BioweaponsBioweapons Research Is Banned By an International Treaty – but Nobody Is Checking for Violations
Scientists are making dramatic progress with techniques for “gene splicing” – modifying the genetic makeup of organisms. This work includes bioengineering pathogens for medical research, techniques that also can be used to create deadly biological weapons.
Scientists are making dramatic progress with techniques for “gene splicing” – modifying the genetic makeup of organisms.
This work includes bioengineering pathogens for medical research, techniques that also can be used to create deadly biological weapons. It’s an overlap that’s helped fuel speculation that the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus was bioengineered at China’s Wuhan Institute of Virology and that it subsequently “escaped” through a lab accident to produce the COVID-19 pandemic.
The world already has a legal foundation to prevent gene splicing for warfare: the 1972 Biological Weapons Convention. Unfortunately, nations have been unable to agree on how to strengthen the treaty. Some countries have also pursued bioweapons research and stockpiling in violation of it.
As a member of President Bill Clinton’s National Security Council from 1996 to 2001, I had a firsthand view of the failure to strengthen the convention. From 2009 to 2013, as President Barack Obama’s White House coordinator for weapons of mass destruction, I led a team that grappled with the challenges of regulating potentially dangerous biological research in the absence of strong international rules and regulations.
The history of the Biological Weapons Convention reveals the limits of international attempts to control research and development of biological agents.
1960s-1970s: International Negotiations to Outlaw Biowarfare
The United Kingdom first proposed a global biological weapons ban in 1968.
Reasoning that bioweapons had no useful military or strategic purpose given the awesome power of nuclear weapons, the U.K. had ended its offensive bioweapons program in 1956. But the risk remained that other countries might consider developing bioweapons as a poor man’s atomic bomb.
In the original British proposal, countries would have to identify facilities and activities with potential bioweapons applications. They would also need to accept on-site inspections by an international agency to verify these facilities were being used for peaceful purposes.
These negotiations gained steam in 1969 when the Nixon administration ended America’s offensive biological weapons program and supported the British proposal. In 1971, the Soviet Union announced its support – but only with the verification provisions stripped out. Since it was essential to get the USSR on board, the U.S. and U.K. agreed to drop those requirements.
In 1972 the treaty was finalized. After gaining the required signatures, it took effect in 1975.
