As on 7 April, Covid-19 had infected 1,431,073 people globally and some 82,096 had died. United Nations Conference on Trade & Development (UNCTAD) has estimated the loss to the global economy as over $1 trillion. International Monetary Fund (IMF) anticipated that its negative impact would far exceed that of the 2008 recession, which was largely a localised aberration. This pandemic is truly global because it has affected almost 200 countries, so far.

In India, the focus has understandably been on the medical aspects of this epidemic. The prime minister of India rightly gave priority to saving human lives over preserving the economy. This Hobson’s choice had delayed reactions in Europe and America until it was too late. A total national level lockdown was, however, ordered in India at a relatively early stage of the outbreak of this pandemic. What we have missed completely so far has been any discussion about the national security implications of his pandemic. The focus in this issue of IMR, therefore, has been precisely on the national security dimensions of this pandemic.

Few people know that the USA and China have been very actively engaged in research on bat-borne strains of the coronavirus. Thus, in 2018, USA and China jointly funded a study in South China, which identified 89 new strains of bat-borne coronaviruses. The US biological research Lab at Maryland had cooperated extensively with the infamous Chinese Institute of Virology at Wuhan in this study. The US has two more labs specializing in biological warfare In Kazakhstan and Georgia. China has two labs focusing on biological warfare at Wuhan. A study of Chinese military doctrines shows a very heavy emphasis on exploiting biological warfare as first strikes in its strategy for non-contact warfare scenarios designed to bring a nation down to its knees without firing a shot. Our study indicates that over a 100 strains of novel bat-borne coronaviruses have already been isolated and harvested and, as such, there was no need to create such a genetically modified virus in the lab. The accidental release theories, thus, do not stand. That leaves us with the far more grim scenario of deliberate release/spread. Biological attacks could, thus, be the opening salvos of a deliberate non-contact warfare offensive.

National Security Dimensions

To empirically analyse this issue, we at IMR crystallized four causative scenarios and then war gamed them in the light of known facts about the biological warfare capabilities and research profiles on this subject in USA and China. We then took a very specific look at extant doctrines of military use of pathogens as part of unrestricted warfare or non-contact warfare. These four scenarios are:

•             Scenario One – Natural epidemic originating In the wet markets of Wuhan.
•             Scenario Two – Accidental release from lab in Wuhan.
•             Scenario Three – Deliberate release of natural bat-borne coronaviral strains by China in Wuhan to trigger global crisis and then make economic gains
•             Scenario 4 – A biological war between USA and China as an escalation of economic warfare.

Virologists and microbiologists so far are focused on Scenario 1, ie, a natural epidemic originating in the wet markets of Wuhan as the real cause. Their major complaint is about China’s delay in warning the world. This accepted wisdom needs greater analysis.

Both China and USA have accused each other of deliberate/ accidental release of this virus in Wuhan. Lab made/ genetically engineered coronaviruses were not required. Over a 100 such strains were naturally available. The strain that broke out in Wuhan was a milder single-mutation strain that is not so dangerous or fatal. Its gene-sequencing was done in India from our students who were evacuated from Wuhan. The one in Italy was far more dangerous and fatal (its hook protein molecule that latches on to the host human cell had undergone three mutations).

Could China have released the milder one in Wuhan and the more dangerous one in Europe (Italy) and USA to win the economic war, weaken the dollar and gain global economic hegemony? Alternatively, is the Chinese accusation of the US military releasing it in Wuhan correct or purely a propaganda stance to counter US accusations? Was that then the start of a biological war exchange? We have examined all these speculations in this issue.

Military Literature

Chinese military literature has talked of the biological aspects of war for the last two decades. It started with a book on Unrestricted Warfare by two Chinese senior colonels in 1999. More recently, in 2010, we had a book “War for Power” by Guo Jiwei of the Chinese Army University, which outlined a concept of war with biological characteristics. The 2017 edition of the PLA’s “Science of Military Strategy” has added a new chapter – “Biology as a Domain of Military Struggle”. It could not be more explicit. The PLA has been scripting biowarfare in their strategic discourse for more than two decades now. Devastated by the Covid pandemic the world cannot ignore these writings as theoretical moonshine.

The post Editorial: The Coronavirus Pandemic appeared first on IMR.

The novel coronavirus pandemic has been a truly unprecedented Black Swan event with a major and devastating impact on global health and economy. 209 countries have been  hit so far and some 1,431,973 people infected till 7 April 2020, of whom some 82,096 have died. It has resulted in a complete shutdown of all the major cities in the world.

The unprecedented bloodbath in the stock markets  in USA, UK and Canada saw the markets tumble by 25-26% and by 14% in India. By sharp contrast, the stock market in China (after an initial freefall) was at 0.3 % gain. As per the UN Trade and Development Agency (UNCTAD) the global economy has taken a hit of some $1 trillion and could engender a recession, perhaps, greater in magnitude than the one we encountered in 2008. In fact, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has said the global impact of the coronavirus will approximate that of the Recession of 2008 and possibly surpass it. Other economists point out that the 2008 implosion was due to dysfunction in US housing lending and these toxic bonds largely affected US banks and their associates elsewhere. The coronavirus pandemic, however, is truly a global shock and whole nations are in lockdown including Europe and America. Its economic impact, therefore, is likely to be much more severe. The world has been shaken by this Black Swan event. How come no one saw it coming? How has it come about so suddenly? What caused it?

The chart below gives the country wise populations effected and Numbers who died till 7 April 2020.

Coronavirus Global Cases, 7 April 2020

Country       Cases            Deaths
USA             400,489        12,857
Spain           141,942        14,045
Italy            135,586        17,127
France         109,069        10,328
Germany     107,663         2,016
China            81,802         3,333
Iran              62,589         3,872
UK                55,242         6,159
Turkey          34,109            725
Switzerland   22,253            821
India              5,351            160

Causative Scenarios

This is an analyses of four likely causative scenarios, which could have triggered this pandemic.

• Scenario 1 – Natural Occurrence. It was a naturally occurring disease. It was a novel coronavirus that made the jump from bats to humans in the wet markets of Wuhan and, thereafter, spontaneously spread from this ground zero to the whole world.
• Scenario 2 – Accidental Release. It was a genetically engineered virus that escaped from a Chinese biological research facility (Institute of Virology) at Wuhan and the infection spread from there to the whole world. The release of the pathogen was purely accidental. However, China very deliberately held back information on this outbreak and let it become a pandemic.
• Scenario 3 – Deliberate Release. Recent Chinese and American studies have both identified some 89 bat-based coronaviruses in south China. Perhaps, some of these were deliberately released by China in Wuhan after it had developed their vaccines. Armed with the first movers advantage, it rapidly arrested the spread of this epidemic in China even as it ensured that it rapidly spread to USA and Europe. The aim was to torpedo the Western economies even as its own resuscitated economy stood to make major gains at the expense of other industrial powers. This non-contact warfare strategy was succinctly summed up by Wion TV  thus – China put the world in ICU and then sold it ventilators!
• Scenario 4 – Retaliation Attack. This scenario stems from accusations made by Chinese officials (Zhao Lijian of the Chinese foreign ministry) that the US military deliberately released the coronavirus In Wuhan. Should that have been the case, the Chinese seem to have responded with a coronavirus strain that deliberately targets Caucasians (or is more lethal than the strain let loose in Wuhan). As the casualties show, it has been rather lethal against Italy, America and some other European countries (depending upon the demographics of age profile of the population). This then becomes the scenario of an economic war between USA and China, which escalates into a biological warfare exchange of attacks with Wuhan as the Pearl Harbour of a new Third World War, so to speak. This has commenced with non-contact strikes engendered by biological viruses.

From the Known to the Unknown

To analyze the four scenarios in terms of probability and plausibility, the methodology we employed was to take an inventory of the biological warfare and research facilities available in China and USA, their current research areas and then the national/military doctrines for the employment of biological warfare weapons for the deliberate attack scenarios. We will proceed from the known to the unknown. To examine the first two scenarios of natural outbreak or accidental release, we examined the views expressed by virological or  micro-biological experts in the light of current research and then looked at how this pandemic has spread on ground.

Examination of Scenario One – Natural Occurrence

Somehow, the consensus so far in the scientific community is that it is a naturally evolved or mutated coronavirus and shows no signs of having been genetically engineered in a laboratory. Majority of the virologists felt that the protein sequence of the coronavirus has evolved naturally and was not constructed in a laboratory as part of genetic engineering. Hence, they seem to rule out the accidental release thesis on this ground alone. There are, however, some caveats here.

A recent study done in 2018 in South China on bats had resulted in the discovery of 89 new novel bat coronavirus strains that used the same receptors as Middle Eastern Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) virus. Authors of the study did the genome sequencing of two of these strains and noted that the current MERS vaccine would not be effective against them. This study was jointly funded by the Chinese Academy of Sciences and USAID and US National Institute of Health. So, it is not essential that the bat coronaviruses, if employed for a deliberate attack, had perforce to be genetically modified ones. Over a 100 natural strains of bat-borne coronavirus are available and could have been employed. That opens up a whole range of possible scenarios.

Four Types of Corona Virus Strains

Dr N Nageshwara Reddy, Chairman Asian institute of Gastroentolgy points out that the coronavirus is an RNA-based virus. It originated in the mid-December or earlier in Wuhan and then travelled to USA, Italy and Europe and then after a lag of 2-3weeks it came to India. Thus, the world had some 3-4 weeks to study this virus. Small mutations occurred that enabled this virus to transfer from bats to humans. Genome sequencing of this virus has since been done in four countries – USA, Italy, China and India. The genotyping of these strains are different. He points out that the genome sequencing results in India and Italy are different. It was discovered that in India, there was a single genome mutation that occurred in the spike protein of the genome. It is this spike protein area that attaches the to the host cell in humans. This made the attachment to the host cell rather weak. On the other hand, in the Italian coronavirus, three mutations had occurred making the attachment to the host cell much stronger. This made the Italian virus far deadlier than its Indian variant. The Indian sample was taken from Indian students who had been evacuated from Wuhan. This could lead to the following set of speculations:

• For purposes of any biological/ viral attack a lab made, genetically modified bug was not the only option. There were 89 novel  bat coronavirus strains that had been identified in China itself and any of these natural occurring viruses could be used for the purposes of biological attack. Only one person or a set of persons had to be infected with a given strain to mount the attack.
• Genome sequencing of these bat coronaviruses highlights the fact that different strains with differing levels of mutation had been encountered in different countries. The ones encountered in Europe, especially Italy, were far more deadly strains than those encountered in Wuhan, where the Indian students were stranded. These points may please be noted for we will return to them later in this analysis.

Deliberate Attack Scenario

To analyse this aspect we will take an inventory of biological warfare capabilities, research facilities and extant doctrines on the use of biological warfare in America and China. Due to the relatively more open nature of society in USA, far greater levels of Information are available there. Since these organisations are largely replicated in China we will commence our discussion with US facilities and doctrines. It is noteworthy that during the Cold War both the USA and USSR had massive stockpiles of chemical and biological warfare weapons. Work on these was halted in 1969 and the Toxic & Biological Weapons Convention was finally ratified in 1975.

United States of America

In 2017-2018, the Pentagon was greatly concerned that bats could be used against  the USA as biological weapons for novel coronaviruses. There were reports that the Russians and Chinese were trying to develop such capabilities. Hence, this research was deemed defensive and reactive even though it did have an offensive component. Thus, sometime in 2017, the Defense Advanced Projects Research Agency (DARPA) and the Cooperative Threat Reduction Program (CTRP) began funding research involving bats and other deadly pathogens including caronaviruses like MERS, SARS and Ebola, etc. There was a programme to preempt  emerging pathogenic threats (PREEMPT program)  announced in April 2018 that focused on animal reservoirs of disease – especially bats and camels. In fact, DARPA spent $10 million on one programme in 2018 to unravel complex causes of bat-borne viruses that had recently made the jump to humans. Another project studied several new strains of corona viruses carried by bats both within China and in countries bordering China. There are three key US laboratories engaged in this biological warfare-based research programmes. These are:

• US Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases (USAMIRD). This facility is located at Fort Detrick Maryland and was studying deadly pathogens  including coronaviruses, Ebola and others. On 20 July 2019, the American Centre For Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) ordered it to halt all research after it found that it lacked facilities to decontaminate waste water. However, CDC allowed it to partially resume research in November 2019. This US facility has a decade old and close partnership with the infamous University of Wuhan’s Institute of Virology.
• Kazhakastan-based Research Institute for Bio-Safety Problems. The Khazakastan National Centre for Biotechnology had received millions of dollars from the US government. This is an Ideal location for research on bat-based coronaviruses for it borders both Russia and China. A US government-funded study here discovered yet more new strains of novel bat coronaviruses. This study was published in 2019 under the title “Discovery and Characteristics of Novel Bat Coronavirus Lineages from Khazakistan.” This study focused on bat-fauna of Central Asia with links to China and East Europe. It found great similarities in bats of China, France, Spain and South Africa suggesting co-circulation of coronaviruses with overlapping geographical distribution. Bats from Khazakastan migrate to China. This institute is the official depository of highly dangerous animal and bird infections with a collection of 278 pathogens and strains of 46 infectious diseases.
• Lugan Centre Georgia. This is said to be a covert US biological weapons laboratory. Sketchy details are available but it is ideally suited to target Russia and do research based on animal and bird species native to that region. Such research labs in far away countries also minimize risks to own populations in cases of accidental release of pathogens.

US Doctrinal Aspects

• 2018 US Bio-Defense Strategy Document. This is an authoritative text and talks of minimizing the risk of bio-threats as a vital national interest of the US. These threats could be due to naturally occurring diseases, accidents involving dangerous pathogens and, finally, deliberate attacks using bio-agents.
• Race/ Ethnicity Specific Bio-agents. The US think tank – Project for a New American Century – had openly advocated the use of race/ ethnicity specific, genetically modified bio-weapons as politically useful tools. Much research has been done in USA and Israel in developing super viruses that will target a certain type of genetic profile. This is a class of bio-weapons that exploit the MHC class of receptor molecules in the immune system that differs among races. It has to do with changing parts of that super virus that bind on the cellular receptors of targeted races. Thus, we could have bio-weapons that attack only Arabs and do not harm the Jews.
• Russia’s Maj Gen Kirilov, Head of Russian Military Radiation, Chemical and Biological Protection unit, accused the US military of harvesting DNA from Russians as part of a covert bio-weapons programme for specific ethnicities. China has also accused the US military of harvesting DNA from Chinese citizens surreptitiously. Whether these are serious allegations or just pro-forma accusations for propaganda advantage, remains to be seen.

Chinese Biological Warfare Capabilities and Doctrines

Chinese society is the most opaque and secretive. Hence, little information is available in the open domain and often recourse has to be made to Western media sources. A recent  Washington Times report claimed that Wuhan has two laboratories linked to China’s biological warfare programme. It cited reports of Israeli bio-warfare specialist Dany Shoham for this. The Wuhan Institute of Virology, under its Director Maj Gen Shi Zhingli, is China’s main laboratory for bio-warfare. Gen Shing Li is also the head of Institute of Bioengineering Academy of Military Sciences at Beijing. Maj Gen Chen Wei is the Chinese military’s top epidomologist and virologist. Reportedly, it is he who led the efforts for the creation of Covid-19 and then the fight against it. These individuals have been cited by name by US lawyer Larry Klayman who has filed a $20 trillion lawsuit against the Chinese government for Covid-19. He asserts that the US intelligence agencies have adequate proof of coronavirus as a Chinese bio-weapons programme.

Some reports have cited a 3 February 2020 speech by Chinese President Xi Jinping to the Politburo Standing Committee. It cited him as saying how, on 7 January, he personally had issued orders to prevent and control the coronavirus. “Laboratory safety was a national security issue”. This speech has been cited as evidence by proponents of the coronavirus lab leak scenario. The Chinese, however, insist that it was a natural occurrence and cited Patient Zero – a Chinese woman who was selling shrimps in the Wuhan wet market. Earlier a man had been cited.

Chinese Doctrinal Approach

In 1999, two Chinese senior Colonels Quiao Liang and Wang Xiangsi had written a path-breaking book called “Unrestricted Warfare: China’s Master plan to Destroy America.” It was largely a theoretical manual on non contact warfare and using all means – military and non-military to bring an adversary to his knees – preferably without fighting.

More recently, in 2010, we had a book “War for Power” by Guo Jiwei of the Chinese Army University, which outlined a concept of war with biological characteristics.

Coming to the present, the 2017 edition of the PLA’s “Science of Military Strategy” has added a new chapter – “Biology as a Domain of Military Struggle.” It could not be more explicit. The PLA has been scripting bio-warfare in their strategic discourse for more than two decades now. The cross integration of Biotechnology, Genetic Engineering and Information Technology has aided the evolution of this line of thinking in non-contact warfare – the new buzzword in Chinese strategic thinking.

Non-Contact Warfare. Non-contact warfare seeks to employ all elements of national power to leverage their influence across multiple domains through kinetic and non-kinetic means with a view to intimidate, paralyse or denude the enemy’s politico military response capabilities and enable winning without fighting or fight with minimal physical contact of our forces. The goal of non-contact warfare is to collapse the enemy systems into confusion and disorder. Biological warfare can actualize the Sun Tzu dictum – the acme of excellence is to subdue the enemy without fighting. It is an important element of non-contact warfare.

(See also “The Speculations Against China”

The post Pandemic : Analysis of the Corona Virus Pandemic appeared first on IMR.

December 6: According to a study in The Lancet, the symptom onset date of the first patient identified was Dec 1, 2019.

December 21: Wuhan doctors begin to notice a “cluster of pneumonia cases with an unknown cause.”

December 25: Chinese medical staff in two hospitals in Wuhan are suspected of contracting viral pneumonia and are quarantined. This is additional strong evidence of human-to-human transmission.

Sometime in “Late December”: Wuhan hospitals notice “an exponential increase” in the number of cases that cannot be linked back to the Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market, according to the New England Journal of Medicine.

December 30: Dr. Li Wenliang sent a message to a group of other doctors warning them about a possible outbreak of an illness that resembled severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS), urging them to take protective measures against infection.

December 31: The Wuhan Municipal Health Commission declares, “The investigation so far has not found any obvious human-to-human transmission and no medical staff infection.” This is the opposite of the belief of the doctors working on patients in Wuhan, and two doctors were already suspected of contracting the virus.

Three weeks after doctors first started noticing the cases, China contacts the World Health Organization.

January 1: The Wuhan Public Security Bureau issued summons to Dr. Li Wenliang, accusing him of “spreading rumors.” Two days later, at a police station, Dr. Li signed a statement acknowledging his “misdemeanor” and promising not to commit further “unlawful acts.” Seven other people are arrested on similar charges and their fate is unknown.

Also that day, “after several batches of genome sequence results had been returned to hospitals and submitted to health authorities, an employee of one genomics company received a phone call from an official at the Hubei Provincial Health Commission, ordering the company to stop testing samples from Wuhan related to the new disease and destroy all existing samples.”

According to a New York Times study of cellphone data from China, 175,000 people leave Wuhan that day. According to global travel data research firm OAG, 21 countries have direct flights to Wuhan. In the first quarter of 2019 for comparison, 13,267 air passengers traveled from Wuhan, China, to destinations in the United States, or about 4,422 per month. The U.S. government would not bar foreign nationals who had traveled to China from entering the country for another month.

January 2: One study of patients in Wuhan can only connect 27 of 41 infected patients to exposure to the Huanan seafood market – indicating human-to-human transmission away from the market.

Also on this day, the Wuhan Institute of Virology completed mapped the genome of the virus. The Chinese government would not announce that breakthrough for another week.

January 3: The Chinese government continued efforts to suppress all information about the virus: “China’s National Health Commission, the nation’s top health authority, ordered institutions not to publish any information related to the unknown disease, and ordered labs to transfer any samples they had to designated testing institutions, or to destroy them.”

Roughly one month after the first cases in Wuhan, the United States government is notified. Robert Redfield, the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, gets initial reports about a new coronavirus from Chinese colleagues.

Also on this day, the Wuhan Municipal Health Commission released another statement, repeating, “As of now, preliminary investigations have shown no clear evidence of human-to-human transmission and no medical staff infections.”

January 4: The head of the University of Hong Kong’s Centre for Infection, Ho Pak-leung, warned that “the city should implement the strictest possible monitoring system for a mystery new viral pneumonia that has infected dozens of people on the mainland, as it is highly possible that the illness is spreading from human to human.”

January 6: The New York Times publishes its first report about the virus, declaring that “59 people in the central city of Wuhan have been sickened by a pneumonia-like illness.”

Also that day, the CDC  “issued a level 1 travel watch – the lowest of its three levels – for China’s outbreak.

Also that day, the CDC offered to send a team to China to assist with the investigation. The Chinese government declined, but a WHO team that included two Americans would visit February 16.

January 8: Chinese medical authorities claim to have identified the virus.

January 10: After unknowingly treating a patient with the Wuhan coronavirus, Dr. Li Wenliang started coughing and developed a fever. He was hospitalized on January 12. In the following days, Li’s condition deteriorated so badly that he was admitted to the intensive care unit and given oxygen support.

January 11: The Wuhan City Health Commission issues an update declaring, “All 739 close contacts, including 419 medical staff, have undergone medical observation and no related cases have been found . . . No new cases have been detected since January 3, 2020. At present, no medical staff infections have been found, and no clear evidence of human-to-human transmission has been found.”

Also on this day, political leaders in Hubei province, which includes Wuhan, began their regional meeting. The coronavirus was not mentioned over four days of meetings.

January 13: Authorities in Thailand detected the virus in a 61-year-old Chinese woman who was visiting from Wuhan, the first case outside of China.

January 14: Wuhan city health authorities release another statement declaring, “Among the close contacts, no related cases were found.” Wuhan doctors have known this was false since early December, from the first victim and his wife, who did not visit the market.

January 15: Japan reported its first case of coronavirus.

The Wuhan Municipal Health Commission begins to change its statements, now declaring, “Existing survey results show that clear human-to-human evidence has not been found, and the possibility of limited human-to-human transmission cannot be ruled out, but the risk of continued human-to-human transmission is low.”

January 17: The CDC and the Department of Homeland Security’s Customs and Border Protection announce that travelers from Wuhan to the United States will undergo entry screening for symptoms associated with 2019-nCoV at three San Francisco, New York (JFK), and Los Angeles airports that receive most of the travelers from Wuhan, China.

Despite the fact that Wuhan doctors know the virus is contagious, city authorities allow 40,000 families to gather and share home-cooked food in a Lunar New Year banquet.

January 19: The Chinese National Health Commission declares the virus “still preventable and controllable.”

January 20: The Wuhan Municipal Health Commission declares for the last time in its daily bulletin, “no related cases were found among the close contacts.”

Head of China’s national health commission team investigating the outbreak, confirmed that two cases of infection in China’s Guangdong province had been caused by human-to-human transmission and medical staff had been infected.

The Wuhan Evening News newspaper, the largest newspaper in the city, mentions the virus on the front page for the first time since January 5.

January 21: The CDC announced the first U.S. case of a the coronavirus in a Snohomish County, Wash., resident who returning from China six days earlier.

By this point, millions of people have left Wuhan, carrying the virus all around China and into other countries.

January 23: Chinese authorities announce their first steps for a quarantine of Wuhan. By this point, millions have already visited the city and left it during the Lunar New Year celebrations. Singapore and Vietnam report their first cases, and by now an unknown but significant number of Chinese citizens have traveled abroad as asymptomatic, oblivious carriers.

January 24: Vietnam reports person-to-person transmission, and Japan, South Korea, and the U.S report their second cases.

February 1: Dr. Li Wenliang tested positive for coronavirus. He died from it six days later.

February 4: Mayor of Florence, Italy, Dario Nardella urged residents to hug Chinese people to encourage them in the fight against the novel coronavirus. Meanwhile, a member of Associazione Unione Giovani Italo Cinesi, a Chinese society in Italy aimed at promoting friendship between people in the two countries, called for respect for novel coronavirus patients during a street demonstration. “I’m not a virus. I’m a human. Eradicate the prejudice.”

February 11: WHO proposed an official name of the virus: COVID-19, an acronym for Coronavirus disease 2019.

February 12: UN activates WHO-led Crises Management Team (CMT) bringing together WHO, OCHA, IMO, UNICEF, ICAO, WFP, FAO, the World Bank and several UN Secretariat departments.

February 13: More than 14,000 new cases were reported in Hubei Province.

February 14: France announces the first coronavirus death in Europe.

February 17: Chinese officials drafted legislation to curb the practice of eating wildlife as it was considered the probable source of the highly contagious disease.

February 19: Hundreds of people left the Diamond Princess cruise ship which was quarantined. People who were tested negative for the virus were offloaded.

February 23: Europe faced its first major outbreak due to the increase in a number of cases in Italy.

February 24: Iran emerged the second focus point of the virus after China.

March 7: Positive COVID-19 cases crossed the 100,000 mark. 100 countries were infected by this time.

March 11: WHO declared COVID-19 as a pandemic. Trump blocks visitors from Europe.

March 12: First death was reported in India due to COVID-19.

March 13: President Trump declared a national emergency in the US. Europe becomes the epicentre of the global pandemic.

March 14: India declared COVID-19 a notified disaster.

March 17: EU bars travellers outside the bloc for a period of 30 days. France imposed nationwide lockdown due to COVID-19.

March 19: Italy overtakes China death tolls.

March 22: India observed Janta Curfew for a day.

March 24: Tokyo Olympics postponed for a year until 2021. Prime Minister Modi announced 21-day lockdown in India.

April 6: Death toll in India crossed the hundred mark.

The post Pandemic : Timeline of China’s Coronavirus Lies appeared first on IMR.

China shamelessly tried to divert attention from the inconvenient truth that for close to two months it covered up the extent and even existence of the virus, in a selfish effort to shield its economy and spare the blushes of the ruling Communist Party.

This criminally negligent behaviour allowed the virus to spread to an unsuspecting world. The Party would be happier if you simply forgot this; instead it should be shouted from the rooftops.

The world today is fighting the deadly novel coronavirus as a biological war with all the resources at their disposal. On many counts China is to blame. It is no coincidence that China has been focusing on biological warfare and integration of biotechnology with information technology in their military doctrine. It has been actively embedding, even sponsoring its people, in academic institutions in the West to gain access to high-end technology.

Initially, the world was appreciative of China’s efforts to control the pandemic so early, but later realised that the virus started from China and it neither made efforts to control the virus nor informed the world about it. Hence, the US president Donald Trump named it as “Wuhan virus” just to emphasise that the virus started from Wuhan, China. U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo also indicated towards China for the outbreak.

Criminal Negligence

The Hong Kong-based South China Morning Post reported that “patient zero” – the first carrier of the coronavirus – was a 55-year-old man from Hubei province, detected as far back as 17 November 2019. However, it was only on December 31, 2019 – by when the virus had already had nearly two months to infect unprotected people – that the Chinese government released initial information on the new virus.

Doctors in Wuhan, and throughout China, were ordered “not to disclose any information about the disease to the public.” It was only after the first case of Coronavirus in Japan on January 15, 2020 raised possibility of human-to-human transmission, and videos of people dropping dead on Wuhan streets went viral, that Chinese authorities admitted to human-to-human transmission of the virus on January 23.

The Chinese government locked down Wuhan on Jan 23, halting all public transportation going in and out of the city. The following day an order was issued suspending group travel within China. But in a blunder that would have far reaching consequences, China did not issue an order suspending group travel to foreign countries until three days later. By then, perhaps, deliberately or unknowingly infected Chinese and foreigners had been sent to all parts of the world.

According to a report published by The New York Times on 22 March, “at least 175,000 people left Wuhan on 1 January 2020. The departures from Wuhan accelerated over the next three weeks. About 7 million people left in January, before travel was restricted.”

China must acknowledge its mistakes and offer to pay compensation for those who have died and bear medical expenses of others. It is in China’s interest to do so, to regain the trust of the international community.

Deliberate Misinformation

Scientists and medical journals warned about the outbreak of the virus. In an article in 2007 and experts in 2019 cautioned about the outbreak of the virus in South China because of eating horseshoe bats and mammals in southern China but government took no action.

When a doctor from the epicentre of the outbreak Wuhan, Li Wenliang, reported the virus for the first time to his medical school classmates in a private WeChat group and later gained traction after screenshots of his messages were shared in many Chinese forums, the authorities arrested him and he later died due to the virus.

Human rights advocate Chen Qiushi tried to warn government and fellow citizens about this dangerous virus and the severity of the situation.

China also expelled American journalists who may have written with facts about Chinese hand in creation and spread of coronavirus. Chinese spokespersons also tried to give the twist of racism and prejudices towards them but forgot that they are one of the worst racists and human right violators.

US President Donald Trump in a media briefing referred to COVID-19 as the “Chinese virus”, which offended China. Following this, the Chinese government and media claimed that the United States was involved in the outbreak of the virus. On March 12, China’s foreign ministry spokesman Zhao Lijan claimed on Twitter that the virus had arrived in China from the United States during the Military World Games in Wuhan in October 2019, alleging that the US Army athletes brought this virus with them.

A British newspaper said scientists had warned UK prime minister Boris Johnson that China could have downplayed its number of confirmed cases of the coronavirus “by a factor of 15 to 40 times.”

Propaganda Fig Leaf

As the novel coronavirus continued its deadly march from Wuhan across the globe, the Chinese attempted to turn the pandemic caused by their own complacency and incompetence, into a propaganda victory by highlighting how effectively China had controlled the disease and China delivering supplies and expertise to the countries it infected.

Suspected Chinese operatives stepped up their efforts offering influential Chinese-speaking Twitter users cash for favorable posts. These efforts appeared to be aimed at disparate audiences outside the country. Most of the posts were in Chinese and aimed at influencing the millions of ethnic Chinese who live outside of China’s borders. Others were in English. The tweets were seen by few people living in China; the Great Firewall blocks Twitter from the Chinese internet, though tech-savvy domestic users find workarounds.

With the epidemic spreading across the world, fake and hijacked accounts sought to promote the Chinese government’s image abroad and shore up its support at home. One typical recent tweet in Chinese proclaimed: “We were not scared during the outbreak because our country was our rearguard. Many disease-fighting warriors were thrust to the front lines. Even more volunteers helped in seemingly trivial yet important ways.”

Chinese Communists believe that appearance of doing good is more important than actually doing it, and so far, media reactions have proved them right. Chinese propaganda machine went into overdrive, praising China for buying time for the world to respond to the pandemic and for leading the global response to the coronavirus. Both claims are false, despite being widely bandied about in the media.

Wuhan’s officials destroyed evidence and harassed medical professionals who warned about the new virus. After president Xi Jinping took charge of China’s response, he lied to World Health Organization officials and waited until after infected people reached Thailand, South Korea, and the United States before initiating lockdowns. For months, China obstructed not the disease, but rather the people trying to stop it.

Blocked UN Security Council Debate

Until 31 March, when the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) was chaired by China, discussion on the coronavirus was blocked. The 15-member UNSC and 193-strong UN General Assembly (UNGA) did not take up the matter under China’s pressure.

The monthly chair of the UNSC decides what is on the agenda and guides the body. China blocked the draft on coronavirus and did not allow the global issue to be discussed. Meanwhile, many countries wanted to pass a proposal on the global issue but China constantly placed obstructions, with involved and knowledgeable persons hitting out online.

Earlier on March 3, China’s UN Ambassador Zhang Jun said there was no need to panic over the coronavirus epidemic and that Beijing did not plan to discuss the situation in the Security Council during its presidency in March.

Estonia, which is a nonpermanent member, had asked for a meeting on the pandemic in mid-March. The document stressed the “growing concern about the unprecedented extent of the Covid-19 outbreak in the world, which may constitute a threat to international peace and security.” The proposal, however, did not go far, with both China and Russia nixing the idea. Calls for virtual UNSC meetings in the era of social distancing and lockdowns have also found no merit with either China or Russia.

While the UN stonewalled a discussion when the G-20 leaders sat down on 26 March for a unique virtual summit, there was no questioning for transparency or origin of the virus.

April will be different. the Dominican Republic has assumed the presidency of the UNSC. Not only is China the source of the pandemic, the US-China rivalry is playing out in the background as well with President Donald Trump insisting on referring to the disease as ‘China virus’.

The UNSC has five permanent members – China, France, the Russian Federation, the United Kingdom, and the United States. The other 10 non-permanent members are Germany, Dominican Republic, Belgium, Estonia, Indonesia, Niger, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, South Africa, Tunisia and Vietnam.

Pressure on WHO

The World Health Organisation (WHO) avoided mentioning Wuhan and named the ailment as COVID-19. WHO also gave no heed to a letter from Taiwan written in December 2019, in which Taiwan stated that coronavirus spreads from human to human and also requested to adopt precautionary measures. Taiwan took preventive measures and although it is so near to China it saved itself from the disaster.

Chinese authorities denied that the virus could be transferred from human to human – WHO assented to that conclusion, despite the suspicions of other outside health experts – until it was too late and long after doctors in Wuhan had concluded human transmission was ongoing.

The official statement, on 8 January, from the World Health Organization declared, “Preliminary identification of a novel virus in a short period of time is a notable achievement and demonstrates China’s increased capacity to manage new outbreaks….WHO does not recommend any specific measures for travelers. WHO advises against the application of any travel or trade restrictions on China based on the information currently available.”

On 14 January, WHO echoed China’s assessment: “Preliminary investigations conducted by the Chinese authorities have found no clear evidence of human-to-human transmission of the novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV) identified in Wuhan, China.”

On 16 January, WHO updated its statement, declaring, “Not enough is known to draw definitive conclusions about how it is transmitted, the clinical features of the disease, the extent to which it has spread, or its source, which remains unknown.”

WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus continued to praise China’s handling of the outbreak. On 22 January he said, “I was very impressed by the detail and depth of China’s presentation. I also appreciate the cooperation of China’s minister of health, who I have spoken with directly during the last few days and weeks. His leadership and the intervention of President Xi and Premier Li have been invaluable, and all the measures they have taken to respond to the outbreak.”

In the preceding days, a WHO delegation conducted a field visit to Wuhan. They concluded, “deployment of the new test kit nationally suggests that human-to-human transmission is taking place in Wuhan.” The delegation reported, “their counterparts agreed close attention should be paid to hand and respiratory hygiene, food safety and avoiding mass gatherings where possible.”

Economic Benefit

Initially, the Chinese economy suffered a huge setback. China’s January-February fixed-asset investment fell 45% year-over-year. Industrial production declined by 14%, and retail sales fell by at least 20%, not counting March.

But end-March, manufacturing data showed the lights had been turned on in China. Manufacturing PMI came in at 52 versus consensus of 44. Non-Manufacturing PMI came in at 52.3 versus consensus estimates of 42. Anything over 50 is positive. PMIs are calculated on a month to month basis. These are March numbers versus February, which saw most of the country’s factories closed because of SARS coronavirus containment efforts.

S&P Global Ratings has maintained its forecast for China’s growth at just under 3%, one of the more bullish calls around.

China will emerge as a big beneficiary because of spread of coronavirus. Shares of European and American companies based in China fell and China, with deep pockets, has purchases shares of these companies.

Large number of old Chinese people died as a result of COVID-19. The government saved a substantial amount of old age pension. China economy is recovering, employees are returning to the factories. Wuhan, the epicentre of the epidemic ended the lockdown, sales picked up, aviation industry was restoring flights, and so on.

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China’s Conspiracy Theories

While USA termed the disease as “Chinese Virus”, Beijing-based a Chinese military official blamed USA for having deliberately injected the virus in Wuhan during the international military games from 18 to 27 October 2019, in which 360 American athletes had taken part, but could not win a single medal. He added that five of their athletes had fallen sick but doctors could not detect the cause of their disease. After their treatment and release from hospital, the five athletes were flown back home in a specially chartered US plane.

Eyebrows were raised in China, Russia, Japan, Taiwan and Germany and probing questions asked why they were segregated from other 355 soldier athletes. Suspecting them to be biochemical soldiers, China asked USA to hand over those five to WHO for testing whether they had contracted Type C strain as in the case of all other patients in Wuhan?

This conspiracy theory rested on the premise that, on 6 August 2019, Centre for Disease Control and Prevention issued an order to a major biological warfare lab in Fort Detrick, Maryland to immediately close down and suspend all operations due to its failure to contain contaminated waste, which might have contained agents such as Ebola, Smallpox, Anthrax, SARS.

The Chinese claim that Corona virus was experimented in a British lab – Pirbright Institute – as a biological weapon. After getting registered in USA, the product was transported to a Canadian lab and from there to a lab in Wuhan. Before shipping it, an anti-virus safety exercise was conducted six weeks prior to the outbreak of this epidemic. The same team is now busy manufacturing anti-coronavirus vaccine. Israel has also produced a drug to treat this virus which will be available in markets in next 4-5 months.

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China has always had a long term outlook. In the late 1990s, the Chinese Communist Party had declared its intention of making China the sole superpower, militarily, economically and geopolitically by 2015. There have been hiccups along the way but the country  is pushing its agenda with single-minded purpose. They put aside their sovereign claims to disputed areas to an extent, to develop their economy and, today, China is the second biggest economy in the world.

The COVID-19 outbreak has demonstrated how the entire world’s trade and markets are inextricably linked to China. Every country was worried about its supply chain and the adverse effect on the economy. Today, Chinese manufacturing activity is chugging back to normalcy with the rest of the world’s economies struggling to prevent a recession or even a depression.

Most of the world looks at China with certain amount of suspicion except for its acolytes, such as Pakistan and North Korea. But the fund managers in the West, the hardnosed pragmatists that they are, are looking at investing in China again. They even consider the yuan a safe investment, given the fact that the Chinese have intentionally depressed its value to enhance their exports. The Western fund managers take it as a given that the yuan will get upvalued and the investments will pay good returns.

Chinese businessmen have invested funds in property and assets all over the globe. Most of the countries are going to examine foreign investment plans with a toothcomb, without specifically mentioning China. It is not going to be easy for China to invest in property as before unless they use shell companies.

One Belt One Road (OBOR) is the brainchild of Xi Jinping which is an ambitious plan. It was initiated in 2013 and covers about 78 countries. India had correctly declined to join. China will call in the loans especially from countries who are heavily indebted. Several small counties will not able to pay the loan. China is likely to demand assets and infrastructure in lieu.  Chinese companies and China will occupy their prime ports, land and other places. Sri Lanka has already lost Hambantota and China is in control of Gwadar port of Pakistan. It is expected that China will also occupy some fertile land of Pakistan and will exploit the mineral resources of Balochistan, Gilgit and Baltistan.

China’s attempt to realign globalisation to be at the centre, with its ‘One Belt One Road’ initiative, must be checked.

The Chinese government has invested heavily in funding the Chinese diaspora across the world to identify the super achievers especially in the field of science & technology. The arrest of a professor of Chinese origin, for receiving funds to identify such super achievers is a case in point.

The major economies of the world, with a few exceptions are likely to go into recession or even depression. The world’s automotive industry, the telecom industry, the semi conductor industry and many more are dependent on China and China will extract more concessions from all of them in their march to be the sole  economic and geopolitical super power while concurrently enhancing its military might.

Time will tell if the coronavirus outbreak was natural or a result of neglect or a pre-planned operation. The outbreak did highlight the risks of a system that puts social stability and ruling party legitimacy above the public interest.

The outbreak happened at the time when officials were gathering for annual meetings of the local Communist Party-run legislatures, when propaganda departments instruct the media not to cover negative stories. That may explain the lack of openness and transparency in this crucial early phase of the outbreak.

China’s primary response strategy was to attribute itself as a victim and utilize strategies that depict good will, anger at external agents and clamping down on dissent. However, as the situation evolved, China was eager to use the outbreak for its own morbid opportunism and point out that its strategies were also increasingly adopted by democracies as well. The Chinese government demonstrated global leadership by sending medical aid in the form of doctors and resources to other countries affected by the virus. This was part of a secondary response strategy – one that can only be analyzed as the pandemic is curtailed.

In case China continues to obfuscate the issue and seek to profit from the catastrophe, there must, at the very least, be outright international condemnation of China for concealing information from its own people and the rest of the world. The international community must unite to ensure China doesn’t take undue advantage of the weakened dispositions of other countries affected by the pandemic. In the medium to long term, supply chains involving China must be reworked.

This crisis has also raised doubts on the vigilance and effectiveness of the World Health Organization (WHO), which is expected to be at the vanguard. Cautious counsel may also argue that any attempts to impose the UN sanctions will be vetoed by China. However, this crisis is an opportunity for international bodies to revive the trust in them. If the Security Council fails, the General Assembly should come together to take appropriate action.

The belligerent country can also be affected. While the US spent trillions of dollars in fighting war on terror, proxy war and hybrid war, China on the other hand focused its entire energies on its four-point modernization program to develop its economy and technical and technological skills.

China is the only country which has successfully contained the disease. Many countries even with the best of health care systems, simply gave in. Rich countries are still shy of spending money on health care, hospitals, free medical services and extending support to the poor nations. Emphasis is on militarism and defence.

The scenario after recovery from the Covid-19 attack is far from clear. We are still barely starting to understand the consequences of Covid-19. Corporates would be forces to seek bailout packages. The US war on terror will suffer from diminished funds.

In conclusion, it can be said that Covid-19 attack has shown that bioweapons can create the perfect geopolitlcal and social engineering environment for full-spectrum dominance.

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Singapore-based Cmde S Pradeep is an anyalst of international relations

OPINION

Chinese medical materials bound for Italy at a hospital in Hangzhou, s Zhejiang Province, China, 17 March 2020.

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China created the coronavirus and developed it’s antidote/vaccine. My contention is that the genetically-engineered laboratory-made viruses were not really needed. There were several strains of naturally occurring bat-borne novel corona viruses available in China, which had been discovered in 2018.

To avoid/ negate strong responses from USA and other countries (USA’s nuclear doctrine and the doctrines of many other countries openly advocate use of nuclear weapons in response to biological or chemical attacks), China spread the novel coronavirus first in its own Wuhan city and the Hubei province.

My take is that the less lethal single mutation strain of bat coronavirus was released in Wuhan. It was swiftly brought under control. However, what was exported to USA and Italy and rest of Europe (via deliberately infected individuals) was the far more lethal – three mutation bat coronavirus, which latches on far more strongly to human cells.

What is noteworthy is that the national capital Beijing and the financial capital Shanghai largely remained unscathed. Thus, Beijing, with a population of 2.15 crore people had 569 infected and only 8 died. Shanghai, with a population of 2.5 crore had just 468 people infected and only 5 deaths. This ring-fencing looks suspect.

Allies of China, Russia and North Korea remained largely unscathed even as South Korea and Europe were hit. Taiwan and Japan were able to control it better due to extensive testing and mitigation strategies.

Since the Wuhan virus release was as per a ‘plan, the Chinese reaction was highly efficient. They were prepared with projects, prefabricated hospital buildings and materials to roll out a very impressive response that locked down Wuhan city and  Hubei province rapidly and efficiently. It flattened the epidemic spread curve.

Meanwhile, the Chinese government cracked down on release of information about this virus. Dr Li Wen Liang, a Chinese ophthalmologist who worked as a physician at Wuhan Central Hospital, who warned the world about the possible outbreak of SARS-like illness ‘was killed’. The Chinese government actively suppressed knowledge of the virus and prohibited professionals from publishing findings that could have saved lives.

All this while, China quietly ‘ensured’ spread of this epidemic. Wuhan was directly connected to America by over 20 flights a day. It was equally well connected with Europe. In my view, the bat coronavirus strain exported was the far more deadly three-mutation type that has shown up in genome sequencing tests in Italy. China ‘deliberately’ kept it’s airports and borders open to facilitate spread of virus to pandemic proportions. In February, even as coronavirus spread, China’s foreign minister Wang Yi pressured neighbouring countries to keep borders open for prestige and reputation reasons.

With its ‘first mover’ advantage of  having released the bat virus China rapidly controlled the epidemic to just about a lakh people and controlled the spread of this epidemic at home even as it raged in other countries.

As stock markets crashed globally, foreign companies in China resorted to panic selling of their stock holdings in high-tech companies to cut their losses and run. The Chinese government stepped in with alacrity to buy these shares at rock bottom prices and, in effect, nationalised all these high value companies. It began to aggressively buy out collapsing companies in Italy, Europe and Australia. China now planned to position it’s economy in strategic sectors to box out other industrialised nations still reeling from coronavirus impact. As per China State Administration of Science & Technology Industry for National Defense – “China must jump start it’s economy to pave way for international market expansion after this epidemic is over.”

China rapidly returned to normalcy. It jump started production of coronavirus-related equipment, masks, protective personal  equipment (PPE), and ventilators. To quote Wion TV, “As China put the rest of the world in ICU, it began to manufacture ventilators.”

As Michael Sobelik said, “the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) started this fire but they are angling to emerge from its ashes as the saviours.” China was the arsonist posing to be the fire-fighter. The aim simply is to turn coronavirus into a net positive for the CCP.

The Chinese Narrative

China, in its defence, claimed that it’s response bought time for the rest of the world to prepare and, in propaganda terms – China is a Global Health provider that is shipping masks and test kits to other nations. It sent health teams to Italy and Iran and supplied them face masks.

The sum of this thesis is that the Chinese deliberately created a biological Pearl Harbour in Wuhan as per a methodical plan. Then they let the epidemic radiate outwards to the world even as they put up an impressive performance (premeditated) to control it and exploit it for great economic advantage and profit. It is a spine chilling scenario. China will have to satisfy the world on this account.

A variant of this scenario is that though the outbreak was natural, China deliberately delayed it’s news and impact. Resultant lack of situational awareness led to this becoming a global pandemic.

Biological War Scenario?

These observations can lend themselves to another set of interpretations.

• Is what we have seen the first silent exchange of biological warfare shots as part of an unrelenting economic war between USA and China?
• Is what the Chinese foreign ministry spokesman said – the Americans hit first with release of a natural bat coronavirus strain in Wuhan – true?
• The Chinese hit back with deadlier (three-mutation) strain of the virus to strike US and Europe in a major way.
• Winners in this war will be the nations that are able to rapidly clamp down the epidemic within their borders even as they ensure that it flares in adversary nations.
• Have we just witnessed the opening salvos of a Global Third World War? These are not nuclear-tipped missile exchanges but silent salvos of biological virus taking a fearful toll with vials released clandestinely and through deliberately infected humans.

The gap in this thesis is – what was the US motivation for striking first with a naturally occurring bat coronavirus? Since the USA is the stronger side, its motivation for employing asymmetric attacks is far lesser than China’s. Chinese military literature, on the other hand, has openly been advocating such a biological strike.

In the previous and this article the plausible scenarios for the outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic have been sketched out. Reports have been cited with facts from open sources. We still need conclusive evidence to take a final judgment call. This judgment will have to factor in the biological warfare doctrines and capabilities of the nations concerned and the type of research they were engaged in. The reader can draw his own conclusions. We are on the cusp of radical changes in the nature of war and war fighting. Non-contact warfare may well be the dangerous new norm. The circumstantial evidence may be all there. What we need is the smoking gun. Possibly, it will come to light with time.

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China rushed health professionals from the armed forces from Hubei province and other areas to Wuhan to tackle the load of patients.

Forecasts suggest global GDP will fall by 0.9 per cent in 2020. Western countries at the heart of the current pandemic will be among the hardest hit – with GDP predicted to fall over the calendar year by 7 per cent in Italy, 6.5 per cent in Germany, 5.3 per cent in the UK and 4.9 per cent in the US.

Imported Cases and Local Transmission

The patient was infected after attending a meeting in Singapore and confirmed positive in Malysia

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The Army sent instructions to augment medical facilities and infrastructure. These included:

• Increasing the capacity for surveillance and isolation at Military, Base and Command Hospitals.
• Setting up a 45-bed isolation facility and a 10-bed ICU facility at field hospitals exclusively for COVID-19 patients at six hours’ notice.
• Keeping 30 per cent of field hospitals on standby for constructing COVID hospitals in COVID hotspots.
• Preparing Quick Reaction Medical Teams to mobilise at six hours’ notice.

Armed Forces Hospitals Geared Up

Twenty-eight hospitals of the army, air force and navy across India were earmarked, by 28 March, as COVID-19 hospitals to handle and treat coronavirus cases, which was part of the measures of the defence forces to help civil authorities.

Separately, five hospitals of the three defence services can carry out COVID testing. These include Army Hospital Research and Referral, Delhi; Command Hospital Air Force, Bangalore and Armed Forces Medical College, Pune; Command Hospital (Central Command) Lucknow; Command Hospital (Northern Command) Udhampur. Six additional hospitals were also being equipped with the resources to begin such testing.

Some of the major hospitals among the 28 earmarked are – Military Hospital Avadi, Base Hospital Lucknow, Military Hospital Gaya, Military Hospital Belgaum, Military Hospital Patiala, Military Hospital Panagarh, INHS (Indian Naval Hospital Ship) Nivarini in Odisha, INHS Jeevanti in Goa and 4 Air Force Hospital in Kalaikunda. Other hospitals are at Dimapur, Suratgarh, Ahmedabad, Akhnoor, Hindon, Karwar, Golconda and Bangalore.

The hospitals have prepared logistics plans for evacuation, establishing isolation facilities and treatment areas, and manpower and equipment management. Placement of medical and paramedical staff with the necessary equipment for handling these cases had started.

The new facilities to be setup are separate from the existing isolation facilities that are already part of these hospitals. These hospitals are in addition to the ones that have already been converted to handle coronavirus cases of the armed forces and civilians, following the setting up of isolation wards.

For formations along the Line of Control (LoC) with Pakistan and Line of Actual Control (LAC) with China, isolation wards at peripheral hospitals have been geared up.

The Indian Air Force’s (IAF) Command Hospital Air Force Bangalore (CHAFB) has been designated as the first laboratory in the air force to undertake COVID-19 testing. The IAF has nine quarantine facilities, each with 200-300 personnel capacity each, at nodal IAF bases across the country.

The Indian Navy has set up isolation facilities at its premier hospital INHS Asvini at Mumbai to treat Covid-19 cases. The Navy’s Command Headquarters at Kochi and Vizag have also been directed to set up similar facilities. Separate “Fever Clinics” are functioning at all naval hospitals to prevent the spread of infection from undiagnosed cases.

Evacuation and Quarantine

Indians and foreigners evacuated from COVID-19 affected countries were housed and observed at six quarantine facilities run by the Armed Forces at Manesar, Jaisalmer, Jodhpur, Chennai, Hindan and Mumbai. These included evacuees from Iran, Italy, China, Japan and Malaysia besides IAF evacuation flight crew.

In addition to the active quarantine centres, more facilities were made operational at Kolkata, Visakhapatnam, Kochi, Dundigal near Hyderabad, Bengaluru, Kanpur, Jaisalmer, Jorhat and Gorakhpur.

Precautionary Measures

A number of measures were taken by the Indian Army to prevent the pandemic among its personnel so that the Army personnel were available to do their primary task and support the people in the fight against Covid.

Intensive information, education and communication campaigns were launched for serving personnel. Leave extension of those on leave as well as curtailment of leave to bare minimum was imposed. Segregation facilities were set up to observe troops already back from leave from various states.

Arrangements were made for troops returning from leave or out-station duties reporting to screening centres established at various transit camps. After the medical screening they were being quarantined for 14 days in the quarantine room established in the units.

Advisories were issued by AFMS on social distancing, cancellation of courses and training, use of masks, preventive measures to be taken at workplace and guidelines on COVID surveillance and contact tracing.

The Military Operations Directorate issued directions to curtail leave. All troops returning from leave, especially from Covid hotspots were screened and quarantined on arrival.

Training activities, including collective training activities scheduled at units and brigades, were postponed or cancelled. Physical training and games continued with the required minimum distance between individuals.

All courses due to start from March 23 or afterwards were postponed. Non-essential conferences and seminars involving moving personnel may were cancelled or postponed. Entry to essential stores and CSD was regulated and later cancelled.

While the army continued to function normally on the borders, officers posted in headquarters – who amount to 40 per cent of the overall cadre – were asked to function from home.

In the barracks to avoid congestion, distance between the beds has been increased, to avoid crowding in dining halls, meals are served at staggered timings, social distancing is being maintained and adequate hand-washing points are in place.

Assistance to Maldives

A 14-member team of medical officers and paramedical staff of Army Medical Corps was sent to the Maldives for capacity building measures and assist in setting up their own testing, treatment and quarantine capacities. The team stayed in the Maldives for 10 days and returned on 23 March 2020. AFMS was ready to dispatch a Rapid Response Team to Nepal and other countries for assisting them with the COVID situation.

At Sea

The Indian Navy put in a series of precautionary measures to prevent any outbreak on its ships by minimising port calls at foreign shores and continuous medical monitoring of its sailors.

The Navy has more than 20 ships out at sea at any point in time which includes coastal patrols and harbour patrols, besides the mission-based deployments in international waters. More than 3,000 naval personnel are on board these vessels. These measures call for significant logistics support, including critical fuel supply to naval ships.

The Navy has taken to replenishment at sea, including refuelling of ships in international waters using its own vessels deployed as part of Operation Sankalp, which started in July 2019 in the Gulf of Oman, anti-piracy missions near the Gulf of Aden, and naval deployment for patrolling a strategic choke point of the Strait of Malacca.

The Navy also instituted measures to continuously monitor the health and symptoms of its personnel who are part of any planned sailing. Medical teams on board vessels were monitoring the health of personnel. This became critical after US sailors on a US navy ship, with 5,000 US military personnel onboard, tested positive for coronavirus.

Personal Protective Equipment

Provision of Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) was a challenge with adequate quantities only for use in hospitals. Additional procurement was being planned to tide over the crisis, since the Armed Forces were directed to augment medical resources for the civil health set up.

Northern Command

17 helplines were established by Northern Command in the Union Territories of Jammu & Kashmir (J&K) and Ladakh for the civilian population. Mobile vehicle check posts, which are usually deployed for counter terrorist operations, were educating the population on Covid-19 by way of audio broadcasts through loudspeakers. Posters and banners were also pasted at multiple places in Urdu, Hindi and English.

Ordnance Factory Board

The Ordnance Factory Board (OFB), which produces arms, ammunition and equipment for the military, has separately designated 285 beds as Covid-19 quarantine facilities. These include 40 beds in Jabalpur, thirty beds each at Ishapore, Cossipore, Khadki, Kanpur, Khamaria and Ambajhari; 25 beds at Ambernath and 20 beds each at Avadi and Medak.

The Ordnance Factory Board (OFB) is utilizing its facilities to try and manufacture personal protection equipment and face masks, in accordance with a pilot order placed by HLL Lifecare Limited, a public sector unit under the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare.

Comments

With almost 7,000 specialists and super specialists spread across India, and over 130 hospitals, military medicine is an asset that rarely comes into limelight. Supported by thousands of nursing officers and more than 40,000 paramedics, AFMS is the medical backbone on which the three Services have survived over the years. And this is the backbone to which India turned to when a unique medical crisis threatened from across the borders.

Over the years, medical cases have included everything between combat wounds, high altitude ailments and childbirth. This is only possible because of the unique dedication of military medical personnel. In India, there is no state-run medical service like the AFMS.

Military hospitals are even more remarkable for their specialised facilities are on par with the most expensive and posh private sector establishments. Other than the various AIIMS hospitals set up across India, there is no state-run medical service that can match what the military has managed.

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Let us start by understanding the human immune system with its two major divisions – the innate and the acquired immune systems. The innate immune system is a baseline system that cannot adapt to changing needs. Its components are skin, enzymes in saliva, tears, and cells such as macrophages. The acquired immune system is an adaptable entity that can change according to needs. It comprises primarily of T-lymphocytes and B-lymphocytes; the latter is responsible for making antibodies. Acquired immunity has evolved over millions of years into being able to recognize what is “self” and what is “non-self” (ie, foreign). The “self vs non-self” education of the acquired immune system takes place in the thymus of the developing fetus. By the time a child is born, the immune system already knows what “self” molecules are, and what is not recognized as “self” by the immune system is treated as foreign. And attacked. The most usual targets of attack are, naturally, bacteria and viruses.

The T-cells cannot recognize the foreign substance themselves. Specialized cells called antigen-presenting cells (APC), components of the innate immune system perform that job. The APC ingest the bacteria or virus and destroy it by digesting it. Then the APCs present parts of the destroyed bacteria or virus (now called an antigen) on their surface using specialized molecules called major histocompatibility complex Type II molecules (MHC). The MHC is really the key to the process. If the antigen presentation is improper or inadequate, the T-cells do not get activated and infections run amuck. On the other hand, if the MHC presents a “self” antigen, under the proper circumstances, it can lead to autoimmune diseases such as diabetes, rheumatoid arthritis, etc. Therefore, it should not be a surprise that a strong relationship exists between certain diseases and MHC subtypes. In other words, these MHC subtypes tend to present certain auto-antigens and if one happens to have these MHC subtypes, one is at a greater risk of developing an autoimmune disease compared to someone who does not. An example is the MHC HLA B27 and the disease ankylosing spondylitis.

MHC molecules differ among different races. For example, the MHC that leads to the propensity for ankylosing spondylitis tends to be higher in Caucasians compared to Orientals. The reasons for MHC differences are not known. However, it is speculated that migration from Africa early in the evolutionary process lead Caucasians to loose MHC that are important for combating bacteria and viruses since infections are less prevalent in temperate zones (Jeffery KJ, Bangham CR in Microbes Infect 2000 Sep; 2(11): 1335-41). At present, MHC differences are not very well characterized, though the human genome project will help solve part of that problem.

Even if humans have not characterized MHC differences, microorganisms have. Bacteria and viruses have evolved along with the human immune system and have exploited the variations in MHC and associated molecules to their advantage. For example, alleles in MHC class II loci and interleukin 10 promoter have been demonstrated to influence the outcome of viral hepatitis (Antiviral Res 2001 Nov; 52(2): 113-6). Similarly, variations in class I MHC can affect susceptibility to HIV (Immunol Letters 2001 Nov 1; 79 (1-2): 151-7), and allelic frequencies of a (CCTTT)(n) pentanucleotide repeat in the NOS2A promoter region affect susceptibility to malaria (Nitric Oxide 2000 Aug; 4(4): 379-83). As a final example, MHC DQ3 may affect hydrocephalus due to toxoplasmosis (Int J Parasitol 1999 Sep; 29(9): 1351-8). Some racial differences have been noticed but not characterized such as the susceptibility of blacks to tuberculosis (N Y State J Med 1991 Jun; 91(6): 239-42).

How do bacteria and viruses take advantage of racial differences? Some microorganism use components of the MHC as receptors for binding and invading cells. Gene terrorists can take a page out of the microorganisms’ book and create super bugs that target certain genetic profiles. They can alter the tropism of bacteria and viruses, changing parts of bugs that bind cellular receptors by a technique called site directed mutagenesis. In other words, it would enable a bug to attack cells bearing certain MHCs more avidly. And since certain ethnic groups preferentially express those MHC molecules, it would lead to ethnic or racial targeting. That is one way ethnic targeting by bio-weapons can take place (there are others, but due to space constraints, those interested can read my book, Germs of War).

How does this affect India? First, who are India’s principal adversaries? Pakistan and China.

Pakistanis are, genetically, not different from Indians. An interesting study published in Nature News 2009 (Published online 23 September 2009| Nature|doi:10.1038/news. 2009.935) showed that in India, there is tremendous homogeneity despite caste, religion, and regional divisions. Other studies have extended this observation to Pakistan. The implications are, that, if either country were to develop and launch a targeted biological weapon against the other, its own populace would suffer equally (unless it had undertaken mass vaccination or other similar preventative measures prior to the launch). I want to emphasize this and hope the Jihadis understand this critical point before they embark on a Bio-Mumbai type attack. Not to dwell on this too much but as an aside, Israel would be a plumb target for Jihadis in Pakistan.

China is a different story. A study published in Dec 2009 by HUGO (human genome organization) showed that South Asia was the hub of human propagation in Asia, (http://www.genomeweb.com/arrays/hugo-pan-asian-snp-consortium-maps-genetic-diversity-asia) and South Asians have the greatest genetic diversity in Asia. Chinese, to put it simply, are derived from Indians, and have much less genetic diversity. This puts the Chinese at a comparative disadvantage when it comes to biological weapons (BWs). Anything China develops against Indians will also affect its own people. But the reverse is not true. India can develop BWs that can affect almost all Chinese (especially Han Chinese) with limited impact on its own people. Not that I would advocate it but it is also a point I hope the mandarins in Beijing (sorry for the pun) understand. Considering that the Chinese communists had no qualms about killing more than 30 million of its own people during the cultural revolution, I don’t think empathy for Indians would dissuade them from launching a BW against India. But the thought of losing their whole country just might.

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Dr. Ketan Desai

By now, everyone now knows what weapons of mass destruction are. They fall into three categories – nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons. Of the three, I consider biological weapons to be the most dangerous. To get a better perspective, consider plague and smallpox. The former, inadvertently launched by the Tartars in 1348, decimated 30 per cent of European population within 3 years. Smallpox was even more deadly, causing the deaths of 90% of Mayans and Aztecs, enabling the Spanish to conquer the ‘new world”.

The potential of biological weapons has not been ignored by armies of the world. Between World War I and ratification of the Biological and Toxins Weapons Convention, it is estimated that at least 20 countries had biological weapons program. The reasons are not hard to understand. Biological agents are easy to make, merely requiring a laboratory on par with what is found in most universities today, and can be created by any graduate student. They are not resource intensive, and most ingredients are easily available. This is in marked contrast to nuclear weapons which are very expensive to make, require radioactive precursors that are under the tight supervision of international agencies, and require technology that are not easy to come by. This is why, despite intense efforts, only a few countries in the world possess nuclear weapons.

Biological weapons have additional attractiveness, in that they can be tailor made, based on the requirements of the “manufacturer”. In order to understand this point, it is important to differentiate between bio-terrorism and biological warfare. The former includes agents designed to spread terror but with limited number of deaths. A perfect example of this is the ‘anthrax scare’ in the US in 2001, where the amount of fear far exceeded the number of those affected. In contrast, biological warfare uses agents that have the potential to cause large number of deaths, numbering in the hundreds of thousands or millions.

Thus, a perpetrator of bio-terrorism would chose diseases such as anthrax and botulism, with agents that are not self-replicating (so as to limit spread) but which have a high lethality (to increase fear). Think of it as a “biological Unabomber”. While dangerous to those exposed, this is a limited threat.

In contrast, biological weapons tend to be self-propagating agents (to increase spread) that are inhaled (to increase dispersal) and one which are made resistant to antibiotics).

“In light of the September 11 tragedy, we can no longer afford to be complacent about the possibility of biological terrorism,” warns a commentary in Nature Genetics. “The revolution in biology could be misused in offensive biological weapons programs, directed against human beings and their staple crops and livestock.”

Thus, the next generation of biological weapons may exploit knowledge about genomes, with calamitous effect. A couple of years from now, there may be as many as 70 pathogens whose genetic code has been cracked. The genome of cholera, leprosy, the plague and tuberculosis are already in the public domain, as is Staphylococcus aureus that is becoming resistant to antibiotics. There is fear that a bioterrorist with lots of money and a good laboratory could use this readily available data, inserting or swapping genes in bacteria and viruses to create new, horrifyingly virulent agents.

There are at least two documented cases in which biologists have created doomsday bugs. One was a strain of the common intestinal bug Escherichia coli that was 32,000 times more resistant to the antibiotic cefotaxime than conventional strains. The superbug’s creator was Willem Stemmer, chief scientist with Maxygen, a California pharmaceutical research firm, who was exploring the function of resistance genes in bacteria. The technique used, DNA shuffling, involves shattering multiple copies of a gene and then reassembling them. The process produces a range of daughter genes with the fragments stitched together in subtle but new ways. The enzymes involved in the re-assembly are prone to errors, leading to mutations and, therefore, greater diversity. The daughter genes can then be re-introduced into the bacteria and the resultant bacteria with the desired strains (such as those good as biological agents) selected. Fragments from different bacteria can be mixed and matched by this technique. Needless to say, the potential of this in the wrong hands is enormous. In response to an appeal by the American Society for Microbiology, the E.coli created by Stemmer was destroyed.

In another example, Australian scientists Ron Jackson and Ian Ramshaw unwittingly created a vicious strain of mousepox, a cousin of smallpox. They were attempting to control the population of mice by altering the genes of mousepox to make it more lethal. To create their mouse contraceptive, they took a relatively benign strain of mousepox and added genes for proteins carried on the surface of mouse eggs. The idea was that cells infected by the viruses would churn out egg proteins, causing female mice to produce antibodies against their own eggs. To maximize the vaccine’s effectiveness, Jackson and Ramshaw also engineered the virus so that it contained the gene for interleukin 4, a cytokine that boosts anti-body production. The IL-4 gene also shut down the mice cellular immune response so they were unable to fight off the virus. The effect was lethal, with mice that were previously immunized against mousepox dying within days. The implications are obvious and profound.

Two kinds of people would use such weapons. The first could be nihilists and anarchists, who find all aspects of modern society despicable and feel they need to start all over again. Such persons could create a recombinant agent (such as a virus) that could literally destroy society as we know it. Unfortunately, such an agent would not be hard to create. For example, HIV-1 could easily be inserted into Adenovirus (after removing the dispensable E3 gene of the latter) creating inhaled AIDS. Needless to say, such a creation would be devastating.

The other perpetrators of biological warfare could be terrorists groups such as Al Qaeda. Groups such as this could gamble that even though biological warfare would hurt them as much in the end, it would level the playing field, where they have the long term advantage (in their view, thanks to their fanaticism). A tactic they could use is to select agents to which they are relatively immune while the Western world is relatively naïve. This can be created by insertion of antibiotic resistant genes or genes that selectively attack certain racial groups (in another article, I will show how such agents can be created). Given the jihadi mentality, such groups will consider their own mortality as martyrdom, while those of the enemy as the ultimate goal.

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Diseases/Agents Listed as Potential Bioterror Threats by the US Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)

CATEGORY A:  Easily disseminated; high mortality rates.

Bacteria (single-celledorganisms):
Anthrax (Bacillus anthracis)
Plague (Yersinia pestis)
Tularemia (Francisella tularensis)

Viruses:
Smallpox (Variola major virus)
Viral Hemorrhagic Fevers: Ebola, Marburg,
Lassa, Machupo (various families of viruses)
Biotoxins (poisonous substances produced by living or ganisms):
Botulism (Clostridium botulinum toxin)

CATEGORY B: Moderately easy to disseminate; low mortality.

Bacteria:
Brucellosis (Brucella species)
Glanders (Burkholderia mallei)
Melioidosis (Burkholderia pseudomallei)
Psittacosis (Chlamydia psittaci)
Food safety threats (e.g., Salmonella species, Escherichia coli O157:H7, Shigella)
Water safety threats (e.g., Vibrio cholerae, Cryptosporidium parvum)

Viruses:
Viral encephalitis (Alphaviruses)
Rickettsia (micro-organisms that live in cells)
Qfever (Coxiella burnetii)
Typhus fever (Rickettsia prowazekii)

Biotoxins:
Epsilon toxin of Clostridium perfringens
Ricin toxin from castor beans
Staphylococcal enterotoxin B

CATEGORY C:  Emerging infectious diseases.

Viruses:
Examples are Nipah virus and Hantavirus
Coronaviruses

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