Relearning the ABCs: Terrorists and “weapons of mass destruction”

Nonproliferation Review

Volumn 7, Issue 2, 2000, Pages 108-119

  Maerli, Morten Bremer ^a  

^a STANFORD UNIVERSITY   (United States)

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EID: 84883236834     PISSN: 10736700     EISSN: 17461766     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1080/10736700008436814     Document Type: Article

References (86)

1. Tessa Walters, George Bunn, John Finn, and Sumit Ganguly at the Center for International Security and Cooperation (CISAC), Stanford University, Ronald Mitchell at the Center for Environmental Sciences and Policy (CESP), Stanford University, Eric Croddy and Jonathan B. Tucker at the Center for Nonproliferation Studies, Monterey Institute of International Studies, and Robert L. Rinne at SandiaNational Laboratory, for useful comments and suggestions on earlier drafts of this article. Any errors or inaccuracies are the sole responsibility of the author, as are the views expressed. The article was written during a beneficial stay at CISAC, made possible through the gracious funding of the Fulbright Foundation, The Scandina-vian-American Association, the Norwegian Ministry of Defense, NATO, and CISAC.
2. Atomic weapons include both nuclear and radiological weapons.
3. Jonathan B. Tucker and Amy Sands, “An Unlikely Threat,” Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists 55 (July/August 1999), p. 47.
4. Jonathan B. Tucker and Amy Sands, “An Unlikely Threat,” Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists 55, p. 46.
5. Biological toxins are among the most lethal agents known. A single microbe can, because it reproduces, theoretically produce the desired detrimental outcome in a target host. That is, a single smallpox virus or plague bacillus can grow and produce disease with fatal outcomes. However, it usually takes more than a single organism to establish an infection.
6. E.g., by using genetically engineered organisms acting directly at the cells. From J.P. Robinson, quoted in Lois R. Ember, “A Double-Edged Sword,” Chemical & Engineering News, December 6, 1999, p. 110.
7. Gavin Cameron, “WMD Terrorism in the United States: The Threat and Possible Countermeasures,” The Nonproliferation Review 7 (Spring 2000), p. 172.
8. The major comparisons throughout the text will be made between nuclear and biological weapons, being the potentially most lethal ABC weapons.
9. J. Miller, “Terrorism around the Mediterranean,” paper presented to the 29* Annual Conference of the International Institute for Strategic Studies, Barcelona, Spain, 1987.
10. Cameron, “WMD Terrorism in the United States,” p.163.
11. Wolfgang K.H. Panofsky, “Dismantling the Concept of ‘Weapons of Mass Destruction’,” Arms Control Today 28 (April 1998), p. 3.
12. Steve Fetter, “The Future of Nuclear Arms Control,” Physics and Society 28 (October 1999), p. 8.
13. While the FBI defines WMD as those involving chemical, biological, or nuclear weapons, others, like Richard A. Falkenrath, Robert D. Newman, and Bradley A. Thayer, in America’s Achilles’ Heel: Nuclear, Biological, and Chemical Terrorism and Covert Attack (Cambridge, MA: BCSIA Studies In International Security, The MIT Press, 1998), discuss NBC (nuclear, biological and chemical) weapons instead. For a useful discussion of the problems of defining WMD terrorism.
14. Cameron, “WMD Terrorism in the United States,” pp.163-164.
15. Walter Laqueur, The New Terrorism: Fanatics and the Arms of Mass Destruction (New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999), p. 7.
16. Cameron, “WMD Terrorism in the United States,” p.164.
17. Cameron, “WMD Terrorism in the United States,”, p.173.
18. Cameron, “WMD Terrorism in the United States,”, p.165.
19. These are the numbers as of December 1999. For a description of 55 of the terrorist incidents in the database, see “Terrorism in the U.S.A. Involving Weapons ofMass Destruction,” Chemical and Biological Weapons Nonproliferation Project, Center for Nonproliferation Studies, Monterey Institute for International Studies, January 1, 1999.
20. Cameron, “WMD Terrorism in the United States,” p.165.
21. Trend analyses inevitably involve inaccuracies due to the divergent definitions and categories of terrorism, which create biases in all statistics on terrorism. The statistical figures can be incomplete due to a lack of international observers or journalists or because of a high frequency of terrorism in a region (and thus a lack of newsworthiness), or Reflect a political agenda, governed by the strategic or national goals of a government that reports on terrorist incidents.
22. Bruce Hoffman, Inside Terrorism (London: Victor Gollancz, 1998), p. 29.
23. Laqueur, The New. Terrorism, p. 70.
24. David Rapoport, “Terrorism and Weapons of the Apocalypse,” National Security Studies Quarterly 5 (Summer 1999), p. 51.
25. For an interesting comparison of the efforts of these two highly different groups to acquire weapons of mass destruction, see Gavin Cameron, “Multitrack Micro-proliferation: Lessons From Aum Shinrikyo & A1 Qaida,” Studies in Conflict and Terrorism 22 (October-December 1999).
26. The nuclear weapons program of Aum Shinrikyo was abandoned for biological and chemical weapon programs. Using a track normally pursued by states, the Aum Shinrikyo tried to acquire and then enrich the fissile materials for their nuclear weapons from natural uranium mined at the cult’s premises in Australia. However, such an approach, which requires extensive equipment, would be a more feasible method for state nuclear weapons production. This may be why the cult abandoned that approach to follow a more opportunistic path.
27. Laqueur, The New Terrorism, p. 65.
28. [fEditor’s note: In order not to make it easier for unwanted actors to find information about how to build a nuclear bomb, the specific reference provided by the author has been removed from this endnote]
29. Luis W. Alvarez, The Adventures of a Physicist (New York: Basic Books Inc., 1987), p. 125.
30. “Fat Man,” the plutonium bomb used against Nagasaki, had the same design as the bomb used in the Trinity test on July 6,1945 in New Mexico.
31. Rodney W. Jones et al., Tracking Nuclear Proliferation: A Guide in Maps and Charts, 1998 (Washington, DC: Carnegie Endowment for Peace), p. 243.
32. The technical literature is flooded with relevant information. [Editor’s note: In order not to make it easier for unwanted actors to find information about how to build a nuclear bomb, the specific references provided by the author have been removed from this endnote.]
33. The lectures were delivered by Robert Oppenheimer’s theoretical lieutenant. [Editor’s note: In order not to make it easier for unwanted actors to find information about how to build a nuclear bomb, the individual’s name and specific references provided by the author have been removed from this endnote]
34. [Editor’s note: In order not to make it easier for unwanted actors to find information about how to build a nuclear bomb, the specific websites provided by the author have been removed from this endnote]
35. Frank Bamaby, How Nuclear Weapons Spread: Nuclear Weapon Proliferation in the 1990s (New York: Routledge,1993), p. 37.
36. [Editor’s note: In order not to make it easier for unwanted actors to find information about how to build a nuclear bomb, the specific reference provided by the author has been removed from this endnote]
37. J. Carson Mark, Theodore Taylor, Eugene Eyster, William Maraman, and Jacob Wechsler, “Can Terrorists Build Nuclear Weapons?” in Paul Leventhal and Yonah Alexander, eds., Preventing Nuclear Terrorism: The Report and Papers of the International Task Force on Prevention of Nuclear Terrorism (Lexington, MA: The Nuclear Control Institute and Lexington Books, 1987), p. 63.
38. Falkenrath etal., America’s Achilles’ Heel, p. 100.
39. A total of 2,050 nuclear tests have been carried out by seven nuclear weapons states. Center for Defense Information, The Defense Monitor 28 (1999).
40. E.g., the classic book of Samuel Glasstone and Philip J. Dolan, The Effects of Nuclear Weapons, third edition (Washington, DC: United States Department of Defense and the Energy Research and Development Administration, 1977). The book was first published in 1950.
41. A wide range of Internet sites offer both graphical and visual demonstrations of the powers of nuclear weapons, often by comparing them with the effects of conventional explosives. See e.g., .
42. Military Critical Technologies website, “Part II: Weapons of Mass Destruction Technologies” (1997, updated December 1999), p. II-5-1, .
43. The bare critical mass of HEU metal enriched to 94 percent U-235 is 52 kg. Mark et al., “Can Terrorists Build Nuclear Weapons?” p. 63.
44. These are the amounts required for a reasonably well-designed implosion bomb. The figures for a gun-type design weapon will be higher. See Matthew Bunn, The Next Wave: Urgently Needed Steps to Control Warheads and Fissile Materials (Washington, DC: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 2000), p. 9.
45. Thomas B. Cochran and Christopher E. Paine, “The Amount of Plutonium and Highly-Enriched Uranium Needed for Pure Fission Nuclear Weapons” (New York: Natural Resources Defense Council), revised, April 13, 1995, p. 9.
46. The minimum quantities given by these authors contrast with the “Significant quantities” of the International Atomic Energy Agency of 8 kg of plutonium and 25 kg of highly enriched uranium, respectively.
47. Gavin Cameron, “Nuclear Terrorism Reconsidered,” Current History (April 2000), p. 154.
48. Two-thirds of these materials are produced for military purposes. David Albright and Kevin O’Neill, eds., The Challenges of Fissile Material Control (Washington, DC: Institute for Science and International Security, ISIS Reports, 1999), p. 6.
49. David Albright, Frans Berkhout, and William Walker, Plutonium and Highly Enriched Uranium, 1996: World Inventories, Capabilities and Policies (London: Stockholm International Peace Research Institute and Oxford University Press, 1997), pp. 441-443.
50. A test was carried out in 1962 with reactor plutonium provided by the United Kingdom (US Department of Energy, “Additional Information Concerning Underground Nuclear Weapons Tests of Reactor-Grade Plutonium,” undated factsheet).
51. The isotopic composition of the material is classified, but may have had some weapons-grade qualities. Generally reactor-grade plutonium is significantly more radioactive than weapons-grade plutonium. This complicates the design, manufacture, and stockpiling of the weapons. Moreover, due to the high neutron background in reactor-grade plutonium, the material is less controllable. An increased risk of pre-ignitions and fizzle yields will be the result. But, this will also ease the detonation of the nuclear weapons. The ever-increasing quantities of plutonium from civilian nuclear power plants could thus make reactor-grade plutonium a more appealing option to terrorists. Reactor-grade plutonium is considered by the International Atomic Energy Agency as a direct-use, i.e., weapons-usable, material.
52. See, e.g., Washington Post, September 26, 1998, p. A19.
53. P. Mann, “Nuclear Risks Mount in Besieged Russia,” Aviation WeekandSpace Technology (September 1998).
54. Graham T. Allison, Owen R. Cote, Jr., Richard A. Falkenrath, and Steven E. Miller, Avoiding Nuclear Anarchy: Containing the Threat of Loose Russian Nuclear Weapons and Fissile Material (Cambridge, MA: CSIA Studies in International Security no. 12, MIT Press, 1996).
55. For documented thefts of weapons-usable fissile materials and an important and timely update on the proliferation challenges and steps to be taken to minimize the risk of nuclear proliferation from the Former Soviet Union, see Bunn, The Next Wave.
56. United States General Accounting Office (GAO), Nuclear Nonproliferation: Limited Progress in Improving Nuclear Material Security in Russia and the Newly Independent States, Report to Congressional Requesters, GAO/RCED/NSIAD-OO-82, March 2000, p. 7.
57. These rapid upgrades are referred to as “quick fixes.” They involve steps such as fortifying entrance and exit points, placing one-ton concrete blocks on material storage areas, or even just bricking up windows to secure these sites against terrorist or outside attack. The next level of protection includes material tracking and accounting systems to protect against insiders siphoning off these fissile materials. Both layers of protection are needed to secure materials well into the future. Statement of Rose Gottemoeller, Deputy Administrator for Defense Nuclear Nonproliferation (Acting), US Department of Energy, before the Subcommittee on Energy and Water Development, Committee on Appropriations, United States Senate, March 28, 2000, .
58. GAO Nuclear Nonproliferation, p. 8.
59. GAO Nuclear Nonproliferation, p. 7.
60. Statement by US Secretary of Energy Bill Richardson before the Committee on Armed Services Subcommittee on Military Procurement, US House of Representatives, March 4, 1999, .
61. J.L. Ford, R.C. Schuller, and William Potter, “Defining the Nuclear Smuggling Pathways,” paper presented at the International Conference on NonProliferation and Safeguards ofNuclear Materials in Russia, Moscow, May 14-17, 1996.
62. William Potter, “Before the Deluge? Assessing the Threat of Nuclear Leakage from the Post-Soviet States,” Arms Control Today 25 (October 1995).
63. Personal communication with A. Eveleens, IAEA Illicit Trafficking Database Office, April 17, 2000.
64. For a description of the case, see Bunn, The Next Wave, p. 17.
65. Scott Parrish and Tamara Robinson, “Efforts to Strengthen Export Controls and Combat Illicit Trafficking and Brain Drain,” The Nonproliferation Review 7 (Spring 2000), p. 112.
66. Bunn, The Next Wave, p. 17.
67. E.g., from soil samples and infected rodents. In addition to naturally occurring organisms, genetically modified organisms may be used as biological agents in the future.
68. Rapoport,- “Terrorism and Weapons of the Apocalypse,” p. 54.
69. Military Critical Technologies, “Weapons of Mass Destruction Technologies,”p. II-5-1.
70. National Academy of Sciences, Management and Disposition of Excess Weapons Plutonium (Washington, DC: Committee on International Security and Arms Control, National Academy Press, 1994), p. 33.For details, see .
71. In addition, long-term effects of radiation (e.g., Increased cancer and possibly genetic changes) will occur.
72. “Aum contained some 20 scientists with graduate degrees, and its laboratories were so good that the chief chemist said he left the university because Aum’s facilities were better.
73. Murray Sayle, “Nerve Gas and Four Noble Truths,” The New Yorker, April 1, 1996.
74. Mistakenly, the Tokyo subway incident often is quoted as a biological attack. It was, however, carried out with sarin, a chemical nerve agent.
75. Glasstone and Dolan, The Effects of Nuclear Weapons, p. 27.
76. P. Slovic, “Perception of Risk,” Science 236 (1987), pp. 280-285.
77. For the importance of radiation exposures being “confirmed” to cause psychological impact, see Morten B. Maerli, “The Norwegian Public’s Perception of Risk from Electromagnetic Fields,” Radiation Protection Dosimetry 68, nos. 3/4 (1996), pp. 235-238.
78. Laqueur, The New Terrorism, p. 70.
79. Cameron, “Nuclear Terrorism Reconsidered,” p. 155.
80. Rapoport, “Terrorism and Weapons of the Apocalypse,” p. 56.
81. Terrorists might go to an outbreak area to try to obtain infectious agents with proven lethality. In fact, members of Aum Shinrikyo went to Africa to attempt getting the Ebola virus for later terrorist acts, but without success.
82. R.S. Lanciotti et al. “Origin of the West Nile Virus Responsible for an Outbreak of Encephalitis in the Northeastern United States,” Science 286 (December 17, 1999), pp. 2333-2337.
83. K.R. Smith, P. Slovic, “Perception of Risk and the Future of Nuclear Power,” Physics and Society 23 (January 1994), .
84. Normally, the number of acute casualties will be low during acts of radiological terrorism, but their potential psychological impact could be strong. The most spectacular performance with radiological weapons so far was given by Chechen leaders in 1995. At that time, they threatened to turn Moscow into a “desert” by using armed and buried containers of cesium. After they gave notification to a television company, one container was, under heavy media coverage and publicity, found in the Izmailovskii Park of Moscow. The Moscow incident was more of a warning and an act of blackmail than anything else, as the actual radiation effects probably would have been limited.
85. Radioactive isotopes suitable for use as weapons include cesium-137, cobalt-60, iodine-131, and other short-lived, relatively easy-to-produce fission products. The most readily available source for the materials of radiological weapons is spent fuel from nuclear reactors; indeed, the spent fuel rods themselves are sufficiently “hot” to be used directly, although chopping or pulverizing them could increase the effects. Medical isotopes are another readily available source of radioactive material in quantities suitable for spreading terror. Several hundred radioactive sources get lost every year in the United States.
86. Figures for biological and chemical preparation are taken from John T. Finn and Tessa L. Walters, “Preparing for Bioterrorism and the Flu,” unpublished manuscript. These figures are compared with the overall request for $906 million for the fiscal year 2001 DOE budget on nuclear nonproliferation. Figures taken from the Statement of Rose Gottemoeller before the Senate Subcommittee on Energy and Water Development, March 28,2000.