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The genesis of the US nuclear weapons program went hand in hand with the genesis of the US biological weapons program (and of course both were predated by the US chemical weapons program). An important date in both efforts was July 1941:

https://www.osti.gov/opennet/manhattan-project-history/Event...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_Bureau_of_Consultants

The nuclear effort is of course more well known and documented, while relatively few books have been written about the biological & chemical warfare programs, and those that have tend to suffer from large-scale omissions (Korean War, Vietnam War, covert CIA programs, cooperation with Canada and British BW programs, etc.). Nevertheless:

> "Secretary Stimson conveyed the committee's recommendations to President Roosevelt, who in May of 1942 authorized the secretary to create an organization within the Federal Security Agency to conduct the U.S. Biological Warfare Program so as to avoid public concern over America's vulnerability. The exchange of information on this subject with the United Kingdom and Canada, which had been inaugurated some months before, was continued, and provision was made for the interchange of biologic-warfare personnel among the 3 countries (U.S. Army 1977)... In 1942, the U.S. Army Chemical Warfare Service assumed the responsibility for a large-scale research and development program. Fort Detrick in Frederick, MD, was selected to carry out the biologic-warfare task."

https://nap.nationalacademies.org/read/5739/chapter/12

The entire history is fairly insane, as large-scale tests of actual pathogenic bacteria were also conducted over large barges full of animals scattered across large tracts of the open ocean, which also exposed naval soldiers, as revealed c.2001, in tests with names like "Shady Grove" from the early 1960s:

https://www.chicagotribune.com/chi-0110230264oct23-story.htm...

Notably, many elements of the US biological weapons program were revived in the 1990s following revelations of the scale of the Soviet BW programs that continued through the 1970s and 1980s, and many people think those public-private contractor-led programs were the actual source of the anthrax used in the 9/18/2001 and 10/9/2001 anthrax mailings to media and Congress, respectively. The justification was 'we have to make these weapons to study how to defend against them'. Examples include:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Clear_Vision

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Jefferson

This, incidentally, also explains some of the justifications for the gain-of-function research developments of the past two decades (many financed out of Project Bioshield-type funding approved after the anthrax attacks) that appear to have played a leading role in the genesis of the Covid pandemic.




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