Medical threat is the composite of all ongoing or potential enemy actions and environmental conditions that will reduce combat effectiveness through wounding, injuring, causing disease, and/or degrading performance. Soldiers are the targets of these threats. Weapons or environmental conditions that will generate wounded, injured, and sick soldiers, beyond the capability of the HSS system to provide timely medical care from available resources, are considered major medical threats. Weapons or environmental conditions that produce qualitatively different wound or disease processes are also major medical threats. Added to the combat operational and disease and nonbattle injury (DNBI) medical threats are adversary use of the following types of weapons, agents, and devices:
- Biological warfare agents.
- Chemical warfare agents.
- Nuclear weapons.
- Toxic industrial materials.
- Radiological dispersal devices.
- Directed-energy devices/weapons.
- Chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear, and high-yield explosives.
1-3. Nuclear, Biological, Chemical, and Radiological Dispersal Device Threats—The Health Service Perspective
a. Nuclear Weapons and Radiological Dispersal Device Threats. Since the breakup of the Soviet Union, the number of countries with known nuclear capable military forces has almost doubled. Available information suggests that a number of countries in the Middle East, Asia, and Africa have or may have nuclear weapons capability within the next decade. [Table 1-1] lists those countries known to have, suspected of possessing, or seeking, nuclear weapons. Planners can expect, as a minimum, 10 to 20 percent casualties within a division-sized force that has experienced a nuclear strike. In addition to the casualties, a nuclear weapon detonation can generate an electromagnetic pulse (EMP) that will cause catastrophic failures of electronic equipment components. Radiological dispersal devices, comprised of an explosive device with radioactive material, can be detonated without the need for the components of a nuclear weapon. The RDD can disperse radioactive material over an area of the battlefield causing effects from nuisance levels of radioactive material to life-threatening levels without the thermal and, in most cases, the blast effects of a nuclear detonation. For nuclear weapons effects see [Appendix A.]
Table 1-1. Countries Possessing or Suspected of Possessing Nuclear Weapons
| KNOWN TO POSSESS | SUSPECT OR SEEKING |
|---|---|
| UNITED STATES OF AMERICA | IRAQ |
| RUSSIA | NORTH KOREA |
| UKRAINE | IRAN |
| BELARUS | LIBYA |
| KAZAKSTAN | ALGERIA |
| PEOPLE'S REPUBLIC OF CHINA | SOUTH AFRICA |
| FRANCE | ISRAEL |
| UNITED KINGDOM | |
| PAKISTAN | |
| INDIA |
b. Biological Warfare.
(1) Biological warfare (BW) is defined by the US intelligence community as the intentional use of disease-causing organisms (pathogens), toxins, or other agents of biological origin (ABO) to incapacitate, injure, or kill humans and animals; to destroy crops; to weaken resistance to attack; and to reduce the will to fight. Historically, BW has primarily involved the use of pathogens in assassinations or as sabotage agents in food and water supplies to spread contagious disease among target populations.
(2) For purposes of medical threat risk assessment, we are interested only in those BW agents that incapacitate, injure, or kill humans or animals.
(3) Known or suspect BW agents and ABOs can generally be categorized as naturally occurring, unmodified infectious agents (pathogens); toxins, venoms, and their biologically active fractions; modified infectious agents; and bioregulators. See [Table 1-2] for examples of known or suspected BW threat agents. Also, [Table 1-3] presents possible developmental and future BW agents.