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p. 2003 Capture Of Hambali And Sufaat's Assistants And The Seizure Of "Extremely Virulent" (But Unweaponized) Anthrax Muklis Yunos was arrested on May 25, 2003. Agents reportedly became suspicious when an ambulance pulled over and delivered Yunos, who was wearing a plaster cast on a leg as part of a disguise. According to other reports, he was also wearing facial bandages. An Egyptian missionary accompanying him, Al Gabre Mahmud, was apparently on an international terrorist watchlist. Authorities became suspicious when the two went to the wrong gate (and did not go to the one typically used for medical transport). The pair then objected when officials wanted to remove some of the mummy-like bandages. AP reported that a police intelligence dossier describes him as "a fanatic of the extreme fundamentalist movement" who received training in an Al Qaeda camp in Afghanistan, including lessons on the use of anthrax as a biological weapon. He is described as about five foot three and with the features of a Japanese-Korean. The MILF leadership has strongly but unconvincingly denied that Yunos is affiliated with their organization. Yunos initially was cooperating with authorities over a bucket of spicy Kentucky Fried Chicken, complaining about the arrogance and unhelpfulness of MILF leadership. Hambali was arrested in mid-August 2003 in Thailand. Hambali had fled Malaysia with his wife, Lee, not long after 9/11. His wife and her sister had studied at the school of Bashir, JI's religious leader. He told his mother they were moving to Thailand. Hambali worked and his wife studied Arabic. Over the next two years, he also spent time in Cambodia and Myanmar. Soft-spoken and polite, the neighbors said he kept to himself in the apartment building. He reportedly underwent plastic surgery to alter his appearance, but perhaps he just shaved his beard. His wife, an ethnic Chinese Malaysian who converted to Islam, was also detained. After being shipped to Jordan, where he was harshly interrogated, Hambali eventually began providing information about Al Qaeda's anthrax production program. He told interrogators that the terror network had succeeded in producing what author Ron Suskind describes as an "extremely virulent" strain of anthrax before the September 11 attacks. In the autumn of 2003, Suskind reports, U.S. forces in Afghanistan found a sample of the virulent anthrax at a house in Kandahar. Pulitzer Prize winning author Ron Suskind writes: "One disclosure was particularly alarming: al Qaeda had, in fact produced high-grade anthrax. Hambali, during interrogation, revealed its whereabouts in Afghanistan. The CIA soon descended on a house in Kandahar and discovered a small, extremely potent sample of the biological agent." He continued: "The anthrax found in Kandahar was extremely virulent. What's more, it was produced, according to the intelligence, in the months before 9/11. And it could be easily reproduced to create a quantity that could be readily weaponized." In his groundbreaking report, Suskind writes: Ever since the tense anthrax meeting with Cheney and Rice in December 2001, CIA and FBI had been focused on determining whether al Qaeda was involved in the anthrax letter attacks in 2001 and whether they could produce a lethal version that could be weaponized. The answer to the first was no; to the second, "probably not." Though the CIA had found remnants of a biological weapons facility -- and blueprints for attempted production of anthrax -- isolating a strain of virulent anthrax and reproducing it was viewed as beyond al Qaeda's capabilities. Suskind continued:
Based on the additional information being provided in 2003, authorities also captured two mid to low level technicians -- an Egyptian and a Sudanese. President Bush has explained that these mid-to low level technicians were part of a Southeastern Asian based cell that was developing an anthrax attack on the United States. Sufaat wrapped things up in the Summer of 2001, according to Tenet, and briefed Hambali and Zawahiri over the course of a week. q. Warlord Hekmatyar's Henchman in Kabul: Gitmo Charges And Anthrax Powder An exclusive September 2007 Associated Press, article quoted one hearing before the Combat Status Review Tribunal. It quoted an allegation against Rahmatullah Sangaryar, who stood accused of "planning biological and poison attacks on United States and coalition forces in Kandahar, Afghanistan" and of possessing anthrax powder and a liquid poison." The article reports that "the Afghan detainee said he was captured only with muddy clothes, possessed no anthrax and never planned such an attack."
I have not seen the transcript being relied upon by the AP. AP obtained the 2006 transcript of my interest mentioning the anthrax allegation under FOIA. There is an earlier transcript presumably among a set of transcripts at the CSRT website. It is linked from the Wikipedia.org entry for "Rahmatullah Sangaryar."
Gulbuddin Hikmatyar founded Hizb-I Islami Gulbuddin (HIG) as a faction of the Hizb-I Islami party in the late 1970s. His group was one of the major mujahedin groups in the war against the Soviets. He received about half of all CIA funding despite his virulent anti-western views. Hekmatyar has long-established ties with both Osama Bin Ladin and blind sheik Abdel-Rahman. Prosecutors in the prosecution of US-based charities took a dim view of any defendant's connection to Hekmatyar. r. Unconfirmed Claim: 2007 Capture of Taliban Spokesman With Anthrax Packets Intended For Mailing To Government Officials Amerithrax Agents checked the Kabul area in May 2004 but came up empty, sources told the Washington Post. In November of that year, on additional information, agents spent weeks searching an area in the Kandahar mountains, several hundred miles outside of Kabul,. Again they found nothing. In January 2007, a Taliban spokesman was captured. An Afghanistan governor says his residence contained anthrax powder packets. According to a report by the Afghan Islamic Press Agency, as monitored by the BBC, the powdered anthrax was intended for mailing to government officials. The former Taliban spokesman quietly told a camera that he was "on a mission" when he was arrested. The fellow who reportedly had "anthrax powder packets" had been living in Peshawar. Muhammad Hanif's real name is Abdulhaq Haji Gulroz. Is this young guy mentioned above Qari Mullah Din Muhammad Hanif, the former madrassa-trained Minister of Education who wouldn't let the medical school use cadavers? (That was a good thing, given that the school didn't have electricity.) Is he a "Dr." If so, what kind? The former education minister had not received a secular education and oversaw the medical school. A veterinary student in September 2001 said they had nothing in the way of facilities or equipment. It was the Agriculture Minister who had taken a keen interest in supervising the Red Cross/FAO-funded anthrax vaccine laboratory. Yazid Sufaat did his anthrax work, he says, as part of a Taliban medical brigade. A building associated with the charity WAFA housed a lab, and WAFA was a militant supporter of the Taliban. So while we await lab tests and further clarification or confirmation, this sketchy report about anthrax powder packets is certainly intriguing. Hanif also claimed that Mullah Omar was living in Quetta under the Pakistan ISI's protection. The Washington Post once focused on the ISI's failure to cooperate with the microbiologist and food production expert Rauf Ahmad who was helping Ayman -- and noted that I had publicly associated him with the documents provided by the Defense Intelligence Agency first. But no paper has yet addressed the ISI role in connection with suppressing information about the prosecution (or lack thereof) of bacteriologist Abdul Qadoos Khan, in whose home KSM was reportedly arrested. Nor has anyone addressed its suppression, in this context, of the whereabouts of Aafia Siddiqui. (It was my understanding that the ISI has her and the children and that she is under house arrest). It's perfectly understandable why the ISI would not want to cooperate -- having worked closely with the Taliban for years at the urging of the US. Moreover, the political risks are very real given the unpopularity with the Pakistan public of pursuing respected professionals who are sympathetic to Al Qaeda. But no failure on the part of the ISI to cooperate with the FBI or CIA on the subject of an attack using aerosolized anthrax should be countenanced. "As I worked through the letters, it became apparent that Fort Detrick was the best place for the FBI to begin looking for a suspect," Dr Paul Keim, an anthrax expert at the University of Northern Arizona, was hired by the FBI to help with the investigation, told the Daily Mail [UK] in 2005. TIGR scientist Timothy Read who headed the project to sequence the anthrax used in the attacks said of the comparison of the anthrax that killed Bob Stevens to the anthrax held at USAMRIID “It is basically like looking for differences in identical twins.” Read said: "The anthrax strain from the Florida case was very similar to an anthrax strain that was derived from one distributed through Fort Detrick." Ari Fleischer explained: "What you have to keep in mind is the difference between knowledge about what type of information you have to have to produce it, and who could have sent it They are totally separate topics that could involve totally separate people. It could be the same person or people. It could be totally different people. The information does not apply to who sent it." Dr. Martin Hugh-Jones of Louisiana State University expressed skepticism that the FBI was up to the technical challenges: “When you can’t even find a refrigerator to keep the bug, that doesn’t say much for your chances of ever finding the one who mailed it.” Ken Alibek, the former head of the Soviet bio-weapons programme suggests that 'If I were a terrorist, I would certainly not use a strain known to be from my country.'" The Ames strain came from a cow in Texas in 1980. Texas veterinarian Mike Vickers sent a sample from a carcass in south Texas to the Texas Veterinary Medical Diagnostic Lab ("TVMDL"). A now-retired Dr. Howard Whitford, who isolated it from a carcass, forwarded it. When it arrived at Ft. Detrick, it bore a preprinted label from Agriculture Department's National Veterinary Laboratory in Ames, Iowa. The mailing label resulted in the name "Ames" and some initial confusion among outside experts as to the history of the strain. It was forwarded pursuant to a request by Dr. Knudson of Ft. Detrick who had sought field strains of anthrax. Dr. Knudson at Ft. Detrick still had the correspondence from the time, to include even the mailing label. Published accounts say that it was just a mistaken use of the lab mailer and was sent from USAMRIID directly from Texas. In reality, based on what United States Postal Inspector, a member of the Amerithrax Task Force has said, perhaps it was first sent to Iowa. In contrast, a USDA spokesman has formally denied to me, after having the answer vetted by counterterrorism officials, having any indication that it was ever at Ames. He had previously noted that they may have had it without knowing it as the "Ames strain."
A preliminary related question is: Did the Texas lab that first isolated it keep a sample? Dr. Howard Whitford, now retired to Montana, in response to a telephone inquiry, reports he may have sent it elsewhere. But as a general rule, most diagnostic labs have such a high a volume of samples -- and they are the same for veterinary purposes -- that samples would be routinely destroyed. The isolate likely was chosen to be sent to Ft. Detrick in the first place because the notes by the veterinarian, Dr. Vickers, indicate that it was particularly virulent, killing 30 cattle in a short time. He gave the example of one cow that had been healthy in the morning and then dead a few hours later. As for the testing of lab isolates where the strain is known to be (and a copy of the strain can be obtained for testing), the genetic analysis of Dr. Keim, from Northern Arizona, had potentially promised to remove all doubt as to the source of the anthrax. Hope has long since faded according to press reports. A spokesman at the Institute for Genetic Research in Rockville, Md. provided the FBI with its first genetic road map for anthrax, has said that the differences identified by his team could not pinpoint the source. The Science article reporting the Keim and Read genetic analysis does not address the testing done with respect to isolates from the vast majority of labs where Ames was known to be. 15 lab isolates remained to be tested. The research is reported in Science. The analysis is directed to showing the similarity between various samples of Ames. The institutions known to have fully virulent B. anthracis Ames include USAMRIID, Naval Medical Research Center, Dugway in Utah, CDC, CAMR-Porton [in Great Britain], Battelle in Ohio, University of Northern Arizona (Keim), University of New Mexico, Louisiana State University (Hugh-Jones), and University of Scranton (DelVecchio). Alibek says Russia had Ames. Porton Down reportedly provided it to four unnamed researchers. (That, for example, is where Martin Hugh-Jones at LSU got it in the late 1990s). American Type Culture Collection ("ATCC") has written me to say that as a matter of policy, they will not address whether their patent repository (as distinguished from their online catalog) had virulent Ames prior to 9/11. They did not take the opportunity to deny it. Anthrax that was destroyed at Iowa State University in early Fall 2001 had first been isolated as early as 1928. There were 100 or so vials of five or six strains. By way of further background, there was no requirement to document transfers prior to 1997. One former USAMRIID-sponsored vaccine researcher at UMass, Dr. Curtis Thorne reports that samples used to be sent by ordinary mail. In 2001, his research on virulence of genetically altered anthrax strains was being built upon at the University of Texas (Houston) by Theresa Koehler under a grant from the CIA, the National Institutes of Health and others. The Ames strain, along with other strains, would be distributed not for nefarious purposes, but for veterinary and other research, to include use in challenging vaccines in development. “It’s critical to use a genetically complete strain of the [anthrax] bacterium in experiments involving virulence,” University of Texas (Houston) scientist Koehler has said. "We just don't know how many hands it went through before it got to the ultimate user," explained Michael Osterholm, director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota and once a consultant to the government's investigation. One expert, Dr. C.J. Peters, summarizes: "Knowing that this strain was originally isolated in the U.S. has absolutely nothing to do with where the weapon may have been prepared because, as I tried to make the point, these strains move around. A post doc in somebody's laboratory could have taken this strain to another lab and it could have been taken overseas and it could have ended up absolutely anywhere. Tiny quantities of anthrax that you couldn't see, that you couldn't detect in an inventory can be used to propagate as much as you want. So that's just not, in fact, very helpful." It's naive to think that Al Qaeda could not have obtained Ames just because it tended to be in labs associated with the US military. As just one example, US Army Al Qaeda operative Sgt. Ali Mohammed accompanied Zawahiri in his travels in the US. (Ali Mohamed had been a major in the same unit of the Egyptian Army that produced Sadat’s assassin, Khaled Islambouli). Ali Al-Timimi was working in the building housing the Center for Biodefense funded by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency ("DARPA") and had access to the facilities at both the Center for Biodefense and the adjacent American Type Culture Collection. Michael Ray Stubbs was an HVAC system technician at Lawrence Livermore Lab with a high-level security clearance permitting access. That was where the effort to combat the perceived Bin Laden anthrax threat was launched in 1998. Aafia Siddiqui, who attended classes at a building with the virulent Vollum strain. She later married a 9/11 plotter al-Balucchi, who was in UAE with al-Hawsawi, whose laptop, when seized at the home of a bacteriologist, had anthrax spraydrying documents on it.. The reality is that a lab technician, researcher, or other person similarly situated might simply have walked out of some lab that had it. Among the documents found in Afghanistan in 2001, were letters and notes written in English to Ayman Zawahiri by a scientist about his attempts to obtain an anthrax sample. One handwritten letter was on the letterhead of the Society for Applied Microbiology, the UK's oldest microbiological society. The Society for Applied Microbiology of Bedford, UK, recognizes that "the development and exploitation of Applied Microbiology requires the maintenance and improvement of the microbiological resources in the UK, such as culture collections and other specialized facilities." Ft. Detrick sent its Ames strain to places like Porton Down in Great Britain and Suffield in Canada. Martin Hugh-Jones at Louisiana State University was sent the Ames strain in the late 1990s from Peter Turnbull at Porton Down. Jones says he traded anthrax strains like they were baseball cards. USAMRIID sent Ames to the lab at Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff in March 2000. USAMRIID sent the University of New Mexico Health Sciences Center, an Albuquerque research institute, the strain in March 2001. Aberdeen Proving Ground built a Biolevel-3 facility sometime in 2001 and by 2002, according to one newspaper account, had 19 virulent strains of anthrax, including Ames. Peter Turnbull, then at Porton Down, has said that Porton Down shared Ames with "very few" researchers whom he declined to name. Porton Down scientists previously acknowledged sharing the Ames strain with the agency's public health branch, the Center for Applied Microbiology and Research ("CAMR"). CAMR officials also acknowledged distributing Ames to a small number of private researchers. The Washington Post in the spring of 2002 reported that “it is now indisputable the mailed microbes are direct descendants of the germs developed at Fort Detrick.” According the Post article, the sequencing has allowed Keim's lab to rule out three sources of the anthrax, including one isolate from the British biodefense lab at Porton Down. At Brandeis University in Waltham, Mass. -- where Al Qaeda sympathizer Aafia Siddiqui studied -- research scientist Daniel Perlman ran into trouble with university administrators after conducting experiments after the anthrax attacks, upon being asked by a company to devise a diagnostic tool to detect anthrax contamination. He and a colleague revived a sample of anthrax from an old strain and created a nutrient on which pretty much only anthrax would thrive." Upon hearing of the scientists' study, Brandeis' administration became alarmed that anthrax had been grown without university approval. It called in authorities, and it shut the biology building for a week to test for spores. Microbiologist Mahler advises me that she and Dr. Perlman used virulent Vollum, the strain used by the US Army before Ames. In 2005, Dr. Michael V. Callahan, who worked for the Department of Defense at the time of his testimony, told the House Subcommittee on Prevention of Nuclear and Biological Attack of the Committee on Homeland Security: "the choice of the near-ubiquitous Ames strain, combined with the absence of forensic details in either the agent or the letters, indicate that the terrorist is scientifically informed, wary of detection and extremely dangerous." The strain referenced in documents on Khalid Mohammed's computer seized in March 2003 was not Ames and perhaps not even virulent. It is reasonable to assume that the anthrax purchased from the North Korea supplier was not Ames (if that report of an early acquisition is credited). Thus, the question relevant to an Al Qaeda theory is what access to the US Army strain might have been accomplished by someone with 1) an organization supported by funds diverted from charities backing his play, and 2) a lot of educated and technically-trained Salafists who believe in his Islamist cause. Some possible sources include England, Canada, Russia (or former Soviet bloc country), the US Army, or a facility that obtained Ames from the US Army or other researcher who had it. Former UN Inspector Richard Spertzel thought that Iraq would likely have Ames -- having first sought it in 1988 (and security being so lax at so many laboratories that had it). The strains Iraq reportedly included Sterne, A-3, two Vollum strains, and five other strains from the American Type Culture Collection. Russia reportedly had Ames and a senior Russian scientist was assisting Iraq. Dr. Alibek has explained that Russia had spies at Ft. Detrick, which explains why they tended to copy everything Ft. Detrick had done 6 months later. Former Russian bioweaponeer Serge Popov at the GMU Center for Biodefense, agrees, as does Raymond Zilinskas, a Russian biological arms specialist and Director of the Chemical and Biological Weapons Non Proliferation Program at the Monterey Institute of International Studies. A former KGB spy master says that the Russians had a spy at Ft. Detrick who provided samples of all specimens by diplomatic pouch. But it seems more likely that Al Qaeda simply got it directly from a western laboratory -- given that Ayman had a trusted scientist attending conferences sponsored by Porton Down scheduling 10-day lab visit as early as 1999 and had the support of other scientists (such as GMU's Al-Timimi) who did advanced research at US and UK universities. NBC once reported that the 16 labs known to have Ames had been winnowed to 4 that were a match. In March 2005, at a bioterrorism conference, French Interior Minister Dominique de Villepin had claimed that al-Qaeda affiliates have produced biological and chemical weapons in Georgia's Pankisi Gorge, which borders on Chechnya. The militants there had a connection and contact with Arab Chechen fighter Ibn Khattab. De Villepin told members of a bioterrorism conference in Lyons, France, that after the invasion of Afghanistan, al-Qaeda cells moved to the Pankisi Gorge in order to continue their efforts. Russia claimed that the Pankisi Gorge in the former Soviet republic of Georgia was a haven for Chechen militants and international terrorists. Bin Laden's confidante Ibn Khattab, who was killed by a poison letter in 2002, once said that wounded fighters and some international aid organizations were located there. Chechnya lies 40 miles to the North. The Georgians say a six-man team of chemists was brewing poisons to be used on Westerners in Central Asia. Until late 2001, the Arab fighters reportedly were protected by high-ranking and corrupt officials and operated with impunity in the dense forests. The FSB has identified Islamic charities operating in Chechnya and elsewhere in the region to include Al-Haramain and Benevolence International Foundation historically associated with Al Qaeda's aspiration to develop anthrax for use against US targets. The Benevolence International Foundation, a Chicago-based charity, provided financial support to the Chechen Islamists, according to a U.S. government affidavit filed in a Chicago court. In September 2005, more than 60 deadly bacterial strains that were the legacy of the former Soviet Union's biological weapons program were brought to the US from Baku, Azerbaijan as part of a joint program to combat bioterrorism. Copies of the strain were shipped aboard a U.S. military plane -- on one of those not-so-secret secret missions announced the same week by the Associated Press. Arriving at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware, analysis of the strains at the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology began immediately. The shipment was pursuant to an agreement under which the US provided money for its security of the pathogens to prevent theft by bioterrorists. Russia, in contrast, AP reported, "has declined to share its biological strains and has urged former Soviet republics not to share their pathogens." The strains were shipped in what looked like a large camping cooler -- and it took a waiver by authorities to avoid going through the X-ray. An Army captain from the Walter Reed Institute of Research was waiting to bring the strains back to the United States. After the analysis by AFIP, the announcements by the FBI relating to Amerithrax, as reported by the press, began pointing to the fact that the Ames strain was more widely distributed than previously believed. In late October 2006, the Washington Post reported: "But the more the FBI investigated, the more ubiquitous the Ames strain seemed, appearing in labs around the world including nations of the former Soviet Union." But the precise sourcing of the Post report is unclear and one expert advises me that Azerbaijan did not have Ames. In May 2006, Michael Scheuer also claimed that Ansar-al-Islam in Northern Iraq was experimenting with anthrax based on signals intelligence and human intelligence. Thus, Zawahiri's access to the Ames strain is still yet to be proved or disclosed, but there was no shortage of possibilities. Dr. Lorraine Hoffman, Iowa State University veterinary microbiologist, on the clearing up of the Ames strain confusion, summarized the issue of access to Ames nicely: “Whoever got it, got it from somewhere.” Dr. Keim observes: “Whoever perpetrated the first crime must realize that we have the capability to identify material and to track the material back to its source. Whoever did this is presumably aware of what’s going on, and if the person is a scientist, they can read the study. Hopefully, the person is out there thinking: When am I going to get caught?” t. Made In America: The Cell Culture Before the anthrax mailings, in an interview in September 2000, Dr. Ken Alibek addressed whether Bin Laden could make a "Alibek-caliber" powdered anthrax. Dr. Alibek was a colleague of microbiologist Ali Al-Timimi. Al-Timimi was taught by Bin Laden's sheik al-Hawali and actively communicating with him.
After the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology detected silica, [USAMRIID Major General John] Parker did disclose that the anthrax in question contained silica, a common substance found in sand and quartz. Another department colleague of Bin Laden's sheik's protege -- Dr. Alibek's co-director of the Center for Biodefense at GMU --told a reporter that the presence of silica is significant, but he declined to say why, citing national security concerns. "I don't think I want to give people -- terrorists -- any information to help them, said Dr. Charles Bailey, a scientist at Advanced Biosystems Inc. at George Mason University and former commander of the Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID)." The problem was that a microbiologist trained in computer science and actively communicating with Bin Laden's sheik, according to NSA intercepts, was working just feet away from both famed Russian anthrax bioweaponeer Ken Alibek and Dr. Bailey. Bin Laden's supporters already had access to the information. Links to the power point presentations on microbial forensics at the National Academies last Thursday of Randy Murch (Virginia Tech), Stephen Morse (Columbia), Bruce Budowle (FBI) can be reached here. Dr. Keim advises me that he is in Europe and will post his powerpoint upon his return. Scientists have determined that anthrax spores mailed to Capitol Hill were made less than two years ago before being mailed. Moreover, contrary to what has often been implied or assumed, the technique to weaponize the anthrax used in the Fall 2001 was not the one used by the US Army in weaponizing anthrax in the 1950s. William Patrick's process for weaponizing anthrax involved freeze drying and chemical processing whereas it was the process contemplated by Al Qaeda that involved spraydrying. "We made little freeze-dried pellets of anthrax," Donald Schattenberg explained, "then we ground them down with a high-speed colloid mill." The finding cast doubt on the hypothesis that the spores could have been stolen from a lab a long time ago. Commenting on the fine powder sent Senator Daschle and Leahy, "Only nations, probably, have figured out how to do this," Professor Matthew Meselson at Harvard said at the time. But, he adds, this means "how to do it is in the minds of people," including former employees of weapons programs in the Soviet Union and the US. Dr. Spertzel, the U.N. Special Commission chief biological inspector from 1994 to 1998 told the Washington Post: “In my opinion, there are maybe four or five people in the whole country who might be able to make this stuff, and I’m one of them. And even with a good lab and staff to help run it, it might take me a year to come up with a product as good.” At a break from a briefing before a Congressional subcommittee in December 2001, Dr. Richard Spertzel and Dr. Dr. Ken Alibek discussed access to the Ames strain and the method of weaponization. They might just as well have been demonstrating how to palm a basketball -- with Dr. Alibek agreeing with Dr. Spertzel on the likely general method but saying it is easier than Dr. Spertzel may think. According to an article in the New England Journal of Medicine, "Scanning electron microscopy of the spores used in the Senate office attack showed that they range from individual particles to aggregates of 100 [microns] or more. Spores were uniform in size and appearance and the aggregates had a propensity to pulverize (i.e., disperse into smaller particles when disturbed)." At least everyone can agree that the product, fortunately, was not resistant to antibiotics. "That's the best news you've had as president," Condi Rice told the President. Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani noted at the time, "The baby has responded to treatment, and we are very hopeful he is going to make a full and complete recovery." As Tom Brokaw said in closing a broadcast, “In Cipro we trust.” The Homeland Security Subcommittee on Prevention of Nuclear and Biological Attack held a hearing in July 2005 on "Engineering Bio-Terror Agents: Lessons from the Offensive U.S. and Russian Biological Weapons Programs." The hearing evaluated Al Qaeda's ability to develop and use catastrophic biological weapons -- such as weaponized anthrax. The hearing examined the known biological warfare capabilities developed by the U.S. and Russian offensive programs, and the potential of those capabilities being utilized in future terrorist attacks. One of the witnesses at the hearing ironically was the former colleague of Al-Timimi, Dr. Kenneth Alibek, Executive Director, Center for Biodefense, George Mason University Another witness, Dr. Michael V. Callahan, Director, Biodefense & Mass Casualty Care, CIMIT/Massachusetts General Hospital, explained:
Richard L. Lambert, the FBI inspector in charge of the "Amerithrax" investigation, told the court in a filing that a civil suit by Dr. Steve Hatfill could jeopardize the probe and expose national secrets related to U.S. bioweapons defense measures. "In the hands of those hostile to the U.S., this valuable intelligence could aid state sponsors of terrorism or terrorist organizations in their efforts to genetically engineer or alter their anthrax bioweapons to 'spoof' or escape detection." Lambert said that disclosure also could make public sensitive intelligence collection sources and methods.
This picture above was given to Dr. Richard Preston by someone at USAMRIID as similar to what the Daschle anthrax looked like. A key fact is that of the exosporium, which is a loose-fitting protein envelope surrounding about 7-10 spore coats that overlay the cortex, had traces of silica. Calling on two of the same key cast members in his New York Times best-seller Hot Zone, the scientists who first identified the virus Ebola Reston, Richard Preston in 2002 provided a riveting account of Ft. Detrick's initial microscopic examination of the mailed anthrax in Demon in the Freezer. The account was excerpted in The Sunday Times. The exosporium is the spore's outermost layer. The silica was not dispersed inside of the B. anthracis spore coats and cortex under the exosporium. Ari Fleischer discusses the silica in the anthrax in his book Taking Heat. He reports that he had argued at length with ABC News over its story that the additive was bentonite (which arguably was characteristic of the Iraq program). He explained that from the start he had told ABC that it was silica, not bentonite, that had been detected. The suggestion that AFIP experts did not know the difference between silica and silcon is not well founded, and the scientist who performed the EDX specifically told the journalist that oxygen was also detected in ratios consistent with silicon dioxide. A PhD student supervised by Matthias Frank, a big star at Livermore in developing the biosensor, addressed these issues in 2004. Lawrence Livermore lab was tasked with combating the Bin Laden anthrax threat in 1998 and is steeped in biodetection, the subject of the PhD thesis. LLNL researchers have developed advanced technologies to rapidly detect the airborne release of biological threat agents. The student cites Gary Matsumoto's Science article and says:
Former Russian bioweaponeer Ken Alibek and Harvard biologist Matthew Meselson, however, have opined that there was no special silica coating observable in the Scanning Electron Microscope ("SEM") images they saw. The presence of any silica, Drs. Meselson and Alibek say, may have come from the environment because of the special tendency of anthrax spore coats to attract silicon. (The lead FBI scientist Dwight Adams relied on the study provided the FBI by Meselson in briefing the Congress in November 2002.) Indeed, the silica may have been in the culture medium and then removed as described by a mid-March 2001 and related patent filed by researchers at Dr. Alibek's Center for Biodefense at GMU. Dr. Alibek reports that, like Dr. William Patrick, he was also given a polygraph. A scientist from the FBI Laboratory, Dr. Doug Beecher, in a July 2006 issue of "Applied and Environmental Microbiology" provided me a copy of his article that reports that:
The vague and ambiguous passage mere confirms Dr. Alibek's point that a sophisticated product can result from a relatively simple method. Harvard University Matthew Meselson reviewed the language in the FBI scientist's article before publication. "The statement should have had a reference," editor-in-chief of the microbiology journal told a trade periodical. "An unsupported sentence being cited as fact is uncomfortable to me. Any statement in a scientific article should be supported by a reference or by documentation." The two passages, footnoted or not, essentially said what Dr. Alibek had been saying: "'[J]ust because you have a sophisticated product doesn't mean the technique has to be sophisticated.' " Silica in the culture medium would not be a sophisticated "additive" but would permit the agent to be concentrated. In a Letter to the Editor in Applied and Environmental Microbiology, Aug. 2007, p. 5074, titled “Unsupported Conclusions on the Bacillus anthracis Spores,” Kay A. Mereish, at the United Nations, reports:
Dr. Mereish tells me that her letter to the editor was not intended to agree or disagree with the FBI scientist. She merely notes that his two sentences that related to this issue of additive were not supported by the scientific experiment and data that he published. She relies on Dr. Small who made her statement based on her scientific research finding in connection with her work on the anthrax samples. Dr. Mereish's letter, however, is another example where the use of "electrical charges" scientists as Dr. Patrick and Dr. Alibek are failing to distinguish between electrostatic charges and Van der Waals forces, thus resulting in some of the confusion in the press reports. Kathryn Crockett, Ken Alibek’s assistant -- was just a couple doors down from Ali Al-Timimi -- addressed these issues in her 2006 thesis, "A historical analysis of Bacillus anthracis as a biological weapon and its application to the development of nonproliferation and defense strategies." She expressed her special thanks to Dr. Ken Alibek and Dr. Bill Patrick. Dr. Patrick consulted with the FBI and so the FBI credits his expertise. "I don't want to appear arrogant. I don't think anyone knows more about anthrax powder in this country," William Patrick told an interviewer. Dr. Alibek’s access to know-how, regarding anthrax weaponization, similarly, seems beyond reasonable dispute. Katie successfully defended the thesis before a panel that included USAMRIID head and Ames strain researcher Charles Bailey, Ali Al-Timimi's other Department colleague. She says that scientists who analyzed the powder through viewing micrographs or actual contact are divided over the quality of the powder. She cites Gary Matsumoto’s “Science” article in summarizing the debate. She says the FBI has vacillated on silica. “Regarding the specific issue of weaponization," Dr. Alibek's assistant concluded in her PhD thesis, "according to several scientists at USAMRIID who examined the material, the powder created a significant cloud when agitated meaning that the adhesion of the particles had been reduced. Reducing the adhesion of the particles meant that the powder would fly better.” She explains that “The most common way to reduce electrostatic charge is to add a substance to the mixture, usually a silica based substance.” On the issue of encapsulation, she reports that “many experts who examined the powder stated the spores were encapsulated. Encapsulation involves coating bacteria with a polymer which is usually done to protect fragile bacteria from harsh conditions such as extreme heat and pressure that occurs at the time of detonation (if in a bomb), as well as from moisture and ultraviolet light. The process was not originally developed for biological weapons purposes but rather to improve the delivery of various drugs to target organs or systems before they were destroyed by enzymes in the circulatory system" (citing Alibek and Crockett, 2005). "The US and Soviet Union, however, " she explains, "used this technique in their biological weapons programs for pathogens that were not stable in aerosol form... Since spores have hardy shells that provide the same protection as encapsulation would, there is no need to cover them with a polymer.“ She explains that one “possible explanation is that the spore was in fact encapsulated but not for protective purpose. Encapsulation also reduces the need for milling when producing a dry formulation." By reducing the need for milling, she means permits greater concentration of the biological agent. If the perpetrator was knowledgeable of the use of encapsulation for this purpose, then he or she may have employed it because sophisticated equipment was not at his disposal." One military scientist who has made anthrax simulants described the GMU patents as relating to an encapsulation technique which serves to increase the viability of a wide range of pathogens. More broadly, a DIA analyst once commented to me that the internal debate seemed relatively inconsequential given the circumstantial evidence -- overlooked by so many people -- that US-based supporters of Al Qaeda are responsible for the mailings. The FBI scientists have been able to distinguish between water isotopes ratios in the anthrax. Brian Williams reports that investigators have told NBC that the water used to make the spores came from the Northeastern United States. Researchers have been able to establish that anthrax grown in water in the Northeastern United States is distinguishable from anthrax grown in water from the Southeast and Pacific Northwest. In one published anthrax study, researchers grew Bacillus subtilis, a harmless bacteria that resembles Bacillus anthracis, using local water from five different U.S. cities. The scientists were able to distinguish those grown in various cities. The method can be used to narrow the number of possible origins of the water based on the number of oxygen and hydrogen isotopes. Interviewer Kestenbaum said: "Ehleringer is now creating a map showing how the isotope ratios of water vary anthrax was grown, it may rule some places out." As defined by the Census Bureau, the Northeast region of the United States covers nine states: Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New Hampshire, New York, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, and Vermont. A scientist explained the research in an NPR interview in 2004. We thus apparently know from First Grade geography that Maryland-bound Dr. Steve Hatfill did not weaponize the anthrax. I infer from the NBC report that from the isotope ratios, authorities believe either that the anthrax was grown in one of the yellow (or perhaps light green) areas, but not one of the dark green, blue or red areas on Ehrlinger's map. The yellow swath includes much of the Northeastern United States -- places like Manhattan, and Syracuse, NY as well as places like Ann Arbor and Minneapolis. Islamabad and Baghdad can be excluded. Pretty much all foreign locations apparently can be excluded (except for parts of Canada), along with places with comparable oxygen isotope ratios such as Central New Jersey, Maryland and Ohio. Outside of the United States, pretty much only the adjacent parts of Canada above Northeastern US (e.g., parts of Ontario and Quebec) match the yellow swath that the scientists found distinguishing. The authors of one of the key articles specifically noted that they couldn't distinguish between North Carolina and Ohio -- the dark green. Similarly, they can't distinguish between Central New Jersey and North Carolina (again, the dark green). The key studies in the peer reviewed literature indicate that they were funded by the Central Intelligence Agency. Someone needs to pay the bills. Ehleringer and his colleagues published a March 2007 article titled "Stable isotope ratios of tap water in the contiguous United States" in "Water Resources Research." The study was funded by the "federal government." The raw data survey results have been embargoed by the federal government." (The agency would usually be identified). In other water isotope ratio studies the funding agency was identified as the CIA or whatever agency it was -- it varied. Perhaps this March 2007 study was funded by the Department of Justice/Federal Bureau of Investigation and was done specifically for the purpose of laying the scientific groundwork of a prosecution in Amerithrax. Separately, a press release announced in September 2003 that University of Maryland researchers have developed a technique to help the FBI track the origins of deadly anthrax spores by identifying the medium used to grow it. The FBI asked Maryland professor Catherine Fenselau to turn her mass spectrometry lab to the forensic task of sleuthing how bacillus spores, such as anthrax, are prepared. While the Utah scientist in this study was looking at the tap water, Helen W. Kreuzer-Martin, the Maryland scientist in a study published in April 2007 titled "Stable Isotope Ratios and the Forensic Analysis of Microorganisms," was looking at the nutrients in the culture. The DOJ/FBI likely hopes to put all the data together with the more familiar reasons to suspect someone (means, motive, modus operandi and opportunity), and put on a case that to a moral certainty proves it was committed by the perp(s). Absent the scientific evidence, there perhaps is a lack of a "smoking gun." Here, based on this new science, hopefully there is a smoking petri dish. By looking at the oxygen, hydrogen and deuterium geospatial distribution, authorities can more precisely identify where the water came from. For example, the deuterium map might be relied upon to eliminate an ambiguity left by the range indicated by the oxygen and hydrogen maps. In a March 31, 2003 public exchange sponsored by the Washington Post, in response to my written question submitted in advance, Ali Al-Timimi's George Mason University colleague, Kenneth Alibek, said: "This anthrax wasn't sophisticated, didn't have coatings, had electric charge and many other things." In other responses, he further explained: "There was no special need to add silica to this anthrax. Presence or absence of silica says nothing about whether it was state sponsored." US bioweaponeer William Patrick took time out from advising GMU grad students and gave it a 7 out of 10 --- calling it professionally done but not weapons grade. Perhaps that would be a B+ or even an A-. In an interview with CBS, William Patrick explained that he had been given a polygraph in June 2002 about the anthrax letters. He reports that "The FBI that they wanted me to become a part of their inner circle of--of experts, and that in order to become a part of that inner circle of technical experts, that I'd have to pass a polygraph test." In fact, he has not been quoted since, as he often was in 2001. Thus, this was a good indication of what scientific information the FBI credits or at least that they credit his expertise. On April 11, 2003, Scott Shane reported that reverse engineering "carried out at the Army's biodefense center at Dugway Proving Ground in Utah, raises the disquieting possibility that al-Qaeda and other terrorist groups could create lethal bioweapons without scientific or financial help from a state." Quoting one outside bioterrorism expert. "It shows you can have a fairly sophisticated product with fairly rudimentary methods." At last report, the reverse engineering reportedly was not able to recreate the identical product. Lisa Bronson, deputy undersecretary of defense for technology security policy and proliferation, has said that commercially available equipment used to make powdered milk could be used to make powderized anthrax. A spray dryer is used in chemical and food processing to manufacture dried egg, powdered milk, animal feed, cake mixes, citrus juices, coffee, corn syrup, cream, creamers, dried eggs, potatoes, shortening, starch derivatives, tea, tomatoes, yeast, and -- last but not least -- yogurt. Washington State University also has an informative discussion on the web. Making dried milk is not rocket science and doesn't require a PhD. But, if experience is any guide, Al Qaeda has PhD's and even rocket scientists who are sympathetic to its cause (indeed, even the father of Pakistan's atomic bomb). Here is a Q&A from a March 31, 2003 exchange with Kenneth Alibek, in response to a question I posed to him. (The month before 100 agents had come to Syracuse the same minute Ali Al-Timimi's residence was searched, and so I was curious what the fuss was all about.)
To find the missing spraydryer, perhaps the FBI merely needs to find and trace the steps of Al Qaeda's expert yogurt or dried milk or animal feedstuffs or rice hull processor. Confounding things a bit, a couple years later, Dr. Alibek told me that he had come to think that it was made using a fluidized bed dryer rather than a spraydryer. One potential lead that was reported in the press concerned a $100,000 piece of equipment bought by someone from Pakistan paying cash who had it delivered to 215 Main St. in Ft. Lee, NJ, one mile from where pilot Nawaf al-Hazmi lived. Nawaf attended a critical meeting with Yazid Sufaat, the biochemist working on anthrax, in January 2000. The United States alleged in its indictment of Zacarias Moussaoui that on or about April 1, 2001, Nawaf al-Hazmi was in Oklahoma (at the same time Zacarias Moussaoui was in Norman, Oklahoma). Nawaf then lived in Falls Church, VA and attended mosque and met with the imam that spoke alongside fellow Falls Church imam Ali Al-Timimi at a conference with other Salafists in Toronto and London in July and August 2001. The individual from Karachi who had ordered the processor pled guilty to a check kiting scheme that raised the funds used to purchase the processor. The purchaser, Syed Athar Abbas from California and then New Jersey, used the name Arthur Abbas in making the purchase. The front company was Computers Dot Com, a computer peripherals wholesaling firm, owned by Abbas. A Syed Athar Abbas (with records showing a different age and a different social security number) had a computer peripherals wholesaling firm named Mixun Solutions, also based in Karachi. Mixun Solutions went defunct after the New Jersey Syed Athar Abbas was arrested. According to the database PACER, he had initially been denied bail because he turned in two expired passports but failed to turn in the third. The New Jersey Syed Athar Abbas was given back his passport after serving a 15 month sentence. Karachi was where KSM and As Sahab was located. KSM settled his family in Karachi in 1998. In April 2001, al Hawsawi, whose laptop contained the anthrax spraydrying documents, traveled to Dubai from Karachi at the direct of Qaeda's Media Committee. Between September 11 and September 21, 2001, KSM and others at the guesthouse in Karachi, Pakistan recorded many news stories of the 9//11 attacks for future in As Sahab films. In “connecting the dots” one also would want to consider whether any supporter of the militants had access to the know-how of this encapsulation technique. I’ve posed the question whether Ali Al-Timimi had access to such know-how. A supporter of the Taliban who was working with Bin Laden’s spiritual mentor, Al-Timimi was a Salafist imam sentenced to life plus 70 years for sedition and exhorting some young men to go abroad and defend their faith. We might also consider, however, whether any supporter of the militants has expertise in such polymerization or encapsulation relating to drug delivery, such as biochemist Magdy al-Nashar. He studied in North Carolina in 2000. His webpage at Leeds explained he was expert in functional polymers used in the delivery of drugs. He was represented by an attorney in Cairo who has been alleged as Ayman Zawahiri's conduit to jihadists in Egypt and Iraq and elsewhere. Al-Nashar had the keys to the apartment used to make the London subway bombs and to store materials shipped to al-Zawahiri's chief aide al-Hadi. Ali Al-Timimi was a graduate microbiology student at George Mason University, where famed Russian bioweaponeer and former USAMRIID Deputy Commander and Acting Commander Charles Bailey on March 14, 2001 filed a patent involving the use of hydrophobic silica in permitting greater concentration of biological agents. There is a related, more sophisticated, patent based on Dr. Alibek's know-how published later (after the mailings). The First Floor that intermingled the Center for Biodefense/Hadron and the GMU/ATCC computational sciences people. Here, the government even allowed the method to be commercialized and be published in the public domain for use in a broad range of possible commercial applications. Perhaps the United States biodefense establishment should not let officials commercialize and disclose such dual use technology, whether the patent is assigned to a DARPA-funded program or not -- and whether deemed "biofriendly" or not. (The patent, which is not classified, has been assigned to George Mason University). Here is a Floor Plan for the First Floor of Discovery Hall at George Mason University. FBI Director Mueller this Fall cautioned universities to guard against access to pre-patent, pre-classification biochemistry information. GMU microbiology grad Al-Timimi, who was working with and had been taught by Bin Laden's sheik, did mathematical support work for the Navy that required a high security clearance, while working for a Beltway contractor. What did his work for the Navy involve? When pressed by the interviewer, "Does it nag at you in the back of your mind that possibly you do know [the anthrax processor]?" Dr. Bill Patrick said: "Possibly, possibly, I could have talked to these people. But it would have been within the context of their having a need to know." He explained: " Most of my discussions about the biological problem has been in secure conferences and meetings, and involve people with need to know, with security clearance and what have you. I don't talk about 'how to', I don't get into 'how to' with many people, no people other than the fact that those who really have a need to know." Al-Timimi had a high security clearance for some of his work for the government. Why? When? As so well explained by Rutgers professor Richard Ebright, proliferation of know-how serves to proliferate opportunities for access to that know-how. MIXED GENOTYPE AND INVERTED PLASMID Dr. Read, a scientist helping with the Amerithrax investigation in the DNA sequencing, long ago published the news that the anthrax was a 50/50% mixture of genotype 62 (Ames) and genotype 62 with an inversion on the plasmid. This would mean two distinct nucleic acids were detected in the sample. This means that some of the Ames had a segment of DNA that is inverted, or flipped, relative to the remainder of the plasmid. One expert advises me that no properly trained microbiologist would propagate or archive a mixture. Standard microbiological procedure calls for isolation of single colonies - i.e., single, unmixed cells and their clonal, unmixed progeny -- at each step. Inversions are not an uncommon class of mutational events, however. It would only be especially probative if it were a rare inversion and if samples were to be present among samples collected from laboratory archives. It is possible that the anthrax used is highly distinctive (pinpointing a single lab) and the authorities just don't have that sample collected. Barbara Hatch Rosenberg, who runs the Federation of American Scientists’ chemical and biological arms control program, announced in December 2001. “I’m certain it’s someone connected with a government program, or who works in a laboratory connected with a government program,” she said. “The grapevine has it that the results of an experiment on genetic variation at certain locations suggest that this material was made in a very small batch, and that suggests that the material was not made in some old weapons program on a large scale,” she said, citing sources inside and outside the government. “All the available information is consistent with a U.S. government lab as the source, either of the anthrax itself or of the recipe for the U.S. weaponization process,” wrote Rosenberg on a webpage. In an August 2007, scientists working on the FBI Amerithrax investigation wrote "Role of Law Enforcement Response and Microbial Forensics in Investigation of Bioterrorism" in the Croat Medical Journal. The choice of the Croat Medical Journal is an interesting coincidence given that a doctor who had worked for Benevolence International Foundation in Zagreb, Croatia at a time BIF was actively seeking WMD, worked at Lenox Hill Hospital in Manhattan where the first inhalational victim, Kathy Nguyen, died. Ms. Nguyen had worked in a stockroom at a related nearby hospital that was a subsidary of Lenox Hill. The doctor was even a listed author in Journal of American Medical Association article describing the epidemiological investigation of her case. It is a coincidence such as the FBI's choice of February 26, the date of the WTC 1993, for the search of Ali Al-Timimi's townhouse and search and/or arrest of a couple drying experts related to Al-Timimi's charity. Two days later after the massive FBI operation (part of OPERATION IMMINENT HORIZON), Lenox Hill Hospital issued a stern warning to the former employee of the Al Qaeda charity front. In February 2007, under a Consent Order, the former Falls Church, VA resident lost his Virginia medical license for failing to disclose the February 28, 2003 warning. His lawyer also represents IANA, for example, in the lawsuit brought by the estate of former John P. O'Neill. The FBI scientist's article explained that there
The authors explained: "The forensic comparison of a genetic profile from a reference sample with that of an evidentiary sample can have three possible general outcomes: match or inclusion, exclusion, or inconclusive. With microbial genetic information, it is less likely to have a prescribed interpretation policy for what constitutes a match and what does not. Some questions may be difficult to answer unequivocally based on extant data. Uncertainty is greater than what is experienced for human DNA identity testing because of unknown diversity, limited databases, unknown manipulations, and limited genetic testing. However, the power of microbial forensic tools is increasing rapidly with ever advancing technology." The FBI published the key microbial forensics article recently in the Croat Medical Journal. It is published by the faculty at the Croat Medical School, the alma mater of the Lenox Hill doctor who worked for the Al Qaeda charity front. The FBI searched Ali Al-Timimi's and arrested and searched the drying experts connected to Al-Timimi's charity on the 10th anniversary of WTC 1993. The investigative reason one could brainstorm for doing this is that it then gets people talking and making references that can be captured on electronic intercepts. So go ahead, bad guys. Talk about the evolving field of microbial forensics if you dare.
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