In his history of the Soviet Union in the Second World War, Christopher Bellamy argues that if either side was going to break the 1925 Geneva Protocol prohibiting the use of gas and bacteriological warfare, then 1942 was the most likely year. This conclusion is not surprising, since it was precisely at this moment, that both the fate of the Soviet Union and the Third Reich hung precariously in the balance during the build-up to, and the outcome of, the Battle of Stalingrad. In his account of the Soviet BW programme, Alibek, a former senior manager of Biopreparat, raises the intriguing possibility that in the late summer of 1942 the Red Army engaged in the deliberate aerosol dissemination of Francisella tularensis (the causative agent of tularaemia) against German panzer troops near Stalingrad. However, a number of prominent scholars have disputed Alibek's version of events. Chief among these is Erhardt Geissler who notes that tularaemia is endemic in the region and in any case a large outbreak occurred during the winter of 1941-1942. He points to evidence that infected rodents were the key to the large-scale outbreaks and that inhalationary tularaemia may have resulted from inhalation of dust from contaminated straw in matresses. Crucially, Geissler notes that there are no contemporary accounts by the German army or intelligence services regarding the use of F. tularensis as a biological weapon at Stalingrad.
