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CLASSIC: Bug Wars: When We Tried to Turn Insects into Soldiers · Ridiculous History

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Fellow Ridiculous historians, as we're wrapping up this week of
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: celebratory classics for Labor Day, we've got to tell you,
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: there is a story we ran into in our sister show,
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: Stuff They Don't Want You to Know, about cyber cockroaches.
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: Remember that one? Yeah. It was odd, right?
• 0:20
  Speaker 2: They were technically designed to be deployed to find survivors
• 0:25
  Speaker 2: amidst rubble. But then there was talk of them being
• 0:28
  Speaker 2: able to also inject people with things.
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: Yes. Yeah.
• 0:32
  Speaker 2: That one threw me a little bit. It seemed like
• 0:34
  Speaker 2: those features exist at cross purposes.
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: They were also pretty vague about what could be injected.
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: They just kept using the word injectables. Injectables.
• 0:44
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: Which is not very reassuring. You're talking about train spotting here? Exactly. We,
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: we were, we were, Both startled, I think, in a
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: bit of synchronicity to learn that after we had reported
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: the latest news on cyber cockroaches, this story from 2019
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: popped up on our radar. Folks, it turns out that
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: multiple governments have been trying to turn insects into soldiers
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: for like decades. And why not, Ben? That's what I say.
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: Why not?
• 1:17
  Speaker 2: We are on a bit of a run with a
• 1:18
  Speaker 2: little break in between for Yasuke of odd soldiers. I
• 1:22
  Speaker 2: suppose in feudal Japan, Yasuke would have been considered an
• 1:25
  Speaker 2: odd soldier.
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: Oh, yes, very much so. And check this one out.
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: We can't wait to hear your thoughts. Be kind to
• 1:32
  Speaker 1: your local insects, even if bugs aren't your cup of tea.
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: And do tune in next week when we're going to
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: get into some even more weird war stuff. Backpack nukes
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: at Matahari. Ridiculous History is a production of iHeartRadio. Welcome
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: to the show, Ridiculous Historians. Thanks so much for tuning in.
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: My name is Ben, and I got to tell you,
• 2:22
  Speaker 1: something's bugging me. My name is Noel the Big Buzz Brown.
• 2:25
  Speaker 1: Is that what they call you? Oh, no, they call
• 2:29
  Speaker 1: me that. Who are they? You know, the royal they. Oh, good.
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: The editorial they. We're also joined by our super producer,
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: Casey the Big Itch Pegram. How's it going, Casey? Scratching
• 2:44
  Speaker 1: away over here, I guess. It's that summertime in Georgia, man.
• 2:48
  Speaker 2: And, you know, when you realize, too, part of the
• 2:51
  Speaker 2: story is the government actually dumping more mosquitoes into Georgia.
• 2:57
  Speaker 2: That's when you realize how truly callous and cruel the
• 3:00
  Speaker 2: American government can be.
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I'll take the name Ben Dropkick Bolin. And it
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: is true. The thing that's specifically bugging me today is
• 3:09
  Speaker 1: just the heat walking to work. But we are talking
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: about bugs. We're talking about entomology. We're talking about warfare.
• 3:18
  Speaker 1: We're talking about bug wars. That sounds pretty cool. Yeah,
• 3:22
  Speaker 1: literal bug wars, right? So, Noel, what are you talking about?
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: People were dropping mosquitoes into Georgia? That's one of them.
• 3:32
  Speaker 2: That was Operation Big Buzz, which in the 1950s, the
• 3:35
  Speaker 2: Army put more than 300,000 mosquitoes uninfected mosquitoes into bombs
• 3:42
  Speaker 2: and then drop them onto the unsuspecting population of Savannah, Georgia.
• 3:47
  Speaker 2: And this was a test for something that the government
• 3:50
  Speaker 2: was working on on a much larger scale, the weaponization
• 3:54
  Speaker 2: of insects. We'll get into the specifics of each of
• 3:56
  Speaker 2: these operations. But for now, Ben, what the hell is
• 3:59
  Speaker 2: the weaponization of insects? Let's backtrack a little bit. Sure.
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: It's a form of biological warfare that You know, it's
• 4:07
  Speaker 1: something that a lot of engineers have said before in
• 4:10
  Speaker 1: the past. People can make things that are pretty good
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: in terms of technology. But when it comes to the
• 4:17
  Speaker 1: natural results of evolution, Mother Nature tends to make pretty
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  Speaker 1: great stuff. So why would we go back and try
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  Speaker 1: to build tiny, tiny machines and weapons of our own
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  Speaker 1: when we could just use the existing creatures? insects.
• 4:32
  Speaker 2: Yeah, we know that various versions of weaponizing animals have
• 4:36
  Speaker 2: gone varying ways, you know, dolphins, tiny bat bombs, you know,
• 4:42
  Speaker 2: that on Japan, the idea that the bats would deploy
• 4:45
  Speaker 2: into eaves of homes and then these incendiary devices would
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  Speaker 2: go off and burn down Japan.
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  Speaker 1: That didn't work out so well.
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  Speaker 2: This story that we're talking about today, the weaponization of insects,
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  Speaker 2: has had varying.
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  Speaker 1: Degrees of success in various different cultures, not only ours.
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  Speaker 2: But here's the thing. So the turn of the 20th century,
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  Speaker 2: human beings in general started figuring out that insects carry diseases.
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  Speaker 2: The term is vectors. They were vectors for diseases. There
• 5:15
  Speaker 2: is a professor at the University of Wyoming who explained
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  Speaker 2: it as such in the Casper Star Tribune, a gentleman
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  Speaker 2: by the name of Jeff Lockwood. He says– Quote, the Japanese, French, Germans, English,
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  Speaker 2: and the United States all had entomological disease programs active
• 5:32
  Speaker 2: during the golden years of 1930 to 1970. And that
• 5:36
  Speaker 2: includes a Japanese World War II program. The name of
• 5:39
  Speaker 2: that program was Unit 731.
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: Unit 731 was the Japanese government's World War II analog
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  Speaker 1: to the horrific human experimentation that took place under the
• 5:52
  Speaker 1: Nazi regime during the Holocaust. So Unit 731 is a very,
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  Speaker 1: very dark thing. It's not ridiculous, but do be aware
• 6:02
  Speaker 1: that it exists. Essentially, Unit 731 engaged in tremendously horrific,
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  Speaker 1: unethical human experimentation. There are sickening stories that are all
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  Speaker 1: true and that are worse than fiction. You can learn
• 6:20
  Speaker 1: more about these evil science experiments. I do not use
• 6:23
  Speaker 1: the word evil lightly. by searching online. There are, of course,
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: numbers of books here. They were doing stuff like studying
• 6:29
  Speaker 1: hypothermia by submerging people's limbs in water until the arm
• 6:35
  Speaker 1: or leg is frozen solid and ice formed over it,
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  Speaker 1: and then striking them with canes. They were essentially vivisecting people,
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  Speaker 1: conducting surgery on them while they were alive, starving them,
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  Speaker 1: burning them, infecting them with various diseases.
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  Speaker 2: And part of it was their weaponization of insects wherein
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  Speaker 2: they sprayed fleas from low-flying airplanes, and these fleas were
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  Speaker 2: infected with cholera. And according to the Boston Globe, in
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  Speaker 2: another piece that Lockwood contributed to, these deaths could have
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  Speaker 2: exceeded that of both Hiroshima and Nagasaki combined, those bombings.
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  Speaker 2: At least 440,000 Chinese were killed using these plague-infected fleas.
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  Speaker 1: That number comes from an international symposium of historians in 2002.
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  Speaker 1: So relatively speaking, it's pretty recent. And think about that number,
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  Speaker 1: 440,000 people. Japan, we should say as well, is the
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  Speaker 1: only country in history that has verifiably used plague. bugs
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  Speaker 1: in war. Other countries have experimented with it. Spoiler alert,
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  Speaker 1: one of them being the good old U.S. of A.
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  Speaker 1: In fact, we experimented with this not once, but multiple
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  Speaker 1: times in a very short time span in the 1950s, right?
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  Speaker 1: Because we said there's a golden age from the 1930s
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  Speaker 1: to the 70s. In the U.S., we had not one,
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  Speaker 1: but three huge operations, weaponizing insects, In the mid-1950s, and
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  Speaker 1: it's fascinating stuff. The first one where Casey Pegram took
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  Speaker 1: his nickname for today is Operation Big Itch, which also
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  Speaker 1: used fleas, right? They took a page from the Japanese
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  Speaker 1: government there.
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  Speaker 2: Yes, and we have, thanks to the lovely folks at
• 8:28
  Speaker 2: The Smoking Gun, have a document that catalogs several of
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  Speaker 2: these programs, one of which has been entirely redacted. But
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  Speaker 2: we do have a little bit of information about that
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  Speaker 2: one from some other sources. But according to Section 1
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  Speaker 2: of a document called The History of In-Field Testing in
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  Speaker 2: the U.S., Operation Big Itch took place in 1954 and
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  Speaker 2: was a series of trials, of tests, that were conducted
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  Speaker 2: using fleas loaded into E-14 munitions with what's described as
• 8:57
  Speaker 2: cardboard and sponge inserts. The idea was that the bugs
• 9:01
  Speaker 2: would be dropped from altitudes of between 305 and 610
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  Speaker 2: meters over a testing area called the Dugway Proving Ground
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  Speaker 2: in Utah. The idea was to investigate the the viability
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  Speaker 2: of the munitions used here and how effective they would
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  Speaker 2: be in disseminating what's referred to very scientifically as these
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  Speaker 2: arthropod vectors.
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  Speaker 1: Right, exactly. This specifically was the tropical rat flea or
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  Speaker 1: Xenopsila chopis. The logic here is pretty sound, right? The
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  Speaker 1: waves of death known collectively as the Black Plague came
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  Speaker 1: from fleas. They're very, very good for transmitting diseases quickly.
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  Speaker 1: Big Itch showed a lot of promise, but it also
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  Speaker 1: had some problems. So they were loaded into these munitions,
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  Speaker 1: dropped from the air, as you said, up to, what,
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  Speaker 1: 610 meters. They used a couple of different bombs. The
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  Speaker 1: E-14 bomb and the E-23 bomb, which they could cluster
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  Speaker 1: into a kind of a Voltron arrangement called the E-86
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  Speaker 1: cluster bomb or the E-77. Without getting too in the
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  Speaker 1: weeds on these abbreviations and numbers, just know that the
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  Speaker 1: E-14 was designed to hold 100,000 fleas, and the E-23
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  Speaker 1: was designed to hold 200,000 fleas. The E-23 was the
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  Speaker 1: worst performer. Over half of the bombs failed. They didn't
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  Speaker 1: meet their expectations. They malfunctioned during, this is the worst part,
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  Speaker 1: they malfunctioned during testing. On the plane, right? Yeah, and
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  Speaker 1: the fleas were released into the aircraft where they attacked
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  Speaker 1: the pilot, the bombardier, and an observer. Someone was just
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  Speaker 1: sitting there, you know, As a bystander. So they imagine
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  Speaker 1: you're about to launch a bomb of fleas and the
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  Speaker 1: bomb goes off in the plane. That's exactly what happens.
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  Speaker 1: And this, by the way, comes from a great book
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  Speaker 1: called Weapons of Mass Destruction, an Encyclopedia of Worldwide Policy,
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  Speaker 1: Technology and History by James J. Wirtz.
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  Speaker 2: Next, we have Operation Big Buzz, which was in 1955.
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  Speaker 2: And this was an experiment that the Georgia centric one
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  Speaker 2: that we mentioned earlier in the show. It was a
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  Speaker 2: field test that was trying to figure out the, I
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  Speaker 2: don't know, the viability again of actually breeding and then
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  Speaker 2: housing and then loading up into bombs and ultimately, you know,
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  Speaker 2: scattering these across the land. Yellow fever infected mosquitoes.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah. Over 300,000, right? It gets even crazier.
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  Speaker 2: Than that, right?
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  Speaker 1: So they did these tests.
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  Speaker 2: In Savannah, Georgia, where they released 330,000 Aedes aegypti mosquitoes,
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  Speaker 2: which are known vectors for yellow fever. And they did
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  Speaker 2: this by dropping them on Georgia parks all throughout Savannah.
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  Speaker 2: And they were kind of released out into suburbs as well.
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  Speaker 2: And the idea was that they would see how many
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  Speaker 2: reports came in of citizens being being bitten, and they
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  Speaker 2: would kind of be able to tell how effective this
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  Speaker 2: was as a means of dispersing this disease.
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  Speaker 1: Not the best methodology. When's the last time you contacted
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  Speaker 1: the government because a mosquito attacked you? These mosquitoes, by
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  Speaker 1: the way, thankfully, were not actually infected with yellow fever
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  Speaker 1: for the purposes of this test. But it's pretty insane
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  Speaker 1: to think that they said, okay, let's just drop this
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  Speaker 1: off and see what happens. See who is so concerned
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  Speaker 1: about mosquitoes that they call us. They were also dropping
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  Speaker 1: these from the same bombs in the Big Itch, the
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  Speaker 1: E14 bombs. So they clearly thought that there was some
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  Speaker 1: promise for this. In total, I think it was 1
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  Speaker 1: million female mosquitoes they bred for the testing. At least
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: according to Public Health Issues Disaster Preparedness. That's a real...
• 13:09
  Speaker 1: Very sexy acronym. Yeah, super creative. Oh, that would be FIDIP.
• 13:15
  Speaker 1: Now that is pretty cool sounding. FIDIP. That comes from
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: John Marr and Lloyd Novick over at FIDIP.
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  Speaker 2: I think that's why I like acronyms so much, because
• 13:23
  Speaker 2: the sound of the acronym is usually infinitely more fascinating
• 13:26
  Speaker 2: and intriguing than when you actually name out the individual words.
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  Speaker 1: It's a little easier to remember, too, because it's a mnemonic.
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  Speaker 1: So what happened with the yellow fever run through or
• 13:40
  Speaker 1: rehearsal there in Savannah? Well, I mean, it was annoying, right? Right.
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  Speaker 2: I mean, it was literally like, you know, Georgia, Savannah
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  Speaker 2: in particular, is a swampy kind of breeding ground for
• 13:52
  Speaker 2: mosquitoes anyway. Can you imagine just unleashing that on your
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  Speaker 2: own people? I mean, sure, they weren't infected with the
• 13:58
  Speaker 2: actual disease, right? But they were still infected. essentially doing
• 14:02
  Speaker 2: military tests on their own citizens, right?
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  Speaker 1: And there was even more subterfuge because we found that
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  Speaker 1: government officials disguised themselves as healthcare professionals to monitor the population.
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  Speaker 1: So that's how they were getting, just to clarify, that's
• 14:18
  Speaker 1: how they were intending to get feedback. That's pretty gross, man.
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  Speaker 1: It's definitely unethical. And with the results there, Would we
• 14:28
  Speaker 1: say that that was a success? Because the idea, again,
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: was they would drop them, and the test was going
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: to be whether the mosquitoes could survive the drop and
• 14:37
  Speaker 1: then seek food on the ground, right? Seek blood.
• 14:40
  Speaker 2: Yeah. What they determined was that the female mosquitoes actively
• 14:43
  Speaker 2: sought blood meals from humans and guinea pigs, which is
• 14:48
  Speaker 2: what they were described as in the report.
• 14:50
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 14:51
  Speaker 2: And that some of the mosquitoes were collected as far
• 14:53
  Speaker 2: as four-tenths of a mile from the target release site. So, yes,
• 14:58
  Speaker 2: it was absolutely effective. They could get into homes, you know.
• 15:01
  Speaker 2: I mean, if they were infected with this deadly disease,
• 15:05
  Speaker 2: it would have been an absolute bloodbath, no pun intended,
• 15:07
  Speaker 2: or maybe pun intended.
• 15:08
  Speaker 1: What do I know? Yeah, I mean, absolutely. This seems
• 15:12
  Speaker 1: ridiculous now, but it had enormous potential for destruction, so
• 15:17
  Speaker 1: much so that that after releasing these Aedes aegypti mosquitoes,
• 15:22
  Speaker 1: the U.S. government said, I really think we're on to something. Okay,
• 15:26
  Speaker 1: maybe big itch was just a good starting point for us.
• 15:31
  Speaker 1: And the big buzz showed some promise. So, hey, guys,
• 15:35
  Speaker 1: it's 1956. We're living in the future. Let's do this
• 15:39
  Speaker 1: one more time. What do you say for old time's sake?
• 15:42
  Speaker 1: Fun is what I say. So that gives us one.
• 15:45
  Speaker 2: Of the more shadowy operations known as Operation Dropkick, which
• 15:51
  Speaker 2: I believe was your.
• 15:51
  Speaker 1: Nom de plume in this episode, right, Ben? Yeah, I
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: have a very lazy fighting style. I just sort of
• 15:56
  Speaker 1: put my foot up and then it drops. Yeah, exactly.
• 15:59
  Speaker 1: It's very effective on shoes. Yeah, well, it's kind of
• 16:04
  Speaker 1: an MMA style. It's like an MMA move. Yeah.
• 16:07
  Speaker 2: So this was kind of similar to these other operations,
• 16:10
  Speaker 2: but had some pretty important distinctions. This took place in
• 16:13
  Speaker 2: 1956 when this is the Chemical Corps.
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: Isn't that right? Isn't that what conducted this operation? Yep.
• 16:20
  Speaker 2: Which is an organization I was not familiar with. Tell
• 16:22
  Speaker 2: us a little bit about the Chemical Corps, Ben.
• 16:24
  Speaker 1: Sure. The Chemical Corps is the branch of the U.S. Army.
• 16:28
  Speaker 1: The official stories, they specifically work on defense against nuclear weapons, chemical,
• 16:34
  Speaker 1: biological weapons. You'll hear people say that for most of
• 16:39
  Speaker 1: its history, the Chemical Corps was actually tasked with delivering
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: these weapons instead of defending against them. And you'll hear
• 16:46
  Speaker 1: that because it's true. Right. Exactly.
• 16:49
  Speaker 2: So they conducted Operation Dropkick when they released 600,000 uninfected
• 16:57
  Speaker 2: mosquitoes onto a bombing range in Avon Park, Florida.
• 17:03
  Speaker 1: Yes, that's right. And their methodology was improving. They were
• 17:06
  Speaker 1: able to track these mosquitoes a little bit better. They
• 17:09
  Speaker 1: were able to come up with an estimate of how
• 17:11
  Speaker 1: many entered houses and bit people. And they also found
• 17:14
  Speaker 1: that they could deliver them through a couple of different
• 17:19
  Speaker 1: devices or methods. In this case, they were released from helicopters, right?
• 17:24
  Speaker 1: And people in Avon Park, still some of them remembered this.
• 17:29
  Speaker 1: You know, they were old enough to be conscious of
• 17:32
  Speaker 1: these things happening. And they reported that mosquitoes weren't the
• 17:36
  Speaker 1: only things released. There is a Avon Park resident named
• 17:40
  Speaker 1: Beatrice Peterson, who wasn't aware of the mosquito releases because
• 17:44
  Speaker 1: there are already mosquitoes in Florida. But she did recall
• 17:47
  Speaker 1: that a ton of screw worm flies were released in
• 17:50
  Speaker 1: the mid to late 1950s when she was 14.
• 17:54
  Speaker 2: I think. Yeah. And she describes them as being dropped
• 17:56
  Speaker 2: from little boxes out of these helicopters and that they'd
• 17:59
  Speaker 2: see them at school and the boxes would open up
• 18:03
  Speaker 2: and the flies would be dispersed.
• 18:05
  Speaker 1: And here's the thing.
• 18:06
  Speaker 2: Avon Park in Florida was a prominently black neighborhood and
• 18:11
  Speaker 2: prominently lower income. And a lot of folks actually got
• 18:15
  Speaker 2: sick because of this. And I believe a handful actually died.
• 18:18
  Speaker 1: Yeah. And we shouldn't skip over that because it is
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: true that in many of the illegal experiments that the U.S.
• 18:26
  Speaker 1: conducted domestically, they focused on marginalized communities because they thought
• 18:32
  Speaker 1: they could get away with it. There would at the
• 18:34
  Speaker 1: very least be less legal trouble or less possibility. So
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: the big question is, what would have happened if these
• 18:41
  Speaker 1: insects were carrying disease? The answer is clearly a public
• 18:46
  Speaker 1: health disaster would have been possible, would have been in
• 18:48
  Speaker 1: the cards, you know, a yellow fever outbreak. So they
• 18:52
  Speaker 1: found that in theory, unlike the bat bomb or the
• 18:56
  Speaker 1: cyborg cat, which are both real things, this weaponization of
• 19:00
  Speaker 1: insects had some sand to it. It could actually work.
• 19:04
  Speaker 1: And although the three experiments we outlined occurred in the 1950s,
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: that doesn't mean that the U.S. Army called it quits.
• 19:11
  Speaker 1: We have evidence that shows they were interested in it
• 19:14
  Speaker 1: even more recently, right?
• 19:15
  Speaker 2: Yeah, we have some documentation that shows that up until
• 19:19
  Speaker 2: as recently as the 1980s, 81 in fact, there's a
• 19:23
  Speaker 2: report on entomological warfare that piggybacks off of the research
• 19:29
  Speaker 2: that was done at that Dugway Proving Ground in Utah.
• 19:32
  Speaker 2: And the study actually looks more at how we could
• 19:35
  Speaker 2: defend ourselves against attacks being done on U.S. soil by
• 19:40
  Speaker 2: infected mosquitoes with yellow fever. And according to the report,
• 19:45
  Speaker 2: it noted that U.S. intelligence information indicated that Warsaw Pact
• 19:50
  Speaker 2: nations have attempted to develop this capability, and it also
• 19:55
  Speaker 2: looks at cost estimates of what the fallout from these
• 19:59
  Speaker 2: kinds of attacks might be. So this isn't necessarily looking
• 20:03
  Speaker 2: at doing the research and developing these techniques ourselves, but
• 20:07
  Speaker 2: more guarding against it. in the case of attacks from
• 20:10
  Speaker 2: other nations outside of America.
• 20:12
  Speaker 1: Right. And this leads us into a bit of conspiratorial
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: speculation here. We've heard of the Zika virus, right? Remember,
• 20:20
  Speaker 1: that was in the news a lot. So the Zika
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: virus is a disease transmitted primarily by these mosquitoes that
• 20:27
  Speaker 1: we mentioned earlier. Symptoms can be mild and include fever, rash, conjunctivitis, muscle,
• 20:33
  Speaker 1: joint pain, malaise, a headache. It's 2019, man. I feel
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: like most people have malaise of some sort nowadays. But
• 20:42
  Speaker 1: it can pose great dangers. It can be particularly dangerous
• 20:47
  Speaker 1: to unborn children. It can cause infants to be born
• 20:51
  Speaker 1: with a number of deleterious conditions. But some people will
• 20:57
  Speaker 1: tell you that the Zika virus is an offshoot of
• 21:00
  Speaker 1: the U.S. Army's EW or Entomological Warfare Program because in
• 21:05
  Speaker 1: the 1930s, This mosquito, Aedes aegypti, was found in every
• 21:09
  Speaker 1: country in South and Central America, throughout the Caribbean, and
• 21:13
  Speaker 1: even here in the southeastern United States. And then it
• 21:16
  Speaker 1: came with, you know, it came with all the diseases
• 21:19
  Speaker 1: that this creature usually carries. Yellow fever, dengue fever, also
• 21:23
  Speaker 1: called breakbone, and now Zika. So people were working to
• 21:28
  Speaker 1: eradicate this troublesome creature, which was occurring naturally. It's not
• 21:33
  Speaker 1: like Peru was bombing Brazil with these or something. In 1958,
• 21:36
  Speaker 1: Brazil successfully eradicated the mosquito and was working to eradicate
• 21:41
  Speaker 1: it not just from its own country, but from the
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: rest of the hemisphere. This was going to be the
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: culmination of decades of work. And unfortunately, even while the U.S.
• 21:53
  Speaker 1: was funding eradication efforts in South America, it was still
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: secretly raising colonies of millions of these mosquitoes to use
• 22:01
  Speaker 1: as weapons. So it was kind of shooting ourselves in
• 22:04
  Speaker 1: the foot, robbing Peter to pay Paul.
• 22:06
  Speaker 2: It seems like it got out of hand really quickly.
• 22:08
  Speaker 2: And a lot of this research really makes me think,
• 22:11
  Speaker 2: is the U.S. responsible for how many mosquitoes ended up, like,
• 22:15
  Speaker 2: in the South?
• 22:16
  Speaker 1: They had to, mosquitoes already naturally occurred. No, I know that.
• 22:19
  Speaker 2: But I'm just saying, like, when you dump that many
• 22:22
  Speaker 2: more on top of an already thriving population.
• 22:25
  Speaker 1: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's not going to double down
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: on that. Great time to be a bird.
• 22:28
  Speaker 2: Ooh, that's Because I was just thinking like already in
• 22:31
  Speaker 2: the summer here in Atlanta, I'm already covered in mosquito
• 22:34
  Speaker 2: bites and I haven't been spending that much time outside.
• 22:36
  Speaker 2: So they definitely are able to infiltrate homes and get
• 22:39
  Speaker 2: inside and get at those those blood bags that are
• 22:43
  Speaker 2: human beings.
• 22:44
  Speaker 1: I hear you can modify your diet. I don't know
• 22:46
  Speaker 1: if it's true such that mosquitoes won't find you tasty. Really? Yeah. Yeah.
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: You will hear people say that there are a couple
• 22:54
  Speaker 1: of different what they call mosquito repellent foods, garlic and onions.
• 22:58
  Speaker 1: That's not a problem. Apple cider vinegar, lemongrass, chili peppers, grapefruit,
• 23:03
  Speaker 1: which I am not going to eat. Not a grapefruit fan. No,
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: I hate it. Really? Hate it. Not even like in
• 23:09
  Speaker 1: a little cocktail, like a little grapefruit and vodka? Grapefruit
• 23:13
  Speaker 1: is an injustice that shall not stand. Interesting. I used
• 23:15
  Speaker 1: to not like it either.
• 23:16
  Speaker 2: The ruby red I find a little bit more palatable
• 23:18
  Speaker 2: than the regular old grapefruit.
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: I think it was because when I was in Boy Scouts,
• 23:25
  Speaker 1: One summer in the middle of nowhere, we were stranded
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: in a place where the only thing to drink was
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: water or this rancid grapefruit juice. So that was my
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: first success. Yeah, I just can't do it. Got it.
• 23:36
  Speaker 1: I fully support everyone who enjoys grapefruit. Just don't make
• 23:41
  Speaker 1: me participate. No, that's fine. To each his own.
• 23:48
  Speaker 2: I also heard a thing about mosquitoes that if you
• 23:50
  Speaker 2: flick them off before they've fully had a chance to
• 23:53
  Speaker 2: do their dirty work, it itches more.
• 23:56
  Speaker 1: Oh.
• 23:57
  Speaker 2: Because there's some kind of antibody or something they inject
• 24:00
  Speaker 2: into the bite after they've finished that makes it, like,
• 24:03
  Speaker 2: less itchy.
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: Kind of like the little Cheez-Its you get if you
• 24:07
  Speaker 1: donate blood. Exactly.
• 24:08
  Speaker 2: It's just like that. I'm not even going to bother
• 24:10
  Speaker 2: confirming whether this is true or not. I just choose
• 24:12
  Speaker 2: to believe it is true. But what we definitely know
• 24:14
  Speaker 2: is true is there is a precedent for this kind
• 24:16
  Speaker 2: of research, and we alluded to it earlier in the show.
• 24:18
  Speaker 2: But in 1941, Heinrich Himmler was ordered to create a
• 24:23
  Speaker 2: research station, a laboratory that was based out of the
• 24:26
  Speaker 2: concentration camp at Dachau under the command of the Nazi SS.
• 24:31
  Speaker 2: And that was to focus on studying diseases with the
• 24:36
  Speaker 2: goal of protecting the Germans. But some new reports from
• 24:40
  Speaker 2: the University of Tübingen, an ecologist by the name of
• 24:43
  Speaker 2: Klaus Reinhardt, indicate that they were actually working on offensive
• 24:48
  Speaker 2: biological warfare programs as well.
• 24:50
  Speaker 1: Yeah, just like the U.S. Chemical Corps. You know, they
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: say it's for defense or research, but it turns out
• 24:58
  Speaker 1: the potential for weaponizing this stuff is just too promising.
• 25:03
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so under the 1925 Geneva Protocol, Hitler wasn't allowed
• 25:08
  Speaker 2: to use chemical or biological weapons during World War II. But,
• 25:12
  Speaker 2: you know, like we say, we can on paper say, yeah,
• 25:14
  Speaker 2: of course, we're going to follow the rules of engagement.
• 25:18
  Speaker 2: But behind closed doors, he had folks working around the
• 25:21
  Speaker 2: clock to study the same thing that we're talking about
• 25:24
  Speaker 2: in the United States, weaponization of mosquitoes and fleas.
• 25:28
  Speaker 1: Right. And as Klaus Reinhart points out, reading through the
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: details of the research seems to indicate that there was
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: a nother research program, a classified project codenamed Dormaus, or
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: can you give it a shot in German?
• 25:46
  Speaker 2: How about Siebenschlafer or Schlefer?
• 25:49
  Speaker 1: Because it's got the umlaut over the A, so that
• 25:51
  Speaker 1: makes it an E sound.
• 25:52
  Speaker 2: Schlefer.
• 25:53
  Speaker 1: I'm glad you're here. We found this in a Smithsonian article.
• 25:57
  Speaker 1: This title is golden. Nazi scientists wanted to use mosquitoes
• 26:01
  Speaker 1: to send diseases behind enemy lines.
• 26:03
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and that's by Colin Schultz. And it goes through
• 26:06
  Speaker 2: this research material that we discussed. And some of the
• 26:10
  Speaker 2: wording in these documents is what indicates there may have
• 26:13
  Speaker 2: been a parallel program. So we don't necessarily know this
• 26:16
  Speaker 2: for a fact or have confirmation, but there is some indication. Again,
• 26:20
  Speaker 2: according to Reinhart, the wording, he says, in the German
• 26:24
  Speaker 2: documents suggests that they knew that there was a planned
• 26:29
  Speaker 2: release of mosquitoes.
• 26:31
  Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly. So. There's a report dated in September of 1944,
• 26:37
  Speaker 1: September the 23rd. And in this report, they have some
• 26:41
  Speaker 1: what we call weasel words. They've got some wiggle room.
• 26:44
  Speaker 1: They say they're carrying out research, quote, in order to
• 26:48
  Speaker 1: clarify the question whether an artificial mass infection of the
• 26:52
  Speaker 1: malaria parasite onto humans is possible and how one can
• 26:56
  Speaker 1: counter an action that aims at such mass infection. So
• 27:01
  Speaker 1: the idea here is, Ultimately, we're learning how to protect
• 27:05
  Speaker 1: ourselves against weaponized bugs. And the way we're going to
• 27:09
  Speaker 1: do that is to weaponize some bugs and infect a
• 27:12
  Speaker 1: ton of people with malaria.
• 27:13
  Speaker 2: And then a pretty solid cover story is that they
• 27:17
  Speaker 2: were doing this research to prevent plague outbreaks in the
• 27:20
  Speaker 2: concentration camps with already weakened, you know, prisoners.
• 27:24
  Speaker 1: Of war that were used basically as slave labor. So
• 27:27
  Speaker 1: that was an important quality of this research as well. Right.
• 27:31
  Speaker 1: They were entirely concerned with the slave labor aspect. It's
• 27:35
  Speaker 1: not like they were working on people's quality of life.
• 27:39
  Speaker 1: And I got to say, you know, I'm surprised that
• 27:41
  Speaker 1: this kind of thing has not been more widely reported
• 27:45
  Speaker 1: or has not happened more often because it's clearly unethical,
• 27:50
  Speaker 1: but it would have to be effective. You know, the
• 27:52
  Speaker 1: mosquitoes just get in everywhere. They're ubiquitous.
• 27:55
  Speaker 2: Well, we know it is effective from the way the
• 27:57
  Speaker 2: Japanese used it on the Chinese, which With those insane
• 28:00
  Speaker 2: numbers of casualties, I think we said in the neighborhood.
• 28:02
  Speaker 1: Of half a million. Yeah, 440,000.
• 28:05
  Speaker 2: So I guess, knock wood, thank our lucky stars that
• 28:08
  Speaker 2: this hasn't been used more because it just sounds like
• 28:10
  Speaker 2: an absolute terror. I mean, even the testing in Savannah,
• 28:13
  Speaker 2: can you imagine having that many bitey mosquitoes dropped on
• 28:17
  Speaker 2: you during the heat of summer? And all of a sudden, like,
• 28:20
  Speaker 2: where are these clouds of, you know, insects coming from?
• 28:22
  Speaker 2: It sounds like a biblical plague.
• 28:24
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, and Savannah already has an atomic bomb resting
• 28:28
  Speaker 1: in the water off the coast. Yeah, man, they can't
• 28:30
  Speaker 1: get a break. They can't get a break. I have
• 28:33
  Speaker 1: to ask you guys. Okay, so, Noel, you have what
• 28:35
  Speaker 1: they in the South call sweet blood. Yeah. Right? Because
• 28:39
  Speaker 1: mosquitoes bite you. They love me. Casey, what about you?
• 28:41
  Speaker 1: Are bugs a fan of your blood? Unfortunately, yes, they are. Wow. Well,
• 28:46
  Speaker 1: maybe you guys should incorporate some garlic onions. But I
• 28:50
  Speaker 1: eat a lot of garlic and onions. Grapefruit. Do I
• 28:53
  Speaker 1: have to rub it on my actual body? Yes. While
• 28:56
  Speaker 1: intoning the phrase, bugs, bugs, go away. Drink my blood
• 29:01
  Speaker 1: another day. All right. I'll remember that for next time.
• 29:04
  Speaker 2: And you folks, for next time, remember to check us
• 29:07
  Speaker 2: out on Facebook.
• 29:08
  Speaker 1: Our group is called The Ridiculous Historians. You can be
• 29:11
  Speaker 1: a member.
• 29:11
  Speaker 2: All you got to do is invoke my name, Casey's name,
• 29:14
  Speaker 2: Ben's name, all three, or just make a funny joke
• 29:16
  Speaker 2: that makes us laugh.
• 29:18
  Speaker 1: Yeah, give me a T-shirt idea, too, if it's a
• 29:20
  Speaker 1: good T-shirt. Wow, that sounds harsh. I promise if you
• 29:25
  Speaker 1: send a good T-shirt idea or even one that we
• 29:27
  Speaker 1: don't end up using, That's not grounds for rejection.
• 29:31
  Speaker 2: And those sweet t-shirt ideas may or may not end
• 29:33
  Speaker 2: up in our TeePublic store, teepublic.com slash ridiculous history, where
• 29:37
  Speaker 2: you can buy all kinds of ridiculous swag, including... the
• 29:40
  Speaker 2: brand new Casey on the Case childhood modeling photo t-shirt
• 29:44
  Speaker 2: that to me looks like some kind of cool indie rock,
• 29:47
  Speaker 2: like Dinosaur Jr.
• 29:49
  Speaker 1: Sonic Youth shirt.
• 29:50
  Speaker 2: I am actually, I've got one packed in my bag
• 29:52
  Speaker 2: for my upcoming trip, and I plan to rock it
• 29:54
  Speaker 2: all over New York City.
• 29:56
  Speaker 1: They did a fantastic job with that one. Also, Casey,
• 30:01
  Speaker 1: by the way, huge thanks again for letting us do that.
• 30:04
  Speaker 1: I know I bugged you for a while.
• 30:07
  Speaker 2: No, I love how it turned out. So, yeah, all's
• 30:09
  Speaker 2: well that ends well. So get you one of those shirts.
• 30:12
  Speaker 2: If you don't want to do that, which you should,
• 30:14
  Speaker 2: you can check us out on Instagram. Me and Ben
• 30:17
  Speaker 2: exist independently of the show. I am at HowNowNoelBrown.
• 30:20
  Speaker 1: I post, you know, My stories are fun.
• 30:22
  Speaker 2: You can check me out hanging out with my kid,
• 30:24
  Speaker 2: eating a lot of fancy foods at different eateries around
• 30:27
  Speaker 2: town in the United States.
• 30:28
  Speaker 1: And Ben, you're on there too, aren't you? The rumors
• 30:31
  Speaker 1: are true. You can find me on Instagram, getting kicked
• 30:35
  Speaker 1: into and out of various countries. I am at Ben
• 30:38
  Speaker 1: Bolin there. And you can find me on Twitter, hot
• 30:41
  Speaker 1: takes left and right. I am at Ben Bolin, H-S-W-L-E.
• 30:45
  Speaker 1: We want to give a huge, huge thanks, of course,
• 30:47
  Speaker 1: to you, super producer Casey Pegram, to you folks listening,
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: and also to Alex Williams, who composed our track. Yeah,
• 30:54
  Speaker 1: Gabe Luger, our research associate and friend. Christopher Asiotis, here
• 30:58
  Speaker 1: in spirit as always. Jonathan Strickland, the quiz star. I'm
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: starting to warm up to his antics a little bit.
• 31:02
  Speaker 1: It is his birthday today as we record. HBD, Jay Strick. Yeah,
• 31:07
  Speaker 1: I just walked by, shot him a little finger gun
• 31:09
  Speaker 1: and said, Happy New Year, bro. I'll shoot him a
• 31:11
  Speaker 1: different finger when I walk by. Okay, I feel like
• 31:13
  Speaker 1: you might. But it will accompany birthday wishes. So let
• 31:17
  Speaker 1: us know what you think about these strange sorts of experiments,
• 31:21
  Speaker 1: not just entomological warfare, but also the use of animals
• 31:25
  Speaker 1: in war in general. We have never done what would
• 31:28
  Speaker 1: be a lighthearted and delightful episode on animals who got
• 31:33
  Speaker 1: military ranks. No. That's just adorable. Okay, we got to
• 31:37
  Speaker 1: do that. We got to do that one. And if
• 31:39
  Speaker 1: you want to send us those recommendations, you can write
• 31:41
  Speaker 1: to us at ridiculous at iheartradio.com. See you next time, folks.
• 31:51
  Speaker 2: For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
• 31:55
  Speaker 2: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.