Theos-Talk Archives (October 2001 Message tt00510)

New Scientist (UK)

London, October 24, 2001
Anthrax bacteria likely to be US military strain
by Debora MacKenzie

THE bacteria used for the anthrax attacks in the US is either the strain
the US itself used to make anthrax weapons in the 1960s, or close to it.
It is not a strain that Iraq, or the former Soviet Union, mass-produced
for weapons.

There have been charges over the past week that the sophistication of
the anthrax suggests that it was produced with the backing of some
government, such as Iraq. But neither the strain nor the physical form
of the anthrax is particularly sophisticated, say bioweapons
specialists.