No Evidence – Biden Not Happy After All U.S. Spy Agencies Still “Inconclusive” Over Origins Of Covid-19

No Evidence – Biden Not Happy After All U.S. Spy Agencies Still “Inconclusive” Over Origins Of Covid-19

After 90 days of investigations carried out by all the U.S. intelligence agencies, there is still no evidence to point finger at China as the exact origin of Covid-19. Newly installed U.S. President Joe Biden issued an order in May to the intelligence community to “redouble efforts” to collect and analyze information, hoping to find a “definitive conclusion” about the origins of the Coronavirus pandemic.



The U.S. intelligence community was given 90 days by Biden to confirm the hypothesis first promoted by former U.S. president Donald Trump that the virus may have escaped from a Chinese laboratory. After his disastrous mishandling of the outbreak in the U.S., Trump had tried to deflect his incompetency and complacency by putting all the blames on the Chinese government.



Not satisfied with calling it as the “Chinese virus” or “Wuhan virus”, Trump then said his government will investigate whether the virus came from a laboratory in China (despite the lack of evidence). Amusingly, top US general Mark Milley had raised his doubt on the similar issue, saying American intelligence suggested the Coronavirus was likely to have occurred naturally instead of being manufactured in a laboratory.



Besides China, Trump had also diverted attention to the WHO and cut US$400 million funding to the World Health Organization. The former president had accused the WHO of promoting Chinese “disinformation” about the virus. His administration basically accused the WHO of having its role in helping China to cover up the Coronavirus outbreak.



Earlier, Trump had accused Beijing of not telling him earlier what was happening so that he could prepare earlier. In truth, as early as January 22, 2020, as the nation saw the first American diagnosed with Covid-19 after returning from China, Trump confidently told CNBC – “We have it under control. It’s one person coming in from China. It’s going to be just fine.”



Later, at a press conference on Feb 10, 2020, Trump even suggested that the highly infectious disease would simply “go away” in April, as temperatures warm. In fact, just hours before the WHO declared the outbreak a global emergency, Trump had even assured Americans that the virus would have “a very good ending for us”.



Interestingly, an unclassified briefing document on the Coronavirus has been revealed by the U.S. military showing that as early as Feb 3, 2020, the United States Army had warned the White House that the pathogen could kill at least 150,000 Americans. The document – “Black Swan” analysis – which was prepared on Feb 3 had projected that between 80,000 and 150,000 people could die.



But Trump administration’s hostile and anti-Chinese policy has become such a convenient tool to divert attention from the incompetence of American leaders themselves. The U.S. also was not impressed that China is threatening the U.S. as an economic superpower. Therefore, blaming the Chinese for the global pandemic is the best and easiest way to undermine China.



As anti-Chinese sentiment in the U.S. escalated, thanks to Republican Trump, Democrats Biden has decided to continue his predecessor’s policy. Like Trump, Joe Biden is committed to a distinctly anti-China global strategy rooted in fears of American decline. The POTUS has sworn that China will not become the world leader, let alone the wealthiest country in the world.



Jamie Dimon, the CEO and chairman of JP Morgan Chase, wrote in his annual letter to the company’s shareholders – “China’s leaders believe that America is in decline. While the U.S. had faced tough times in the past, the Chinese see an America that is losing ground in technology, infrastructure, and education – a nation torn and crippled by politics, as well as racial and income inequality.”



Naturally, U.S.’ claims to find the true origins of the pandemic have been met with strong resistance by China. While Washington says that Beijing has not been “completely transparent” in the global investigation into the source of Covid-19, China says the U.S. is trying to create disinformation, manipulate news media and sensationalize “fabricated evidence” to smear other countries.




After all, in its report in March, WHO has already dismissed the possibility that the Covid pandemic began with a lab leak because it was “extremely unlikely” that the virus was introduced to humans this way. Of course, the White House has rubbished the report, saying – “The report lacks crucial data, information, and access. It represents a partial and incomplete picture.”



Under pressure, WHO has proposed a second phase of investigation, which will involve the audit of laboratories and markets in the city of Wuhan, the area where the virus was first identified. Furious, Zeng Yixin, deputy health minister, said this showed “disrespect for common sense and arrogance toward science”. The proposal was an allegation that China’s laboratory protocols had been violated.



In July, China rejected the WHO’s proposal, accusing it as politically motivated. Mr Zeng said – “We will not accept such an origin-tracing plan. We hope the WHO would seriously review the considerations and suggestions made by Chinese experts and truly treat the origin tracing of the Covid-19 virus as a scientific matter, and get rid of political interference.”



Now that a new assessment by all the U.S. spy agencies have failed to confidently conclude whether the new Coronavirus jumped to humans naturally, or via a lab leak, it would be harder for Biden to continue his crusade to demonize China. The report, which was released on Friday, found that the virus was not developed as a biological weapon.



More importantly, the intelligence community also assessed that Chinese officials did not have foreknowledge of the virus before the initial outbreak that triggered a global pandemic. While Biden can continue to pressure China to reveal more, which the country won’t, the U.S. spy agencies said they would not be able to reach a more definitive conclusion unless it receives more information.



In retaliation to the U.S. determination to find fault with China, the Chinese have instead called WHO and the international community to open an investigation of the Fort Detrick bio-laboratory, claiming that the Covid-19 virus originated from an American military base in Maryland, about 80 km (50 miles) north of Washington DC.



Formerly the centre of the US biological weapons programme (1943-1969), Fort Detrick currently houses biomedical labs researching viruses, including Ebola and smallpox. The Chinese media argues that it makes more sense that Fort Detrick, home to US Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID), was the source of the Coronavirus outbreak than the “Wuhan lab leak” theory.



In August 2019, its deadly germ research operations were abruptly shut down following serious safety violations. That incident has been connected to the virus’s origins to a U.S. Coronavirus expert, Dr Ralph Baric, and researchers at Fort Detrick. Apparently, Baric and his team, including researchers from the Wuhan Institute of Virology in China, were leading the charge in studying bat Coronaviruses.



Known as “The Coronavirus Hunter”, American scientist Baric has been tracking Coronaviruses for decades and working on medications to treat Coronavirus-caused infections. In 2003, a published paper, of which Baric was a co-author, showcased the power of “reverse genetics” technique, which could bring an actual virus to life from its genetic code and “mix and match” parts of multiple viruses.



Hence, if Washington wants Beijing to be “completely transparent”, the U.S. too should show its transparency – open the door of Fort Detrick for international audit and investigation. Other evidence presented in USA Today and The Palm Beach Post shows there were 171 cases linked to Covid-19 in Florida in December 2019, where 107 of the patients had not traveled outside of the U.S.



In the same breath, perhaps the Biden administration should explain why scientists of the University of Cambridge in the U.K. together with researchers from Germany had discovered that Americans who had lived in Wuhan had “type-A” of Covid-19, the root of the outbreak, but most of the Chinese infected in Wuhan had the “type-B”, which can’t exist without type “A”.