Another Type of Abuse,Neglect and Negligence by U.S. Intelligence Community

by Jerry Gordon interview with Dr.Jill Dekker

When news leaked out of the September 6th Israeli Air Force and commando raid on a Syrian Nuclear facility followed by revelations about the deaths of dozens of Iranians and Syrians in a Chemical warfare missile accident in July the world was jarred.Recently, it was revealed that the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (North Korea) had aided Syria in its chemical warfare programs.

I noted in a recent interview with former US UN Ambassador John Bolton his early concerns about the Syrian Bio Warfare threat. Questions arose, specifically about the size, nature and danger of the Syrian bio-warfare military programs.For answers and professional views on how extensive the Syrian bio-warfare threat is, we turned to Dr. Jill Dekker, a consultant to the NATO Defense Establishment in bio-warfare and counter terrorism.

Dr. Dekker is also a member of the board of advisors of the Intelligence Summit.Dr. Dekker’s answers give a foreboding picture of how large and refined the Syrian bio-warfare programs are and how little Western Intelligence knows about how the programs were developed.

For answers and professional views on how extensive the Syrian bio-warfare threat is, we turned to Dr. Jill Dekker, a consultant to the NATO Defense Establishment in bio-warfare and counter terrorism. Dr. Dekker is also a member of the board of advisors of the Intelligence Summit.

Dr. Dekker’s answers give a foreboding picture of how large and refined the Syrian bio-warfare programs are and how little Western Intelligence knows about how the programs were developed. The potential exists for a significant WMD threat in the Middle East and the West, especially, against America.

Syria is a proxy ally of Iran, North Korea (DPRK) and terror groups such as Hezbollah, Islamic Jihad and Hamas. Thus, the supply of bio-weapons and delivery platforms that could results in mass casualties makes it a real and present danger.

We were pleased that Dr. Dekker took time out from her professional work to answer questions about the Syrian bio-warfare establishment and WMD threat.

Jill Dekker: In 2001, when the US suffered its anthrax attacks, everything changed. We went from looking at bio-safety as an aspect of protecting workers and the environment, to bio-security and trying to safe-guard High Consequence Pathogens mainly in P3 and P4 facilities from terrorists.

I now focus on state supported bio-terrorism whereby pathogens don’t need to be stolen or diverted. A state warfare lab, such as exists in Iran and Syria today, could easily provide their terrorist surrogates with the most advanced biological agents for covert operations. This is far more likely and would be far more devastating in terms of kill ratios than some lone terrorist group trying to weaponize pathogens without state support or a warfare laboratory

in Afghanistan, you may recall, the US recovered documents which Al Qaeda had on their bio-programs. I moved from an interest in bio-safety and bio-security to looking at the threat state biological warfare labs pose and the types of criteria we need to assess them. Most biological weapons research is dual use.

Contrary to how the US State Department and other agencies tend to downplay the sophistication of the Syrian biological and nuclear programs, they are very advanced. Syria has always had the most advanced chemical weapons program in the Middle East.

The US and other western agencies have in a sense been distracted by this, but their biological programs and the “concept of use” are robust. Syria’s biological weapons capability today is closely tied to the former and current Soviet and Russian programs respectively, the DPRK, Iran and the former Iraq regime. A major concern is their strategic concept of use - which has gone from one of ‘special weapons’ to incorporation into their ‘conventional arsenal.’ That is a significant shift and one that seems to have eluded the US.

Dekker: The Syrians work on most Category A pathogens: anthrax, plague, tularemia, botulinium, smallpox, aflotoxin, cholera, ricin, camelpox. Some of these they acquired during natural outbreaks, others they acquired from the Soviets, Russians, DPRK, Iran and Iraq.

US intelligence agencies denied the Soviets could possibly have such a massive program - even after the defection of high level scientists- such Vladimir Pasechnik. You have to wonder at what point they are going to sharpen up and see that nations like Syria also have a robust advanced biological weapons program.

Gordon: We heard that some of the late Saddam Hussein’s Bio-warfare research and pathogens may have been transferred to Syria during Operation Enduring Freedom. Is that accurate to your knowledge, and who facilitated the transfer? What types of bio-warfare agents and materials might have been transferred?

Dekker: Yes. It is important to remember that the Iraqi programs were far more advanced at the time than what the Syrians had, and were developing. The delivery of certain pathogens in a ‘weaponized’ form taught the Syrians new techniques they previously had not mastered. This is very problematic.

What Hussein’s transfer taught the Syrians was more sophisticated ways of weaponization and dispersal. I believe Russian special ops- their Spetsnaz teams - transported sections of the programs. Remember these are not MIRVed ICBM’s we are talking about - you don’t need to stockpile biological weapons. It is the quality of the pathogen and ‘weaponization’ or aerosolization, milling processes that count, not the quantity.

If you take something like Bot - I gram of crystalline Botulinium is estimated to kill about a million people if it were evenly dispersed

Gordon: To your knowledge what pathogens and toxins are the Syrian bio-warfare establishment developing and what is their propensity to produce mass casualties?

Dekker: Syria posesses Category A, B, and C pathogens and toxins. To my knowledge the most problematic

A particular issue I have with smallpox research conducted in rogue states is that these programs most likely are not based on vaccine preventable strains. So the US national strategic stockpile of smallpox vaccine, which has cost the US tax payers billions of dollars to stockpile, may be totally non-efficacious against a battle strain developed in Syria, Iran or the DPRK.

It creates a false sense of security to think that out of 128 strains, only four (the most prevalent previously naturally occurring strains) are the ones rogue states would choose to reintroduce smallpox. It is naive to think that states developing weapons of mass destruction are going to select a strain we can prevent. The Soviets ramped up their work on smallpox once they knew the WHO had declared it eradicated and that the United States had ceased vaccination against it.
Dekker: The Syrian biological warfare programs are administratively run under the SSRC in Damascus. They have one of the most highly developed pharmaceutical industries in the Mid East.

Gordon: What means of delivery does Syria have available for its bio weapons?

Dekker: Well they’ve mastered micro-encapsulation which is necessary for aerosol dispersal. They have experimented with parachute dispersal techniques for orthopox based on Soviet methods. They are also developing micro aerosol dispersal technologies which have no military application. This is probably the most alarming as it is designed for terrorist use.

The Syrians are perfecting advanced dispersal technologies that will be for use against civilians but far more sophisticated than the use of a crop duster.

Gordon: How much of a threat is the Syrian Bio-warfare capability to Israel and US forces in the Middle East, e.g. Iraq?

Dekker: Syria poses an immediate and imminent threat to the United States and Israel. it may be possible for Syria to contaminate water distribution systems with a pathogen like Crypto which is impervious to chlorine and will pass through most filtration systems. Such a contamination could infect significant sections of a population.

Even in the United States, there have been natural outbreaks. There is no treatment available, so it could have quite an impact. There are other concerns such as the use of pre-deployed biological agents in the event that Iran is attacked by the United States. Again, here we should pay close attention to how the Soviets planned for Mutual Assured Destruction (MAD). They planned their smallpox program specifically in the event of MAD so that smallpox would wipe out whoever was left. It’s not beyond reason to consider that the Syrians and Iranians have engaged in such contingency planning

Gordon: How much does the US Bio-warfare establishment and intelligence community know about the Syrian Bio-warfare threat?

Dekker: It is similar to the US negligent underestimation and denial that the Soviets had a massive biological weapons program. The US Intelligence Community negligently underestimates and denies the sophistication of the Syrian biological weapons programs which is very unfortunate.

Former US Ambassador to the UN, John Bolton has tried since 2001 to warn the US about the threat the Syrian biological weapons programs poses. His warnings have fallen on deaf ears.

The US public needs to be informed that the intelligence community is falling far short here in protecting them.

Other US allies are not, they are up to speed. Again as an American citizen it is unbelievable to see such negligence in the US intelligence community. Having lived in Europe for 20 years and working as a defense consultant on Category A warfare agents, this is not the standard approach of other NATO nations. There is something deeply disturbing with the US approach. Time will tell as unfortunately it did with 9/11.

Gordon: In your opinion, what has prevented the US from recognizing the significance of the Syrian bio-warfare threat and developing effective counter measures?

Dekker: I believe there is a specific mind-set within the US intelligence community which makes it difficult for them to procure sources in the Middle East and of course the lack of language ability..their approach is not reassuring.

they have not taken appropriate defensive measures in view of the potential consequences of a WMD attack, they have left the US exposed.

The US relies heavily on technology and has done so for a number of years. Biological weapons cannot be assessed by satellites anymore. Perhaps during the old Soviet era but now science has moved beyond this. I believe the US incompetence in this field and its arrogance could eventually lead to a successful strike on the US by a rogue nation-possibly in the very near future.

Another problem for the United States ...is their failure to inform the US public on the real threat they face. The smallpox program is a case in point. The US may not be able to protect its citizens with its ‘treasured’ national strategic stockpile of smallpox vaccine. Who wants to be the one to come out and announce that to the US public?

Who wants to say they have no idea how advanced the Syrian Botulinium or Plague programs are because they don’t have any access? It would be very unpopular if the US public knew they were potentially defenseless and that the people charged with protecting them had dropped the ball again. What is disconcerting is they don’t seem to be able to recognize, acknowledge and correct their prior mistakes, If they don’t start taking Mid-East biological weapons programs more seriously the U.S. is likely to suffer far worse attacks than 9/11. The US intelligence community is inadequately equipped to deal with this threat.

Gordon: Could Bio-weapons developed by the Syrian military establishment be used as WMD producing significant mass casualties in Israel, the EU and here in America?

Dekker: Yes, Syria is very good at conducting covert operations. They have a number of technologies available which they could provide to either Special Forces or terrorists who could release them in airports, other transportation hubs, airplane ventilation systems and that would cause mass casualties.

I certainly believe they have very advanced biological weapons capabilities and we are at a point where there really aren’t any technological obstacles for them to overcome in dispersal or deployment. This is why intelligence is so vital in this area. It is probably the last line of defense, so to neglect it, or deny that one should allocate resources for prevention, is odd. Some biological weapons use pathogens which don’t need to be ‘weaponized’.

Of all the countries Israel is by far the most prepared to handle the release of biological weapons. The nations of Western Europe are unevenly prepared and the United States is probably not prepared. In such an attack, the country would probably suffer major mass casualties. I think the Syrians are much more sophisticated than the US intelligence community realizes. This puts American lives at immediate risk. The American public should demand that the US intelligence community close the gap in their intelligence on the Syrian biological weapons programs. Additionally, they have underestimated the Syrian nuclear programs for several years as well.

Gordon: In your opinion what should America, Israel and NATO do to combat the Syrian Bio-warfare threat and its proliferation to terrorist groups?

The US intelligence community could start by acknowledging that Syria has an advanced, well developed program and take things a bit more seriously.

The US Intelligence Community seems particularly risk averse. It’s almost as if Syria couldn’t possibly have such a program because their scientific community isn’t advanced enough.

Other NATO nations are preparing for deliberate disease outbreaks and acknowledge that Syrian biological weapons programs are a threat.Biological weapons and terrorist use of them require excellence in intelligence not incompetence and denial.

Gordon: Thank you Dr. Dekker for this most informative and I’m sorry to say, frightening discussion of the Syrian bio-warfare threat and why America has not done enough to recognize and combat it.

Dr. Dekker suggests that for more information you consult “Biological Terrorism: The Threat of the 21st Century” by Marie Sultan for the types of technological advancements which might be a concern.

Comments:

Dr. Jill Dekker is a well respected scientist whose veracity is beyond repute. I have worked in the intelligence field within the Military as well as civilian law enforcement and am now retired but still giving my services to B’nai Elim (a very pro-active Jewish - Zionist organization) as their chief of intelligence and security. If Dr. Jill Dekker said that a new “Ice Age” was beginning along with rapid “Global Cooling” in January… I would go out and buy some thermal underwear. In other words, the information that she has garnered regarding the Syrian bio-weapons capabilities is totally accurate.

Doctor Dekker has merely scratched the surface regarding Syrian complicity with Hezbollah, Hamas, Fatah, Al-Queda and other purveyors of terrorism.

We are standing on the brink of another World War and no matter which direction we take, we will be risking freedom as we know it today. Our Government’s egregious actions directed at Dr. Dekker in a lame effort to intimidate her signal only the beginning of the erosion of our individual liberties in the name of National Security.

Bill ManiaciChief, Intelligence and SecurityB’nai Elim / The Maccabee Group
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For whatever good it might do, I emailed the URL for Dr. Dekker’s interview to each member of the Senate Foreign Affairs Committee. The email included the following comment: “US seems stunningly unprepared for biological weapons in the hands of rogue states.” Is there an equivalent in the House? Jerry
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America is in the most vulnerable position as they are totally unprepared and in constant denial. It is time for America to revive DUCK AND COVER DRILLS! by Jamit
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If you have friends and family in the US this interview is most disturbing, reason enough for each one of us to be writing our senators in congress and demand the US intelligence community take inmediate steps to close this gap and face this reality with effective steps to protect the american public, denial , incompentence, negligence, and looking the other way is not an acceptable way to deal with Elder Abuse, neither it is an acceptable way to deal with this potential inmediate threat.

Bank your Body

Freezing your physical assets - from skin to eggs - is a controversial new trend in anti-ageing. So will you invest? CLAIRE COLEMAN investigates more:

Remember a few years ago when your skin was clearer, your body was thinner and you could run up five flights of stairs without breaking into a sweat?

And now imagine how seductive it would be if someone offered you the chance to freeze time, halt the ageing process and always look and feel as great as you did at the age of 21.

Until recently, the possibility of doing anything remotely resembling this would have been considered science fiction.

Now advances in medical technology mean that increasing numbers of us can, to a certain extent, if not stop time, at least freeze our assets at the point at which they are most valuable so that we can return to them when we need, literally, an injection of youth and vigour in the future.

Banking your body is the latest trend in anti-ageing and with the huge advances being made in cell collection, storage and replication, it looks set to grow and grow over the next decade. And the implications, for everything from our skin and our hair, to our fertility, are staggering.

COLLAGEN
As we age, the quantity and quality of collagen in our skin degenerates, resulting in skin that is less toned and prone to wrinkles. Injecting new collagen can counteract these problems and, while collagen can be obtained from various sources - including cows, pigs and even dead bodies - many people prefer the thought of autologous collagen (reinjection of one's own collagen).

in the USA some will separate it from other tissues after one type of operation (liposuction/breast reduction) and store it for use in the patient's face in the future. Dr Thierry Vidal of London's Skin Health Spa thinks that such procedures will be commonplace in the future.

there's no doubt that in the future it could be quite common for young people to store samples of collagen and other tissues that degrade with age, with a view to using them in an anti-ageing process in later life.'

SKIN

Maintaining baby soft skin forever might be a real possibility in the future. A product currently available called ReCell or CellSpray uses a sample of the patient's own skin to create a sprayable skin solution that contains all the skin cells necessary for healthy skin growth and can then be applied to a wound or damaged area of skin.

The company is also able to replicate the skin cells in a lab, should more cells be required. At the moment the technology is predominantly used on burns patients but, according to Matthieu Leclerc-Chalvet of Clinical Cell Culture, the company behind ReCell:

'The cosmetic applications for this treatment can be combined with something like laser resurfacing or dermabrasion to reduce the risks of scarring and improve healing.'

FAT

Although fat has its drawbacks as a filler for wrinkles (it tends to be reabsorbed by the body and so needs regular top ups), fat transfer, where fat is removed from one area of the body and then re-injected into another part, is a relatively commonplace procedure.

One significant advantage is that the body's own fat cells are less likely to cause an allergic reaction or be rejected by the body than a synthetic or foreign substance. In most instances, surgeons will remove and re-inject the fat at the same time.

However it is possible to freeze fat so that a patient can have top-ups of their own cells over a longer period of time, a popular practice in the US.

Danya Hoenig, a medical assistant who works with her husband, Los Angeles plastic surgeon Jonathan Hoenig explains, 'We have a clinical-grade freezer here which stores fat at minus 30 degrees Fahrenheit.

We will keep fat samples for around a year, defrosting small amounts at a time so it can be used for cheek augmentation and similar facial procedures.'

VEINS

The idea of taking out parts of your body that you don't want and then recycling them in ways that you do has a certain satisfying symmetry about it. And fat is not the only substance to be used in this way.

It has been reported that some cosmetic surgeons in the US are storing varicose vein tissue, that has been removed from a patient's legs, and subsequently using the collagen it contains to inject it into their face as a filler.

HAIR

Help may be at hand for those concerned about hairloss, or hair that thins with age. While hair transplants are relatively common procedures at the moment, where hair follicles are removed from one part of the scalp and reimplanted in another area, new technologies which allow scientists to replicate hair follicles in the lab could mean that, in theory, young healthy hair follicles could be removed from a small, inconspicuous area at the nape of the neck, multiplied in the laboratory and then stored to be reimplanted at strategic locations, either to thicken existing hair or where baldness has set in.

'While it's not happening at the moment, storing hair follicles in case you suffer from hair loss in later life could certainly be a possibility in the future," says Consultant Plastic Surgeon Jim Frame, of the Capio Springfield Hospital in Chelmsford, Essex.

He also believes this sort of hair grafting could also come in handy when performing facelifts. 'In a lot of cases, when a facelift is performed, the hairline moves and this can look unnatural,' explains Mr Frame. 'Reimplanting hair follicles to recreate a more natural hairline could be a solution to this.'

EGGS

In a society where we're increasingly having children later in life, be it due to careers or simply not finding the right man, the prospect of putting healthy, young eggs on ice is very attractive.

But while sperm banking is nothing new, egg freezing is much more complicated, less effective and, therefore, less common. However, new technologies are currently being worked on that could change all that within 12 months.

Dr Fishel estimates that while the majority of egg freezing cases Care Fertility sees are women who wish to freeze eggs for medical reasons (such as before having cancer treatment), around one in three cases are for lifestyle reasons.

And he believes that as the new techniques are introduced this trend will become more commonplace.

'If I had a daughter in her mid-20s who was on a career path and not considering conception until her mid to late 30s, I would certainly suggest that she went through a couple of cycles of egg stimulation with a view to freezing around 30 healthy eggs.'

Dr Fishel says he would not be surprised if egg freezing became routine.

'When you think about the cost of endless cycles of IVF for older women, plus the elevated risks of Down's Syndrome when using older eggs, in a society where women are increasingly having children later, freezing eggs is, frankly, a sensible thing to do.'

BODY PARTS

One of the other alternatives to egg freezing is a technique called ovarian cryopreservation where, pre-treatment cancer patients have slivers of their ovaries removed and frozen, and then subsequently reimplanted after treatment and, once transplanted, begin to release eggs and work in the same way as undamaged ovaries.

This is a procedure that Kylie Minogue underwent prior to her cancer treatment. But a company called Alcor in the US lets you go one step further and freeze your entire body. Believers in cryogenics are convinced that, one day in the future, the technology will be available to bring them back to life once more.

To be accurate, the process Alcor uses is not freezing, but vitrification, where more than 60 per cent of the water in the body's cells is replaced with protective chemicals which means that rather than actually freezing and forming ice crystals which can destroy body tissues, it is just deep cooled and then suspended in a tank of liquid nitrogen.

STEM CELLS

Stem cell banking hit the news recently as Richard Branson announced the latest Virgin venture, Virgin Health Bank, a company that offers new parents the opportunity to preserve cells from the blood of their newborn child's umbilical cord. Stem cells are the cells from which all other cells form - everything from the teeth and skin to bone and the heart.

Although the research is still in its infancy, many in the industry believe that stem cells are the future of medicine. 'Stem cells literally have the ability to turn back time,' says medical scientist, Dr Cuross Bakhtiar of London's Harley Street Cosmetic.

'They have the potential to regenerate blood cells damaged by heart attacks and even improve sight damaged by retinal degradation.'

Dr Donald Gibb, an obstetrician in private practise in London's Harley Street, has seen the number of parents looking to bank stem cells increase over the past few years.

'For several years now I've made my patients aware of the possibility of banking stem cells when their child is born and I would say roughly 20 per cent of them do so.' He believes this number could well increase further.

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