The Stepnogorsk Scientific and Technical Institute for Microbiology, also known as the Scientific Experimental and Production Base, was one of the premier

biological warfare Biological warfare, also known as germ warfare, is the use of biological toxins or Pathogen, infectious agents such as bacteria, viruses, insects, and Fungus, fungi with the intent to kill, harm or incapacitate humans, animals or plants as an ...

facilities operated by the

Soviet Union The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

. It was the only

Biopreparat The All-Union Science Production Association Biopreparat (, , ) was a Soviet agency created in April 1974, which spearheaded the largest and most sophisticated offensive biological warfare program known. It was a vast, ostensibly civilian, netw ...

facility to be built outside of Russia proper, and one of the few ever visited officially by Western experts. As of 1998 the site conducted civilian biological research overseen by director Vladimir Bugreyev. At the time the

United States Department of State The United States Department of State (DOS), or simply the State Department, is an United States federal executive departments, executive department of the U.S. federal government responsible for the country's foreign policy of the United State ...

and the U.S. Civilian Research & Development Foundation provided significant funds supporting civilian research at Stepnogorsk.

History

The facility was built in 1982, ten kilometers from Stepnogorsk,

Kazakhstan Kazakhstan, officially the Republic of Kazakhstan, is a landlocked country primarily in Central Asia, with a European Kazakhstan, small portion in Eastern Europe. It borders Russia to the Kazakhstan–Russia border, north and west, China to th ...

, in the wake of the accident at Sverdlovsk. It was built to develop and produce large quantities of weaponized

anthrax Anthrax is an infection caused by the bacterium '' Bacillus anthracis'' or ''Bacillus cereus'' biovar ''anthracis''. Infection typically occurs by contact with the skin, inhalation, or intestinal absorption. Symptom onset occurs between one ...

, almost 300 tons annually, in order to fill the production gap caused by a potential shutdown of their Sverdlovsk facility.Miller, Judith; Engelberg, Stephen; and Broad, William. ''Germs: Biological Weapons and America's Secret War''. New York: Simon and Schuster, Inc., 2002. Soviet leadership placed Colonel Kanatjan Alibekov (a.k.a.

Ken Alibek Kanatzhan "Kanat" Baizakovich Alibekov (born 1950), known as Kenneth "Ken" Alibek since 1992, is a Kazakh-American microbiologist, bioweaponeer, and biological warfare administrative management expert. He was the first deputy director of Biop ...

) in charge of the base until his transfer to Moscow in 1987. Following the

dissolution of the Soviet Union The Soviet Union was formally dissolved as a sovereign state and subject of international law on 26 December 1991 by Declaration No. 142-N of the Soviet of the Republics of the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union. Declaration No. 142-Н of ...

in 1991, the Stepnogorsk base fell under the purview of the nascent Kazakh government, who, having little interest in

weapons of mass destruction A weapon of mass destruction (WMD) is a Biological agent, biological, chemical weapon, chemical, Radiological weapon, radiological, nuclear weapon, nuclear, or any other weapon that can kill or significantly harm many people or cause great dam ...

, let the secret city fall into disrepair. Kazakh President

Nursultan Nazarbayev Nursultan Abishuly Nazarbayev (born 6 July 1940) is a Kazakhstani politician who served as the first president of Kazakhstan from 1991 to 2019. He also held the special title of Elbasy from 2010 to 2022 and chairman of the Security Council of ...

personally granted a team of American experts, led by

U.S. Department of Defense The United States Department of Defense (DoD, USDOD, or DOD) is an executive department of the U.S. federal government charged with coordinating and supervising the six U.S. armed services: the Army, Navy, Marines, Air Force, Space Force, t ...

diplomat Andy Weber, permission to visit the still-operational site in 1995, the first time an American intelligence team had ever been allowed to do so.

References

{{authority control Biological warfare facilities Medical research institutes in the Soviet Union Microbiology institutes Military installations of the Soviet Union Soviet biological weapons program