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| Significant Terrorist Incidents Involving Chemical and Biological Agents | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Year | Organization | Agents | Comments |
| 1946 | DIN ("Revenge" in Hebrew; also Dahm Y'Israel Nokeam, "Avenging Israel's Blood") (Germany) |
Arsenic Compounds | Motivated by a desire to obtain revenge on Germans for the Holocaust, three members of the group hid in a bakery in the Stalag 13 prison camp near Nuremberg, Germany where the Americans were detaining several thousand SS troops. They applied an arsenic-containing mixture to loaves of bread. More than 2000 prisoners reportedly became ill, with more than 200 requiring hospitalization. |
| 1970 | Weather Underground (United States) |
Tried to obtain agents from Ft. Detrick by blackmailing a homosexual serviceman. | The case may well be apocryphal. |
| 1972 | R.I.S.E (United States) |
Typhoid, diphtheria, dysentery, meningitis and several others to be delivered by aerosol. | A group of students in Chicago with an apocalyptic philosophy. They had grandiose schemes of world destruction that gradually shrank until their plans were discovered and the ringleaders fled to Cuba. |
| 1974 | Aliens of America (Alphabet Bomber) (United States) |
Nerve Agents | Beginning in July of 1974, a number of messages
were received which purported to be from a group called the "Aliens of America."
The messages included claims that the group had developed and possessed
a supply of 4 nerve agents (AA1, AA2, AA3, and AA4S), as well as sarin.
After several incidents, it was concluded that the threats to use nerve agents might be credible to some degree. The Aliens of America turned out to be a single man, a resident alien named Muharem Kurbegovic. At the time of his arrest, no chemical agents were found; however, he had reportedly aquired "all but one" of the ingredients requirred to produce a nerve agent, and a search of his appartment turned up a variety of materials, including precursors for phosgene and a drum containing 25 pounds of sodium cyanide. |
| 1980 | R.A.F. (Rote Armee Faktion) (Germany) |
Botulinum toxin | Supposedly facilities for the manufacture of the toxin were found in an RAF safehouse in Paris. The report was later repudiated by the West German Bundeskriminalamt (Federal Office of Crime.) |
| 1984 | Rajneshee Cult (United States) | Salmonella enterica serovar typhimurium | The cult were trying to influence a local
election by making people too sick to vote. They did this by manually contaminating
food, e.g. salad bars, with cultures of Salmonella enterica serotype
Typhimurium, a common causative organism for food poisoning. The pathogen
was obtained from materials purchased by the Rajneesh Medical Corporation
for their (state-licensed) medical laboratory. Over 750 people were affected.
The cult fell apart and members turned informant to expose the effort.
There is credible evidence that the use of Salmonella typhi, which produces typhoid fever, had been considered, but was rejected because the risks of having it traced back to the cult were too high. |
| 1991 | Minnesota Patriots Council (United States) |
Ricin | The group extracted ricin from castor beans
obtained through mail order. They planned to disseminate the agent as an
aerosol but were arrested after the FBI had penetrated the group and learned
of the plan.
Two members of the group, Doug Baker and Charles Wheeler, were the first individuals to be indicted and convicted under the Biological Weapons Anti-Terrorism Act of 1989. |
| 1990-1995 | Aum Shinrikyo (Japan) |
Bacteria and viral agents, toxins, organophosphorus nerve agents. | An apocalyptic group that believed
it necessary to destroy the planet with chemical and biological weapons
in order to allow the cult to take over. They failed quite dismally on at
least 10 occasions to conduct biological attacks, infecting only cult members.
They were more succesful with chemical weapons, eventually killing 20 or more in both individual and mass casualty attacks and sickening thousands with crude preparations of nerve agents. Several members of the cult have been sentenced to death for their actions. |
| 1995 | Aryan Nation (United States) |
Yersinia pestis | A member of the group fraudulently obtained samples of the plague bacterium from the American Type Culture Collection. |
| 1995 | The Covenant and the Sword (United States) |
Ricin | The ricin, which had been smuggled in from Canada, was baked into cakes that were to be given to the local Internal Revenue Office at Christmas time. The perpetrator hanged himself shortly after arrest. |
| 1998 | Republic of Texas (United States) |
Bacterial and viral agents | Members of the Republic of Texas seccessionist group were arrested for violation of 18 USC 2332a - making a "Threat to Use Weapons of Mass Destruction" as a result of e-mailed threats against (then) U.S. President Clinton and a variety of federal agents and their families as well as a local judge. The men arrested had planned to produce a weapon by modifying a butane lighter to shoot cactus spines which were to be coated with biological agents. They had claimed to have blood containing the AIDS virus and rabies available. They also claimed they could get a supply of anthrax from a foreign country. The two men (of three arrested) sentenced for the plot received terms of imprisonment of more than 24 years. It is not clear if they actually had access to the agents they claimed to have available. |
| 2001 | Unknown (United States) |
Bacillus anthracis | A series of letters containing an extremely high quality preparation of anthrax spores were mailed to a number of politicians and media personalities. None of the targets appeared to have been affected but a number of innocents, especially in the US Postal Service, were made seriously ill or killed. |
| 2003-2004 | Fallen Angel (United States) | Ricin | An individual who was protesting against modification of rest regulations for truckers started sending crude ricin preparations to various offices in Washington, DC. This included the White House. The ricin sent through the mail and at least one of the letters was sent from Chattanooga. Tennessee. |