The Use of Biological Weapons in War

The use of biological weaponry has been used for sometime. Early forms of it could have included using poisonous plants or animals on darts, arrow heads, etc. or leading the enemy into a disease ridden part of the country. Unfortunately the strategy of using diseases and infectious plants/spores has become more dangerous because of the large amount of development in the area of technology. All though some people argue that the use of biological weaponry is infinitely safer than nuclear and chemical, I disagree. I believe that in the sense of the environmental impact, biological weapons are better than nuclear; However, with the improved technology and the greater possibility of the disease spreading into unwanted countries or areas, the chance of many unintended deaths/injuries is too high for any country to take the chance of using biological weapons. 

Bioterrorism is involves the usage of diseases and toxins to weaken or kill an opposing country in warfare. Many of the organisms that are used in biological warfare are high infectious and can stay infectious for sometime. An example of one of these diseases could be anthrax (spores that, if not treated immediately, can cause respiratory failure) or smallpox (highly contagious spore that causes blisters all over the body). Because these diseases are highly infectious it is extremely easy for one out break to start very serious pandemic. This may not have been the case in the past but with the increase in travel to different parts of the world, there is a possibility of you not knowing you have a disease, and therefore spreading it to different countries without you knowing. Also, with the increase in technology and remote controlled devices, you could easily be infected with one of the typical (or non typical) microorganisms without your knowing and not knowing how you became infected in the first place. With these things, you can see that biological terrorism is a effective, dangerous method that people may be turning to in the near future.

As with any global issue, there are many viewpoints on the issue at hand. Here are just a few that have brought up the most controversy. Many people around the world believe that using biological weapons is better than the alternative/traditional ways to weaken, kill or injure an opposing force. When it comes to the environment, using biological weapons is better than the alternative (nuclear bombs, etc) because it would not pollute the air that everybody on this world breath. Unfortunately, it is possible that the disease/micro organism could affect the plant and animal life in the area that it was spread. This is could cause changes in other parts of the world if (for example) if migrating animals could no longer get their food source because it was contaminated/changed by the micro organism. This would affect the other organisms that lived off of the migrating animals, and so on, and so on. Other people believe that it is safer to transport biological weapons than the traditional. I have concluded that this is not the case. The nature of biological weaponry is to be discrete but also harm a fair number of people. When you are transporting a small but highly infectious and contagious spore/organism, you could easily infect yourself without even realizing it. Which could in turn, backfire on the country you were returning to, and infect them. War has always been a touchy subject and so naturally many people will have many opinions on the subject but I still stand by my view saying that we should not be using these types of weapons in war.

As you can tell, I am strongly against the usage of biological weapons in warfare but it is not without reason. I strongly believe that we can go to war using the same weapons, have the same artillery and still make an impact. The risks of using biological weapons are too high to take the chance to use them. Besides the risks of spreading the diseases to other non-target countries and possibly destroying the ecosystem, there is one more reason why biological weapons is not the best idea for war measures. The spores and organisms that are used in bioterrorism can continue to be infectious for many years. If we were to release one of these diseases on a country or area, this disease could be present for many years to come. With that in mind, you could no longer travel to that country or area until you were positive that all of the microorganisms were dead and no longer infectious. Having to test this would be very dangerous and would probably be very costly. As you can see, the amounts of risks outweigh the positives in using biological weapons.

If all countries agree to not use bio-weapons, the world could save billions of dollars in medical costs as well as billions of lives.  Diseases no longer affects just one country anymore, the travel from place to place has increased and therefore the risk of for deaths will increase. The medical costs will be saved, for no one needs cures, antibiotics or vaccines. If countries just said no to these types of weapons, that country and the rest of the world would not have to pay for it once a dangerous disease has been unleashed. So although some people may think it’s safer to use this type of weapon, I strongly disagree because the risk of hurting unintentional victims is too high to take the risk.

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