Thread: U.S. port security unlikely to stop nukes: experts

Now isn't this encouraging we are wide open in all directions.

1 hour, 14 minutes ago



WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Bush administration efforts to screen U.S.-bound cargo for radioactive weapons are unlikely to stop a determined militant group from smuggling nuclear material onto American soil, experts said on Thursday.

Peter Zimmerman of Kings College, London, and Jeffrey Lewis of Harvard, who have researched the task of building an improvised nuclear device, said anyone hoping to hatch a nuclear attack on the United States would most likely build the weapon on American soil.

That would require them to smuggle highly enriched uranium from abroad. But packaging material as common as aluminum foil could shield the uranium from scanning devices meant to detect radioactivity.

"I am not presently optimistic that current efforts to inspect and scan will have any payoff against highly enriched uranium," said Zimmerman, a nuclear physicist who is director of the Kings College London Center for Science & Security Studies.

They spoke to reporters on the same day the Bush administration unveiled a $60 million program to scan U.S.-bound cargo for nuclear and radiological material at ports in Pakistan, Oman, South Korea, Honduras, Britain and Singapore.

Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff told reporters the program was part of an effort to cut off the possibility of a nuclear attack on U.S. soil.

"I don't know that there's that much Chertoff can do," said Lewis, a policy expert from Harvard's John F. Kennedy School of Government.

Neither expert directly addressed the new U.S. port security initiative.

But both said the most effective means of protecting against nuclear terrorism would be to drive up the black market price for fissile material by upgrading security at nuclear facilities, particularly in the former Soviet Union.

Zimmerman and Lewis produced a study showing a nuclear weapon as strong as the atom bomb dropped on Hiroshima could be constructed and deployed for $5.4 million. As many as 140,000 people died as a result of the August 6, 1945, U.S. attack on the Japanese city.

"If we think this can be done for less than $10 million, that's just too low, because there are terrorist groups with access to that much money," Lewis said.

"What I'd like to see is efforts made in securing fissile material so our estimate would go up (and) there won't be terrorist groups that are capable of doing this."
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20061208/ts_ ... nuclear_dc

It's only by the grace of God that it has'nt happened yet with all of the clowns at the helm in our government.

Originally Posted by CCUSA

It's only by the grace of God that it has'nt happened yet with all of the clowns at the helm in our government.

You are so right, I wait and expect it every day. You just know it is coming.

"I don't know that there's that much Chertoff can do," said Lewis, a policy expert from Harvard's John F. Kennedy School of Government.

Yupper.......that's why he gets the big bucks!

Anyhooo, they've got the wide open northern & SOUTHERN border to dance over. Don't ya feel like our taxdollars have been put to good use?

.

Yes, this has scared me since Sept 11th.

One of the main functions of our federal government is to protect our borders which it has failed miserably and now we hear hardly any cargo is screened. Unbelievable, amazing, crazy, etc. I feel like we're sitting ducks!