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Los Alamos Security Infiltrated By Reporter
morcheeba writes "Wired reported Noah Shachtman gives a first-hand account of his entry into a high-security area at Los Alamos National Laboratory. Yes, there are pictures. It seems that the birthplace of the atom bomb is being guarded by string, backed up by guards with empty holsters. There's a little more info on Noah's Defense Tech website."
"We didn't fence all 43 square miles," said lab spokeswoman Nancy Ambrosiano. "But if you're near an area that matters, you can't get in."
If you read the article, it turns out this boob managed to infiltrate a "Top-Secret" storage shed for illicit camping gear. There are probably thousands of facilities around the country that house classified facilities that you could still walk into the lobby of and claim to have infiltrated. You can drive onto many military bases around the country, untill you get to the defenses that protect anything important. Shachtman is trully a l33t j00rnul15t.
It's hard to make it stick, for one, especially if they find evidence of some sort of mismanagement.
For the second, do you know how much publicity would come of trying to prosecute a reporter for reporting the truth? This story will fade away into the background in a day or two if they just ignore it, or release a noncommittal statement. A few heads will quietly roll among the security staff and that will be it.
If they try to prosecute it becomes a story of how an incompetent government is incapable of protecting any nation secrets while AT THE SAME TIME trying to impinge on the Freedom of the Press clause in the Bill of Rights.
The Bill of Rights will never get amended because the freaks on the Left would rather die than see freedom of speech/assembly/the press impinged upon, and the freaks on the Right would rather die than see the Right to Bear Arms/Freedom of Religion touched.
On top of all this, this country's leaders are cravenly attached to opinion polls, and opnion polls are VERY strongly influenced by the press, which means that ANY government official is going to be VERY careful before trying to stick it to a member of the press.
Heh. Not exactly the short answer.
ad logicam Claiming a proposition is false because it was presented as the conclusion of a fallacious argument.
Arrests are often because they refuse to reveal their sources in court.
This one actually is bad. Journalism is about getting the truth, and the truth is often stifled by threats to the people who have it. By keeping sources secret, the journalists help the truth to get out while protecting those involved.
Donate background CPU time to fight cancer.
Here is a page describing LANL, and includes a map. Notice the scale of the map and how huge an area LANL covers. Notice that TA-33 is one of the most remote facilities.
And here is a pdf in two parts (part one and part two) that describes every tech area, and includes maps. The description and map of TA-33 is in part one.
Looking at the detail of the area of TA-33 near Highway 4 (because there's a whole bunch of TA-33 away from the highway!), I see dozens of buildings. Clearly, the writer couldn't have approached either of the two buildings that are designated as being in the "hazard category" because they are well within the perimeter of TA-33 and along the main roadway that serves the cluster of buildings at that northern portion of TA-33. He tries to make it sound as if the whole of TA-33--a huge area covering a range of terrain--is or should be guarded with high-level perimeter security and that, once he crossed the perimeter into TA-33, he was "in". But this is just silly. Buildings within technical areas have their own security, and the most senstitive buildings have the most intense security. He walked up to a "silver building" that was near the roadway. Big deal! That means nothing.
You and all the other people here who don't know anything about LANL are being misled by this writer who is preying upon your preconceived ideas about what such an installation is like. LANL is not like what most people imagine. There are lower and higher level security areas. There are areas that are essentially completely insecure. It covers a huge amount of territory, in some cases seemingly intermingled with the town.
I have nothing but contempt for this writer because he took a stupid risk for a trivial payoff. If he believed that the labs were insecure in this way, then he should have researched what the most sensitive buildings were, and attempted to enter them. As it is, his account reads like someone who was driving around, saw that the fence ended, and decided to snoop in the name of journalism. Then, afterwards, he contacted some "sources" and used their claim that TA-33 involved "black-op" stuff to make it seem like the one little portion of it he tresspassed upon was itself important.
He doesn't provide a map, doesn't provide a description of TA-33, doesn't tell you how much area TA-33 covers, doesn't tell you how many different buildings there are. He provides no context from which the ignorant reader can evaluate his claims of discovering a serious security lapse. He does, however, through insinuation and omission, strongly imply that he's done something extraordinary. But he hasn't.
Breaking the law in this manner should be punished regardless. Nevertheless, I'd be willing to applaud his efforts and courage if he was actually doing something worthwhile and noble. Instead, he's grandstanding and being stupid about it, to boot. He deserves to be thrown in jail just for being such a pathetic example of a journalist.