Chemical-Biological Weapons of Mass Destruction: Understanding the Problem

摘要

This publication is the report of the Chemical-Biological Weapons of Mass Destruction: Understanding the Problem Workshop. The Workshop successfully accomplished its goal of developing an understanding of Chemical-Biological (CD) WMD defense analysis problems confronting the United States at home and abroad. The participants, numbering 147 and representing a wide array of defense, federal and commercial organizations, assessed the military operations research community's capabilities to support military and civil CD WMD defense, crisis response and consequence management efforts. Principal findings include recognition that significant uncertainties constrain efforts to confidently assess chemical and biological warfare effects, available analytical models are inconsistent, and the community of expert analysts is overly fragmented with inadequate training and resources. The associated recommendations focus upon efforts to reduce technical and operational data gaps through experimentation, exercises and tests over the next five to ten years; to implement operational risk management and mitigation procedures that are flexible and effective over a dynamic range of threats; to establish standards and procedures for validating and accrediting analytical models and the associated data; and to foster professional communities of chemical-biological warfare analysts by establishing rewarding career paths in all military services and federal agencies, integrating expert groups, and providing certified training.