Project 112

[thedrifter]

PRESS ADVISORY from the United States Department of Defense

No. 173-P
PRESS ADVISORY October 8, 2002

Assistant Secretary of Defense (Health Affairs) William
Winkenwerder, Jr., will hold a news conference to release 28
detailed fact sheets on 27 Cold War-era chemical and biological
warfare tests identified as Project 112.

The briefing will take place tomorrow, Oct. 9, 2002, at 1 p.m.
EDT in the DoD Briefing Room, Pentagon 2E781. These documents
will supplement information already posted on the World Wide Web
at
http://deploymentlink.osd.mil/

Point of contact is Jim Turner at (703) 697-5135.

[Web version: http://www.defenselink.mil/news/Oct2002/p10082002_p173-02.html]

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Sempers,

Roger

[thedrifter]

Wed Oct 9,12:02 AM ET
By MATT KELLEY, Associated Press Writer

The United States held open-air biological and chemical weapons tests in at least four states — Alaska, Hawaii, Maryland and Florida — during the 1960s in an effort to develop defenses against such weapons, according to Pentagon (news - web sites) documents.



A series of tests in Alaska from 1965-67 used artillery shells and bombs filled with the nerve agents sarin and VX, the records show.

The Defense Department planned to release summaries of 28 chemical and biological weapons tests at a House Veterans Affairs Committee hearing Wednesday. The Associated Press obtained the summaries Tuesday.

The documents did not say whether any civilians had been exposed to the poisons. Military personnel exposed to weapons agents would have worn protective gear, the Pentagon says.

The Pentagon previously acknowledged that it had conducted biological and chemical tests — including a few on U.S. soil — but the latest documents give the most detailed picture so far of the testing program inside the United States.

The tests were part of Project 112, a military program in the 1960s and 1970s to test chemical and biological weapons and defenses against them. Parts of the testing program done on Navy ships were called Project SHAD, or Shipboard Hazard and Defense.

The tests were directed from the Deseret Test Center, part of a biological and chemical weapons complex in the Utah desert.

Some of those involved in the tests say they now suffer health problems linked to their exposure to dangerous chemicals and germs. They are pressing the Veterans Affairs Department to compensate them and the Defense Department to release more information about the tests.

In response to pressure from veterans and Congress, the Pentagon began releasing details of the tests last year. Earlier this year, the Defense Department acknowledged for the first time that some of the 1960s tests used real chemical and biological weapons, not just benign stand-ins.

"The Cold War era experiments of Project SHAD, which we are now learning used live toxins and chemical poisons on American servicemen on American soil, must be aggressively investigated in as open and transparent a manner as possible," said the House Veterans Affairs Committee chairman, Rep. Chris Smith, R-N.J. "Our focus must be on quickly identifying those veterans who were involved, assessing whether they suffered any negative health consequences and, if warranted, providing them with adequate health care and compensation for their service."

The Defense Department has identified nearly 3,000 soldiers involved in tests disclosed earlier, but the VA has sent letters to fewer than half of them. VA and Pentagon officials acknowledged at a July hearing that finding the soldiers has been difficult.

The tests described in the latest Pentagon documents include:

_ Devil Hole I, designed to test how sarin gas would disperse after being released in artillery shells and rockets in aspen and spruce forests. The tests occurred in the summer of 1965 at the Gerstle River test site near Fort Greeley, Alaska, the documents said. Sarin is a powerful nerve gas that causes a choking, thrashing death. It killed 12 people in a Tokyo subway attack in 1995 and the Bush administration says it is part of Iraq's chemical arsenal.

_ Devil Hole II, which tested how the nerve agent VX behaved when dispersed with artillery shells. The test at the Gerstle River site in Alaska also included mannequins in military uniforms and military trucks. VX is one of the deadliest nerve agents known and is persistent in the environment because it is a sticky liquid that evaporates slowly. Iraq has acknowledged making tons of VX.

_ Big Tom, a 1965 test that included spraying bacteria over the Hawaiian island of Oahu to simulate a biological attack on an island compound, and to develop tactics for such an attack. The test used Bacillus globigii, a bacterium believed at the time to be harmless. Researchers later discovered the bacteria could cause infections in people with weakened immune systems.

___

On the Net:

Descriptions of some of the tests: http://deploymentlink.osd.mil/current_issues/shad/shad_intro.shtml



Sempers,

Roger

[thedrifter]

U.S. Secretly Tested Bioweapons

By MATT KELLEY
.c The Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) - The Pentagon acknowledged Wednesday that some soldiers
engaged in chemical and biological weapons testing in the 1960s may not have
been fully informed about the secret experiments conducted at sea and in five
states from Alaska to Florida. Some tests used the military's deadliest nerve
agent, VX.

Thousands of civilians in Hawaii and Alaska also probably were unaware they
were sprayed with relatively mild bacteria meant to simulate germ weapons
such as anthrax, the Defense Department's top health official said.

Dr. William Winkenwerder, assistant defense secretary for health affairs,
said there's no evidence anyone died as a result of the classified tests,
which were part of biological and chemical warfare programs the United States
abandoned in 1970.

Four people at the military's Deseret Testing Center in Utah were infected
during biological weapons work, but all recovered, said Dr. Michael
Kilpatrick, another Pentagon health official. Records do not show who the
people were or what germs infected them, Kilpatrick said.

At a news conference, the Pentagon released declassified summaries of 28 of
the tests, showing for the first time the scope of open-air testing of
chemical and biological agents on American soil. About 5,500 service members
participated in the tests.

Tests in Alaska exposed soldiers in protective suits to deadly nerve agents,
including VX, and experiments in Hawaii used a hallucinogen developed as a
chemical weapon, according to Pentagon records.

Winkenwerder said all military personnel in tests of real chemical or
biological weapons used protective gear and were vaccinated. But he
acknowledged that the protective equipment used 40 years ago was not as
effective as the suits used today.

``It's not clear that in every instance, people were fully informed'' of the
risks, Winkenwerder told a news conference.

At a House Veterans Affairs subcommittee hearing, lawmakers criticized the
Pentagon for waiting until last year to begin releasing details of the tests.

``It's pretty deplorable that the DOD held this info up for so long,'' said
Rep. Mike Thompson, D-Calif. ``We need to get out there and get these guys
tested, and make sure they know the seriousness of what they were exposed
to.''

Winkenwerder said the names of the service members participating in the tests
have been turned over to the Department of Veterans Affairs. The VA has
notified about 1,400 of those veterans and hopes to send out a batch of 1,000
more letters soon.

The agency has commissioned a *$3 million study to determine if test
participants are getting sick because of their exposure. So far, 55 veterans
have filed claims with the VA blaming their health problems on their
participation in chemical or biological tests.

One of them is Jack Alderson of Eureka, Calif., who participated in
biological weapons tests in the Pacific as a Navy lieutenant in 1965.
Alderson says he has breathing problems and other ailments that could have
been caused by the chemicals used to decontaminate ships after the tests.

``This is just the start,'' Alderson said after Wednesday's hearing. ``I've
been trying to get it exposed since 1993.''

The civilian exposures came during tests in Alaska and Hawaii that involved
spraying Bacillis globigii, a bacterial relative of anthrax, from airplanes.
At the time, BG was considered to be harmless. Later, researchers discovered
it could cause infections in people with weak immune systems.

One of the tests, called ``Big Tom,'' involved spraying the bacteria over the
Hawaiian island of Oahu in May and June 1965.

Winkenwerder said there's evidence that local authorities were told of the
tests, though public notification probably did not occur.

Two other tests in Hawaii, named ``Pine Ridge'' and ``Tall Timber,'' used a
chemical agent code-named BZ in forest preserves southwest of Hilo. BZ, a
compound of benzilic acid, causes stupor, hallucinations and confusion. It
was meant to incapacitate enemy soldiers, according to Pentagon summaries of
the tests.

The Pine Ridge and Tall Timber tests were meant to determine how to
disseminate BZ ``in or below a jungle canopy,'' the test summaries said.

A series of tests called ``Elk Hunt'' in 1964 and 1965 involved Army soldiers
in protective suits moving through areas contaminated with VX. Most of the
tests were near Fort Greely, Alaska, though some tests were conducted in
Canada and some vehicle decontamination tests were done at what is now the
Aberdeen Proving Ground in Maryland.

VX is a sophisticated nerve agent that lasts longer in the environment than
other such agents. The tests were meant to determine how long VX would remain
deadly and how well decontamination procedures worked.

Sempers,

Roger