Biohazard

We worked out a compromise. I agreed to retain my position as first deputy director of Biopreparat and to spend every morning at Samokatnaya Street on administrative and supervisory duties in return for a concurrent appointment to Biomash. This had never been done before, but times were changing. It was a perfect solution for both of us. Kalinin could keep a potential rival safely out of his orbit while continuing to tap the scientific expertise he needed to keep his research program alive. And I could begin to separate myself from a program I no longer considered viable.

Biomash was only fifteen minutes' drive from my apartment in northern Moscow. I would get home early enough to spend evenings with my family for the first time in years. Some of the senior managers were military officers, but the department heads were civilian scientists who took a refreshingly relaxed view of their duties. What made Biomash attractive to me was the fact that 40 percent of its output went to hospitals and civilian medical labs. I intended to increase that percentage. Kalinin and I agreed that my new job would start on December 30, 1990.

It wasn't going to be as clean a separation as we had hoped.

A month after this conversation, in October 1990, we were informed that a "trilateral agreement" had been reached between the Soviet Union, the United States, and Great Britain to organize a series of reciprocal visits to suspected biological warfare facilities. The 1972 Biological Weapons Convention had no provisions for inspections, a limitation that continues to frustrate the international arms control community to this day. Visits were to depend on the trust and goodwill of all sides.

That trust, to the extent it had ever existed, was now considerably frayed. We were told that the diplomatic negotiations had been tense and protracted. The mood filtered down through The System. Anxious debates raged inside the Military-Industrial Commission and the Ministry of Defense.

The memo from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs notifying us of the agreement had left it to us to decide which facilities to open. The defense ministry quickly signaled it wanted no part in this charade. "You can show whatever you want in Biopreparat," General Yevstigneyev snapped when I asked for his suggestions. "But no foreigner is getting into our military sites."

Kalinin, sensing a political opportunity, volunteered that Biopreparat act as the host. He ordered me to decide which of our installations could be "sacrificed" in the interests of East-West relations.

The choices were grim. Though some of our explosive test chambers had been dismantled since Gorbachev's decree, large industrial fermenters at Stepnogorsk and Omutninsk furnished unmistakable evidence of our activities.

At the time, Biopreparat controlled about forty facilities in fifteen cities across the Soviet Union. About a dozen were used exclusively for offensive work, but many others mixed civilian and military functions. Judicious exposure of the Western delegation to these dual-function facilities would protect us while demonstrating our good faith.

We decided to open Obolensk, Vector, Lyubychany (a tiny research institute close to Moscow), and Pasechnik's Leningrad institute. The last was the easiest choice: it was the place Western inspectors were most likely to demand to see, and we had already eliminated all evidence of biowarfare research there.

I never believed that we would be able to pull it off. Anyone with basic knowledge of biological weapons would recognize the signs of our activity. After notifying the labs and preparing instructions for the staff at each institute, I headed over to Biomash with relief. Now it was their problem.

On Friday, January 11, 1991, Kalinin called me into his office for a special meeting. Colonel Vladimir Davydov was there when I arrived. He'd taken the most comfortable chair opposite Kalinin's desk, which I took as a sign of favor. Davydov evidently assumed he would soon step into my shoes as first deputy director. I sat on a sofa facing them both.

The general was in his most agreeable mood.

"Kanatjan, I want to ask you a favor," he began. "The American and British delegation is arriving on Monday. I'm too busy to host them and unfortunately so is Vladimir."

He glanced at Davydov, who refused to meet my eyes.

"I know you don't really want to be involved," Kalinin continued, "but you're the only other senior manager who can do the job. Would you mind acting as host?"

"Yes, I would mind," I said stiffly. "I've only just begun my duties at Biomash, and I don't want to be involved in any of this. I don't see how we can prevent them from learning what we've got."

Kalinin was implacable.

"I thought you might say that. Why don't we come up with a compromise? If you can escort our visitors to the first two facilities, Lyubychany and Obolensk, Vladimir should be free by then and he can take the other two. Kanatjan, we need your help."