[ RadSafe ] Re: [DailyBrief] Wash Post - U.S. Called Unprepared ForNuclear Terrorism

[Gerry Blackwood]

Jaro
 
While I have a regard for Blix and if his quote was not taken out of context he is dead wrong and should know a lot better than this. Anyone who knows weapon systems knows better. A simple nuke does not need state sponsorship to build. A fusion nuke? Yes of course much different. But a simple fission nuke is within the capabilities of UBL and AQ. The material is available and NO ONE can say either way if UBL does or does not have the SNM. All he then needs is a trained and experienced weapons physicists and a machine shop. Yes there is an assortment of problems that arise with development of even a simple nuke. But to say ""Support and coordination from states would be needed for terrorists to produce WMDs,"  or equate the long term effects of global warming to a WMD as in nuke as the same concern is also outlandish. While General Mohamed ElBaradei has a completely different take, ""Mr. ElBaradei said. "All of us are vulnerable because all of us use nuclear materials and radioactive
 materials can easily move across borders."  I will also note;
 
"Some experts share the view of the Director General of the United Kingdom Security Service, who said in August 2003: "It will only be a matter of time before a crude version of a [chemical, biological, radiological or nuclear] attack is launched at a major Western city." To date, the IAEA´s own database on illicit trafficking has recorded, since 1993, over 650 confirmed incidents of trafficking in nuclear or other radioactive material. Last year alone, nearly 100 such incidents occurred, 11 of which involved nuclear material. While the majority of trafficking incidents do not involve nuclear material, and while most of the radioactive materials involved are of limited radiological concern, the number of incidents shows that the measures to control and secure nuclear and other radioactive materials need to be improved."
 
Yes we overplay the nuclear threat...but I rather overplay this threat rather than have anyone exposed to its final outcome, which is just unimaginable and for all responders out there try doing this under martial law as well. Believe me if we had any actionable intelligence that a nuke was either headed for this country or was in this country we would lock down this country so tight that your asshole would hurt. But even that does not guarantee we would intercept the package before detonation. 
 
As far as John Parachini is concerned. Another academic who has no clue! No real life counter-terrorism experience! Again his remarks as quoted and again if not taken out of context are plainly arsine. The NY Times just ran a article "Russian nuclear hunt shifts into gear"... Lets see the detectors picked up 14000 hits of which only "200 involved cases of possible smuggling, including people who apparently had material but did not realize it." I can't help but wonder what the false alarm rate was, how many were suspect but not investigated for a number of Russian reasons  While the detectors are limited as to detection of the 910 metric tons of HEU that has been floating around since 1991. Lets not talk about historical inaccuracy of Soviet nuclear inventories.
 
As far as the discussion of decontamination of the fallout after a nuclear detonation. While science say's one thing it is completely ridiculous to even consider that the average citizen would even plausibly accept it. While as we know the US Congress would be doing its typical hatchet job..... Lets be real not silly. 


Jaro <jaro-10kbq at sympatico.ca> wrote:
Gerry Blackwood wrote :

"Security experts consider a terrorist nuclear strike highly unlikely
because of the difficulty in obtaining fissionable material and constructing
a bomb."

What security experts? I hate it when these morons write crap like this.
Please identify the security experts......
- - - - - - - - - - - - - -

OK :


International Experts Play Down Threat Of Terrorists Acquiring WMD's
Helsinki (AFP) Apr 14, 2005
Terrorist groups and organizations have neither the capacity nor the
ambition to produce weapons of mass destruction (WMDs), former UN chief
weapons inspector Hans Blix, and other experts said at a conference in
Helsinki last Thursday.
"I'm as concerned about global warming and its long term effects" as about
the immediate threat of terrorists acquiring weapons of mass destruction,
said Blix, a former Swedish diplomat who was charged with searching for such
weapons ahead of the US-led invasion of Iraq.

"Support and coordination from states would be needed for terrorists to
produce WMDs," he insisted, speaking at a conference here entitled "WMD
terrorism: how scared should we be?".

Blix acknowledged however that "there is a small but not zero risk" of
terrorists laying their hands on weapons of mass destruction, and called for
more preventive measures.
"Material and technology are now widespread and an ability to create WMDs is
also greater," he said.

John Parachini, a political analyst with the California-based Rand
Corporation, agreed that the current threat of terrorists gaining access to
such weapons had perhaps been exaggerated.
"WMDs are not easy to produce," he said, adding that "the mix of terrorism
and WMDs becomes really dangerous if a group or groups form a sort of
connection with a state and get knowledge from states how to produce WMDs".

"WMDs used by Al-Qaeda is much further off than we think," agreed Thomas
Sanderson of the Strategic and International Studies' Transnational Threats
Project.

He cautioned however that the attacks on the World Trade Center in 1993 and
2001 showed that "the intention of terrorist groups to cause major damage is
there".

"You don't need to kill thousands of people in order to cause a terrible
effect on a country, as anthrax showed," he added, referring to a scare soon
after the 2001 attacks.

According to Parachini, there have been only four known cases in recent
history of non-state actors using non-conventional weapons to wreak havoc:
the Rajneeshee sect's salmonella poisoning of an Oregon town in 1984, the
chlorine attack on the Sri Lankan air force carried out by the Tamil Tigers
in 1990, the Aum sect's release of deadly sarin gas on a Tokyo subway train
in 1995 and finally the deadly anthrax letters, believed to be of domestic
origin, that terrorized the United States in 2001.
===========

Jaro
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^


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