Abstract
These seminal works have defined the discipline, challenged conventional thinking, and expanded scientists' and policy makers' understanding of the interaction between the life sciences and international security.
The interdisciplinary field known as biosecurity addresses policy issues at the nexus of biology, biotechnology, infectious disease, and international security. Some biosecurity analysts focus on the deliberate use of biological agents by state or sub-state actors to harm humans, livestock, or crops, and strategies to prevent or mitigate such attacks. Others define biosecurity more broadly to cover the full spectrum of infectious disease threats, including natural outbreaks and laboratory accidents as well as intentional use. Still other analysts include “dual-use” life science research that is conducted for peaceful purposes but has an inherent potential to be diverted for hostile ends. Examples include genome synthesis (which could be misused to create dangerous viral pathogens in the laboratory) and studies of brain chemistry (which could provide the means to manipulate human cognition and emotion).
Although policy analyses of biological warfare and infectious diseases date back to the 1940s, papers that sought to integrate the previously separate domains of public health and national security first appeared during the mid-1990s. Driving this convergence were concerns over emerging and reemerging infections (such as HIV/AIDS, SARS, and multidrug-resistant tuberculosis), which came to be seen as security threats, and fears of bioterrorism spawned by the determined, but ultimately unsuccessful, efforts of the Aum Shinrikyo cult in Japan to acquire and use biological weapons. The following list of seminal works in the field of biosecurity covers the 60-year period from 1949 to 2009.
Peace or Pestilence: Biological Warfare and How to Avoid It
Rosebury, a microbiologist who worked in the U.S. program to develop biological weapons during and after World War II, wrote the first book to address their security implications. Peace or Pestilence is both a personal memoir and a polemic that describes biological warfare as “public health in reverse.” Rosebury warns that germ weapons have no real military utility because the outcome of a biological attack would be impossible to predict or control. Unfortunately, his arguments had no immediate impact; it was not until 20 years later, in November 1969, that the United States finally renounced its offensive bioweapons program.
The Problem of Chemical and Biological Weapons, Vols. I-VI
This six-volume series, written more than 30 years ago, is technologically dated but remains an invaluable historical reference on chemical and biological warfare (CBW). The titles of the books in the series are: The Rise of CB Weapons; CB Weapons Today; CBW and the Law of War; CB Disarmament Negotiations, 1920-1970; The Prevention of CBW; and Technical Aspects of Early Warning and Verification.
Technologies Underlying Weapons of Mass Destruction
Produced by Congress's former Office of Technology Assessment (which was closed in 1995), this report is a useful primer on nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons and ballistic missile delivery systems. Chapter 3 of the report, titled “Technical Aspects of Biological Weapon Proliferation,” covers the development, production, weaponization, and delivery of biological agents such as anthrax bacterial spores. In addition to describing the steps involved in acquiring a bioweapon capability, the report analyzes “choke points” (technical hurdles or vulnerabilities) during the acquisition process that might be targeted by nonproliferation measures, as well as potential “signatures” of illicit development or production activity that could be exploited for intelligence collection or treaty verification. The report is available online at http://www.princeton.edu/∼ota/disk1/1993/9344/934405.PDF.
Microsecurity: Disease Organisms and Human Well-Being
Pirages's article was among the first to draw attention to the implications of infectious disease for international security. He identifies four major transformations that have increased the threat from harmful microbes. First, rapid population growth in the developing world has given rise to teeming “megacities” and squalid refugee camps that foster the spread of epidemics, while the expansion of human settlements into marginal and remote areas has resulted in exposure to previously unknown pathogens. Second, changes in human behavior, such as sexual promiscuity and intravenous drug use, have weakened resistance to infectious diseases and facilitated their transmission. Third, regional and global environmental changes, such as global warming, are producing ecosystem shifts conducive to the spread of malaria and other vector-borne infections. Fourth, technological innovations such as air travel, antibiotics, and mass-produced foods indirectly amplify the effects of harmful bacteria and viruses. Asserting that infectious disease is “potentially the largest threat to human security lurking in the post-Cold War world,” Pirages calls for a major transfer of resources from military expenditures to the fight against natural epidemics.
Biohazard: The Chilling True Story of the Largest Covert Biological Weapons Program in the World–Told from the Inside by the Man Who Ran It
Despite its flaws, this memoir by a former Soviet bioweaponeer had a major impact on official and public perceptions of the biological warfare threat. Military physician Ken Alibek (né Kanatjan Alibekov), a native of Soviet Kazakhstan, rose through the ranks to become the deputy director of Biopreparat, a state-owned pharmaceutical complex that served as a cover for a large portion of the Soviet bioweapon program. Alibek describes the vast scale and scope of that effort, including giant “mobilization” factories that, in the event of World War III, would have produced the causative agents of smallpox, anthrax, and plague in multiton quantities for strikes by strategic bombers and ballistic missiles against U.S. and Chinese cities. Although many claims in the book are based on indirect knowledge and may be inaccurate, Alibek effectively conveys the ethos of the Soviet bioweapon program, which was characterized by appalling overkill, flagrant disregard for international law, and layers of deception.
The Global Infectious Disease Threat and Its Implications for the United States
This unclassified National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) was the first official U.S. government report to characterize infectious disease as a security threat. The “Key Judgments” section begins with an arresting statement: “New and reemerging infectious diseases will pose a rising global health threat and will complicate U.S. and global security over the next 20 years. These diseases will endanger U.S. citizens at home and abroad, threaten U.S. armed forces deployed overseas, and exacerbate social and political instability in key countries and regions in which the United States has significant interests.”
According to Jennifer Brower and Peter Chalk of RAND, the global infectious disease NIE was “a watershed in U.S. foreign policy” because it persuaded the national security community to acknowledge nontraditional threats beyond those posed by foreign military forces. This recognition led the United States to support U.N. Security Council Resolution 1308 designating HIV/AIDS as a threat to international peace and security–the first time a health issue was accorded such status. Arguably, the NIE also paved the way for the George W. Bush administration's massive HIV/AIDS prevention and treatment program (commonly known as PEPFAR). The report is available online at http://www.dni.gov/nic/PDF_GIF_otherprod/infectiousdisease/infectiousdiseases.pdf.
Toxic Terror: Assessing Terrorist Use of Chemical and Biological Weapons
Beginning in the mid-1990s, growing concern over the threat of chemical and biological terrorism–and the vulnerability of civilian populations to such attacks–led Congress to allocate billions of dollars for counterterrorism and consequence-management programs. Notably lacking from the threat assessments, however, was an understanding of the motivations and patterns of behavior of the terrorists themselves. In an effort to fill this information gap, Toxic Terror contains 12 historical case studies (researched from primary sources such as court documents and declassified government files) of groups and individuals that, between 1946 and 1998, allegedly acquired or used biological or chemical weapons. By systematically comparing these cases, the book identifies the types of actors most likely to engage in this form of terrorism. An unexpected finding was that three oft-cited incidents of chemical or biological terrorism–involving the Weather Underground, the Baader-Meinhof Gang, and the Red Army Faction–turned out to be apocryphal.
Averting the Hostile Exploitation of Biotechnology
Meselson, a professor of molecular and cellular biology at Harvard University, warns in this article about the dual-use risks associated with the biotechnology revolution and highlights the stakes in managing them on a global basis. “During the century ahead,” he writes, “as our ability to modify fundamental life processes continues its rapid advance, we will be able not only to devise additional ways to destroy life but will also be able to manipulate it–including the processes of cognition, development, reproduction, and inheritance. A world in which these capabilities are widely employed for hostile purposes would be a world in which the very nature of conflict had radically changed. Therein could lie unprecedented opportunities for violence, coercion, repression, or subjugation.”
Meselson believes it is still possible to avoid the hostile exploitation of biotechnology by strengthening the norms embodied in the 1972 Biological Weapons Convention. Achieving this goal, he concludes, “will require wider understanding that the problem of biological weapons rises above the security interests of individual states and poses an unprecedented challenge to all.” The article is available online at http://www.brad.ac.uk/acad/sbtwc/other/avertingu.pdf.
Dreaded Risks and the Control of Biological Weapons
This paper explains why biological weapons are perceived as so dangerous and how that perception distorts government and public responses. Stern observes that when people calculate risks, they tend to discount hazards that seem routine (such as indoor air pollution) or that are accepted voluntarily (such as driving) and overestimate those that are high profile (such as hazardous waste dumps) yet actually pose a lower aggregate risk to human health. Biological weapons elicit a disproportionate level of fear, disgust, and horror because they fall into the category of “dreaded risks,” characterized by involuntary exposure, unfamiliarity, invisibility, uncontrollability, and indiscriminate effects. Stern warns that the exaggerated emotional response to such hazards reduces the ability of policy makers to make accurate trade-offs between risks that are mundane but widespread and those that are spectacular but rare. She concludes that it is vital “to ensure that the revulsion invoked by [biological] weapons does not push us to take actions with unacceptable adverse effects on competing interests, including the promotion of legitimate research, civil liberties, and public health.”
The Pace and Proliferation of Biological Technologies
Carlson's paper provides graphical data showing that the productivity of DNA sequencing and synthesis (as measured by the number of DNA units that can be sequenced or synthesized per person per day) has increased exponentially since 1970. These biotechnologies are advancing even faster than Moore's Law, which predicts a doubling roughly every 18 months in the number of transistors that can be built into a microelectronic chip for a fixed price. Labor costs associated with DNA sequencing and synthesis also have fallen precipitously as “benchtop laboratory techniques that once required a doctorate's worth of experience have been replaced by automated processes that can be monitored by a technician with only limited training.” As a result of these trends, the chemical synthesis of entire microbial genomes has become technically and economically feasible.
The first de novo synthesis of a functional virus–poliovirus, consisting of 7,440 chemical units called nucleotides–was announced in 2002 by Eckard Wimmer and his colleagues at the State University of New York. Carlson predicts that the global proliferation of DNA sequencing and synthesis capabilities is inevitable and that attempts at regulation would be counterproductive by generating black markets that are difficult to monitor. Whether or not one agrees with Carlson's policy prescription, the technological trends he identified have persisted. During the five years after his paper was published, researchers synthesized the 1918 pandemic strain of the influenza virus (13,400 nucleotides), the SARS virus (29,700 nucleotides), and an abridged genome of the bacterium Mycoplasma genitalium (583,000 nucleotides).
Biotechnology Research in an Age of Terrorism
This influential report, prepared by an expert committee chaired by MIT biology professor Gerald Fink, helped to establish a scientific consensus that certain research findings in the life sciences are “dual-use” because they could be exploited by states, terrorists, or criminals for hostile purposes. To instill confidence that “the potential risks of misuse of dual-use research are being adequately addressed while enabling vital research to go forward,” the committee recommended establishing an oversight system based on seven types of “experiments of concern” that would trigger careful review by security experts and informed members of the scientific community. (Such experiments would increase the virulence, transmissibility, or host range of a pathogen, facilitate its weaponization, enable it to evade detection or diagnostic modalities, or render it resistant to vaccines or anti-infective drugs.) The Fink Committee report, as it is known, also urged the creation of a federal advisory committee to provide guidance on the oversight of dual-use research. This recommendation led the Bush administration to establish the National Science Advisory Board for Biosecurity, which first convened in mid-2005.
Biodefense Crossing the Line
In the years following 9/11 and the 2001 anthrax mailings, U.S. government spending to protect the civilian population against bioterrorism soared from about $400 million in 2001 to more than $6 billion in 2004. Of particular concern to U.S. biodefense officials was the risk that hostile states or terrorists might use genetic engineering techniques to create “enhanced” biowarfare agents with greater lethality, environmental stability, detection difficulty, or resistance to existing drugs and vaccines. The Bush administration responded to this emerging threat by emphasizing “science-based threat characterization,” including laboratory studies of genetically engineered pathogens that would guide the development of medical counter-measures. To perform such research, the Department of Homeland Security established the National Biodefense Analysis and Characterization Center (NBACC) at Fort Detrick, Maryland. In this editorial, three leading experts on biological weapons sound the alarm that NBACC's threat-assessment activities could violate the ban on offensive development enshrined in the Biological Weapons Convention and provoke countries such as Russia and China to follow suit, worsening the very dangers that the U.S. government sought to diminish. The article is available online at http://www.politicsandthelifesciences.org/Contents/Contents-2003-9/PLS2003-9-22-02-0002.pdf.
The Promise and Perils of Synthetic Biology
Synthetic biology is an emerging discipline that involves the design and engineering of novel biological systems for practical purposes, employing many of the strategies that electrical engineers use to make computer chips. Drawing on DNA synthesis technology, synthetic biologists have developed a toolkit of genes with known functions called “BioBricks.” These standardized biological parts can be assembled like transistors, resistors, and capacitors into genetic circuits that perform specific tasks. So far synthetic biologists have used BioBricks to perform ingenious parlor tricks, such as inducing bacteria to blink slowly on and off like Christmas tree lights. But potential applications include the construction of bioengineered microbes that produce pharmaceuticals, detect toxic chemicals, break down pollutants, repair defective genes, destroy cancer cells, or generate hydrogen.
This article examines the potential biosafety and biosecurity risks of synthetic biology and concludes that bioterrorists are unlikely to exploit the technology to create “designer pathogens” more deadly than those that exist in nature. Nevertheless, if synthetic microorganisms are created by combining a large number of DNA elements in new ways, the complex interactions among them could give rise to unintended harmful properties that threaten public health or the environment. Given the inherent uncertainties involved in assessing the biosafety risks of synthetic organisms, the authors call for a “precautionary” approach to oversight and regulation. The article is available online at http://www.thenewatlantis.com/publications/the-promise-and-perils-of-synthetic-biology.
DNA Synthesis and Biological Security
Over the past decade, commercial DNA synthesis companies have sprung up around the globe to meet the demand of scientific and corporate clients for customized pieces of DNA. To place an order, one goes to a supplier's website, enters in the desired DNA sequence, and provides a credit card number; two weeks later, a vial containing the synthesized DNA molecules is shipped to the customer by express mail. Although most companies in this sector supply short pieces of single-stranded DNA (less than 200 nucleotides long), about 50 firms in several countries synthesize gene-length pieces of double-stranded DNA.
In this landmark article, a group of academics, industry executives, and security experts propose a voluntary oversight framework for the commercial DNA synthesis industry to prevent criminals and terrorists from ordering pathogenic genes over the internet. Such a system would involve three tiers. First, customers who place orders for customized DNA sequences would have to identify themselves, their home institution, and relevant biosafety information. Second, DNA synthesis companies would use an approved software tool to screen synthesis orders against a database of DNA sequences coding for dangerous pathogens and toxins, flagging close matches for review. Third, the companies would work with government law enforcement agencies, such as the FBI, to develop a process for reporting suspicious orders. Although some biosecurity experts believe that formal regulations may still be necessary, particularly for companies that refuse to screen voluntarily, the proposed oversight system is a step in the right direction.
Compendium of Iraq's Proscribed Weapons Programmes in the Chemical, Biological, and Missile Areas
This comprehensive U.N. report describes (in chapter V, “Biological Weapons Programme”) the key elements of Iraq's biowarfare capability before the 1991 Persian Gulf War and the subsequent efforts of U.N. inspectors to uncover them. Iraq initially denied possessing a bioweapon program and hid its illicit activities at several ostensibly civilian facilities that produced vaccines, biopesticides, and single-cell proteins (an animal feed supplement). To penetrate the veil of secrecy surrounding the program, U.N. inspectors assembled bits of evidence from multiple sources, including interviews with Iraqi officials, on-site inspections of dual-use facilities, sample collection and analysis, and “mass-balance” calculations that compared Iraq's imports and consumption of bacterial culture media.
This investigation ultimately turned up major discrepancies that, in July 1995, forced the Iraqi authorities to acknowledge the large-scale production of three biowarfare agents: anthrax spores, botulinum toxin, and aflatoxin. The following month, Hussein Kamel, the mastermind of Iraq's WMD programs, defected to Jordan and revealed that the three agents had been filled into bombs and missile warheads prior to the Gulf War. The ability of the U.N. inspectors to uncover compelling circumstantial evidence for illicit production despite Iraq's extensive deception and denial efforts provides important lessons for monitoring clandestine bioweapon programs. The relevant chapter of the report is available online at http://www.un.org/Depts/unmovic/new/documents/compendium/Chapter_V.pdf.
Incapacitating Biochemical Weapons: Promise or Peril?
Complex technical, legal, and policy issues surround the development and use of incapacitating biochemical agents for peacekeeping, counterterrorism, and law enforcement operations. A major theme of this edited volume is that true “nonlethal” agents do not exist–a drug has yet to be discovered that can incapacitate people quickly and without risk of death when employed in a real-world military or law enforcement situation. Nevertheless, revolutionary advances in the life sciences, particularly with respect to understanding brain chemistry, could generate new capabilities to manipulate human consciousness, emotion, cognition, and behavior. These advances, coupled with the changing nature of conflict in the twenty-first century (e.g., a new emphasis on counterterrorism and urban warfare), have sparked renewed state interest in biochemical incapacitating agents as a means of limiting civilian casualties. Biologist Mark Wheelis warns, however, that if governments decide to go down this path, they may be “choosing a future in which human physiology becomes a target of soldiers, terrorists, criminals, and despots.”
Biosecurity in the Global Age: Biological Weapons, Public Health, and the Rule of Law
In this ambitious book, two law professors examine biological weapons and public health from a holistic perspective. Fidler and Gostin define biosecurity as “society's collective responsibility to safeguard the population from dangers presented by pathogenic microbes–whether intentionally released or naturally occurring.” They argue that effective policies for biosecurity must integrate the separate policy realms of public health and national security, a challenging task that “requires changing entrenched perspectives and practices and building new, sustainable governance approaches to threats posed by pathogenic microbes.” The authors conclude that in a globalizing world, embedding biosecurity principles in the rule of law demands new forms of global governance that are not state-centric but take full account of the role of sub-state actors.
Framing Biosecurity: An Alternative to the Biotech Revolution Model?
Vogel's article was the first to put the social construction of biotechnology on the biosecurity agenda. She argues that any scientific or technological process is a “sociotechnical assemblage” that incorporates two types of knowledge: explicit and tacit. Explicit knowledge is information that can be codified and written down, such as a recipe or a laboratory protocol, whereas personal tacit knowledge involves subtle hands-on skills that cannot be reduced to writing but must be acquired through practice. In addition, tacit knowledge may be “communal,” meaning that it resides in teams of specialists from different disciplines who collaborate on a project. Biotechnologies whose mastery requires personal and/or communal tacit knowledge are more difficult to acquire and transfer than those that are readily codified. Based on Vogel's empirical studies of the role of personal and communal tacit knowledge in genome synthesis, she questions the conventional wisdom that bioterrorists could exploit the published scientific literature to produce pathogenic viruses.
Living Weapons: Biological Warfare and International Security
This book is a scholarly analysis of the unique challenges that biological weapons pose for international security with respect to arms control, deterrence, civil-military relations, intelligence, and terrorism. To assess the strategic consequences of bioweapon proliferation, Koblentz draws on international relations theory and historical studies of the U.S., Soviet, South African, and Iraqi biowarfare programs. He argues that because of the advantages that biological weapons hold for the attacker, they have a destabilizing effect on international security. Equally problematic is the fact that the materials, equipment, and know-how needed to develop biological weapons overlap extensively with those used to conduct civilian biomedical research and to prepare biological defenses. The resulting ambiguities limit the effectiveness of verification for the Biological Weapons Convention, impede the civilian oversight of biodefense research, and increase the difficulty of obtaining accurate intelligence on an adversary's biowarfare capabilities and intentions. At a time when the United States enjoys overwhelming conventional military superiority, Koblentz warns that biological weapons offer a means for weaker states and terrorist groups to wage asymmetric warfare. The book concludes with a set of policy prescriptions for reducing the dangers described in the preceding chapters.