New documentary sheds light on Canadian WWII anthrax program

I was not aware of this. Very Interesting! Didn't think the allies would stoop to this level

New documentary sheds light on Canadian WWII anthrax program | Bio Prep Watch

 

War brings out the worst in people. Not surprised that Grosse-Ile is named either.

The "Allies" also made the Agent family of chemicals in Eastern Canada during the Vietnam War. They even tested them on rural towns/hamlets before sending them to Vietnam, the people that were impacted by them have tried to get the government to fess up but no luck so far.

 

I was unaware of that Canadian connection to the plan. But that was part of the existing British "Operation Vegetarian", which had been in development since 1942, and was ready to go in mid-1944. It was held back because of the success of the Normandy landings. Britain had manufactured five million anthrax laced "cattle cakes" and planned to drop them on Germany in 1944. The aim of Churchill's "Operation Vegetarian" was to wipe out the German beef and dairy herds and then see the bacterium spread to the human population. This was designed to be dispersed using returning bombers on their way home from dropping their regular loads, they could then release these little "bomblets" out through the flare dispenser tubes.

With people then having no widespread access to antibiotics, this would have caused many thousands, perhaps even millions of German men, women and children to die. The anthrax cakes were tested on Gruinard Island, off Wester Ross, which was only finally cleared of contamination in 1990. "Operation Vegetarian" was planned for the summer of 1944 but it was abandoned as the Allies' Normandy invasion progressed successfully.

Details of the wartime secret operation are contained in a series of War Office files (WO 188) at the Public Record Office in Kew. Some of the files remain classified even yet. The man whose task was to carry out "Operation Vegetarian" was Dr. Paul Fildes, director of the biology department at Porton Down near Salisbury in Wiltshire.

The British work on anthrax, or "N" as it was code-named, in the weapon form led (1943) to the design of an "N" bomb suitable for mass production by we Americans. Each particular set of munitions weighed 1.8 kilograms (4 pounds). 106 of these "bomblets" were to be packed into a 225 kilogram (500 pound) cluster-bomb canister and dropped over Nazi population and dairy production centers. There was a second delivery method which would have been even more effective. That was to separate the small "bomblets" out of the cluster bomb, and disperse them out of the flare tubes as the planes returned from normal bombing runs at night. This would insure wide distribution of the cakes, and save on time/weight, and possible discovery by the Nazis as an intentional attack.

The whole thing was protected by the highest level of secrecy; TOP SECRET:GUARD (which we Americans described jokingly as "DESTROY BEFORE READING!"). An initial pilot batch of 5,000 "N bombs" was produced at Camp Dietrich in May 1944, and medium-scale production at a rate of about 50,000 bomblets a month followed. The bomblets were then turned over to the British, who stockpiled them. The plant at Vigo, Indiana, was designed for production of 500,000 anthrax bombs per month. The plant was never put into full operation, partly because of extreme concerns over its safety to our own local populace, but also coupled with the success of the Normandy invasion a month later in June of 1944. By the end of the war, it had been converted into antibiotic production, though it could have easily been converted back to bio-weapons manufacture if the need had arisen.

As mentioned, fortunately this plan was never needed nor implimented.