Monday, October 22, 2001; Page A18

Anthrax as a weapon is not new. In 1945 England planned to wipe out Germany with 5 million anthrax cattle cakes to be dropped in pastures from bombers.

The aim of "Operation Vegetarian" was to wipe out the German beef and dairy herds and then see the bacterium spread to the human population. With people then having no access to antibiotics, this would have caused many thousands -- perhaps even millions -- of German men, women and children to suffer awful deaths.

The anthrax cakes were tested on Gruinard Island, off Wester Ross in Scotland, which was finally cleared of contamination in 1990.

England's Operation Vegetarian was planned for the summer of 1944, but it was abandoned as the Allies' Normandy invasion progressed successfully. At the end of 1945, 5 million anthrax-infected cattle cakes were incinerated in one of Porton Down's furnaces in Southern England.

ED TONER

Brick, N.J.