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Steve
Hatfill Addresses America
August 17, 2002
By Jay LeBoeuf
Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. My name is Steve Hatfill.
I'm a medical doctor, a biomedical scientist, an international
man of mystery, and a whirlwind in the sack.
I am a loyal American. I love my country. And when I say
my country, I mean the USA, and not Rhodesia or South Africa,
both of which I have also loved, but not anymore, for various
reasons.
I called you out here today to tell you all that I had nothing
whatsoever to do with the mailing of the anthrax letters that
terrorized America over ten months ago. And furthermore, anyone
in the press or biomedical community who contends or suggests
that I was somehow involved in these horrific acts is asking
for an envelope full of finely milled, weaponized payback,
if you get my drift.
Yes, it's true that, in the course of my multifaceted career,
I have worked for most of the heads sprouting from the shoulders
of that thrashing hydra known as the military-industrial-intelligence
complex.
And yes, it's true that, over the last three decades, I have
amassed an impressive background in all manner of biological
terror methods and techniques. I was considered such an expert,
in fact, that I was hired by UNSCOM to go into Iraq after
the Gulf War and seek out Saddam's biological weapons stockpiles.
And yes, it's true that I was once commissioned by the government
to do a study on the feasibility of sending anthrax through
the mail as a terrorism method.
And yes, it's true that I wrote a novel a couple years ago,
explaining in excruciating detail the exact methods by which
a bio-terror attack could be waged against the Congress.
One misconception I want to clear up right now, however,
is this notion that I personally worked with anthrax bacteria.
In fact, I am a virologist, not a bacteriologist. My specialty
is with the Ebola virus and monkeypox, not anthrax. It was
an entirely different kind of laboratory-created genocide
I was researching there at Fort Detrick... which happens to
be the place where the anthrax that was used in the terror
attacks most likely came from, and is also where my UNSCOM
partner colonel David Franz was stationed... but so what?
If I say I never touched the stuff, I never touched it. Case
closed. "My word is bond," as we used to say in the Selous.
Besides which, surely, none of the above-mentioned facts
gives the FBI the right to hassle me, or to give me the business.
Ladies and gentlemen of the press, I am here today to let
you know that the FBI has, indeed, been hassling me. And what's
more, they have been giving me the business.
Allow me to fill in some details… Last fall, two FBI came
by my office and asked me to take a polygraph test. I jumped
at the chance. Later, a polygraph was administered and, after
reviewing the charts, the examiner told me that I had passed.
I had nothing to do with the anthrax letters! So it should
have been case closed, right? You'd think I would be in the
clear, right? Continuing to hassle me would be, like, double
jeopardy, right? As it turns out, no… that's wrong. Three
times wrong.
A few months after those first FBI interviews and the polygraph,
the private sector got involved. I got a call from a reporter
who all but accused me of mailing the anthrax letters. Two
days later, a former colleague told me that this same reporter
had phoned him and made similar accusations. Let me tell you,
I hadn't been that upset since way back in my Selous Scout
days, when I was part of the white supremacist counterinsurgency
forces fighting black rebels in Rhodesia, and a mysterious
outbreak of anthrax killed two hundred villagers, not too
far from where I was quartered at the time.
So now, all of a sudden, the FBI starts hassling me again.
They want to sweep my apartment again, and they want to bring
their hounds this time. Those dogs went nuts! They just tore
the hell out of the place. And do you know who had to clean
it up? Me. That's who. And along with the hounds, they brought
TV crews, helicopters, and a huge truck full of hazardous-materials
technicians all decked out in their moonsuits. The neighbors
were aghast. Needless to say, I was mortified.
And now, after all that, they're talking about placing me
under surveillance! Or even getting a handwriting expert to
compare my writing to that on the anthrax letters. Just because
of some loopy coincidence involving the return address on
the letters having some similarities to a neighborhood near
where I lived in Rhodesia. Handwriting experts! The ultimate
invasion of privacy! I mean, what do they take me for, some
kind of Arab?!
Which reminds me... I wish to object in the strongest possible
terms to having my character assassinated by reference to
events from my past which bear absolutely no relationship
to the question of who the anthrax killer is.
Did I mention I was a member of Rhodesia's Selous Scouts?
Besides, how bad could I possibly be if, as the New York
Times has recently revealed, the Bush administration is
still allowing me to go on semi-covert operations in Central
Asia under an assumed identity? Do you really think the US
Government would still be making use of my services if they
thought I was in any way responsible for the attempted bio-terror
assassination of the Democratic leadership in Congress and
the Senate? An assassination attempt that led to the accidental
deaths of five innocent people?
Come on!
But enough chit-chat. The time has come for me to wrap this
up, and get down to brass tacks. Basically, gentlemen, I know
you're listening, and it all boils down to this: I will not
be railroaded.
I am a loyal white American. I am extremely proud of the
work I have done for the United States and for my country
and her people. Even the stuff I'm not so proud of anymore,
I'm still kinda proud of it. If this investigation continues
to go the way it has been, and I am backed into a corner,
I want certain individuals to know that I'm no fool. I didn't
walk into this thing ass-backwards, you know. Certain guarantees
were made, and I expect those guarantees to be honored. I
know you know I know things. I know you know I know how to
protect myself. I won't let you make me your Lee Harvey Oswald.
So go ahead, keep pushing. See what it gets you. See how
long your house of cards can stand up to the hurricane of
truth, if it is ever unleashed. And trust me gentlemen, if
anything happens to me, it WILL be unleashed.
I bid you all a good afternoon.
Editor's Note: Dr. Hatfill's actual public statement may be
read in it's entirety here.
Other
sources:
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/08/13/opinion/13KRIS.html
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2002/jul2002/anth-j03.shtml
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/americas/story.jsp?story=134396
http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2002/01/26/assaad/index_np.html
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