Tularemia, Biological Warfare, and the Battle for Stalingrad

[Aragorn2002]

I've read that the Soviets used a biological weapon during the battle of Stalingrad. Ken Alibek, a former top Soviet bioweapons scientist, maintains that an outbreak of tularemia among German troops during the battle of Stalingrad resulted from the deliberate spraying of the agent by the Soviet defenders.Tularemia is also known as "rabbit fever" or "deer fly fever," and caused by the francisella tularensis bacterium, tularemia is one of the most infectious diseases known.

Since this forum is a great source of all kind of interesting facts about the war I wonder whether anyone ever heard of this before, or perhaps even knows more about this.

[Bogdan]

Hi,

I did a little research on "Axis History forum"

Wartime Use Against Germans

While he was a graduate student at the Tomsk Medical Institute (1973-75), Alibek studied Soviet wartime medical records that strongly suggested that the Red Army had used tularemia as a weapon against German troops outside Stalingrad in 1942 (pages 29-31). Tularemia is a highly infectious disease that produces debilitating headaches, nausea and high fevers. If untreated, it can be lethal. It is also hard to extinguish, which makes it attractive to anyone trying to produce biological weapons.

Alibek discovered that the "first victims of tularemia were German panzer troops, who fell ill in such large numbers during the late summer of 1942 that the Nazi campaign in southern Russia ground to a temporary halt." In addition, he relates, thousands of Russian soldiers and civilians living in the Volga region came down with the disease within a week of the initial German outbreak. Never before had there been such a widespread outbreak of the disease in Russia.

Why had so many men first fallen sick with tularemia on the German side only? Furthermore, 70 percent of the Germans infected came down with a pneumonic form of the disease, which (Alibek reports) "could only have been caused by purposeful dissemination."

Whereas there were ten thousand cases of tularemia reported in the Soviet Union in 1941, in the year 1942 -- when the battle of Stalingrad was at its height -- the number of cases soared to more than one hundred thousand. Then, in 1943, the incidence of the disease returned to ten thousand. The battle for Stalingrad raged from September 1942 until February 2, 1943, when Friedrich von Paulus, commander of the German Sixth Army, surrendered along with 91,000 officers and men (of whom only 6,000 survived Soviet captivity).

Alibek became convinced that "Soviet troops must have sprayed tularemia at the Germans. A sudden change in the direction of the wind, or contaminated rodents passing through the lines, had infected our soldiers and the disease had then spread through the region."

To his professor, a Soviet colonel named Aksyonenko, he explained that the evidence he had found "suggests that this epidemic was caused intentionally." Aksyonenko responded with a stern warning: "Please. I want you to do me a favor and forget you ever said what you just said. I will forget it, too ... Never mention to anyone else what you just told me."

Some years later, an elderly Soviet lieutenant colonel who had worked during the war in the secret bacteriological weapons facility in Kirov told Alibek that a tularemia weapon had been developed there in 1941. He also left him "with no doubt that the weapon had been used." This same officer further suggested that an "outbreak of Q fever among German troops on leave in Crimea in 1943 was the result of another one of the [soviet] biological warfare agents" (p. 36).

More informations and links here .

Hope it helps

[Bigduke6]

I'm not convinced. I lifted this Q&A from the Center for Disease Control and Prevention:

Q. What is tularemia?

A. Tularemia, also known as “rabbit fever,” is a disease caused by the bacterium Francisella tularensis. Tularemia is typically found in animals, especially rodents, rabbits, and hares. Tularemia is usually a rural disease and has been reported in all U.S. states except Hawaii.

Q. How do people become infected with tularemia?

A. Typically, people become infected through the bite of infected insects (most commonly, ticks and deerflies), by handling infected sick or dead animals, by eating or drinking contaminated food or water, or by inhaling airborne bacteria.

Lifted Q&A ends.

I think the answer to the mysterious tularemia epidemic at Staligrad can be found in the unprecendented numbers of corpses and rats at the battlefield, and lack of clean water, rather than some Soviet bioweapons attack. After all, Soviet soldiers and civilians were hit too.

[Aragorn2002]

Bogdan, great site that Axis History forum. Very nice source for all kind of interesting facts. Thanks. Bigduke, it is possible that it's coincidence, but I doubt it. Too much diseases among German troops (especially jaundice). In all accounts on Stalingrad it's remarkable how many men became ill. And the fact that Soviet soldiers and civilians were involved too...well, Stalin didn't care one little bit about his own people. It wouldn't have stopped him.

[Soddball]

Stick 2 million men in a confined area with no latrines, poor drainage and poor food (which lowers their immunity).

The biggest killer of armies has historically been disease. Napoleonic armies were routinely routed not by the opponent but by illness.

Antony Beevor's "Stalingrad" (superb book) talks about high levels of disease but never even discusses 'Russian bio warfare'. Give it a read.

Where did you read that the Russians achieved this? And what makes you think that they managed to spread jaundice around? One of the causes of jaundice is malaria. Lots of stagnant pools of water lying around make a perfect breeding ground for mosquitoes.

[Aragorn2002]

Yes, I agree with you on jaundice, but I still consider it very well possible that the Russians used bacteriological weapons at the eastern front. But you are right of course, there is no evidence, so no facts. It just intrigues me.

[Bigduke6]

Bacteriological weapons make little sense if the other guy has better health care. Diseases don't care which army they hit. It might have made some sense for the Germans to spread a disease, but the Russians with their weaker medical support? Irrational. You hurt yourself more than the other guy. If you are not suicidal, why do it?

Of course, if the task is imagining senseless things imaginary and senseless Soviets may have done, we may be onto something.

[Andreas]

What's the effect of that stuff on cattle?

[Soddball]

I think it's extremely unlikely they did such things. Where in 1930s and 1940s Russia was there equipment capable of mass producing and distributing bacteriological toxins?

I'd be inclined to see it as a myth, nothing more.

[Michael Dorosh]

Originally posted by Soddball:

I think it's extremely unlikely they did such things. Where in 1930s and 1940s Russia was there equipment capable of mass producing and distributing bacteriological toxins?

I'd be inclined to see it as a myth, nothing more.

Well 91,000 men surrendered - and all but 5,000 diee off, mostly in the first few weeks of captivity...which was in winter (no mosquitos...)

Tantalizing, but of course, also prime for vicious rumours to spread...

[Bigduke6]

Biermann, you're going to milk that for all it's worth, won't you? :mad:

[Andreas]

[Puts monocle back in]

Harharhar <- evil German laugh

[Soddball]

Originally posted by Michael Dorosh:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Soddball:

I think it's extremely unlikely they did such things. Where in 1930s and 1940s Russia was there equipment capable of mass producing and distributing bacteriological toxins?

I'd be inclined to see it as a myth, nothing more.

Well 91,000 men surrendered - and all but 5,000 diee off, mostly in the first few weeks of captivity...which was in winter (no mosquitos...)

Tantalizing, but of course, also prime for vicious rumours to spread... </font>

[Aragorn2002]

Originally posted by Soddball:

I think it's extremely unlikely they did such things. Where in 1930s and 1940s Russia was there equipment capable of mass producing and distributing bacteriological toxins?

Read the links:"During the terrible Russian civil war of 1917-1921, in which the fledgling Soviet regime defeated the dispersed and divided anti-Communist "White" forces, as many as ten million people lost their lives. Most of these deaths came not in combat, but instead were caused by famine and disease -- especially typhus.

Conscious of this, the revolutionary Soviet government early on put a high priority on diseases as a method of warfare. In 1928 it issued a secret decree ordering the development of typhus as a battlefield weapon. In the decades that followed, the USSR built and maintained a wide-ranging biological warfare program. For example, Alibek relates, Soviet scientists developed a sophisticated plague warfare capability, and an arsenal in Kirov (now Vyatka) stored 20 tons of plague aerosol weaponry (p. 166)."

The Soviets were better prepared for WW 2 than any other nation. And that's also no myth.

[Aragorn2002]

Originally posted by Bigduke6:

Bacteriological weapons make little sense if the other guy has better health care. Diseases don't care which army they hit. It might have made some sense for the Germans to spread a disease, but the Russians with their weaker medical support? Irrational. You hurt yourself more than the other guy. If you are not suicidal, why do it?

Why do it? Because the Soviets could afford lots of casualties, the Germans couldn't.

Originally posted by Bigduke6:Of course, if the task is imagining senseless things imaginary and senseless Soviets may have done, we may be onto something. [/QB]

It is equally senseless to assume it can't have happened. And there are some indications it could have happened. Whether they are reliable or not remains to be seen. Not everything can be found in history books.

[John D Salt]

Originally posted by aragorn2002:

The Soviets were better prepared for WW 2 than any other nation. And that's also no myth.

Right up until 1936, anyway.

All the best,

John.

[John D Salt]

Originally posted by aragorn2002:

Not everything can be found in history books.

No, some things can be found with Google...

http://cns.miis.edu/research/cbw/tula.htm

suggests a natural outbreak is the more likely explanation.

All the best,

John.

[Soddball]

Originally posted by aragorn2002:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Soddball:

I think it's extremely unlikely they did such things. Where in 1930s and 1940s Russia was there equipment capable of mass producing and distributing bacteriological toxins?

Read the links:"During the terrible Russian civil war of 1917-1921, in which the fledgling Soviet regime defeated the dispersed and divided anti-Communist "White" forces, as many as ten million people lost their lives. Most of these deaths came not in combat, but instead were caused by famine and disease -- especially typhus.

Conscious of this, the revolutionary Soviet government early on put a high priority on diseases as a method of warfare. In 1928 it issued a secret decree ordering the development of typhus as a battlefield weapon. In the decades that followed, the USSR built and maintained a wide-ranging biological warfare program. For example, Alibek relates, Soviet scientists developed a sophisticated plague warfare capability, and an arsenal in Kirov (now Vyatka) stored 20 tons of plague aerosol weaponry (p. 166)."

</font>

[Andreas]

Originally posted by aragorn2002:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Soddball:

I think it's extremely unlikely they did such things. Where in 1930s and 1940s Russia was there equipment capable of mass producing and distributing bacteriological toxins?

Read the links:"During the terrible Russian civil war of 1917-1921, in which the fledgling Soviet regime defeated the dispersed and divided anti-Communist "White" forces, as many as ten million people lost their lives. Most of these deaths came not in combat, but instead were caused by famine and disease -- especially typhus. </font>

[Bigduke6]

It is a well-known fact that Soviet flea-circus brigades were better-equipped than their German counterparts, particularly in terms of carrier systems (dogs and poorly-groomed infantrymen) and area effect. (Square centimetres of target skin inflamed, and blood drawn from target.)

CMBB of course uses the memoires of Peiper and Mellinthin as their main source for the tactics and combat efficiency of Soviet flea circus brigades, and so grossly misdepicts these Red Army forces.

While Soviet flea circus brigades in fact were elite troops on a par with spetsnaz and suicide anti-panzer dogs, these two German authors describe the success of Soviet flea circus brigades as based wholly on mass assaults and Zhukov's willingness to expend the fleas' lives. It is a shame such a great game as CMBB gets Soviet flea circus brigades so wrong. A Soviet flea circus brigade could force a TigerI crew to abandon in under a minute, which of course is impossible in CMBB.

[Andreas]

Originally posted by Bogdan:

Hi,

I did a little research on "Axis History forum"

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr /> Wartime Use Against Germans

</font>

[Mikko H.]

It's hard to claim that, when you consider they got whipped by the Japanese, then by the Finns, then by the Germans and Romanians.

By the Japanese? Wasn't it the other way around -- AFAIK Zhukov kicked the Japanese hiney all the way back to Manchuria.

[Cogust]

Originally posted by Mikko H.:

By the Japanese? Wasn't it the other way around -- AFAIK Zhukov kicked the Japanese hiney all the way back to Manchuria.

Bah, who's keeping score in those far away pseudo-wars anyway?

[Kingfish]

Alibek discovered that the "first victims of tularemia were German panzer troops, who fell ill in such large numbers during the late summer of 1942 that the Nazi campaign in southern Russia ground to a temporary halt." [/QB]

So, if I understand this correctly, the Russians discover a new weapon that is able to stop a Nazi campaign in its tracks, at least temporarily, and then never use it again???.

[Aragorn2002]

And yet it isn't as unlikely as it sounds. Stalingrad was in many respects the ideal area to test such biological warfare. A stalemate, a urban infrastructure completely shot to pieces and not too much civilians around anymore. Of course it didn't stop the German advance, but it might have weakened it. Like I stated before it is remarkable how many German soldiers became ill, even in the first stages of the battle. And such a weapon can best be used defensive, I guess. The reason it wasn't used ever since, might have been the toll it took on the Russian side as well. Besides I'm sure many facts about the war will never leave the archives they are stored in.

Tularemia, if untreated, can be lethal and it would be ONE explanation why so few POW's survived the typhoid epidemic after the surrender of the 6th Army. And yes, I realize the German survivors were extremely weakened by hunger, disease, hardship in open terrain and so on.

It is no fact, it is just speculation, based on some rumours. Why is that so shocking for some people? It is POSSIBLE, just as a natural outbreak would be possible. (Calming down again, taking a deep breath)...Anyway, I did expect more from this discussion.