CIAO DATE: 09/04

A First–hand Report: Cuban Biotechnology

Glenn Baker

Center for Defense Information

May 2003

Abstract

John Bolton, U.S. undersecretary of state for arms control and international security, triggered a furor when on May 6, 2002, he stated, “The United States believes that Cuba has at least a limited offensive biological warfare research and development effort.” Two days later, I was meeting with a representative from the Cuban Interests Section on an unrelated matter when I posed the question, “How would Cuba respond if CDI asked to bring a group of experts down to learn more about these charges?” I had no expectations of hearing any more about it. But less than two weeks later, I was told that not only was there an interest, but that we were invited to bring anyone, come anytime, and visit anywhere we wanted. Clearly, Bolton’s comments had struck a nerve in Havana.

It is easy to see why. In the same speech, Bolton went on to say, “States that renounce terror and abandon WMD [weapons of mass destruction] can become part of our effort. But those that do not can expect to become our targets.” Furthermore, Cuba has remained on the State Department’s list of sponsors of terrorism since its inception in 1979, despite considerable evidence that Cuba is held to a different standard than other countries due to politics. In the context of the war on terrorism and the new U.S. policy of pre-emptively attacking nations suspected of possessing WMD, Cuba feels increasingly in the crosshairs. (Cuba’s harsh crackdown on dissidents in April 2003 only served to heighten these tensions.) As I went about identifying and recruiting experts on bioscience and bioweapons, one thing became clear: allegations of biological weapons efforts are extremely hard to either prove or disprove. The means to create germ weapons, unlike nuclear, can be easily concealed or dismantled in a short period of time, and do not require elaborate technical facilities. Any nation with a fairly sophisticated pharmaceutical industry inherently has the capability to develop bioweapons, whether or not it has the intention to do so.

Furthermore, it was mutually agreed that the CDI trip in no way constituted “inspections,” a term that implies a certain degree of confrontation and an element of surprise. Therefore it became evident that our visit would provide neither the “smoking gun” nor the “clean bill of health” that might put an end to the controversy.

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