Is this why Senator Thomas Daschle got an anthrax letter?

["Richard M. Smith" <rms () computerbytesman com>]

Hmm, Tom Daschle vs. Tom Dashiell..

 

Richard

 

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9B00E5DF1630F931A25756C0A96E9
58260&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=print

 

May 12, 1998

Thomas Dashiell, 70, Builder, And Dismantler, of Germ Arms 

By JUDITH MILLER 

Thomas R. Dashiell, who became a major figure in America's effort to develop
offensive biological weapons but later worked to destroy them, died on May 4
in Frederick, Md., where he lived. He was 70. 

The cause was leukemia, his family said. 

With degrees in biology and chemical engineering, Mr. Dashiell began work as
a microbiologist at Fort Detrick, Md., in 1950. ''These were the days of
what was then known as 'black biology,' when the United States had a highly
secret program to develop offensive germ weapons,'' said Leonard A. Cole,
author of ''The Eleventh Plague'' (W. H. Freeman & Company, 1997), about
biological and chemical warfare, who knew Mr. Dashiell for more than a
decade. 

In time, Mr. Dashiell became assistant scientific director for development
and engineering at Fort Detrick, a senior position. Most of his work was
classified and remains secret to this day. 

Then, in 1969, President Richard M. Nixon announced that the United States
would unilaterally end its program to develop offensive germ weapons. In
1972, the nation joined the Soviet Union and more than 70 other countries in
signing the Biological Weapons Convention, which barred possession of deadly
biological agents except for defensive work like research into vaccines,
detectors and protective gear. 

Many scientists at Fort Detrick questioned the wisdom of that policy, but
Mr. Dashiell ardently agreed with it and refocused his efforts on destroying
much of what he and his colleagues had built. He became the principal
manager for that effort, which included the destruction of biological
stockpiles at Fort Detrick. 

Mr. Dashiell later worked at the Pentagon as director of environmental and
life sciences in the Office of the Director of Defense Research and
Engineering, and then undertook the Pentagon's first department-wide
research and development program in environmental quality and biotechnology.


After retiring in 1988, he continued working to strengthen the Biological
Weapons Convention, serving as a technical consultant to the Arms Control
and Disarmament Agency. Patricia A. Woodring, who was the agency's senior
adviser for the biological convention, said Mr. Dashiell had played an
important role in efforts to devise ways to verify that countries were
complying with treaty commitments. ''He was an encyclopedia of technical
information and experience,'' she said. 

Mr. Dashiell, a native of Riverton, Md., received bachelor's degrees at
Western Maryland College and Johns Hopkins University. He wrote or was a
co-author of numerous technical publications, among them Jane's Chem-Bio
Handbook, a widely used reference on chemical and biological weapons issues.


He is survived by his wife of 49 years, Virginia T. Dashiell; a son, Thomas
M. Dashiell of Yorktown, Va.; a daughter, Tina D. Roth of Warrenton, Va.; a
sister, Evelyn D. Styles of Chadds Ford, Pa., and two grandchildren. 

 

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