Slashdot Mirror
Scientists Who Smuggle Radioactive Materials
Lasrick writes: Although the complicity of scientists in the smuggling of radioactive materials has been a long-standing concern, smuggling-prevention efforts have so far failed to recognize a key aspect to the problem: scientists are often sought out to test the quality and level of the material well before it is taken to the black market. Egle Murauskaite of the U.S. National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism (START) describes why concentrating on this aspect of the smuggling process, long considered less egregious than the actual selling of the material, could really make a difference in keeping radioactive materials off the black market in the first place.
There is no black market for radionuclides - they are useless for criminals. And terrorists would want either something REALLY hot for a dirty bomb (in which case they don't need to do any tests except standing nearby with a dosimeter) or highly enriched uranium or weapons-grade plutonium. Both require expertise to turn into actual weapons.
We know that it is happening since 1985, there had been at least a case of a scientist (E.Brown, if i'm not mistaken) smuggling plutonium to give it to libyan terrorists, or even doing very dangerous experiments with it.
So I bought some Plutonium-186 from Frederick Hallam. Performed exactly as promised. Used to make Electron Pump. Excellent energy source. Would purchase again.
There's a lot of legitimate uses for elements and isotopes, and I can see people not wanting to get all mixed up with government red tape. Do we have a very good reason to ban trade or ownership of THE BASIC BUILDING BLOCKS OF MATTER? I mean, I could see restrictions on the few isotopes that could be used to make nuclear weapons, but other than that it's just another hazardous material.
Don't waste your vote! Vote for whoever you want, unless you live in a swing state it won't matter anyways
Unfortunately, there are no more TLAs left so the function will have to be folded into existing agencies.
Why is there an "insightful" mod and why isn't it "-1"? If I wanted insight, I wouldn't be reading
The black market for radioactive material is crushingly predominately for military or civilian usage of country which have difficulty of getting the material by normal means for a variety of reason. Not terror. In fact let us count the incidents :
1) two incidents with the Chechen burying something in Russia in both case it was source which were orphaned.
2) 2 counts of some intelligence source pretending al quaeda or similar wanting to do radiological bomb (among them Jose padilla which was not even charged for that ! It tells you how much evidence or even capacity the guy had for that).
3) Russia Killing somebody using polonium. Oh wait that's not terror that's assassination by a major country
That's it. NONE of those involved scientist smuggling radioactive material. So why the heck such story come up on regular basis , when it is quite certain that the black market for radioactive material is NOT for terror.
C. Sagan : A demon haunted world:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0345409469/
visit randi.org
I know of a scientist who smuggled a small amount of plutonium into the US. It was needed for an XRF instrument.
I wonder how much of this goes on for legit scientific investigations simply because the legal channels are so difficult to deal with.
Wow, dude. You need to do real research. You clearly didn't even bother reading the article, which gave incidents much more serious then you mention.
The IAEA keeps a database of incidents. Here's a hit from a quick Google search.
http://www.iaea.org/Publications/Magazines/Bulletin/Bull461/illicit_nuclear_trafficking_3.html
Between the period 1993 to 2003 alone there were 540 confirmed illicit trafficking incidents. Of those 540, 18 involved highly enriched uranium or plutonium.
And that was 2003. We've had another decade since then.
Most incidents aren't reported in the regular news cycle. By the time an incident becomes public knowledge too much time has past for regular people to care. So the only way to understand the actual threat is by following the research. The 24-hour news cycle and political pundits (scare mongers, peaceniks) aren't going to provide anything even remotely related to the facts.
On the contrary, I fear the biggest nuclear threat in the modern world is from individual "terror" groups. In the age of Mutually Assured Destruction, the only people with nothing to lose are those who can't be tied to a specific region. If a group of unaffiliated individuals attack a country, that country has no recourse for nuclear retaliation.
I highly recommend the documentary "Countdown to Zero", it recounts the stories of a couple of extremist organisations caught in the process of acquiring nuclear material, and the frightening thing is that most of these cases were caught by accident, ie. luck. And if those were found by accident, we have no idea how many transactions may have been successful.
To quote a Russian military prosecutor with regards to the tracking & security of nuclear material during the collapse of the Soviet Union:
"potatoes were guarded better"
Just start over and use "AAA".
Sleep your way to a whiter smile...date a dentist!
In order to continue the "War On Terror" they need to invent bogey men. Reality does matter to those people, just watch TV "News" every now and again.
A point that you miss is that there are countless beneficial uses for radioactive materials that are not related to terrorism, in fact every time you go near a medical facility pay attention to all of the signs.
When is the last time you ever heard a "3rd world countries only want uranium so that they can terrorize the world" speaking politician mention how they believe those countries can achieve medical procedures we use every day in hospitals and labs (not including Universities and other research facilities) without radioactive isotopes. Things like X-Rays, Chemotherapy, CT scans, and everything else found in a Nuclear Medicine office (which is a pretty long list).
Before you "but that's radioactive Iodine, not Uranium" you hopefully know that production of radioactive Iodine requires Uranium. The difference between weapons grade and medical grade Uranium is how much enrichment is done (much less for Medical use, much more for Military use)
Not to stray from the point, but I'd guess that there really is a black market for radioactive materials. The reason for that would not be for "dirty bombing terrorist acts", but because some nations block production in other countries. Prohibitions don't work, and often have an opposite result from the intention.
Iran for example was the target of a massive amount of espionage and insurgency trying to destroy their production, even though their enrichment was just enough for medical purposes (repeatedly verified by UN inspectors). And if you are one of the "Iran is Evil" believers, pray tell us who that so called aggressive nation hell bent on the destruction of Israel and takeover of the world has attacked in the last 200 years? They had to defend themselves against a US armed Saddam Hussein, but did not start that conflict.
With that much money being spent to stop Iran from production, what do you think a Hospital in Cambodia does? Argue when the US yells "terrorist!" and try to produce their own anyway with incredible cost and risk, or buy it elsewhere. Probably the latter, especially when it's probably cheaper and faster to acquire on a black market without all the red tape.
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.
If a group of unaffiliated individuals attack a country, that country has no recourse for nuclear retaliation.
Some governments, at least including the US, various UK states such as Canada and Australia, the PRC, and some continental European powers, have had agents working full time on just getting samples of radionucleotides from various fission plants, and analyzing those samples so that, if those nucleotides turn up in a dirty bomb or worse, an actual fission device, they can tell just where they were made by differences in various isotopic ratios, trace elements, and such. Knowing the source does not always mean those nations would retaliate against an attack from a group of apparently non-affiliated individuals, but it's certainly one piece of evidence in building a case for retaliation that would satisfy at least part of the international community. Nations have some interest therefore in reporting thefts of materials internationally, and various governments have some interest in setting up conditions for such reporting (i.e. in some cases, assuring the reporting country this will be classified and not released, and so hopefully not available for political candidate's uses.)
I'd say that against groups such as you describe, it may not be possible to respond with nuclear retaliation, or recourses may be limited. It may also be desirable to respond with something less damaging to innocent bystanders, other nations, and the environment, even if a nuclear option is possible. This could go anywhere from a use of actual boosted fission devices within hours of the first event, to a much more measured response, possibly weeks or even longer after the first event.
By the way, probably the most workable term for 'unaffiliated individuals' in US sources is "non-state actors", relatively short, straight-forward and to the point. In the US, emergency response teams called NEST would be responsible for the first stages of gathering samples from a dirty bomb incident or similar event, but their primary purpose is to stop such events before there is a detonation or risk to the public, if that's still possible when they become involved. NEST now stands for Nuclear Emergency Support Team, but in some older sources, the S stood for Search instead of Support. Calling one a NEST Team is redundant, but occasionally done by the media. NESTs are authorized to respond to incidents both inside and outside US borders, but just what that means in practice is unclear..
Who is John Cabal?
The pump is Bad... :)
Truth isn't Truth - Guliani
Those are hindering or directly endangering the government's work. They should be transferred to gitmo.
Patents Drive Free Software as Hurricanes Drive Construction Industry
"Although the complicity of scientists in the smuggling of radioactive materials has been a long-standing concern"
First I've heard of this, what are the names of these scientists caught smuggling of radioactive materials? I do believe we're in greater danger from nation states selling actual nuclear bombs to other nation states.