When Life Becomes Weaponry: Healing and Harming Use the Same Tools

The perception of biological threats as marginal biosecurity issues had been prevalent for decades. States feared accidents, lab security issues, and disease monitoring. The premise of such a way of perceiving biological threats was that biological capability presupposed rare assets – money, knowledge, equipment – that remained rare and thus visible. This is no longer the case. The same developments that have led to genetic cures for cancer and sickle-cell anaemia have made pathogen manipulation accessible to the point where the capability depends on knowledge and computing resources rather than rare assets. The realisation of this by governments has come suddenly due to the technical reality they had not been prepared for.

Illustration by The Geostrata

And now, synthetic biology has entered the arena of competition with artificial intelligence, quantum computing, and semiconductors. The significance of this is that it shifts the entire strategic equation. These are all fields wherein technological dominance translates into geopolitical superiority, wherein supply chain dominance and regulation create coercive force, and all fields where verification is impossible.

Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats (CRISPR) toolkits are already being taught in high schools. Machine-learning algorithms can generate new proteins in days. The capabilities of biotech have expanded beyond conventional Western strongholds—Beijing, Bangalore, Tehran. This is not just a list of scientific achievements. This is an example of a structural change in how biotech is perceived by governments.

THE TRAP OF DEMOCRATIZATION

The cost of gene synthesis has fallen from thousands per base pair in 2000 to pennies per base pair now. However, this is not a peak; the prices keep decreasing. Equipment that used to be available only in research labs at institutions is now affordable by smaller research teams around the world. In addition to that, the skills gap has been bridged. CRISPR technology is now considered to be part of conventional molecular biology training. 

Thousands of International Genetically Engineered Machine (iGEM) graduates who are well-versed in synthetic biology are distributed across different nations with different security laws regarding bioengineering. This is amplified by the advances in AI and machine learning algorithms, which enable the design of completely new proteins through computational simulation in silico, without experimental verification.

Finally, geographical diffusion is another dimension in the democratisation of synthetic biology. The Chinese company Beijing Genomics Institute (BGI) is now running the world’s largest genome sequencing facility and has stated that it will use its services for military applications.

Indian Council of Scientific and Industrial Research(CSIR) labs conduct cutting-edge research in the field of synthetic biology. The Iranians combine their civil and military biological programs. Biotechnology incubators are being created even in smaller countries. The importance of the above convergence lies in the fact that, since capability relies on knowledge, computational power, and the ability to function in regulatory grey zones, the obstacles fall below the detection threshold level. It is impossible to watch the development of the protein using a computer. It is impossible to separate research for vaccine platforms from research for pathogens.

IMPOSSIBLE DISTINCTION 

The crux of the matter is that the technology that saved millions of lives during the course of COVID-19 is the same technology that has the potential to engineer the next pandemic. The CRISPR that heals people from sickle cell disease can engineer a pathogen that would become resistant to vaccines. Tissue engineering that restores damaged organs can increase the transmissibility of pathogens. The technology used is the same. Intentions cannot be discerned. There is no way to technically differentiate vaccine platform research from pathogen engineering.

The creation of horsepox in 2014 by reassembling published sequences is an example. Scientists have assembled the sequence of a virus that is already known using only sequence data from the public domain. This experiment is seen as an example and is more or less ignored after that. Screening procedures that do exist are voluntary in nature. The Biosafety and Biosecurity Consortium model does not have an enforcement system. There are a lot of Deoxyribonucleic Acid (DNA) synthesis services that fall outside the purview of the model altogether. Orders could be split up between various service providers, none of which are under any threshold for detection.

Vulnerability comes in the form of attribution opacity. Attacks in cyberspace leave traces. Attacks by use of force leave their marks too. A bioterrorist attack by use of an engineered pathogen or vaccine tampering might look like a natural event. This makes denial possible. Capability for bioterrorism is built up through publicly available defence research. Intent is unclear as healing and harming use the same tools.

HOW NATIONS PLAY FOR BIOTECH DOMINANCE 

United States government policies define synthetic biology as one of competition and critical infrastructure. Here, the policies revolve around retaining an edge in protein design and cell engineering along with ensuring supply chain security through DNA synthesis screening. However, there is an inherent constraint in this policy structure since the possibility of increasing regulation may cause investment and knowledge transfer to nations with lower regulations.

The Chinese government has embraced the integration of synthetic biology as a state priority under biotech qianguo.

The policy brings together genomic data using BGI, connects civilian research with military research facilities (Academy of Military Medical Sciences), and creates centres of expertise in various regions in Africa and Southeast Asia. The benefit lies in the architectural integration of data and AI. The EU regulates using precautionary principles: bioethics protocols and screening procedures. This hampers innovation but does not bring tangible security benefits. This equilibrium is sustainable only if the rivals have similar restrictions, which is not the case.

India is caught up in this dilemma. Biotechnology is an instrument of development: agriculture, pandemic response, medicine. CSIR has well-developed programs. However, India still faces the problem of governance – how to use its biotechnology capabilities to gain an edge while conducting biosecurity screenings. This is the fundamental issue that all states with dual-use capabilities face.

VERIFICATION TRAP

The Biological Weapons Convention of 1972 is the legislative framework for such a process. The convention does not have any verification or inspection mechanism at all. There is an enormous variation in the national implementation of the convention—from well-developed biological security measures to the lack of them. DNA synthesis screening is totally based on voluntary compliance only.

Current policy actions—sequences flagged by AI technology, supply chain monitoring, tiering of access—are small steps towards flawed approaches. The key issue is one of verification. It is impossible to verify the ability of synthetic biology like that of nuclear weapons. There are no clear indications. The detection window is shrinking.

The logic of deterrence is not definite. If all states are capable equally, will there be more security? With asymmetric capabilities, how will the weaker state secure itself? These questions have no answer.

RACE WITH NO RULES

For governments, synthetic biology has become a strategic issue since access has been democratised, but capability has become centralised. Timelines for detection have shrunk. AI has made protein design a computational challenge. Control over biotechnological platforms like CRISPR, cell-free technology, and machine learning architecture is economically and politically powerful.

Synthetic biology is strategically important not because weaponisation is imminent, but rather because it shares the same competitive space as semiconductors and artificial intelligence, areas in which advantage in technology leads to geopolitical supremacy. Nations vie for supremacy in science, supply chains, and regulation. The control of the means of designing life is power.

With the growing availability and cost-effectiveness of biotechnology, it has become clear to the world that biotechnology is another competitive domain besides cyberspace, AI, and outer space. The point is not whether it does matter. The point is whether governments create effective governance within the next two or three years or fall back on competitive positioning that ends up making everybody lose out. The existing mechanisms are practically irrelevant. It is that space where strategic risks lie.

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BY HEMA

TEAM GEOSTRATA

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