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Re: So, is reprocessing in America's future?
Count among those destitute terrorists nuclear pioneers, H.D Smyth and E.P.
Wigner, who three days after Pearl Harbor wrote a report concluding that the
fission products formed in only a single day of operating a nuclear reactor
at a power of 100,000 kilowatts might be enough to render a large area
uninhabitable. In 1948, the brilliant Hans Thirring published a paper
describing the potential in the dispersal of short-lived fission products
to force evacuation of enemy cities.
Nuclear proliferation is nuclear proliferation.
It is doubtful terrorists or terrorist nations are very much interested in a
clean, high-yield bomb. Consider what might have followed by way of response
if the SCUD missle that hit the US installation in Saudi Arabia during the
Gulf War had a nuclear component to it, either a very poor bomb or just a
load of mixed fission products.
Ray
----- Original Message -----
From: maury <maury@WEBTEXAS.COM>
To: <radsafe@list.vanderbilt.edu>
Sent: Friday, July 06, 2001 12:28 PM
Subject: Re: So, is reprocessing in America's future?
>
> Amen - well put. There is no real issue here, but the various interested
> parties will keep it "alive" anyway. It is kind of amusing to note the
> wide
> range of imagination and creativity shown in the process. And it is
> always
> remarkable how ignorant these destitute terrorists are.
> Cheers, Maury Siskel maury@webtexas.com
> ====================================
> PBarring@KDHE.STATE.KS.US wrote:
>
> > This is just my two cents, since everyone else is piping in. What needs
to
> > be said is that if somebody REALLY wants fissionable material, for a
device
> > or just to scatter isotopes all over the place, they WILL get it.
You're
> > not dealing with cretins. You are dealing with educated leaders,
> > knowledgeable support personnel and LOTS of money. Reprocessing is not
the
> > problem, or at least not the problem the press makes it out to be.
There
> > is already plenty of material out there available for use, and for a lot
> > less trouble and expense than stealing it from a reprocessing facility
or
> > fuel shipment. Heck, if I were a terrorist I could make plenty of
people
> > miserable and scared by touching-off a plain old chemical bomb with
medical
> > isotopes and source material strapped to it. People don't care how the
> > radiation is spread around or even what the isotopes are, all they know
is
> > that radiation is evil stuff and that we all lie. Again, we need to
> > educate people. Maybe we should start with the press corps.
> >
> > "Just my humble opinions. Nothing I say is endorsed by my employer. I
> > also DO NOT endorse terrorism."
> >
> > Phil
> >
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