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
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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CENTER FOR DEFENSE INFORMATION
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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