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Home / Issues / Proliferation Risks & Threats |
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Summary of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee Meeting Dirty Bombs and Basement Nukes: The Terrorist Nuclear Threat March 6, 2002 David Smigielski & Michael Roston The following summary is drawn from RANSAC's observation of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee meeting regarding the nuclear capabilities of terrorist groups. This summary represents RANSAC's impression of the discussion, and none of these notes should be attributed as an official word-for-word transcript of the events. Senators attending the sessions: Sen. Joseph Biden [D-Delaware], committee Chair. During his opening remarks, Senator Biden stressed the point that radiological and nuclear terrorism are within the realm of possibility; that, in his words, "there are enough screwballs out there." Biden went on to address the greatest threat from these types of weapons, stating that intercontinental ballistic missiles were the least likely nuclear threat to American security. Instead, he said, the biggest danger is terrorist access to fissile material; what he has termed as "Russia's nuclear candy store." Biden concluded his opening remarks by stressing the need to know "what is out there and can terrorists get it...this threat must remain [just] a threat, and nothing more." Statements From The Speakers Dr. Richard A. Meserve, Chairman, Nuclear Regulatory Commission Meserve began with an assessment of the threat presented by radiological devices. In the opinion of the NRC, radiological devices are not effective mass casualty weapons [i.e. causing tens of deaths as opposed to thousands]. In addition, the level of shielding that is incorporated into civilian nuclear devices [such as x-ray machines] acts as a further safeguard by making the devices much heavier and more difficult to handle. Radiological devices are not effective weapons mainly because the wide dispersion of the radioactive material lowers its intensity. However, radiological devices may have severe psychological effects and may result in area contamination. Meserve went on to discuss the threat posed by nuclear material in civilian devices. According to his testimony, nuclear materials are widely used in civilian applications, such as medical research, but most of these materials are not useful in the creation of a radiological weapon. Meserve addressed the steps the NRC is taking to lessen the threat posed by radiological devices including issuing advisories to NRC licensees to bring radioactive materials under tighter control and working with the Office of Homeland Security, the FBI, and additional federal agencies to examine the current regulatory system. In regards to weapons grade nuclear materials, Meserve said that they are safe here but there is a significant risk of foreign source diversion; in his words "Protection at the source should be the priority." Dr. Donald D. Cobb, Associate Lab Director for Threat Reduction, Los Alamos National Laboratory Cobb emphasized four main points regarding nuclear materials:
Koonin began by addressing the problems of homeland defense, primarily the fact that finite resources must work to protect an infinite number of targets. With regards to nuclear material, Koonin elaborated on Meserve's testimony that although such materials are commonly used in a variety of industries, most are harmless. According to Koonin, some material can be extremely dangerous in small amounts. At this point Biden queried as to how small an amount was dangerous, Koonin responded that three curies, or a percentage of a gram, of some materials would render an area uninhabitable if spread over a half mile area. Koonin went on to describe the threat of radiological weapons as "very credible" due to the fact that the materials are easy to obtain and the expertise is out there. Koonin pointed out the weakness of the current regulatory system due to its reliance on the "good faith of licensed end-users." He then described a radiological attack on the financial district of a major city and the resulting economic damage that could ensue, as months would be needed for decontamination. From Koonin's point of view, seven steps needed to be taken:
Meserve, when asked about the "brain drain" in Russia stated, "the people we've talked to [in Russia] are patriots...there is no epidemic but one person could cause problems." Biden closed by stating that decisions need to be made as to where the limited funds should go, where security should be tightest, and what steps can be taken to increase detection. Notes on the Afternoon Testimony Henry Kelly, President of the Federation of American Scientists Dr. Kelly began his testimony with three main points:
To look at the impact of a dirty bomb explosion, Dr. Kelly presented several charts to the committee (available at: http://www.fas.org/ssp/docs/kelly_testimony_030602.pdf). The first chart presented the radioactive effects of a cesium-137 weapon exploded on Capitol Hill. The chart contained two rings, one involving the most immediate radioactive effects. The second ring represented the point at which contamination would no longer be a concern, according to a standard used by the Environmental Protection Agency, indicating that everything within a half-mile of the detonation would be contaminated. He added that calculating the effects of such a weapon for remediation purposes would be very difficult to determine when you started to talk about the inside of buildings, as the material could get trapped in HVAC systems. An additional concern of such a weapon's effects is that materials like cesium-137 fuse with concrete, and so one of two choices would have to be made: either destroy the buildings, or reconsider our threshold for unacceptable risk of contamination. He also presented a similar diagram that illustrated the impact of a cobalt-60 explosion at the tip of Manhattan Island. He suggested three solutions:
Early detection needs to be improved. Better detectors and sensors can be developed, especially to eliminate false alarms that could help prevent mass panic. He tied the idea of panic into the emergency response to a dirty bomb attack, and discussed the Brazilian cesium-137 incident in which the local emergency room was quickly overload with people claiming symptoms of radiation poisoning, while less than 10% of them were suffering from it. This inability to do effective triage is the biggest problem in emergency response that needs to be corrected. He worried that much of the training for first response teams at present is inadequate because the materials for training are of poor quality and out of date. Harry Vantine, Division Leader, Counterterrorism and Incident Response, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory Vantine started out noting that many warnings of nuclear danger are referred to the Energy Department because it is considered the repository of nuclear information. He felt that this analytical capability needed to have its supported augmented, and that Congress should provide it with a mandate to work out response to attacks involving specific locations and scenarios. Vantine noted that at the moment, much of the work on these scenarios is carried out voluntarily, and not as part of the Energy Department's or the Labs' daily activities. As a consequence, requests for information on risks need to be prioritized based upon the risk to life they represent. Currently, improvised nuclear weapons (i.e. the "basement nukes" in the Hearing's title, or INDs) and biological weapons are at the top of the list in terms possible dangers. Vantine discussed INDs, nuclear weapons that could be designed by terrorists who acquired the requisite materials, by saying that no matter how crude they are, their yield would have catastrophic effects. The enormous amounts of radiation produced would make response by emergency workers impossible. This impact could be differentiated from radiological weapons or dirty bombs, the impact of which would be more economic and psychological than anything else. He argued for materials protection as the best solution. Beyond this, he said many ideas existed for superior detection equipment that would provide early warning. A current problem is that such technologies have not been integrated into border patrol and urban defense systems. He felt that sites where cargo is offloaded, especially seaports, needed better detection, and that cities needed distributed radiation sensor networks. Consequence management was also an important feature to avoid a public panic and counter feelings of helplessness if such an attack occurs. In terms of longer-term R&D, Vantine felt that forensic analysis and attribution needed to be improved, pointing out that three months after the anthrax attacks, the responsible party had not been discovered. He said that DOE is doing new forensics work, but that these efforts may be too overwhelming for DOE to accomplish alone. In discussing the threat assessment, he suggested that even though it has a low probability, the use of an improvised nuclear weapon would be of high consequence, and so it is necessary to make it a priority in preventing such an occurrence. Dirty bombs, he said, were higher risk, but of much lower consequence. In conclusion, he stated that there is no silver bullet to counter WMD, and that any approach needed to be multi-layered. Question and Answer Session Senator Biden started the Q&A by asking what the engineering requirements were for the production of the crudest nuclear weapon. Vantine responded that this was difficult to assess. During counterterrorism exercises, DOE lab scientists had been asked to build an IND, but Vantine supposed that these scientists don't think like "terrorists," so it is hard to answer this question based on his experience. Senator Biden then said that he needed to know what to prioritize. For an IND, he understood that getting fissile material was the hardest part. He felt the safeguards in the United States were good, but that his confidence had diminished about the safeguards in other locations. He then asked if it would be relatively easy to transport fissile materials once they were acquired. Vantine responded that according to DOE's smuggling monitoring programs, there were more scams than good information, and that usually, people don't understand what it is that they are smuggling. Senator Biden followed-up his question by asking if un-shielded nuclear material would kill a trafficker. Specifically, he asked if the transport of plutonium is as difficult to transport as various other radioactive materials. Vantine responded that with proper shielding, plutonium could be transported, but that it was too confidential to get into details. The Senator next asked if nuclear material would have to be transformed once it is acquired to produce a weapon. Vantine said he could only speak about this in a closed session. Senator Biden then asked if there were any indicators and warning signs of someone illicitly manufacturing a nuclear weapon. He compared this to the precursor chemicals needed to manufacture illegal drugs. Vantine answered that some chemicals are used in the manufacture of nuclear weapons, and that in general, the warning signs go in the order of people, equipment, and information. Biden asked if the equipment needed to manufacture nuclear weapons involved certain metals that could be detected. Vantine said that no metal in particular was required, and that many paths can be taken in procuring nuclear weapons production equipment. He added that many technologies were dual use and so it was difficult to rely on this method for detection of illicit nuclear weapons production activities. Biden asked what the US can do to raise the bar and deter acquisition of nuclear weapons. Vantine answered that the US has the best-developed strategy to prevent acquisition of nuclear weapons at home, and that it needed to encourage other states to develop a comparable strategy. Senator Biden then remarked that increased safeguards around nuclear weapons material in other locations was an important first step, and asked Vantine if he had read the Baker-Cutler report. Vantine said he had not, and Biden said he would send it to him, that he wanted Vantine to read it, and offer a response to the report that was grounded in his technical knowledge of the subject. Senator Biden next brought up an anecdote, in which someone asked Robert Oppenheimer what the best tool was to find a smuggled nuclear weapon. Oppenheimer answered that it was a screwdriver - used to open every crate and box. He then asked all three panelists about the difficulty of detecting INDs and dirty bombs. Vantine answered that dirty bombs tended to emit a great deal of radiation, and that they are easier to detect. He was optimistic that more effective detectors were being generated to see past background radiation, but that better software had to be designed to complement these systems. Dr. Koonin was less confident about detection equipment, suggesting that radiological materials were regularly transported and missed by detectors. Dr, Kelly added that better detection could always be designed, but he agreed with Vantine that better systems needed to be developed, especially systems that could detect specific radioactive signatures. Koonin added that systems needed to be constantly tested to ensure that they were being properly used - i.e. deliberately defeating them whenever possible to see where their vulnerabilities were. Senator Biden next mentioned the IAEA mission to Georgia in January, and asked how useful its programs were. Koonin answered that these activities were a good start, but he felt that there was room for improvement within IAEA activities. The Senator asked if the programs needed to be expanded, or done differently. Koonin said that other states might see a different balance in the needs for better control of radioactive materials. Vantine said that cargo shipping detection problems needed to be addressed much more seriously by the IAEA. Senator Biden next asked about remediation after a dirty bomb attack. Specifically, he inquired building decontamination. Kelly answered that the Scandinavian countries had invested heavily in remediation related to Chernobyl, but did not have a good solution. He added that doing it right was important, because improper remediation could make the problem much worse. He said a typical solution was to dispose of contaminated dirt and tear down contaminated buildings. Biden then asked about remediation in the context of the New York attack scenario, i.e. if a dirty bomb had been used in the World Trade Center attacks. Koonin answered that a 1,000-curie weapon would have contaminated 30 square miles of New York City. Senator Biden then asked for some concluding remarks. Dr. Vantine spoke first, suggested that in looking toward the use of WMDs by terrorists, preventing the loss of life in a particular attack must always determine where priorities will be placed. In Chernobyl, he said, 30 people died and 140 suffered radiation poisoning, and that all of these people were nuclear workers. He said this impact paled in comparison to terrorist attacks using conventional weapons, and that while we must keep our eye on all dangers, the loss of life must be prioritized. Dr. Koonin then noted that improvements in the safety and security of radioactive materials needed to be prioritized. Dr. Kelly concluded the hearing by suggesting that dirty bombs are not the most serious, but that reasonable investments needed to be made in preventing terrorists from acquiring them. |
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