| I read your "Why can’t we agree on the (non)existence of biolabs in Ukraine?" article and to me there seemed like one glaring omission: Is the allegation by the Russians that there are US funded biolabs in Ukraine even true? Actually, I think we can break it down further: 1) Are there biolabs in Ukraine?
2) Are they funded (at all) by the US? Addressing 1 and breaking it down even further: How does one define a biolab? By many definitions a yogurt factory could be called a "biolab" as could a factory that manufactures antibiotics or vaccines. The implication of the Russian allegation is that there are biolabs in Ukraine creating biological weapons. Is this true? (probably not) and if so how much has the US contributed to these biolabs? (again, doesn't seem very likely that the US is funding the development of biological weapons in Ukraine, this is the sort of thing you tend to keep close to home) Ok, then how about the more broad definition of a biolab - are there biolabs in Ukraine that study diseases? Most likely there are Universities in Ukraine that have labs where diseases are studied. Are these kinds of biolabs a danger? Generally not unless they have very poor lab discipline (this starts to get into your article which suggests that those more on the left side of the spectrum think that studying diseases is a good thing, but I would suggest that anyone with a science background regardless of their political affiliation would agree that we should be studying pathogens in order to defend against them ). How about, are there other kinds of labs that could be very broadly defined as biolabs in Ukraine? - yes, there very likely are. As I said above, a yogurt factory could be broadly defined as a biolab. But a yogurt factory poses no danger to anyone (except for perhaps the lactose intolerant, and even then...). Calling it a 'biolab', while broadly true, is done to give it a sort of dangerous implication. (same would apply to labs manufacturing medicines - an antibiotic manufacturing facility could be called a biolab, but it's manufacturing essential medicines) Essentially it's a propaganda move to instill FUD. Your article read more like "Both sides have a point", but as I've outlined above, that really depends on how you define the terms and on the veracity of the original claim. |
Well, the Dept of Defense does more than pay for weapons, defense also means defense against things like pandemic-causing viruses or pathogens that might destroy food, that's why they're funding labs to research these things (i.e. bio threats!) in Ukraine: https://ua.usembassy.gov/embassy/kyiv/sections-offices/defen...
Somehow, no one's been able to explain this clearly to everyone who's claiming "US-funded bio weapons!".