Biowarrior: Inside the Soviet/Russian Biological War Machine

by Igor V. Domaradskij

Overview

Domaradskij (chief research fellow, the Moscow Gabrichevsky G. N. Institute of Epidemiology), a leading Russian scientist who worked at the center of the Russian project Biopreparat, offers a chilling look into the biological weapons program of the former Soviet Union, revealing the deadly nature of the research he participated in for 15 years. B&w personal and historical photos are included. Co-author Orent is a freelance science writer. Annotation ©2003 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781615926251
Publisher:	Prometheus Books
Publication date:	08/01/2003
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
File size:	504 KB

About the Author

Igor V. Domaradskij (Moscow, Russia) is chief research fellow of the Moscow Gabrichevsky G. N. Institute of Epidemiology and Microbiology; a member of the Russian Academy of Medical Sciences and the Academy of Natural Sciences of Russia; and the author of fourteen books on microbiology, biochemistry, and immunology.
Wendy Orent (Atlanta, GA) is a freelance writer and an anthropologist.

Editorial Reviews

This autobiography of a Soviet scientist works better as memoir than it does as insight into the biological threat that might exist from research done in the former Soviet Union. After a somewhat lengthy description of his childhood and early adult years in the 1930s and '40s, Domaradskij, now chief research fellow at the Moscow Gabrichevsky G.N. Institute of Epidemiology and Microbiology, depicts his rapid rise in the Soviet research system. For several decades, Domaradskij worked as an epidemiological researcher. Then in 1970 he was called to work on the Soviet secret biological weapons program. (He reiterates from firsthand knowledge what has long been known: when inconvenient, the Soviets simply ignored international treaties, such as those regarding banned weapons.) What comes through from his description of Biopreparat, as the program was known, is not its technological advances-Domaradskij admits that its major achievement has long since been scientifically superseded-but the petty bureaucracy of the Soviet system. As was the case throughout the Soviet Union, science took a back seat to politics, and personal advancement and greasing the palms of one's superiors took priority over cutting-edge research. Domaradskij bit his tongue for a while before speaking out against the program and eventually losing his prestigious position. In this sometimes laborious read, he shows how the Communist system's excesses eventually pushed a loyal-and rewarded-citizen into the status of a semidissident. (Aug.) Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.

Publishers Weekly

Domaradskij has enjoyed a long and distinguished career as a microbiologist in the Soviet Union, first in legitimate epidemiological control research, then in covert defense operations against offensive biological weapons. In 1970, he was transferred to the weapons development program, Biopreparat, where he attempted to develop new germ weapons. Now nearly 80 and still living in Moscow, he has written this memoir to explain his involvement and offer his take on the bureaucratic struggles in which he was caught. As a child of the 1930s who had seen close relatives disappear into Stalin's purges, he concluded that he had no choice but to join the Communist Party and to take the jobs assigned to him, despite his preference for lab research. The factual presentation, unfortunately, includes little psychological insight, so readers don't get a sense of the agonizing decisions Domaradskij was forced to make. Readers of Loren Graham's books on Soviet science will recognize the tension between the demands of science and those of the Communist Party. Despite the awkward presentation, specialized collections dealing with weapons of mass destruction will still want this. Defector Ken Alibek published a widely known account of Biopreparat in Biohazard.-Marcia L. Sprules, Council on Foreign Relations Lib., New York Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.

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