the rollback of south africa's biological warfare program

1990. The 1976 uprisings led the apartheid regime to search for ways,
including the use of chemical agents, to control or incapacitate large groups of
people.
At the same time as the Soweto uprisings, the “Muldergate” scandal
erupted. The scandal demonstrated that corruption was eating away at the
formerly unquestioned strength of the apartheid regime. Informal norms had
become entrenched by the mid-1970s that permitted an extensive level of
corruption within the Afrikaner-dominated bureaucracies. The corruption was
an important pre-condition that allowed Wouter Basson and other top officials
to use the CBW program in the late 1980s and early 1990s as a cover for their
personal gain.
In the wake of these regime-shaking events, the Defense Minister, P.W.
Botha, replaced B.J. Vorster as President in 1978 and initiated his vision of the
“total strategy.” Botha differed from his predecessor in the degree that he was
oriented towards the military (and special forces), especially because of his
years of service as defense minister. He initiated a range of reforms, combined
with the widespread use of coercive power, to ensure the survival of the
regime. Power was increasingly consolidated in the hands of the military and
taken away from civilians. In particular, Botha favored the development of
advanced weapons projects and covert operations that would give South Africa
additional advantages against its adversaries. South Africa initiated a series of
internal and external military and paramilitary operations. These included
assassinations, torture, and smuggling, as well as forgery, propaganda, and
subversion. All were defined as “legitimate” weapons against the “total
onslaught” of “red” and “black” forces. These practices were established at the
top and legitimized deviant behavior throughout the military, police and
intelligence services. 37
Within the “any means necessary to survive” framework, preparations
began to develop a chemical and biological warfare (CBW) program, called
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