Just thought I would post this for fun, If anyone wants to know a little more about this weapon you can go HERE

The dystopian British sci-fi film 28 Days Later opens with animal rights activists breaking into the Cambridge Primate Research facility to free chimpanzees used in a secret weapons program.
Terrified by the intrusion, a scientist warns the raiders that the chimps are infected with a genetically-modified pathogen. Ignoring his admonition, the chimps are let loose from their cages and immediately attack everyone in sight, unleashing a plague of unimaginable proportions.
Despite the film’s fanciful scenario (with animal rights’ campaigners clearly focused in the cross-hairs) this grim, cautionary tale does contain a kernel of truth. While marauding gangs of flesh-eating zombies haven’t invaded our cities, a subtler threat looms on the horizon.
The sixth anniversary of the murder of British biological weapons expert Dr. David Kelly on July 17, 2003, lifted the lid on more than government lies that smoothed the way for the illegal invasion and occupation of Iraq; it exposed the shadowy world of germ warfare research in Britain and the United States.

Along with the 2001 anthrax attacks in America that murdered five people and exposed some 10,000 others to a weaponized form of the bacteria, Kelly’s death under highly questionable circumstances focused attention on the West’s bioweapons establishment. For a fleeting instant, all eyes were trained on an international network of medical researchers, corporate grifters and Pentagon weaponeers busy as proverbial bees experimenting with deadly microorganisms.

And then as they say, things went dark; as more bodies piled up, cases were “closed” and the money kept on flowing…

An Expansive Bioweapons-Industrial Complex

The production of biological weapons were ostensibly banned when the United States signed the Biological Weapons Convention (BWC) in 1975. However, the absence of any formal verification regime limited, some would argue purposely so, the effectiveness of the treaty from the get-go.

Indeed, a giant loop hole in the BWC allows for the production of “small quantities” of pestilential agents “for medical and defensive purposes.” Note however, it is is not the production of said agents that are prohibited as such but rather, their transformation into “weapons, equipment or means of delivery … for hostile purposes or in armed conflict.”

And with the September 11 and anthrax attacks as a pretext, the United States embarked on a systematic and reckless program to expand research into the creation of prohibited weapons systems. Along with renewed interest in these dodgy projects, now euphemistically dubbed “biodefense” to avoid breaching the BWC, came a huge increase in funding as new facilities are built and older ones “upgraded.” A May 2009 report by the Congressional Research Service (CRS) estimates that overall government spending has “increased from $690 million in FY2001 to $5.4 billion in FY2008.”

According to the Washington D.C.-based Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation since the 2001 terrorist attacks “the U.S. government has spent or allocated nearly $50 billion among 11 federal departments and agencies to address the threat of biological weapons. For Fiscal Year 2009 (FY2009), the Bush Administration proposes an additional $8.97 billion in bioweapons-related spending, approximately $2.5 billion (39%) more than the amount that Congress appropriated for FY2008.” … Continue Reading

THE Pentagon’s enthusiasm for non-lethal crowd-control weapons appears to have stepped up a gear with its decision to develop a microwave pain-infliction system that can be fired from an aircraft.

The device is an extension of its controversial Active Denial System, which uses microwaves to heat the surface of the skin, creating a painful sensation without burning that strongly motivates the target to flee. The ADS was unveiled in 2001, but it has not been deployed owing to legal issues and safety fears.

Nevertheless, the Pentagon’s Joint Non-Lethal Weapons Directorate (JNLWD) in Quantico, Virginia, has now called for it to be upgraded. The US air force, whose radar technology the ADS is based on, is increasing its annual funding of the system from $2 million to $10 million.

The transmitting antenna on the current system is 2 metres across, produces a single beam of similar width and is steered mechanically, making it cumbersome. At the heart of the new weapon will be a compact airborne antenna, which will be steered electronically and be capable of generating multiple beams, each of which can be aimed while on the move.

The ADS has been dogged by controversy. Jürgen Altmann, a physicist at Dortmund University in Germany, showed that the microwave beams can cause serious burns at levels not far above those required to repel people. This was verified when a US airman was hospitalised with second-degree burns during testing in April 2007.

The airborne version will not make it any less contentious. “Independent of the mode of production, with this size of antenna the beam will show variations of intensity with distance – not just a simple decrease – up to about 500 metres,” says Altmann. Shooting it on the move with any accuracy will be difficult, he adds.

Dave Law, head of the technology division of the JNLWD, says the new antenna will operate at the lowest possible effective power level and will have a sophisticated automated target-tracking system.

In a recent cost-benefit analysis, the US Government Accountability Office rated the ADS worst out of eight non-lethal weapons currently in development.

The United States military is prepared for the possibility that North Korea may attempt to launch a missile toward Hawaii, President Barack Obama said in remarks released on Sunday.

“This administration — and our military — is fully prepared for any contingencies,” Obama said in an interview with CBS television when asked about reported North Korean intentions to fire a missile toward Hawaii on or about July 4.

Pressed on whether his comments were a warning of a military response, Obama said no.

“It’s just we are prepared for any contingencies,” he said. “I don’t want to speculate on hypotheticals. But I do want to give assurances to the American people that the T’s are crossed and the I’s are dotted in terms of what might happen.”

North Korea conducted a nuclear test on May 25 and may be looking to launch a long-range missile toward Hawaii after the United Nations punished Pyongyang by toughening sanctions.

Obama said the international community was united in its approach to North Korea.

“One of the things that we have been very clear about is that North Korea has a path toward rejoining the international community,” he said.

“We hope they take that path. What we’re not going to do is to reward belligerence and provocation in the way that’s been done in the past.”

Israel is seriously considering taking unilateral military action to stop Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons, according to a report by top US political figures and experts released Wednesday.

The report also says Israel’s time frame for action is growing shorter, not only because of Iranian advances, but because Teheran might soon acquire upgraded air defenses and disperse its nuclear program to additional locations.

The report, “Preventing a Cascade of Instability,” was put out by the Washington Institute for Near East Policy (WINEP). It also argues that international sanctions against Iran need to be intensified urgently for the engagement the Obama administration is planning with Teheran to be effective.

An early draft of the report was endorsed by Dennis Ross before he withdrew upon joining the Obama administration, in which he is serving as a special representative dealing with various countries in the region, including Iran. Senator Evan Bayh of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, and Congressman Gary Ackerman, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs subcommittee on the Middle East, were among the signatories.

Extend cooperation between allies in missile defense
The bipartisan group also recommended increasing security guarantees and the supply of missile defenses and other protective measures to allies in the Middle East, both to reassure them of America’s commitment to them and to dampen the perceived effectiveness, and hence appeal, of nuclear weapons for Iran.

But the report, several of whose authors met with high-level Israeli officials to assess their perspective, notes that Israel is not interested in becoming part of an American nuclear umbrella, even as Gulf countries want more assurances on that front.

“A declared US guarantee would clarify a situation of ambiguity that may already work to Israel’s advantage,” the report notes. Also, “many Israelis fear that a declared US guarantee could come at the price of circumscribing Israel’s freedom of action in confronting existential dangers.”

Israel is quite serious concerning acting on its own over a nuclear-armed Iran,” former US ambassador to the United Nations Nancy Soderberg, one of the task force members who traveled to the region to research the report, said at a WINEP event held Wednesday on the report’s release.

She noted that the timetable for an Israeli attack might be “significantly” moved up if Jerusalem believed Russia was going to make good on its pledge to supply Iran with the S-300 surface-to-air missile system, which would greatly complicate any Israeli attack.

However, According to this article from 2008, Israel probably already has an electronic countermeasure to the s-300.

If the delivery does occur, the report recommends more arms sales to Israel, such as more modern aircraft, so it can maintain its military edge.

Later, she said that the aim of the report was to come up with strategies where neither the United States nor Israel was at the point of launching military action.

“You’ve kind of lost the ballgame at that point,” she said.

To that end, the 10-page document urges more international sanctions and expanding financial pressure taken by the US Treasury, by creating similar programs at the US Commerce and State Departments.

The study stresses the importance of having a united global front and pushes for intensified diplomacy with Russia to both make sanctions more effective and to persuade the Russians not to deliver the S-300 system.

“Iran does not want to be isolated on the international stage: It is not North Korea. The broader the international consensus, the better. The repeated shows of unanimity by the UN Security Council seem to have impressed Iran more than the limited economic or security impact of the sanctions imposed thus far,” the report states, in making the case for more sanctions.

At the same time, it contends that aggressive engagement is needed because “another important goal is to show the Middle East and the world that the United States will go the extra mile to resolve the Iranian nuclear issue. Some circles in countries friendly to the United States now wonder – without reason – if Washington is as much an obstacle to resolving the nuclear impasse as is Teheran.”

Even if engagement, sanctions and other measures prove ineffective, the report warns against sanctioning a “fallback” policy where Iran is allowed to have some, even if limited, capacity to enrich uranium in its territory.

“Iran’s having a latent capability to quickly make nuclear weapons could lead to much the same risk of cascading instability as an Iran with an actual weapon,” it reads, pointing to the risk for nuclear proliferation, Iranian regional hegemony and more.

The report makes no mention of the presidential elections in Iran this June, which could see the more moderate Muhammad Khatami replace fiery current President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

Some analysts have suggested that the Obama administration wait to either engage or press for further sanctions until after the campaign, so as not to increase the likelihood of Admadinejad winning.

But the task force calls for immediate action, arguing that the president is less important than Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatolla Ali Khamenei, in making decisions and that the top priority should be creating leverage heading into negotiations.

An Iranian professor in the audience at Wednesday’s WINEP conference, however, said that increasing pressure would increase extremism and Iranian hard-line leaders’ sticking to the nuclear program.

WINEP executive director Robert Satloff, who presided over the conference, responded that the report’s recommendations also included many incentives for Iran should it cooperate with the United States.

He also said Iran was already beginning to reap some of the rewards of influence just by having been successful in advancing its nuclear program, and that this report was intended to stanch that progress.

“Even without testing a nuclear weapon or declaring the ability to do so, Iran’s progress toward nuclear weapons capability is already having a substantial impact on the Middle East,” it says. “Time is short if diplomatic engagement is to have a chance of success.”