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A fringe theory largely confined to Russian state media and the far-flung outer regions of the internet was launched into the mainstream thanks to comments made by Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Victoria Nuland.

For years, Russia’s government has accused the United States Department of Defense of working with Ukraine to develop biological weapons at labs in the country. Russian media amplified this claim ahead of its invasion of Ukraine last month. The U.S. denies the charge.

Shortly before the Russian military entered Ukraine thinking it was going to casually waltz into Kyiv like some bellicose Baryshnikov, unsubstantiated claims about Ukrainian bioweapons made the rounds on social media. One graphic in particular purported to show the locations of “US BIOLABS IN UKRAINE.”

The graphic declared, “Exclusive US biolabs in Ukraine, and they are financed at the expense of the US Department of Defense.”

Along with “denazifying” Ukraine’s government, the bioweapons narrative is one of the pretexts Russia is using to justify its invasion. But given that Ukraine’s president is Jewish, along with the

fact that no evidence has been provided showing Ukraine is making bioweapons, Russia’s casus belli is wanting, to say the least. And even if Ukraine were making bioweapons, that would not necessarily justify Russia waging a preventive war.

But thanks to Nuland, some U.S. media pundits have embraced the bioweapons theory. That includes Tucker Carlson.

In an otherwise mundane hearing of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations on Tuesday, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) asked Nuland a straightforward question that should have been easy enough for a career foreign service bureaucrat such as herself to handle:

Does Ukraine have chemical or biological weapons?

Now, the position of the U.S. government is Ukraine does not have bioweapons – at least not any bioweapons the U.S. is involved with. So it would be very strange in this case for Nuland to leave open the possibility that Ukraine does, because that might suggest there may be something to Russia’s claim.

And yet, that is exactly what Nuland did.

Here was her response:

Uh, Ukraine has uh, biological research facilities, which, in fact we are now quite concerned Russian troops, Russia forces may be seeking to uh, gain control of. So, we are working with the Ukrainians on how they can prevent any of those research materials from falling into the hands of uh, Russian forces should they approach.

Notice that Nuland did not answer the question. In a moment like this, a more competent official would have

said something like, “Not to my knowledge,” or, “We have no indication of that,” or, “That would be a violation of Ukraine’s obligations under the Biological Weapons Convention and we have no reason to believe Ukraine is noncompliant.”

But for some reason, Nuland went with door number four: a non-answer and some cryptic blathering about “biological research facilities” that she is “quite concerned” may fall into Russian hands.

It should be noted at this point that Russia, Ukraine, and the United States have all ratified the aforementioned Biological Weapons Convention, which “effectively prohibits the development, production, acquisition, transfer, stockpiling and use of biological and toxin weapons.”

Now, just because these countries have signed this treaty, doesn’t automatically mean they aren’t making biological weapons. History is rife with instances of treaty noncompliance. Indeed, the Russians were violating the agreement as recently as 1992, and possibly later. This week, White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki even suggested Russia may use biological weapons in its war against Ukraine, perhaps in a false flag operation.

Over at Fox News, Carlson aired Nuland’s testimony on consecutive nights in an attempt to give oxygen to the bioweapons theory. But while he emphasized her vague remarks on Ukraine’s bio-labs to breathe life into it, he casually dismissed the very next thing she said.

After Nuland stumbled through answer about bio-labs, Rubio asked

her, “If there’s a biological or chemical weapon incident or attack inside of Ukraine, is there any doubt in your mind that 100% it would be the Russians that would be behind it?”

She replied, “There is no doubt in my mind, senator, and it is classic Russian technique to blame on the other guy what they’re planning to do themselves.”

It makes sense Carlson dismissed this albeit ineloquent response by Nuland while touting her other answer. After all, it doesn’t fit his preferred narrative, which he has gone to extreme lengths to finesse.

His show on Thursday was a perfect example.

Citing an interview from last month with a Pentagon official named Robert Pope, who is the head of the Department of Defense’s Cooperative Threat Reduction Agency. Carlson noted, “Pope was in the man in charge of securing or eliminating Soviet-era bioweapons. So, he knows a lot about the subject – maybe more than anyone else.”

Carlson proceeded to claim Pope said Ukraine is using the bio-labs “to conduct new bioweapons research.”

But that’s not at all what Pope said. Instead, Carlson engaged in egregious cherry-picking and lying in order to stoke the theory that Ukraine is making bioweapons.

What Pope actually said was, “There is no place that still has any of the sort of infrastructure for researching or producing biological weapons.”

In the words of Tucker Carlson, Pope

“knows a lot about the subject – maybe more than anyone else.”

Watch above via C-SPAN.

Tags: Russia, Ukraine, victoria nuland