Slashdot Mirror


How To Safeguard Loose Nukes

Lasrick writes "The Bulletin has an interesting article about the likelihood of terrorists obtaining nuclear material. 'Since 1993, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has logged roughly 2,000 cases of illicit or unauthorized trafficking of nuclear and radioactive material. Thirty illicit radioactive trafficking incidents were reported in the former Soviet region alone from 2009 to 2011. As Obama said in December, "Make no mistake, if [terrorists] get [nuclear material], they will use it."'"

32 of 167 comments (clear)

  1. The real worry is 3D printing by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Soon, with the whole periodic table available in one giant print cartridge, people will be able to 3D print nuclear weapons. If someone manages to download plans for the Tsar Bomba, we're cooked.

    1. Re:The real worry is 3D printing by letherial · · Score: 2

      Well considering that most material that is made, this includes all of earth and every molecule in your body was at one time a bunch of hydrogen under very intense pressured being cooked together basically, and most materials cannot be just made without these conditions...i think we are safe from terrorist printing nukes in the foreseeable future.

    2. Re:The real worry is 3D printing by rossdee · · Score: 2

      And what would the cost of that cartridge be? Add in the cost of the packaging (lead shielding) and then the normal markup on printer cartridges, and the economy of the galaxy would collapse if somebody bought one. (see the history of Magrathea)

    3. Re:The real worry is 3D printing by AK+Marc · · Score: 2

      Bah, Star Trek did it decades ago.

  2. Obama also said he would close Gitmo by e065c8515d206cb0e190 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Seriously, what's the point of that Obama quote?

    1. Re:Obama also said he would close Gitmo by c0lo · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Seriously, what's the point of that Obama quote?

      "Be afraid, be very afraid! That all you need to know" - seems like a good point to me (even if it's not necessary good for me or, for the matter, for the rest of about 7 billions with the exception of the people in power).

      --
      Questions raise, answers kill. Raise questions to stay alive.
    2. Re:Obama also said he would close Gitmo by girlintraining · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Seriously, what's the point of that Obama quote?

      To continue the fascade that a bunch of people who kick it out in the desert and shoot their guns in the air at weekend training camps are evil because they're muslims or whatever, as opposed to people who kick it up in the woods and shoot their guns in the air at weekend training camps here, but aren't? Just a thought.

      I'm sure there are terrorists out there... but I'm also reasonably sure they are so few in number as to not be a serious threat. Even if a 9/11 happened every year, it wouldn't be serious, in terms of economic damage and loss of life. However, there are legions of people who have been labelled as such because it's the only way to justify spending trillions of dollars... I mean, what if there were only 300 terrorists in the whole world. What then? We spend a trillion dollars to "contain" them... when we really ought to just pay them 3 billion dollars each to move to a secluded island and live out their remaining days in luxury. Bonus: It would be cheaper than what we've been doing so far...

      --
      #fuckbeta #iamslashdot #dicemustdie
    3. Re:Obama also said he would close Gitmo by girlintraining · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Hint: they don't want luxury and they don't want peace, until their flags are flying over all corners of the civilized world and their ideas about Islam (not just any brand of Islam either) dominate.

      Three billion dollars buys a lot of change in thinking. You can get a Congressman to sell his soul for a lot less.

      They are America's sworn enemies. We can't wish or negotiate that away, we have to defend ourselves. And the best defense is a good offense. That's why Obama's administration deserves huge props for taking out Bin Laden. That's how it's done, Dubya. That's how it must always be done.

      Yes! We must bomb them! shoot them! Drop nukes! At a cost of many trillions of dollars! Because they don't want money! They don't want to be rich! They're poor, living in mud huts in the desert, and don't wanna change! Not ever! Not one single one! So passionate is their belief, they would happily choose suicide over spending the rest of their days rolling in hundred dollar bills naked! YES! I BELIEVE YOU!

      Also, your fly is down.

      --
      #fuckbeta #iamslashdot #dicemustdie
    4. Re:Obama also said he would close Gitmo by sjames · · Score: 2

      To be fair, Obama's approach has been much more effective than GWB so far. I would like to see our forces completely withdrawn from the region and replaced by small specialized forces to hunt down the actual terrorists (yes, even using drones) while NOT shooting up the countryside and generally convincing common people that the terrorists are right about us.

      Sadly, nearly anything would be cheaper and more effective than our invasion has been.

    5. Re:Obama also said he would close Gitmo by lesincompetent · · Score: 3

      To continue the fascade that a bunch of people who kick it out in the desert and shoot their guns in the air at weekend training camps are evil because they're muslims or whatever[...]

      Yes. They are (doing) evil (things) because of their religion. Like some christians. Religion is the problem here.

      Religion is an insult to human dignity. With or without it you would have good people doing good things and evil people doing evil things. But for good people to do evil things, that takes religion.

      -Steven Weinberg

    6. Re:Obama also said he would close Gitmo by tehcyder · · Score: 2

      try looking at the facts... obama had NOTHING to do with taking bin laden out. in fact he would have stopped it from happening if he had more info and had a chance....

      Yeah, it was George W Bush that killed Bin Laden. With his bare hands. But the goddamned liberal media spun it to be pro-minority, as always.

      --
      To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
    7. Re:Obama also said he would close Gitmo by DarkOx · · Score: 2

      To be fair, Obama's approach has been much more effective than GWB so far. I would like to see our forces completely withdrawn from the region and replaced by small specialized forces to hunt down the actual terrorists (yes, even using drones) while NOT shooting up the countryside and generally convincing common people that the terrorists are right about us.

      Based on exactly what?

      It was the troop surge that worked. Bush pretty much started with the small force go after high value targets strategy we are using now and it failed then. It turned out you had to establish basic control and security before you could move to a precise targeting strategy. To my knowledge none of our military strategists and commanders have gone on record suggesting these strategies would have been viable without doing the surge and many have cautioned against over dependance on special operations. In other words people who make a living studding this stuff still see it as a support role.

      The drone program is by many accounts hurting Al Qaeda quite badly but is by many accounts harming lots of civilians, and further endangering the stability of already tenuous various states like Pakistan and Yemen. This may be causing a general break down of society in places as people fear going out because of the drones, seeding the idea their government is not sovereign and dose not represent them but is a US puppet breading contempt for the law by the people there, and finally creating more generalized hatred of the USA. Its likely we are attacking the hydra with sword here, cutting off the Al Qaeda heads in the fashion is growing the terrorists of tomorrow.

      Its still very unclear the Federal government in Afghanistan can survive after we complete the troop withdrawal. The Iraqi government slowly moves from one corruption scandal to the next; ever since we left (and somewhat before we did too).

      We more or less left the Egyptian public hung out to dry while their society becomes a military dictatorship at worst, one election than permanent theocracy probably, or just another failed state situation. I am not sure what we could have or should have done but what we have done by simply continuing to prop up the military with foreign aide and weapons there is morally bankrupt on all kinds of levels. We should have at the vary lease been "hands off until you all work it out." unless we could come up with something better.

      Libya is a slow moving disaster as well. I am not referring to the embassy in Benghazi either, but to the fact that the government is not able to provide basic security to people living there. Various militia groups are the 'law' in many parts; and they don't have a great human rights record. Its not unlikely that Libya will also become a failed state.

      All in all I don't see much out there suggesting the quality of life has improved for people living in those regions, basic justice and human rights are not be better protected, American influence in the region has not been enhanced, popular opinion of the USA is not much better. All in all I don't Obama's foreign policy as being much different than Bush's except in the most superficial use of language; and in general no more or less successful. You can argue we only got into some of these messes because of Bush and I will partly concede that point; but I think the Libya intervention and the general aggressive expansion of the drone program servers as a strong indicator that Obama in actually not any less hawkish. Had he been in the Oval Office on Sept 11th I really have strong doubts our national response would have been a whole lot different.

      --
      Repeal the 17th Amendment TODAY! Also Please Read http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
    8. Re:Obama also said he would close Gitmo by jbengt · · Score: 2

      It was the troop surge that worked.

      The most effective part of "the surge" was us hiring militias to work on our side.

      Bush pretty much started with the small force go after high value targets strategy we are using now and it failed then.

      On the contrary, the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq were based on overwhelming military force, just not overwhelming numbers of troops. It's true that our military's original strategy stupidly assumed that the people would instantly rally to our side, start new democracies, and go merrily on their way, and the GWB strategy downplayed the potential for fighting among factions, within factions, and resentment of foreign invaders. So we did go in with too little force to force the establishment of a new civil order, but that is not the same as just going after Al-Qeada leaders and terrorists.

      It turned out you had to establish basic control and security before you could move to a precise targeting strategy.

      Only because they wanted to overthrow the existing governments and establish new governments that would follow their neo-con ideal for governance.

  3. As Obama said in December, by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    "Make no mistake, if [terrorists] get [nuclear material], they will use it."

    This coming from the world's biggest terrorist, the Drone Ranger

    1. Re:As Obama said in December, by c0lo · · Score: 2

      "Make no mistake,

      Translation

      --
      Questions raise, answers kill. Raise questions to stay alive.
  4. Radioactive material != Nuclear weapons by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    People need to stop conflating radioactive materials and nuclear weapons. The only 3 isotopes that matter for nuclear weapons are U-233, U-235, and Pu-239. These are the fissile nuclides. Get enough of these together and you can level a city. Contrast this with any dirty bomb material. If you get enough of that together and blow it up, you've simply provided contractors with 3 months of decontamination work with pressure washers. Not the same thing.

    1. Re:Radioactive material != Nuclear weapons by fustakrakich · · Score: 2, Informative

      You're forgetting, panic = ratings

      --
      “He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
    2. Re:Radioactive material != Nuclear weapons by thesupraman · · Score: 4, Interesting

      And dont forget, it better be a pretty damn small city, and you need a way to get the (not small...) bomb to correct altitude, AND it would have to work..

      It would probably be much more effective, and one hell of a lot easier to mail what ever fissile material you have to the local media, claiming to have a bomb...

    3. Re:Radioactive material != Nuclear weapons by Mr.+Slippery · · Score: 4, Informative
      --
      Tom Swiss | the infamous tms | my blog
      You cannot wash away blood with blood
    4. Re:Radioactive material != Nuclear weapons by Bomazi · · Score: 4, Informative

      Neptunium-237 is weapon-usable as well.

    5. Re:Radioactive material != Nuclear weapons by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

      I read that and I find that rather stupid. I'll tell you why.

      You see, I just spent part of this week getting a new Cobalt-60 source exactly like is described in the article installed in the facility where I work. 2500 Curies. You definitely don't want to be around it when it is exposed. If you were to steal it, grind it up, and evenly dust it over a thousand square kilometers, you'd have 2.5 Ci per sq kilometer, or 2.5 microCuries per square meter, or about 3700 dpm/m^2.

      Just so that you know, the typical standard of cleanliness when cleaning up an area which has been exposed to a Co-60 spill is about 200 dpm per 100 cm^2, or about 20000 dpm/m^2. In other words, the dirty bomb scenario described in the paper would be barely within the limits of detection, and if someone performed a contamination test, the area would register as "clean".

      Now, of course, in real life the dust would not be spread evenly, but then we aren't talking 1000 sq km as the article said, now are we? In real life, it would also be fairly easy to clean up as well, at least to a livable standard.

      I get really tired of dealing with all the locks, alarm systems, etc. that are now required just to have one of these sources on site. I totally understand and approve safety precautions like interlocks, etc. But having to get a key to unlock the key box to get the other key that unlocks the bunker where the source is, when it takes 12 hours to install or remove the source, just so that phantom terrorists don't steal it is a daily pain in my ass.

    6. Re:Radioactive material != Nuclear weapons by Swampash · · Score: 2

      Afterwards people will see how much of a non-issue it is, and no one will be afraid of dirty bombs anymore.

      Yes, in exactly the same way that nobody is afraid of terrorists getting on airliners any more.

      Let me rephrase because the sarcasm didn't really work. If there is a successful attack with fissile material, America will lose its mind so hard that the post-9/11 insanity that persists today will seem like a happy memory.

  5. Re:It's the USA's fault there are so many nukes by confused+one · · Score: 5, Insightful

    If we didn't keep building nukes, forcing other countries to keep building nukes to compete....

    We haven't built any new nuclear weapons in decades. In fact, we've been gradually decomissioning them, in step with Russia, as we reach new treaty agreements.

  6. Re:It's the USA's fault there are so many nukes by Nyder · · Score: 2

    Yeah, let's just sit around complacently and wait for the next 9/11.

    You dumbass.

    considering how much rights the people of the united states lost due to laws after 9/11, I don't think we could handle another one. They have no choice but to lock up everyone since taking away our rights wouldn't of worked.

    9/11, we get attack by "terrorist" so we go invade a country that has nothing to do with it.

    Like I said, the USA is a bully.

    --
    Be seeing you...
  7. Re:It's the USA's fault there are so many nukes by NalosLayor · · Score: 3, Insightful

    How many nuclear weapons do you think the US has built in the last twenty years? Hint: It's zero.

  8. Comment removed by account_deleted · · Score: 2

    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  9. Sane foreign policy... by Darkness404 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    The US needs to adopt sane foreign policy, our entire stance on nuclear weapons is this mythical idea that no country other than allies of the US can reproduce an invention from the 1940s. If a third-world country wants to be assured that it won't be invaded by the US, it needs to have nuclear weapons.

    Consider the different attitude the US has when discussing negotiations with nuclear-armed states and states without nuclear weapons. Nuclear-armed states are treated with much more respect and resort to diplomacy rather than outright invasion.

    --
    Taxation is legalized theft, no more, no less.
    1. Re:Sane foreign policy... by khallow · · Score: 3, Insightful

      In some cases, some cultures are completely alien to another.

      It's worth noting that none of the cultures you mention count. There's two problems that people often don't get about nukes. One is the crazy person with nukes. For whatever reason, including the above mentioned "completely alien" culture, you could have someone far more willing to use nukes than you would expect.

      Another is extremely short decision time frames. There are countries which because they are near one another, have only a few minutes to decide whether some blips on a screen (or the equivalent) are either innocuous (could be flaws in the detector hardware, rocket test, whatever) or the end of their civilization. The faster this decision needs to be made, the more likely it is that someone makes a bad choice, such as launching a retaliatory strike.

      Proliferation increases the chances that either of the above potential problems becomes an actual problem that kills lots of people.

  10. Re:It's the USA's fault there are so many nukes by anagama · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I agree with the idea that America can't survive another terrorist attack -- I don't mean of course, the political entity, I mean the ideals America is supposed to be built on -- things like privacy, the right to a fair trial before the government kills you or executes you, the right to travel ... you know, freedom.

    In fact, if you really think about it, it seems we didn't survive 9/11.

    And of course, 80% of the populace likes it this way.

    What will be interesting is whether after the next terrorist attack -- there will be one because it is completely impossible to prevent every such possible instance of terrorism -- is whether we will just overtly shift into police state mode. The unitary executive theory will sure prove handy to whoever is president at that time.

    --
    What changed under Obama? Nothing Good
  11. Re:It's the USA's fault there are so many nukes by gman003 · · Score: 2, Informative

    The USSR built nearly twice as many warheads as the US.

    Informative chart

  12. Obama catch phrases by phantomfive · · Score: 4, Funny

    "Make no mistake" is what Obama says so you'll think he's serious. When he tells someone they're wrong, he says, "let me be clear." "It will not be easy" means you should vote for him (the voting booth is just down the street, you can do it!), and when he says, "here's the deal" who knows what it means.

    --
    "First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
  13. North Korea by PerMolestiasEruditio · · Score: 2

    1/ They have the bomb.
    2/ They are desperate for money, and have few qualms, and seemingly little good judgement about doing whatever it takes to get money to maintain their fucked up internal power structure. $2 billion per year exports at moment, but $3 billion imports and $20 billion external debt
    3/ There are numerous groups in the world who do not like the west (some 'terrorists', some countries) who could probably raise a few hundred million to a billion dollars to buy a nuclear bomb.
    4/ Short of hitting them with a pre-emptive nuclear strike North Korea cannot be invaded/stopped without massive risk/destruction to South Korea, Japan, and possibly USA (nuclear weapons + ICBM), also huge danger from China if it comes to a shooting war/invasion.

    Pretty good chance that North Korea will sell a bomb to someone to use on a western city. Iran and pakistan are also moderately dangerous. I wouldn't feel particularly safe living in coastal USA cities, or Israel for that matter in the next 20 years.