The only thing worse than genocide is irreversibly compromising the human genetics with incalculable consequences for all current and future generations. And, once again, we bring proof they are knowingly doing this, and where there’s awareness, there’s also intention. So this video below should open the Nuremberg 2 trials.
The WEF published this video in 2016, one year prior to Moderna’s Tal Zaks video for TED that we’ve already manage to make quite viral. This crucial issue is hugely underrated and most people still are not so sure what to believe simply because The Military Biotech Complex is burning the books through its Big Tech arm. Hopefully the video before clarifies the issue for good.
Before we further discuss this, please see this “prequel” for very important context:
Actually, one of our first videos deleted by YouTube was just scientists describing their work in the field of epigenetics and epitratrascriptomics, a whole science dedicated to editing DNA using RNA as a screwdriver. See:
Now that we are on the same page, in terms of information, I’d like to go back to our new video, there’s a few key points that I’d like to stress:
They’ve been in the know since Day 1, this is not a surprising side effect, it’s the effect they pursued.
The above implies intention
Obviously they have no clue what this will lead to, other than genetic chaos. In the words of Bill Gates “If you want to see the effects after two years, you need to wait two years”. How about 20 or 200 years?
Cherry on the cake – the newest revelations: 50% truncated mRNA that no one has any clue what it does
All of the above is potentially irreversible, definitive and transmissible to the future generations. We have no clue what’s going to happen, but your grand-grand-grand kids may all suffer from it. Even if you’re a pure blood, you can get contaminated a million ways. AND THAT’S WHAT’S WORSE THEN GENOCIDING A GENERATION IN ONE COUNTRY OR ANOTHER.
Which brings me to another crucial question I launched in the public square long ago, without any satisfactory response:
You all know DNA is described as made of two protein spirals. If you take one and you break it to pieces, the result is hardly different from RNA or their description of a virus. In which case I would love an expert to explain:
What happens to the DNA debris resulted from cell death, where does it go and can it be mistaken for viruses? Are infections and diseases actually auto-immune attacks?
Here’s a possible starting point:
Mechanisms and physiology of the clearance of dead cells by efferocytosis
“Unlike PAMPs, which are derived from microbes, damage-associated molecular patterns (DAMPs) are of cellular origin and can be liberated upon cell death. DAMPs trigger inflammatory responses, and may also serve as chemoattractants for macrophages. DAMPs are metabolically diverse entities, including genomic and mitochondrial DNA, nuclear proteins (HMGB, histones)25, cytoplasmic proteins (S100), cytokines (IL-1α, IL-33, IL-36), and other small molecules (ATP, UTP, uric acid crystals) (Table 1)26. In addition, inflammasome [G] -mediated caspase-1 activation generates inflammatory cytokines IL-1β and IL-18 during pyroptosis (see Box 1) that lead to inflammatory immune activation after cellular demise.27 Below, we review the relevance of DAMPs during efferocytosis, the ability of DAMPs to modulate inflammation, and specific DAMPs and their effects.
DNA as a DAMP.
Several mechanisms ensure low DNA burden following apoptotic death and contribute to its immune-silent phenotype. In healthy cells, caspase-activated DNase (CAD) exists in complex with its inhibitory chaperone ICAD and remains constitutively inactive in the cytosol28,29. Active caspase-3 cleaves ICAD28,30, promoting CAD homodimerization, nuclear translocation, and DNA hydrolysis between nucleosomes. Nuclear pieces are then neatly packaged with cytoplasm into apoptotic bodies that are eventually digested during efferocytosis31. In contrast, nuclear and mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA), as well as pathogen-derived DNA molecules in those cells dying due to an infection, can be released to the extracellular environment from non-apoptotic dying cells. Toll-like receptor 9 (TLR9) is activated by unmethylated CpG sequences such as those found in mtDNA or bacterial DNA (Table 1), and activation of TLR9 triggers downstream inflammatory responses. circulating DNA DAMPs can accumulate in the body in cases where non-apoptotic cell death is widespread; for example, mtDNA was found to be elevated in the plasma of trauma patients32, likely as a result of injury-induced cell death.
DNA in the extracellular environment is processed by DNase-I33, while DNase-III (also known as TREX1) clears cytoplasmic DNA34, and DNase-II processes DNA from dying cells in the phagocyte’s lysosomes to help maintain negligible levels of DNA following efferocytosis. Should DNA escape to the cytosol, it can be recognized by cytosolic DNA sensors35, including cyclic GMP-AMP synthase (cGAS) and the inflammasome component AIM2. cGAS is activated upon cytosolic DNA binding and subsequently catalyzes a reaction between GTP and ATP to form cyclic GMP-AMP (cGAMP)36. The newly synthesized cGAMP binds to and activates the stimulator of interferon genes protein (STING), leading to TANK binding kinase 1 (TBK1)-dependent phosphorylation of the interferon regulatory factor IRF337. These events trigger the IRF3-mediated activation of a Type I interferon response.
DNase-II-deficient or DNase III-deficient mice die during embryogenesis and this embryonic lethality can be prevented if the response to misplaced DNA is abrogated through deletion of cGAS, STING, or the Type-I interferon receptor (IFNAR)38–41. It is possible that these DNases function to limit cytosolic DNA following efferocytosis during development, thereby preventing this lethal interferonopathy, although how the DNA of engulfed corpses might be released from the phagosome or lysosome to become cytosolic, triggering such responses, remains unknown.
Similarly, recognition of cytosolic DNA by AIM2 causes AIM2 to recruit and activate caspase-1, resulting in IL-1β processing and release, contributing to inflammation42,43. Again, when and how defects in the clearance of DNA during efferocytosis may engage AIM2 remains unclear.
Protein DAMPs.
High mobility group protein B1 (HMGB1) is a nuclear protein that binds to DNA and assists replication, repair and transcription44,45,46. Although some HMGB1 can be released to the extracellular milieu under steady state conditions47 or during apoptosis48, it is predominantly released during forms of immunogenic cell death25. Efficient efferocytosis can thus limit the release of HMGB1. Based on its redox status, HMGB1 can function as a chemotactic agent (reduced) or as an inflammatory agent (oxidized)49. In its reduced form, HMGB1 can prevent the induction of immune tolerance [G] to antigens associated with the dying cell48. Reduced HMGB1 may bind to TLRs or the receptor for advanced glycation end products (RAGE) (Table 1)50, leading to immune cell activation and cytokine production. Recently, binding of reduced HMGB1 to the chemokine receptor CXCR4 was observed during tissue regeneration following injury51, highlighting the possible importance of this molecule in the response to dying cells. S100 proteins can also be released from dying cells52, and efferocytosis can limit the release of these proteins from dying cells. Again, TLRs and RAGE appear to be the primary receptors on macrophages that promote inflammatory activation in response to S100 proteins.”
Efferocytosis is critical for tissue homeostasis.Efferocytosis can be carried out by professional phagocytes (red boxes), such as macrophages and dendritic cells, or to a lesser extent by non-professional phagocytes (blue boxes) such as epithelial cells. Disruption of normal efferocytosis can contribute to the development of a wide range of pathologies (light grey boxes) across a variety of tissues. (dark grey boxes). COPD, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease; IPD, idiopathic pulmonary disease; SLE, systemic lupus erythematosus.
I keep my expectations low, but please surprise me!
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Except in the process of “doing it”, very interesting undisclosed trades have occurred.
An amazing researcher / whistleblower, former pharma and medical device R&D executive Sasha Latypova has recently confirmed and furthered our research on several topics. Here’s a fragment from a recent Substack post:
I know what is in the redacted part of the above paragraph and it was not hard to figure out. The first redaction under 1.1.1 BACKGROUND is “Fosun Pharmaceuticals”, so the sentence reads “Fosun Pharmaceuticals”, Pfizer and BioNTech entered into an agreement for the co-development…”
Note: the only journalist I am aware of in either “mainstream” or “resistance” who mentioned Fosun was Naomi Wolf, kudos to her. I was in touch with The Epoch Times to try to publish this information, and even they decided to bury the story (but they published my other materials). I did discuss this on Dr. Jane Ruby’s show, and kudos to her as well for not being afraid to cover the truth.
Below is the timeline of some of the key investments and R&D deals I was able to identify from public SEC shareholder disclosures, immediately preceding and following the “pandemic”:
Just to make sure, we are talking about the exact technology in the mRNA shots. Here is the definition from March 17, 2020 agreement between Pfizer and BioNTech (p. 4):
The same document describes a data sharing agreement, “pharmacovigilance” globally among the 3 parties. They will count the bodies and share the data with each other:
On the “pharmacovigilance” aspect, there is a 4th participant in this arrangement – the Israeli Ministry of Health, which entered into a data sharing agreement with Pfizer on January 6, 2021 and gave Pfizer (and by extension, US DoD and anyone who controls it, BioNTech and anyone who controls it, Fosun and anyone who controls it, i.e. CCP) access to all their citizens’ centralized electronic health records. But don’t worry, Benjamin Netanyahu promised to keep the data de-identified. Right.
Side note – Israeli government recently “misplaced” the Manufacturing and Supply Agreement with Pfizer mentioned in the data sharing agreement above (so we know for sure it exists). The government sadly cannot find it for some reason…
This gets even larger and more interesting when looking at the sources of “R&D” financing. Turns out, there were numerous financial backers and co-investors in the BioNTech “venture” in the years preceding the global fraud and mass murder exercise. According to Crunchbase, BioNTech, a tiny company with just a handful of employees and NO PRODUCTS or scale manufacturing, raised $1.7B in 9 rounds of investments since around 2008. Large portion of the money, $1B+ was raised before 2020. What was it for, since no big clinical trials or scale manufacturing was happening then? That’s a good question, worth examining at some point. Cursory review of some of the investment rounds indicates wide and very international involvement of a variety investors from US, Europe, UK, Australia, South Africa, mainland China, Hong Kong and Singapore among others. These likely included many government actors: “sovereign” funds, pension funds and the like who often do these investments by allocating money to “private venture funds” (limited partners in a private venture funds are confidential). Maybe I will do a separate article on this at a later date.
Note, many people ask me “what about China and Russia?” when I talk about our own government and DoD engaged in mass genocide of Americans. I answered about China – they are allied with the US DoD on this. The CCP is profiting from the financial windfall of the US government printing dollars and throwing them into the mRNA furnaces where they are driving masses of the brainwashed citizens to suicide themselves. China claims to use “traditional vaccines” – if you believe what the Chinese say, I have a bridge to sell you.
I have not seen evidence of any similar alliance with Russia. This makes sense, because ultimately this boils down to the war of US vs Russia using proxies and alliances (as it always does). This does not mean that Russia are “the good guys”. Simply that the owners of Russia (whoever they are, not necessarily based in Russia) disagree with the owners of the US (whoever they are, not necessarily based in the US). Russia is running the same “covid script”, using knock off RNA/DNA injections, probably buying materials from the same suppliers, and also using war to kill off their own younger population. It’s just that they are doing it for THEIR OWN interests, not that of the US and their allies. – Sasha Latypova
For more context and a larger horizon on the topic, you also need to see this essential piece:
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… caused a bunch of alarmist headlines about the WEF and “poop water”, and they are not wrong, just behind the curve:
But poop-water’s story goes back more than a decade. By my observations, whatever it is, if it’s happening now, it’s probably been in the works for 2o years or longer. This next thing is from 2011 Buzzfeed:
Why Drinking Purified Poo Water Is So Gross, Even When It Shouldn’t Be
There’s a reason you don’t drink out of the toilet. It’s gross. Even if you got a super toilet that only flushed diamond rain water, it’d still be disgusting. But that’s the thing. The only thing keeping you from drinking cleansed pisswater is you.
According to NPR, proposals to reuse sewage and turn it into drinking water have been shot down numerous times over the years. And it’s not that the water didn’t meet standards for cleanliness. It would have been fine. Rather, they never got off the ground simply because the idea sounded so nasty.
And don’t get me wrong. We’ve done it, too. It just has everything to do with a phenomenon called psychological contagion. Remember the episode of Seinfeld when Jerry accidentally knocks his girlfriend’s toothbrush into the toilet? And, after brushing her teeth with it, she forever after had a “taint”? Same deal. The dirtiness of the toilet attached itself to her mouth. So too does the dirtiness of our poop to the water that was cleansed of it. We still think it’s dirty.
So how do you fix it? More psychology. Scientists found that after making people think about the purified water in an underwater aquifer, they were more apt to drink it. Which is kinda crazy. Just think. You could make me drink actual poo water if you made me think it was mountain fresh, but telling me truly clean water originated in a sewer would make me cringe.
Moreover, actually putting that thinking into practice would be expensive. Running the water some kind of underground spring just to make you think it’s clean could make it dirty all over again. So then it has to be cleaned again, making the process cost maybe three times as much as it already does. And you’d probably have to pay more for it, too.
To be continued? Our work and existence, as media and people, is funded solely by our most generous supporters. But we’re not really covering our costs so far, and we’re in dire needs to upgrade our equipment, especially for video production. Help SILVIEW.media survive and grow, please donate here, anything helps. Thank you!
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They are known for owning a massive supermarket chain called Boni, but few people know they are also massively invested in Picnic, huge groceries retailer in The Netherlands, about to expand in Germany too, as attested by the mainstream media RTL.
Even less people know is that…
Picnic directly buys from an existing supermarket chain (Boni), which saves them the operational costs on that side. Not having shops saves them big time on distribution and rent, which they can use to benefit consumers:
So whether you buy from Boni or Picnic, you buy from the Dutch Nitrogen Minister. I can’t believe I just wrote this previous sentence and it’s legit too…
But, in September 2021, after pouring in about half a billion dollars, the lead investor in Picnic has become none other than Bill Gates. That kind of money buys you access to anything.
The exact amount that the Gates put down, is unknown. But they did provide the majority of the funds, CEO Michiel Muller says in an interview. The Gates Foundation was joined by previous investors in the Series D funding round, such as NPM Capital, De Hoge Dennen and Hoyberg.
@picnic is the fastest growing company in the Netherlands! This is the conclusion of a yearly study by Erasmus Centre for Entrepreneurship together with @NLGroeit into the fastest growing scale-ups in the Netherlands. Check out the complete list: https://t.co/5Nd4zaFUaWpic.twitter.com/1zgl4qzmUJ
They have been accused of violating several Dutch labor laws. The FNV said on Thursday it would take Picnic to court for refusing to pay staff according to the nationwide supermarket pay and conditions agreement (cao).
dutchreview.com
And this is not the first time Gates stuck his nose into Dutch food and agriculture.
Dutch Foreign Trade Minister and Bill Gates Discuss Cooperation Between the Netherlands and Gates Foundation
Dutch Minister for Foreign Trade and Development Aid Sigrid Kaag met with Bill Gates, co-chairman of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation during the 2018 World Bank Spring Meetings in Washington DC. Bill Gates expressed his appreciation that the Dutch development budget is ‘going back in the right direction’. Both share the vision that the private sector can provide a key contribution to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals. Further cooperation was discussed, such as in the areas of agriculture and health care.
The Netherlands and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation have been involved supporting industry benchmarking for sustainable development from the very start. The Access to Medicine Index was the first industry benchmark of this kind. As early as 2010, Bill Gates was the first to state that industry benchmarks should also be created for other industries to boost the private sector’s contribution to sustainable development and to give credit to companies that set an example.
Since then, the Access to Seeds Index as well as the Access to Nutrition Index were set up with support of both The Netherlands and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Currently the World Benchmarking Alliance is being set up, which will focus on developing new industry benchmarks tracking, disclosing and encouraging the contributions of various industries to achieving the SDGs.
UPDATE: JULY 11, 2022 – EXPLOSIVE PICNIC IN THE NETHERLANDS
Dutch prime Minister Mark Rutte, Chinese Premier Li Keqiang and UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon announce the launch of the first regional office of the Global Center on Adaptation in China. The two countries have agreed to work closely together to accelerate action to make China and the region more resilient to the reality of the climate crisis on its fragile ecological environment.
About GCA
Launched in 2018 the Global Center on Adaptation works to accelerate action and support for adaptation solutions, from the international to the local, from the public and private sector, to ensure we learn from each other and work together for a climate resilient future.
The Global Center on Adaptation is a Managing Partner of the Global Commission on Adaptation led by Ban Ki-moon, 8th Secretary-General of the United Nations, Bill Gates, co-chair of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, and Kristalina Georgieva, CEO of the World Bank.
The GCA head office is based in The Netherlands.
So there. More interesting connections to be revealed soon, stay tuned.
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Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOG – Get Rating) CAO Amie Thuener O’toole sold 42 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, June 1st. The shares were sold at an average price of $2,298.63, for a total transaction of $96,542.46. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief accounting officer now owns 1,181 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $2,714,682.03. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available at this link.
Amie Thuener O’toole also recently made the following trade(s):Get Alphabet alerts:
On Tuesday, May 3rd, Amie Thuener O’toole sold 42 shares of Alphabet stock. The stock was sold at an average price of $2,335.30, for a total transaction of $98,082.60.
On Friday, April 1st, Amie Thuener O’toole sold 42 shares of Alphabet stock. The stock was sold at an average price of $2,800.20, for a total transaction of $117,608.40.
NASDAQ GOOG traded up $72.18 on Thursday, hitting $2,354.92. 1,373,569 shares of the company were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 1,582,973. The company has a market cap of $1.55 trillion, a PE ratio of 21.30, a PEG ratio of 1.07 and a beta of 1.13. Alphabet Inc. has a 12 month low of $2,044.16 and a 12 month high of $3,042.00. The stock has a fifty day moving average of $2,464.33 and a 200-day moving average of $2,675.68. The company has a current ratio of 2.87, a quick ratio of 2.85 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.06.
Shares of Alphabet are scheduled to split on Monday, July 18th. The 20-1 split was announced on Tuesday, February 1st. The newly minted shares will be payable to shareholders after the closing bell on Friday, July 15th.
Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOG – Get Rating) last released its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, April 26th. The information services provider reported $24.62 earnings per share for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $25.51 by ($0.89). Alphabet had a net margin of 27.57% and a return on equity of 30.18%. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business earned $26.29 earnings per share. On average, analysts expect that Alphabet Inc. will post 112.46 earnings per share for the current year.
GOOG has been the subject of a number of research analyst reports. Tigress Financial upped their price objective on shares of Alphabet from $3,540.00 to $3,670.00 in a research report on Friday, March 18th. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft decreased their price target on shares of Alphabet from $3,150.00 to $2,900.00 in a research report on Wednesday, April 27th. Canaccord Genuity Group upped their price target on shares of Alphabet from $3,350.00 to $3,500.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, February 2nd. Cowen upped their price target on shares of Alphabet from $3,500.00 to $3,600.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research report on Wednesday, February 2nd. Finally, Wedbush restated an “outperform” rating on shares of Alphabet in a research report on Wednesday, April 20th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a hold rating and thirty have assigned a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Alphabet presently has a consensus rating of “Buy” and a consensus price target of $3,308.77.
Several institutional investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in GOOG. Morgan Stanley lifted its stake in shares of Alphabet by 2.1% in the second quarter. Morgan Stanley now owns 2,433,132 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $6,098,209,000 after buying an additional 50,601 shares in the last quarter. New World Advisors LLC purchased a new stake in shares of Alphabet in the third quarter valued at about $724,000. EagleClaw Capital Managment LLC raised its holdings in shares of Alphabet by 3.5% in the third quarter. EagleClaw Capital Managment LLC now owns 2,946 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $7,853,000 after purchasing an additional 99 shares during the last quarter. Legacy Wealth Planning LLC purchased a new stake in shares of Alphabet in the third quarter valued at about $205,000. Finally, BloombergSen Inc. raised its holdings in shares of Alphabet by 1.4% in the third quarter. BloombergSen Inc. now owns 45,471 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $121,180,000 after purchasing an additional 616 shares during the last quarter. 31.20% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.
About Alphabet
Alphabet Inc provides various products and platforms in the United States, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, the Asia-Pacific, Canada, and Latin America. It operates through Google Services, Google Cloud, and Other Bets segments. The Google Services segment offers products and services, including ads, Android, Chrome, hardware, Gmail, Google Drive, Google Maps, Google Photos, Google Play, Search, and YouTube.
So Alphabet stock doesn’t seem to be currently underperforming. If the cause of all these evolutions is not something happening in the present, Gates and the Alphabet CAO could very well have information about something in the future that determined them to take action. Insider info?
As for publicly available info on Alphabet’s future, the only notable event announced is:
In short, that means Alphabet shares aren’t many and they are expensive. It also means the current owners are not trading them enough to create speculative value growth. So they split every share in 20 tinier shares with the same total value. Those are bite-sized shares that smaller sharks can take on.
What that also means is that Alphabet needs funds and the little closed circle of rich elite stockholders isn’t providing enough, the actual business is not making much either, so they need to raise more from market speculations. The strategy chosen to achieve this: They lower their pants a bit for easier plebeian access, in hope they will get access to more plebeian pockets in return.
While all this info might not be enough to derive definitive and specific conclusion about the future of these two pillars of the digital dome, namely Alphabet and Microsoft, a few things can be said with close to 100% certainty:
Extraordinary evolutions have extraordinary causes.
The Military BioTech Complex will have to transform and adapt to the extraordinary change it’s causing. That will reflect in its corporate avatars.
If Twitter is going through a self-inflicted crisis, it’s hardly possible for Google to fully avoid something similar, for the same reasons. I’d guess Google should suffer even more from user backlash by now, because their offer is even easier to replace, but they’re just better at hiding it and there’s no Elon Musk to look under their hood.
Microsoft’s public image is inextricably tied to Bill Gates’, whose credibility took the most spectacular nosedive last couple of years.
These previous four statements might be one and the same.
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Sometimes my memes are 3D. And you can own them. Or send them to someone. You can even eat some of them. CLICK HERE
NTI Co-Chairman and CEO Ernest J. Moniz and Munich Security Conference (MSC) Chairman Ambassador Wolfgang Ischinger convened 19 current and former global leaders and experts for a March 17, 2021 senior leaders tabletop exercise focused on reducing high-consequence biological threats with potentially catastrophic consequences.
This third annual tabletop exercise organized by NTI’s Global Biological Policy and Programs team (NTI | bio) in conjunction with the MSC is part of the MSC’s “Beyond Westlessness: The Road to Munich 2021” campaign. This effort includes several virtual high-level events and initiatives aimed at advancing the security policy dialogue on priorities for a new transatlantic agenda and laying the groundwork for in-person debates in Munich later in the year. This year’s exercise was conducted on a virtual platform due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The impact of COVID-19 provided a pressing backdrop for this exercise, as the ongoing pandemic has highlighted weaknesses in the international architecture for preventing, detecting, and responding to pandemic threats. This is an urgent concern because future pandemics could match or exceed COVID-19’s devastating impact in lost lives and shattered economies. Even more concerning is that there are critical gaps in biotechnology oversight that create opportunities for accidental or deliberate misuse with potentially catastrophic global consequences. This was illustrated in the exercise scenario: a localized bioweapons attack with a genetically engineered monkeypox virus begins in the fictional country of Brinia. Over 18 months, the scenario evolves into a globally catastrophic pandemic, leaving 40% of the world’s population infected and over a quarter billion people dead.
The fictional exercise scenario unfolded gradually through a series of short videos that participants reacted to during a facilitated discussion. Key themes emerged regarding the need to strengthen international pandemic risk assessment and early warning systems; to establish clear triggers for national-level anticipatory response and aggressive early action to slow disease transmission and save lives; to reduce biotechnology risks and enhance oversight of life sciences research; and to promote new and stronger international health security preparedness financing mechanisms.
A full report will be published later in 2021. More information about previous exercises can be found in final reports from 2019 and 2020.
NTI was founded in 2001 by former U.S. Senator Sam Nunn and philanthropist Ted Turner. It serves as the Secretariat for the “Nuclear Security Project”, in cooperation with the Hoover Institution at Stanford. Former Secretary of State George P. Shultz, former Secretary of Defense William J. Perry, former Secretary of State Henry A. Kissinger and Nunn (the “four horsemen of the nuclear apocalypse”) guide the project—an effort to encourage global action to reduce urgent nuclear dangers and build support for reducing reliance on nuclear weapons, ultimately ending them as a threat to the world
Wikipedia
The only connection between nuclear threats and monkey-pox? Bill Gates and The Rockefeller Foundation, see below:
In early 2018, NTI received a $6 million grant from the Open Philanthropy Project. The grant will be used to “help strengthen its efforts to mitigate global biological threats that have increased as the world has become more interconnected.”
Why?
In January 2018 NTI announced that it had received $250,000 in support from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. That money will help advance NTI’s efforts in developing a “Global Health Security Index”. The index would analyze a country’s biological programs and policies.
NTI has received international recognition for work to improve biosecurity, primarily through creating disease surveillance networks. Whether a biological threat is natural or intentional, disease surveillance is a key step in rapid detection and response. Because the response of a health system in one country could have a direct and immediate impact on a neighboring country, or even continent, NTI developed projects that foster cooperation among public health officials across political and geographic boundaries.
In 2003, NTI created the Middle East Consortium for Infectious Disease Surveillance (MECIDS) with participation from Israel, Jordan, and the Palestinian Authority. MECIDS continues to share official health data and conduct infectious disease prevention training.
NTI also created the Connecting Organizations for Disease Surveillance (CORDS), which in 2013 launched as an independent NGO that links international disease surveillance networks, supported by the World Health Organization, and the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations.
This is just the top line of a large and spectacular Board of Directors:
Co-chaired by Moniz, Nunn and Ted Turner, NTI is governed by a Board of Directors with both current and emeritus members from the United States, Japan, India, Pakistan, China, Jordan, Sweden, France and the United Kingdom. They include:
Dr. Alexey Arbatov, Head, Center for International Security at Institute of World Economy and International Relations, Russian Academy of Sciences
Charles A. Bowsher, Former Comptroller General Of The United States And Head Of The General Accounting Office
NTI’s staff includes experts in international affairs, nonproliferation, security and military issues, public health, medicine and communications, who have operational experience in their areas of specialty
Former U.S. Secretary of Energy Ernest J. Moniz was named co-chair and chief executive officer by the Board of Directors of the Nuclear Threat Initiative (NTI) in March 2017. He began serving in June 2017.
An American nuclear physicist who was named as the 13th United States Secretary of Energy by President Barack Obama in May 2013. He is one of the founders of The Cyprus Institute and he was the Associate Director for Science in the Office of Science and Technology Policy in the Clinton administration.
In November 2020, Moniz was named a candidate for Secretary of Energy in the Biden Administration.] However, former Governor of Michigan Jennifer Granholm was chosen instead.[ Most likely because Moniz has been criticized by environmentalists for his ties to the oil and gas industries. During his career, Moniz has served on the advisory boards for BP, one of the largest oil and gas companies, and General Electric. Prior to his appointment as Secretary of Energy, Moniz served as a trustee of the King Abdullah Petroleum Studies and Research Center in Saudi Arabia, according to Wikipedia.
Meanwhile, he turned 200% woke-green.
Al Gore would be pleased to hear that “An Inconvenient Truth,” his documentary on global climate change, passed the MIT test. Ernest J. Moniz, director of the MIT Energy Initiative, and Peter H. Stone, professor of climate dynamics at the MIT Center for Global Change Science, declared that Gore did “a fine job framing the problem.”
His parents were both immigrants from Portugal. Ernest Moniz father’s name is under review and mother unknown at this time. We will continue to update details on Ernest Moniz’s family.
Ted Turner is founder and co-chair of NTI, a global security organization working to reduce threats from nuclear, biological and chemical weapons; chairman of the Turner Foundation, Inc., which supports efforts to grow and diversify the movement, conserve land to protect and restore wildlife and biodiversity, catalyze the transition to a clean energy future, and protect and restore water resources; chairman of the United Nations Foundation, which promotes a more peaceful, prosperous and just world; and chairman and co-founder of the Ted’s Montana Grill restaurant chain, which operates 47 locations nationwide. Turner is also chairman of Turner Enterprises, Inc., a private company, which manages his business interests, land holdings and investments, including the oversight of two million acres in 11 states and in Argentina, and more than 50,000 bison head.
In March 2021, NTI partnered with the Munich Security Conference to conduct a tabletop exercise on reducing high-consequence biological threats. The exercise examined gaps in national and international biosecurity and pandemic preparedness architectures—exploring opportunities to improve prevention and response capabilities for high-consequence biological events. Participants included 19 senior leaders and experts from across Africa, the Americas, Asia, and Europe with decades of combined experience in public health, biotechnology industry, international security, and philanthropy.
Developed in consultation with technical and policy experts, the fictional exercise scenario portrayed a deadly, global pandemic involving an unusual strain of monkeypox virus that first emerged in the fictional nation of Brinia and spread globally over 18 months. Ultimately, the exercise scenario revealed that the initial outbreak was caused by a terrorist attack using a pathogen engineered in a laboratory with inadequate biosafety and biosecurity provisions and weak oversight. By the end of the exercise, the fictional pandemic resulted in more than three billion cases and 270 million fatalities worldwide.
Discussions throughout the tabletop exercise generated a range of valuable insights and key findings. Most significantly, exercise participants agreed that, notwithstanding improvements following the global response to COVID-19, the international system of pandemic prevention, detection, analysis, warning, and response is woefully inadequate to address current and anticipated future challenges. Gaps in the international biosecurity and pandemic preparedness architecture are extensive and fundamental, undermining the ability of the international community to prevent and mount effective responses to future biological events—including those that could match the impacts of COVID-19 or cause damage that is significantly more severe.
Report Findings and Recommendations
Discussion among exercise participants led to the following key findings:
(The full findings are available on page 14 of the report.)
Weak global detection, assessment, and warning of pandemic risks. The international community needs a more robust, transparent detection, evaluation, and early warning system that can rapidly communicate actionable information about pandemic risks.
Gaps in national-level preparedness. National governments should improve preparedness by developing national-level pandemic response plans built upon a coherent system of “triggers” that prompt anticipatory action, despite uncertainty and near-term costs—in other words, on a “no-regrets” basis.
Gaps in biological research governance. The international system for governing dual-use biological research is neither prepared to meet today’s security requirements, nor is it ready for significantly expanded challenges in the future. There are risk reduction needs throughout the bioscience research and development life cycle.
Insufficient financing of international preparedness for pandemics. Many countries around the world lack financing to make the essential national investments in pandemic preparedness.
To address these findings, the report authors developed the following recommendations:
(The full recommendations are available on page 22 of the report.)
Bolster international systems for pandemic risk assessment, warning, and investigating outbreak origins
The WHO should establish a graded, transparent, international public health alert system.
The United Nations (UN) system should establish a new mechanism for investigating high-consequence biological events of unknown origin, which we refer to as a “Joint Assessment Mechanism.”
Develop and institute national-level triggers for early, proactive pandemic response
National governments must adopt a “no-regrets” approach to pandemic response, taking anticipatory action—as opposed to reacting to mounting case counts and fatalities, which are lagging indicators.
To facilitate anticipatory action on a no-regrets basis, national governments should develop national-level plans that define and incorporate “triggers” for responding to high-consequence biological events.
Establish an international entity dedicated to reducing emerging biological risks associated with rapid technology advances
The international community should establish an entity dedicated to reducing the risk of catastrophic events due to accidental misuse or deliberate abuse of bioscience and biotechnology.
To meaningfully reduce risk, the entity should support interventions throughout the bioscience and biotechnology research and development life cycle—from funding, through execution, and on to publication or commercialization.
Develop a catalytic global health security fund to accelerate pandemic preparedness capacity building in countries around the world
National leaders, development banks, philanthropic donors, and the private sector should establish and resource a new financing mechanism to bolster global health security and pandemic preparedness.
The design and operations of the fund should be catalytic—incentivizing national governments to invest in their own preparedness over the long term.
Establish a robust international process to tackle the challenge of supply chain resilience
The UN Secretary General should convene a high-level panel to develop recommendations for critical measures to bolster global supply chain resilience for medical and public health supplies.
It was my mistake to put WB and WHO on the same level in that headline, WHO does not exists as an entity with own will and personality, it’s just a drawer of sock-puppets.
As for the World Bank / IMF, they’re ran by our old (anything but) friends… scroll a bit the PDF below and take a look who authors this internal report I snitched from the WB website!
Simpletons cried it’s impossible to set up a global event like a pandemic because no one can align all these countries. In fact, about 190 countries and governments owe money to WB / IMF and need to borrow more all the time because they run on debt like Twitter. 190 out of less than 200. There is less agreement over how many countries are there than there is about Covid. Because many countries are not recognized by all players, but Bill Gates is recognized as an Overlords spokesperson. Running human farms on debt is actually how they ended up in a global economic collapse long before Covid, and this is one of the main reasons behind their desperate need for a Great Reset.
Background: Cases of severe autoimmune blistering diseases (AIBDs) have recently been reported in association with the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) vaccination.
Aims: To describe a report of oropharyngeal Pemphigus Vulgaris (OPV) triggered by the mRNABNT162b2 vaccine (Comirnaty®/ Pfizer/ BioNTech) and to analyze the clinical and immunological characteristics of the AIBDs cases reported following the SARS-CoV-2 vaccination.
Methods: The clinical and immunological features of our case of OPV were documented. A review of the literature was conducted and only cases of AIBDs arising after the SARS-CoV-2 vaccination were included.
Case report: A 60-year old female patients developed oropharyngeal and nasal bullous lesions seven days after the administration of a second dose of the mRNABNT162b2 vaccine (Comirnaty®/ Pfizer/BioNtech). According to the histology and direct immunofluorescence findings showing the presence of supra-basal blister and intercellular staining of IgG antibodies and the presence of a high level of anti-Dsg-3 antibodies (80 U/ml; normal < 7 U/ml) in the serum of the patients, a diagnosis of oropharyngeal Pemphigus Vulgaris was made.
Review: A total of 35 AIBDs cases triggered by the SARS-CoV-2 vaccination were found (including our report). 26 (74.3%) were diagnosed as Bullous Pemphigoid, 2 (5.7%) as Linear IgA Bullous Dermatosis, 6 (17.1%) as Pemphigus Vulgaris and 1 (2.9%) as Pemphigus Foliaceus. The mean age of the sample was 72.8 years and there was a predominance of males over females (F:M=1:1.7). In 22 (62.9%) cases, the disease developed after Pfizer vaccine administration, 6 (17.1%) after Moderna, 3 (8.6%) after AstraZeneca, 3 (8.6%) after CoronaVac (one was not specified). All patients were treated with topical and/or systemic corticosteroids, with or without the addition of immunosuppressive drugs, with a good clinical response in every case.
Conclusion: Clinicians should be aware of the potential, though rare, occurrence of AIBDs as a possible adverse event after the SARS-CoV-2 vaccination. However, notwithstanding, they should encourage their patients to obtain the vaccination in order to assist the public health systems to overcome the COVID-19 pandemic.
Hey dumb apes, got it now? #WHO says you gonna get #monkeypox if you keep reproducing and making up for the gap in birthrates caused by their previous advice on #COVID19 . I certainly hope #groomers take the advice! pic.twitter.com/DPZbsxxne4
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! Articles can always be subject of later editing as a way of perfecting them
Every aspect of the Covid crisis has come with evidence of prescience and pre-planning. “Plandemic” is one of the most adequate buzzwords I’ve ever heard. If it’s all planned, the release was planned too, which makes the current debate over the Covid origin retarded. If the cause was a virus (another oxy-moronic debate around “isolation in cultures”), then it didn’t come from animals, it didn’t escape from a lab, it was DISTRIBUTED. Whatever it was, virus, poison, psychosis, EMFs, it was DISTRIBUTED. Better watch the water, the soil and the air!
This first video below was released April 15, 2020. About the same time Trudeau was claiming The Great Reset is a conspiracy theory. Guess when the system was developed and read until the end to find out where it’s at now, I saved you a nice punchline!
How far back does this go? Well, in January 2018, WEF was already spreading this brochure
Among the first to push the Bigger Brother – the Canadian Banksters Cartel, of course.
“The World Economic Forum acknowledges and is inspired by the leadership of our partners whose commitment to this project shows that this future is possible. In particular, we wish to thank Marc Garneau, Minister of Transport of Canada, and the entire team from the Government of Canada for having contributed to ensuring the research and prototype development has been grounded in pragmatic public-sector experience. Together, the World Economic Forum and Accenture, collaborating on Shaping the Future of Security in Travel, hope that this report and the prototype will gain momentum, encouraging public and private parties to pilot and scale this concept in the coming year.”
WEF – Jan, 2018
This quote above, from the aforementioned WEF brochure, shows that WEF’s collaboration with the governments of Canada and The Netherlands on this project extends way before 2018, into the research stages.
From earlier research we know the plan was launched in January 2016:
The Forbes picked up on it, but only in January 2019, yet who was there to care and pay attention? I, for one, was busy enjoying free travel, having nothing and being happy. But Schwab had to take all that from us and replace it with this dumb livestock management app that won’t ever stick on living humans, soulless NPCs only:
Paradigm Shift: Biometrics And The Blockchain Will Replace Paper Passports Sooner Than You Think
Biometrics and blockchain are the keys to the future of traveler identification. GETTY
Crossing international borders without a physical passport may become a reality for some travelers in less than a year. On Wednesday, the World Economic Forum and the governments of Canada and the Netherlands launched a pilot program for paperless travel between the two countries at Montreal’s largest airport.
The new initiative, called Known Traveller Digital Identity (KTDI), is the first platform to use a traveler-managed digital identity for international paperless travel, giving travelers control over when and how their personal data is shared. The identity data normally stored on a chip on a passport is encrypted and securely stored in a digital wallet on a traveler’s mobile device.
Whereas traditional ID systems are managed by centralized authorities, KTDI is based on the blockchain — specifically, Linux’s Hyperledger Indy, a distributed ledger purpose-built for decentralized identity. This is the secret sauce behind the paradigm shift toward a system where travelers — not government agencies or travel brands — control access to their personal data.
“We’re all wildly frustrated by data hacks, data breaches, our identities being stolen — and that’s largely a result of where our identity data is stored today,” says David Treat, a managing director and global blockchain lead at Accenture, the technology advisory partner on the KTDI project.
“The excitement around digital identity underpinned by blockchain and biometrics is that there is now a solution pattern crystallizing where users can be in control of their own data,” says Treat. “They can decide with whom they want to share it, and for how long, and revoke that access at a later point.”
Right now, our personal data is stored many siloed data structures surrounded by supposedly secure perimeters. But if hackers manage to break into them — as they frequently do — they get all the data.
Every time you book a plane ticket, pass through an airport security checkpoint, or reserve a stay at a hotel, your personal data ends up being stored somewhere. By the end of a trip, your information might wind up in dozens of different siloed data stores, where it might remain indefinitely. “Travelers have no control over it. They are essentially handing over a set of data and they have very little visibility as to what happens to it after that,” says Treat.
With KTDI, a traveler might give an airline — or, eventually, a hotel or rental car company — access to specific pieces of personal information for a finite amount of time. When the transaction is finished, the access is revoked.
“It’s very different from today’s world where an airline or hotel will accumulate data over time and hold on to it, and create this big honey pot of information,” says Treat. Instead, the philosophy behind KTDI is more transactional, where information is stored for a user-approved period of time. “When it’s no longer needed, it’s then no longer stored,” says Treat.
So what might a journey might look like for a traveler using KTDI in the future?
To get started, you would download a mobile wallet, enroll for the first time, and establish your profile. Then, in advance of an international flight, you might decide to share your personal information with border authorities and airlines. Now the airport and airline are expecting you. Once you arrive at the airport, you can go through the security checkpoint and board the plane using biometrics to confirm your identity, without any need for a physical passport. After your flight, you might decide to revoke access to your personal data from the airline.
Meanwhile, over time, a tamper-proof digital ledger would be created through the accumulation of authorized transactions by trusted partners such as border agencies and airlines. This establishes a “known traveler status,” which is a reusable digital identity that makes it possible for more streamlined future interactions with governments, airlines and other partners.
This is not just a theoretical concept. Along with the governments of Canada and the Netherlands, partners — including Air Canada, KLM Royal Dutch Airlines, Montreal-Trudeau International Airport, Toronto Pearson International Airport and Amsterdam Airport Schiphol — will be testing the KTDI initiative throughout 2019, with the first end-to-end paperless journey expected to take place in early 2020.
The Forbes piece actually follows the official launch of KTDI two days earlier, as marked by this WEF press-release published from Toronto:
World Economic Forum consortium launches paperless Canada-Netherlands travel pilot
Jun 26, 2019
The World Economic Forum, in collaboration with the governments of Canada, The Netherlands and industry partners, launches the first ever passport-free pilot project between the two countries.
The Known Traveller Digital Identity (KTDI) initiative addresses rising aviation travel demand – expected to grow to 1.8 billion passengers by 2030
The KTDI pilot offers greater control over personal information, putting passengers in charge of when and how data is shared through a ‘traveller-managed digital identity’
MONTREAL, June 26, 2019 /CNW/ – The World Economic Forum and the governments of the Netherlands and Canada launch the first pilot project for paperless travel between the two countries today at Montreal Airport.
Known Traveller Digital Identity (KTDI) is the first platform to use a traveller-managed digital identity for international paperless travel. It will be integrated with partner systems and tested internally throughout 2019, with the first end-to-end paperless journey expected to take place in early 2020.
The pilot initiative is a collaboration between government and industry – border authorities, airports, technology providers and airlines – to create an interoperable system for secure and seamless travel.
“By 2030, international air travel is expected to rise to 1.8 billion passengers, up 50% from 2016. With current systems, airports cannot keep up,” says Christoph Wolff, Head of Mobility, World Economic Forum, “This project offers a solution. By using interoperable digital identities, passengers benefit from a holistic system for secure and seamless travel. It will shape the future of aviation and security.”
KTDI provides a frictionless travel experience for passengers while allowing them to have greater control over their personal data. The identity data that is usually stored on a chip on a passenger’s passport is instead securely stored and encrypted on their mobile device. Passengers can manage their identity data and consent to share it with border authorities, airlines and other pilot partners in advance. Using biometrics, the data is checked at every leg of the journey until arrival at the destination, without the need for a physical passport.
Passengers establish a ‘known traveller status’ over time through the accumulation of ‘attestations’ or claims that are proven and declared by trusted partners, such as border agencies and recognized airlines. The result is a reusable digital identity that facilitates more streamlined and tailored interactions with governments, airlines and other partners.
“Canada is pleased to collaborate with the World Economic Forum, the Government of The Netherlands and our industry partners to enhance aviation security and make international air travel safer by testing new and emerging technologies,” said the Honourable Marc Garneau, Canada’s Minister of Transport. “The Known Traveller Digital Identity pilot project will help facilitate seamless global air travel and benefit the world economy by enhancing the traveler experience, while ensuring that cross-border security is maintained.”
“This KTDI pilot project is a perfect example of the importance of public-private partnership in implementing innovations in the aviation sector and border management and I am honoured that we are engaging in this pilot from the Netherlands,” said Ankie Broekers-Knol, Minister for Migration, The Netherlands.
The governments of Canada and the Netherlands are joined by Air Canada, KLM Royal Dutch Airlines, YUL Montreal-Trudeau International Airport, Toronto Pearson International Airport and Amsterdam Airport Schiphol. This pilot group is supported by technology and advisory partner Accenture, with Vision Box and Idemia as technology component service providers.
KTDI technology
KTDI is based on an interoperable digital identity, linked directly to government-issued identity documents (ePassports). It uses cryptography, distributed ledger technology and biometrics to ensure portability and to safeguard the privacy of personal data. The system’s security relies on a decentralized ledger platform that all partners can access. This ledger provides an accurate, tamper-proof record of the travellers’ identity data and authorized transactions.
Once international travel resumes, self-serve check in terminals like these at Ottawa International Airport will become part of a more hands-free travel experience. (The Canadian Press/Justin Tang)
Just as the 9/11 attacks did 20 years ago, the COVID-19 pandemic will transform the way people travel internationally — with hundreds of millions of dollars in new government spending planned for modernizing border security and updating public health measures at airports.
In the recent federal budget, the federal government announced $82.5 million to fund COVID-19 testing infrastructure at Canadian airports and another $6.7 million to buy sanitization equipment for the Canadian Air Transport Security Authority.
Ottawa also has earmarked $656.1 million over five years to modernize Canada’s border security.
Daniel Gooch, president of the Canadian Airports Council, said the country’s flight hubs still have no clear idea of what is expected of them.
…
At the heart of the move to touchless travel is a trial the federal government is undertaking with the World Economic Forum and The Netherlands called the “Known Traveller Digital Identity” project, or KTDI.
The project began with the publication of a white paper back in 2018 and was seen as a way to modernize air travel by moving passengers through airports faster. That white paper said that a new, touchless system was needed as the number of international air arrivals was expected to increase 50 per cent from 2016 to 2030.
With international travel almost at a standstill now, the technology is seen as a way to facilitate a return to pre-COVID levels of air traffic.
The touchless travel experience
Under the KTDI plan, a digital form of identification is created that contains the traveller’s identity, boarding passes, vaccination history and information on whether they’ve recovered from COVID-19. Travellers with KTDI documentation would still have to face a customs officer, but all other points of contact in an airport could become touchless.
“We’re still talking about a world where you’ll need to carry your passport because it is an international border,” said a senior CBSA official, speaking on background.
“We’re not talking about replacing your passport. But the number of times you have to take out that document, or your boarding pass, to substantiate who you are and where you need to be, gets reduced.”
Passengers wear face masks as they wait to go through security at Pierre Elliott Trudeau International Airport in Montreal. (Ryan Remiorz/The Canadian Press)
The official said the KTDI program is still in its early stages and technological issues are still being worked out. He said that privacy protections would have to be in place before any such system could be launched.
“It’s not like the Government of Canada holds that information in a central place, or airlines hold it in a central place, or border agencies hold it in a central place,” the official said. “It’s the traveller themselves that holds their own information.”
Vaccinated vs. unvaccinated travellers
A CBSA spokesperson told CBC News that the $656.1 million federal investment in border security modernization over five years will fund other “digital self-service tools” that will “reduce touchpoints” and create more “automated interactions” at Canadian airports
The CBSA said more information on those measures will be released to the public “in the coming weeks.”
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is attending the G7 summit in the United Kingdom this weekend, where leaders are expected to discuss international vaccination certification — a so-called “vaccine passport”.
The federal government has signaled already that Canadians who have been fully vaccinated will be allowed to re-enter the country without having to stay in a government authorized quarantine hotel. Confirming the validity of those travellers’ vaccination status will require some kind of vaccine passport like the KTDI program. Canada’s airports like that idea.
Fully vaccinated Canadians can soon skip hotel quarantine
The federal government says it will soon ease restrictions for fully vaccinated Canadians and permanent residents returning from international travel. 2:14
“We’re really leaning on vaccinated vs. unvaccinated. That’s a place where you can have some differentiation of the travel experience to make it a little smoother, a little bit more pleasant for those who have been vaccinated. But we don’t know yet what the government’s plans are for that,” Gooch said.
Once a traveller’s vaccination can be verified, Gooch said, they can be treated differently — perhaps by giving them a single test upon arrival or before they depart, rather than the multiple tests required now.
While the exact changes to international travel are still being worked out, Gooch said the travel experience going forward will be very different from the past.
“Maybe you don’t see an individual at all as you walk through the customs hall,” he said. “Your verification is done through your facial ID, which is connected to your Known Traveller Digital Identification, which is connected to your digital health information and your digital travel documentation.
Tucker Carlson / Ben Dichter:
"Yesterday was my 1st time crossing the border with my digital passport, I held my phone to border agent to give him my QR code, you know what he said? It’s okay I don’t need it! Your phone already popped up & correlated your vaccine passport.” pic.twitter.com/HsXlQlQf9G
Paperless Travel Pilot Outlines Best Practices for Digital Travel Experience
18 Oct 2021, by Madeleine Hillyer, Media Relations, World Economic Forum, mhll@weforum.org
World Economic Forum releases findings from its three-year Known Traveller Digital Identity pilot for paperless, cross-border travel
COVID-19 has heightened the need for digital travel credentials, such as vaccination or COVID test certificates, that can be verified across borders
The pilot indicates that a fully digital travel experience is possible but further progress is needed in the areas of governance, legal, global public-private collaboration and technology standards to drive wider adoption
Read more on the Known Traveller Digital Identity pilot findings here
New York, USA, 18 October 2021 – The World Economic Forum today releases findings from its digital passport pilot project which indicate that a fully digital travel experience is possible. However, further collaboration is needed to progress towards globally accepted and verifiable digital travel credentials.
The Known Traveller Digital Identity (KTDI)initiative, which was started in 2018, has worked with the governments of Canada and the Netherlands plus private-sector partners to pilot digital travel credentials for paperless travel between two countries. Lessons from this pilot are particularly relevant today as COVID-19 has underscored the need for verifiable digital credentials in cross-border travel.
A new white paper, Accelerating the Transition to Digital Credentials for Travel, is the result of collaboration between the World Economic Forum, Accenture and industry and government partners. It draws on lessons from the KTDI pilot and is intended to serve as a playbook to guide decision making and help assess important considerations in the use of verifiable digital travel credentials across borders.
“Creating digital travel credentials that work across borders is not an issue of technology but an issue of governance,” said Lauren Uppink, Head of Aviation, Travel and Tourism, World Economic Forum. “The learnings from the Forum’s KTDI consortium demonstrates that while the technology for the next stage of digital-first travel is ready, thoughtful collective action is what truly enables the design and effective implementation of global governance structures, ensuring that digital travel credentials are easy to use, trustworthy and verifiable across borders.”
“The pandemic has highlighted the urgency for trusted, widely-accepted, privacy preserving digital travel credentials,” says Christine Leong, Global Lead for Blockchain Identity & Biometrics, Accenture. “Leveraging digital travel credentials would provide a much more secure way of sharing verifiable information, leading to greater assurance for travellers, shorter airport processing time, and greater efficiency for airline and border staff. To achieve this, governments and private sector organisations must collaborate to bring about a seamless, paperless and contactless travel continuum for all. The time to work together is now.”
Lessons from the KTDI pilot
The KTDI project established that two major, often misleadingly polarized, technology approaches to verifiable digital identities can work together. Working with governments and technology partners, the consortium found that public key infrastructure (PKI) and decentralized digital identity can co-exist and address the digitalization of various parts of a travel journey.
Furthermore, the pilot project found that these technologies can and must be integrated within existing systems to accelerate adoption and scale.
Interoperability and collaboration were other key areas for progress identified during the KTDI pilot. For paper passports, interoperability already exists as all participating member states agree to follow the specifications through the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO)’s governance and trust frameworks.
Such an agreement for the specifications of digital travel credentials is not as widespread yet, but the adoption of traditional passport specifications shows that the benefits of using digital credentials in travel cannot be realized through isolated or one-off approaches.
The KTDI project
The first cross-border pilot for digital travel identification, the Known Traveller Digital Identity (KTDI) project, has been piloted with government partners from Canada and the Netherlands, along with a consortium of technology, private sector and other partners. The KTDI partners have designed and built the first government-led, public-private ecosystem to test the vision of safe and seamless cross-border travel. This vision aimed to reduce touchpoints by using emerging technologies, including biometrics and decentralized identity, and inform the future development of a globally accepted decentralized identity ecosystem.
Although the COVID-19 pandemic has affected KTDI pilot efforts, it has also created an opportunity to further analyse how decentralized digital identity and PKI-based approaches could work together or work in sync. Although the initial pilot employed a decentralized identity approach to trial trusted digital credentials, KTDI could in the future expand to incorporate additional verifiable credentials such as COVID-19 vaccination certificates, as well as PKI-based digital credentials.
Moreover, while government officials claimed that vaccine passports only included details pertaining to whether someone has received a COVID vaccine, some claim it functions as a tracking app, with border patrol receiving notification of one’s estimated arrival time well before a traveller gets there. Liberals in Canada have also suggested utilizing tracking via digital IDs to hunt down the unvaccinated during future pandemics to get them their shots.
At a Feb. 1 government event on digital ID an assistant deputy minister asked panelists how they could use the technology to better handle future pandemics.
One panelist suggested it could be used to track people to be vaccinated or to identify if they're due for a second dose. pic.twitter.com/eKgBz4lEwX
Travelling from one concentration camp to another will be as joyless as the camps. You can’t escape if there’s no “outside”.
Alongside @ACI_EUROPE, we call for countries to remove remaining intra 🇪🇺 restrictions, including all testing, vaccine certificates, and passenger location forms.
New evidence shows travel restrictions failed to prevent the spread of #COVID19.
To be continued? Our work and existence, as media and people, is funded solely by our most generous supporters. But we’re not really covering our costs so far, and we’re in dire needs to upgrade our equipment, especially for video production. Help SILVIEW.media survive and grow, please donate here, anything helps. Thank you!
! Articles can always be subject of later editing as a way of perfecting them
This document has been published by NASA in July 2001, only a few months before 9/11. And it took 12 years to get some spotlight. Ten more years and we see it coming to life. And now it dwarfs the Great Reset in terms of revelations and implications.
Figuring out The Great Reset was like in those cartoons where some people celebrate killing Godzilla just to discover it was a baby Godzilla, and a raging Godzilla-mom is approaching fast. This is how I felt bumping into this:
Dennis M. Bushnell, “Future Strategic Issues/Future Warfare [Circa 2025]” (sic), NASA Langley Research Center (National Aeronautics and Space Administration), July 2001, 113 pp.; PDF, 1400357 bytes, MD5: c833f3fbc55d07fe891f5f4df5fb2f57. The aforesaid PDF was found on the US Department of Defense’s Defense Technical Information Center (DTIC) website, as archived by the following Internet Archive URL: http://wayback.archive.org/web/20031224161719/http://www.dtic.mil/ndia/2001testing/bushnell.pdf
Dennis M. Bushnell is the Chief Scientist at NASA’s Langley Research Center. The following is a biography page for him:
Bushnell’s above presentation was given on August 14, 2001 at the 4th Annual Testing and Training for Readiness Symposium and Exhibition organized by the National Defense Industrial Association (NDIA) and held at the Rosen Centre Hotel (formerly the Omni Rosen Hotel) in Orlando, Florida. For information on that, see the following page in which the above presentation is available:
“The 4th Annual Testing and Training for Readiness Symposium & Exhibition: Emerging Challenges, Opportunities and Requirements, 13-16 August 2001”, Defense Technical Information Center (DTIC).
See also the following announcement page for this conference:
“4th Annual Testing and Training Symposium and Exhibition: A National Partnership, on August 14-16, 2001 in Orlando, FL at the Omni Centre Hotel”, National Defense Industrial Association (NDIA).
The following is the conference proceedings:
Testing and Training for Readiness Symposium and Exhibition (4th Annual): Emerging Challenges, Opportunities and Requirements Held on 13-16 August 2001 (on CD-ROM), National Defense Industrial Association (NDIA), Aug. 2001; National Technical Information Service (NTIS) Issue Number: 1014.
The text on each page stating “Future Strategic Issues, 7/01” within the above PDF refers to the document’s finalization date of July 2001. The creation date of the above PDF is given as Thu 13 Dec 2001 08:48:04 AM EST, which possibly refers to when the PDF was created from a Microsoft PowerPoint file (.ppt), as it looks like the document was perhaps originally a PowerPoint file.Addeddate 2014-02-11 00:44:28Identifier FutureStrategicIssuesFutureWarfareCirca2025Identifier-ark ark:/13960/t05x4vt08Ocr ABBYY FineReader 9.0Ppi 300Scanner Internet Archive HTML5 Uploader 1.5.1Year 2001
Dr. Dennis M. Bushnell is the Chief Scientist at NASA Langley Research Center. He is responsible for Technical Oversight and Advanced Program formulation for a major NASA Research Center with technical emphasis in the areas of Atmospheric Sciences and Structures, Materials, Acoustics, Flight Electronics/Control/Software, Instruments, Aerodynamics, Aerothermodynamics, Hypersonic Airbreathing Propulsion, Computational Sciences and Systems Optimization for Aeronautics, Spacecraft, Exploration and Space Access . 44 years experience as Research Scientist, Section Head, Branch Head, Associate Division Chief and Chief Scientist. Technical Specialties include Flow Modeling and Control across the Speed Range, Advanced Configuration Aeronautics, Aeronautical Facilities and Hypersonic Airbreathing Propulsion . Author of 252 publications/major presentations and 310 invited lectures/seminars, Member of National Academy of Engineering , Selected as Fellow of ASME, AIAA and the Royal Aeronautical Society, 6 patents, AIAA Sperry and Fluid and Plasma Dynamics Awards , AIAA Dryden Lectureship, Royal Aeronautical Society Lanchester, Swire and Wilber and Orville Wright Lectures, ICAS Guggenheim Lecture, Israel Von Karman Lecture, USAF/NASP Gene Zara Award, NASA Exceptional Scientific Achievement and Outstanding Leadership Medals and Distinguished Research Scientist Award, ST Presidential Rank Award,9 NASA Special Achievement and 10 Group Achievement Awards, University of Connecticut Outstanding Engineering Alumni, Academy of Engineers ,Pi Tau Sigma and Hamilton Awards, Univ. of Va. Engineering Achievement Award , service on numerous National and International Technical Panels and Committees and consultant to National and International organizations. DOD related committee/consulting assignments include USAF Rocket Propulsion Laboratory, BMDC, ONR, Intelligence Community/STIC, AFOSR, NRAC, NRC, WL, LLL, HASC, NUWC, DARPA, AGARD, ARL, IAT, AEDC, JANNAF, NAVSEA, Air Force 2025, AFSOC, Sandia, SAB, Army War College, ACOM Joint Futures, SOCOM, TRADOC, SEALS, JFCOM, IDA, NDU, DSB and Army After Next. Reviewer for 40 Journals and Organizations, Editor, Volume 123 of AIAA Progress Series “Viscous Drag Reduction in Boundary Layers.” Responsible for invention/ development of “Riblet” approach to Turbulent Drag Reduction, High Speed “Quiet Tunnels” for Flight-Applicable Boundary Layer Transition Research, Advanced Computational Approaches for Laminar Flow Control and Advanced Hypervelocity Airbreathing and Aeronautical Concepts with revolutionary performance potential. Contributions to National Programs include Sprint, HSCT/SST, FASTSHIP, Gemini, Apollo, RAM, Viking, X15, F-18E/F [patent holder for the “fix” to the wing drop problem],Shuttle, NASP, Submarine/Torpedo Technology ,Americas’ Cup Racers, Navy Rail Gun, MAGLEV Trains and Planetary Exploration. B.S. in M.E. degree from University of Connecticut with Highest Honors, Distinction, University Scholar (1963), M.S. degree in M.E. from University of Virginia (1967).U.S. Govt. ST.
Dennis Bushnell sits in front of a wall filled with his awards and recognitions in Building 1212.
A voracious reader, Bushnell casually tosses around those kinds of facts. The shelves in his office are jam packed with titles like “The Singularity Is Near,” “Warped Passages,” “The Elegant Universe” and “The World in 2050.” One of his hobbies is to go to thrift stores and buy big bags of cheap books. Fiction, non-fiction: he reads whatever he can get his hands on. “It’s just more input,” he said. “I’m an info junkie.”
Besides these “very military” preoccupations, Bushnell is also obsessed with climate change, which seems to be the focus of about half his scientific efforts. “From Moon landing to Climate change.”.. Quite some title for a bio!
The only notable mention of this paper that I’ve found so far in media is this one from 2020 Counterpunch:
Neoliberalism benefits the few and makes life for the many increasingly impossible. Big data and blanket surveillance give state and corporate intelligence confidence that they can pre-empt and manage mass, social reactions to neoliberalism. This article is an excerpt from my new book, The War on You.
TARGET: “EVERYONE”
In 1997, the U.S. Space Command published its Vision for 2020. The Visionsays that military force is necessary to “protect” U.S. trade and investment. Colonial forces repelled Native American attacks, Navies enforced sea-based commerce, the Air Force had the advantage of the “high ground.” In modern times, space is an additional domain of warfare. The technologies that we take for granted—cargo tankers, computers, e-commerce, drones, GPS, the internet, jet aircraft, touchscreens, and the satellites that make these things possible—were developed in the military sector with public treasure before their transfer to private, for-profit corporations. This, says the Space Command, will lead to “Full Spectrum Dominance.”
A few years later, Dennis M. Bushnell, the chief scientist at NASA’s Langley Research Center, gave a presentation based on the work of a host of powerful U.S. (and other) institutions, including: the Central Intelligence Agency, Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, Defense Intelligence Agency, Federal Bureau of Investigation, Joint Forces Command, the National Research Council, and many others.
Entitled Future Strategic Issues/Future Warfare [Circa 2025], the PowerPoint presentation anticipates: a) scenarios created by U.S. forces and agencies and b) scenarios to which they might have to respond. The projection is contingent on the use of hi-technology. According to the report there are/will be six Technological Ages of Humankind: “Hunter/killer groups (sic) [million BC-10K BC]; Agriculture [10K BC-1800 AD]; Industrial [1800-1950]; IT [1950-2020]; Bio/Nano [2020-?]; Virtual.”
In the past, “Hunter/gatherer” groups fought over “hunting grounds” against other “tribal bands” and used “handheld/thrown” weapons. In the agricultural era, “professional armies” also used “handheld/thrown” weapons to fight over “farm lands.” In the industrial era, conscripted armies fought over “natural resources,” using “mechanical and chemical” weapons. In our time, “IT/Bio/Bots” (robots) are used to prevent “societal disruption.” The new enemy is “everyone.” “Everyone.”
Similarly, a British Ministry of Defence projection to the year 2050 states: “Warfare could become ever more personalised with individuals and their families being targeted in novel ways.”
The war on you is the militarization of everyday life with the express goal of controlling society, including your thoughts and actions.
A U.S. Army document on information operations from 2003 specifically cites activists as potential threats to elite interests. “Nonstate actors, ranging from drug cartels to social activists, are taking advantage of the possibilities the information environment offers,” particularly with the commercialization of the internet. “Info dominance” as the Space Command calls it can counter these threats: “these actors use the international news media to attempt to influence global public opinion and shape decision-maker perceptions.” Founded in 1977, the U.S. Army Intelligence and Security Command featured an Information Dominance Center, itself founded in 1999 by the private, veteran-owned company, IIT.
“Information Operations in support of civil-military interactions is becoming increasingly more important as non-kinetic courses-of-action are required,” wrote two researchers for the military in 1999. They also said that information operations, as defined by the Joint Chiefs of Staff JP 3-13 (1998) publication, “are aimed at influencing the information and information systems of an adversary.” They also confirm that “[s]uch operations require the continuous and close integration of offensive and defensive activities … and may involve public and civil affairs-related actions.” They conclude: “This capability begins the transition from Information Dominance to Knowledge Dominance.”
“Copy/paste NPC from fact-check website can’t find anything” is a debunk these days. On Planet Tardia. This thing is in dude’s official bibliography. With the NASA logo on it and the timestamps in the document. What else?
Now let’s compare our notes with what more aware people warned us long ago.
TruthStream Media never disappoints, here they are, as far back as 2013, and it’s pretty guaranteed to blow your mind:
Dated same year, when this kinda broke out in the public attention for the first time, there’s interview with Deborah Tavares made by actor Trevor Coppola for Anthony J. Hilder. It was posted on Hilder’s YouTube channel on July 23, 2013. The video was filmed at Conspiracy Con 2013, which was held over the weekend of June 1-2 that year in Milpitas, California.
Next, in 2017, former Navy Seal and scientist turned occultist and friend of Timothy Leary, Dr Richard Alan Miller uses the NASA documents as starting point for an even wider and more mind-blowing discussion. It seems all over the place ag times, but it all comes together nicely and there’s a few very interesting connections, prophecies and revelations for everyone, worth going through all of it even when we don’t buy all of it. Anyway, you know our motto: Trust no one, research everything.
Perfect for longer car trips:
“Remember: If you want to now what’s gonna happen next, watch Hollywood!”
Dr Richard Alan Miller u
Hollywood and CIA News Network, I’d add…
To be continued? Our work and existence, as media and people, is funded solely by our most generous supporters. But we’re not really covering our costs so far, and we’re in dire needs to upgrade our equipment, especially for video production. Help SILVIEW.media survive and grow, please donate here, anything helps. Thank you!
! Articles can always be subject of later editing as a way of perfecting them
Dr. Malone was so damn right when he said we’re barely scratching the surface on the biolabs topic. And so was I when I insisted you should pay special attention to the research on insects that’s been going on not only in the US funded labs in Ukraine and Georgia, but all over the world, including US soil.
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTH CAROLINA WELCOMES YOU TO YOUR WORST NIGHTMARE YOU HAVEN’T EVEN FATHOMED YET
The Chernobyl Research Initiative began formal research activities in Ukraine in 2000, Belarus in 2005, and Fukushima, Japan, in July, 2011. To date, the group has conducted more than 35 research expeditions to Chernobyl and 16 expeditions to Fukushima.
USC’s Chernobyl Research Initiative was the first and currently is the only research group to utilize a multidisciplinary approach to address the health and environmental outcomes of radiation effects in free-living natural populations. This has permitted the investigation of both acute (short term) and chronic (long term and multi-generational) exposures.
The Chernobyl Research Initiative is also currently the only research team studying plants and animals in both Chernobyl and Fukushima.
Key funding sources have included the Samuel Freeman Charitable Trust, the CNRS (France), the National Science Foundation, and the National Geographic Society. Subsequently, additional funding sources have included the Civilian Research Development Foundation (CRDF), the National Institutes of Health (NIH), Qiagen GmbH, the Fulbright Foundation, the University of South Carolina Office of Research and the College of Arts and Sciences, the Academy of Finland, and gifts from private citizens.
To date, more than 90 scientific publications have resulted from this initiative, most in the past 10 years (see link above for publications). This research has been highlighted in many newspaper reports and television programs including the New York Times, The Economist, Harpers, the BBC, CNN, CBS’s 60 Minutes, and Miles O’Brian of PBS News Hour (see links above for media coverage).
The team has pioneered the use of ecological, genetic and dosimetric technologies in order to unravel the health and environmental consequences of chronic low-dose exposure resulting from the Chernobyl and Fukushima disasters. These have included massively replicated ecological censuses of natural populations of birds, mammals and insects to investigate population and demographic effects; DNA sequencing and genotoxicity testing to assess short and long term genetic damage to individuals living in the wild; and the use of miniature dosimeters attached to wild animals and field measurements of whole body burdens of radioisotopes in birds and mammals to obtain accurate estimates of realized external and internal radiation doses to animals living under natural conditions. Recently, the group has expanded to include epidemiological and genetic studies of human populations (especially children) living in Chernobyl-affected regions of Ukraine.
Key results include the discovery of tumors, cataracts and damaged sperm in birds from high radiation areas of Chernobyl, and impacts on biodiversity in Fukushima. Exciting new results include the discovery that some species of birds may have developed resistance to the effects of radiation and effects on neurological development in small mammals in both Chernobyl and Fukushima.
These two disasters differ in the time since the events, and the amount and diversity of radionuclides that were released, although the predominant source of radiation is cesium-137 in both locations.
We are seeking funding to support the following ongoing and planned future research activities of the Chernobyl + Fukushima Research Initiative:
1)Continued monitoring of Fukushima populations of birds, small mammals, and insects in order to test for changes in population sizes (abundances) and numbers of species (biodiversity) through time.
2)Continued monitoring of barn swallows and rodents (mice and voles) populations for cancers, survival, reproduction, and genetic damage in Fukushima and Chernobyl (in collaboration with the CNRS, France, Rikkyo University, Tokyo, the Wild Bird Society of Japan, the National Institute of Forestry, Japan, and the University of Jyvaskyla, Finland).
3)Initiate a new project to study effects of radiation on tree growth and soil microbial activity in Fukushima (in collaboration with Chubu University, Nagoya, Japan).
4)Initiate a new project to investigate effects of radiation growth, fertility, and genetic damage in cows living in highly radioactive regions of Fukushima (in collaboration with the Fukushima Cattle Ranchers Association).
5)Initiate a new project to examine mutation rates in humans using whole genome DNA sequencing. Initially this project will focus on families living in contaminated regions of Ukraine. The project is in collaboration with the Montreal Neurological Institute and Hospital at McGill University, the Center of Radiological Research at Columbia University, and the Institute for Radiation Medicine in Kiev, Ukraine.
6)Continued development of new methods for measurement of dose and genetic damage in wild populations of animals.
7)Coordination of an international consortium of independent scientists to provide unbiased evidenced-based information concerning the health and environmental risks related to nuclear accidents. This group will compile, evaluate, and interpret the current scientific and medical literature and develop a literature suitable for public distribution via the print and internet media, as well as public presentations in Japan and internationally.
Highlights from research published by the Chernobyl Research Initiative include the following:
•Population sizes and numbers of species (i.e. biodiversity) of birds, mammals, insects, and spiders are significantly lower in areas of high contamination in Chernobyl.
•For many birds and small mammals, life spans are shorter and fertility is depressed, in areas of high contamination.
•In Fukushima, only birds, butterflies, and cicadas showed significant declines during the first summer following the accident. Other groups were not negatively affected. Now, five years later, effects on birds have increased.
•There is considerable variability among species in their sensitivity to radionuclides. Many species are not affected, and a few species even appear to increase in numbers in areas of high contamination in both Chernobyl and Fukushima, presumably in response to competitive release (i.e. more available food and shelter) and fewer predators.
•Many species show evidence of genetic damage stemming from acute exposures and the differences observed between Fukushima and Chernobyl suggests some species may show the consequences of mutation accumulation over multiple generations.
•Some individuals and species show no evidence of genetic damage in relation to radiation exposure and some even show evidence of evolutionary adaptation to the effects of radiation through increased antioxidant activity, which may provide protection against ionizing radiation.
•The bird species that are most likely to show declines in numbers in response to radiation are those that historically have shown increased mutation rates for other reasons possibly related to DNA repair ability or reduced defenses against oxidative stress.
•Deleterious effects of radiation exposure seen in natural populations in Chernobyl include increased rates of cataracts, tumors, growth abnormalities, deformed sperm, and albinism.
Maps of Contaminated regions of Fukushima (left), Ukraine, Belarus and Russia (right), and Europe (below). Fukushima map courtesy of Shane Welch; other maps courtesy of the European Union.
•Neurological development is impacted as evidenced by depressed brain size in both birds and rodents and consequent effects on cognitive ability and survival have been demonstrated in birds.
•Tree growth and microbial decomposition in the soil are also depressed in areas of high radiation.
•In Fukushima, the first signs of developmental abnormalities have been observed in birds in 2013, although significant genetic damage has not yet been documented for birds or rodents.
Do I need to spell it out? They are using these grounds for experiments. Did they end up being experiment grounds by accident? People in Chernobyl have been evacuated, but fauna and flora are hardly impacted by radiation. Radiation does not discriminate by species. You know who does that? Viruses and bacteria.
WASHINGTON — DARPA, the Pentagon’s high-tech office, is working with the government of Ukraine to develop capabilities to help Kiev in its hybrid warfare challenge.
DARPA director Steven Walker, who recently took over that job after five years as the agency’s deputy, told reporters that he had personally visited the country in 2016 for talks with Ukrainian military, intel and industry leaders.
“We did have a good visit to the Ukraine,” Walker said Thursday at a breakfast hosted by the Defense Writer’s Group. “Yes, we have followed up with them, and through the U.S. European Command, we have started several projects with the Ukraine, mostly in the information space.”
“Not providing them weapons or anything like that, but looking at how to help them with information,” Walker added, before declining to go into further detail.
Ukraine has become a testing ground for hybrid warfare techniques from Russia and Russian-backed militant groups ever Russia’s invasion of Ukrainian territory in 2014, including disinformation campaigns. While that has allowed Moscow to test out new capabilities and techniques, it also provides an opportunity to develop counter techniques — which may benefit the U.S. and its allies in the long term.
“I think we’ve got to get better, as a country, in information warfare and how we approach info warfare,” Walker said. “I think there are capabilities there that we need to improve upon, and DAPRA is working in some of those areas.”
This is not the first tie between DARPA and Kiev. The Ukrainian government has hired Tony Tether, who led DARPA for the entirety of the George. W. Bush administration, to help lead a reorganization of their science and technology efforts, something Tether in a LinkedIn post said was necessary in part because so much of Ukraine’s S&T facilities were in the territory seized by Russia.
The former DARPA head has also consulted for the Ukroboronprom group, Ukraine’s largest defense contractor, and just a few weeks ago was added to the group’s supervisory board in a move that Ukrainian president Petro Poroshenko called a “symbol of effective cooperation between Ukrainian and American partners.”
Tether is expected to try and recreate some of what make DARPA so successful in Ukraine, but Walker notes that many countries have tried to do that — and failed, in large part due to a cultural fear of giving workers the freedom to fail they need.
“When I talk to others about DARPA and why it works, many other cultures say ‘this couldn’t happen,’” Walker noted.
More broadly, Walker said part of what he wants to see at DARPA during his tenure is looking at increasing counterinsurgency capabilities.
“I think as more populations across the world move to larger and larger cities, we need to understand the three dimensionality of cites and how to operate in those very crowded, very three-dimensional spaces,” Walker said, noting DARPA is working on ways to sense and map underground tunnels and infrastructure.
Updated 3/1/18 at 1:45 PM EST to reflect the fact that after publication, DARPA confirmed that Walker visited Ukraine in 2016.
Aaron Mehta was deputy editor and senior Pentagon correspondent for Defense News, covering policy, strategy and acquisition at the highest levels of the Defense Department and its international partners.
The U.S. government’s Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) has been accused of trying to create a new class of biological weapons that would be delivered via virus-infected insects. Aphids are one of the insects being used in the DARPA program.ISTOCK
The U.S. government’s Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) has been accused of trying to create a new class of biological weapons that would be delivered via virus-infected insects.
The Insect Allies program was announced by DARPA in 2016. It is a research project that aims to protect the U.S. agricultural food supply by delivering protective genes to plants via insects, which are responsible for the transmission of most plant viruses. Scientists believe loading the bugs up with viruses that would offer plants protective benefits could be one way of ensuring food security in the event of a major threat.
In an editorial published in the journal Science, a group of researchers led by Richard Guy Reeves, from the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Biology in Germany, says Insect Allies isn’t exactly what it says it is. Instead, they claim DARPA is potentially developing insects as a means of delivering a “new class of biological weapon.”
How Does Insect Allies Work?
There are many threats that could impact upon food security. This includes environmental disasters, natural pathogens and intentional attacks. Crop failure, for whichever of these reasons, has the potential to have devastating consequences—wheat and maize, for example, are relied upon by hundreds of millions across the globe for their basic nutritional needs.
Scientists with the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) are looking at introducing genetically modified viruses that can edit chromosomes directly, like using insects to transmit genetically modified material into plants.DARPA
Genetically altering a species to make it more resilient comes with problems. Introducing alterations directly into a species’ chromosome is slow, as the alteration must be passed down through generations before it takes hold.
Instead, scientists with DARPA are looking at introducing genetically modified viruses that can edit chromosomes directly in fields—these are known as horizontal environmental genetic alteration agents (HEGAAs).
The DARPA program is using the principles of HEGAAs but, unlike traditional methods of dispersal—like spraying fields with them—it wants to spread them through insects. At the moment, maize and tomato plants are being used in experiments and the insects being used for dispersal are leafhoppers, aphids and whiteflies.
“Insect Allies aims to develop scalable, readily deployable, and generalizable countermeasures against potential natural and engineered threats to mature crops,” Blake Bextine, DARPA Program Manager for Insect Allies, told Newsweek. “The program is devising technologies to engineer and deliver these targeted therapies on relevant timescales—that is, within a single growing season. To do so, Insect Allies researchers are building on natural, efficient, and highly specific plant virus and insect vector delivery systems to transfer modified, protective genes to plants.”
Why Biological Weapons?
Reeves and his colleagues offer a number of assertions about why Insect Allies could end up being a means of bioweapon dispersal. Firstly, they question the very nature of the project—the use of insects. Why, they say, are insects so integral? What is the problem with spraying HEGAAs?
The team says Insect Allies “appears very limited in its capacity to enhance U.S. agriculture or respond to national emergencies…. As a result, the program may be widely perceived as an effort to develop biological agents for hostile purposes and their means of delivery.”
Potentially, the viruses being introduced could do harm instead of good. The insects could be used to disperse agents that would prevent seeds from growing. “HEGAA weapons could be extremely transmissible to susceptible crop species, particularly where insects were used as the means of delivery,” they write. “Chromosomal editing would be targetable to particular crop varieties dependent on their genome sequence (presumably those varieties not grown by the deploying parties).”
Maize, one of the crops being tested by Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), is relied upon by millions of people for basic nutrition. Scientists believe loading the bugs up with viruses that would offer plants protective benefits could be one way of ensuring food security in the event of a major threat.ISTOCK
The development of an insect-based system, according to the authors, points to “an intention to develop a means of delivery of HEGAAs for offensive purposes.” The technology, they say, could quickly be simplified and used to develop a whole new class of biological weapons. “In our view, the program is primarily a bad idea because obvious simplifications of the work plan with already-existing technology can generate predictable and fast-acting weapons, along with their means of delivery, capable of threatening virtually any crop species,” they wrote.
The team calls for more transparency from DARPA as the Insect Allies progresses. However, it also says the potential to weaponize this technology is already out there. They say weapons programs are driven by the perceived activities of competitors—maybe the Insect Allies program is a response to intelligence about another nation’s capabilities.
Furthermore, “the mere announcement of the Insect Allies Program, with its presented justifications, may motivate other countries to develop their own capabilities in this arena—indeed, it may have already done so…. Reversal of funding for this DARPA project…would not in itself close the particular Pandora’s box that HEGAAs or their insect dispersal may represent.”
DARPA denies the assertions made by Reeves and his colleagues. “DARPA is producing neither biological weapons nor the means for their delivery,” a spokesman told Newsweek. “We do accept and agree with concerns about potential dual use of technology, an issue that comes up with virtually every new powerful technology.” He said these concerns are the reason Insect Allies has been structured in the way it is—supposedly as a transparent and university-led research project that encourages communication. “We also have numerous, layered safeguards in place to maintain biosecurity and ensure the systems we’re developing function only as intended,” the DARPA spokesperson added.
Bextine reiterated this point. Researchers working with DARPA are allowed to publish their results and work with different agencies. The experiments they carry out are done so in biosecure greenhouses. “At no point in the program is DARPA funding open release of Insect Allies systems,” Bextine said.
He said he disagrees with the conclusion of the editorial in Science, saying technology and research that deals with food security and gene editing “have a higher bar than most for transparency”—and Insect Allies, he says, meets these high standards.
Responding to the queries relating to delivery—why spraying technology cannot be used—Bextine said these are just not up to the challenge, especially when it comes to responding at a large scale to the most severe threats.
“Many existing methods for protecting crops are inefficient, expensive, imprecise, or destructive to plants, may require significant infrastructure, and often provide only limited efficacy,” he said. “Sprayed treatments are impractical for introducing genetic modifications on a large scale and potentially infeasible if the spraying technology does not access the necessary tissues with specificity. Meanwhile, traditional selective breeding methods for introducing protective traits into plants require years to propagate, nowhere near the speed required to prevent a fast-moving threat from developing into a crisis.”
He added that DARPA would never receive funding for the next generation of aerial spraying technology. The development of this new technology is dependent on industry and other research funders. “Instead, we reach for fundamentally new ways of delivering more precise, efficacious treatments through systems that can be readily adapted to confront a range of potential threats.
“Emerging biotechnologies—and especially the cutting-edge research being performed on Insect Allies—are pushing science into new territories. DARPA is proud to be taking a proactive role in working with stakeholders to inform a new framework for considering how the benefits of these technologies can be most safely realized.”
US military plan to spread viruses using insects could create ‘new class of biological weapon’, scientists warn
Agency says it is trying to genetically modify crops, but experts think this goal is ‘simply not plausible’
US military plan to spread viruses using insects could create ‘new class of biological weapon’, scientists warn
Insects could be turned into “a new class of biological weapon” using new US military plans, experts have warned.
The Insect Allies programme aims to use bugs to disperse genetically modified (GM) viruses to crops.
Such action will have profound consequences and could pose a major threat to global biosecurity, according to a team that includes specialist scientists and lawyers.
However, the Defence Advanced Research Projects Agency (Darpa), which is responsible for developing military technologies in the US, says it is merely trying to alter crops growing in fields by using viruses to transmit genetic changes to plants.
In theory, this rapid engineering would allow farmers to adapt to changing conditions, for example by inserting drought-resistance genes into corn instead of planting pre-engineered seeds.
But this seemingly inoffensive goal has been slammed by the scientists, who say the plan is simply dangerous and that insects loaded with synthetic viruses will be difficult to control.
They also say that despite being in operation since 2016 and distributing $27m in funds to scientists, Darpa has failed to properly justify the existence of such a programme.
Research programme with potential for dual use: scientists fear that the Insect Ally programme by the US could encourage other states to increase their own research activities in the field of biological warfare (MPG/D.Duneka) (MPG/ D. Duneka)
“Given that Darpa is a military agency, we find it surprising that the obvious and concerning dual-use aspects of this research have received so little attention,” Felix Beck, a lawyer at the University of Freiburg, told The Independent.
Dr Guy Reeves, an expert in GM insects at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Biology, said that there has been hardly any debate about the technology and the programme remains largely unknown “even in expert circles”.
He added that despite the stated aims of the programme, it would be far more straightforward using the technology as a biological weapon than for the routine agricultural use suggested by Darpa.
“It is very much easier to kill or sterilise a plant using gene editing than it is to make it herbicide or insect-resistant,” explains Reeves.
Experiments are reportedly already underway using insects such as aphids and whiteflies to treat corn and tomato plants.
Mr Beck said he and fellow experts were not suggesting that the US military wanted to create biological weapons, but that the proposed agricultural uses are “simply not plausible for a number of reasons”.
Firstly, they note that if farmers wanted to use genetically modified viruses to improve their crops, there is no reason not to use conventional spraying equipment.
They also noted that despite Darpa stating that no insects used should survive longer than two weeks, if such safeguards were not in place “the spread could in principle be unlimited”.
Mr Beck added: “The quite obvious question of whether the viruses selected for development should or should not be capable of plant-to-plant transmission – and plant-to-insect-to-plant transmission – was not addressed in the Darpa work plan at all”.
Air Force fails to acknowledge mysterious meteor that crashed to Earth near US military base
Making their case in the journal Science, the team noted that if Insect Allies’ research cannot be justified, it could be perceived as breaching the UN’s Biological Weapons Convention.
“Because of the broad ban of the Biological Weapons Convention, any biological research of concern must be plausibly justified as serving peaceful purposes,” explained Professor Silja Voeneky, a specialist in international law at Freiburg University.
“The Insect Allies Program could be seen to violate the Biological Weapons Convention, if the motivations presented by Darpa are not plausible.
“This is particularly true considering this kind of technology could easily be used for biological warfare.”
To prevent any suspicion and to avoid encouraging other nations to develop their own technologies in this area, the authors of the study have called for more transparency from Darpa if it intends to pursue such programmes.
A spokesperson from Darpa defended the programme, explaining that using insects to apply these gene altering treatments could provide advantages over sprays.
“Most importantly in this context, sprayed treatments are impractical for introducing protective traits on a large scale and potentially infeasible if the spraying technology cannot access the necessary plant tissues with specificity, which is a known problem,” they said.
“If Insect Allies succeeds, it will offer a highly specific, efficient, safe, and readily deployed means of introducing transient protective traits into only the plants intended, with minimal infrastructure required.”
LMFAO
Ukroboronprom Appoints Former DARPA Head as Supervisory Board Member
Anthony Tether, Former Head of US DARPA was appointed as member of UOP Supervisory Board (Image: Ukroboronprom)
Ukraine’s state run Ukroboronprom has appointed former head of US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), Anthony Tether as member of UOP Supervisory Board.
Anthony Tether has been in charge of Ukroboronprom long-term development for over a year and a half. He assists in implementing UOP development strategy, implementation of reforms, corporatization, and international audit. The former head of DARPA contributed to strengthening Ukroboronprom’s export potential and investment development. Under his chairmanship, the State General Advanced Research and Development Agency (GARDA, the prototype of the American DARPA) was created, the company said in a statement Thursday.
“As a member of the Supervisory Board, Anthony Tether will help Ukroboronprom to implement the reform strategy and international audit,” said Roman Romanov, Ukroboronprom Director General.
Earlier, Mykhaylo Zhurovs’kyy – the rector of the National Technical University of Ukraine “Kyiv Polytechnic Institute named after I. Sikorsky” – was elected as Chairman of the Supervisory Board. Lieutenant General Yaroslav Skal’ko, former commander-in-chief of the Ukrainian Air Force, was elected as Vice-Chairman.
On January 31, the Ukroboronprom Supervisory Board – after a long-term meeting -took key decisions on the activities of the Concern. During the meeting, UOP management report was heard; strategic directions for UOP development, corporatization process of UOP enterprises-participants, the international audit, the system of effective anti-corruption measures, creation of an advisory body and other issues were discussed.
Ukraine to Create DARPA-like Defence Research Agency
Ukriane will soon set up its General Advanced Research & Development Agency (GARDA), modeled along the American Defence Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) at Igor the Sikorsky Kyiv Polytechnic Institute (KPI).
This was stated by UKROBORONPROM Director General Pavlo Bukin during his speech at the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, during the parliamentary hearings “National Innovation System: State and Legislative Development”.
“It was decided to create an agency of advanced technologies based on the DARPA model, to implement technologies in the defense industry. Mykhaylo Zhurovs’kyy – the rector of the National Technical University of Ukraine “Kyiv Polytechnic Institute named after I. Sikorsky” – agreed that the agency will be based at this very university. I am sure this decision will contribute to the greatest effect”, stressed Pavlo Bukin.
At the same time, he mentioned that the issue of innovative technologies development is connected with the necessity of legislative changes that would improve the mechanisms of financing such projects.
“The legal framework for innovation in Ukraine is sufficiently developed, but some aspects need to be improved, as they hamper financing. When it comes to research institutes and design bureaus – their resources are limited. It is necessary to legislatively create a mechanism for innovation activity financing and preferential taxation, “- said UKROBORONPROM Director General Pavlo Bukin from the rostrum of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine.
He named UGV “Phantom-2” development among UOP innovations. “This platform allows to destroy the enemy’s manpower and to transport the goods, and it has already passed the test abroad, and it can be considered to be a result of the activities of the State Concern and its design engineering bureaus,” said Pavlo Bukin.
Ukroboronprom head: Ukraine’s military industrial complex during hybrid warfare
By Roman Romanov, Dec 11, 2017 Roman Romanov is the director general of Ukrainian defense company Ukroboronprom.
Three years ago, Ukraine was facing an unexpected challenge – Russia’s military aggression. The annexation of Crimea and the first battles in Donbass were a total shock to the Ukrainian armed forces and the domestic defense industry. At that time, defense and law enforcement agencies were uncapable of performing their tasks; weapons and military equipment were not ready for operational use; and the military-industrial complex could not meet the needs of the Army.
Unfortunately, over the past 25 years, Ukrainian defense enterprises received no orders from the state – more than half of the plants were practically closed. The main types of the military equipment manufactured required Russian components.
In 2014, we completely stopped our cooperation with the Russian defense industry, and Ukroboronprom received the task to provide the Army with necessary weapons and military equipment in the shortest possible time.
First of all, we formed a new team of Ukroboronprom managers, who managed to quickly make qualitative changes and introduce the best business and management practices. We replaced about half of the directors of Ukroboronprom enterprises, mainly those who failed to adapt their way of thinking to new realities; we initiated repair and overhaul of the military equipment – Ukroboronprom enterprises organized 55 mobile maintenance crews, restoring military equipment directly in the anti-terrorist operation zone.
Furthermore, we arranged the import of critical components and organized the repair and manufacture of modernized military equipment samples. Ukroboronprom heads for strategic partnership with Western countries and NATO-Ukraine defense-technical cooperation.
In 2015, Ukroboronprom began implementing a new strategic task – the State Defense Order. Ukroboronprom enterprises launched serial production of new military equipment samples. The Army began to receive sniper rifles, mortars, modernized tanks and new armored personnel carriers manufactured in Ukraine.
The next urgent task was set: to overcome the dependence on imported components from the Russian Federation. To solve this problem, we launched a large-scale import substitution program to attract domestic reserves and set up cooperation within the country with enterprises of any form of ownership.
Ukroboronprom representatives visited all regions of Ukraine, held meetings with governors and discussed the issues of attracting the region’s industry to cooperation with Ukroboronprom.
As a result, enterprises from all regions of Ukraine began to join the import-substitution program implementation. As of today, 414 small, medium and large enterprises of Ukraine and 200,000 specialists joined the process. In fact, Ukroboronprom has attracted the whole country to working on strengthening the Ukrainian Army and the development of the country’s economy.
Furthermore, we renewed the workforce, attracted scientific and educational potential of the country: memorandums of cooperation were signed with 48 Ukrainian universities. Today, we train young specialists: 8,000-plus students had their practical training at Ukroboronprom enterprises and almost 600 of them are already working at our plants.
Memorandums of cooperation were signed with 30 institutes of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine. Attracting talented Ukrainian scientists and young specialists resulted in 535 promising developments upon the anvil and 80 projects that are already being implemented at Ukroboronprom enterprises.
We set ourselves to the task of expanding partnerships and implementing NATO standards for all stages of armament life cycles. The work on the introduction of the AQAP 2000 series standards at Ukroboronprom enterprises is launched. The ISO 9001 system already operates at 73 percent for Ukroboronprom enterprises.
Ukroboronprom specialists actively participate in multinational projects of the NATO concept Smart Defence, as well as in the meetings of the NATO-Ukraine Joint Working Group on Defence-Technical Cooperation.
In 2016, the development of the Ukroboronprom reform strategy was launched. The state concern Ukroboronprom held a meeting of a specially established tendering committee, involving the specialist of the Independent Defence Anti-Corruption Committee of Transparency International Ukraine, to help select the international consulting company using a “competitive dialogue” procedure. Thus, the concern started the process of conducting an international audit. We launched the next stage of Ukroboronprom’s reform. Implementation of such a large-scale process – as international audit and transformation of Ukroboronprom’s enterprises into joint stock companies – will last for about two years.
As a result of military operations in the anti-terrorist operation area, 900-plus technical solutions were introduced and implemented by Ukroboronprom engineers in the armored vehicles operated by the Army, having significantly improved tactical and operational characteristics of the military equipment and taking into account hybrid war experience.
Today, the latest developments of our specialists are being used and tested in the anti-terrorist operation zone. A good example is the unmanned complex Spectator, developed by the specialists of state concern Ukroboronprom, together with scientists of the National Technical University of Ukraine “Igor Sikorsky Kyiv Polytechnic Institute.” In May 2015, a contract for production was signed. And in January 2016, the first batch was transferred to Ukraine’s armed forces. This high-tech product has been successfully used in combat conditions for more than a year. The prototype of the new tactical UAV, Horlytsya, developed by the Ukrainian enterprises, successfully performed its first flight.
Hybrid war in the east of Ukraine forced us – taking into account combat experience – to develop unmanned equipment for performing various tasks on the battlefield without putting our soldiers’ lives at risk.
Ukroboronprom withstood the challenge of the war and in three years transferred about 16,000 units of weapons and military equipment to the military. Thanks to the work of the entire defense industry of Ukraine, our armed forces – from combat-ineffective units in 2014 – turned into a well-armed Army.
Mosquitos potentially carry a range of deadly diseases, from malaria to yellow fever. (Photo by James Gathany/CDC. Public Domain.)
WASHINGTON: The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency may have been created to develop cutting-edge technology to help the US take on the Soviet Union in the Cold War, but now it’s taking on another deadly enemy: mosquitos.
DARPA’s latest idea, now entering its second phase, is to get down to the molecular level to make a topical cream that would actually alter the “microbiome” of human skin to make it less appetizing to the disease-carrying insects.
“The ReVector program aims to precisely, safely, and efficiently reduce mosquito attraction and biting, and, subsequently, to help maintain the health of military personnel operating in disease-endemic regions,” the agency said in a release last month.
While tiny compared to the USSR and totally lacking artillery, the mosquito is the deadliest animal on the planet, responsible for spreading malaria, which kills more than 400,000 people every year, in addition to other deadly diseases. Throughout human history militaries have struggled with mosquito-borne maladies, from the million-plus cases that waylayed soldiers during the Civil War to the over 80,000 cases among US servicemembers in Vietnam.
Even though a vast majority of those survived, the disease disrupted the forces’ ability to fight, at times in critical moments. Army researchers currently estimate malaria infections are responsible for up to 21,000 lost work hours and between $1.2 and $4.4 million per year in evacuation and medical costs.
The treatment for malaria has progressed significantly in recent decades, but the ReVector program aims to stop the disease before it can get into the human body at all. The program’s first phase involved the development of technology to “modify human skin microbes” and the “volatile molecules” it produces, and testing the effect of those modifications on mosquitos.
“In Phase 2, the team plans to advance testing in animal models and move complex microbiome communities,” ReVector program manager Linda Chrisley said in the release.
The release explained that “ultimately, ReVector seeks to develop topical formulations that could be applied shortly before a mission with minimal equipment or training, and last for at least two weeks without reapplication, offering improved, sustained protection against disease vectors.”
DARPA is working with Stanford University researchers on the project, and the agency notes the research is reviewed by the US Food and Drug Administration and “if necessary” the Environmental Protection Agency “to ensure that technologies are effective and do not pose a threat to humans or the environment.”
PENTAGON UNIT A1266 STUDIES INSECTS AS BIOTERRORISM AGENTS ON RUSSIA’S DOORSTEPS:
DARPA has been working for several years on genetic editing of mosquitoes. Through its “Insect Allies” program, DARPA has been working, using CRISPR gene-editing and gene drive technologies, on manipulating the Aedes Aegypti mosquito. The US Department of Defense has spent at least $100 million in the controversial technology known as “gene drives” making the US military a top funder and developer of the gene-modifying technology. “Gene drives are a powerful and dangerous new technology and potential biological weapons could have disastrous impacts on peace, food security and the environment, especially if misused,” said Jim Thomas, co-director of ETC Group, an environment safety group. “The fact that gene drive development is now being primarily funded and structured by the US military raises alarming questions about this entire field.”
Entomological warfare is a type of biological warfare that uses insects to transmit diseases. The Pentagon, using DARPA research, has allegedly performed such entomological tests secretly in the Republic of Georgia and Russia. Is the DARPA development, together with Gates’ foundation and Oxitec, of the gene edited mosquitoes a covert program in entomological warfare?
The Pentagon presently has top security bio laboratories in 25 countries across the world funded by the Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA) under a $ 2.1 billion military program– Cooperative Biological Engagement Program (CBEP). They are in former Soviet Union countries such as Georgia and Ukraine, the Middle East, South East Asia and Africa. Among their projects, Phlebotomine sand fly species were collected under the heading, “Surveillance Work on Acute Febrile Illness,” in which all (female) sand flies were tested to determine their infectivity rate. A third project, also including sand flies collection, studied the characteristics of their salivary glands. This is weaponization research.
The controversial person picked by the Biden Administration to become the first Cabinet-level science advisor, Eric Lander, came from the MIT-Harvard Broad Institute. Lander is a specialist in gene drive and gene editing technologies and played a major role in the flawed US Human Genome Project. This is not the kind of science we need to be supporting. It is rather part of what is obviously a larger eugenics agenda and Bill Gates is again playing a key role. SOURCE
The highly attuned sensory abilities of plants could be employed to gather intelligence for the military (Getty Images/iStockphoto)
The US military wants to deploy plants as “the next generation of intelligence gatherers”.
Genetically modified plants could be employed as self-sustaining sensors to gather information in settings unsuitable for more traditional technologies.
The Defence Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), which is responsible for the development of emerging technologies in the US military, has called for scientists to submit ideas for how to harness the power of plants.
In the past, DARPA has produced information-gathering technologies such as the satellites and seismographs employed to ensure Soviet compliance with the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty.
But in this new initiative, termed the Advanced Plant Technologies (APT) programme, the agency is looking to the natural world for help.
“Plants are highly attuned to their environments and naturally manifest physiological responses to basic stimuli such as light and temperature, but also in some cases to touch, chemicals, pests and pathogens,” said Dr Blake Bextine, the manager of the ATP programme.
“Emerging molecular and modelling techniques may make it possible to reprogramme these detection and reporting capabilities for a wide range of stimuli, which would not only open up new intelligence streams, but also reduce the personnel risks and costs associated with traditional sensors,” said Dr Bextine.
The idea is that plants’ natural capabilities can be co-opted to detect relevant chemicals, harmful microorganisms, radiation and electromagnetic signals.
Modifying the genomes of plants would enable the military to control the types of sensing they are doing, and also trigger certain responses that can be monitored remotely using existing hardware.
Technology already exists to monitor plants from the ground, air and even from space.
“Advanced Plant Technologies is a synthetic biology programme at heart,” said Dr Bextine.
“As with DARPA’s other work in that space, our goal is to develop an efficient, iterative system for designing, building, and testing models so that we end up with a readily adaptable platform capability that can be applied to a wide range of scenarios.”
Past experiments with plants that have been modified in this manner have resulted in organisms that have difficulty settling in the natural environment, where they would be deployed.
The additional strain placed on the modified plants by their new duties makes it difficult for them to survive and compete with surrounding plants. This will be a key area that the new programme seeks to address.
The “proposers day” is being held on 12 December in Arlington, Virginia. It will lay out the objectives of DARPA’s programme and take submissions for research projects that are relevant to the initiative.
A British-American gene-editing company has released millions of genetically modified mosquitoes containing a dominant lethal gene, each week for 27 months in the Bahia, Brazil region in a test to see if the gene-edited mosquitoes would mate with local mosquitoes carrying Zika, malaria or other mosquito-borne diseases. A new study documents the alarming fact that following an initial reduction of the target population of mosquitoes, after some months the “population which had been greatly suppressed rebounded to nearly pre-release levels.” Scientists to date have no idea what dangers are presented by the new mutations. This once more highlights the dangers of uncontrolled gene-editing of species.
According to a new published study in Nature Reports journal, genetically engineered mosquitoes produced by the biotech company, Oxitec, now part of the US company Intrexon, have escaped human control after trials in Brazil and are now spreading in the environment.
On paper the theory was brilliant. Strains of “yellow fever” male mosquitoes taken from Cuba and Mexico were altered using gene-editing to make it impossible for their offspring to survive. Oxitec then began a systematic release of tens of millions of the manipulated mosquitoes over more than two years in the the city of Jacobina in the region of Bahia in Brazil. The Oxitec theory was the altered mosquitoes would mate with normal females of the same type which carry infectious diseases like dengue fever, and kill them off in the process.
‘Unanticipated Outcome…’
A team of scientists from Yale University and several scientific institutes in Brazil monitored the progress of the experiment. What they found is alarming in the extreme. After an initial period in which the target mosquito population markedly declined, after about 18 months the mosquito population recovered to pre-release levels. Not only that, the paper notes that some of the mosquitos likely have “hybrid vigor,” in which a hybrid of the natural with the gene-edited has created “a more robust population than the pre-release population” which may be more resistant to insecticides, in short, resistant “super mosquitoes.”
The scientists note that, “Genetic sampling from the target population six, 12, and 27–30 months after releases commenced provides clear evidence that portions of the transgenic strain genome have been incorporated into the target population. Evidently, rare viable hybrid offspring between the release strain and the Jacobina population are sufficiently robust to be able to reproduce in nature…” They continue, “Thus, Jacobina Ae. aegypti are now a mix of three populations. It is unclear how this may affect disease transmission or affect other efforts to control these dangerous vectors.” They estimate that between 10% and 60% of the Bahia natural Ae. Aegypti mosquitoes now had some gene-edited OX513A genome. They conclude that “The three populations forming the tri-hybrid population now in Jacobina (Cuba/Mexico/Brazil) are genetically quite distinct, very likely resulting in a more robust population than the pre-release population due to hybrid vigor.”
This was not supposed to happen. Professor of ecology and evolutionary biology, Jeffrey Powell, senior author of the study, remarked on the findings: “The claim was that genes from the release strain would not get into the general population because offspring would die. That obviously was not what happened.” Powell went on to note, “But it is the unanticipated outcome that is concerning.”
A Gates Foundation Project
The Brazil study deals a major alarm signal on the uncontrolled release of gene-edited species into nature. It calls to mind the horror plot of Michael Crichton’s 1969 science fiction novel, Andromeda Strain. Only it is no novel.
The Oxitec mosquitoes were developed using a highly controversial form of gene-editing known as gene drive. Gene Drive, which is also being heavily funded by the Pentagon’s DARPA, combined with CRISPR gene-editing, aims to force a genetic modification to spread through an entire population, whether of mosquitoes or potentially humans, in just a few generations.
The scientist who first suggested developing gene drives in gene-editing, Harvard biologist Kevin Esvelt, has publicly warned that development of gene editing in conjunction with gene drive technologies has alarming potential to go awry. He notes how often CRISPR messes up and the likelihood of protective mutations arising, making even benign gene drives aggressive. He stresses, “Just a few engineered organisms could irrevocably alter an ecosystem.” Esvelt’s computer gene drive simulations calculated that a resulting edited gene “can spread to 99 percent of a population in as few as 10 generations, and persist for more than 200 generations.” This is very much what has now been demonstrated in the mosquito experiment in Brazil.
Notable is the fact that the Oxitec Brazil mosquito experiment was funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. In June, 2018 Oxitec announced a joint venture with the Gates Foundation, “to develop a new strain of Oxitec’s self-limiting Friendly™ Mosquitoes to combat a mosquito species that spreads malaria in the Western Hemisphere.” The Brazil results show the experiment is a catastrophic failure as the new strain is anything but self-limiting.
The Gates Foundation and Bill Gates have been backing development of the radical gene-editing technology and gene drive technology for more than a decade. Gates, a long-time advocate of eugenics, population control and of GMO, is a strong gene-editing promoter. In an article in the May/June 2018 magazine of the New York Council on Foreign Relations, Foreign Affairs, Gates hails gene editing technologies, explicitly CRISPR. In the article Gates argues that CRISPR and other gene-editing techniques should be used globally to meet growing demand for food and to improve disease prevention, particularly for malaria. In his article he adds, “there is reason to be optimistic that creating gene drives in malaria-spreading mosquitoes will not do much, if any, harm to the environment.”
Every bit as alarming as the failure of the Brazil gene-editing mosquito experiment is the fact that this technology is being spread with virtually no prior health or safety testing by truly independent government institutions. To date the US Government relies only on industry safety assurances. The EU, while formally responsible to treat gene-edited species similarly to GMO plants, is reportedly trying to loosen the regulations. China, a major research center for gene-editing, has extremely lax controls. Recently a Chinese scientist announced an experiment in human gene-editing allegedly to make newborn twins resistant to HIV. Other experiments are proliferating around the world with gene-edited animals and even salmon. The precautionary principle has been thrown to the winds when it comes to the new gene-editing revolution, not a reassuring situation.
Currently Oxitec, which denies that the Brazil results show failure, is now trying to get regulatory approval from the US Environmental Protection Agency to conduct a similar experiment with the same gene-edited species in Texas and Florida. One of the people involved in the attempt, Texan Roy Bailey, is a Washington lobbyist and close friend of Randal Kirk, the billionaire CEO of Intrexon, owner of Oxitec. Bailey is also a major Trump fundraiser. Let’s hope that regulatory prudence and not politics decide the outcome.
F. William Engdahl is strategic risk consultant and lecturer, he holds a degree in politics from Princeton University and is a best-selling author on oil and geopolitics, exclusively for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook.”
So yeah, nothing to worry here, just “health labs” and SPAs …
Thanks Fukushima Exposed for the great and timely contribution that decisively helped me complete this investigation!
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! Articles can always be subject of later editing as a way of perfecting them
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