| Terrorist Use | |||
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| Ancient Times to the 19th Century | 19th Century and World WarI | The Inter-War Years | World War II | Post World War II | Disarmament and proliferation | |||
| Recent years have seen the emergence of a new use of chemical and biological weapons. The simplicity of their manufacture in at least crude form has long been recognized as making them attractive to countries looking for an affordable weapon of mass destruction - a poor man's atom bomb. The simplicity with which the agents can be produced has also made them attractive to groups which are not backed by the resources of governments, and the last decades of the Twentieth Century saw them move into prominence as weapons of terror. | |||
| Click here for a list of significant terrorist incidents. | |||
| There have been several attempts over the years by terrorists to use chemical and biological weapons. These have ranged from the use of typhoid by the Rajneesh cult of Oregon to attempt to influence local elections, to the preparation of ricin by fringe groups in the United States, to blackmail attempts in Europe and the US, to the use of butyric acid (the foul smell of rancid butter) against abortion and family planning clinics in the US. Most of these have failed because the terrorists did not know what they were doing. The nerve agent GB, also known as sarin,was however, sufficiently toxic that eventual success was guaranteed for the Aum Shinrikyo, a quasi-religious group that produced its own and employed it in a series of terrorist acts in Japan. | |||
| Aum's first attempt, in March 1994, to use sarin failed when the spray apparatus malfunctioned, poisoning the operator but not the intended target. They achieved their goal on their next attempt, a release in the town of Matsumoto that killed 7 and left some 500 others sickened. Finally, on March 22, 1995, they committed the act which brough chemical terrorism into the limelight. Using a simple delivery system - plastic bags containing the agent which were punctured to release it by Aum members - they killed 12people and injured some 6000 by releasing sarin in several subway trains in Tokyo, Japan. | |||
| Although the Japanese government reacted swiftly in the aftermath of the attack, it was later found that it had been rather indulgent towards Aum Shinrikyo. The sect was large, rich, and well-organized and had members or sympathizers in many crucial positions and had been able to blunt or deflect investigation. Even some fairly blunt statements about chemical and biological weapons by Shoko Asahara, the leader of the sect, failed to stimulate interest. It was later found that they had also attempted a number of biological attacks with anthrax and botulism weapons that had failed for reasons as outrageous as using vaccine or non-toxigenic strains of bacteria rather than known pathogenic strains. | |||
| Aum Shinrikyo are not only the organization with the resources to acquire CBW. Although the Russian Mafia and South American narcoterrorists are sources of genuine concern, the greatest threat is seen from the group lead by the ascetic anti-Western Saudi Arabian millionaire Osama bin Laden. The United States in particular is concerned about his activities and has attacked one pharmaceutical plant in Sudan that it believed may have played a role in a chemical weapons production line for bin Laden. | |||
| More than anything else, this demonstrates that vigilance, rather than laws or petitions or plebiscites, will be the key to preventing biological and chemical terrorism. However, the threat is now seen to be real enough that many countries are planning and training people to deal with such an event. We can only hope that the training will never be needed. | |||
| Ancient Times to the 19th Century | 19th Century and World WarI | The Inter-War Years | World War II | Post World War II | Disarmament and proliferation | |||
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