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Terrorism Likely

Risk of nuclear terror is high and increasing


Schwartz 15, India Country Director at Office of the Secretary of Defense, Right of Boom: The Aftermath of Nuclear Terrorism, Benjamin Schwartz, https://scholar.google.com/scholar?start=0&q=nuclear+terrorism&hl=en&as_sdt=0,5&as_ylo=2015

WHILE MANY IN THE MEDIA AND THE POLITICAL ESTABLISHMENT have long debated whether or not the threat of nuclear terrorism was real, this isn’t a question on anyone’s mind in the days after the nuclear explosion in downtown Washington, DC. World leaders are unanimous in their expressions of shock, and defensive of their conduct. “We always knew this was a possibility,” remarks the president, flanked by prime ministers and presidents from the closest allied nations, “but there were no signs of a new threat.” While most Americans are silenced by a collective horror, a small number search for someone familiar to blame: “If only the government had ...“ and “The administration hadn’t ...“ These voices murmur with varying degrees of derision. Yet even with the clarity of hindsight, intelligence officials, academics, and pundits can’t point to any single event that marked the moment when nuclear terrorism became an urgent problem. A few thoughtful observers recall the warning of Paul Bracken, who stated that often during periods of rapid change “we are caught up in the spiral of events, lost in its energy, blind to the accumulation of slow changes remaking our world.”1 The proliferation of nuclear knowledge and materials occurred gradually for over half a century. A radioactive crater now testifies to the fact that a tipping point had been passed but gives no indication of how, when, or where. “How did this happen?” is the question on the lips of nearly everyone. But no one in a position of authority can identify a single cause. The magnitude of the attack overwhelms all response resources. Public officials announce a twenty-four-hour curfew throughout Washington while emergency officials are dispatched to the blast site. They contend with the unique features of a nuclear detonation: the explosive blast, direct nuclear radiation, and thermal radiation. The blast’s shock wave generated surface winds approaching one hundred miles per hour, blowing off building walls and breaking glass with enough force to cause injury throughout a three-mile radius. Few of the buildings in a half mile of the blast remain standing, and those that do are not structurally sound. The city’s underground infrastructure—tunnels, the subway system, water mains, power, telecommunications and gas conduits—are now blocked and will remain so for weeks. One mile from ground zero, sturdy buildings are standing but have been rendered unstable, as have most family homes. People are desperate to get as far away as possible, but rubble and overturned vehicles clog streets and fires rage across the city. Panic induced by the visible devastation is compounded by fear of unobservable dangers. There is no consensus on the geographic boundaries of radioactive dust and debris. Nuclear radiation and contaminants associated with building materials, such as asbestos and heavy metals, are detectable as far as ten to twenty miles from the blast site. Victims within this range are already experiencing nausea and vomiting. In the days ahead an agricultural embargo will be declared for the Chesapeake Bay, all of Delaware and parts of New Jersey, Maryland and Virginia, but that is far from the minds of the first responders.2 While emergency responders deal with the immediate human consequences of the attack—treating the injured, stabilizing damaged infrastructure and rebuilding water, sewage, and electrical systems—the experts’ suddenly see a malign trend that had hitherto been obscured by other concerns: the slow but inexorable spread of the technologies of clandestine nuclear warfare. COULD THIS REALLY HAPPEN? Is the scenario above simply the product of an overactive imagination and a penchant for alarmism? This is a reasonable question to ask. And it is worth answering before embarking on an exploration of potential responses to nuclear terrorism. Those who assert that there is a genuine threat of nuclear terrorism should acknowledge at the outset that there are legitimate reasons for skepticism. In fact, those who have paid closest attention to the issue over the years may be most conditioned to be incredulous. They have heard public officials repeatedly issue dire warnings of impending terrorist attacks, watched and seen that no attack materializes, and then have been presented with little or no evidence to support the initial alert. It is also perfectly understandable that reasonable people question the competence and/or trustworthiness of US national security officials, particularly those responsible for nuclear issues. This is especially so in light of the second American-led invasion of Iraq—a war justified to the public largely on the basis of nonexistent nuclear weapons. Moreover, warnings of impending doom didn’t originate with then vice president Dick Cheney. I think we have to live with the expectation,” remarked a Los Alamos atomic engineer in 1973, ‘that once every four or five years a nuclear explosion will take place and kill a lot of people.” This statement is cited in John McPhee’s The Curve of Binding Energy, which detailed concerns about the proliferation of nuclear weapons to nonstate actors over forty years ago.3 In the context of this history, accusations of Chicken Little—like behavior aren’t flippant reactions. While exaggeration may mislead the credulous and offend the perceptive, neither the absence of a precedent for nuclear terrorism nor the intelligence failure regarding Saddam Hussein’s WMD program change the growing threat. Many of these conditions aren’t new; they have existed since the dawn of the nuclear age, and the world has been very fortunate that the danger has been effectively managed for so long. Other conditions are truly unprecedented. The world crossed from Graham Allison’s "Three No’s” into three Yeses with a whimper rather than a bang, but we have nevertheless entered an environment of extraordinary risk. Allison’s contention that “[t]he detonation of a terrorist nuclear device in an American city is inevitable if the U.S. continues on its present course” is certainly debatable . Yet an objective assessment of the current nuclear security situation and its future trajectory leads to an unavoidable conclusion: We are more vulnerable to nuclear terrorism than at any time since the dawn of the nuclear age. THE ENDURING THREAT The greatest danger remains the great discovery—the knowledge that can’t be unlearned. Physical matter is made up of atoms. An atom is composed of a nucleus, which is an assembly of bounded protons and neutrons that is orbited by electrons. The number of protons in an atom’s nucleus defines the element, the basic category of physical matter. The total number of protons and neutrons, taken together, is called the atomic weight. Variations ¡n an element’s atomic weight reflect variation in the number of neutrons bonded with its protons. These variations are known as isotopes. Uranium-235 is an isotope that contains 143 neutrons (which we know by subtracting the 92 protons from the total atomic weight of 235). Bombarding a nucleus that has a large number of protons with additional neutrons can split the atom, a process known as fission. Uranium-235 is especially well suited for this type of reaction given the high number of protons. In keeping with Albert Einstein’s famous equation E=mc2, when fission occurs energy is released because the “binding energy” that holds the neutrons and protons together needs an outlet. The world has known this since 1938, when Lise Meitner and Otto Hahn figured it out while working at the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute in Berlin. The tremendous energy unleashed by an atomic bomb occurs because a chain reaction takes place when neutrons emerging from one fission reaction trigger other fission reactions—a process that requires enough fissile material for ‘supercriticality.” The concept of a chain reaction was investigated by Frederic Joliot-Curie ¡n France and Enrico Fermi and Leó Szilárd in the United States in 1939. This work prompted Albert Einstein to sign his famous letter to president Franklin Delano Roosevelt in August of that year: In the course of the last four months it has been made probable— through the work of Joliot in France as well as Fermi and Szilard in America—that it may become possible to set up a nuclear chain reaction in a large mass of uranium, by which vast amounts of power and large quantities of new radium-like elements would be generated. Now it appears almost certain that this could be achieved in the immediate future. This new phenomenon would also lead to the construction of bombs, and it is conceivable—though much less certain—that extremely powerful bombs of a new type may thus be constructed. A single bomb of this type, carried by boat and exploded in a port, might very well destroy the whole port together with some of the surrounding territory.5

Russian stocks are super vulnerable --- risk’s uniquely high now


Lynch ‘15, staff writer at International Business Times, Dennis, Russia Ends Nuke Cooperation With US, Endangers Global Terrorism Fight, http://www.ibtimes.com/russia-ends-nuke-cooperation-us-endangers-global-terrorism-fight-1789400

Russia is scaling down its hugely successful cooperative effort with the U.S. to secure its nuclear materials, raising concerns over the safety and security of tons of dangerous nuclear materials. Security and non-proliferation experts said the move harms a global effort to secure nuclear material and could leave materials vulnerable to theft by terrorists. Russia has decided to no longer take U.S. funding for on-site security, training and nuclear security measures at its borders under the 25-year-old Cooperative Threat Reduction program that the two countries agreed upon following the fall of the USSR in the early 1990s, according to the Boston Globe. The CTR programs were set to end in 2018, but the Russians are pulling out early amid strained relations between the two countries over the ongoing rebel crisis in Ukraine. “If the U.S. and Russia aren’t leading then that sets a bad example for the rest of the world. We have a special responsibility to combat nuclear terrorism,” said Andrew Bieniawski, of the Nuclear Threat Initiative in Washington, D.C. “This is an area that should not be subject to what is going on in the broader geopolitical situation.” Over 7,500 warheads were dismantled under the CTR program since 1991, according to the U.S. Department of Defense’s Defense Threat Reduction Agency. The U.S. paid at least $2 billion since 1991 to Russia to fund security upgrades around the country over fears that terrorists could get their hands on nuclear materials through the scores of disgruntled, unpaid workers or corrupt officials in the chaos of post-Soviet Russia. While the upgrades have vastly improved security at facilities and the border, there was more work to be done. The U.S. allocated $100 million for upgrades in 2015. But Russia's decision means joint security operations at all 18 of Russia’s civilian-run facilities holding weapons-grade materials will end and the installation of state-of-the art surveillance systems in 13 nuclear storage facilities will be canceled, along with upgrades at 7 “nuclear cities,” or the closed communities built around Russian military nuclear facilities, according to RT. Many doubt Russia will continue to fund these projects to the extent needed to maintain security. In July, the U.S. Department of Energy warned that “securing these stockpiles will not [be done] to the standards necessary unless the United States continues to invest."

Terrorists are motivated to use WMDs


Allison, Director, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, ‘12 [Graham, Douglas Dillon Professor of Government, Harvard Kennedy School, "Living in the Era of Megaterror", Sept 7, http://belfercenter.ksg.harvard.edu/publication/22302/living_in_the_era_of_megaterror.html]

Forty years ago this week at the Munich Olympics of 1972, Palestinian terrorists conducted one of the most dramatic terrorist attacks of the 20th century. The kidnapping and massacre of 11 Israeli athletes attracted days of around-the-clock global news coverage of Black September’s anti-Israel message. Three decades later, on 9/11, Al Qaeda killed nearly 3,000 individuals at the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, announcing a new era of megaterror. In an act that killed more people than Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbor, a band of terrorists headquartered in ungoverned Afghanistan demonstrated that individuals and small groups can kill on a scale previously the exclusive preserve of states. Today, how many people can a small group of terrorists kill in a single blow? Had Bruce Ivins, the U.S. government microbiologist responsible for the 2001 anthrax attacks, distributed his deadly agent with sprayers he could have purchased off the shelf, tens of thousands of Americans would have died. Had the 2001 “Dragonfire” report that Al Qaeda had a small nuclear weapon (from the former Soviet arsenal) in New York City proved correct, and not a false alarm, detonation of that bomb in Times Square could have incinerated a half million Americans. In this electoral season, President Obama is claiming credit, rightly, for actions he and U.S. Special Forces took in killing Osama bin Laden. Similarly, at last week’s Republican convention in Tampa, Jeb Bush praised his brother for making the United States safer after 9/11. There can be no doubt that the thousands of actions taken at federal, state and local levels have made people safer from terrorist attacks. Many are therefore attracted to the chorus of officials and experts claiming that the “strategic defeat” of Al Qaeda means the end of this chapter of history. But we should remember a deeper and more profound truth. While applauding actions that have made us safer from future terrorist attacks, we must recognize that they have not reversed an inescapable reality: The relentless advance of science and technology is making it possible for smaller and smaller groups to kill larger and larger numbers of people. If a Qaeda affiliate, or some terrorist group in Pakistan whose name readers have never heard, acquires highly enriched uranium or plutonium made by a state, they can construct an elementary nuclear bomb capable of killing hundreds of thousands of people. At biotech labs across the United States and around the world, research scientists making medicines that advance human well-being are also capable of making pathogens, like anthrax, that can produce massive casualties. What to do? Sherlock Holmes examined crime scenes using a method he called M.M.O.: motive, means and opportunity. In a society where citizens gather in unprotected movie theaters, churches, shopping centers and stadiums, opportunities for attack abound. Free societies are inherently “target rich.” Motive to commit such atrocities poses a more difficult challenge. In all societies, a percentage of the population will be homicidal. No one can examine the mounting number of cases of mass murder in schools, movie theaters and elsewhere without worrying about a society’s mental health. Additionally, actions we take abroad unquestionably impact others’ motivation to attack us. As Faisal Shahzad, the 2010 would-be “Times Square bomber,” testified at his trial: “Until the hour the U.S. ... stops the occupation of Muslim lands, and stops killing the Muslims ... we will be attacking U.S., and I plead guilty to that.” Fortunately, it is more difficult for a terrorist to acquire the “means” to cause mass casualties. Producing highly enriched uranium or plutonium requires expensive industrial-scale investments that only states will make. If all fissile material can be secured to a gold standard beyond the reach of thieves or terrorists, aspirations to become the world’s first nuclear terrorist can be thwarted. Capabilities for producing bioterrorist agents are not so easily secured or policed. While more has been done, and much more could be done to further raise the technological barrier, as knowledge advances and technological capabilities to make pathogens become more accessible, the means for bioterrorism will come within the reach of terrorists. One of the hardest truths about modern life is that the same advances in science and technology that enrich our lives also empower potential killers to achieve their deadliest ambitions. To imagine that we can escape this reality and return to a world in which we are invulnerable to future 9/11s or worse is an illusion. For as far as the eye can see, we will live in an era of megaterror.

They can overcome tech barriers


Lempke 15, Columnist at Georgetown Security Studies Review, Maciej, Nuclear Terrorism: How to Respond?, http://georgetownsecuritystudiesreview.org/2015/01/23/nuclear-terrorism-how-to-respond/

The threat of nuclear terrorism should not be underestimated. The main reason for concern is not only the possibility of a terrorist group acquiring a nuclear device, but also the inability of responding to such an attack. This issue should be addressed by policymakers who ought to be ready for all possible contingencies in an event of a nuclear terrorist attack. Governments should be aware of the best available options for responding to a nuclear terrorist attack, as inaction in these circumstances would not be a viable alternative. Nuclear terrorism is officially viewed as one of the greatest threats to a state’s security.[1] A number of policymakers and academics argue that despite the technological difficulties surrounding the construction of a nuclear device, a determined terrorist group is capable of acquiring and transporting one across state borders.[2] Many indicate that once possessing the appropriate means, the transfer of nuclear material and assembly of a gun-type nuclear device made from highly enriched uranium is relatively straightforward.[3] This has been supported by a number of studies examining what it would take to build a nuclear weapon by a non-state actor.[4] A scenario presented by Jeffrey Lewis and Peter Zimmerman revealed that with an estimated budget of 10 million dollars and a highly skilled team of 19 people, the engineering work required to construct a nuclear device could be easily done – particularly since most of the essential parts are available online.[5] Contrary to the aforementioned views, some argue nuclear terrorism is an overstated threat. In their view, nuclear weapons are not the most effective mean of achieving the ends of terrorist groups, and their acquisition requires unique skills, organization, and secrecy that are out of reach for any non-state actor.[6] Nevertheless, state leaders view nuclear terrorism as a plausible scenario, investing heavily in preventive measures such as international oversight of nuclear materials, detection systems of radioactive materials, and improvement of intelligence activities. However, current debates on the issue of nuclear terrorism pay little attention to a state’s ability to mount a punitive response to a nuclear attack from a non-state actor. The 2014 Department of Defense Strategy for Countering Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) “defines four principal objectives for countering the threat of nuclear terrorism: reduce incentives to pursue, possess, and employ WMD; increase barriers to the acquisition, proliferation, and use of WMD; manage WMD risks; and deny the effects of current and emerging WMD threat through defenses”.[7] While it is important to discuss measures that could mitigate the threat of nuclear terrorism and tackle its domestic consequences, it is also worth examining whether states are prepared to respond to it militarily. Unfortunately, there is plenty of evidence indicating that governments are ill prepared to respond in these circumstances. The first step in the process of attributing a nuclear terrorist attack is tracing the origins of nuclear materials used in the device. This would require the application of nuclear forensics, which includes analyzing radioactive debris and identifying their unique characteristics that could lead to the country from where the material was obtained.[8] However, this procedure does not guarantee that the source of the nuclear material would be discovered.[9] The information might indicate that the source was 40% North Korean, 30% Pakistani and 30% Russian. In that case, how does one judge which state is to be blamed for facilitating the attack? However, most importantly, even if the result of nuclear forensics were able to trace the origins of the nuclear material, response options would be limited. If a terrorist organization operating from Pakistan were found responsible for a nuclear attack in Washington DC, would it be legal and just for the United States to attack Pakistan? What would be a proportionate and legitimate target to strike? Would a nuclear terrorist attack justify the use of nuclear weapons against the country that supported the offending organization or supplied it with nuclear materials? Finally, how would one prove that the government of Pakistan was willingly and intentionally sponsoring nuclear terrorism?[10] Answers to these questions remain unclear since there has been no comprehensive governmental study outlining US military response to a terrorist nuclear attack. The difficulty in devising an effective response to an act of nuclear terrorism also stems from the fact that, in these circumstances, classical deterrence loses its relevance. One of its basic principles is that both sides know the punishment would be unacceptable if either side decided to use nuclear weapons. However, these assumptions do not stand with regards to terrorist groups, which cannot be deterred by the threat of retaliation. As some indicate, these groups are not making the same cost-benefit calculations as states, making the prospect of reprisal less significant in influencing their actions.[11] Ultimately, the threat of nuclear terrorism should not be neglected and governments should be made aware of the difficulties in devising a response to such an eventuality.

Their evidence is all just like “there are a lot of steps” --- ya obviously, and our authors considered all of them --- the risk is real


Peter Beinart 8, associate professor of journalism and political science at CUNY, The Good Fight; Why Liberals – and only Liberals – Can Win the War on Terror and Make America Great Again, 106-7

For all these reasons, jihadists seem less intent on acquiring a finished nuclear weapon than on acquiring weapons- grade uranium and building the bomb themselves. In the early 1990s, Al Qaeda bought a 3- foot- long cylinder from a Sudanese military officer who said it contained South African highly enriched uranium. It turned out to be a hoax. Jihadists have reportedly made other failed attempts as well. Eventually, however, they could succeed. Moscow may adequately protect its nuclear weapons, but the National Academy of Sciences has warned that “large inventories of SNM [fissile material] are stored at many sites that apparently lack inventory controls.” And the Russians reportedly experience one or two attempted thefts of that material a year—that they know of. If Al Qaeda obtained 50 kilograms of weapons-g rade uranium, the hardest part would be over. The simplest nuke to build is the kind the United States dropped on Hiroshima, a “gun- type,” in which a mass of highly enriched uranium is fired down a large gun barrel into a second uranium mass. Instructions for how to make one are widely available. Just how widely available became clear to an elderly nuclear physicist named Theodore Taylor in 2002, when he looked up “atomic bomb” in the World Book Encyclopedia in his upstate New York nursing home, and found much of the information you’d need. Even with directions, building a nuclear bomb would still be a monumental task. According to a New York Times Magazine article by Bill Keller, in 1986 five Los Alamos nuke builders wrote a paper called “Can Terrorists Build Nuclear Weapons?” They concluded that it would require people who understood “the physical, chemical and metallurgical proper- 107 ties of the various materials to be used, as well as characteristics affecting their fabrication; neutronic properties; radiation effects, both nuclear and biological; technology concerning high explosives and/or chemical pro- pellants; some hydrodynamics; electrical circuitry.” That sounds daunting. Yet, at the end of the paper, the scientists answered their question: “Yes, they can.” Finally, once terrorists built a nuclear weapon, they’d still have to smuggle it into the United States. The best way might be to put it in a shipping container, on one of the many supertankers that bring oil into American ports every day. The containers are huge, more than big enough to fit a gun-t ype nuke, which could be as small as 6 feet in length and 6 inches in diameter. Highly enriched uranium emits much less radiation than plutonium, and inside a supertanker’s thick double-steel hull it would be hard for sensors to detect. What’s more, a single ship can carry several thousand containers, most of which are never searched. On September 11, 2002, ABC News smuggled a 15- pound cylinder of depleted uranium in a cargo container past U.S. customs. On September 11, 2003, they performed the same exercise—and got the uranium past customs again.


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