Dugway proposes training against WMD attacks

Dugway Proving Ground's proposal to increase its role in testing chemical and biological weapons defenses and counterterrorism training has reached a final stage.

The plan calls for testing of chemical weapons simulants outdoors and testing defenses for actual chemical or biological materials in special labs, according to a 2002 draft document of the Army's plan.

"New types of testing, training and technology development" are anticipated at Dugway, according to the draft document.

A report released Friday proposes a permanent annex to the Lothar Salomon Life Sciences Test Facility, where biological defense tests are run. Buildings for communications and testing protective gear are being proposed for the Dugway site, located in a remote area of Tooele County.

There is also a proposal under the Army's seven-year plan at Dugway for a mock city in which to test defenses against chemical and biological terrorist attacks. Counterterrorism training at the Dugway site would increase from "minimal" to "substantial."

When the proposal was in the draft environmental impact statement stage in 2002, immediate concern surfaced from Steve Erickson, speaking for the group Citizens Education Project.

Erickson was critical then of Dugway's "past track record" and expressed concern that the U.S. might be inching closer to the development of offensive biological weapons.

Since that time public meetings have been held to discuss the plan, which now awaits further approval from the Pentagon.

Dugway was already the nation's leading bioweapon and defense test military zone. The proposal would double testing on the base — a Rhode Island-size patch of desert 60 miles southwest of Salt Lake City — and increase counterterrorism training "from a minimal activity to a substantial mission component."

Dugway is the only Army installation large and remote enough to conduct "comprehensive and realistic" testing of biological and chemical systems, munitions, smoke and obscurants without posing a risk to public safety, according to the three-volume proposal.

The facility's mission expanded after Iraq invaded Kuwait in 1990 and the United States found Iraq capable of germ warfare. In 1991, Dugway began anthrax testing, eventually testing several deadly germs in order to find a way to detect bioattacks in times of war. Dugway now stores the pathogens in a secure laboratory.