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Re: Nova - Dirty Bombs



Brian,
 
Your point is well taken and I am aware of this. On the other hand, any would-be terrorist thinking about using radioactive materials would come up with similar ideas. The only casualties that have ever been caused by radioactive sources have been caused by concentrated sources not by dispersed ones. "Dilution is the solution to pollution".
 
Your constitution guaranties the right to bear arms. Guns are fairly irrelevant in today's world. Today's equivalent is information and knowledge. I think people should have the information of what the real risk from radioactive material is (Don't listen to me. Just go to the IAEA website.) instead of following the dirty bomb red herring, so they can protect themselves.
 
I tried to maintain a balance of identifying the real issue (which any terrorist would already know), without giving technical details.
 
How would we look if all the experts and the government said that there is no risk from terrorist use of radioactive material and that any terrorist handling such material would get 6000R (or whatever) and immediately die and then someone pulls off a radiological attack? (You would get 6000R if you tried to aerosolize the source with a fingernail file, but in no other way.) It would result in a complete loss of confidence in our system. This is what the terrorists really want. They don't care if it takes a big body count to do that or not.
 
I think we have to maintain a balance in the type of information that enters the public domain. The "all is well" message needs to be balanced with a reality check every once in a while.
 
Respectfully,
Kai
 
 
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Friday, February 28, 2003 9:38 AM
Subject: RE: Nova - Dirty Bombs

Kai and several others,

I urge that thoughts and ideas which could be used by a potential adversary be kept off of Radsafe and out of any public forum. Anybody could be reading the posts or searching archives. I don’t want internet web site produced by the worlds experts on radiation safety, which contains basic concepts for new terrifying weapons and the prescription for handling them safely.

Brian Keele



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