Abstract
Due to historical and legislation reasons, the category of bioweapons is rather poorly defined. Authors often disagree on involving or excluding agents like hormones, psychochemicals, certain plants and animals (such as weeds or pests) or synthetic organisms. Applying a wide definition apparently threatens by eroding the regime of international legislation, while narrow definitions abandon several important issues. Therefore, I propose a category of ‘biological weapons sensu lato’ (BWsl) that is defined here as any tool of human aggression whose acting principle is based on disciplines of biology including particularly microbiology, epidemiology, medical biology, physiology, psychology, pharmacology and ecology, but excluding those based on inorganic agents. Synthetically produced equivalents (not necessarily exact copies) and mock weapons are also included. This definition does not involve any claim to subject all these weapons to international legislation but serves a purely scholarly purpose. BWsl may be properly categorized on the base of the magnitude of the human population potentially targeted (4 levels: individuals, towns, countries, global) and the biological nature of the weapons’ intended effects (4 levels: agricultural-ecological agents, and non-pathogenic, pathogenic, or lethal agents against humans).
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Atlas RM, Dando M (2006) The dual-use dilemma for the life sciences: perspectives, conundrums, and global solutions. Biosecur Bioterror 4:276–286
Cello J, Paul AV, Wimmer E (2002) Chemical synthesis of Poliovirus cDNA: generation of infectious virus in the absence of natural template. Science 297(5583):1016–1018
Cole LA (1999) Risks of publicity about bioterrorism: anthrax hoaxes and hype. Am J Infect Control 27:470–473
Dando MR (1994) Biological warfare in the 21st Century. Brassey’s, London
Dando M (2001) Genomics, bioregulators, cell receptors and potential biological weapons. Def Anal 17:239–257
Dando M (2011) Advances in neuroscience and the Biological and Toxin Weapons Convention. Biotechnology Research International, Article ID 973851
Dennis DT, Inglesby TV, Henderson DA, Bartlett JG, Ascher MS, Eitzen E et al (2001) Tularemia as a biological weapon: medical and public health management. JAMA 285:2763–2773
Galston AW (2001) Falling leaves and ethical dilemmas: Agent Orange in Vietnam. In: Galston AW, Shurr EG (eds) New dimensions in bioethics: science, ethics and the formulation of public policy. Springer, Dordrecht, pp 109–124
Gilsdorf JR, Zilinskas RA (2005) New considerations in infectious disease outbreaks: the threat of genetically modified microbes. Clin Infect Dis 40:1160–1175
Gould C, Hay A (2006) The South African biological weapons program. In: Wheelis M, Rozsa L, Dando M (eds) Deadly cultures: biological weapons since 1945. Harvard University Press, Cambridge, pp 191–212
Guthrie R (2010) Effectiveness of international efforts to control biological weapons: activities of the European Union and the limits of regime theory. Dissertation, University of Bath
Hall JA, Moore CBT (2008) Drug facilitated sexual assault—a review. J Forensic Leg Med 15:291–297
Harris SH (2002) Factories of death: Japanese biological warfare, 1932–1945, and the American cover-up. Routledge, New York
Hart J (2006) The Soviet biological weapons program. In: Wheelis M, Rozsa L, Dando M (eds) Deadly cultures: biological weapons since 1945. Harvard University Press, Cambridge MA, pp 132–156
Kagan E (2001) Bioregulators as instruments of terror. Clin Lab Med 21:607–618
League of Nations (1925) Protocol for the prohibition of the use in war of asphyxiating, poisonous or other gases, and of bacteriological methods of warfare. http://disarmament.un.org/treaties/t/1925/text. Accessed 19 May 2014
Lockwood JA (2008) Six-legged soldiers: using insects as weapons of war. Oxford University Press, New York
Maher J, Pierpoint H (2011) Friends, status symbols and weapons: the use of dogs by youth groups and youth gangs. Crime Law Soc Change 55:405–420
McNeill JR, Unger CR (2010) Environmental histories of the Cold War. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge
Null G (2003) Germs, biological warfare, vaccinations: what you need to know. Seven Stories, New York
Phills JA, Harrold AJ, Whiteman GV, Perelmutter L (1972) Pulmonary infiltrates, asthma and eosinophilia due to Ascaris suum infestation in man. New Eng J Med 286:965–970
Prusiner SB (1982) Novel proteinaceous infectious particles cause scrapie. Science 216(4542):136–144
RIA Novosti (2012) Ukraine brings back naval killer dolphins. http://en.rian.ru/military_news/20121011/176548999.html. Accessed 19 May 2014
Roberge LF (2013) Analysis of introduced species as a form of biological weapon: part 1—theory and approaches. Biosafety 2:107
Rotz LD, Khan AS, Lillibridge SR, Ostroff SM, Hughes JM (2002) Public health assessment of potential biological terrorism agents. Emerg Infect Dis 8:225–230
Rózsa L (2000) Spite, xenophobia, and collaboration between hosts and parasites. Oikos 91:396–400
Rózsa L (2009) The motivation for biological aggression is an inherent and common aspect of the human behavioural repertoire. Med Hypotheses 72:217–219
Scott-Ham M, Burton FC (2005) Toxicological findings in cases of alleged drug-facilitated sexual assault in the United Kingdom over a 3-year period. J Clin Forensic Med 12(4):175–186
Strelkauskas AJ, Strelkauskas J, Moszyk-Strelkauskas D (2010) Microbiology: a clinical approach. Garland Science, New York
Tucker JB (2012) Innovation, dual use, and security: managing the risks of emerging biological and chemical technologies. MIT Press, Cambridge
United Nations (1972) Convention on the prohibition of the development, production and stockpiling of bacteriological (biological) and toxin weapons and on their destruction. http://www.opbw.org/convention/conv.html. Accessed 5 May 2014
United Nations (1992) Convention on the prohibition of the development, production, stockpiling and use of chemical weapons and on their destruction. http://www.opcw.org/chemical-weapons-convention. Accessed 19 May 2014
US Department of Health and Human Services, National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (2003) Biodefense research agenda for category B and C priority pathogens. NIH Publication No. 03-53152003. http://www.niaid.nih.gov/topics/BiodefenseRelated/Biodefense/Documents/categorybandc.pdf. Accessed 19 May 2014
van Courtland Moon JE (2006) The US biological weapons program. In: Wheelis M, Rozsa L, Dando M (eds) Deadly cultures: biological weapons since 1945. Harvard University Press, Cambridge MA, pp 9–46
Wheelis ML (1998) First shots fired in biological warfare. Nature 395(6695):213
Wheelis M, Sugishima M (2006) Terrorist use of biological weapons. In: Wheelis M, Rozsa L, Dando M (eds) Deadly cultures: biological weapons since 1945. Harvard University Press, Cambridge, pp 284–303
Whitby SM (2002) Biological warfare against crops. Palgrave, Hampshire
Zierler D (2011) The invention of ecocide: Agent Orange, Vietnam, and the scientists who changed the way we think about the environment. University of Georgia Press, Athens
Acknowledgments
This research was supported by the EU and Hungary, co-financed by the European Social Fund in the framework of TÁMOP 4.2.4. A/2-11-1-2012-0001 ‘National Excellence’ Program.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Rozsa, L. A proposal for the classification of biological weapons sensu lato. Theory Biosci. 133, 129–134 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12064-014-0204-0
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12064-014-0204-0