Many technologies have dual-use potential and can be used for both civilian and defense purposes, depending on the intentions of those who have them.
German rocket technology, which resulted in the creation of the V-2 ballistic missile during the Second World War, subsequently gave the United States the opportunity to launch its own space exploration programs in the second half of the 20th century. These technologies have also helped the United States develop its own ballistic missiles.
Today, American scientists from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) are working on a project called "insect allies." It involves the use of insects to infect crops with genetically modified viruses that can alter the genetic profiles of these crops to make them more resistant to disease and natural and man-made threats to food supplies. It is not clear how the flight paths of the insects will be controlled to ensure that only designated targets are infested.
DARPA is run by the US Department of Defense and was founded after the Soviet Union launched its first Sputnik in 1957.
The agency issued an official statement stating that there was no hostile intent and that the program is aimed at providing new capabilities to protect the United States, in particular, the ability to respond quickly to threats to food supplies.
DARPA gave these assurances after German and French scientists earlier this month voiced questions and concerns about the program's effectiveness, suggesting that it may be perceived by many as an attempt to develop biological agents and their delivery vehicles for hostile use. And that if this turns out to be true, then it would mean a violation of the Biological Weapons Convention
If such know-how really exists and is declared as a method of transmission of genetically modified viruses, supposedly capable of provoking useful mutations in plants, then what, in this case, can prevent the use of this know-how with the opposite purpose - to use insects as means of delivery of viruses that can lead to the destruction of crops, damage to crops and, in general, have a detrimental effect on the ecosystem.
The next project, funded by DARPA, is the creation of genetically modified mosquitoes and their subsequent release in the Florida Keys so that they can transmit the genetic virus that leads to sterility to their malaria-carrying partners. Apart from the unknown consequences for the ecosystem as a whole, the knowledge gleaned from such studies may one day enable a state, a non-state actor, or a non-state actor acting in the interests of the state to unintentionally or deliberately use insect vectors to spread various biological agents and genetic viruses among an unsuspecting population.
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Gene editing technology has, among other things, made it possible to revive viruses that have already been destroyed. Last year, Canadians were able to synthesize an extinct horsepox virus, harmless to humans, for only $ 100,000, leading to fears that other smallpox viruses could be recreated in a similar way, such as the now eradicated, but deadly a dangerous virus of smallpox, which in the last century alone led to the death of 300 million people.
Technologies of the recovery of extinct viruses from fragments of DNA or viruses that modify the DNA of plants, which are currently related to dark dystopian fiction, may in the near future be modified to create viruses aimed at affecting certain ethnic groups. Curiously, last year, the US Air Force was looking for an opportunity to obtain genetic and tissue samples from Caucasian Russians, while rejecting similar samples from Ukraine.
It is unclear why the US Air Force needed the genetic material from the Russians, although there is no evidence of their malevolent intentions. However, one cannot discount the concerns expressed in the highest echelons of the Russian government about the plan to collect significant amounts of Russian genetic material for unknown purposes.
Presiding at a meeting of the Russian Human Rights Council last year, President Putin said:
“… Do you know that biological material is collected all over the country? Moreover, for different ethnic groups and people living in different geographical points of the Russian Federation. The question is - this is why this is being done … Such activities are carried out purposefully and professionally. We are such an object of great interest,”he said.
Perhaps there is some other, harmless explanation for all this, but no one gives it. The knowledge gained from civilian projects can be modified for military use, even if there are still several years before the era of biogenetic warfare. Although the US government cannot officially authorize the creation of biogenetic weapons, but who can guarantee that it has full control over its huge military intelligence apparatus and over the incomprehensible "deep state". The knowledge to create such weapons can also be transferred from the state to a non-state actor tasked with doing the dirty work.
While the US empire is steadily declining, it is still strong and will continue to play a major role on the world stage for at least a few more years. Nevertheless, countries such as Russia and China are on the rise and are already making it clear that the 21st century is more likely to be a century of a multipolar world than a blueprint for a New American Era.
In recent years, Russia has taken control of a number of US plans, including the creation of a NATO base in Crimea, the destabilization of Russia's neighbors and the transformation of Syria into a rogue state run by terrorists. A small number of immeasurably rich and powerful individuals, as well as allies - Israel and Saudi Arabia, whose fates are closely intertwined with the fate of the United States, can lose everything, and therefore are ready to crush any obstacles in order to postpone the decline of American hegemony and its inevitable fall into the dustbin stories.
The United States and its closest associates have often shown that they have no fears and have very little restrictions when it comes to committing the worst crimes against human rights in the interests of money and power.
The temptation to use biogenetic weapons to curb a growing rival may one day be too strong to resist.
Sergey "Avarron" Afanasiev