Prospects for Earth under the hood of genetic weapons

2024 Author: Seth Attwood | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 15:55

Recently, the topic of new threats to Russia's security associated with an unprecedented leap in the development of new technologies and, among other things, with a real breakthrough in the field of genetic engineering, has been increasingly raised on the pages of domestic newspapers and on television.

Unfortunately, the moral and ethical aspect of the problem is such that it is possible to call this "leap" progress only with great reservations. Potentially possible human cloning, reproduction of vital organs, genetically modified products (the effect of which on the human body is still under study) and much more are closely related to genetic developments. Including a previously unknown, but today almost become a reality genetic weapon - the so-called "smart weapon" - due to its inherent high degree of selectivity of impact and striking a target with a specific genetic code. The scientific approach is based on the selectivity of the impact of such weapons on an individual of a certain race, a certain ethnos or a certain nation.

What is genetic weapon (GR)? Security experts believe that these are artificially created strains of bacteria and viruses, modified using genetic engineering technologies in such a way that they can cause negative changes in the human body. Genetic weapons work according to gender, age and various anthropological traits, which can be identified by analyzing the structure of DNA that stores the genetic code (since differences between individuals and populations are associated with the uneven distribution of proteins in their distinctive genes). Genetically determined (encoded in DNA) a person's appearance, demeanor, life span and many other characteristics. Genetic engineering also allows you to create copies of DNA - on this principle all cloning experiments are based, which cause the greatest controversy and rejection from the public and the church.

Many organizations around the world are currently working on the identification of distinctive genes. To date, it is known, for example, about 50 human ethnic groups, distinguishable at the genetic level. This means that if a genetic weapon finds itself in the hands of terrorists, an entire ethnic group may end up under the threat of physical extinction. The British Medical Association (BMA) warns that even individual groups within these ethnic groups can be destroyed with the help of GO. The BMA specialists openly declare the reality of creating genetic weapons: "In the next decade, genetic weapons of mass destruction can be created. The rapidly progressing development of genetics may in the coming years become the reason for carrying out ethnic cleansing on an unprecedented scale," the association's report says.

The Financial Times reported at the time that South Africa has recently stopped breeding bacteria that can make people with black skin sterile. Although skeptical opinions are sometimes expressed with regard to civil defense, creating these weapons using modern technologies does not seem to be a futile and so difficult task. For example, it is as simple (relatively simple) as obtaining an antibiotic that selectively affects a specific disease, and even easier, since the task of combat strains is not to cure, but, on the contrary, to destroy.

Former US Secretary of Defense William Cohen made sensational statements back in 1998 that he had materials at his disposal about work on the creation of "certain types of pathogens that could be ethnically specific." A senior Western intelligence source said Israel was one of the countries Cohen had in mind.

According to Western intelligence agencies, repeatedly published in the media, Israel has been actively working on the creation of biological weapons for several years, which could strike only Arabs, but not Jews. As part of the creation of the so-called "ethnic bomb", Israeli scientists use medical advances to identify the distinctive genes that some Arabs possess, in order to then create genetically modified bacteria or viruses. They are trying to use the ability of viruses and some bacteria to change the DNA inside the cells of their residence. Scientists construct deadly microorganisms that attack only carriers of distinctive genes.

The program is being carried out at the Nes Tziyona Biological Institute, Israel's main research center to create a secret arsenal of chemical and biological weapons. An anonymous employee at the center said the task was extremely difficult because both Arabs and Jews were of Semitic origin. However, he added: "We have succeeded in targeting specific genetic profiles of some Arab communities, especially people from Iraq." The disease can be spread by spraying or contaminating water pipes with microorganisms.

In August 2002, the UN urgently sent a special team of doctors and scientists from the French Pasteur Institute to Madagascar to study the epidemic of an unknown disease. The symptoms of the disease, which then affected more than 2,000 people and killed 157 Madagascarians, were similar to those of the common cold. At the same time, the patients experienced severe headache with a sharp disruption of the intestines. According to the testimony of doctors, sick people often did not last even two days. But what made the UN staff even more alarmed is that the epidemic, the first outbreak of which was noted back in June, affects mostly people of one ethnic group. It is possible that scientists then faced just a test of genetic (ethnic in this case) weapons.

The history of genetic weapons is inextricably linked with the history of bacteriological weapons (BW). As you know, first-generation CP - pathogens and toxins of acute epidemic diseases with a short incubation period (plague, cholera, anthrax) - whose production began in the 1920s, was tested by the Japanese on tens of thousands of Chinese prisoners during the Second World War. However, by the 1950s, it was possible to develop methods of combating epidemics, and since it was impossible to covertly use BW, the improvement of this weapon continued.

The next stage in the development of bacteriological weapons falls on the mid-1960s - early 1970s. In 1969, the director of ARPA (the agency for advanced research projects of the US Department of Defense), speaking before Congress, said: "Within the next 5-10 years, you can create a synthetic biological agent against which natural human immunity will be powerless." BO of the second generation was prepared with the expectation of a long incubation period and the slow development of an epidemic that could not be localized (so that a weakened organism would die from an accidental infection), which made traditional quarantine measures ineffective. One of the representatives of this generation is TB, which is resistant to most antibiotics. Viruses were also selected for the destruction of animals and agricultural plants.

In the 1970s, when the gene was first created artificially, the first work on GO took place. First, the military in their laboratories are trying to bring the damaging ability of artificially created strains to 100% - for this purpose, the most deadly variants of the African viruses Marburg, Lassa, Ebola are modified, transforming the insides of people into homogeneous jelly in a matter of hours. For example, American fighting tularemia strains are enhanced by antibiotic resistance and become able to overcome the resistance of the immune system. Research begins to create selectively acting viruses. Already by the end of the 1970s, the efficiency of "triggering" viruses, depending on a given gender and age, reaches 90%. Similar work was actively carried out in the USA, USSR, China and a number of Western European countries. In the 1980s, the Human Genome Project was launched, opening up new perspectives for the military.

In terms of its total impact, GO today significantly surpasses all other types of weapons of mass destruction - it is easy to spread (it is enough to spray the contents of a small ampoule in crowded places), GO strains can travel long distances through the air in search of a subject with the necessary genetic differences, and it is very difficult to identify and track these strains and the creatures affected by them without the appropriate technology. In addition, the GO does not have a return address - if it is possible to record the launch of missiles with nuclear warheads or attempts to use chemical toxic substances, then the effect of GO often affects itself long after its imperceptible spread.

In 1990, scientists believed that the human genome (a way of coding proteins) could be deciphered by 2025. However, scientific organizations in the United States and England have already this summer successfully completed the Human Genome program (computer decoding of human DNA), additionally decoding the genomic structures of dozens of pathogenic bacteria. As you might guess, most of the results of this program are closed - "Genome" allows you to move on to work on a new generation of high-precision genetic weapons, which will appear in the next 5-10 years. Now genetic engineering is simultaneously capable of uncovering the mechanism of action of toxins and ensuring the production of selectively acting toxic products, no different from ordinary ones, without laborious genetic examination. Today, Genome is being replaced by a new Proteome program for decoding and studying the purpose and interaction of proteins, which opens the way to obtaining an absolute weapon that allows for any chosen period - from several hours to tens of years - to systematically destroy any human populations specified by key genetic traits, without fear of a possible retaliation.

From all of the above, it is easy to imagine what humanity will face in the very near future, if we do not carry out the correct work to identify and control illegal research in this area (if it is impossible to completely curtail these works). The most important threat associated with genetic weapons is the development of genetic technologies in private companies and the lack of information about whether genetic technologies were used in the preparation of food products supplied to Russia (such products are called transgenic) and medicines. The world grain market is controlled by five transnational corporations, which determine the prices and volumes of grain supplies to different countries, and the market for all types of vegetable oil is controlled by one concern in general. All of these companies are active in genetic engineering research and are organizing large-scale advocacy campaigns touting the benefits of transgenic (genetically modified) products.

Thus, in October 2000, a scandal erupted in the United States over the appearance in grocery stores of StarLink transgenic corn, which was allowed to be consumed only as feed for livestock. A gene has been added to StarLink that is responsible for the synthesis of a pesticide that destroys the European cornworm. This protein is a powerful human allergen - it is not digested, does not break down at high temperatures and leads to the development of an allergic reaction up to anaphylactic shock. The scandal itself was caused primarily by the fact that the company was selling StarLink under the guise of ordinary corn. Another fact. In 1989, the Japanese drug L-tryptophan, produced by artificially created bacteria, was distributed in the United States. Pathogens penetrating the immune system got into tryptophan in an unexplained way, which led to an epidemic - 10 thousand people were infected, 37 of them died, about a thousand became disabled. The danger of transgenic products and drugs lies not only in possible mistakes, but also in the principles of the human genetic mechanism that are not fully understood. Genes in the body interact with each other, and the consequences of adding a foreign gene cannot be accurately predicted.

The global danger for Russia lies in the eternal misfortune of our science - a catastrophic lack of funds. The level of funding for the entire scientific and technical sphere of the Russian Federation has long been at a critical level. The vice-president of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Academician Vladimir Fortov, notes that our science has exhausted its internal resources of survival (material, moral, psychological), which allow it to stay on the last frontier, beyond which it will face rapid and irreversible degradation. If this continues, Russia risks being left without its genetic scientists altogether. Moreover, without constant practice in the field of molecular biology, the loss of qualifications occurs in a matter of months.

So, the consequences of the use of HE can be truly catastrophic and it is no coincidence that they excite aggressive "minds" around the world. According to the American scientists themselves, 90% of research in molecular biology and genetics can be redesigned at any time to create GO. So, there is a certain document received from the US Navy Research Directorate, which proposes to grow genetically modified insects that would eat away at roads and runways on enemy territory, and also purposefully destroy metal parts, coatings, fuel and lubricants from military equipment and auxiliary equipment.

It is known that a group of scientists have already patented microorganisms that decompose polyurethane contained in the paint that covers ships and aircraft. Another military biotech lab is developing an "anti-material biocatalyst" that breaks down fuels and plastics.

Thus, once again we have to state that a person, having made unique discoveries in genetics, as in his time in the nuclear sphere, has once again invented a new method of self-destruction. Today, more than ever, the question of how to minimize the evil that brings with it "progress" in the field of science-intensive technologies, in particular, in the field of molecular biology and genetic engineering, is urgent.