Despite denials going back to 1945, new information reveals "several" WW2 Japanese "Fu-Go" balloons contained anthrax, while others were suspected of carrying bubonic plague, FBI documents attest
Far be it from me to question the wisdom of J. Edgar Hoover, but this report lacks credibility. To limit myself to an area I am familiar with, as a medical laboratory scientist in New Mexico, plague has known to be endemic here among wild rodents, at elevations of 5000-7000 feet, since 1938.
You may be right, and if that were the only purported evidence, I wouldn't have bothered to reproduce the memo. LaPaz does not appear to be a biologist or zoologist, but an astronomer and mathematician. But there are other oddities to the New Mexico episode.
For one thing, LaPaz was officially involved with the search for the balloons. He had high intelligence contacts. So when he said a number of Fu-Go balloons came down in New Mexico's Sandia Mountains, I presume he is correct about that. So why were these balloon landings never reported? Additionally, he was told that the version of the plague bacteria isolated from the dead rats seemed of a strange type, not responding to the standard agglutination test. Why was that? LaPaz is highly unlikely to have made that part up.
I thank you for your observation. But I note finally that some of the dead rats were found near the Ski Lodge, which base is above 8000', not 5,000-7,000' as you mention for the presence of plague vectors per your knowledge or experience. Unfortunately, the exact elevations aren't recorded in the memo. We definitely need to have all archives on this subject released. I don't think you can discount the Hoover memo based only on this one observation.
Far be it from me to question the wisdom of J. Edgar Hoover, but this report lacks credibility. To limit myself to an area I am familiar with, as a medical laboratory scientist in New Mexico, plague has known to be endemic here among wild rodents, at elevations of 5000-7000 feet, since 1938.
You may be right, and if that were the only purported evidence, I wouldn't have bothered to reproduce the memo. LaPaz does not appear to be a biologist or zoologist, but an astronomer and mathematician. But there are other oddities to the New Mexico episode.
For one thing, LaPaz was officially involved with the search for the balloons. He had high intelligence contacts. So when he said a number of Fu-Go balloons came down in New Mexico's Sandia Mountains, I presume he is correct about that. So why were these balloon landings never reported? Additionally, he was told that the version of the plague bacteria isolated from the dead rats seemed of a strange type, not responding to the standard agglutination test. Why was that? LaPaz is highly unlikely to have made that part up.
I thank you for your observation. But I note finally that some of the dead rats were found near the Ski Lodge, which base is above 8000', not 5,000-7,000' as you mention for the presence of plague vectors per your knowledge or experience. Unfortunately, the exact elevations aren't recorded in the memo. We definitely need to have all archives on this subject released. I don't think you can discount the Hoover memo based only on this one observation.