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Project Coast was a top-secret chemical and biological weapons (CBW) program instituted by the South African government during the apartheid era. Project Coast was the successor to a limited post-war CBW program which mainly produced the lethal agents CX powder and mustard gas; as well as non-lethal tear gas for riot control purposes. Project Coast was headed by Wouter Basson, a cardiologist who was the personal physician of the then South African Prime Minister PW Botha.
In the late 1970s, South Africa became increasingly involved in Angola in operations against Soviet-backed SWAPO, Cuban and Angolan troops. A perceived threat that its enemies had access to battlefield chemical and biological weapons led South Africa to begin ramping up its own program, initially as a defensive measure and in order to carry out research on vaccines. As the years went on, however, research was carried out into offensive uses of the newly-found capability. Finally, in 1981, then-president PW Botha ordered the South African Defence Force (SADF) to develop the technology to a point where it could be used effectively against South Africa's enemies. In response, the head of the SADF's South African Medical Service (SAMS) division, responsible for defensive CBW capabilities, hired Dr Wouter Basson, a cardiologist, to visit a number of countries and report back on their respective CBW capabilities. He returned with the recommendation that South Africa's program be scaled up, and in 1983, Project Coast was formed, with Dr Basson at its head.
In order to hide the program, and to make the procurement of CBW-related substances, Project Coast involved the formation of four front companies, Delta G Scientific Company, Roodeplaat Research Laboratories (RRL), Protechnik and Infladel.
Progressively, Project Coast created a large variety of lethal offensive CBW toxins and biotoxins, in addition to the defensive measures. Initially, these were intended for use by the military in combat as a last resort. To this end, a leaf was taken out of the Soviet book, with a number of devices, designed to look like ordinary everyday objects, being created with the capabilities to poison those targeted for assassination. Examples included umbrellas and walking sticks which fired pellets containing poison, syringes disguised as screwdrivers, and poisoned beer cans and envelopes. In the early 1990s, with the end of apartheid, South Africa's various weapons of mass destruction programs were stopped.
During the first week of May 2000, Judge Willie Hartzenberg and the crowded courtroom of Pretoria’s High Court heard the grizzly confession of Johan Theron, a former information officer of South Africa’s apartheid government’s Special Forces. The small, balding, 57-year-old man told the court that he was involved in the deaths of more than 200 anti-apartheid political prisoners between 1979 and 1987. The deaths, he claimed, were merely a part of his job.
According to Theron, the executions of hundreds of prisoners were a solution to the increasing prison inmate population of several defense force camps. In fact, he told the court that the disposal of the prisoners was primarily his idea, one that he initially proposed to his superiors in 1979. Theron stated that he used various methods to kill the prisoners, including burning, beating, poisoning and strangulation.
One of Theron’s acts took place in 1983 in northern Kwazulu-Natal, Africa. According to LoBaido’s article The Secrets of Project Coast, Theron claimed to have been instructed by his superior, Dr. Wouter Basson, to tie up three prisoners to a tree overnight and smear their bodies with jelly-like lethal toxins. The primary aim was to test the toxic agent to see if it was capable of causing death. To Theron’s dismay, the men did not die as easily as he expected.
The next day, Theron found the men still clinging to life. He decided to get rid of the men in another way. He loaded them into a small plane and flew off towards the ocean. According to an article by South Africa’s Sunday Times, during the flight Theron claimed that he injected the three men with lethal muscle relaxants before dumping their bodies into the sea. Theron further stated to the court that a majority of his victims were disposed of in a similar manner, by dumping them into the water some 100 miles off the coast.
Originally posted by cassandranova
Seeing that examination and curiosity brings new evidence to the light of day about some of the very interesting issues out there, I'm wondering amongst the ATS readers what one conspiracy you'd most like to see get more exposure in the larger public sphere.
I'd ask you to constrain your choices to things for which there exists strong, tangible, and material evidence that it really happened, or is ongoing.