Attack scenarios suggest things could be worse in chemical war

As devastating as Tuesday's terrorist attacks were, national security and public health experts know this:

Something even worse could happen. There are weapons invisible and next-to-impossible to trace.

A whiff of nerve gas. A droplet of anthrax. A particle of smallpox.

Infectious or toxic weapons in skilled hands could cause considerably more casualties among ordinary Americans than the estimated 5,000 dead and missing at the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.

The use of biological or chemical weapons -- described by some as the poor man's atomic bomb -- is a sensitive topic.

Experts caution that a bioterrorism attack here is not inevitable. Their opinions are the products of war games rather than an immediate and real threat.

And there are those who say few terrorists could pull this off, that this would be a more complicated and difficult feat than it may seem.

But the science exists to launch such an attack and, obviously, so does the hatred.

Seattle thought so, too. Before the World Trade Organization meeting there, hospitals stockpiled antidotes, just in case.

A commander of Afghanistan's Taliban said last year Osama bin Laden -- described by administration officials as the prime suspect in Tuesday's attacks -- was training his fighters in the use of chemical weapons. The New York Times reported Sunday that satellite photos show dead animals at a terrorist training camp in eastern Afghanistan operated by bin Laden.

Chemical weapons

Chemical weapons might have an extraordinary effect, wiping out masses of people, all at once. But the deadly effects likely would not spread beyond the people who came in direct contact with the nerve gas or poisonous agent.

In contrast, the scope of an attack using certain biological weapons in an airport or a domed stadium would not be apparent for days or weeks until victims showed symptoms of a mysterious illness.

By then, they could have infected many others around the world. Waves of patients might overwhelm hospitals.

The public, panicked, might turn on their neighbors unless adequate medicines and vaccines were available.