LONDON: War has always been a great stimulus to technological development. For centuries the military have been assiduously harnessing science in the pursuit of more effective ways of killing people. This usually involves creating and delivering bigger bangs, but from antiquity armies have also experimented with other methods of destruction. Shortly after developing their chemical industries, the German and then the British military began experimenting with chemical warfare. Similarly, as the links between infective agents and disease became clear, the potentials of biological warfare were explored. From the second world war onwards, the cold war powers devoted considerable resources to developing what became known in the military as ‘bugs and gas’.

Yet with some exceptions, such as the Iran-Iraq conflict, ‘bugs and gas’ have not been a major part of war fighting. Nor have they played a very important part in what are now called ‘asymmetric wars’- those waged by terrorist groups, who also prefer the conventional ways of causing big bangs. Before Sept 11, much had been written about why chemical and biological warfare (CBW) had not figured more prominently. The reassuring argument was that those who could and did manufacture serious weapons of mass destruction (WMD in the jargon) - nation states and the more organized terrorist groups - would not use them as there would be no political purpose in doing so, and the certainty of massive retaliation would make such an attack suicidal.

On the other hand, those who might like to use them - fanatics at home and abroad - did not know how to. Timothy McVeigh used a fertilizer bomb in Oklahoma. When terrorists did use them, as when the Aum Shinrikyo cult introduced sarin nerve gas into the Tokyo subway, casualties were relatively light. Of course, there were many voices to the contrary, painting lurid apocalyptic scenarios in papers and reports, but these could be seen as politicking by organizations desperate to discover a post-cold war threat and thus secure their own survival.

America appears close to panic, and Britain is not far behind. Is the US overreacting? From the military perspective, chemical and biological weapons are actually not very good. If they were, then those in command of armed forces across the globe would not have acquiesced in international treaties banning their use.

Armies do not willingly forgo weapons that they need, no matter how great the moral outrage. In fact, modern armies believe they are well capable of fighting wars without the assistance of these weapons. Biological weapons have virtually no military value, not least because any effects are usually delayed, unpredictable, and as likely to cause harm to friend as to foe.

Likewise, chemical weapons are difficult to deliver in any substantial quantities to where they are needed on the battlefield. When one considers that it would be hard to find a place on the planet where more people were crowded into such a small area, what is remarkable about the attack on the Tokyo subway is not how many physical casualties were caused, but how few.

CBW weapons, especially if used by the non-military, are also risky to the perpetrator. Researchers in a CIA study used publicly available sources of information, such as the Internet, to construct chemical weapons, and concluded that there was a high probability that people trying to do so would kill themselves. The book notes that in US attempts to develop biological weapons, there were 456 occasions on which scientists became infected by the pathogens they were developing. Three of these were fatal.

But before we all succumb to panic, some cautions are needed. For some years, Britain has taken a less aggressive and less expensive stance on biowarfare preparations. The technical challenges of delivery remain substantial. A Marburg martyr would be committing suicide, but is very unlikely to cause many other casualties. Tragically, one anthrax victim in the US has died, but others were reported well. The Aum cult tried repeatedly to use anthrax in their first attacks on the Tokyo subway. No one noticed.

For a terror weapon to work, people must be terrified. Before the second world war, military planners and politicians alike were convinced that area bombing would produce a collapse of civilian morale and the will to fight. The blitz demonstrated this to be singularly incorrect. Thirty years of IRA activity has caused inconvenience, but civil society has taken it in its stride. If the novelty of chemical and biological weapons wears off, then the weapons themselves will lose most of their potency. —Dawn/The Guardian News Service.