Operation Vegetarian

Operation Vegetarian was a British military plan which involved disseminating linseed cakes infected with anthrax spores onto fields in Nazi Germany.

Background

On 7 December 1941, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill received a top-secret memo summarizing developments at Porton Down. The memo reported that cattle cakes laced with anthrax bacteria are the only biological weapons that could currently be deployed by the United Kingdom.

Churchill's Defense Committee met on 2 January 1942 and gave permission on the production of these cattle cakes. Later that year, the first batch of some five million cakes were manufactured at Porton Down. During this time, the plan was given its code name, Operation Vegetarian.

Testing

On 15 July 1942, a team of scientists from Porton Down led by Paul Fildes began outdoor testing of anthrax bacteria on the remote Scottish island of Gruinard, about 1 kilometer (0.6 miles) off the shore. Fildes' team set off anthrax-filled bombs, observing their impact on a group of sheep placed somewhat downwind. Most of the sheep die within a few days.

Later that year, on 26 September 1942, Fildes' team drops an anthrax bomb from an airplane onto Gruinard. Although the bomb lodges in a bog and does not infect any sheep, a similar more successful test is completed a month later on a Welsh beach.

The five million cakes to be disseminated in Germany were eventually destroyed via incinerator shortly after the ending of World War II in 1945.

Aftermath

The early 1980s saw Gruinard become a public threat when a group calling themselves "Operation Dark Harvest" began sending soil from the island to various British government facilities, demanding that the island be clean. The soil was found to be sufficiently contaminated with anthrax.

Thus, in 1986, the British government began clean up of Gruinard Island by injecting the entire landmass with 280 tons of formaldehyde diluted with seawater. The topsoil was then removed in a series of sealed containers.

The year 1990 found the island being declared as safe. The "Keep Out" signs were removed and a plaque was placed at the foot of sculpture created by George Wylie. The plaque read:

For air, stone and the equilibrium of understanding. Welcome back Gruinard.

In 1997, a film made of the anthrax work performed on Gruinard Island was declassified. The video is now part of the Imperial War Museum Film and Video Archive. Its IWM catalogue number is DED 252.^[1]

Since 2007, not a single case of anthrax from the test flock of sheep left on the island has been reported.

Notes

↑ The video was uploaded onto the website YouTube on 9 February 2014 by user "experimentsrus." The film can thus be watched here.

External Links

References

No adequate sources have been found so far.

[iwm-1] The video was uploaded onto the website YouTube on 9 February 2014 by user "experimentsrus." The film can thus be watched here.

[1]