Weekly Terrorism Spotlight

Volume 1, Issue 7 (April 28)

INSIDE THIS ISSUE:

Florida Islamic student terror case widens

Senate views nuclear terrorism scenarios

The Homeland Security committee of the U.S. Senate held hearings through April on nuclear terrorism scenarios

The U.S. Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee examined nuclear terrorism scenarios by consulting field experts at hearings through April.

Committee Chairman Joseph Lieberman [D – Conn.] said the threat must be thoroughly covered no matter how difficult imagining such horror might be.

“The scenarios…are very hard for us to contemplate, and so emotionally traumatic and unsettling that it is tempting to push them aside,” Lieberman said in remarks to open an April 15 hearing.

Committee spokesperson Jen Burita told PRB News the issue of homegrown Islamic terrorism is always an aspect of the hearings involving terrorism, and nuclear terror is no exception.

“That has been a concern and continues to be a concern,” Burita said. “Homegrown terrorism is a recurrent issue mentioned during this ongoing committee process.”

She added homegrown terrorist activity was not the focus of the committee in late April, but was understood as part of the background in dealing with the aftermath of a nuclear terrorist attack on American soil.

“The latest hearing focused on what is to be done in the aftermath of an incident, the need to prepare and how far we need to go with preparedness from the point we are at now,” Burita said.

Burita confirmed expert testimony before the committee included concerns that homegrown Islamic terrorists are capable of at least helping in the transport of improvised nuclear devices, a new concept in the field of nuclear warfare.

Improvised devices stretch the possibility of nuclear weapons capability to organizations lower down the scale from traditional multi-billion-dollar government-run infrastructure.

Chief Intelligence Officer Charles E. Allen said improvised nuclear devices factor in his office’s work to analyze accessible nuclear materials, their security and distribution globally “and our ability to identify and detect them,” he said.

“An improvised nuclear device will lack the sophistication of a state-developed weapon,” he added, noting they would likely be made individually, and with no safety controls.

The yield and destructibility of such weapons would also be unknowable, but probably slight in comparison to properly manufactured nuclear bomb.

“That is not to say that such a device should be considered less of a weapon of mass destruction,” Allen said.

Allen said some traffickers in nuclear materials have been discovered, but most cases revealed a total lack of buyers – the traffickers were discovered as they sought buyers.

“This suggests, however, that an organized trafficker with access to both materials and qualified buyers might escape detection,” Allen said.

Nuclear design of functional detail and technology continues to be above the level of all but a “very select group of key operatives,” he said, as Internet information falls short.

“I do not believe that any terrorist organization currently has developed a nuclear device,” Allen said. “I recognize, however, that the terrorist threat is dynamic and constantly evolving.”

An example he gave was Abu Ayyub al-Masri, an Islamic jihad terrorist leader with al-Qaeda, calling upon the acquisition of nuclear scientists as a service to Allah – to develop a nuclear bomb.

At a later hearing, Lieberman acknowledged, “Although we cannot know the exact yield from a nuclear weapon acquired by terrorists, a detonation would kill an enormous number…[from] the initial blast, the ensuing fires and the spread of lethal radiation.”

Ranking Republican committee member Susan Collins [Maine], agreed. “A 10-kiloton device – a plausible yield for a bomb constructed by terrorists – could be smuggled into a seaport as cargo,” she said.

The scenario included use of a charter airplane or truck. “When detonated, this bomb could instantly kill many thousands and destroy buildings within a half-mile radius,” she added.

The committee focused on testimony from leading experts as to the “overwhelming” aftermath of such a disaster – the nation’s infrastructure is likely not capable of dealing with it at this time.

University of Georgia Professor, Dr. Cham Dallas, an expert on “Mass-Destruction Defense,” offered response recommendations that ought to be prepared now, ahead of time:

Expand the number of emergency response personnel, ancillary emergency responders trained for a nuclear incident.
Develop public information campaigns – a marketing approach – for mass casualty response.
Prepare now for monitoring nuclear attack patients likely to be part of an internally displaced population problem.
Prepare rapid mobilization of medical resources and personnel.
Convert military maritime vessels to be ready for civilian applications – as emergency response platforms.

Ashton Carter of Harvard University’s Preventive Defense Project, offered a stark reality check for being politically prepared – so nuclear terrorism is prevented “at the source.”

On “the day after,” he would tell any U.S. President, first, “If I were in your shoes, I would not be in your shoes,” meaning the incident wouldn’t have happened.

“Nuclear terrorism can be eradicated,” Carter said. “The reason for this is a fortunate blessing of nature: making a nuclear bomb requires highly enriched uranium or plutonium…it [is] comparatively difficult to make either one.”

Carter said governments could safeguard these materials, and if there were no governments of the sort not to safeguard these materials around to have them, there would be no nuclear terrorism threat.

“There is therefore no more important national security imperative than to prevent ‘loose nukes’ at the source,” he said.

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