The Origin of the Origin of the AIDS Myth

I was listening to Talk of the Nation Science Friday. Jon Moore, a Professor of Microbiology at Cornell University Hospital was on discussing the state of the art in AIDS treatment. He said something that surprised me. It seems that the source of the myth that the US created AIDS is actually well known.

He said it was a propaganda campaign from the old KGB coordinated by the Stasi, the German Secret Police. This is from the book Comrade Kryuchkov's Instructions: Top Secret Files on KGB Foreign Operations, 1975-1985 published by Stanford University Press.

[Service A's] main triumphs occurred in the Third World where it was able to tap a rich vein of anti-Americanism and anti-imperialism, combined with receptiveness to conspiracy theory about the West. In 1983, Service A began to disseminate the claim that AIDS virus had been 'manufactured' at Fort Detrick,Maryland. The story was slow to take off. But form late 1985 onwards it swept the Third World as well as taking in some Western media. In the first six months of 1987 alone, the AIDS fabrication received major news coverage in over forty Third World countries.

The source for this revelation is former KGB Col. Oleg Gordievsky, who was also a double agent for British intelligence.

Question Worth Asking

How do you combat a pernicious misperception when facts don't do the trick?

Another Question Worth Asking

How many people have died for this clever bit of spy craft in support of a government that no longer exists?

Another Question Worth Asking

Do the people who cooked this up still find it funny, or only then?

Another Question Worth Asking

Have the lives saved come anywhere close to the lives lost because of covert intelligence agencies?