The terrifying specter of a large-scale biological weapons attack on the United States has drawn the focus of policymakers and remained a high priority since September 11, 2001, and the subsequent anthrax attacks. The notion that terrorists—whether on their own or with the aid of rogue states—could develop, weaponize, and effectively deploy a biological weapon in an American city has been perceived as a dire threat in large part because of assumptions about the nature of bioweapon development. Combine the perceived lethality and high potential for contagion of many well-known and ostensibly accessible strains of disease, the inherent difficulty of detection, and competent and committed bad actors with the resources to acquire the materials necessary to develop a usable biological weapon, and the United States is highly vulnerable. The problem has often been frighteningly posed as a matter not of “if” but “when.”

In her excellent new book, Barriers to Bioweapons, Sonia Ben Ouagrham-Gormley has thoroughly examined and persuasively dismissed many of these assumptions. Because bioweapon development has often (mistakenly) been viewed as analogous to that of nuclear weapons, she argues that both scholars and practitioners overlook the real difficulties—the barriers—unique to the construction of biological weapons. Far from being predicated on the attainment of the materials necessary to make a usable weapon, like uranium or plutonium in the case of nuclear weapons, the acquisition of materials in the biological weapons-development process is only the very first step in a long chain that is influenced by a host a factors, both material and ideational. By moving away from the prevailing flawed model of bioweapons development, it is possible to better understand the difficulties inherent in the enterprise and thus the nature of the threat, and to better adjust nonproliferation and counterproliferation policies in order to address the actual threat of a terrorist or rogue state’s biological weapon program.

Ouagrham-Gormley argues that complex scientific endeavors, even where the acquisition of material inputs may be critical, are not simply questions of relevant actors possessing a basis of “explicit” knowledge, or “that which can be translated into written form or verbalized” (p. 18). Instead, she underscores the critical importance of “tacit” knowledge, “composed of unarticulated skills, know-how, practices, tricks of the trade, or visual and tactile cues that are more personally held” (p. 18). Some of this can be shared, but some cannot be made explicit, which places a real premium on the ability of individuals to work together over a long term, to develop and share communal knowledge, and also to understand the potentially idiosyncratic rituals and gestures that may emerge from the process of actually doing the host of tasks related to scientific research and the development of technological artifacts. It quickly becomes apparent how this may constitute a major barrier to progress in bioweapons or any endeavor when multiple actors from diverse backgrounds or disciplines must collaborate to achieve an end product. However, the development of biological weapons presents an even greater challenge because of the very nature of the enterprise: “Given the fragility and unpredictability of bio-agents, and the challenges of tacit knowledge creation and institutionalization, the environment required to achieve fruitful interactions does not occur spontaneously; it must be engineered in an especially appropriate organizational context” (p. 37).

The production and transfer of knowledge is a social process, and while knowledge can indeed be stored and shared, knowledge can also be lost. The author identifies important factors internal to a weapons-development program—talented individuals and cohesive groups, corporate culture, communities of practice, organization structure—as critical nodes or “reservoirs” of knowledge that must be configured to optimize the sharing of ideas and information. Perhaps, unsurprisingly, managers play a critical role in this model, building trust and morale, creating an environment conducive to sharing ideas, and maintaining open communication flows within and throughout the various components of the organization. At the same time, however, external factors like the political priority of the program (and the amount of outside interference it engenders), the level and persistence of economic support, the location of facilities, and access to foreign technical assistance can also play a role in shaping outcomes.

The empirical chapters provide strong support for Ouagrham-Gormley’s arguments. She presents chapter-length treatments of the United States and Soviet bioweapons programs, respectively, and a third chapter containing smaller case studies of the Iraqi and South African programs, as well as the Japanese terrorist group Aum Shinrikyo’s attempt to create its own bioweapon. Providing a rich and detailed historical context, she focuses on those key internal and external variables that combine to shape the ultimate results of the program. It is interesting and reassuring to note that both the U.S. and Soviet programs, despite relatively large investments, access to necessary materials, and “brainpower,” ultimately made little progress in the weaponization of biological weapons or the development of new synthetic toxins, which were important program goals. However, their poor results stemmed from different sources arising from the interaction of the variables she examines.

The post-1972 Soviet experience and the three smaller cases of Iraq, South Africa, and Aum Shinrikyo all reflect in (in the author’s view) the importance of the 1972 Biological Weapons Convention (BWC), which by necessity drove the programs underground and thus by its presence created a major barrier to the sharing of information that is critical for achieving success in this highly difficult endeavor. Perhaps most applicable to concerns today, the case of Aum Shinrikyo reflects how the clandestine nature, idiosyncratic leadership, interpersonal and group social dynamics, constant threat of discovery by intelligence or law enforcement, and pervasive violence that typifies active terrorist organizations combine to create a very high bar to the development of biological weapons.

Ouagrham-Gormley concludes with a set of useful policy prescriptions that should be seriously considered by homeland security and counterproliferation experts. With the new narrative of biological weapons development she has presented, the set includes U.S. support for the expansion of the BWC with a verification mechanism; the development and adoption of a new threat assessment that focuses far more on likely individuals and groups capable of contributing to the development of illicit bioweapons than on access to material factors; and the revisiting of existing policies that assume that new technologies will provide new avenues to bad actors in pursuit of bioweapons, when knowledge and expertise are far more critical.

Barriers to Bioweapons provides a clear and insightful examination of what is a highly technical and complex subject matter. It can be argued that the book’s approach may not be parsimonious, and the model that the author constructs admittedly has several complicated and interdependent components. Thus, it is difficult to distill which factors may matter most, particularly at given times or places, because they contribute to “shape” rather than “determine” outcomes. But for the subject matter, this is hardly a serious concern, and the book provides a useful template for analyzing and explaining the relative successes or failures of a number of potential large-scale scientific endeavors beyond the realm of Weapons of Mass Destruction. It is a must-read for nonproliferation experts and should be a standard text for understanding biological weapons development for some time to come.