Is it time to chalk up another one to “The Conspiracy Theorists Were Right”?
For the past few years, after all, it’s been nothing but a crazy “cooker” conspiracy theory to suggest that the origins of the Wuhan pandemic were anything other than completely natural. Especially once Donald Trump had the temerity so suggest otherwise, the legacy media and the left political class have been absolutely feral in their frenzied certainty: there was no “lab leak”. That’s just harmful disinformation, and you’re probably a Russian agent.
Except…
The US Energy Department has concluded that the Covid pandemic most likely arose from a laboratory leak, according to a classified intelligence report recently provided to the White House and key members of Congress.
The shift by the Energy Department, which previously was undecided on how the virus emerged, is noted in an update to a 2021 document by Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines’s office.
Oh, boy — right again.
Of course, it’s important not to over-egg this particular plague pudding: the Energy Department is just one of many US government agencies who’ve put their two-cents in. Of the others, four dispute the lab-leak theory and two are undecided.
On the other hand, the Energy Department report is highly significant for two reasons. Firstly, it’s based on new intelligence. Secondly, the agency’s opinion has considerable weight due to its scientific expertise, and oversight of US national laboratories.
Another agency that agrees with the Energy Department is the FBI.
The FBI employs a cadre of microbiologists, immunologists and other scientists and is supported by the National Bioforensic Analysis Center, which was established at Fort Detrick, Md., in 2004 to analyse anthrax and other possible biological threats.
US officials declined to give details on the fresh intelligence and analysis that led the Energy Department to change its position.
The biggest problem with getting to the truth of the Wuhan pandemic is that so many people have so much to hide — and have been assiduously doing so almost from the instant someone coughed in the Wuhan wet market.
The Chinese Communist Party has destroyed vital evidence, disappeared key scientists, and obstructed foreign investigators, every step of the way. China’s lackeys in the international scientific community, including some who were appointed to investigate the virus’ origins by the WHO, have also thrown up endless smokescreens and roadblocks. Complicit US scientists and government officials have frantically covered their own arses.
It hasn’t helped, either, that there is a distinct lack of political will in Washington to get to the truth.
The update, which is less than five pages, wasn’t requested by Congress. But politicians, particularly House and Senate Republicans, are pursuing their own investigations into the origins of the pandemic and are pressing the Biden administration and the intelligence community for more information.
Officials didn’t say if an unclassified version of the update would be issued. US national-security adviser Jake Sullivan, asked about the Journal’s reporting Sunday, said President Biden had repeatedly directed every part of the intelligence community to invest in trying to discern as much as possible about the origins of the pandemic.
Sure, and Hunter’s laptop was just “Russian disinformation”, or so Joe said.
Consider the competing arguments on their merits.
The “natural emergence” theory argues that the virus emerged naturally and evolved to infect humans after being carried by an animal host. This, as they correctly say, has been the way that previously novel infectious diseases have arisen.
There’s just one problem:
Yet no confirmed animal source for Covid-19 has been identified. The lack of an animal source, and the fact that Wuhan is the centre of China’s extensive coronavirus research, has led some scientists and US officials to argue that a lab leak is the best explanation for the pandemic’s beginning.
As for China’s extensive, secretive research — research we know the military was pushing, and which we know involved incredibly dangerous “gain of function” research (deliberately making a pathogen even dangerous in order to, supposedly, anticipate how to combat it) — alarm bells were ringing right up to the eve of Covid.
US State Department cables written in 2018 and internal Chinese documents show that there were persistent concerns about China’s biosafety procedures, which have been cited by proponents of the lab-leak hypothesis.
Wuhan is home to an array of laboratories […]
The debate over whether Covid-19 might have escaped from a laboratory has been fuelled by US intelligence that three researchers from the Wuhan Institute of Virology became sick enough in November 2019 that they sought hospital care […] some former US officials say the sick researchers were involved in coronavirus research.
The Australian
All just a coincidence, no doubt.
And don’t you dare go thinking that one of your “conspiracy theories” has been proven right. Again.
