This book explores how potential bio-threats and risks may evolve post 9/11 given the rapid changes in biotechnology and synthetic biology. It also explores what role intelligence communities can play in understanding threats and risks. It argues that although bio-threats and risks are largely low probability and high impact in nature, intelligence in ‘Five Eyes’ countries remain insufficiently prepared to understand them. This book identifies key areas where intelligence reforms need to take place including a more strategic and systematic collaboration between national security/law enforcement intelligence and the scientific community. It is aimed at intelligence analysts, those in the scientific community working on health security threats, policy makers and researchers working on biosecurity and bioterrorism threats and risks.

Biosecurity and Bioterrorism, Second Edition, takes a holistic approach to biosecurity, with coverage of pathogens, prevention, and response methodology. It addresses these hazards in the context of vulnerability assessments and the planning strategies government and industry can use to prepare for and respond to such events. The book is organized into four thematic sections: Part I provides a conceptual understanding of biowarfare, bioterrorism and the laws we have to counteract this; Part II investigates known bioagents and the threat from emerging diseases; Part III focuses on agricultural terrorism and food security; and Part IV outlines international, US, and local initiatives for biodefense and biosecurity. Case studies illustrate biodefense against both intentional terrorism and natural outbreaks. - Covers emerging threats of pandemic influenza, antibiotic resistant strains of bacterial pathogens, and severe respiratory diseases caused by novel viruses - Offers increased international coverage, including initiatives to counter biological weapons and threats, and food security - Updated throughout with latest protocols for dealing with biological threats and new case studies - Includes online instructor ancillaries - PowerPoint lecture slides, test questions, and an instructor manual, for increased classroom functionality

Biomedical advances have made it possible to identify and manipulate features of living organisms in useful ways-leading to improvements in public health, agriculture, and other areas. The globalization of scientific and technical expertise also means that many scientists and other individuals around the world are generating breakthroughs in the life sciences and related technologies. The risks posed by bioterrorism and the proliferation of biological weapons capabilities have increased concern about how the rapid advances in genetic engineering and biotechnology could enable the production of biological weapons with unique and unpredictable characteristics. Globalization, Biosecurity, and the Future of Life Sciences examines current trends and future objectives of research in public health, life sciences, and biomedical science that contain applications relevant to developments in biological weapons 5 to 10 years into the future and ways to anticipate, identify, and mitigate these dangers.

Based on a series of regional meetings on university campuses with officials from the national security community and academic research institutions, this report identifies specific actions that should be taken to maintain a thriving scientific research environment in an era of heightened security concerns. Actions include maintaining the open exchange of scientific information, fostering a productive environment for international scholars in the U.S., reexamining federal definitions of sensitive but unclassified research, and reviewing policies on deemed export controls. The federal government should establish a standing entity, preferably a Science and Security Commission, that would review policies regarding the exchange of information and the participation of foreign-born scientists and students in research.

Winter 2001

Life today is rife with rapid-fire "high alert" responses, a proliferating trend that is especially pronounced in the United States (though most certainly felt elsewhere as well), where past catastrophes shape expanding perceptions of imminent danger. September 11, 2001 looms as an inescapable spectral presence, defining an important baseline for the ramping up of biosecurity measures. However, the contributors to this volume argue against biosecurity as the new status quo by focusing instead on the ugly underbelly. Through considering the vulnerability of individuals and groups and particularly looking at how vulnerability propagates in the shadow of biosecurity, BioInsecurity and Vulnerability challenges the acceptance of surveillance measures or security interventions as necessities of life in the new millennium.

The working paper is divided into two main parts. The first part is a descriptive analysis of the illicit use of biological agents by criminals and terrorists. It draws on a series of case studies documented in the second part. The case studies describe every instance identifiable in open source materials in which a perpetrator used, acquired, or threatened to use a biological agent. While the inventory of cases is clearly incomplete, it provides an empirical basis for addressing a number of important questions relating to both biocrimes and bioterrorism. This material should enable policymakers concerned with bioterrorism to make more informed decisions. In the course of this project, the author has researched over 270 alleged cases involving biological agents. This includes all incidents found in open sources that allegedly occurred during the 20th Century. While the list is certainly not complete, it provides the most comprehensive existing unclassified coverage of instances of illicit use of biological agents.

"Biological weapons are widely feared, yet rarely used. Biological weapons were the first weapon prohibited by an international treaty, yet the proliferation of these weapons increased after they were banned in 1972. Biological weapons are frequently called 'the poor man's atomic bomb,' yet they cannot provide the same deterrent capability as nuclear weapons. One of my goals in this book is to explain the underlying principles of these apparent paradoxes."—from Living Weapons Biological weapons are the least well understood of the so-called weapons of mass destruction. Unlike nuclear and chemical weapons, biological weapons are composed of, or derived from, living organisms. In Living Weapons, Gregory D. Koblentz provides a comprehensive analysis of the unique challenges that biological weapons pose for international security. At a time when the United States enjoys overwhelming conventional military superiority, biological weapons have emerged as an attractive means for less powerful states and terrorist groups to wage asymmetric warfare. Koblentz also warns that advances in the life sciences have the potential to heighten the lethality and variety of biological weapons. The considerable overlap between the equipment, materials and knowledge required to develop biological weapons, conduct civilian biomedical research, and develop biological defenses creates a multiuse dilemma that limits the effectiveness of verification, hinders civilian oversight, and complicates threat assessments. Living Weapons draws on the American, Soviet, Russian, South African, and Iraqi biological weapons programs to enhance our understanding of the special challenges posed by these weapons for arms control, deterrence, civilian-military relations, and intelligence. Koblentz also examines the aspirations of terrorist groups to develop these weapons and the obstacles they have faced. Biological weapons, Koblentz argues, will continue to threaten international security until defenses against such weapons are improved, governments can reliably detect biological weapon activities, the proliferation of materials and expertise is limited, and international norms against the possession and use of biological weapons are strengthened.

This book tracks post 9/11 developments in national security and policing intelligence and their relevance to new emerging areas of intelligence practice such as: corrections, biosecurity, private industry and regulatory environments. Developments are explored thematically across three broad sections: applying intelligence understanding structures developing a discipline. Issues explored include: understanding intelligence models; the strategic management challenges of intelligence; intelligence capacity building; and the ethical dimensions of intelligence practice. Using case studies collected from wide-ranging interviews with leaders, managers and intelligence practitioners from a range of practice areas in Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the UK and US, the book indentifies examples of good practice across countries and agencies that may be relevant to other settings. Uniquely bringing together significant theoretical and practical developments in a sample of traditional and emerging areas of intelligence, this book provides readers with a more holistic and inter-disciplinary perspective on the evolving intelligence field across several different practice contexts. Intelligence and Intelligence Analysis will be relevant to a broad audience including intelligence practitioners and managers working across all fields of intelligence (national security, policing, private industry and emerging areas) as well as students taking courses in policing and intelligence analysis.

In this volume, a distinguished international group of contributors present the latest molecular, organismal, and epidemiological research on arenaviruses. Their work will broaden both the clinician's and the researcher's knowledge of basic mechanisms of immunological tolerance, viral immunosuppression, the nature of protective immune responses to vaccination, and viral effects on cell functions.