Jakob Segal (17 April 1911 – 30 September 1995) was a Russian-born German

biology Biology is the scientific study of life. It is a natural science with a broad scope but has several unifying themes that tie it together as a single, coherent field. For instance, all organisms are made up of cells that process hereditary ...

professor Professor (commonly abbreviated as Prof.) is an academic rank at universities and other post-secondary education and research institutions in most countries. Literally, ''professor'' derives from Latin as a "person who professes". Professo ...

Humboldt University of Berlin Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin (german: Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, abbreviated HU Berlin) is a German public research university in the central borough of Mitte in Berlin. It was established by Frederick William III on the initiative ...

in the former

East Germany East Germany, officially the German Democratic Republic (GDR; german: Deutsche Demokratische Republik, , DDR, ), was a country that existed from its creation on 7 October 1949 until German reunification, its dissolution on 3 October 1990. In t ...

. He was one of the advocates of the

conspiracy theory A conspiracy theory is an explanation for an event or situation that invokes a conspiracy by sinister and powerful groups, often political in motivation, when other explanations are more probable.Additional sources: * * * * The term has a nega ...

that HIV was created by the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country Continental United States, primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., ...

government at

Fort Detrick Fort Detrick () is a United States Army Futures Command installation located in Frederick, Maryland. Historically, Fort Detrick was the center of the U.S. biological weapons program from 1943 to 1969. Since the discontinuation of that program, i ...

Maryland Maryland ( ) is a state in the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States. It shares borders with Virginia, West Virginia, and the District of Columbia to its south and west; Pennsylvania to its north; and Delaware and the Atlantic Ocean t ...

. After the fall of the Soviet Union, KGB defector

Vasili Mitrokhin Vasili Nikitich Mitrokhin (russian: link=no, Васи́лий Ники́тич Митро́хин; March 3, 1922 – January 23, 2004) was a major and senior archivist for the Soviet Union's foreign intelligence service, the First Chief Di ...

and two former members of East Germany's secret police revealed that Segal was a Soviet

disinformation Disinformation is false information deliberately spread to deceive people. It is sometimes confused with misinformation, which is false information but is not deliberate. The English word ''disinformation'' comes from the application of the ...

agent who worked for the KGB.

Early life and education

Segal was born in

Saint Petersburg Saint Petersburg ( rus, links=no, Санкт-Петербург, a=Ru-Sankt Peterburg Leningrad Petrograd Piter.ogg, r=Sankt-Peterburg, p=ˈsankt pʲɪtʲɪrˈburk), formerly known as Petrograd (1914–1924) and later Leningrad (1924–1991), i ...

Russian Empire The Russian Empire was an empire and the final period of the Russian monarchy from 1721 to 1917, ruling across large parts of Eurasia. It succeeded the Tsardom of Russia following the Treaty of Nystad, which ended the Great Northern War ...

, into a

Lithuanian Jewish Lithuanian Jews or Litvaks () are Jews with roots in the territory of the former Grand Duchy of Lithuania (covering present-day Lithuania, Belarus, Latvia, the northeastern Suwałki and Białystok regions of Poland, as well as adjacent ...

family, the son of Hermann Segal, a merchant from

Kaunas Kaunas (; ; also see other names) is the second-largest city in Lithuania after Vilnius and an important centre of Lithuanian economic, academic, and cultural life. Kaunas was the largest city and the centre of a county in the Duchy of Traka ...

(1880–1941), and Rebekka (''née'' Schlimakowski; 1887–1941). He had an older brother, Moshe, an electrician. When he was 8, his family moved to

Königsberg Königsberg (, ) was the historic Prussian city that is now Kaliningrad, Russia. Königsberg was founded in 1255 on the site of the ancient Old Prussian settlement ''Twangste'' by the Teutonic Knights during the Northern Crusades, and was ...

Prussia Prussia, , Old Prussian: ''Prūsa'' or ''Prūsija'' was a German state on the southeast coast of the Baltic Sea. It formed the German Empire under Prussian rule when it united the German states in 1871. It was ''de facto'' dissolved by an e ...

(now

Kaliningrad Kaliningrad ( ; rus, Калининград, p=kəlʲɪnʲɪnˈɡrat, links=y), until 1946 known as Königsberg (; rus, Кёнигсберг, Kyonigsberg, ˈkʲɵnʲɪɡzbɛrk; rus, Короле́вец, Korolevets), is the largest city and ...

Russia Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and Northern Asia. It is the largest country in the world, with its internationally recognised territory covering , and encompassing one-ei ...

). He was educated in

Berlin Berlin ( , ) is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's sixteen constitu ...

and

Munich Munich ( ; german: München ; bar, Minga ) is the capital and most populous city of the German state of Bavaria. With a population of 1,558,395 inhabitants as of 31 July 2020, it is the third-largest city in Germany, after Berlin and ...

, where he joined the Red Students' League (''Roter Studentenbund'') and the

Communist Party of Germany The Communist Party of Germany (german: Kommunistische Partei Deutschlands, , KPD ) was a major political party in the Weimar Republic between 1918 and 1933, an underground resistance movement in Nazi Germany, and a minor party in West German ...

. In 1933, he immigrated to France, where he furthered his studies in

Toulouse Toulouse ( , ; oc, Tolosa ) is the prefecture of the French department of Haute-Garonne and of the larger region of Occitania. The city is on the banks of the River Garonne, from the Mediterranean Sea, from the Atlantic Ocean and fr ...

before earning a doctorate in physiology from the

Sorbonne Sorbonne may refer to: * Sorbonne (building), historic building in Paris, which housed the University of Paris and is now shared among multiple universities. *the University of Paris (c. 1150 – 1970) *one of its components or linked institution, ...

in 1936. During the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposi ...

, he and his German wife, Lilli (''née'' Schlesinger, whom he had met at university in Toulouse) joined the resistance as part of the ''

Main-d'œuvre immigrée The Main-d'œuvre immigrée was a French trade unionist organisation, composed of immigrant workers of the '' Confédération générale du travail unitaire'' (CGTU) in the 1920s. The MOI was affiliated to the Profintern. The MOI was initially na ...

'' and went underground. All of his family, including his parents and brother, were killed in the Holocaust. Lilli was arrested in 1943 and deported to

Auschwitz Auschwitz concentration camp ( (); also or ) was a complex of over 40 Nazi concentration camps, concentration and extermination camps operated by Nazi Germany in Polish areas annexed by Nazi Germany, occupied Poland (in a portion annexed int ...

in July 1944, but was sent to a work camp and survived by escaping that November. In 1946, he joined the

Centre national de la recherche scientifique The French National Centre for Scientific Research (french: link=no, Centre national de la recherche scientifique, CNRS) is the French state research organisation and is the largest fundamental science agency in Europe. In 2016, it employed 31,63 ...

. Following the Soviet annexation of Lithuania during the war, Segal and wife accepted Soviet citizenship. In the early 1950s, he moved to East Germany, reportedly on the recommendation of Soviet officials, becoming '' informeller Mitarbeiter''. In 1952, he became a biology professor at

Humboldt University Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin (german: Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, abbreviated HU Berlin) is a German public research university in the central borough of Mitte in Berlin. It was established by Frederick William III on the initiati ...

East Berlin East Berlin was the ''de facto'' capital city of East Germany from 1949 to 1990. Formally, it was the Soviet sector of Berlin, established in 1945. The American, British, and French sectors were known as West Berlin. From 13 August 1961 u ...

, and in 1953 founded its Institute for Applied Bacteriology. From 1967–70, he worked at the National Center for Scientific Research in

Havana Havana (; Spanish: ''La Habana'' ) is the capital and largest city of Cuba. The heart of the La Habana Province, Havana is the country's main port and commercial center.

Cuba Cuba ( , ), officially the Republic of Cuba ( es, República de Cuba, links=no ), is an island country comprising the island of Cuba, as well as Isla de la Juventud and several minor archipelagos. Cuba is located where the northern Caribb ...

. He moved to

Mexico City Mexico City ( es, link=no, Ciudad de México, ; abbr.: CDMX; Nahuatl: ''Altepetl Mexico'') is the capital and largest city of Mexico, and the most populous city in North America. One of the world's alpha cities, it is located in the Valley o ...

, where he retired in the early 1970s before returning to East Berlin.

Operation Infektion

Segal was recruited out of retirement by the KGB for

Operation INFEKTION Operation INFEKTION was an active measure disinformation campaign run by the KGB in the 1980s to plant the idea that the United States had invented HIV/AIDS as part of a biological weapons research project at Fort Detrick, Maryland. Historian ...

, a

campaign designed to spread the belief that

HIV/AIDS Human immunodeficiency virus infection and acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (HIV/AIDS) is a spectrum of conditions caused by infection with the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), a retrovirus. Following initial infection an individual ...

was created by the United States Government. According to U.S. intelligence historian

Thomas Boghardt Thomas Boghardt is a senior historian at the US Army Center of Military History. Prior to this post, he served as the historian at the International Spy Museum in Washington, D.C., and, formerly, as a Thyssen fellow at Georgetown University. He ...

, Segal possibly suspected it was a Soviet campaign when approached by the

Stasi The Ministry for State Security, commonly known as the (),An abbreviation of . was the state security service of the East Germany from 1950 to 1990. The Stasi's function was similar to the KGB, serving as a means of maintaining state autho ...

(MfS): Segal, together with his wife and Ronald Dehmlow, a fellow retired professor from Humboldt, published a 47-page pamphlet titled ''AIDS—Its Nature and Origin'', in which they speculated that AIDS was the creation of the U.S. government, which had first tested it on gay prison inmates. What became known as the "Segal Report" was distributed by the Stasi and KGB at the Eighth Conference of Non-Aligned Nations, held 1–6 September 1986 in

Harare Harare (; formerly Salisbury ) is the capital and most populous city of Zimbabwe. The city proper has an area of 940 km2 (371 mi2) and a population of 2.12 million in the 2012 census and an estimated 3.12 million in its metropolitan ...

Zimbabwe Zimbabwe (), officially the Republic of Zimbabwe, is a landlocked country located in Southeast Africa, between the Zambezi and Limpopo Rivers, bordered by South Africa to the south, Botswana to the south-west, Zambia to the north, and ...

, which was attended by representatives of more than 100 Third World countries. It produced the desired effect at the conference, and its claims were reprinted in the press in more than 25 countries in Africa. One of Segal's claims was that Prof. Robert Gallo crossed the Visna sheep virus with the

Human T-lymphotropic virus The human T-lymphotropic virus, human T-cell lymphotropic virus, or human T-cell leukemia-lymphoma virus (HTLV) family of viruses are a group of human retroviruses that are known to cause a type of cancer called adult T-cell leukemia/lymphoma an ...

(HTLV I) in 1978 in the P4 laboratory of the

U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases The United States Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID; pronounced: you-SAM-rid) is the U.S Army's main institution and facility for defensive research into countermeasures against biological warfare. It is located ...

in Fort Detrick. Proponents of this theory claim that 90% of HIV RNA is found in Visna and 10% in HTLV I. Genomic analysis, however, shows that such claims are false. Research after Segal's theory shows that HIV is much more closely related to the

simian immunodeficiency virus ''Simian immunodeficiency virus'' (''SIV'') is a species of retrovirus that cause persistent infections in at least 45 species of non-human primates. Based on analysis of strains found in four species of monkeys from Bioko Island, which was iso ...

than to any other virus.

HIV therapy hypothesis

Segal suggested an HIV therapy of anti-inflammatory

aspirin Aspirin, also known as acetylsalicylic acid (ASA), is a nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drug (NSAID) used to reduce pain, fever, and/or inflammation, and as an antithrombotic. Specific inflammatory conditions which aspirin is used to treat inc ...

or ultraviolet radiation of the patient's blood in order to reduce the metabolic activity of macrophages, which are host cells for HIV. He also supported the idea of a p24- vaccine without gp120 which was patented by

Jonas Salk Jonas Edward Salk (; born Jonas Salk; October 28, 1914June 23, 1995) was an American virologist and medical researcher who developed one of the first successful polio vaccines. He was born in New York City and attended the City College of New ...

as " Remune".

Works

*Jakob Segal/Lilli Segal: ''Aids - die Spur führt ins Pentagon'' zusammen mit Manuel Kiper, ''Biokrieg'', Vg. Neuer Weg, 2. ergänzte Auflage Oktober 1990, *Manuel Kiper: ''Seuchengefahr aus der Retorte - Vom sorglosen Umgang mit Genen, Viren und Bakterien'', rororo Verlag, 1992, *Lilli Segal/ Jakob Segal/ Christoph Klug: ''AIDS can be conquered'', Verlag Neuer Weg 1995/2001, *Jakob Segal: ''AIDS Zellphysiologie Pathologie und Therapie'', Verlag Neuer Weg 1992, *Jacob Segal: ''wie das Leben auf der Erde entstand'', DIETZ VERLAG BERLIN, 2. Auflage 1958 *Jakob Segal und Gunther Seng und andere: ''Methoden der UV- Bestrahlung von Blut—HOT und UVB'', Hippokrates Verlag Stuttgart 1990, *Jakob Segal, Ute Körner, Kate P. Leiterer: ''Die Entstehung des Lebens aus Biophysikalischer Sicht'', VEB Gustav Fischer Verlag 1983, Bestellnummer: 533 7707 *Jakob Segal: ''Biophysikalische Aspekte der elementaren Zellfunktionen'', VEB Georg Thieme Verlag Leipzig 1978, Bestellnummer: 532 816 5

References

External links

Hiv, Visna Heteroduplex, Gonda, 1985, iHiv, Visna Heteroduplex, Gonda, 1985, iiThomar, Ähnlichkeit von Aids und VisnaReport by Jakob Segal about the origin of AIDS
(published by

monochrom Monochrom (stylised as monochrom) is an international art-technology-philosophy group, publishing house and film production company. It was founded in 1993, and defines itself as "an unpeculiar mixture of proto-aesthetic fringe work, pop att ...