it, not a grad student in a basement, and that the knowledge of how to do that would be limited to a very narrow circle of people, some state actors and some people with access to American secrets?

GOVERNOR RIDGE: I'm not prepared to tell you what level of competency, accessibility to equipment, and other training either an individual or an institution needs in order to develop this level of anthrax.

Q General Parker, can we ask you a question, sir? If you wouldn't mind stepping up to the podium. I take it that some of the tests that you were alluding to are on this chemical agent that's been mixed in with the anthrax to modify the electro-static properties of the anthrax. Can you tell us what your preliminary investigation shows about that? And who has the ability to alter the electro-static properties of anthrax spores?

MAJOR GENERAL PARKER: Well, first of all, your question is complex, and I'd like to say that, although we may see some things on the microscopic field that may look like foreign elements, we don't know that they're additives, we don't know what they are, and we're continuing to do research to find out what they possible could be. They're unknowns to us at this present time.

Q Can you tell us who has the ability to alter the electro-static properties of anthrax spores in order to allow them to become more easily aerosolized?

MAJOR GENERAL PARKER: Sir, that's beyond my knowledge. I don't know.

Q Isn't it limited to a very small number of countries?

MAJOR GENERAL PARKER: I don't know, sir.

Q -- sophisticated product? Are you looking at a sophisticated product, essentially?

GOVERNOR RIDGE: What the General is trying to relate to you is that this still has -- there's a series of tests that need to be conducted by these men, who are far better equipped intellectually and by experience, to draw some conclusions from those results. And the fact of the matter is, we don't have all the information available to us yet to draw any of the conclusions to answer some of the questions you're asking.

Q When you say they're from the same -- all letters are from the same strain or family, how much does that really narrow this down?

GOVERNOR RIDGE: Not much.

Q Not much?

GOVERNOR RIDGE: I don't think. I mean, I've got -- my sense is, it doesn't narrow it much at all. My brother and I are from the same family. So it means, it's a very broad and genetic classification. But, apparently, there are several strains available for research around the world.

Q Can you tell us which strain it is, sir? And does the fact that these are a little bit --

GOVERNOR RIDGE: Ames strain. "

www.whitehouse.gov...



I could go on and on with more authoritative sources who say that the strain used in the attacks was Ames-strain, but I guess they are all tuned to "one channel", and YOU are the only one that possesses a higher level of thinking...right? You will never cease your constant posting of right-wing propaganda, in order to prove yourself right, and not even look at all the facts...I'm sorry that you really haven't been taught to look at something from all sides, or at least you don't have enough sense to do so. Carry on.

[Edited on 24-4-2004 by Shoktek]

I agree with Shoktek on the variety used. It was most definitely the Ames strain. No two ways about it. I encourage everyone to do the research for themselves.

Additive Made Spores Deadlier
3 Nations Known to Be Able to Make Sophisticated Coating
"The anthrax spores that contaminated the air in Senate Majority Leader Thomas A. Daschle's office had been treated with a chemical additive so sophisticated that only three nations are thought to have been capable of making it, sources said yesterday.

The United States, the former Soviet Union and Iraq are the only three nations known to have developed the kind of additives that enable anthrax spores to remain suspended in the air, making them more easily inhaled and therefore more deadly, experts said yesterday. Each nation used a different technique, suggesting that ongoing microscopic and chemical analyses may reveal more about the spores' provenance than did their genetic analysis, which is largely complete but reportedly has done little to narrow the field.

A government official with direct knowledge of the investigation said yesterday that the totality of the evidence in hand suggests that it is unlikely that the spores were originally produced in the former Soviet Union or Iraq.

...

The anthrax spores that contaminated the air in Senate Majority Leader Thomas A. Daschle's office had been treated with a chemical additive so sophisticated that only three nations are thought to have been capable of making it, sources said yesterday.

The United States, the former Soviet Union and Iraq are the only three nations known to have developed the kind of additives that enable anthrax spores to remain suspended in the air, making them more easily inhaled and therefore more deadly, experts said yesterday. Each nation used a different technique, suggesting that ongoing microscopic and chemical analyses may reveal more about the spores' provenance than did their genetic analysis, which is largely complete but reportedly has done little to narrow the field.

A government official with direct knowledge of the investigation said yesterday that the totality of the evidence in hand suggests that it is unlikely that the spores were originally produced in the former Soviet Union or Iraq.

Even identifying the kind of coating may not solve the crucial question of who is perpetrating the terror, because little is known about how secure the stores of the three countries' stocks have been during the past few years.

Nonetheless, the conclusion that the spores were produced with military quality differs considerably from public comments made recently by officials close to the investigation, who have said the spores were not "weaponized" and were "garden variety." Those descriptions may be technically true, depending on how one defines those terms, several experts said. But they obscure the basic and more important truth that the spores were treated with a sophisticated process, meaning the original source was almost certainly a state-sponsored laboratory.

The finding strongly suggests that the anthrax spores in the U.S. mail attacks were not produced in a university or makeshift laboratory or simply gathered from natural sources. But it does not answer the question of whether a state-sponsored laboratory supplied the anthrax spores directly to terrorists or simply lost control of some stocks in recent years.

The presence of the high-grade additive was confirmed for the first time yesterday by a government source familiar with the ongoing studies, which are being conducted by scientists at the Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases at Fort Detrick in Frederick. Four other experts in anthrax weapons said they had no doubt that such an additive was present based on the high dispersal rate from the letter to Daschle (D-S.D.).

www.washingtonpost.com...

It goes on to say the US, Russia, and Iraq methods for making this kind of Anthrax. From what it says in that part, it seems Russia would definetly be out of the question. It also says that Silica is used in the Iraq version, so it could be a possibility...but most investigators have said it was made in the US, so who knows...

I think you would have to find out where exactly the Ames-strain anthrax was sent, and then analyze how the additive got into the mixture, and that should give you good evidence towards where it came from. It was still created in the US.

[Edited on 24-4-2004 by Shoktek]

If Russia is out of the question, that begs the question..
Who provided that technology to Iraq? We did. That point must continue to be made. Our military created this monster. The attack came from within.

Awesome job, Shoktek. Keep up the good work.

Originally posted by EastCoastKid
If Russia is out of the question, that begs the question..
Who provided that technology to Iraq? We did. That point must continue to be made. Our military created this monster. The attack came from within.

Well, im not sure about Russia, that was just my opinion from what I've read, I'm no biochemist that could say whether or not Russia made it...but the facts are easy to interpret.

It has been documented in the Riegle report, we sent Iraq anthrax throughout the 80's...I do have the batch #'s, I don't know if they could be used to find out what kind of anthrax was sent or not. Iraq focused mainly on producing botulin and anthrax in four facilities in Baghdad, starting in 1989. We gave them anthrax and botulin, as well as plans for constructing such facilities, and delivery methods such as missiles. (ch1 & Introduction, 1994 Riegle Report )

[Edited on 24-4-2004 by Shoktek]

Army Sent Anthrax Strain to Only 5 Labs

"No records were available before 1997, when a new federal law required researchers to report the transfer of dangerous pathogens to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. But Army officials said the other labs to receive Ames were the Defence Research Establishment Suffield, a Canadian biodefense institute that
received Ames in 1998; the U.S. Army Dugway Proving Ground, a test facility in the Utah desert that received the bacteria in 1992; and the Chemical Defence Establishment at Porton Down, a British biodefense institute near Salisbury, England, which received the Ames strain in the mid-1980s."

www.geocities.com...
(As from washington post article)


[Edited on 24-4-2004 by Shoktek]