During
World War II, scientists from the United Kingdom, United States and Japan (
Unit 731 of the imperial Japanese army) were involved in research into producing a biological weapon from smallpox.
[97] Plans of large scale production were never carried through as they considered that the weapon would not be very effective due to the wide-scale availability of a
vaccine.
[98]
In 1947 the
Soviet Union established a smallpox weapons factory in the city of
Zagorsk, 75 km to the northeast of Moscow.
[99] An
outbreak of weaponized smallpox occurred during testing at a facility on an island in the
Aral Sea in 1971. General Prof. Peter Burgasov, former Chief Sanitary Physician of the
Soviet Army and a senior researcher within the
Soviet program of biological weapons, described the incident:
On
Vozrozhdeniya Island in the
Aral Sea, the strongest recipes of smallpox were tested. Suddenly I was informed that there were mysterious cases of mortalities in
Aralsk. A research ship of the Aral fleet came to within 15 km of the island (it was forbidden to come any closer than 40 km). The lab technician of this ship took samples of plankton twice a day from the top deck. The smallpox formulation—400 gr. of which was exploded on the island—"got her" and she became infected. After returning home to Aralsk, she infected several people including children. All of them died. I suspected the reason for this and called the Chief of General Staff of Ministry of Defense and requested to forbid the stop of the
Alma-Ata—Moscow train in Aralsk. As a result, the epidemic around the country was prevented. I called
Andropov, who at that time was Chief of KGB, and informed him of the exclusive recipe of smallpox obtained on Vozrazhdenie Island.
[100][101]
Others contend that the first patient may have contracted the disease while visiting Uyaly or
Komsomolsk-on-Ustyurt, two cities where the boat docked.
[102][103]
Any sane species would not have such people.
