The program begins with an excerpt that comes from the consummately important Whitney Webb article he has used on many occasions.
The Project For A New American Century’s Rebuilding America’s Defenses argues that biological warfare–particularly when twined with genetic engineering–can become a “politically useful tool.”
Indeed, as we have said so many times, if one is going to detach the second-largest economy from the world and alienate that country from others, the Covid-19 pandemic is, indeed, “a politically useful tool” for so doing.
(In FTR#1190, we examined the PNAC agenda, its codification in national security policy in a document largely crafted by Philip Zelikow. Zelikow headed the 9/11 Commission and was centrally involved in writing its flawed report, the systematic shortcomings of which could be said to characterize the commission as “The Omission Commission.)
Zelikow is now heading a commission to examine the Covid-19 pandemic, including the so-called “Lab-Leak Hypothesis.”
The program references this excerpt, designating Covid-19 as a “politically useful tool.”
As seen below, there are indications that the DARPA program was, indeed, looking at the exploitation of genetics in the application of biological warfare.
Next, we highlight an excerpt from an article that is featured in FTR#‘s 686 and 1115. ” . . . . The production of vaccine against a stockpiled BW weapon must be considered an offensive BW project According to MIT scientists Harlee Strauss and Jonathan King, ‘These steps—the generation of a potential BW agent, development of a vaccine against it, testing of the efficacy of the vaccine—are all components that would be associated with an offensive BW program.’27 Clearly, without an antidote or vaccine to protect attacking troops, the utility of a stockpiled BW agent would be seriously limited. . . .”
We then review material from FTR#1166, among other programs, looking at the development of Moderna’s vaccine, the drug remdesivir and military domination of the Operation Warp Speed Covid vaccine program.
They key consideration is: do these developments indicate the dynamic Strauss and King cite above?
At a minimum, they are no more than the proverbial six degrees of separation from being part of an offensive biological warfare program.
In previous posts and programs, we have noted that Moderna’s vaccine work has been financed by DARPA. We have also noted that the overall head of Operation Warp Speed is Moncef Slaoui, formerly in charge of product development for Moderna!
Of great significance is the central role of the military in the development of treatment for Covid-19:
1.–The program notes that: ” . . . . Remdesivir predates this pandemic. It was first considered as a potential treatment for Ebola, and was developed through a longstanding partnership between the U.S. Army and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. . . .”
2.–Jonathan King, who has chaired the microbial physiology study section for the NIH has sounded the alarm about “vaccine research” masking offensive biological warfare research: “. . . . King, who has chaired the microbial physiology study section for the NIH, believes that without intensive independent scrutiny, the Pentagon is free to obscure its true goals. ‘The Defense Department appears to be pursuing many narrow, applied goals that are by nature offensive, such as the genetic ‘improvement’ of BW agents,’ King says. ‘But to achieve political acceptability, they mask these intentions under forms of research, such as vaccine development, which sound defensive. . . .”
3.–Moderna’s vaccine development was overseen by an unnamed Pentagon official: ” . . . . Moderna’s team was headed by a Defense Department official whom company executives described only as ‘the major,’ saying they don’t know if his name is supposed to be a secret. . . . .”
4.–The pervasive role of the military in Operation Warp Speed (the Trump administration’s vaccine development program) has generated alarm in civilian participants:”. . . . Scores of Defense Department employees are laced through the government offices involved in the effort, making up a large portion of the federal personnel devoted to the effort. Those numbers have led some current and former officials at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to privately grumble that the military’s role in Operation Warp Speed was too large for a task that is, at its core, a public health campaign. . . .”
5.–General Gustave Perna–one of the principals in Operation Warp Speed–has chosen a retired Lieutenant General to oversee much of the program: ” . . . . ‘Frankly, it has been breathtaking to watch,’ said Paul Ostrowski, the director of supply, production and distribution for Operation Warp Speed. He is a retired Army lieutenant general who was selected to manage logistics for the program by Gen. Gustave F. Perna, the chief operating officer for Operation Warp Speed. . . .”
6.–The military will be able to trace the destination and administration of each dose: ” . . . . Military officials also came up with the clever idea — if it works — to coordinate the delivery of vaccines to drugstores, medical centers and other immunization sites by sending kits full of needles, syringes and alcohol wipes. Vaccine makers will be alerted when the kits arrive at an immunization site so they know to ship doses. Once the first dose is given, the manufacturer will be notified so it can send the second dose with a patient’s name attached several weeks later. The military will also monitor vaccine distribution through an operations center. ‘They will know where every vaccine dose is,’ Mr. [Paul] Mango said on a call with reporters. . . .”
Central to the inquiry about a laboratory genesis for the virus is Ralph Baric. In the context of some of his actions in conjunction with the development of vaccines and prophylactic measures in connection with biological warfare, we note that:
1.–Baric’s modification of a horseshoe bat virus to make it more infectious (in collaboration with Shi Zhengli and in an EcoHealth Alliance affiliated project) took place in North Carolina, not Wuhan. “. . . . Critics have jumped on this paper as evidence that Shi was conducting “gain of function” experiments that could have created a superbug, but Shi denies it. The research cited in the paper was conducted in North Carolina. . . .”
2.–Baric has been using related techniques to text remdesivir (in 2017) and the Moderna vaccine. This places him in a milieu inextricably linked to the military and pre-dating the pandemic. ” . . . . Using a similar technique, in 2017, Baric’s lab showed that remdesivir — currently the only licensed drug for treating covid — could be useful in fighting coronavirus infections. Baric also helped test the Moderna covid vaccine and a leading new drug candidate against covid. . . .”
The flimsy evidentiary foundation of the Trump/Biden “Oswald Institute of Virology” did it charge is evidenced by a new allegation coming from David Asher, senior fellow at the right-wing Hudson Institute and the former State Department adviser who co-authored a fact sheet last January on activity inside the lab as described in Katherine Eban’s “Vanity Fair” piece.
Note that:
1.–Asher reportedly told NBC News that he is “confident” that the Chinese military was funding a “secret program” that involved Shi Zhengli’s coronavirus research at the WIV.
2.–Shi reportedly worked with two military scientists at the lab. (Not surprising given that the vast bulk of BW research is inherently “dual-use.”
3.–Asher claims he was told this by several foreign researchers who worked at the WIV who saw some personnel there in military garb.
4.–IF true, the [alleged] members of this secret Chinese military biowarfare research team apparently didn’t think it was important to not wear military clothing during their secret research at a research facility intended for civilian use only.
5.–We aren’t told the identity of these foreign researchers who allegedly saw this.
6.–We aren’t told if Asher meant “foreign researchers”–non-Chinese researchers working at the WIV (so foreign to China) or Chinese researchers working at the WIV (so foreign to Asher).
7.–Shi’s research could be characterized as funded by the US military through the EcoHealth Alliance collaboration.
8.–Keep in mind that this remarkable claim is based on anonymous sources that may not exist but are are claimed by Asher to exist.
Asher’s anonymously-sourced allegations contrast with information from a Bloomberg News article about Danielle Anderson, a bat-borne virus expert who worked at the WIV as late as November 2019
Note that:
1.–Anderson would have been at WIV during the period when an outbreak from the WIV would presumably have taken place under a lab-leak scenario.
2.–Anderson is described as the only foreign researcher working at the WIV.
3.–If Anderson was the lone foreign researcher at the WIV, who are Asher’s “several anonymous foreign WIV researchers?”
A chilling article may forecast the potential deployment of even deadlier pandemics, as operational disguise for biological warfare and genocide.
Note that the sub-heading referring to the lab-leak hypothesis is followed by no mention of the lab-leak hypothesis, per se.
Is this a between-the-lines reference to impending biological warfare development and the deployment of another pandemic?
Note that the Army scientist quoted in the conclusion offers an observation that is very close to a Donald Rumsfeld quote reiterated by Peter Daszak in an article we reference in FTR#1170.
1.–From the Defense One article: ” . . . . ‘We don’t want to just treat what’s in front of us now,’ [Dr. Dimitra] Stratis-Cullum said. ‘I think we really need to be resilient. From an Army perspective. We need to be agile, we need to adapt to the threat that we don’t know that’s coming.’ . . .”
2.–From the article from Independent Science News: ” . . . . ‘There are known knowns; there are things we know that we know. There are known unknowns; that is to say, there are things that we know we don’t know. But there are also unknown unknowns — there are things we don’t know we don’t know.’ (This Rumsfeld quote is in fact from a news conference) . . . . In the subsequent online discussion, Daszak emphasized the parallels between his own crusade and Rumsfeld’s, since, according to Daszak, the ‘potential for unknown attacks’ is ‘the same for viruses’. . . .”
We conclude with another “look back looking forward.”
In FTR#456, we noted the eerie foreshadowing the the 9/11 attacks by Turner Diaries author William Luther Pierce. Key aspects of that book, in turn, foreshadow aspects of the 9/11 attacks.
In 1998, the author of that tome,–William Luther Pierce–explicitly foreshadowed the 9/11 attacks which defined and cemented Dubya’s administration. “ . . . . In one chilling commentary Pierce, (after noting that Bin Laden and the rest of the lost generation of angry Moslem youth had it with their parents’ compromises and were hell bent on revenge against infidel America) issued this stark, prophetic warning in a 1998 radio address titled, ‘Stay Out of Tall Buildings.’ ‘New Yorkers who work in tall office buildings anything close to the size of the World Trade Center might consider wearing hard hats . . .’ Pierce warned.’ . . . The running theme in Pierce’s commentaries is—to paraphrase his hero Hitler—that Osama Bin Laden’s warning to America is ‘I Am Coming.’ And so is bio-terrorism.’ . . .”
In that context, we note that China is devastated by a WMD/Third World War in Turner Diaries.
Continuing discussion and analysis from FTR#’s 1183 and 1184, we finish analyzing an article about Shi Zhengli, Pentagon and USAID funding for her research into bat-borne coronaviruses through EcoHealth Alliance.
The Pentagon funding for these projects must be seen against the background of three overlapping areas of consideration:
1.–The fact that any virus can be synthesized or modified from scratch. As detailed in a very important article from The Guardian: “ . . . Advances in the area mean that scientists now have the capability to recreate dangerous viruses from scratch; make harmful bacteria more deadly; and modify common microbes so that they churn out lethal toxins once they enter the body. . . In the report, the scientists describe how synthetic biology, which gives researchers precision tools to manipulate living organisms, ‘enhances and expands’ opportunities to create bioweapons. . . . Today, the genetic code of almost any mammalian virus can be found online and synthesised. ‘The technology to do this is available now,’ said [Michael] “It requires some expertise, but it’s something that’s relatively easy to do, and that is why it tops the list. . . .”
2.–Also fundamental to an understanding of the Covid “op” is the devastating nature of bat-borne viruses when introduced into the human body. “ . . . . As Boston University microbiologist Thomas Kepler explained to the Washington Postin 2018, the bat’s unique approach to viral infection explains why viruses that transfer from bats to humans are so severe. . . . ‘A virus that has co-evolved with the bat’s antiviral system is completely out of its element in the human,’ Kepler said. ‘That’s why it is so deadly — the human immune system is overwhelmed by the inflammatory response.’ The bat immune system responds very differently from ours to viral infection. Instead of attacking and killing an infected cell, which leads to a cascade of inflammatory responses, the bat immune system can starve the virus by turning down cellular metabolism. The bat origin of SARS-CoV‑2 may explain the cytokine storms that are hastening some COVID-19 deaths. . . .”
3.–Analysis presented in the liberal New York Magazine by Nicholson Baker takes stock of the implications of contemporary biotechnology and what we have termed (in past broadcasts) “The Magic Virus Theory.” “. . . . SARS‑2 seems almost perfectly calibrated to grab and ransack our breathing cells and choke the life out of them. . . . Perhaps viral nature hit a bull’s‑eye of airborne infectivity, with almost no mutational drift, no period of accommodation and adjustment, or perhaps some lab worker somewhere, inspired by Baric’s work with human airway tissue, took a spike protein that was specially groomed to colonize and thrive deep in the ciliated, mucosal tunnels of our inner core and cloned it onto some existing viral bat backbone. It could have happened in Wuhan, but — because anyone can now ‘print out’ a fully infectious clone of any sequenced disease — it could also have happened at Fort Detrick, or in Texas, or in Italy, or in Rotterdam, or in Wisconsin, or in some other citadel of coronaviral inquiry.. . .”
Taken together and in the context of the full-court press against China discussed in many programs including FTR#’s 1090, 1091, 1178, 1179, 1180, the Pentagon/USAID funding of EcoHealth Alliance and the research into bat-borne coronaviruses being conducted at the WIV and elsewhere in and around China, the three considerations just enumerated point ominously to the Covid-19 pandemic as an “op.”
The program opens with more material from an article by Alexis Baden-Mayer about Shi Zhengli, which concludes with an interesting, important detail.
The People’s Liberation Army assumed control of the Wuhan Institute of Virology on January 26, 20 roughly two weeks after the genome for the SARS Cov‑2 was published: ” . . . . The Wuhan Institute of Virology is China’s only biosafety level 4 lab. While it has always been under the control of the Chinese government, since January 26, 2020, it has been under the command of the People’s Liberation Army, specifically its top biological-weapons specialist, a major general named Chen Wei. . . .”
An article in The Asia Times provides more depth on the growing tension between the U.S. and China.
Author Pepe Escobar feels that China became aware that they had been the focal point of a biological warfare attack. This dovetails with the analysis we presented about the WIV being taken over by the People’s Liberation Army on 1/26/2020.
President Xi Jinping has dropped verbal clues as to the Chinese view of the origin of the Covid-19: ” . . . . Beijing is carefully, incrementally shaping the narrative that, from the beginning of the coronavirus attack, the leadership knew it was under a hybrid war attack. The terminology of President Xi Jinping is a major clue. He said, on the record, that this was war. And, as a counter-attack, a ‘people’s war’ had to be launched. Moreover, he described the virus as a demon or devil. Xi is a Confucianist. Unlike some other ancient Chinese thinkers, Confucius was loath to discuss supernatural forces and judgment in the afterlife. However, in a Chinese cultural context, devil means ‘white devils’ or ‘foreign devils’: guailo in Mandarin, gweilo in Cantonese. This was Xi delivering a powerful statement in code. . . .”
Escobar also notes Event 201, which we highlighted in FTR #‘s 1111 and 1112: ” . . . . Extra questions linger about the opaque Event 201 in New York on October 18, 2019: a rehearsal for a worldwide pandemic caused by a deadly virus – which happened to be coronavirus. This magnificent coincidence happened one month before the outbreak in Wuhan. Event 201 was sponsored by Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the World Economic Forum (WEF), the CIA, Bloomberg, John Hopkins Foundation and the UN. The World Military Games opened in Wuhan on the exact same day. . . .”
As noted by Pepe Escobar, Event 201–which began on the same day as the Military World Games in Wuhan–helped to set the PR template for Covid-19.
Avril Haines was a key participant in the event. Former Deputy CIA Director Avril Haines is Biden’s Director of National Intelligence.
The cognitive template for Covid-19 was also set by Peter Daszak, who has widely disseminated the supposition that “Disease X” would overtake the world.
It is our view that the efforts of Daszak, the Event 201 players and others could be compared to the propagandizing that elements of the WACCFL and the intelligence community, as well as elements of the U.S. far right did in the run-up to the JFK assassination.
That propagandizing was a key element in the “Painting of Oswald Red.”
The program concludes with rumination about the possible significance of Daszak’s Ukrainian heritage. This discussion will be fleshed out in our next program, reviewing the constellation of covert “ops” against China and the participation of elements of U.S. intelligence and Ukrainian fascism in the destabilization of Hong Kong and the propagation of the Uighur myth.
Harvesting the lethal political crop risen from seeds planted before, during and in the immediate aftermath of World War II, this program sets forth the dynamics underlying the Covid-19 operation.
In numerous programs and posts, we have presented disturbing evidence that SARS CoV‑2 may well be a man-made virus, and that the Wuhan Institute of Virology was set up to take the fall for its creation.
(We have termed that institution “The Oswald Institute of Virology,”–set up to take the fall for the creation of the virus rather like the way Lee Harvey Oswald was “painted red” in order to set up “the Communists” to take the fall for the assassination of JFK.)
Before setting forth the Pentagon, State Department and [probable] CIA funding for the research into bat-borne coronaviruses at the Wuhan Institute of Virology, it is fundamental to an understanding of the realization of the Covid “op” to grasp the state of the art in genetic engineering of microorganisms.
As detailed in a very important article from The Guardian: “ . . . Advances in the area mean that scientists now have the capability to recreate dangerous viruses from scratch; make harmful bacteria more deadly; and modify common microbes so that they churn out lethal toxins once they enter the body. . . In the report, the scientists describe how synthetic biology, which gives researchers precision tools to manipulate living organisms, ‘enhances and expands’ opportunities to create bioweapons. . . . Today, the genetic code of almost any mammalian virus can be found online and synthesised. ‘The technology to do this is available now,’ said [Michael] Imperiale. “It requires some expertise, but it’s something that’s relatively easy to do, and that is why it tops the list. . . .”
Also fundamental to an understanding of the Covid “op” is the devastating nature of bat-borne viruses when introduced into the human body.
A lengthy excerpt of an article we will examine at greater length is important to consider in this context: “. . . . A Google Scholar search produced two papers Shi has published that lists DTRA as a funder.
To see how the first paper, ‘Comparative Analysis of Bat Genomes Provides Insight into the Evolution of Flight and Immunity,’ is relevant to biological weaponry, it helps to understand the military’s interest in bat immunity.
As Boston University microbiologist Thomas Kepler explained to the Washington Post in 2018, the bat’s unique approach to viral infection explains why viruses that transfer from bats to humans are so severe.
This was the subject of a paper, ‘The Egyptian Rousette Genome Reveals Unexpected Features of Bat Antiviral Immunity,’ that he published with military scientists and DTRA funding.
‘A virus that has co-evolved with the bat’s antiviral system is completely out of its element in the human,’ Kepler said. ‘That’s why it is so deadly — the human immune system is overwhelmed by the inflammatory response.’
The bat immune system responds very differently from ours to viral infection. Instead of attacking and killing an infected cell, which leads to a cascade of inflammatory responses, the bat immune system can starve the virus by turning down cellular metabolism.
The bat origin of SARS-CoV‑2 may explain the cytokine storms that are hastening some COVID-19 deaths. According to WebMD:
‘Certain kinds of cytokines trigger cell death. When you have many cells doing this at the same time, a lot of tissue can die. In COVID-19, that tissue is mostly in the lung. As the tissue breaks down, the walls of the lungs’ tiny air sacs become leaky and fill with fluid, causing pneumonia and starving the blood of oxygen.’
Kepler says the military is using its experiments on bat immunity to ‘develop drugs that dampen down inflammation and arrest the virus by depriving it of what it needs to grow rather than trying to kill it outright.’ But, it clearly has another objective, as well: to make viruses more deadly by ‘passaging’ them through bats. . . .”
A recent article in the liberal “New York Magazine” discusses the Wuhan Institute of Virology and gain-of-function experiments performed under the joint auspices of that institution and the Pentagon-funded EcoHealth Alliance of Peter Daszak. Daszak is advised by David Franz, the former commander of Ft. Detrick.
Funded by USAID (a State Department subsidiary that serves as a cover for CIA covert operations), that program saw Chinese researchers partner with, among others, Ralph Baric.
In the detailed analysis presented by Nicholson Baker in the article, no mention is made of the Pentagon funding of EcoHealth Alliance, nor the disturbing information about DARPA’s research into bat-borne coronaviruses detailed in the consummately important article by Whitney Webb.
The Baker piece does conclude with an oblique nod to the ease with which viruses can be synthesized and holds open the possibility that Fort Detrick or any other place could have been the locus of synthesis.
“. . . . SARS‑2 seems almost perfectly calibrated to grab and ransack our breathing cells and choke the life out of them. ‘By the time SARS-CoV‑2 was first detected in late 2019, it was already pre-adapted to human transmission,’ Alina Chan and her co-authors have written, whereas SARS, when it first appeared in 2003, underwent ‘numerous adaptive mutations’ before settling down. Perhaps viral nature hit a bull’s‑eye of airborne infectivity, with almost no mutational drift, no period of accommodation and adjustment, or perhaps some lab worker somewhere, inspired by Baric’s work with human airway tissue, took a spike protein that was specially groomed to colonize and thrive deep in the ciliated, mucosal tunnels of our inner core and cloned it onto some existing viral bat backbone. It could have happened in Wuhan, but — because anyone can now ‘print out’ a fully infectious clone of any sequenced disease — it could also have happened at Fort Detrick, or in Texas, or in Italy, or in Rotterdam, or in Wisconsin, or in some other citadel of coronaviral inquiry. . . .”
The analysis begins with excerpting of a thought-provoking and disturbing article about DARPA research into bat-borne diseases, including some caused by coronaviruses–is set forth here.
As readers digest this information, remember that DARPA can bring to bear the twined technologies artificial intelligence and super-computers. It has the state of the art with respect to both. Combined with gene editing, that technological pairing offers the possibility of truly horrifying synthetic viruses.
In FTR #‘s 1157, 1158 and 1159, we highlighted very disturbing connections between Peter Daszak and his EcoHealth Alliance and the Pentagon and USAID, a State Department subsidiary that serves as a frequent cover for CIA.
The EcoHealth Alliance–financed by USAID–partnered with the Wuhan Institute of Virology and Dr. Ralph Baric of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill to research bat-borne coronaviruses. A “chimeric” virus was created by Baric under this program in 2015, and Baric was subsequently selected to create the SARS Cov‑2 virus from scratch.
A new article adds further depth to the alarming connections of Daszak, the EcoHealth Alliance and Jeffrey Sachs. (As discussed in a number of programs, including the above-mentioned FTR #‘s 1157, 1158 and 1159, Sachs presided over the Harvard Institute of International Development, a US-funded organization that advised Boris Yeltsin’s disastrous economic policy in Russia.)
Many in Russia view Sachs as “an emissary either of Satan or the CIA.” Recent political incarnations have him as a member of the [Bernie] Sanders Institute and an advisor to AOC.
A brilliant, insightful article by Sam Husseini on Independent Science News provides critical depth to our previous coverage of Citizen Daszak.
Husseini notes that:
1.–The Pentagon and USAID (a State Department subsidiary that has frequently fronted for CIA) are the largest funders of EcoHealth Alliance, which obscures this fact: “ . . . . Daszak’s EcoHealth Alliance obscures its Pentagon funding. . . . Only buried under their ‘Privacy Policy,’ under a section titled ‘EcoHealth Alliance Policy Regarding Conflict of Interest in Research,’ does the EcoHealth Alliance concede it is the ‘recipient of various grant awards from federal agencies including . . . . the US Agency for International Development and the Department of Defense.’ . . . Even this listing is deceptive. It obscures that its two largest funders are the Pentagon and the State Department (USAID) . . . . These two sources thus total over $103 million. . . .”
2.–One of the principal advisers to EcoHealth Alliance is David Franz: ” . . . . The military links of the EcoHealth Alliance are not limited to money and mindset. One noteworthy ‘policy advisor’ to the EcoHealth Alliance is David Franz. Franz is former commander of Fort Detrick, which is the principal U.S. government biowarfare/biodefense facility. . . .”
3.–Peter Daszak has high regards for Donald Rumsfeld, whom he enthusiastically quotes. (Rumsfeld was Chairman of the Board of Gilead Sciences for many years, leaving that position to become Secretary of Defense for George W. Bush. Rumsfeld made millions on his sale of Gilead stock, which soared in value following the Pentagon’s purchase of Gilead’s Tamiflu to combat a feared breakout of H5N1 influenza. Gildead Sciences makes remdesivir, which was being tested on rhesus macaques at the U.S. Army’s Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases at Fort Detrick in the spring of 2019. The USAAMRIID was shut down by the CDC in early August of 2019, in part for the improper disposal of waste from “non-human primates” infected with a “select agent” which has not been disclosed for national security reasons.) ” . . . . ‘It’s an awesome quote! And yes, it’s Donald Rumsfeld, Jeff, and I know he’s a Republican, but — what a genius!’ . . .”
4.–The close association of Jeffrey Sachs and Daszak: ” . . . . In September, Sachs’ commission [on the Lancet–D.E.] named Daszak to head up its committee on the pandemic’s origins. Daszak is also on the WHO’s committee to investigate the pandemic’s origin. He is the only individual on both committees. . . .”
Centered primarily on the work of respected Chinese scientist Shi Zhengli and her gain-of-function experiments on bat-borne coronaviruses, another important article points out that her work is inextricably-linked with the Pentagon, USAID-funded Ecohealth Alliance.
Although Ms. Baden-Mayer’s article uncritically presents material from dubious sources such as The National Review, it does not shirk on coverage of the importance of Daszak’s organization and the many military and national security links to the work at the WIV performed by Shi Zhengli and her colleagues.
NB: A major–albeit understandable– flaw in Ms. Baden-Mayer’s research is the fact that neither she, nor many of the people she quotes, takes stock of the fact that ANY VIRUS CAN BE SYNTHESIZED OR ALTERED IN A LABORATORY USING CONTEMPORARY TECHNOLOGY!
Key Points of Discussion and Analysis Include:
1.–A National Institute of Health query of the work at WIV, the questions in which were presented to Daszak’s EcoHealth Alliance! ” . . . . The letter with these demands didn’t go to Shi or WIV, it went to EcoHealth Alliance, a U.S.-based non-profit funded by the U.S. government, including [primarily] the U.S. military, to support scientists working in 30 countries. EcoHealth Alliance is listed as a funding source on some of Shi’s most controversial papers. And EcoHealth Alliance scientists, including its president Peter Daszak, often co-author, with Shi, published papers. . . .”
2.–Review of the operational relationship between Daszak’s organization, and Shi Zhengli’s cooperation with Ralph Baric: ” . . . . Shi’s most infamous EcoHealth Alliance-funded paper is, ‘A SARS-Like Cluster of Circulating Bat Coronaviruses Shows Potential for Human Emergence.’ In this controversial gain-of-function research collaboration with U.S. scientist Ralph Baric of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Shi and Baric used genetic engineering and synthetic biology to weaponize a bat coronavirus, maximizing its potential human infectivity. . . .”
3.–Review of the USAID funding of the EcoHealth Alliance/Shi/Baric collaboration (USAID is a State Department subsidiary which serves as one of CIA’s most common and insidious front organizations. ) ” . . . . Shi’s funding for this study came through a USAID Emerging Pandemic Threats-PREDICT grant to EcoHealth Alliance—but the record for this grant appears to have been scrubbed from the U.S. government’s database. . . .”
4.–Review of the obfuscation of the USAID funding for the EcoHealth Alliance for this period. “. . . . EcoHealth Alliance was a PREDICT partner during the 2009–2014 funding cycle, but there is no record of a USAID grant to EcoHealth Alliance for this time period among the $100.9 million in grants it has received from the U.S. government since 2003. . . .”
5.–Discussion of Shi/Daszak collaboration on on a key sequence–the RsShCo14-CoV Sequence: ” . . . . Shi’s contribution to the work she did with Baric was the ‘RsSHC014-CoV Sequence That Was Isolated from Chinese Horseshoe Bats.’ . . . . Shi Zhengli and Peter Daszak announced their discovery of RsSHC014 in their 2013 paper, ‘Isolation and Characterization of a Bat SARS-Like Coronavirus that Uses the ACE2 Receptor,’ and stated that it was found during ‘a 12-month longitudinal survey (April 2011–September 2012) of SL-CoVs in a colony of Rhinolophus sinicus at a single location in Kunming, Yunnan Province, China.’ . . . .”
6.–Funding for the Kunming virus research came from a number of institutions, including the NIH and USAID, which both have collaborated with Pentagon and CIA in the past.
7.–EcoHealth Alliance helped finance Shi’s research in Mojiang: ” . . . . Shi’s paper, ‘Coexistence of Multiple Coronaviruses in Several Bat Colonies in an Abandoned Mineshaft,’ was written by a team of scientists who were all Chinese nationals working at Chinese institutions. Nevertheless, in addition to funding from the Chinese government, the authors acknowledged support from the U.S. National Institute of Allergies and Infectious Disease (R01AI110964), a $3.7‑million grant to EcoHealth Alliance for ‘Understanding the Risk of Bat Coronavirus Emergence,’ (2014–2025). . . .”
8.–Further review of Shi’s research funding from the Pentagon, via EcoHealth Alliance: ” . . . . Shi Zhengli and her collaborators are also funded by the U.S. military. Peter Daszak’s EcoHealth Alliance currently receives more money from the Department of Defense’s Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA) for Scientific Research Combatting Weapons of Mass Destruction than any other military contractor—$15 million (25.575 percent) of the $60.2 million dispersed in the last 6 months. . . .”
9.–More about military collaboration with Shi: ” . . . . In addition to military funding through DTRA, Shi’s paper was co-authored by two U.S. military scientists, Christopher C. Broder and Eric D. Laing of the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences, Department of Microbiology and Immunology. . . .”
The People’s Liberation Army assumed control of the Wuhan Institute of Virology on January 26, 2020 at the time that the genome for the SARS Cov‑2 was published: ” . . . . The Wuhan Institute of Virology is China’s only biosafety level 4 lab. While it has always been under the control of the Chinese government, since January 26, 2020, it has been under the command of the People’s Liberation Army, specifically its top biological-weapons specialist, a major general named Chen Wei. . . .”
In FTR #‘s 1157, 1158 and 1159, we highlighted very disturbing connections between Peter Daszak and his EcoHealth Alliance and the Pentagon and USAID, a State Department subsidiary that serves as a frequent cover for CIA. The EcoHealth Alliance–financed by USAID–partnered with the Wuhan Institute of Virology and Dr. Ralph Baric of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill to research bat-borne coronaviruses. A “chimeric” virus was created by Baric under this program in 2015, and Baric was subsequently selected to create the SARS Cov‑2 virus from scratch. FTR#1170 provides critical depth to our previous coverage of Citizen Daszak, noting that the Pentagon and USAID are the MAIN funding sources for EcoHealth Alliance, as well as the fact that Daszak is advised by David Franz, the former commander of Fort Detrick.What we believe is the “setting up” of the WIV to take the blame for making Covid-19 (like the propaganda characterizing U.S. intelligence agent Lee Harvey Oswald as a “Communist”) is further buttressed by an article by Alexis Baden-Mayer.
The program begins with analytic review of the military’s role in U.S. vaccine development.
In previous posts and programs, we have noted that Moderna’s vaccine work has been financed by DARPA. We have also noted that the overall head of Operation Warp Speed is Moncef Slaoui, formerly in charge of product development for Moderna!
Of great significance is the central role of the military in the development of treatment for Covid-19:
1.–We note that: ” . . . . Remdesivir predates this pandemic. It was first considered as a potential treatment for Ebola, and was developed through a longstanding partnership between the U.S. Army and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. . . .”
2.–Jonathan King, who has chaired the microbial physiology study section for the NIH has sounded the alarm about “vaccine research” masking offensive biological warfare research: “. . . . King, who has chaired the microbial physiology study section for the NIH, believes that without intensive independent scrutiny, the Pentagon is free to obscure its true goals. ‘The Defense Department appears to be pursuing many narrow, applied goals that are by nature offensive, such as the genetic ‘improvement’ of BW agents,’ King says. ‘But to achieve political acceptability, they mask these intentions under forms of research, such as vaccine development, which sound defensive. . . .”
3.–Moderna’s vaccine development was overseen by an unnamed Pentagon official: ” . . . . Moderna’s team was headed by a Defense Department official whom company executives described only as ‘the major,’ saying they don’t know if his name is supposed to be a secret. . . . .”
4.–The pervasive role of the military in Operation Warp Speed (the Trump administration’s vaccine development program) has generated alarm in civilian participants:”. . . . Scores of Defense Department employees are laced through the government offices involved in the effort, making up a large portion of the federal personnel devoted to the effort. Those numbers have led some current and former officials at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to privately grumble that the military’s role in Operation Warp Speed was too large for a task that is, at its core, a public health campaign. . . .”
5.–General Gustave Perna–one of the principals in Operation Warp Speed–has chosen a retired Lieutenant General to oversee much of the program: ” . . . . ‘Frankly, it has been breathtaking to watch,’ said Paul Ostrowski, the director of supply, production and distribution for Operation Warp Speed. He is a retired Army lieutenant general who was selected to manage logistics for the program by Gen. Gustave F. Perna, the chief operating officer for Operation Warp Speed. . . .”
6.–The military will be able to trace the destination and administration of each dose: ” . . . . Military officials also came up with the clever idea — if it works — to coordinate the delivery of vaccines to drugstores, medical centers and other immunization sites by sending kits full of needles, syringes and alcohol wipes. Vaccine makers will be alerted when the kits arrive at an immunization site so they know to ship doses. Once the first dose is given, the manufacturer will be notified so it can send the second dose with a patient’s name attached several weeks later. The military will also monitor vaccine distribution through an operations center. ‘They will know where every vaccine dose is,’ Mr. [Paul] Mango said on a call with reporters. . . .”
Obfuscating the nature of U.S. vaccine contracting is the fact that the contracting is done through ATI. ” . . . . In part, it’s because of the way many Operation Warp Speed contracts have been executed, with their terms largely invisible to the public. . . . under the hood, the effort’s largest agreements with vaccine companies—totaling more than $6 billion—have been managed by a third party, a defense-oriented nonprofit called Advanced Technology International (ATI). . . . with ATI as an intermediary, these billion-dollar deals instead fall under something called an ‘other transaction agreement’ that isn’t subject to the same kinds of cross-checks and accountability. . . .”
The balance of the program consists of analysis of the capital interests behind BioNTech–the German corporate partner producing a Covid vaccine with Pfizer.
Headed by a German MD couple whose parents were “gastarbeiter” (guest workers), BioNTech has soared exponentially in value since the approval of the vaccine by a number of countries.
A dominant consideration in power politics remains the advisory to “Follow the Money.”
Against the background of I.G. Farben and its successor companies’ dominant position in both the global pharmaceutical and chemical market, as well as its major position within the remarkable and deadly Bormann capital network, the program explores the capitalization of Uğur Şahin and Özlem Türeci’s Ganymed firm and BioNTech.
Of paramount significance in both Ganymed (the couple’s initial commercial venture) and BioNtech are twin brothers Thomas and Andreas Struengmann.
Key points of analysis:
1.–The brothers are major players in the pharmaceutical and biotech market.
2.–They keep a purposefully low professional profile–a professional behavior characteristic of the deadly Bormann network.
3.–Thomas was an important member of the board of Wacker Chemie, a major successor to two I.G. Farben subsidiary companies.
4.–Wacker Chemie has apparently obfuscated its Nazi past.
5.–Andreas initiated his medical career in apartheid South Africa, and the brothers’ Hexal firm began its significant international expansion in that country. (The apartheid regime was an offshoot of the Third Reich.)
6.–Firms that evolved from I.G. Farben figure prominently in the dealings of Hexal, Wacker Chemie and BioNTech (Novartis, the Hoechst division of Sanofi-Aventis.)
Supplementing FTR #1138, this program continues discussion about drug treatments for, and vaccines to prevent, Covid-19.
In previous posts and programs, we have noted that Moderna’s vaccine work has been financed by DARPA. We have also noted that the overall head of Operation Warp Speed is Moncef Slaoui, formerly in charge of product development for Moderna!
Of great significance is the central role of the military in the development of treatment for Covid-19:
1.–The program notes that: ” . . . . Remdesivir predates this pandemic. It was first considered as a potential treatment for Ebola, and was developed through a longstanding partnership between the U.S. Army and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. . . .”
2.–Jonathan King has sounded the alarm about “vaccine research” masking offensive biological warfare research: “. . . . King, who has chaired the microbial physiology study section for the NIH, believes that without intensive independent scrutiny, the Pentagon is free to obscure its true goals. ‘The Defense Department appears to be pursuing many narrow, applied goals that are by nature offensive, such as the genetic ‘improvement’ of BW agents,’ King says. ‘But to achieve political acceptability, they mask these intentions under forms of research, such as vaccine development, which sound defensive. . . .”
3.–Moderna’s vaccine development was overseen by an unnamed Pentagon official: ” . . . . Moderna’s team was headed by a Defense Department official whom company executives described only as ‘the major,’ saying they don’t know if his name is supposed to be a secret. . . . .”
4.–The pervasive role of the military in Operation Warp Speed (the Trump administration’s vaccine development program) has generated alarm in civilian participants: “. . . . Scores of Defense Department employees are laced through the government offices involved in the effort, making up a large portion of the federal personnel devoted to the effort. Those numbers have led some current and former officials at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to privately grumble that the military’s role in Operation Warp Speed was too large for a task that is, at its core, a public health campaign. . . .”
5.–General Gustave Perna–one of the principals in Operation Warp Speed–has chosen a retired Lieutenant General to oversee much of the program: ” . . . . ‘Frankly, it has been breathtaking to watch,’ said Paul Ostrowski, the director of supply, production and distribution for Operation Warp Speed. He is a retired Army lieutenant general who was selected to manage logistics for the program by Gen. Gustave F. Perna, the chief operating officer for Operation Warp Speed. . . .”
6.–The military will be able to trace the destination and administration of each dose: ” . . . . Military officials also came up with the clever idea — if it works — to coordinate the delivery of vaccines to drugstores, medical centers and other immunization sites by sending kits full of needles, syringes and alcohol wipes. Vaccine makers will be alerted when the kits arrive at an immunization site so they know to ship doses. Once the first dose is given, the manufacturer will be notified so it can send the second dose with a patient’s name attached several weeks later. The military will also monitor vaccine distribution through an operations center. ‘They will know where every vaccine dose is,’ Mr. [Paul] Mango said on a call with reporters. . . .”
This program begins with information about the ongoing professional massaging of Gilead Sciences’ anti-viral remdesivir.
The most positive studies have proved remdesivir/Veklury only modestly successful against SARS Cov‑2 (the virus that causes Covid-19). Remdesivir (now marketed under the brand name Veklury) has been propelled to the forefront of treatment regimens for the pandemic, a development which appears to diminish the chances for a competing, more effective drug to gain professional approval for treating Covid-19.
” . . . . Other studies have shown no benefit, including the World Health Organization’s Solidarity trial, released as a preprint on Oct. 15. Based on these results, the European Society of Intensive Care Medicine is now recommending that the drug not be routinely used in hospitalized Covid-19 patients. Infectious disease experts have stated that after examining all available evidence, we can reasonably conclude only that remdesivir may work. . . .”
Deeply disturbing, as well, is the news that the “positive news” about vaccine success and development has been generated by press releases from the companies that manufacture them: ” . . . . But the companies announced the findings in news releases, not in peer-reviewed scientific journals, and did not disclose the detailed data that would allow outside experts to evaluate their claims. Therefore, the results cannot be considered conclusive. The figures on effectiveness may change as the studies continue. . . .”
Program Highlights Include: The rapid spread of the disease is benefitting the speed-up of vaccine research; review of the attenuated, manipulated NIAID study on remdesivir that generated positive news, a run-up in the stock price of Gilead Sciences and a boost for the market as a whole; review of the role of “Scientists to Stop Covid-19” in massaging the vetting process for remdesivir; review of the CDC’s closing of the USAMRIID in August of 2019 and the testing of remdeisivir at that facility in March of 2019; review of the insidious, incestuous relationship between the authorities “regulating” treatment of Lyme Disease and those who benefit from the administration of that treatment; review of Lyme Disease as a biological warfare weapon.
In previous posts and programs, we have noted that Moderna’s vaccine work has been financed by DARPA. We have also noted that the overall head of Operation Warp Speed is Moncef Slaoui, formerly in charge of product development for Moderna! Of great significance is the central role of the military in the development of treatment for Covid-19: 1.–We note that: ” . . . . Remdesivir predates this pandemic. It was first considered as a potential treatment for Ebola, and was developed through a longstanding partnership between the U.S. Army and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. . . .” 2.–Jonathan King, who has chaired the microbial physiology study section for the NIH has sounded the alarm about “vaccine research” masking offensive biological warfare research: “. . . . King, who has chaired the microbial physiology study section for the NIH, believes that without intensive independent scrutiny, the Pentagon is free to obscure its true goals. ‘The Defense Department appears to be pursuing many narrow, applied goals that are by nature offensive, such as the genetic ‘improvement’ of BW agents,’ King says. ‘But to achieve political acceptability, they mask these intentions under forms of research, such as vaccine development, which sound defensive. . . .” 3.–Moderna’s vaccine development was overseen by an unnamed Pentagon official: ” . . . . Moderna’s team was headed by a Defense Department official whom company executives described only as ‘the major,’ saying they don’t know if his name is supposed to be a secret. . . . .” 4.–The pervasive role of the military in Operation Warp Speed (the Trump administration’s vaccine development program) has generated alarm in civilian participants: “. . . . Scores of Defense Department employees are laced through the government offices involved in the effort, making up a large portion of the federal personnel devoted to the effort. Those numbers have led some current and former officials at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to privately grumble that the military’s role in Operation Warp Speed was too large for a task that is, at its core, a public health campaign. . . .” 5.–General Gustave Perna–one of the principals in Operation Warp Speed–has chosen a retired Lieutenant General to oversee much of the program: ” . . . . ‘Frankly, it has been breathtaking to watch,’ said Paul Ostrowski, the director of supply, production and distribution for Operation Warp Speed. He is a retired Army lieutenant general who was selected to manage logistics for the program by Gen. Gustave F. Perna, the chief operating officer for Operation Warp Speed. . . .” 6.–The military will be able to trace the destination and administration of each dose: ” . . . . Military officials also came up with the clever idea — if it works — to coordinate the delivery of vaccines to drugstores, medical centers and other immunization sites by sending kits full of needles, syringes and alcohol wipes. Vaccine makers will be alerted when the kits arrive at an immunization site so they know to ship doses. Once the first dose is given, the manufacturer will be notified so it can send the second dose with a patient’s name attached several weeks later. The military will also monitor vaccine distribution through an operations center. ‘They will know where every vaccine dose is,’ Mr. [Paul] Mango said on a call with reporters. . . .” Adding to the opaque nature of American government contracting with vaccine makers is the fact that those contractors are being executed through a Defense Department-oriented third party–ATI. ” . . . .What’s behind the confusion? In part, it’s because of the way many Operation Warp Speed contracts have been executed, with their terms largely invisible to the public. . . the effort’s largest agreements with vaccine companies—totaling more than $6 billion—have been managed by a third party, a defense-oriented nonprofit called Advanced Technology International (ATI). . . . Normally, when the government makes an agreement with a contractor, it has to follow federal acquisition regulations. But with ATI as an intermediary, these billion-dollar deals instead fall under something called an ‘other transaction agreement’ that isn’t subject to the same kinds of cross-checks and accountability. . . .”
This post supplements and is intended to call attention to FTR #‘s 1157, 1158 and 1159. A consummately important article about Peter Daszak (right) and the EcoHealth Alliance provides troubling insights into the uneven professional track record of Daszak and the profound involvement of the organization he heads with the Pentagon and other U.S. national security establishment institutions. Exemplifying EcoHealth Alliance’s work is a Pentagon contract with Tanzania, researching CCHF–Crimean-Congo Hemorrhagic Fever. ” . . . . EcoHealth Alliance has a $5‑million Pentagon contract, ‘Crimean-Congo Hemorrhagic Fever: Reducing an Emerging Health Threat in Tanzania.’ Crimean-Congo Hemorrhagic Fever (CCHF) is a tick-borne disease, originally only infecting animals. . . . There was only ever one case of CCHF in Tanzania, and that was in 1986. . . . Gain-of-function research on CCHF is being conducted at the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s National Bio and Agro-Defense Facility (NBAF) . . . . (The National Bio and Agro Defense Facility will take over the mission of the Plum Island Animal Disease Center and become the lead facility for Foreign Animal Disease research.) . . .”
A noteworthy development in the Covid-19 “op” concerns the selection of experts to oversee The Lancet’s investigation of the origins of the SARS CoV‑2.
In FTR #1156, we looked at the involvement of known U.S. intelligence cut-outs–notably USAID–and their funding of programs ostensibly aimed at preventing epidemics. Those programs involved the “Gain-of-Function” mutation of bat-borne coronaviruses, creating novel “chimeric” viruses that never existed before.
The ostensible purpose was to “prevent” future epidemics. We wondered in FTR #1156 if those ostensible epidemic “prevention” programs may have masked epidemic propagation programs, rather like Unit 731.
Peter Daszak of the EcoHealth Alliance was selected to lead the project.
His perspective would, on the surface, appear to be less than objective, in as much as he championed the very type of GOF experiments that are at the center of this inquiry.
Of interest, as well, is the selection of Jeffrey Sachs, an economist, member of the [Bernie] Sanders Institute, economic adviser to Bernie Sanders, economic adviser to AOC and, most importantly, head of the [partly] government financed Harvard Institute of International Development which (as advisers to Boris Yeltsin) drove the Russian economy back to the Stone Age.
Sachs has no medical or scientific credentials.
A consummately important article about Daszak and the EcoHealth Alliance provides troubling insights into the uneven professional track record of Daszak and the profound involvement of the organization he heads with the Pentagon and other U.S. national security establishment institutions.
EcoHealth Alliance looks disturbingly like an organization that fronts for elements and individuals involved with biological warfare research.
“Peter Daszak, President of EcoHealth Alliance, is a top scientific collaborator, grantwriter and spokesperson for virus hunters and gain-of-function/dual-use researchers, in labs both military and civilian.
Daszak works with dozens of high-containment laboratories around the world that collect pathogens and use genetic engineering and synthetic biology to make them more infectious, contagious, lethal or drug-resistant. These include labs controlled by the U.S. Department of Defense, in countries in the former Soviet Union, the Middle East, South East Asia and Africa.
Many of these labs are staffed by former biological weapons scientists. (See Arms Watch’s reports.) Before the Biological Weapons Convention was ratified, this research was called what it is: biological weapons research. Now, it’s euphemistically called gain-of-function or dual-use research.
Gain-of-function research to alter coronaviruses for the infection of humans goes back to 1999 or earlier, years before the first novel coronavirus outbreak. On behalf of the U.S. government, often the military, Daszak scours the globe for animal pathogens and brings them back to the lab to be catalogued, investigated and manipulated. . . .”
Key points of analysis and discussion include:
1.–EcoHealth Alliance contracts with the Pentagon in Tanzania, South Africa, Georgia and Malaysia, as well as the U.S.
2.–” . . . . A recent Wired magazine article quoting Daszak described how a virus collected in 2012 was found to be a 96-percent match to SARS-CoV‑2 in 2020 . . . ‘a lack of funding meant they couldn’t further investigate the virus strain now known to be 96 percent genetically similar to the virus that causes Covid-19’ . . . .”
3.–Daszak’s claim that they couldn’t further investigate that virus because of a lack of funding is dubious, in that recent grants to the organization are on top of ” . . . . $100.9 million that EcoHealth Alliance has received in government grants and contracts since 2003. . . .”
4.–Daszak does not explain how that virus (discovered in 2012) turned into SARS-CoV‑2. ” . . . . Some scientists say it would take 50 years for RaTG13 [the virus in question–D.E.] to turn into SARS-CoV‑2. . . .”
5.–Daszak is heavily networked with the Department of Homeland Security: ” . . . . the Department of Homeland Security’s National Biosurveillance Integration Center (NBIC) . . . . gave Daszak’s EcoHealth Alliance a $2.2‑million contract (2016–2019) to create a ‘Ground Truth Network’ of ‘subject matter experts’ who could provide ‘contextual information pertaining to biological events.’ . . . .”
6.–The intellectual and professional track record of Daszak and EcoHealth Alliance is porous. EcoHealth Alliance floated a canard about Ebola potentially traveling to the U.S. ” . . . . an EcoHealth Alliance spokesperson, spread a false (not to mention racist and xenophobic) narrative, one that subsequently would be thoroughly debunked, that bushmeat smuggled to the U.S. from Africa could transmit Ebola to Americans. . . .”
7.–Daszak missed the boat badly with regard to SARS: ” . . . . It is commonly accepted that the SARS pandemic began in 2002, when humans caught a bat virus from civet cats at a wet market in Guangdong, China. But Daszak and his collaborators admit they have no evidence to explain how the virus leapt from bats to civets to humans. . . .”
8.–” . . . . SARS-CoV was found in civets at the Guangdong wet market, but civets aren’t the natural reservoir of this virus. Bats are. Only the civets at the market—and no farm-raised or wild civets—carried the virus. None of the animal traders handling the civets at the market had SARS. . . .”
9.–” . . . . When Daszak and his collaborators at the WIV searched the cave in Yunnan for strains of coronavirus similar to human versions, no single bat actually had SARS. Genetic pieces of the various strains would have to be recombined to make up the human version. Adding to the confusion, Yunnan is about 1,000 kilometers from Guangdong. . . .”
10.–” . . . . So, how did viruses from bats in Yunnan combine to become deadly to humans, and then travel to civets and people in Guangdong, without causing any illnesses along the way during this 1,000 kilometer trip? . . .”
11.–Daszak and the EcoHealth Alliance were deeply involved with a USAID and NIH funded joint WIV/University of North Carolina project we have covered extensively in past programs. ” . . . . The two institutions also worked as collaborators under another $2.6‑million grant, ‘Risk of Viral Emergence from Bats,’ and under EcoHealth Alliance’s largest single source of funding, a $44.2 million sub-grant from the University of California at Davis for the PREDICT project (2015–2020). . . .”
12.–” . . . . It’s the $44.2‑million PREDICT grant that EcoHealth Alliance used to fund the gain-of-function experiment by WIV scientist Zhengli Shi and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill’s Ralph Baric. Shi and Baric used genetic engineering and synthetic biology to create a ‘new bat SARS-like virus . . . that can jump directly from its bat hosts to humans.’ . . .”
13.–” . . . . The work . . . published in Nature in 2015 during the NIH’s moratorium on gain-of-function research, was grandfathered in because it was initiated before the moratorium (officially called the U.S. Government Deliberative Process Research Funding Pause on Selected Gain-of-Function Research Involving Influenza, MERS and SARS Viruses), and because the request by Shi and Baric to continue their research during the moratorium was approved by the NIH. . . .”
14.–” . . . . As a condition of publication, Nature, like most scientific journals, requires authors to submit new DNA and RNA sequences to GenBank, the U.S. National Center for Biotechnology Information Database. Yet the new SARS-like virus Shi and Baric created wasn’t deposited in GenBank until May 2020. . . .”
15.–” . . . . why is the government focusing on just one of EcoHealth Alliance’s projects, when the organization has received $100.9 million in grants, primarily from the Department of Defense, to sample, store and study bat coronaviruses at labs around the world? Coronaviruses, both those that have been collected from animals and those that have been created through genetic engineering and synthetic biology, at all of these labs should be compared with SARS-CoV‑2. . . . .”
16.–” . . . . Daszak’s collaborators working under contracts with the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) aren’t allowed to conduct gain-of-function research unless specifically approved to do so by the Potential Pandemic Pathogen Care and Oversight (P3CO) committee. This committee was set up as a condition for lifting the 2014–2017 moratorium on gain-of-function research. The P3CO committee operates in secret. Not even a membership list has been released. . . .”
17.–Exemplifying EcoHealth Alliance’s work is a Pentagon contract with Tanzania, researching CCHF–Crimean-Congo Hemorrhagic Fever. ” . . . . EcoHealth Alliance has a $5‑million Pentagon contract, ‘Crimean-Congo Hemorrhagic Fever: Reducing an Emerging Health Threat in Tanzania.’ Crimean-Congo Hemorrhagic Fever (CCHF) is a tick-borne disease, originally only infecting animals. . . . There was only ever one case of CCHF in Tanzania, and that was in 1986. . . . Gain-of-function research on CCHF is being conducted at the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s National Bio and Agro-Defense Facility (NBAF) . . . . (The National Bio and Agro Defense Facility will take over the mission of the Plum Island Animal Disease Center and become the lead facility for Foreign Animal Disease research.) . . .”
Program Highlights Include: The prominent role in the Sanders Institute and AOC’s advisory team of Jeffrey Sachs, whose HIID team of advisers (with government funding) sent Russia back to the Stone Age, economically; the “handoff” to Jeffrey Sachs and his HIID of Russia and other former Soviet Republics by the Gehlen/GOP Nazis manifesting through the Free Congress Foundation; review of the operational political continuum stretching from the Third Reich, through the OSS, the CIA and the GOP; review of the roles of Allen Dulles, William Casey, Resorts International and Donald Trump in that continuum.
In past programs, we have briefly noted that military and [ostensibly] civilian programs officially involved with “epidemic prevention” might conceal clandestine biological warfare applications designed to create epidemics.
This program further develops that inquiry
The official distinction between “offensive” and “defensive” biological warfare research is academic.
In that context, one should note that the official title of Unit 731, the notorious Japanese biological warfare unit was “the Epidemic Prevention and Water Purification Department of the Kwantung Army.”
Noteworthy in that general context is the observation by Jonathan King (professor of molecular biology at MIT), that Pentagon research into the application of genetic engineering to biological warfare could be masked as vaccine research, which sounds “defensive.”
In FTR #1130, we noted the role of four-star general Gustave Perna in Trump’s “Operation Warp Speed,” instituted by General Mark Milley, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
Whether the program serves as cover for military research seems a reasonable question to ask, under the circumstances.
In our last program, we weighed New York Times columnist Charles Blow’s thoughts about a white-supremacist minority grouped around the GOP. Blow saw those interests working to preserve their privilege in a number of respects.
This program asks, in effect, if the global equivalent of Blow’s malefactors might be doing something similar with the Covid-19 “op” and related, overlapping clandestine operations. How might the interests we saw in FTR #1128
Selected excerpts of a Whitney Webb article provide insight into the possible offensive nature of programs ostensibly aimed at preventing epidemics. Like Unit 731 (see above), “Epidemic Prevention” may well be masking “epidemic creation.”
In connection with that possibility, the DARPA focus on gene-driving technology is frightening and fraught with devastating possibilities.
Whether or not gene-driving impacts DARPA assisted Covid-19 vaccine development by Moderna and Inovio, the Pentagon underwriting of these firms is of concern.
Some interesting points raised by Dr. Daniel R. Lucey are particularly important in light of the information we have developed in the past about gain of function experiments.
Lucey’s points of inquiry–although not discussed in this article–are particularly important when considered in conjunction with the joint U.S./Chinese program to investigate bat-borne coronaviruses, a program whose American funding apparatus involved USAID, a frequent front for CIA operations.
The gain of function experiments we discussed in FTR #‘s 1116, 1117 and 1121 involving adapting the H5N1 avian flu virus to ferrets is worth contemplating in the context of information indicating that the SARS Cov‑2 virus is particularly infective for ferrets.
Was part of the modified H5N1 flu virus adapted to SARS Cov‑2?
A key factor spurring our suspicion concerning genetic-engineering of one or more variant of the Covid-19 virus concerns a 2015 Gain-of-Function experiment. This should answer Dr. Lucey’s query.
“. . . . Ralph Baric, an infectious-disease researcher at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, last week (November 9) published a study on his team’s efforts to engineer a virus with the surface protein of the SHC014 coronavirus, found in horseshoe bats in China, and the backbone of one that causes human-like severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) in mice. The hybrid virus could infect human airway cells and caused disease in mice. . . . The results demonstrate the ability of the SHC014 surface protein to bind and infect human cells, validating concerns that this virus—or other coronaviruses found in bat species—may be capable of making the leap to people without first evolving in an intermediate host, Nature reported . . . .”
Critics have flagged Gain-Of-Function research as dangerous. Proponents are not dissuaded, including Peter Daszak. “. . . . But Baric and others argued the study’s importance. ‘[The results] move this virus from a candidate emerging pathogen to a clear and present danger,’ Peter Daszak, president of the EcoHealth Alliance, which samples viruses from animals and people in emerging-diseases hotspots across the globe, told Nature. . . .”
Of more than passing interest is the disclosure that the project on bat-borne coronaviruses conducted in the Wuhan laboratory was a joint U.S./Chinese project, and that Ralph Baric was a key American partner in the project.
This is the undertaking about which we have reported and discussed extensively in the past! ” . . . . One of Dr Shi’s co-authors on that paper, Professor Ralph Baric from North Carolina University, said in an interview with ‘Science Daily’ at the time: ‘This virus is highly pathogenic and treatments developed against the original SARS virus in 2002 and the ZMapp drugs used to fight ebola fail to neutralise and control this particular virus.’ . . . .”
We note that the WIV project co-funded by USAID involved genetic manipulation of bat-borne coronaviruses.
” . . . . Now Dr Richard Ebright, an infectious disease expert at Rutgers University (USA), has alerted the public to evidence that WIV and US-based researchers were genetically engineering bat viruses to investigate their ability to infect humans, using commonly used methods that leave no sign or signature of human manipulation. Ebright flagged up a scientific paper published in 2017 by WIV scientists, including Shi Zhengli, the virologist leading the research into bat coronaviruses, working in collaboration with Peter Daszak of the US-based EcoHealth Alliance. Funding was shared between Chinese and US institutions, the latter including the US National Institutes of Health and USAID. The researchers report having conducted virus infectivity experiments where genetic material is combined from different varieties of SARS-related coronaviruses to form novel ‘chimeric’ versions. . . .”
In May, the Trump administration terminated the funding for the project. A key point of analysis was set forth by Dr. Christine Johnson: ” . . . . Virus samples in labs are almost never still infectious, after being frozen in nitrogen during the collection process and then inactivated in the lab to preserve their genetic sequence. . . .