TheMillerCircle.org

You all remember the anthrax scare right after 9/11, in which five people died from anthrax exposure and the method of delivery, through the U.S. mail, terrorized a nation. Of course everyone wanted an answer about the perpetrator and a quick solution to a very scary terrorist threat. So former Army biology research worker Steven J. Hatfill got the call. You may remember Faux News in particular painting a picture of Hatfill as if no other person could have carried out the wicked deed. His life was ruined and he became something of a train wreck. John Aschcroft leaked his name as a suspect and from then on, his life was a downward spiral.

Hatfill filed several lawsuits to clear his name and this past June the government agreed to pay him $2.825 million plus a yearly annuity. Thus exonerated and cleared of any suspicion, the investigation turned to another Army bioweapons researcher, microbiologist Bruce E. Ivins , who had been working on weapons grade anthrax and searching for cures for several years. The anthrax scare was good for his career, as he published several papers after the scary national event. But, with Hatfill out of the way as a suspect, the newfocus of attention onto him as a suspect led to a psychological deterioration and he threatened to kill his co-workers taking them out with him in a "blaze of glory." A restraining order against him further intensified his isolation and decline and he committed suicide yesterday. It is unclear if we will ever know his guilt or innocence.

It seems to me that the major point of this event has always been the larger implication, for it goes way beyond this event and brings up the issue of how best to insure overall public safety. I always assumed that the weapons grade anthrax distributed through the mail came from a U.S. Army research center of microbiology as it seemed the most likely source. But, in addition to acknowledging the tragic impact the anthrax event had on two families of suspected perpetrators and the families of the victims, we should not hesitate to acknowledge and publicaly engage in the larger message of this tragedy. By maintaining huge stockpiles of weapons, including biomaterials, nuclear weapons, cluster bombs, etc., we can almost guarantee that one day a nuclear device will be detonated in a major U.S. city, just as weapons grade anthrax was released through the U.S. mail. And with better than average probability, that device will come from the same source as did the anthrax: a U.S. weapons storage depot. Someone pissed off at the government, or in need of money, living in or near a major city, will detonate a device, or sell one to a terrorist organization, so that one city becomes toast. The larger the weapons cache, the more likely this kind of outcome awaits our future. Only when these weapons are eliminated entirely can the public be free of this kind of threat. It isn’t the outside that we should be afraid of, but disgruntled insiders.