the rollback of south africa's biological warfare program

destruction investigation into this case, began investigating claims Ford made
to his associates and friends that he served as a consultant to the SADF and
had close ties with the CIA. Former South African General Surgeon, Dr. Niels
Knobel, initially confirmed that he met Ford at a conference in San Diego,
California in the late 1980s and that they had remained friends ever since.
Knobel also confirmed that they shared an interest in AIDS, because they both
knew that the epidemic was going to have a devastating impact in Africa.
However, Knobel recently acknowledged that he met with Ford and his
associates, during one of their many visits to the South African trade
representative’s official residence in Los Angeles. 95 In a recent phone
interview, Knobel stated, “Our whole policy of protecting members of the
defense force against HIV (educating them to use condoms) came from my
relationship with Larry. We both worked toward a cure for AIDS that would
be available to the vast population of Africa, (and) there was no political
agenda.” 96
Others reported that Ford visited South Africa several years earlier than
Dr. Knobel acknowledged. According to Dr. Scharf, the former head of
Military Hospital One in Pretoria, Ford visited in the mid-1980s as a guest of
the South African Surgeon General. Dr. Scharf remembered a visit by Ford to
his hospital as the guest of Knobel in 1984 or 1985. Knobel insisted that Ford
be given VIP treatment (at the hospital’s expense). Scharf was offended by
Ford’s request for human placenta that he wanted to use in his research on
viruses. Scharf refused to cooperate and claimed that he threw Ford out of his
office, after warning him that such activities would be very controversial, if
they became public, due to the fact that all Africans viewed babies as sacred. 97
Recently, Knobel confirmed to American reporters that he helped Ford
establish protocols to test his product in South Africa but said he did not know
if those trials were every carried out. According to microbiologist Mike
Odendaal, researcher at RRL, Ford also visited South Africa again in 1987 to
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