Synopsis
This shocking report details the production of biological weapons. Readers are invited into a Soviet bioweapons lab to observe scientists tampering with some of the world's deadliest viruses, including anthrax, smallpox, and ebola.
| Details | | Publication Date: | 1999-05-01 |
| Size | | Length: | 319 pages | | Height: | 9.8 in | | Width: | 6.5 in | | Thickness: | 1.2 in | | Weight: | 21.6 oz |
Publisher's Note
For fifty years, while the world stood in terror of a nuclear war, Russian scientists hidden in heavily guarded secret cities refined and stockpiled a new kind of weapon of mass destruction - an invisible weapon that would strike in silence and could not be traced. It would leave hundreds of thousands dead in its wake and would continue to spread devastation long after its release. The scientists were bioweaponeers, working to perfect the tools of a biological Armageddon. Ken Alibek began his career as a doctor wanting to save lives and ended up running the Soviet biological weapons program - a secret military empire masquerading as a pharmaceutical company. At its peak, the program employed sixty thousand people at over one hundred facilities. Biohazard is a terrifying, fast-paced account of tests and leaks, accidents and disasters in the labs, KGB threats and assassinations. The book is full of revelations - evidence of biowarfare programs in Cuba and India, actual deployments at Stalingrad and in Afghanistan, experiments with mood-altering agents, a contingency plan to attack major American cities, and the true story behind the mysterious anthrax outbreak in Sverdlovsk. But beyond these is a twisted world of lies and mirrors, and the riveting parable of the greatest perversion of science in history.
Industry Reviews
"Alibek tells the story of the development of Soviet bacteriological weapons in the context of his own unusual life, providing entertaining (and frequently bloodcurdling) details and anecdotes. His scientific and technical elucidations are both highly competent and readily comprehensible to any lay reader."
Literary Review - Oleg Gordievsky (06/19/1999)
"Alibek's medical training and military discipline may account for the book's clinical tone, which, juxtaposed with the factual presentation, can make a reader's skin crawl....Should be required reading for those in the national security and public health fields...."
Smithson
"...[A] first-class book....Alibek provides mountains of facts as well as insights into the Byzantine intrigues and power struggles within the Soviet system."
British Medical Journal (Internet) - Fred Charatan (10/16/1999)
| See an error? Submit a change request |
All rights reserved.
