Posted on 11/02/2001 10:50:27 PM PST by Ymani Cricket
Experts Believe Nuke Attack Likely
Nov. 2--Nuclear experts warned on Friday any future act of nuclear terrorism could use crude weapons from commonplace radioactive materials aimed more at spreading panic than causing physical harm.
"In some states where radioactive materials are not well regulated, they are potentially available," said Graham Andrew, scientific adviser at the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).
In an interview with Reuters on the sidelines of an IAEA conference on nuclear terrorism, Andrew said terrorists could take radiotherapy or x-ray materials from hospitals to construct a crude bomb.
"On the consequence side, you're not going to get a large number of fatalities. The conse-quence is going to be more one of economic disruption and anxiety in the public.
Often referred to as a dirty bomb, such a device could easily be built by surrounding a radioac-tive source with explo-sives and detonating it to spread radioactivity across a wide area.
The potential for panic is quite large. Radioactivity is invisi-ble, you can't see it or feel it. And you don't know what its impact on your health in 10 years will be," he said.
IAEA Director-General Mohamed El-Baradei told the conference although it was highly unlikely terrorists could get their hands on a sophisticated nuclear weapon and detonate it, this could not be ruled out.
"This is the most horrifying scenario, but also the most unlikely," El-Baradei said. "But nothing is excluded, as we've learned from September 11."
I noticed also, the Doomsday Clock was moved forward again, via Drudge Report and Yahoo. During the persian Gulf War, if I remember correctly it was moved up to 14 minutes to midnight. From the picture I saw on Yahoo (click here) it looks like it's at 10 till?
20 years ago if this happened I have no doubt your scenario would prove correct.
Today, if we were "nuked" by Iran, we would probably be lectured that we shouldn't be angry at Iranians in the United States, and that Iran is a "nation of peace". And that would be by our leaders.
The left wingers would probably state that we should be asking ourselves what did we do to deserve being nuked, and to forget about retaliation, and to go to the "root causes" behind the reasons for us being nuked.
I'm not being facetious. I really think that is how things would play out.
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