Posted on 07/19/2004 7:30:11 PM PDT by thinkahead
Is al Qaeda Preparing a Nuclear Hit?
by J. R. Nyquist
Top U.S. officials are worried that al Qaeda is preparing a major assault before the November elections. The present level of concern was first voiced by the U.S. Attorney General, then by the Secretary of Homeland Security, and now by the acting Director of Central Intelligence. The warnings qualitatively differ from previous warnings. Two data points serve to explain this qualitative shift. The first data point is the claim that al Qaeda has nuclear weapons that are probably deployed on U.S. soil. The second data point is the fact that steps are being taken to cope with a major disruption of the November elections.
A new book by terrorism expert and former FBI consultant Paul Williams says that al Qaeda acquired 20 nuclear suitcase bombs from the Chechen mafia between 1996 and 2001. This agrees with similar statements made by Yossef Bodansky in his 1999 book, Bin Laden: The Man Who Declared War On America. In saying that al Qaeda poses a nuclear threat, Williams takes his analysis a step farther. He says that al Qaeda has almost assuredly smuggled suitcase bombs into the United States. He also says that these bombs are in the10 kiloton range, capable of inflicting millions of casualties. Williams believes that al Qaeda will use several of these devices in simultaneous attacks against urban targets by the end of 2005.
Is there any reason to credit this dreadful conclusion?
This week the country’s journalists were jolted by reports that security officials are looking into legal mechanisms for postponing the November elections in the event of a terror assault on the homeland. Conspiracy theorists and Bush-haters are already decrying what they call “the obvious power-grab.” But the story is not so simple, since the underlying threat is undeniably real. To be sure, Al Qaeda promised to bring death to America in the wake of 9/11 and death’s tardiness is evident. Many are therefore encouraged to denounce those who offer dire warnings. The July 19 issue of Newsweek offers a startling check to this view. American counter-terror officials have “alarming” intelligence, writes Michael Isikoff, “about a possible al Qaeda strike inside the United States this fall….” Government officials are anticipating an attack that may force the postponement of the November presidential elections.
Now let us think. Would explosions on subways, buses or trains, etc., force a closure of the polls? Spain was hit by train bombings on the eve of its recent elections, and the elections went forward without postponement. To disrupt America’s elections a terrorist would need more than a few conventional bombs. He would have to kill more than a few hundred people to disrupt America’s elections.
According to Isikoff, U.S. intelligence analysts have concluded that al Qaeda wants to “interfere with the [U.S.] elections.” Newsweek’s sources allege that the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel has been asked by the Department of Homeland Security to outline the legal steps required for election postponement
In a July 8 background briefing by the Department of Homeland Security, a senior official said that a major offensive was being planned by bin Laden’s group. “Osama bin Laden and Ayman Zawahiri have issued several public statements last fall,” he explained, “threatening to carry out those attacks. And numerous al Qaeda spokespersons have, in fact, said that these plans are underway and are near completion.”
Al Qaeda’s stated goal is the destruction of the United States. This goal is peculiar in terms of its grandiosity and the frankness with which it has been broadcast. What are we to make of this? A small group cannot realistically hope to achieve such an objective on its own. Yet this is the stated objective. How on earth do they hope to advance their cause when it is so baldly overstated? After all, to propose unrealistic objectives is to court the disappointment of your own followers. If you say that you will soon destroy the United States you had better deliver a devastating attack or brace for a crippling loss of credibility and prestige. Be careful, as well, that your attack is not ineffectual since you will only raise the level of your adversary’s vigilance.
Clearly, it makes no sense that al Qaeda would declare an objective without the means to achieve that objective. Furthermore, Superpowers do not scare easily. A social system predicated on economic optimism isn’t going to surrender its most fundamental assumptions to an Islamic scarecrow hiding in a distant cave. And yet, American officials are worried. Now ask yourselves the next logical question: If the White House suspected that al Qaeda was ready with nuclear weapons on U.S. soil would the president warn the public?
In the first place, the government could not afford to warn the public. The warning itself would trigger an economic disaster and the government would be blamed. The government itself would be called on the carpet. The opposition party would turn the situation to political advantage. Therefore, a warning about nuclear strikes would be political suicide. The ruling power in this country cannot close the border because we depend on foreign trade. The government cannot arrest and deport illegal aliens because we depend on their labor. We cannot deport all Muslim aliens, since political correctness forbids such blatant profiling. The most effective security measures are impossible under the present political system. As it stands the U.S. would have to undergo an internal revolution before Washington could enact the policies most needed to defend against the suitcase nuclear threat. Simply put, the country is not ready to accept such measures. The country is not convinced that such measures are absolutely necessary. Therefore, the government cannot accept the reality of suitcase nuclear bombs sitting on U.S. soil! To admit of such a thing would be tantamount to admitting that our form of government must come to an end.
The basis of our nuclear defense for half a century has been “deterrence.” Unless you can pinpoint your enemy, unless you can locate him on a map, you cannot send a missile against him. You cannot retaliate. In the case of terrorists hiding in remote mountain caves, there may be no deterrence even if you threaten to locate them and nuke their cave. Since they do not care about their own lives, since they are determined to die for their cause, deterrence is ineffective.
Here is the dilemma of the United States in the first decade of the twenty-first century.
© 2004 Jeffrey R. Nyquist
July 14, 2004
it isn't a matter of knowing what you need - I've known what is needed since I was a third-grader.
it is a matter of GETTING what you need, in sufficient quantity, of sufficient quality, assembled in the correwct manner, etc etc etc...
Takes more money and equipment than they can get ahold of, and the shelf-life of such nukes is a known non-negotiable quantity.
I tend to agree. They'll just contaminate them for a few hundred years. There are other, easier ways..
It is a matter of scale. All nukes are not equal.
They are doing drills in the schools locally. In house shelter and lock-in drills. There are no sirens here, unlike the days of Civil Patrol.
a bona fide nuclear weapon -- NOT a "dirty bomb", but the genuine article
I appreciate your honesty and value your input. I agree whole heartedly. It is very sobering.
That still leaves it at my original question--- what are we suppose to do. I have heard so many times people say flee the cities. Well, that would be nice--- but highly impractical for a large number of the citizenry. Leaving this in the hands of the government is ludicrous, IMO. I feel they have a part to play. However, I strongly believe that CITIZENS need to organize themselves into responsible units to help safeguard their communities. How exactly this might be done, is what I would love to brainstorm.
yeh, but the fuze materials are not available unless you have large scale nuclear technology/research program support.
yeah but alqaeda threatens russia as well, chechen terrorists are an al qaeda affiliate.
1-i doubt the soviets would sell their to al qaeda, knowing they could end up in moscow
2- apart from the russia, america, and france, i doubt if another country could make them so small. So that would narrow done the list to just three countries, none of which are likely to sell them to terrorists.
2- reports that claim upto 100 nukes missing could be nothing more than rumours. Have they identified the units from where they're missing.
I mean if you know where they are missing from, you could pick the leads from there and then follow the leads.
I am sure this would have been done, if the nukes really had been missing.
because alqaeda is as much a threat to russia as it is to the US, the russians wouldn't sell them the nukes
but if individual commanders did, the tracks could be easily picked up from there.
knowing how ruthless alqaeda is and knowing how easy it would be to get such nukes in, they would have already detonated them if they had them.
i'da say we need to go back to russia, find the units from where the nukes were missing and track the leads from there.
This is all just a paranoid fantasy, and it diverts attention from the much more deadly danger of chemical attack.
Well you'd have to first of all prioritize the al qaeda threat from the most deadly to the least deadly and dedicate your efforts accordingly
1- WMD's would pose the most significant al qaeda threat. this has to be dealt with better security At WMD sources ,so that they don't fall into al qaeda hands in the first place.
2- Sky jackings would be the next most significant threat. this should be addressed with better security at airports from which flights to the US originate, plus security on the flights themselves.
3- Wherever the terrorists enter from, Explosives within the US should be tightly controlled from falling into terror hands.
3- I would presume by now, we have good US airport and port security in place, so the alqaeda threat would be most likely to originate from mexico or canada.
this can be most effectively addressed by first preventing their entrty into canada and mexico and then tightening the security at US-mexican and US-canadian border.
Both the mexican and canadian govts should be urged and helped to tighten their border and airport, and port security.
I would expect them to use third countries to gain entry into the US, if they find US security too tight.
The best measures would be to prevent the terrorists from entering mexico and canda itself.
it would be good to recruit hispanic intelligence cadres to hunt al qaeda both in mexico and in islamic countries where hispanics could easily blend in with the muslims.
4- if all these measures are effective terrorists could still strike at US interests abroad.
But whatever security we implement, it has to be prioritized to first address large scale harm and then focus on the most likely routes.
Well you know....we all want to change the world!
True. Al Queda may not have that.....they definitely don't if doint it alone.
yeh, but the fuze materials are not available unless you have large scale nuclear technology/research program support.
Ever heard of Pakistan? North Korea? Libya? China? Iran?
I'll stop there, on the off chance that you've heard of one of them. ;)
Right, just like they hit us with one jetliner at a time. As soon as they'd get enough of a cell in the USA to take over the plane -- with one jihaddiboy fresh out of flight school -- they'd lob a Boeing at a building.
No reason for them to wait until they had everything in place for a massive coordinated attack, and then hit us with everything all at once. That's why the 9/11 attacks took four months, with the last plane smashing into the Pentagon in January 11th of '02.
Right?
Oops.
Oh, right. I forgot. That was just a coincidence, that business about all those planes hitting us on the morning of 09/11/01. It's not like they planned it like that. It just happened that that's when they managed to get all their teams ready. Just a big coincidence, that's all. I mean, when they had each team ready, they used it. No way would they sit on a team, waiting for the rest of the teams to get in country, prepared, settled in, and so forth. Right?
And another thing. That whole business about Al Quaida's habitual fixation on multiple coordinated attacks is just an old wives tail. An urban legend.
The fact that all of their known attacks have taken that form is just a coincidence. It means nothing. Only a paranoid conspiracy theorist would try to pretend there's a pattern to their MO.
Oh, one other thing: they're not patient, either. All that talk about how they're so f'n patient, willing to wait years to "finish what they started, until all the pieces are finally in place?
Yup, you guessed it. It's another urban legend.
So get back to the toob already. Game's on, beer's cold. Don't fret your purdy l'il head about this silly nonsense. There's important stuff going on in this country. Scott. Lacy. Kobe. And that guy who didn't really go to med school. Yeah, that's the ticket. Stick with the important stuff. Anything you really need to know about you'll find on tabloid teevee.
Hey, don't take my word for it. Ask Greta!
I don't know what to tell you. Anything I'd be able to come up with would be so unpalatable that I'd rather not play the "prophet of doom" role. A weather guy can look at the maps, tell you he sees a storm coming, but he can't tell the storm to go away. And sometimes sitting in the bathtub or under a table in the northeast corner of the basement (or was it southwest corner?) ain't gonna do the trick.
If you can brainstorm some way out of it, then by all means shout it from the rooftops, because there are millions of people who need to hear it.
Millions...
Meanwhile, I suggest people watch Cabaret, and read Lucifer's Hammer. And hope it turns out better than either of 'em.
Thank you for expressing your opinion.
Now, click on my name to read Chris Hitchens' experience, so that you can insult him, too. I'm sure that in a battle of the reputations and credibility, the match between "Zeroisanumber" and "Hitchens" will be... entertaining.
Christ, you think they'd have used the thing by now, wouldn't you?
What Christopher Hitchens heard in December of 2001 is similar to the hysteria that gripped the country immediately after Pearl Harbor. People "in the know" in California circa early-1942 fled the coast because they were informed that the Japanese invasion fleet was on it's way by people whose job it was to know. They were afraid, and by being "in the know" and having/believing this information that the general public didn't made them feel more in control of a terror that they were almost powerless to affect in any meaningful way. What you're posting about is very similar, it seems like special information that only those heroic few who are "in the know" can have and understand. It makes believers feel better because they think that by having this information they are more in control of an uncontrollable situation and that they're doing something useful by spreading the word.
The information that I posted was given by a retired nuclear engineer of 30-years experience who called into the Michael Savage show a week or so back. He essentially said that while the idea of a suitcase nuke is scary, the technical realities of nuclear weapons and the difficulty in getting them makes their use unlikely. As unlikely, when you think about it, as a Japanese invasion of California circa 1942.
I'm sorry if I came off as insulting. I was at work and wrote in haste.
Well, I saw Armageddon and Independence Day. Trying to stop it before it happened worked there. Sort of. I suggest people watch and read anything that helps them understand to do all you can to prevent, prepare and survive.
I would argue that they used everyone they had when they made the 9/11 attack - a 100% effort. If they had more they would have used it.
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