Project Clear Vision
Project Clear Vision was a covert examination of Soviet-made biological bomblets conducted by the Battelle Memorial Institute under contract with the CIA. The legality of this project under the Biological Weapons Convention (BWC) of 1972 is disputed.{{where?|date=February 2013}}
History
=The operation=
Project Clear Vision was conducted between 1997 and 2000, during the Clinton Administration.Miller, Judith, Engelberg, Stephen and Broad, William J. "[https://www.nytimes.com/2001/09/04/world/us-germ-warfare-research-pushes-treaty-limits.html U.S. Germ Warfare Research Pushes Treaty Limits]", The New York Times, September 4, 2001. Retrieved January 6, 2009. The project's stated goal was to assess the efficacy of bio-agent dissemination from bomblets. The program received criticism due to suspicions that its findings could possibly be used in a covert US bioweapons program.{{citation needed|date=February 2013}}
=Reportage=
The secret project was disclosed in a September 2001 article in The New York Times. Reporters Judith Miller, Stephen Engelberg and William J. Broad collaborated to write the article. Shortly after the article appeared, the authors published a book that further elaborated the story. The 2001 book, Germs: Biological Weapons and America's Secret War, and the article are the only publicly available sources{{citation needed|date=February 2013}} concerning Project Clear Vision and its sister projects, Bacchus and Jefferson.Enemark, Christian. Disease and Security: Natural Plagues and Biological Weapons in East Asia, ([https://books.google.com/books?id=bT9j6lhPHHUC&dq=%22Project+Clear+Vision%22&pg=PA174 Google Books]), Routledge, 2007, pp. 173-75, ({{ISBN|0415422345}}).
Legality
As signatory to the BWC, the United States is committed to refrain from development of bioweapons. Moreover,
the US did not disclose the secret project in its annual confidence-building measure (CBM) declarations.Tucker, Jonathan B. "[http://www.armscontrol.org/act/2004_10/Tucker.asp Biological Threat Assessment: Is the Cure Worse Than the Disease?] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080517115818/http://www.armscontrol.org/act/2004_10/Tucker.asp |date=2008-05-17 }}", Arms Control Today, October 2004. Retrieved January 6, 2009. The US maintains that the program was fully consistent with the BWC because the project was defensive in nature.
References
{{reflist}}
Further reading
- Miller, Judith, Engelberg, Stephen and Broad, William J. Germs: Biological Weapons and America's Secret War, ([https://books.google.com/books?id=RBb8ss3GG1MC&dq=nixon+biological+weapons+ban&pg=PA63 Google Books]), Simon and Schuster, 2002, ({{ISBN|0684871599}}).
{{U.S. biological defense}}
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