Posted on 10/04/2001 7:14:01 PM PDT by Enemy Of The State
THE EAGLE WEEPS
BECAUSE THE EAGLETS ARE NO LONGER FREE
By: Dorothy Anne Seese
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God bless
GandtheD
Russia
A primary source of diverted weapons or material could be Russia. No Russian bombs have been officially reported missing, and Russian authorities maintain that no nuclear material has been lost. Rather, the outstanding question is whether a bomb, or fissile material in sufficient quantity to make one, has disappeared without Moscow's knowledge. While few outside observers dispute this, none are privy to the raw data that could validate or refute the Russian claim.
One concern long has been the allegations voiced by the former Secretary of Russia's Security Council, Gen. Alexander Lebed. After conducting an exhaustive inventory of Russian nuclear weapons in the 1990s, he found that 84 "suitcase" nuclear bombs had vanished from the Russian arsenal.
The prevailing judgment among Western experts is that Russia may have lost track of the paper trail for any number of bombs, but that the bombs themselves probably have been dismantled or tucked away in storage, rather than having been stolen. The infamous Russian accounting system using hand receipts stored in shoe boxes provides ample grist for this theory.
While there is no reason to doubt the sincerity of the Russian military and civilian leaders who have shouldered the custodial duties for Russian nuclear weapons, it is nonetheless possible that Russian nuclear security has been compromised from the inside without detection.
As noted, such a bomb could be transported to the United States inside one of the countless containers arriving at American ports every day. This avenue seems especially easy to arrange by bin Laden's al Qaeda network, which has extensive business connections around the world. Such a container could accommodate a good-sized atomic bomb, which could be detonated in a harbor. Or it could be unloaded and carted off in a small truck or van to any destination in the lower 48 states. Indeed, once unloaded from a ship, one of Russia's 'missing' suitcase bombs, which are thought to weigh some 60 pounds and measure the size of a small refrigerator, practically could be carried as a back-pack by a strong person.
Disconcertingly, it is conceivable that Russia may have built even smaller bombs, comparable to the truly attaché-class atomic bomb secretly built by the United States in the late 1970s. This U.S. bomb design was so compact and lightweight that it could have been covertly transported as innocent hand-luggage by any reasonably strong individual. In fact, a replica — with proxy nuclear material and conventional explosives in place of the real stuff — was disguised as a briefcase, and actually hand-carried on commercial airline flights from California to Washington in the early 1980s.
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Bump to a good article, and repeat excellent comments. I could not have said it better.
November 1997
General Aleksandr Lebed's recent allegation that some former Soviet suitcase size nuclear weapons may be missing has generated a storm of negative media commentary in Moscow and concern and unease in Washington. Even though many contradictory reports have been published, some patterns are discernable that provide important clues to unraveling the story of the "suitcase nukes."
In a meeting with a US Congressional delegation in May 1997, and again in an interview broadcast on 60 Minutes on 7 September 1997, Lebed claimed that the Soviet Union created perhaps one hundred atomic demolition munitions (ADMs), or atomic land mines. These low-yield (circa 1 kiloton) devices were to be used by special forces for wartime sabotage and thus were small, portable, and not equipped with standard safety devices to prevent unauthorized detonation. According to Lebed, some of the ADMs were deployed in the former Soviet republics, and might not have been returned to Russia after the Soviet Union's collapse. During his short tenure as Secretary of the Russian Security Council, Lebed started an investigation into the whereabouts of these weapons, but was fired by President Yeltsin before the investigation was completed.
Lebed's statements are not the first indication that the Soviet Union built ADMs, or that some might have gone astray. In January 1996, the Monterey Institute's Center for Nonproliferation Studies received information from a Russian presidential advisor that an unspecified number of ADMs had been manufactured in the 1970s for the KGB. Indeed, in the wake of Lebed's charges, former Russian presidential advisor Aleksey Yablokov told a US Congressional subcommittee on 2 October 1997 that he was "absolutely sure" that ADMs had been built in the 1970s for the KGB's special forces, and that these weapons were not included in the Russian Ministry of Defense nuclear weapons inventory nor covered by its accounting and control systems. Even earlier, in the summer of 1995, the Russian press published several articles claiming that Chechen separatists had either obtained, or tried to obtain, small nuclear weapons. Lebed's claims are thus not completely new, but they are noteworthy because he was in a position to gain access to information on such weapons.
Official Russian reactions to Lebed's statements were negative and derisory. Russian Prime Minister Viktor Chernomyrdin termed Lebed's allegations "absolute absurdity," while a presidential spokesman said "such superfantasies can only be the product of a diseased imagination." But as the official denials continued, they became increasingly self-contradictory and less credible. Some Russian military and atomic energy officials denied that the Soviet Union had ever created ADMs, and even stated that such weapons were either technically impossible, or prohibitively expensive. Others admitted that such weapons might have existed, but that they were all accounted for and under strict control. All agreed, however, that Lebed's claims were motivated by his desire to regain the political limelight and prepare for a future presidential campaign.
The official denials may well have been orchestrated and coordinated to impugn Lebed's reputation and reliability. If so, they were poorly conceived and raised more questions than they answered. Seemingly authoritative statements by Russian officials that portable ADMs are technically infeasible are belied by the fact that the United States built hundreds of them during the 1960s. The Soviet Union certainly had the technical capability to create portable ADMs, and may well have had military requirements to do so. Soviet strategy included diversionary actions and special force operations behind enemy lines, and ADMs might well have been stockpiled for use in a nuclear war. Certainly, if the United States developed and deployed ADMs it would be unusual for the Soviet Union not to follow suit. Thus, the claims that the Soviet Union did not produce ADMs are not convincing.
The claim that all nuclear weapons are accounted for is perhaps more credible, but is impossible to confirm. The misleading statements on the technical feasibility of ADMs do not bolster confidence in the claims that all Russian nuclear weapons are securely stored. However, most reports of the loss or theft of nuclear weapons have turned out to be based on weak evidence. The articles on nuclear theft that appeared in the Russian press in mid-1995 were apparently partly based on a report in the extreme right-wing Russian newspaper Zavtra (which in turn evidently was inspired by an article in the Russian-language edition of Soldier of Fortune, which claimed that suitcase nukes were smuggled through Lithuania to Iraq and possibly other countries). Zavtra's correspondent claimed to have met with a former Chechen "agent" who participated in the diversion of two suitcase-size nuclear weapons to Chechnya in 1992. To bolster its claim, Zavtra published the technical details of the devices. However, the technical details appear to be inaccurate, and weaken, rather than strengthen, the report's credibility. After publishing the article, the Zavtra correspondent was abducted, beaten, and threatened with death if he pursued the story. But after reporting the abduction, Zavtra retracted the original article, claiming that the meeting with the agent, and the subsequent beating, had been perpetrated by Chechen agents who hoped that rumors of nuclear weapons in Chechnya would strengthen Chechnya's hand in negotiations with Moscow. Nevertheless, the original article triggered a string of media reports and speculation concerning nuclear weapons in Chechnya, eventually prompting an explicit denial of the story by Chechen military leader Shamil Basayev. Thus, while there have been a number of reports of the smuggling of portable nuclear weapons, the most publicized reports do not seem to be based on firm evidence, and have been propounded by sources of dubious reliability.
Lebed's charges have therefore not been adequately dismissed by his critics, nor fully substantiated by his supporters. The claims that the Soviet Union never built ADMs ring hollow, but neither is there any solid evidence indicating the loss or diversion of such weapons. This does not mean that the threat of diversion does not exist, though. The social, political, and economic stresses that wrack Russia provide strong incentives for military "insiders" to steal nuclear weapons. While organizing such a theft would be extremely difficult, the consequences of a successful theft would be disastrous. Increasing security at nuclear weapons facilities, and especially at civilian nuclear facilities with weapons-grade fissile material, must therefore be at the forefront of the US-Russian security agenda. Increased work in this regard may help to ensure that stories of weapons or fissile material diversion remain fiction, and do not become fact.
Speaking of nukes... how high did they count before they came up with the missing number "84"?
Truly frightening accounting here, same site as you quoted, and it is from 4 years ago!! Are the numbers now higher or lower?
Stay safe,
Mrs Kus
This needs to be hammered home in letters to congress, newspapers and all media. Get off your asses everyone and start writing now!
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