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03/15/02 ****     RADIATION BULLETIN(RADBULL)       **** VOL 10.67
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   RADBULL IS PRODUCED BY THE ABALONE ALLIANCE CLEARINGHOUSE
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                         NUCLEAR POLICY
 
1 Swedish Nuclear Plants Considered 
2 US: Bingaman's battle to get bill to Bush a thing of adversity
3 US: Senate says 'no' to bill to require more renewable energy 
4 US: INEEL may get planned power reactor
5 Russian environmentalists object to plans to build nuclear reactors 
6 AU: Prop-up loan startles nuclear regulator 
 
                         NUCLEAR REACTORS
 
7 Lithuanian leader tells EU summit country needs aid to close 
8 US expert says Armenia's nuclear plant poses no threat 
9 USA to provide Armenia 3m dollars to improve radioactive control 
10 Russia begins work on Indian nuclear plant 
11 Authorities in northern Russian republic against new nuclear 
12 US: Damage to Ohio Nuclear Plant May Cost FirstEnergy $55 Million, D
13 US: NRC to Discuss Millstone Performance with Dominion Nuclear
14 US: NRC Issues Confirmatory Action Letter to Pennsylvania Medical 
15 US: NRC Names New Senior Resident Inspector at Millstone Unit 2
16 US: NRC Issues Confirmatory Action Letter on Davis-Besse; Schedules 
17 US: Damage to Ohio Nuclear Plant May Cost FirstEnergy $55 Million, D
18 US: Davis-Besse Nuclear Plant Comes Close To Disaster 
19 US: Military (at Duke reactor) exercise remains a puzzle 
 
                          NUCLEAR SAFETY
 
20 Did Anyone Lose a Cesium Rod? Disaster Narrowly Averted in Taiwan In
21 Uranium inquiry ordered by MoD
22 DEPLETED URANIUM IN BUNKER BOMBS
 
                         NUCLEAR FUEL CYCLE
 
23 US: Bush to dump nuclear waste in earthquake zone
24 Country faces legal action over pollution 
25 US: Mill hoped to take radioactive soil
26 US: Tainted-soil plan delayed
27 US: Opponents say heavy lobbying taints Nevada nuclear dump plan
28 US: Federal prosecutors looking at Utah tribe's nuclear waste deal
29 US: Slag dump poses concerns: Bronner wants issue resolved before RS
30 US: Pro-Yucca groups' political giving criticized
31 US: YUCCA MOUNTAIN: Senior manager set to retire
32 US: Shoshone to testify against measure
33 US: Letter: Nevada can solve nuclear challenge
34 UK: MOX Demo Plant Gets Green Light
35 UK: Copeland Wants Money in Exchange for Nuclear Dump
 
                         NUCLEAR WEAPONS
 
36 Removal of nuclear fuel from Russian submarines under way 
37 Russian fifth-generation nuclear submarine nearing completion 
38 Russian minister satisfied with US explanation of nuclear 
39 US: Pentagon Report Discusses Nukes
40 US: The Penalty Was Steep for a Missile Defense Whistle-Blower 
41 Washington’s risky nuclear dance 
42 US: Pentagon Report Discusses Nukes
43 Russia Satisfied With US Nuke Reasons
44 US: Powell Promises Nuclear Restraint
45 The nuclear war: opportunities and possibilities 
46 US: 'No longer the weapons of last resort'
47 US: Nuclear Warhead Study Aims at Buried Targets 
48   Russian, U.S. defense officials say legally binding document on 
49 Iran issues anti-nuclear warning - 
50 US:  U.S. Optimistic on Deal Over Nuclear Weapons - 
51 Nothing 'prudent' about planning nuclear attacks
52 US: Nuclear Posture Review [Excerpts]
53 US:  Opinion - Can Nuclear Weapons Make the World Safe? 
54 US: The nuclear-posture review
55 North Korean party paper fears US nuclear attack 
 
                        US DEPT. OF ENERGY
 
56 Report finds funny credit at DOE sites 
57 16-ton magnetic spectrometer installed at lab
58 FFTF backers seek commercial restart
59 Scientist hopes Oak Ridge tests will prove fusion theory 
60 'Jesse Culture': Bechtel Jacobs making progress 
 
                          OTHER NUCLEAR
 
61 John Challens; Helped British Develop A-Bomb 

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                         FULL NEWS STORIES
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 1 Swedish Nuclear Plants Considered 

March 15, 2002

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Filed at 12:28 p.m. ET

STOCKHOLM, Sweden (AP) -- The Swedish government has suggested a 
new approach to phasing out nuclear power that would give the 
industry a greater say on when to close the reactors.

The suggestion, part of an energy proposal unveiled Friday, was 
welcomed by the power industry while nuclear opponents worried it 
would slow down the phasing-out process.

Energy Minister Bjoern Rosengren insisted the government still 
was committed to pull the plug on nuclear power but added it 
would take time. ``In my opinion, it will take 30 to 40 years 
before it can be phased out,'' he told Swedish radio.

About half of Sweden's energy supply comes from nuclear power 
plants. The plan will be presented to the 349-seat Riksdag, or 
parliament, next Thursday. It was not clear when a vote would be 
held.

The energy proposal also suggested introducing a system of 
``green certificates'' that would boost incentives to use 
renewable energy sources, such as hydro and wind power.

In 1980, following a referendum, parliament decided to close the 
Scandinavian country's 12 reactors by 2010. But Sweden has since 
moved away from a specific deadline and has closed only one of 
the reactors at Barsebaeck.

Parliament has set a tentative date for closing another in 2003. 
The new proposal, based on a German model, suggested giving the 
power industry a fixed amount of energy to be produced at the 10 
remaining reactors. Power companies would then decide on their 
own when to close the plants.

The chief executive of Sydkraft, one of Sweden's largest power 
companies with stakes in the reactors, said it would be hard to 
replace nuclear power efficiently.

``To substitute for it without heavy economical or environmental 
consequences for society is a very demanding task,'' Sydkraft's 
Lars Frithiof said in a statement. ``Sweden will therefore rely 
on nuclear power for many years in the future.''

Nuclear opponents applauded the government for keeping its 
commitment to phase out nuclear energy but said the plan could 
cause further delays.

``Before, it was elected officials who decided the pace. Now, the 
industry, which doesn't want to dismantle, makes the decisions. 
It could slow down the process,'' Greenpeace spokesman Dima 
Litvinov said.

Copyright 2002 The Associated Press | Privacy Information  
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 2 Bingaman's battle to get bill to Bush a thing of adversity

Albuquerque Tribune Online

  [Nelson] 

WASHINGTON, D.C. - New Mexico's junior senator contorted his 
face, censoring a yawn. Above him, in the gallery of the U.S. 
Senate, the somber busts of our nation's founders gazed upon him. 
Their stony aggregate at times exceeded the number of reporters, 
tourists and senators traipsing in and out of the chamber.

 It was, a longtime Washingtonian said, "a thing of beauty."

 As in: "Go watch (U.S. Sen. Jeff) Bingaman present his energy 
bill. It's something that's actually going to pass and, in 
Washington these days, that's a thing of beauty."

 It sure didn't look pretty. Not even to Bingaman, a Silver City 
Democrat.

 "I've never thought of any piece of legislation as a thing of 
beauty," he said. "Certainly not this bill. The process of trying 
to write and enact legislation is a very messy process."

 So far, the messiness includes a simmering tiff with New 
Mexico's senior senator, Republican Pete Domenici, as well as a 
national feud over oil drilling in Alaska's Arctic National 
Wildlife Refuge.

 Last week, Domenici criticized Bingaman for having "hijacked" 
the bill to the Senate floor without debating it in the Energy 
and Natural Resources Committee. "I'm not the least bit proud of 
the path by which this legislation has arrived on the floor," 
Domenici fumed in a press release. "It sets a new low for the 
legislative process that the Senate has prized for centuries."

 But that prized process has previously endured the whims of 
those who cherish it. Last year, Domenici himself fast-tracked a 
budget resolution to the floor.

 No matter. Critics now sneer that Bingaman wanted to bar his 
committee from adding an ANWR amendment to the bill. He protests 
that he only wanted to ease its passage and set a national policy 
for the production and use of oil, gas, coal, wind, sunshine and 
nuclear power.

 Most of the issues in the bill have been thoroughly debated for 
years anyway, he says. Putting it to committee could have bogged 
it down with partisan spats over endless amendments.

 Instead, for two weeks and counting, the bill has had the floor 
. . . where senators have bogged it down with partisan spats over 
endless amendments.

 Every hour or so, one of them enters the chamber, picks up a 
microphone and explains the need to tack more pages onto the 
500-page bill. And then explains it again. And again.

 Sometimes, all the senators hustle down to vote on a particular 
proposal. But usually, the amendments just stack up for a later 
vote so that someone else can pick up a microphone and explain 
and then explain and then explain again.

 "It requires a lot of compromise and settling for half-loaves 
when you wish you could do better," Bingaman said of the process. 
"In the ideal circumstances, you work out a lot of these issues 
instead of pushing them to a vote.

 "The thing that has always distinguished this place is that you 
have unlimited ability to debate and unlimited ability to amend."

 That ability will come to its sorest test when - and if - the 
Senate takes up the wildlife refuge. Domenici says the votes are 
there to approve the drilling; Bingaman says the votes aren't 
there to keep opponents from staging a filibuster.

 If that happens, it could doom any hope that we might someday 
drive fuel-efficient cars, buy better light bulbs and wave 
bye-bye to our friendly, local power company.

 "That's always a possibility," Bingaman said. "But at the same 
time, there are a lot of provisions in here that a lot of 
senators strongly support. And I think President Bush would very 
much like to sign an energy bill before this fall."

 So he slogs through each day, methodically racking up what will 
eventually be his longest floor stint in a 19-year Senate career. 
He listens to the explanations, censors his yawns and awaits his 
bill's uncertain fate.

 What does he think about?

 "That's hard to say," he said. "It depends on what you're 
listening to."

 Then he sighed.

 "There are times when you wonder how many times some of your 
colleagues feel obligated to give the same speech."

 Nelson's column runs on Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday. Call her 
at 823-3691

or send e-mail to knelson@abqtrib.com. Print this 
[http://www.abqtrib.com/print/index.cfm] 

© The Albuquerque Tribune. 
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 3 Senate says 'no' to bill to require more renewable energy 

Friday, March 15, 2002
 Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal 
'Green power' measure rejected
 
By CHRISTINE DORSEY 
STEPHENS WASHINGTON BUREAU 

WASHINGTON -- Renewable energy proponents lost a battle Thursday 
to aggressively boost solar, wind, biomass and other alternative 
power industries. 

The U.S. Senate rejected an effort by Sen. James Jeffords, I-Vt., 
to require utilities in every state to produce at least 20 
percent of their electricity from renewable sources by 2020. The 
rest could originate from traditional coal, natural gas and 
nuclear sources. 

Jeffords' amendment would have given utilities nationwide 15 
years to fortify their renewable energy portfolios. It failed, 
70-29. Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., voted for the amendment. Sen. 
John Ensign, R-Nev., voted against it. 

The proposal was seen as a boost to geothermal, solar and wind 
energy industries in Nevada, where permits are being sought for 
renewable energy power plants. 

Nevada already is installing its own renewable portfolio standard 
that will require 15 percent of the state's energy to come from 
green sources by 2015, the most aggressive renewable portfolio in 
the nation. 

Under a national standard, utilities that couldn't meet the green 
energy requirement would have had to buy credits from utilities 
that have an excess of renewable power. 

Jeffords argued that an aggressive federal standard will help 
reduce air pollution and boost jobs in rural states where 
windmills, geothermal plants and other renewable energy plants 
could be built. 

"The resources are there," Jeffords said. "This will create 
billions of dollars in jobs and investment." 

He said his home state is a large wind energy producer, and also 
is plagued by acid rain caused by coal-fired plants in the 
Midwest whose soot blows to the East. 

The amendment was offered as the Senate continued to debate a 
Democrat-written energy bill. The bill already contains a 
provision requiring a 10 percent renewable portfolio standard by 
2020, but Republicans were threatening to offer an amendment to 
strip it from the package. 

Democrats were considering a less aggressive standard as a 
compromise, but no further action was taken Thursday night. 

Led by Sen. Frank Murkowski, R-Alaska, Republicans argued any 
federal renewable standard would amount to an expensive federal 
mandate on states. 

Murkowski said despite $6.5 billion in federal tax breaks over 
the last five years, renewable energy apart from hydropower has 
only been able to generate 2 percent of the nation's electricity. 

Jeffords responded that oil, gas and nuclear companies have 
received more than $11 billion in tax breaks that have helped 
them dominate the energy markets. 

Murkowski also said the amount of land needed to develop a wind 
farm or solar panel generator leaves a "footprint" that would 
degrade the environment, but would yield only a fraction of the 
energy as the same space needed to drill for oil in Alaska's 
Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. 

"(The 20-percent standard) is impractical and unrealistic," 
Murkowski said. 

Sen. Paul Wellstone, D-Minn., supported Jeffords. He said cleaner 
burning electricity would more than make up for the added land 
use. 

"I'd love to see us do more," Wellstone said, but later conceded 
there was not enough support in the Senate to take such an 
aggressive stance on renewables.
 

webmaster@lvrj.com Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal, 1997 - 
*****************************************************************
 4 INEEL may get planned power reactor

IdahoStatesman.com
 
   Friday, March 15, 2002   
  
 Bush initiative aims to revive nuclear industry
 
By Faith Bremner
 Gannett News Service 

WASHINGTON -- Eastern Idaho could play a leading role as the Bush 
administration and commercial nuclear power plant owners team up 
to try to jump-start the nation´s stalled nuclear power industry. 

The Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory is 
one of three U.S. Department of Energy facilities being 
considered as a site for the nation´s next commercial nuclear 
power reactor, and because of its location and history, 
supporters say that there´s a good chance it will be chosen. 
Existing nuclear plant sites that have room to expand also are in 
the running. 

Any power generated by a new nuclear power plant in Idaho would 
be sold and could be used in Idaho and throughout the West. 

The Department of Energy has offered up INEEL, along with the 
Portsmouth Gaseous Diffusion Plant in Piketon, Ohio, and the 
Savannah River Site near Aiken, S.C., as possible sites. 

Idaho´s congressional delegation and the Eastern Idaho Economic 
Development Council are lobbying vigorously to have the INEEL 
chosen as the site for the new reactor, which would create 
hundreds of construction and technical jobs in the eastern part 
of the state. 

It´s all part of the Nuclear Power 2010 initiative -- a proposed 
public-private partnership between the federal government and 
private industry that aims to restore public confidence in 
nuclear power and to have a new nuclear power plant built in the 
country by 2010. No nuclear power plant has been ordered since 
1978. Construction of the nation´s newest nuclear plant -- the 
Watts Bar Plant in Tennessee -- was finished in 1995. 

President Bush is asking Congress for $38.5 million for the 
program in next year´s budget. Over seven years, the initiative 
could cost taxpayers as much as $400 million. 

Federal dollars would be spent on the licensing process and on 
research and development. Power companies would spend a similar 
amount. The companies would pay to build the reactors, which 
range in cost from $300 million to $1 billion. Supporters say the 
initiative is an opportunity to research and develop promising 
new reactor designs that are safer and cheaper to build and 
operate.

It´s also a test of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission´s nuclear 
reactor licensing process, which Congress streamlined in 1992 but 
has yet to be tried. The old process took 10 years to navigate. 
Industry officials hope the new process will take five years or 
less. 

"The private sector wants to be assured that before they make 
billions of dollars in investments, (the plant) will go on line 
and pay for itself," said Sen. Larry Craig, R-Idaho. 

Nuclear and taxpayer watchdog groups are outraged by the use of 
tax dollars to shore up an industry that has been in decline 
since the Three Mile Island accident in Pennsylvania in 1979. 

"This is something industry should be doing on its own," said 
Pierre Sadik, spokesman for U.S. Public Interest Research Group, 
an environmental/consumer group. "The nuclear industry can´t find 
a site on its own, so the government will go hand-in-hand with it 
across the country, shopping for a site." 

Gary Richardson, executive director of the nuclear watchdog group 
Snake River Alliance, said he doubts that another nuclear plant 
will be built in the United States, let alone in Idaho, because 
the public continues to distrust nuclear energy. 

And until DOE cleans up the 150,000 cubic meters of radioactive 
waste buried and stored at the INEEL from past projects, it 
shouldn´t be spending money on new ones, Richardson said. The 
Bush administration has proposed cutting INEEL´s cleanup budget 
by 20 percent next year. 

"They need to clean up the mess left from research in the past, 
both here and elsewhere," Richardson said. "If they can do that 
first, maybe we´ll talk about the other." 

Exelon, a company that operates 17 nuclear power plants in 
Illinois and Pennsylvania, and Dominion Resources, which operates 
three plants in Virginia and Connecticut, have a contract to do 
initial studies of the three DOE sites.

Nuclear power plant owners also can submit their own plant sites 
for the program if they have enough room to accommodate a new 
reactor. 

On April 15, plant operators will submit proposals to DOE that 
outline which sites they want to study further and which reactor 
designs they want to use. Operators´ plans could get an early 
endorsement from DOE this summer. 

INEEL has a good chance of being chosen because it is remote, 
scientists there have experience building nuclear reactors, and 
the surrounding community is supportive, backers of the idea say. 
Four years ago, at the urging of Idaho´s congressional 
delegation, DOE designated INEEL the nation´s lead nuclear 
research lab. Since 1948, the lab´s scientists have built 52 test 
reactors, only one of which exists today. The first one, 
Experimental Breeder Reactor 1, supplied electricity to Arco for 
a short time. 

INEEL would be attractive to a company that wants to build one of 
the new gas-cooled reactors, said James Lake, INEEL´s associate 
lab director over nuclear and energy systems. INEEL is 
researching the fuels used in the new designs, which are not yet 
licensed in the United States. Research indicates that the 
gas-cooled designs may be safer and require less shielding than 
the old water-cooled models. 

The experimental reactors -- which use helium instead of water to 
cool the radioactive fuel -- have been built in Germany and 
China. 

"My guess is, if one of these companies wants to build a gas 
reactor, they´ll be more interested in building on a DOE site 
than they would a commercial site because it needs to be tested," 
Lake said. 

Despite concerns about the vulnerability of nuclear power plants 
to terrorist attacks, eastern Idahoans would welcome one, said 
Jim Bowman, president and chief executive officer of the Eastern 
Idaho Economic Development Council. "Our people are familiar with 
(nuclear technology) and they´re comfortable with it," Bowman 
said. "Idaho, being a remote location, is an ideal place for this 
kind of development."
 
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 5 Russian environmentalists object to plans to build nuclear reactors 

- 3/15/2002 - ENN.com
 
Friday, March 15, 2002 By Mara D. Bellaby, Associated Press 

MOSCOW — Russia's plan to build a floating nuclear power plant in 
the White Sea is dangerous and too risky, leading Russian 
environmentalists said Thursday, urging neighboring countries to 
object. 

The Atomic Energy Ministry has said the first-of-a-kind plant 
would be set afloat in the White Sea and used to provide energy 
to the Arkhangelsk region, some 600 miles north of Moscow. 
Previous plans also called for a floating nuclear plant in the 
Chukotka region and off the Kamchatka peninsula in Russia's Far 
East. 

"It would be unforgivable to proceed with these plans," said 
Alexei Yablokov, an environmental scientist who heads the Russian 
Center for Ecological Politics. Yablokov spoke at a press 
briefing about the release of a new study on floating nuclear 
plants that calls them "a menace to the world's oceans." Russia 
has long been interested in using such plants to supply 
electricity to remote northern and eastern regions, where severe 
weather makes construction on land difficult and expensive. But 
despite often-announced plans that the project had the green 
light, the floating plants have still not received backing from 
the highest levels of the Russian government or a proper license, 
environmentalists said. 

"It is still not too late to stop this," said Vladimir Kuznetsov, 
director of nuclear and radiation security programs for the 
Russian Green Cross, an environmental advocacy program. 

The environmentalists said the government must have an open and 
public discussion about the proposed project, including its 
benefits and dangers. The experts questioned whether the plant 
could be adequately secured, particularly against terrorist 
attacks. Kuznetsov noted that the proposed plants would have two 
nuclear reactors containing enough material to build 10 atomic 
bombs.

Critics have also expressed concern about Russia's ability to 
safely build and manage a floating nuclear power plant. 

Russia's nuclear reactors were designed in the Soviet era, and 
many are in need of repair, prompting frequent minor 
malfunctions. The Soviet Union was the site of the world's worst 
nuclear disaster in 1986 at Chernobyl in Ukraine. "It is better 
that we don't even head down this path," Yablokov said. 

The environmentalists said nations that share international 
waters with Russia, such as the United States, Canada, Norway, 
Denmark, Finland, and Sweden, should take the lead in condemning 
the proposed plants. 

Copyright 2002, Associated Press
*****************************************************************
 6 AU: Prop-up loan startles nuclear regulator 

smh.com.au - 

Date: 16/03/2002
 
By Cynthia Banham 

The country's nuclear regulator is investigating why it was not 
told about a $10.5 million prop-up loan by the bankrupt Argentine 
government to the company contracted to build the new Lucas 
Heights reactor.
 
And it wants to know why it took until last week for its chief 
executive to learn of the deal - on radio.
 
John Loy, the head of the Australian Radiation Protection and 
Nuclear Safety Agency, hopes to have made a decision about 
whether to grant a construction licence to the Argentine company 
INVAP by the end of this month.
 
But this week he said the contingency loan, which was first 
confirmed by the Government in Parliament this week, was 
"something about which we have asked questions".
 
Of concern is whether INVAP will be able to fulfil its 
obligations to see the project through.
 
"We want to understand [the loan] and make sure it's consistent 
with our understanding about INVAP's capacity," Dr Loy said. 

Asked how he first learnt about the loan, he replied "on [the ABC 
radio program] AM". Just why the regulator was never told about 
it by INVAP or the reactor's operator, ANSTO, was "one of the 
questions we're asking", he said.
 
The Government said the project was still on track - the contract 
for the $290 million reactor was signed in July 2000 and the 
reactor is due to be built by 2005.
 
A spokesman for the Science Minister, Peter McGauran, said the 
minister was satisfied ANSTO was "on top of things and, yes, 
confident [the reactor] will go ahead if of course ARPANSA grants 
the licence".
 
ANSTO maintains it is in "close consultation with INVAP 
concerning the Argentine currency crisis" and is satisfied it 
"has not impaired INVAP's capacity to fulfil its obligations 
under the contract".
 
But the Opposition and Green groups are calling for the project 
to be halted because of what Labor has described as a "serious 
cash-flow crisis as a result of Argentina's financial meltdown", 
as well as concerns about the operator's plans for disposal of 
nuclear waste - another issue ARPANSA is investigating as part of 
its licence decision.
 
Labor called this week for the Government to produce contractual 
and financial documents relating to the operator and the 
construction company.
 
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 7 Lithuanian leader tells EU summit country needs aid to close 
nuclear plant 

BBC Monitoring Service - United Kingdom; Mar 15, 2002


Barcelona/Vilnius, 15 March: Speaking at the European Union 
summit in Barcelona, Lithuanian President Valdas Adamkus 
underlined that Lithuania would be meeting the commitments it 
made concerning its nuclear plant closure [and said that] at the 
same time it expected the EU to pledge long-term financial 
support for closing the plant.

"I'd like to underscore: Lithuania will meet the commitments it 
had made. However, we cannot make commitments beyond our economic 
and financial possibilities. The truth is obvious - Lithuania is 
and will be incapable of financing the closure of both nuclear 
power units," Adamkus told the summit, attended by the leaders of 
the EU member and candidate states, on Friday [15 March].

The head of Lithuania said that the country expected the EU to 
make a clear long-term commitment to help solving the problems of 
the Ignalina nuclear power plant.

"A commitment that would not end in 2006. The financial action 
plan that the [European] Commission has proposed is a good basis 
for further discussions," Adamkus said...

Source: BNS news agency, Tallinn, in English 1357 gmt 15 Mar 02 
/BBC Monitoring/ © BBC.
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 8 US expert says Armenia's nuclear plant poses no threat 

BBC Monitoring Service - United Kingdom; Mar 14, 2002

Yerevan, 14 March: The Armenian nuclear power plant does not pose 
a threat to the South Caucasus region. Jack Ramsey, an expert of 
the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission for international 
programmes, said this in reply to question by an Arminfo 
correspondent about the state of security at the Armenian nuclear 
power plant.

He said that the risk level at the plant did not exceed the norms 
accepted in the world and connected with nuclear plants. It 
should be noted that a group of MAGATE experts consisting of four 
people is currently in Armenia to hold a seminar with plant 
employees on the state of metal [as published] in the reactor.

[Passage omitted: the Azerbaijani delegation at the Parliamentary 
Assembly of the Council of Europe is going to raise the problem 
of the Armenian nuclear plant]

Source: Arminfo, Yerevan, in Russian 1455 gmt 14 Mar 02 /BBC 
Monitoring/ © BBC.
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 9 USA to provide Armenia 3m dollars to improve radioactive control 

BBC Monitoring Service - United Kingdom; Mar 14, 2002


Text of report by Armenian news agency Arminfo Yerevan, 14 March: 
The US Nuclear Regulatory Commission will provide 3m dollars to 
Armatomenergonadzor [Armenian nuclear energy control] for 
improving control over radioactive sources. The three-year-long 
programme, the implementation of which will cost 1m dollars a 
year, envisages delivering to Armenia dose meters, spectrographs 
and mobile laboratories. An appropriate agreement was signed 
today between Armatomenergonadzor and the US Nuclear Regulatory 
Commission.

Jack Ramsey, the commission's expert for international 
programmes, says that the USA have allocated 40-45m dollars to 
Armenia over the past seven years to improve radioactive 
security.

Armatomenergonadzor Director Ashot Martirosyan noted that 
according to MAGATE [the group of experts of the International 
Agency for Atomic Energy] requirements, the control over 
radioactive sources had been handed over from the Health Ministry 
to his organization.

Source: Arminfo, Yerevan, in Russian 1455 gmt 14 Mar 02 /BBC 
Monitoring/ © BBC.
*****************************************************************
 10 Russia begins work on Indian nuclear plant 

BBC Monitoring Service - United Kingdom; Mar 15, 2002

Text of report in English by Russian news agency Interfax

Moscow, 15 March: Russia has started building a nuclear power 
station in the Indian city of Kudankulam, hoping to complete the 
first stage of work in late March, general director of 
Atomstroyeksport, Russia's nuclear facilities maker abroad, 
Viktor Kozlov, has told Interfax.

"Contracts with the Indian side have been signed and the station 
is already under construction. By 31 March, the plant's 
underground pipeline will be ready," said he, adding that "the 
foundation for it has been prepared".

"Russian plants have already started assembling equipment for the 
Indian nuclear power station," said Kozlov The Elektrosila plant 
and the Leningradskiy Metallicheskiy Zavod (belonging to the 
Power Machines concern in St Petersburg) will make a 
turbogenerator and a steam turbine for the station's No 1 unit.

Izhorskiye Zavody (St Petersburg), incorporated in the 
Obyedinennyye Mashinostroitelnyye Zavody holding, are busy with 
the reactor's casing and other equipment for the Kudankulam 
plant.

In all, Kozlov said, about 300 Russian enterprises will supply 
equipment for the Indian station, which will take 6-8 years to 
build.

The Russian-Indian contract to install two nuclear units of the 
VVER-1000 type at the Kudankulam station was signed in Moscow on 
6 October 2001.

The plant will be constructed using a Russian blueprint in 
keeping with a 1988 intergovernmental agreement between the 
former USSR and India. The Kudankulam station will use IAEA 
guarantees.

According to Russia's Nuclear Power Ministry, a unit similar to 
those to be constructed in India costs 1.5bn-2bn dollars to 
build.

Source: Interfax news agency, Moscow, in English 1417 gmt 15 Mar 
02 /BBC Monitoring/ © BBC.
*****************************************************************
 11 Authorities in northern Russian republic against new nuclear 
power station 

BBC Monitoring Service - United Kingdom; Mar 14, 2002


Text of report in English by Russian news agency Interfax

Petrozavodsk, 14 March: Deploying new sources of pollution such 
as a nuclear power station in Karelia, which remains a uniquely 
beautiful area of Russia, is out of the question, that republic's 
prime minister, Sergey Katanandov, told the Karelian Legislative 
Assembly today.

Conventional power stations using local fuels should be built in 
the republic, he said.

The federal 2002-2010 Energy-Efficient Economy programme approved 
last December provides for the continued design of a Karelian 
nuclear power station, the first of whose four power units is to 
be commissioned in 2007.

Katanandov has already rejected this idea and said that plans for 
building the station have never been cleared with him or any 
regional official.

If the construction plans are not called off, he reserves the 
right to hold a republican referendum on the issue.

Source: Interfax news agency, Moscow, in English 1832 gmt 14 Mar 
02 /BBC Monitoring/ © BBC.
*****************************************************************
 12 Damage to Ohio Nuclear Plant May Cost FirstEnergy $55 Million, Delay Restart 
	
 Jim Mackinnon , Akron Beacon Journal, Ohio 

Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News ( March 15, 2002 ) 

Mar. 14--The damage to the Davis-Besse nuclear power plant may 
cost FirstEnergy as much as $55 million and delay its restart 
until June, when summer electricity use begins to peak, the 
utility announced yesterday. Meanwhile, the plant's woes raise 
concerns that other plants might have similar safety problems. 
The nuclear power industry and nuclear power opponents are 
intensely interested in the surprising discovery that boric acid, 
a byproduct of the nuclear reaction, apparently carved a 
six-inch-deep cavity in the 6 3/8-inch-thick steel reactor head, 
a vital safety component that covers the fuel core. "This was 
something that was not expected. It was not predicted to occur. 
We have not seen this kind of erosion," said Brian Sheron, 
associate director for the project license and technical 
assessment office in the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. His 
office is overseeing the NRC's investigation at Davis-Besse. 

The discovery has had repercussions near and far. 

FirstEnergy's stock has taken a hit on the news. Regulatory 
investigators and others are scrambling to find what caused the 
four-inch-by-five-inch-wide cavity. At least one anti-nuclear 
group opposes the plant's restart. FirstEnergy says it can buy 
power from other suppliers, if needed, until the nuclear plant is 
running again. 

And while there's no danger of a core meltdown or release of 
radiation at Davis-Besse, the discovery of the cavity could force 
the temporary shut down of other nuclear power plants of similar 
design elsewhere in the nation to check for signs of cavity 
formation, Sheron said. While a widespread shut-down scenario is 
unlikely, other operators of pressurized water nuclear power 
plants will have to prove to the NRC that their own safety 
inspections have already accounted for, or soon will account for, 
the kind of degradation found in Davis-Besse, he said. 

Nuclear plants that are scheduled to shut down this spring for 
inspections, maintenance or refueling will have to check for the 
degradation, he said. Other plants not scheduled for shut down 
will have to tell the NRC "Why do you believe you don't have this 
problem? he said. If they can't answer that question to the 
agency's satisfaction, the NRC can force the power plant to shut 
down until an inspection is done, he said. 

One prominent anti-nuclear power group yesterday called upon the 
NRC and FirstEnergy to not allow the reactor to restart until a 
permanent reactor head vessel, which covers the radioactive fuel 
core, is installed. That could take as long as two years to 
manufacture, a FirstEnergy spokesman said. 

The Nuclear Information and Resource Service, a Washington-based 
group that opposes nuclear power, said the plant came dangerously 
close to a catastrophic accident -- a charge FirstEnergy called 
"nonsense." The NRC's Sheron also said there was no immediate 
danger to the public. "These reactors do have a lot of (safety) 
margins and are strong. We design for that kind of accident." 

But the Davis-Besse cavity shows that neither federal regulators 
nor the nuclear power industry knows everything that happens 
inside a nuclear power plant, said Paul Gunter, director of the 
Reactor Watchdog Project for the Nuclear Information and Resource 
Service. 

"There are so many unknowns," he said. "FirstEnergy should not be 
allowed to fire the reactor up without replacing the reactor 
vessel head." 

FirstEnergy had already ordered a new vessel head prior to the 
discovery of the cavity, said plant spokesman Richard Wilkins. 
But the vessel can't be built and delivered for at least another 
two years, he said. 

The utility is devising ways to repair the damage and operate the 
reactor until the new vessel head is installed. 

"What we're looking at is doing it right," Wilkins said. "There 
isn't any doubt that it can be fixed." 

About 50 people are working on the repair project, including some 
of the world's best nuclear experts, he said. 

The Akron utility said repairs will delay restarting the Oak 
Harbor plant, which first began operating in 1977, through May 
and possibly into June.

Davis-Besse has been closed since Feb. 16 for refueling and the 
safety inspection, and was originally set to begin producing 
power again on March 31. The NRC last year ordered operators of 
the nation's 69 pressurized-water reactors like Davis-Besse to 
look for cracks in parts inside reactor vessels called control 
rod penetration nozzles. Five of Davis-Besse's 69 nozzles were 
found to have cracks; one of the nozzles apparently allowed boric 
acid to form on the reactor vessel itself and eat into the carbon 
steel. The acid stopped when it came into contact with a 3/8-inch 
layer of stainless steel that covers the thick carbon steel 
shell. Repairs alone could cost between $5 million and $10 
million, FirstEnergy said. 

In addition, FirstEnergy said the loss of Davis-Besse's 
generating capability will increase its energy costs by $10 
million to $15 million each month the plant remains shut down. 

The company said the outage extension could reduce its after-tax 
earnings by 5 to 10 cents per share. 

FirstEnergy's stock has fallen 6.3 percent since Monday's close. 
Shares yesterday were down 76 cents to $36.23. The stock is still 
up 3.6 percent year to date, and up 37 percent from the same date 
a year ago. 

It's uncertain how the loss of Davis-Besse's 873 megawatt 
generating capability for an extended period will impact the 
state. 

FirstEnergy said it can contract to buy power from other 
producers for its customers as needed. In addition, FirstEnergy 
and other utilities in recent years have been adding so-called 
peaking facilities that can supply electricity for short periods 
of high usage such as during a heat wave. 

Peak electricity usage for the summer usually happens in July and 
August, according to the East Central Area Reliability Council. 
The Canton-based organization monitors electricity usage and 
capability for an eight-state region that includes Ohio. The 
council's forecast on electricity generation and demand for this 
summer isn't ready. 

to http://www.ohio.com/bj (c) 2002, Akron Beacon Journal, Ohio. 
Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune
*****************************************************************
 13 NRC to Discuss Millstone Performance with Dominion Nuclear

 NRC: Press Release Region I - 2002 - 15 - 

 U.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION Office of Public Affairs, 
Region I 475 Allendale Road, King of Prussia, Pa. 19406 
www.nrc.gov

  No. I-02-015                          March 14, 2002 CONTACT:     
Diane Screnci (610) 337-5330 Neil A. Sheehan (610) 337-5331                     
E-mail: opa1@nrc.gov [opa1@nrc.gov]   
  
  Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff will take part in two 
public meetings regarding the Millstone nuclear power plant on 
Thursday, March 21. The facility, which has two operational 
reactors, is located in Waterford, Conn., and operated by 
Dominion Nuclear Connecticut, Inc. At 1:30 p.m. that day , NRC 
staff will meet with representatives of Dominion Nuclear at the 
Leland F. Sillin Nuclear Training Center, located at the plant 
off Rope Ferry Road, to discuss the results of the agency's 
annual assessment of Millstone's safety performance. The meeting 
will be open to the public for observation. Before the session is 
adjourned, NRC staff will be available to answer questions from 
the public on the safety performance of Millstone Units 2 and 3 
and the role of the NRC in ensuring safe plant operation.
 
The performance period to be discussed is April 1, 2001, to 
December 31, 2001. NRC staff will also provide an overview of the 
agency's Reactor Oversight Process.
 
At 7 p.m. that day, NRC staff will hold a joint meeting with 
Connecticut's Nuclear Energy Advisory Council to discuss the 
annual assessment results for Millstone, as well as the NRC's 
implementation of its Reactor Oversight Process. In addition, the 
NRC will discuss the results of a special inspection that was 
conducted regarding two fuel rods determined to be missing from 
the permanently shutdown Millstone Unit 1 nuclear plant. That 
meeting, which will also be open to the public for observation, 
will take place at Waterford Town Hall, 15 Rope Ferry Road in 
Waterford. As with the earlier meeting, NRC staff will be 
available to answer questions from the public before adjournment.
 
A letter sent from the NRC Region I office to Dominion Nuclear 
addresses plant performance during the period and will serve as 
the basis for the discussions. It is available on the NRC web 
site at: 
http://www.nrc.gov/NRR/OVERSIGHT/ASSESS/LETTERS/mill_2001q4.pdf
 
Current performance information for Millstone Unit 2 is available 
on the NRC web site at: 
http://www.nrc.gov/NRR/OVERSIGHT/ASSESS/MILL2/mill2_chart.html
 
Current performance information for Millstone Unit 3 is available 
on the NRC web site at: 
http://www.nrc.gov/NRR/OVERSIGHT/ASSESS/MILL3/mill3_chart.html
   
*****************************************************************
 14 NRC Issues Confirmatory Action Letter to Pennsylvania Medical 
Firm
 
NRC: Press Release Region I - 2002 - 16 - 

 U.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION Office of Public Affairs, 
Region I 475 Allendale Road, King of Prussia, Pa. 19406 
www.nrc.gov
  
  No. I-02-016           March 14, 2002 CONTACT:     Diane 
Screnci (610) 337-5330 Neil A. Sheehan (610) 337-5331     E-mail: 
opa1@nrc.gov [opa1@nrc.gov]   
  
  The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has issued a Confirmatory 
Action Letter to a Jenkins Township, Pa., medical company that 
provides nuclear medicine services. The letter confirms the 
company's agreement to halt all NRC-licensed activities until it 
takes several actions to conform to agency regulations. Advanced 
Medical Imaging, Inc., has an NRC license that allows it to use 
certain types of nuclear material to perform diagnostic tests, 
such as radioactive imaging.
 
During a telephone conversation on March 13, the NRC confirmed 
the company is conducting NRC-licensed activities without a 
radiation safety officer as required by its NRC license. The 
agency found that the radiation safety officer listed on the 
company's license was not serving in that capacity.
 
Advanced Medical Imaging has agreed to take the following actions 
prior to resuming licensed activities: immediately place all 
NRC-licensed nuclear materials in its possession in secure 
storage and cease all licensed activities until it has obtained 
an NRC-approved authorized radiation safety officer; and provide 
to the NRC a written statement that the RSO has read and 
understands the duties of an RSO and is willing and able to carry 
them out. 

The company must notify the agency in writing when it has 
completed these actions.
   


*****************************************************************
 15 NRC Names New Senior Resident Inspector at Millstone Unit 2
 
    NRC: Press Release Region I - 2002 - 17 - 

 U.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION Office of Public Affairs, 
Region I 475 Allendale Road, King of Prussia, Pa. 19406 
www.nrc.gov
  
  No. I-02-017           March 14, 2002 CONTACT:     Diane 
Screnci (610) 337-5330 Neil A. Sheehan (610) 337-5331     E-mail: 
opa1@nrc.gov [opa1@nrc.gov]   

  Nuclear Regulatory Commission officials in King of Prussia, 
Pa., have announced the assignment of Stephen Max Schneider as 
the agency's senior resident inspector at Millstone 2 nuclear 
power plant in Waterford, Conn. Schneider replaces Steve Jones 
who accepted a position in the Office of Nuclear Reactor 
Regulation at NRC's headquarters in Rockville, Md.
 
Schneider joined the NRC's Region IV office in Arlington, Texas, 
as a reactor engineer in 1999. Most recently he was a resident 
inspector at the River Bend Nuclear Generating Station in 
Louisiana. Prior to joining the NRC, he worked for the Department 
of Energy and the Department of Defense. 

Schneider earned a bachelor's degree in civil engineering from 
the University of Lowell in Massachusetts. 

Each U.S. commercial nuclear power plant has at least two NRC 
resident inspectors. They serve as the agency's eyes and ears at 
the facility, conducting regular inspections, monitoring 
significant work projects and talking with plant workers and the 
public.
 
Schneider joins NRC resident inspector Paul Cataldo at Millstone 
2. They and the other resident inspectors at Millstone Station 
can be reached at 860/447-3170.
*****************************************************************
 16 NRC Issues Confirmatory Action Letter on Davis-Besse; Schedules 
Meetings; Establishes Web Link for Info on Reactor Vessel 
Degradation
 
   NRC: Press Release - 2002 - 29 - 

 U.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION Office of Public Affairs     
Telephone: 301/415-8200 Washington, DC 20555-001     E-mail: 
opa@nrc.gov [opa@nrc.gov] www.nrc.gov   
  
  No. 02-029     March 15, 2002   

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff has issued a Confirmatory 
Action Letter (CAL) to FirstEnergy Nuclear Corporation confirming 
the company's commitments regarding actions it will take to 
evaluate and resolve damage to a small area of the reactor 
pressure vessel head at the Davis-Besse Nuclear Power Station.
 
The plant, located at Oak Harbor, Ohio, shut down February 16 for 
refueling and maintenance. Inspections revealed a cavity in the 
top of the reactor pressure vessel (RPV) head that may have been 
caused by corrosion from boric acid deposits. As announced March 
12, the NRC has sent an Augmented Inspection Team to the site to 
monitor the licensee's investigation and evaluation of the 
degradation to the reactor pressure vessel head.
 
The CAL confirms commitments First Energy has made to the NRC to: 

  + Quarantine components or other material from the RPV head and 
nozzle penetrations that are deemed necessary to fully address 
the root cause of the occurrence of degradation. + Prior to 
implementation, provide plans for further inspection and data 
gathering to support determination of the root cause to the NRC 
for review and comment. + Determine the root cause of the 
degradation around the RPV head penetrations, and promptly meet 
with the NRC to discuss this information. + Evaluate conditions 
throughout the reactor coolant system relative to the degradation 
mechanisms that occurred on the RPV head. + Obtain NRC review and 
approval of the repair or modification and testing plans for the 
RPV head, prior to implementation of those activities. + Prior to 
restart, obtain NRC review and approval of any modification and 
testing activity related to the reactor core or reactivity 
control systems. + Prior to the restart of the unit, meet with 
the NRC to obtain restart approval. During that meeting, the 
company will discuss its root cause determination, extent of 
condition evaluations, and corrective actions completed and 
planned to repair the damage and prevent recurrence. + Provide a 
plan and schedule to the NRC, within 15 days of the date of this 
letter, for completing and submitting to the NRC the company's 
ongoing assessment of the safety significance for the RPV head 
degradation. Issuance of the CAL does not preclude subsequent 
issuance of an order formalizing the commitments or requiring 
other actions on the part of the company.
 
On March 19, the NRC staff will meet with the representatives 
from the Nuclear Energy Institute and the Materials Reliability 
Program to discuss the problem at Davis-Besse and its possible 
generic implications. The meeting is scheduled for 11:00 a.m. to 
1:00 p.m. in Room T-8A-1 of the agency's Two White Flint North 
Building, 11545 Rockville Pike, Rockville, Maryland. 
Representatives from NEI will present preliminary results of a 
survey of potentially affected utilities undertaken at the 
request of NRC, which asked for information on the extent of 
recent visual examinations and tests of reactor pressure vessel 
heads, as well as plans for conducting such inspections during 
outages this Spring. The meeting will be open to the public for 
observation and NRC officials will be available before the 
meeting is adjourned to answer any questions. The meeting contact 
is Steve Bloom at (301) 415-1313.
 
A separate public meeting will be held from 1:00 to 5:00 p.m. on 
March 20 with NRC's stakeholders during which the NRC staff will 
present a briefing on the status of activities regarding the 
problem at Davis-Besse and solicit comments from the attendees. 
The meeting will be held in the Commission Conference Room in the 
lobby of the agency's One White Flint North Building, 11555 
Rockville Pike, Rockville, Maryland. Arrangements have been made 
to permit interested individuals to listen to the meeting via 
telephone by calling: (301) 231-5539 or 1- 800-638-8081and 
entering passcode 5315# at the prompt. Fifty phone lines will be 
available. If difficulties are experienced, help will be 
available in accessing the conference by calling 1-800-368-5642 
and requesting operator assistance. Additional details are 
available by calling Stephen Sands at (301) 415-3154, or Douglas 
Pickett at (301) 415-1364.
 
To help keep the public informed of its activities, NRC has 
established a section on its web site where information about 
reactor pressure vessel head degradation will be posted and 
updated, including press releases, documents and correspondence 
with NRC licensees. The web address is: 
http://www.nrc.gov/reactors/operating/ops-experience/vessel-head-degradation.htm
l
*****************************************************************
 17 Damage to Ohio Nuclear Plant May Cost FirstEnergy $55 Million, Delay 
            Restart 

Jim Mackinnon , Akron Beacon Journal, Ohio 
Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News ( March 15, 2002 ) 

Mar. 14--The damage to the Davis-Besse nuclear power plant may 
cost FirstEnergy as much as $55 million and delay its restart 
until June, when summer electricity use begins to peak, the 
utility announced yesterday. Meanwhile, the plant's woes raise 
concerns that other plants might have similar safety problems. 
The nuclear power industry and nuclear power opponents are 
intensely interested in the surprising discovery that boric acid, 
a byproduct of the nuclear reaction, apparently carved a 
six-inch-deep cavity in the 6 3/8-inch-thick steel reactor head, 
a vital safety component that covers the fuel core. "This was 
something that was not expected. It was not predicted to occur. 
We have not seen this kind of erosion," said Brian Sheron, 
associate director for the project license and technical 
assessment office in the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. His 
office is overseeing the NRC's investigation at Davis-Besse. The 
discovery has had repercussions near and far. 

FirstEnergy's stock has taken a hit on the news. Regulatory 
investigators and others are scrambling to find what caused the 
four-inch-by-five-inch-wide cavity. At least one anti-nuclear 
group opposes the plant's restart. FirstEnergy says it can buy 
power from other suppliers, if needed, until the nuclear plant is 
running again. 

And while there's no danger of a core meltdown or release of 
radiation at Davis-Besse, the discovery of the cavity could force 
the temporary shut down of other nuclear power plants of similar 
design elsewhere in the nation to check for signs of cavity 
formation, Sheron said. While a widespread shut-down scenario is 
unlikely, other operators of pressurized water nuclear power 
plants will have to prove to the NRC that their own safety 
inspections have already accounted for, or soon will account for, 
the kind of degradation found in Davis-Besse, he said. 

Nuclear plants that are scheduled to shut down this spring for 
inspections, maintenance or refueling will have to check for the 
degradation, he said. 

Other plants not scheduled for shut down will have to tell the 
NRC "Why do you believe you don't have this problem? he said. If 
they can't answer that question to the agency's satisfaction, the 
NRC can force the power plant to shut down until an inspection is 
done, he said. 

One prominent anti-nuclear power group yesterday called upon the 
NRC and FirstEnergy to not allow the reactor to restart until a 
permanent reactor head vessel, which covers the radioactive fuel 
core, is installed. That could take as long as two years to 
manufacture, a FirstEnergy spokesman said. 

The Nuclear Information and Resource Service, a Washington-based 
group that opposes nuclear power, said the plant came dangerously 
close to a catastrophic accident -- a charge FirstEnergy called 
"nonsense." The NRC's Sheron also said there was no immediate 
danger to the public. "These reactors do have a lot of (safety) 
margins and are strong. We design for that kind of accident." 

But the Davis-Besse cavity shows that neither federal regulators 
nor the nuclear power industry knows everything that happens 
inside a nuclear power plant, said Paul Gunter, director of the 
Reactor Watchdog Project for the Nuclear Information and Resource 
Service. 

"There are so many unknowns," he said. "FirstEnergy should not be 
allowed to fire the reactor up without replacing the reactor 
vessel head." 

FirstEnergy had already ordered a new vessel head prior to the 
discovery of the cavity, said plant spokesman Richard Wilkins. 
But the vessel can't be built and delivered for at least another 
two years, he said. 

The utility is devising ways to repair the damage and operate the 
reactor until the new vessel head is installed. 

"What we're looking at is doing it right," Wilkins said. "There 
isn't any doubt that it can be fixed." 

About 50 people are working on the repair project, including some 
of the world's best nuclear experts, he said. 

The Akron utility said repairs will delay restarting the Oak 
Harbor plant, which first began operating in 1977, through May 
and possibly into June. Davis-Besse has been closed since Feb. 16 
for refueling and the safety inspection, and was originally set 
to begin producing power again on March 31. The NRC last year 
ordered operators of the nation's 69 pressurized-water reactors 
like Davis-Besse to look for cracks in parts inside reactor 
vessels called control rod penetration nozzles. Five of 
Davis-Besse's 69 nozzles were found to have cracks; one of the 
nozzles apparently allowed boric acid to form on the reactor 
vessel itself and eat into the carbon steel. The acid stopped 
when it came into contact with a 3/8-inch layer of stainless 
steel that covers the thick carbon steel shell. Repairs alone 
could cost between $5 million and $10 million, FirstEnergy said. 

In addition, FirstEnergy said the loss of Davis-Besse's 
generating capability will increase its energy costs by $10 
million to $15 million each month the plant remains shut down. 

The company said the outage extension could reduce its after-tax 
earnings by 5 to 10 cents per share. 

FirstEnergy's stock has fallen 6.3 percent since Monday's close. 
Shares yesterday were down 76 cents to $36.23. The stock is still 
up 3.6 percent year to date, and up 37 percent from the same date 
a year ago. 

It's uncertain how the loss of Davis-Besse's 873 megawatt 
generating capability for an extended period will impact the 
state. 

FirstEnergy said it can contract to buy power from other 
producers for its customers as needed. In addition, FirstEnergy 
and other utilities in recent years have been adding so-called 
peaking facilities that can supply electricity for short periods 
of high usage such as during a heat wave. 

Peak electricity usage for the summer usually happens in July and 
August, according to the East Central Area Reliability Council. 
The Canton-based organization monitors electricity usage and 
capability for an eight-state region that includes Ohio. The 
council's forecast on electricity generation and demand for this 
summer isn't ready. 
      
----- To see more of the Akron Beacon Journal, or to subscribe to 
the newspaper, go to http://www.ohio.com/bj 
      
(c) 2002, Akron Beacon Journal, Ohio. Distributed by Knight 
Ridder/Tribune Business News. 
*****************************************************************
 18 Davis-Besse Nuclear Plant Comes Close To Disaster 

NIRS davis-besse press release

 NUCLEAR INFORMATION AND RESOURCE SERVICE 

1424 16th Street, NW, Suite 404, Washington, D.C. 20036 
202.328.0002; fax 202.462.2183; nirsnet@nirs.org; www.nirs.org 

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:    March 13, 2002 
CONTACT: 

Paul Gunter and Kevin Kamps, NIRS, Washington, DC 202-328-0002 
Mary Olson, NIRS Southeast, Asheville, NC 828-251-2060 

As Lax Regulator Places Company Interests Ahead of Public Safety 
(Washington, DC) First Energy, an Ohio electric utility, drove 
its deteriorating Davis-Besse nuclear power station dangerously 
close to a catastrophic accident it was revealed today. Moreover, 
the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) capitulated to First 
Energy pressure to delay inspections of a vital safety component 
beyond a requested December 31, 2001 deadline in order to 
accommodate the industry rather than force an early shutdown to 
conduct inspections on deteriorating equipment. 

Following the February shutdown for refueling outage and 
inspection at the Davis-Besse nuclear power station, 21 miles 
Southeast of Toledo, Ohio, operators discovered a cavity had 
eaten through 6-inches of carbon steel on the top of the 6½-inch 
thick reactor pressure vessel, the apparent result of corrosive 
coolant leakage from the reactor core. Less than a half inch of 
the reactor vessel's stainless steel liner remained in the bottom 
of the 4"X5"X6" cavity separating the reactor's highly 
radioactive and pressurized internal environment (2500psi) from 
blasting into the reactor containment building damaging safety 
equipment and possibly setting into motion a core melt accident.  
Initial company inspections additionally found cracks in the 
welds on five of the 69 nickel alloy sleeves that penetrate the 
reactor pressure vessel head to allow for control rod insertion 
to safely shutdown the reactor. 

"First Energy pushed this reactor beyond all reasonable safety 
margins and the NRC basically allowed it," said Paul Gunter, 
Director of the Reactor Watchdog Project for Washington, DC-based 
Nuclear Information and Resource Service. "This was a dangerous 
nuclear experiment on public safety that came damn close to 
exceeding the strength of a fundamental piece of reactor safety 
equipment, the reactor pressure vessel," he said. 

The United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) had earlier 
granted operators at Davis-Besse a delay from a December 31, 2001 
inspection report deadline on the same vessel head area of the 
reactor pressure vessel as was required of all other pressurized 
water reactor operators issued in a NRC industry bulletin on 
August 03, 2001. First Energy successfully fought NRC's request 
to shutdown early to inspect for damage to the region control rod 
drive mechanism vessel head penetrations for cracking and 
corrosive coolant leakage. 

"Davis-Besse is a highly susceptible reactor with known 
deteriorating margins of reactor safety in this area," said NIRS 
staffer Kevin Kamps. "First Energy operators calculated the risks 
of running the reactor to their scheduled February outage to 
maximize their profits," said Kamps. "Such high-stakes risk 
taking means gambling with the health and safety of very large 
numbers of people," Kamps concluded. 

The reactor coolant at Davis-Besse as at other nuclear reactors 
is a solution of boron and water. Reactor coolant escaping 
through cracks and around flanges on the control rod drive 
mechanisms allows the corrosive boron to drip, crystallize and 
attack the carbon steel exterior surface. 

While the corrosive action of the boron crystals apparently 
stopped at the stainless steel liner, given a wide enough cavity 
in the carbon steel, the reactor pressure vessel could have 
ruptured as the result of the extreme internal pressure exceeding 
the sheer stress of the steel liner tearing a hole through the 
vessel wall from the inside out. 

Reactor coolant released as a high-pressure jet stream of 
radioactive water much like a super fire hose could damage 
reactor safety equipment located directly above the reactor 
vessel and potentially introduce a shock wave sufficient to break 
already cracked control rods ejecting them as missiles further 
damaging equipment including other control rods needed to shut 
down the reactor. 

Davis-Besse now plans to find a used reactor pressure vessel head 
or alternately weld metal plates on the interior and exterior 
sides of the vessel head to plug the hole until a new vessel head 
could be fabricated and installed two years from now. First 
Energy is also considering grinding out the cracks in welds on 
vessel head penetrations for control rod drive mechanisms  and 
re-welding the sleeves. 

"The First Energy repair option on the cavity in the reactor 
vessel has no standard or code to measure its reliability and 
safety by," said Gunter. "Such a repair could very well introduce 
additional stresses to this safety component to make the repair 
unreliable and risk public safety again later on down the line," 
Gunter concluded. --30-- 
*****************************************************************
 19 Military (at Duke reactor) exercise remains a puzzle 

Augusta Georgia: Metro:

Web posted Friday, March 15, 2002
 
Associated Press [http://wire.ap.org/] 

ROCK HILL, S.C. - It's been six months since the night when 
mysterious helicopters swooped down near a nuclear plant near 
Rock Hill, and still the details are as murky as when it 
happened.

 On Sept. 15, when nerves were frayed four days after the 
terrorist attacks on New York and Washington, residents in a 
subdivision near the Catawba River heard the helicopters flying 
low along the river toward the plant.

 Occasionally a helicopter from Duke Power Co.'s Catawba nuclear 
plant checks on power lines, but this was a Saturday night and it 
was dark.

 "They were very low, and it made a lot of noise," resident Sue 
Brown said. "I was thinking they really want to keep a close eye 
on the nuclear plant up there. It really didn't worry me."

 Law officers repeatedly tried, but failed, to contact the 
helicopter pilots. F-16 fighters from Shaw Air Force base were 
sent into the air although the helicopters were gone by the time 
the fighters arrived.

 Local emergency officials say the helicopters were on a military 
training exercise, but the Pentagon denies involvement.

 "We didn't have anything up there," said Maj. Mike Halbig, a 
Defense Department spokesman.

 However, the North Carolina Division of Emergency Management 
concluded the exercise was conducted by Special Forces units.

 "Apparently they decided to hold a mock attack ... DOD officials 
forgot to put this exercise on the 'hot sheet' for operations, 
therefore, no other agencies were notified prior to F-16s 
responding," the agency's report said.

 Residents also saw soldiers rappelling from helicopters and 
heard gunfire, according to the report.

 The FBI told the power company later that Special Forces units 
were involved, the report said. FBI officials in Columbia refused 
to comment, and special operations units from the military 
branches say the helicopters were not theirs.

 The Nuclear Regulatory Commission concluded the helicopters were 
conducting authorized activities and "there was no threat to the 
nuclear facility," said commission spokeswoman Beth Hagner.

 She said the commission submitted a report to the Emergency 
Operations Center on Sept. 16. However the report, which was 
obtained under the Freedom of Information Act, does not say who 
was responsible for the exercise.
 
Chronicle [http://www.augustachronicle.com] 
*****************************************************************
 20 Did Anyone Lose a Cesium Rod? Disaster Narrowly Averted in Taiwan Incident

Public Citizen through
         
March 14, 2002

Meanwhile, U.S. Government Intentionally Releasing Radioactive 
Materials Into Market

WASHINGTON, D.C. – A recent incident in Taiwan, in which a 
62-pound rod of cesium was pulled from a pile of scrap metal 
prior to being melted in a steel works furnace, is yet another 
sign that nuclear materials and waste are being handled 
improperly and that nuclear regulatory agencies are not 
safeguarding the public, Public Citizen said today.

Further, the incident should be noted by U.S. government agencies 
charged with regulating nuclear waste, because they are now 
attempting to introduce additional radiation sources into 
consumer products and the environment by permitting radioactive 
waste to be recycled, Public Citizen said.

Wednesday’s Taipei Times reported that the cesium rod, which was 
highly radioactive, was discovered mixed with non-radioactive 
metal scraps on a truck at a steel foundry that operates a 
melting furnace. Taiwan officials said they didn’t know where the 
rod came from.

Had the rod been melted in the foundry’s furnace, there would 
have been an extremely hazardous radioactive emission, creating 
an immediate health hazard and seriously polluting the 
environment. The cesium rod emitted more than 270 times the 
radiation per hour than recommended by the International 
Commission on Radiation Protection.

Similar incidents in the United States have not always had such a 
fortunate ending. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) 
has reported that at least 26 accidental meltings of radioactive 
material have occurred in the United States since 1983. This 
number accounts for more than half of the 49 accidental meltings 
worldwide that the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) had 
tallied as of 1998.

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is notified of 
approximately 200 lost or stolen radioactive sources each year. 
While some radioactive materials are found in or near scrap 
yards, metal foundries, factories or recycling facilities, others 
are handled unknowingly by non-nuclear workers or even sold in 
stores. In the United States in the past six months:

  A foreign shipment of iridium, delivered from overseas by 
standard couriers and with no detection by the U.S. Customs 
Service, arrived in New Orleans by truck before it was determined 
that the package was leaking high doses of radiation. 

  Radioactive tools were stolen from a Utah nuclear waste 
facility and sold to at least one local pawn shop. The pawn shop 
was unaware that the tools were radioactive and subsequently sold 
the tools to a third party. Some of the tools are still missing. 

  The U.S. Army detected cesium-137 and cobalt-60 throughout a 
wooded area within the city limits of Anniston, Ala., a short 
distance from a community center. 

  An industrial radioactive device used to measure soil density 
was found on the steps of a pawn shop in Prichard, Ala. 

"The government should heed the warnings provided by these 
incidents and the Taiwan episode," said David Ritter, policy 
analyst with Public Citizen's Critical Mass Energy and 
Environment Program. "This ought to make them change their minds 
about the very bad idea of putting radioactive materials on the 
common market."

These incidents include only accidents and thefts, however. 
Authorities are simultaneously sanctioning the intentional 
releases of radioactive wastes from nuclear facilities operated 
by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) and its contractors, or 
licensed by the NRC. This is done on a case-by-case basis. The 
wastes are released without restriction and can be dumped in a 
municipal landfill, incinerated, sold or donated "as is," or even 
recycled into a plethora of everyday consumer products and 
industrial materials.

Now, the DOE and NRC are pushing nuclear industry-friendly 
policies to standardize and increase the release and "recycling" 
of radioactive wastes.

"These agencies are truly captured by the nuclear industry, and 
the industry is trying to greenwash their latest scheme with 
terms like 'recycling' and 'beneficial reuse,' " said Wenonah 
Hauter, director of Public Citizen's Critical Mass Energy and 
Environment Program. "If the 'recycling' practice doesn't lead to 
major savings or profits for those who make the mess, it's still 
a handy way for them to evade liability for their waste. But the 
American public doesn't want to come in contact with nuclear 
waste. They don't want their kids to ride bicycles made of 
nuclear waste. We need to ban this practice once and for all."

Ritter noted that people would never opt to buy products made 
from "recycled" radioactive waste.

"If you were in a store, and could choose between the 
non-contaminated frying pan or the one with the label that said 
"slightly radioactive," which one would you pick? If the nuclear 
industry had to tell us which products their nuclear reactor and 
weapon waste goes into, we know the practice would stop 
immediately. Unfortunately, labels aren't required."

###
*****************************************************************
 21 Uranium inquiry ordered by MoD

Times Online

March 15, 2002

By A Scotland Correspondent
 		   		 		
THE Ministry of Defence is to carry out an inquiry into the 
potential effects on the health of the Armed Forces handling 
depleted uranium ammunition, after concerns were raised about 
testing with depleted uranium shells on the Kirkcudbright firing 
range in Dumfries and Galloway. 

The testing involved hundreds of tonnes of the controversial 
ammunition being fired into the Irish Sea. 

Depleted uranium has been used in the shells because of its 
improved abilities to penetrate armour over traditional 
ammunition. 

The Ministry of Defence has previously refused to accept any 
conclusive link between cancer and the use of depleted uranium 
ammunition. 

However, after recommendations from the Royal Society, the 
Ministry has now decided to conduct a study “to identify any 
links between exposure to depleted uranium and ill-health”, 
including a review of the “effects of depleted uranium inhalation 
on the pulmonary lymph nodes”. 

The Ministry of Defence inquiry will cover the effects of used 
depleted uranium shells on soil and marine environments. A key 
development is that the inquiry will also investigate safer 
alternatives to the use of depleted uranium.
   	 		
Copyright 2002  
[http://www.thetimes.co.uk/section/0,,549,00.html]              
Times
*****************************************************************
 22 DEPLETED URANIUM IN BUNKER BOMBS

America's big dirty secret
 
Le Monde diplomatique

[http://MondeDiplo.com/]     

    The United States loudly and proudly boasted this month of 
its new bomb currently being used against al-Qaida hold-outs in 
Afghanistan; it sucks the air from underground installations, 
suffocating those within. The US has also admitted that it has 
used depleted uranium weaponry over the last decade against 
bunkers in Iraq, Kosovo, and now Afghanistan. by ROBERT JAMES 
PARSONS *
                                        
"The immediate concern for medical professionals and employees of 
aid organisations remains the threat of extensive depleted 
uranium (DU) contamination in Afghanistan." This is one of the 
conclusions of a 130-page report, Mystery Metal Nightmare in 
Afghanistan? (1), by Dai Williams, an independent researcher and 
occupational psychologist. It is the result of more than a year 
of research into DU and its effects on those exposed to it. 

Using internet sites of both NGOs (2) and arms manufacturers, 
Williams has come up with information that he has cross-checked 
and compared with weapons that the Pentagon has reported — indeed 
boasted about — using during the war. What emerges is a startling 
and frightening vision of war, both in Afghanistan and in the 
future. 

Since 1997 the United States has been modifying and upgrading its 
missiles and guided (smart) bombs. Prototypes of these bombs were 
tested in the Kosovo mountains in 1999, but a far greater range 
has been tested in Afghanistan. The upgrade involves replacing a 
conventional warhead by a heavy, dense metal one (3). Calculating 
the volume and the weight of this mystery metal leads to two 
possible conclusions: it is either tungsten or depleted uranium. 

Tungsten poses problems. Its melting point (3,422°C) makes it 
very hard to work; it is expensive; it is produced mostly by 
China; and it does not burn. DU is pyrophoric, burning on impact 
or if it is ignited, with a melting point of 1,132°C; it is much 
easier to process; and as nuclear waste, it is available free to 
arms manufacturers. Further, using it in a range of weapons 
significantly reduces the US nuclear waste storage problem. 

This type of weapon can penetrate many metres of reinforced 
concrete or rock in seconds. It is equipped with a detonator 
controlled by a computer that measures the density of the 
material passed through and, when the warhead reaches the 
targeted void or a set depth, detonates the warhead, which then 
has an explosive and incendiary effect. The DU burns fiercely and 
rapidly, carbonising everything in the void, while the DU itself 
is transformed into a fine uranium oxide powder. Although only 
30% of the DU of a 30mm penetrator round is oxidised, the DU 
charge of a missile oxidises 100%. Most of the dust particles 
produced measure less than 1.5 microns, small enough to be 
breathed in. 

For a few researchers in this area, the controversy over the use 
of DU weapons during the Kosovo war got side-tracked. Instead of 
asking what weapons might have been used against most of the 
targets (underground mountain bunkers) acknowledged by Nato, 
discussion focused on 30mm anti-tank penetrator rounds, which 
Nato had admitted using but which would have been ineffective 
against superhardened underground installations. 

However, as long as the questions focused on such anti-tank 
penetrators, they dealt with rounds whose maximum weight was five 
kilos for a 120mm round. The DU explosive charges in the guided 
bomb systems used in Afghanistan can weigh as much as one and a 
half metric tons (as in Raytheon's Bunker Buster — GBU-28) (4). 

Who cares?
 

In Geneva, where most of the aid agencies active in Afghanistan 
are based, Williams's report has caused varied reactions. The 
United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Refugees and 
the Office for the Co-ordination of Humanitarian Affairs have 
circulated it. But it does not seem to have worried agency and 
programme directors much. Only Médecins sans Frontiéres and the 
UN Environment Programme (UNEP) say they fear an environmental 
and health catastrophe. 

In March and April 2001, UNEP and the World Health Organisation 
(WHO) published reports on DU, reports that are frequently cited 
by those claiming DU is innocuous. The Pentagon emphasises that 
the organisations are independent and neutral. But the UNEP study 
is, at best, compromised. The WHO study is unreliable. 

The Kosovo assessment mission that provided the basis for the 
UNEP analysis was organised using maps supplied by Nato; Nato 
troops accompanied the researchers to protect them from 
unexploded munitions, including cluster bomb sub-munitions. These 
sub-munitions, as Williams discovered, were probably equipped 
with DU shaped-charges. Nato troops prevented researchers from 
any contact with DU sub-munitions, even from discovering their 
existence. 

During the 16 months before the UNEP mission, the Pentagon sent 
at least 10 study teams into the field and did major clean-up 
operations (5). Out of 8,112 anti-tank penetrator rounds fired on 
the sites studied, the UNEP team recovered only 11, although many 
more would not have been burned. And, 18 to 20 months after the 
firing, the amount of dust found directly on sites hit by these 
rounds was particularly small. 

The WHO undertook no proper epidemiological study, only an 
academic desk study. Under pressure from the International Atomic 
Energy Agency, the WHO confined itself to studying DU as a 
heavy-metal, chemical contaminant. In January 2001, alerted to 
the imminent publication by Le Monde diplomatique of an article 
attacking its inaction (6), the WHO held a press conference and 
announced a $2m fund — eventually $20m — for research into DU. 
According Dr Michael Repacholi of the WHO, the report on DU, 
under way since 1999 and supervised by the British geologist 
Barry Smith, would be expanded to include radiation 
contamination. The work would include analyses of urine of people 
exposed to DU, conducted to determine the exposure level. 

But the monograph, published 10 weeks later, was merely a survey 
of existing literature on the subject. Out of hundreds of 
thousands of monographs published since 1945, which ought to have 
been explored in depth, the report covered only monographs on 
chemical contamination, with a few noteworthy exceptions. The few 
articles about dealing with radiation contamination that had been 
consulted came from the Pentagon and the Rand Corporation, the 
Pentagon think- tank. It is unsurprising that the report was 
bland. 

The recommendations of the two reports were common sense, and 
repeated advice already given by the WHO and echoed regularly by 
the aid organisations working in Kosovo. This included marking 
off known target sites, collecting penetrator rounds wherever 
possible, keeping children away from contaminated sites, and the 
suggested monitoring of some wells later on. 

Uranium plus
 

The problem can be summed up as two key findings: 

o Radiation emitted by DU threatens the human body because, once 
DU dust has been inhaled, it becomes an internal radiation 
source; international radiation protection standards, the basis 
of expert claims that DU is harmless, deal only with external 
radiation sources; 

o Dirty DU — the UNEP report, for all its failings, deserves 
credit for mentioning this. Uranium from reactors, recycled for 
use in munitions, contains additional highly toxic elements, such 
as plutonium, 1.6 kilogrammes of which could kill 8bn people. 
Rather than depleted uranium, it should be called uranium plus. 

In a French TV documentary on Canal+ in January 2001 (7), a team 
of researchers presented the results of an investigation into a 
gaseous diffusion — recycling — plant in Paducah, Kentucky, US. 
According to the lawyer for 100,000 plaintiffs, who are past and 
present plant employees, they were contaminated because of 
flagrant non-compliance with basic safety standards; the entire 
plant is irrevocably contaminated, as is everything it produces. 
The documentary claimed that the DU in the missiles that were 
dropped on Yugoslavia, Afghanistan and Iraq is likely to be a 
product of this plant. 

These weapons represent more than just a new approach to warfare. 
The US rearmament programme launched during Ronald Reagan's 
presidency was based on the premise that the victor in future 
conflicts would be the side that destroyed the enemy's command 
and communications centres. Such centres are increasingly located 
in superhardened bunkers deep underground. 

Hitting such sites with nuclear weapons would do the job well, 
but also produce radiation that even the Pentagon would have to 
acknowledge as fearsome, not to mention the bad public relations 
arising from mushroom-shaped clouds in a world aware of the 
dangers of nuclear war. DU warheads seem clean: they produce a 
fire modest in comparison with a nuclear detonation, though the 
incendiary effect can be just as destructive. 

The information that Williams has gathered (8) shows that after 
computer modelling in 1987, the US conducted the first real 
operational tests against Baghdad in 1991. The war in Kosovo 
provided further opportunity to test, on impressively hard 
targets, DU weapon prototypes as well as weapons already in 
production. Afghan-istan has seen an extension and amplification 
of such tests. But at the Pentagon there is little transparency 
about this. 

Williams cites several press articles (9) in December 2001 
mentioning NBC (nuclear-biological-chemical) teams in the field 
checking for possible contamination. Such contamination, 
according to the US government, would be attributed to the 
Taliban. But, last October, Afghan doctors, citing rapid deaths 
from internal ailments, were accusing the coalition of using 
chemical and radioactive weapons. The symptoms they reported 
(haemorrhaging, pulmonary constriction and vomiting) could have 
resulted from radiation contamination. 

On 5 December, when a friendly-fire bomb hit coalition soldiers, 
media representatives were all immediately removed from the scene 
and locked up in a hangar. According to the Pentagon, the bomb 
was a GBU-31, carrying a BLU-109 warhead. The Canal+ documentary 
shows an arms manufacturer's sales representative at an 
international fair in Dubai in 1999, just after the Kosovo war. 
He is presenting a BLU-109 warhead and describing its penetration 
capabilities against superhardened underground targets, 
explaining that this model had been tested in a recent war. 

Donald Rumsfeld, US Secretary of Defence, on 16 January this year 
admitted that the US had found radiation in Afghanistan (10). But 
this, he reassured, was merely from DU warheads (supposedly 
belonging to al-Qaida); he did not explain how al-Qaida could 
have launched them without planes. Williams points out that, even 
if the coalition has used no DU weapons, those attributed to 
al-Qaida might turn out to be an even greater source of 
contamination, especially if they came from Russia, in which case 
the DU could be even dirtier than that from Paducah. 

Following its assessment mission in the Balkans, UNEP set up a 
post-conflict assessment unit. Its director, Henrik Slotte, has 
announced that it is ready to work in Afghanistan as soon as 
possible, given proper security, unimpeded access to hit sites, 
and financing. The WHO remains silent. When questions about the 
current state of the DU research fund were addressed to Jon 
Lidon, spokesman for the director general, Dr Gro Harlem 
Brundtland, the WHO did not answer. Yet Williams urges that 
studies begin immediately, as victims of severe UD exposure may 
soon all be dead, yet with their deaths attributed to the rigours 
of winter. 

In Jefferson County, Indiana, the Pentagon has closed the 
200-acre (80-hectare) proving ground where it used to test-fire 
DU rounds. The lowest estimate for cleaning up the site comes to 
$7.8bn, not including permanent storage of the earth to a depth 
of six metres and of all the vegetation. Considering the cost too 
high, the military finally decided to give the tract to the 
National Park Service for a nature preserve — an offer that was 
promptly refused. Now there is talk of turning it into a National 
Sacrifice Zone and closing it forever. This gives an idea of the 
fate awaiting those regions of the planet where the US has used 
and will use depleted uranium.
 
* Journalist, Geneva 

(1) See website [http://www.eoslifework.co.uk/du2012htm] 

(2) The internet sites of Janes Defense Information 
[http://www.janes .com] , the Federation of American Scientists 
[http://www.fas.org] , the Centre of Defense Information 
[http://www.cdi.org] . 

(3) See FAS Website 
[http://www.fas.org/man/dod-101/sys/smart/hdbtdc.htm] 

(4) FAS [http://www.fas.org/man/dod-101/sys/smart/index.html] and 
USA Today 
[http://wwwusatoday.com/graphis/news/gra/gbuster/frame.htm] 

(5) <i class="spip">Chronology of environmental sampling in the 
Balkans</i> 
[http://www.deploymentlink.osd.mil/du_balkans/du_balkans_tabc.htm]
 

(6) See Deafening silence on depleted uranium, Le Monde 
diplomatique English edition, February 2001. 

(7) La Guerre radioactive secrète, by Martin Meissonnier, Roger 
Trilling, Guillaume d'Allessandro and Luc Hermann, first 
broadcast in February 2000; updated and rebroadcast in January 
2001 under the title L'Uranium appauvri, nous avons retrouvé 
l'usine contaminée by Roger Trilling and Luc Hermann. 

(8) The Use of Modeling and Simulation in the Planning of Attacks 
on Iraqi Chemical and Biological Warfare Targets 
[http://www.gulflink.osd.mil/aircampaign/index.htm] 

(9) For example "New Evidence is Adding to US Fears of Al-Qaida 
Dirty Bomb", International Herald Tribune, December 5, 2001; 
"Uranium Reportedly Found in Tunnel Complex", USA Today, December 
24, 2001. 

(10) "US Says More Weapons Sites Found in Afghanistan", Reuters, 
January 16, 2002.

Translated by the author ALL RIGHTS RESERVED © 1997-2002 Le Monde 
diplomatique   
*****************************************************************
 23 Bush to dump nuclear waste in earthquake zone

Independent News

© 2002 Independent Digital (UK) Ltd

By Andrew Gumbel in Los Angeles

15 March 2002

From the air, or from the lonely wastes of Highway 95 in the 
middle of the Mojave desert, it looks the remotest place on 
earth. Yucca Mountain is no more than a long ridge surrounded by 
dust, sand and little else for dozens of miles. And yet it could 
be the source of the next big scandal to hit the American 
administration.

President George Bush has approved a plan to move 77,000 tons of 
nuclear waste from around the country to a storage area under the 
mountain, pushing forward where two previous administrations, 
including his father's, did not dare.

Yucca Mountain is about as unsuitable a repository site as one 
could imagine. The area is criss-crossed by no fewer than 33 
earthquake faults. The rock is volcanic, there are volcanic cones 
in the area, and the latest scientific guesswork is that there 
has been an eruption in the past 20,000 years – a mere blip in 
the estimated 250,000- year toxic lifespan of nuclear waste. 
Moreover, scientific studies by former Department of Energy 
officials have found evidence that groundwater, currently running 
300 metres beneath the site, has risen in the past and flooded 
the storage area. Were that to happen once the waste arrived, it 
could not only contaminate the drinking water of the few hundred 
people who live locally (including members of a native tribe, the 
Western Shoshone, who believe Yucca Mountain to belong to them 
under a 19th- century land treaty). Radioactive toxins are likely 
to reach the surface, evaporate and pose a grave health threat to 
a large area of the American West.

No other country has opted to create a central waste repository, 
and nuclear energy experts around the world will be watching to 
see what the United States does, and what the consequences are.

Alarm at the plan in America has been raised not just by 
environmentalists. The government's own scientific oversight 
body, the Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board, reported in 
January that it found the Department of Energy's case for Yucca 
Mountain to be "weak to moderate" and contained "gaps in data and 
basic understanding".

That report did not, however, stop Spencer Abraham, the Secretary 
for Energy, from recommending presidential approval. "I have 
considered whether sound science supports the determination that 
the Yucca Mountain site is ... suitable for the development of a 
repository. I am convinced that it does," Mr Abraham wrote, 
without citing a single scientific authority. The President took 
only 24 hours to rubber-stamp his recommendation.

In Nevada, the rebellion is in full swing. Senator Harry Reid, a 
Democrat, has accused Mr Bush of betraying Nevada voters, without 
whose support he would not be President. Oscar Goodman, the Mayor 
of Las Vegas, which is 90 miles (140km) south-east of Yucca 
Mountain, has called Mr Abraham a "blockhead". The Nevada 
Governor, Kenny Guinn, a Republican, has said he will veto the 
President's decision, which means it will be sent to Congress for 
a vote. And that, expected some time in the next couple of 
months, is where the real battle will begin.

From the Bush administration's point of view, the issue is 
simple. The President likes nuclear power, just as he likes the 
entire energy sector. Nuclear power companies donated almost 
$300,000 (£211,000) to his campaign. He is keen to build reactors 
for the first time since the Three Mile Island accident in 1979. 
Unless the country's 131 reactors can find somewhere to send 
waste, they will have to cease production.

Yucca Mountain has been the only site under government 
consideration since 1987, when alternatives in New Hampshire and 
Texas were rejected because of political lobbying. (It might not 
have been a coincidence that George Bush Senior, then the 
Vice-President, was beginning his White House run and did not 
want to jeopardise his chances in the key New Hampshire primary.) 
That decision – known out west as the "Screw Nevada bill" – has 
been followed by many other, equally political, ones.

Ostensibly, Yucca Mountain was selected for its geology. But when 
the geological nightmare became clear, the Department of Energy 
said it would look only at how secure the waste containers would 
be. When the containers seemed unlikely to meet government 
standards, the Environmental Protection Agency watered down the 
standards.

The contradictions have multiplied since the Bush administration 
took office. Last year, the Department of Energy found that the 
law firm it had hired to help draft licences for Yucca Mountain 
was a lobbyist for the nuclear industry. No fewer than 14 lawyers 
from the firm, Winston & Strawn, had simultaneously billed the 
government and the Nuclear Energy Institute, the sector's chief 
lobbying body.

Lisa Gue, an analyst with the consumer advocacy group Public 
Citizen, says this is further proof that the nuclear lobby is 
setting the rules. "The process itself has become disingenuous," 
she said. "The government hasn't proceeded honestly, it has 
merely sought justification for a foregone conclusion."

Mr Bush's opponents know the environment is an area of potential 
political weakness – after all, this is the President who tore up 
the Kyoto Protocol on global warming, tried to relax curbs on 
arsenic in drinking water, and has just told taxpayers that they, 
not the energy industry, will have to pay for toxic clean-ups.

Many Washington lobbyists have also expressed amazement at the 
way Mr Bush has flown in the face of scientific opinion. "Clinton 
was not much better when it came to environmental protection, but 
at least he was smart enough to listen to the scientists," one 
government science adviser said.

Even if Congress approves the plan – and plenty of members are 
recipients of nuclear energy funds – the battle will not end 
there. Nevada has threatened to withhold the water needed to 
build the repository. Legislators in other states are considering 
no- transit laws, meaning waste consignments – each of them a 
potential "mobile Chernobyl", and a tempting terrorist target -- 
could not cross their territory to Yucca Mountain.

The White House, for the moment, is unapologetic. Not going 
ahead, Mr Abraham wrote in his letter of recommendation, would be 
"an irresponsible dereliction of duty". As the controversy heats 
up, those words may come back to haunt him. 

*****************************************************************
 24 Country faces legal action over pollution 

Irish Newspapers - 

THE EU announced last night it is taking legal action against 
Ireland for not protecting the public from toxic industrial 
emissions. 

It announced four separate legal actions and warned that the air 
pollution emitted by industry could have "serious effects on the 
environment and on human health".

The Government should have introduced new EU laws into 
legislation to prevent these pollutants, called Volatile Organic 
Compounds (VOCs), by April 15 last, the EU said. VOCs are 
contained in petrol and diesel fumes and are close to breaching 
EU health limits in parts of Dublin. 

In another announcement yesterday the EU said it was also taking 
Ireland to court for not properly protecting workers and the 
public from radiation.

Ireland has also failed to implement an EU directive improving 
protection for patients and medical staff, it said. In yet 
another action the country is facing a European court for not 
designating sufficient salmon rivers, raised bogs and cold-water 
coral reefs for protection under the Wild Birds and Habitats 
Directive.

In another action the Government is cited for not doing an 
environmental impact assessment on a peat extraction project in a 
sensitive area at Moud's Bog, Co Kildare. Last night Green MEP 
Patricia McKenna hit out at the government and said it had years 
to comply with these laws.

"The Government has been sending farcical leaflets to every 
household regarding emergency nuclear plans but it does not even 
comply with basic laws on radiation to protect medical staff. 
It's a complete disgrace," Ms McKenna said.

Treacy Hogan Environment Correspondent


© Copyright Unison
*****************************************************************
 25 Mill hoped to take radioactive soil

Denver Post.com
 
Owens derails toxin storage
 
Theo Stein [tstein@denverpost.com]        
Denver Post Environment Writer

--> Friday, March 15, 2002 - Gov. Bill Owens ordered the state 
health department to block a struggling Fremont County mill's 
plan to accept 450,000 tons of mildly radioactive soil from a New 
Jersey Superfund site until the company proves the plan is safe 
and legal. 

Health department officials said Cotter Corp. hoped to begin 
receiving shipments of the thorium-contaminated soil from a site 
in Maywood, N.J., within a month. 

But the company failed to answer critical questions about whether 
the material met requirements of the mill's radioactive-materials 
permit, according to Doug Benevento, manager of the department's 
environmental programs. 

"We're obviously not going to let them accept this material until 
we're certain about how they intend to handle the stuff when it 
gets here," said Benevento. "They also have to show how they're 
going to test it to make sure there's nothing else in there." 

More than 100 residents turned out for a meeting hosted by the 
company in early March to oppose the company's plan, which was 
disclosed by newspaper reports. 

Residents were upset to learn that Cotter's state permit allowed 
it to become a radioactive dump. 

"The public's been kind of blind-sided by this," said Donna 
Murphy, a Can~on City resident. "We thought Cotter's permit for 
storing tailings was limited to what they processed or 
reprocessed on site. We didn't know we'd become a repository for 
waste from somewhere else." 

"Ultimately, we hope the governor and the health department will 
close what appears to be some major loopholes in the permitting 
process," said Ross Vincent, a national policy adviser for the 
Sierra Club who lives in Pueblo. 

On Thursday, Fremont County Commissioners asked for a six-month 
moratorium on the disposal project in letters sent to the Army 
Corps of Engineers, which has oversight for the New Jersey 
cleanup; EPA Administrator Christine Whitman; and members of 
Colorado's congressional delegation. 

Commissioner Jim Schauer said he also had a letter to hand to 
Owens at a local banquet Thursday night. 

"We just want to know what it is and to have a little time to 
think about it," Schauer said. 

Company officials couldn't be reached for comment Thursday. But 
in February, vice president Rich Ziegler said the soil from 
Maywood was five to 10 times less radioactive than the tailings 
already on site. He said the company wasn't going into the 
radioactive-landfill business but needed the income from the 
contract to carry it through a down cycle in the uranium 
business. 

But Cotter has also expressed interest in taking 45,000 tons of 
tungsten tailings, which are also radioactive, from a Long Island 
cleanup site.
 	 

 All contents Copyright 2002 The Denver Post or other copyright 
*****************************************************************
 26 Tainted-soil plan delayed

Rocky Mountain News: State
 		 		
Owens wants health agency to analyze shipment of dirt from 
radioactive site in N.J.

By Dick Foster, News Southern Bureau

Gov. Bill Owens on Thursday halted the planned shipment of 
radioactive soil from New Jersey into Colorado until the state 
health department can thoroughly analyze the plan. 

Owens acted after an outcry last week from residents of Canon 
City, where the 470,000 tons of contaminated dirt would be 
deposited at the Cotter Corp. uranium mill. 

"The governor asked the health department to do a thorough review 
of the proposed shipment. To do that, the health department is 
suspending the shipment until they can conduct that review," 
Owens' press secretary, Dan Hopkins, said Thursday. 

But Hopkins added that if the radioactive soil meets conditions 
of Cotter's state license as a radiation mill and waste 
repository, the governor and the health department would be 
powerless to stop the shipment. 

"It's all a question of law and we are going to follow the law. 
Cotter does have a permit, and we have to assure ourselves Cotter 
is operating within that permit," Owens said Thursday shortly 
before speaking at the Lincoln Day Dinner in Canon City. 

No timetable has been set for shipment to begin. 

"All I know is it's sometime this year," said Cotter President 
Rich Ziegler. Townspeople only learned of the plan Feb. 27. No 
public meetings to inform residents were scheduled by Cotter or 
state officials until after the residents voiced outrage. 

A quickly formed citizens' group demanded a halt to the plan, at 
least until the public could study it. 

Canon City residents praised Thursday's announcement by the 
governor. "It's provided an avenue for the community to protect 
its interests," said Jeri Fry, co-chair of the citizens' group, 
Colorado Citizens Against Toxic Waste. Cotter opened its uranium 
mill in Canon City in 1958 but hasn't refined uranium since 1987. 
The plant recently began milling zirconium for electronics. 

Cotter signed a contract to accept the radioactive soil from a 
contaminated industrial site in Maywood, N.J., being cleaned up 
under the Environmental Protection Agency's Superfund program. 
The Army Corps of Engineers is supervising removal of the 
contaminated soil, which will be shipped by rail to Cotter. 

Cotter's radioactive materials license, issued by the state 
health department, allows it to mill and store radioactive 
materials on its Canon City mill site, said Jake Jacobi, the 
health department's program manager for radiation services. 

Ziegler said the delay would have little effect on Cotter's 
eventual importation of the soil because the plan complies with 
conditions of its license. 

"We've been in the process of working with the health department 
for several weeks," he said. 

Jacobi said the imported soil was far less radioactive than the 
wastes that Cotter itself produced while milling uranium. 

"It's basically dirt that's been contaminated with tailings from 
a thorium mill. What Cotter has historically processed is much 
'hotter' than what would be coming in from New Jersey," said 
Jacobi. 

But there is a legacy of anger and mistrust in the relations 
between Cotter and Canon City. 

Colorado filed suit against Cotter in 1983 after it found that 
uranium had contaminated the groundwater and wells of residents 
downstream from the mill, and radioactive dust was found in areas 
around the plant. 

The mill was declared an EPA Superfund site the following year. 
Dust cleanup has been completed, but Cotter still is required to 
monitor for groundwater contamination under conditions of the 
Superfund cleanup. 

Juries awarded $57 million in damages to residents in two 
class-action lawsuits last year for health effects and property 
damage from groundwater contamination. Cotter is appealing the 
judgments. 


Contact Dick Foster at (719) 633-4442 or 
fosterd@RockyMountainNews.com. March 15, 2002  

ARCHIVES PHOTO REPRINTS FAQ     2002 © The E.W. Scripps Co.
*****************************************************************
 27 Opponents say heavy lobbying taints Nevada nuclear dump plan
 
Las Vegas SUN
 
March 14, 2002 
 
LAS VEGAS (AP) - Opponents of a federal plan to bury the nation's 
radioactive waste in Nevada say a nuclear industry trade group 
has paved the way to the dump with more than $29 million in 
soft-money contributions. 

"All the money that changed hands casts a huge cloud over the 
credibility of the decision-making process for Yucca Mountain," 
said Andy Draheim, a San Francisco-based official with the 
governmental watchdog group Common Cause. Draheim focused on 10 
years of Nuclear Energy Institute contributions during the Energy 
Department's study of Yucca Mountain - the site President Bush 
picked in February for the nation's nuclear waste dump. 

NEI spokesman Scott Peterson said Thursday that the institute and 
its 260 members did nothing wrong by giving $29.2 million to 
political parties from Jan. 1, 1991, to June 30, 2001. 

Soft-money contributions can be made to national political 
parties by individuals, unions and corporations, but federal law 
bans corporations and unions from giving directly to politicians 
and candidates. 

Peterson didn't dispute the dollar figures compiled and reported 
Wednesday by Common Cause. 

"The fact is, both sides spend money on lobbying," Peterson said 
from Washington. "That doesn't affect the science one way or the 
other." 

Nevada is fighting the Yucca Mountain plan, and Gov. Kenny Guinn 
has pledged to veto it by April 16 - exercising a prerogative 
granted to Nevada when Congress in 1982 first authorized site 
studies of the volcanic ridge 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas. 

A veto would send the issue to Congress, where a simple majority 
of both houses would be needed to proceed with the dump. 

Opponents hope Harry Reid, the second-ranking Democrat in the 
Senate, can marshal support to uphold the veto in the 
Democratic-controlled Senate because they don't think they can 
muster a majority in the House. 

Bob Loux, the top appointed state official heading Nevada's 
opposition, said the state has a $5.25 million fund built by the 
state Legislature, counties and cities to fight the nuclear dump. 
The American Gaming Association has put up an additional $500,000 
and the Nevada Resort Association is contributing $250,000. The 
state has hired as its chief lobbyists Kenneth Duberstein, a 
Republican and former White House chief of staff to President 
Ronald Reagan, and John Podesta, former White House chief of 
staff in the Democratic administration of President Bill Clinton. 

Another pro-Yucca Mountain lobbying effort is being funded by the 
U.S. Chamber of Commerce through its Alliance for Energy and 
Economic Growth. It is headed by John Sununu, a Republican former 
New Hampshire governor and White House chief of staff for former 
President George Bush, and Geraldine Ferraro, former Democratic 
New York congresswoman and vice presidential nominee. 

Critics say the nuclear industry would benefit if the federal 
government transfers the responsibility of storing spent nuclear 
waste from commercial nuclear power plants. 

Nuclear energy is a cornerstone of the Bush administration's 
national energy policy, and industry officials hope that solving 
the waste disposal problem will spur production of new nuclear 
plants. 

"They've been paving the way with dollars, and the science has 
pretty much been for show," said Kalynda Tilges, Las Vegas-based 
coordinator for Citizen Alert, a Nevada watchdog group. "The 
nuclear industry is trying to buy a solution for pawning their 
garbage off on the American taxpayer." 

The Common Cause study found that Nuclear Energy Institute and 
its members - including nuclear power producers, energy 
suppliers, labor unions, plant designers and engineering firms - 
contributed about $10.8 million to Democrats and about $18.5 
million to Republicans over the past decade. 

Peterson said the contributions were "given as part of a public 
process that everyone can participate in." 

He said Yucca Mountain was selected on the basis of sound science 
- the standard that Congress set in the Nuclear Waste Policy Act 
of 1982. 

"Yucca Mountain has been studied by independent scientists from 
the U.S. Geological Survey, national laboratories and other 
world-class scientists," the NEI official said. "They're not 
going to be compromised by contributions to elected officials in 
Washington." 

Draheim said the nuclear energy industry is counting on 
politicians to approve the Yucca Mountain project - and let the 
industry resume building nuclear power plants for the first time 
since 1972. 

The federal government has spent about $7 billion studying the 
Yucca Mountain site - most from a special tax paid by utilities 
that have nuclear power generators. 

Project engineers say Yucca Mountain would cost an additional $58 
billion to build if it opens on schedule in 2010. It would remain 
radioactive for 10,000 years or more. 

All contents copyright 2002 Las Vegas SUN, Inc.
*****************************************************************
 28 Federal prosecutors looking at Utah tribe's nuclear waste deal
 
Las Vegas SUN
 
March 14, 2002 
 
SALT LAKE CITY (AP) - Federal prosecutors have sought Goshute 
tribal leaders' records of their dealings with a utilities 
consortium proposing a nuclear-waste storage facility on the 
Skull Valley reservation. 

FBI agents handed the subpoenas to tribal Chairman Leon Bear and 
disputed tribal Secretary Rex Allen on Sept. 12 as they left a 
Salt Lake City meeting. The Salt Lake Tribune said in a copyright 
story that it confirmed this week that the subpoenas had been 
delivered. 

Federal officials would not say who is being investigated or for 
what. "We don't comment on pending investigations," FBI spokesman 
Kevin R. Eaton said. 

The tribe has divided into three factions, with Bear leading 
supporters of the nuclear waste deal, Margene Bullcreek leading 
opponents and Allen representing those who want stronger 
oversight of the nuclear facility. 

There also are disputes over who is the rightful leader of the 
tribe and allegations have been made that money from the Private 
Fuel Storage LLC, the utility consortium that wants to put the 
storage facility on the reservation, has not been fairly 
distributed among tribal members or accounted for. 

Allen, who is in a dispute with Bear over whether he continues to 
be tribal secretary, said he turned over papers in his possession 
within 24 hours. Bear said he did not. 

"They have got to realize the tribe is a sovereign nation, and 
they can't just come in and ask for documents," Bear said 
Wednesday. He said he needs the tribal council's permission to 
disclose the financial information. 

Bear, Allen and Allen's sister, Mary Apadaca, signed the 1997 
lease that allows PFS to apply for a federal permit to store 
power-plant waste on the reservation 45 miles southwest of Salt 
Lake City. 

The proposed facility, big enough to hold storage casks 
containing all the spent fuel produced nationwide in four decades 
of commercial nuclear power, is opposed by the state. 

Last week, the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission blocked a 
request for financial information by the Atomic Safety and 
Licensing Board, which reports to NRC. The licensing panel asked 
tribal leaders in February for an accounting of project money as 
part of an inquiry into allegations that the project's benefits 
have not been shared equally and that leaders have used it 
instead to reward their supporters and punish opponents. 

The NRC agreed with its staff and Bear's attorneys, who said the 
agencies had no business delving into tribal affairs. 

All contents copyright 2002 Las Vegas SUN, Inc.
*****************************************************************
 29 Slag dump poses concerns: Bronner wants issue resolved before RSA 
plan moves forward -->             

 By Mike Goens 
March 15, 2002
 
A 100-acre area used to bury waste from TVA's old fertilizer 
development operation could be jeopardizing an economic 
development proposal for the Shoals.
 
Retirement Systems of Alabama Chief Executive Officer David 
Bronner said Thursday that he is concerned about the possibility 
that a portion of land he needs for a golf complex cannot be used 
because of materials buried in a slag dump on the proposed site.
 

The land, which is part of the Tennessee Valley Authority's 
Muscle Shoals Reservation, was used to dump phosphate while the 
fertilizer center was operating from 1934-1987.
 
"There is a huge phosphate dump there," Bronner said. "The 
question is whether it's dangerous or not."
 
A Bureau of Mines survey of the slag area in 1990 revealed that 
the reservation has a phosphate slag landfill containing about 
1.64 million tons of waste slag. 

"It's so huge that it would take 30 boxcar loads going out of 
there every day for 30 years to get rid of it," Bronner said. 
"That stuff doesn't go away for 1,600 years, and that's not 
within our deadline."
 
Information supporting the potentially needed cleanup measures 
could not be verified Thursday.
 
TVA spokesman Gil Francis said the slag area is going through the 
same environmental assessment that is being conducted on all 920 
acres that has been requested to be considered for a 36-hole 
Robert Trent Jones Golf Trail complex.
 
"Pending the completion of the environmental assessment, a 
determination will be made in reference to the slag," Francis 
said.
 
The Bureau of Mines study in 1990 concluded the slag stockpiles 
"are not hazardous materials, according to (Environmental 
Protection Agency) toxicity test."
 
Bronner originally listed today as the "drop-dead" deadline to 
have all details of the project worked out. He said during a 
meeting with local officials March 1 that the area had met his 
response deadline and that he was willing to give TVA 30-90 days 
to complete its environmental assessment of the reservation 
property.
 
The preliminary design of the proposed trail complex on the 
reservation includes portions of the slag area, said course 
designer Bobby Vaughan. He referred to the area two weeks ago 
when he said the course design "takes lemons and makes lemonade 
out of it."
 
Bronner said he expects the assessment to determine if the slag 
area can be used for the golf course. If it cannot be used, other 
options would be explored, including opting not to build the golf 
course.
 
"Would it be insurmountable? I don't know," Bronner said.
 
He said he wants to know that the slag area will not be dangerous 
if areas are disturbed during course construction.
 
Meanwhile, Bronner said RSA is looking at modifications to the 
preliminary design. He did not elaborate. 

He said the project will need more land that doesn't include the 
slag or officials will talk to TVA about making the area 
environmentally receptive.
 
Bronner said at the very least, TVA should place a fence around 
the area.
 
"We're looking at it and seeing if we can stay away from that 
area," he said. "I would say walkers, joggers and everyone else 
should stay away from it until a determination is made.
 
"If everything checks out fine, we'll be OK."
 
Bronner said he's confident that Vaughan and his staff can work 
around any other sensitive area that might arise during the 
assessment.
 
Local governments trying to partner with RSA on the project 
requested an additional 270 acres about three weeks ago to give 
designers flexibility in their design so sensitive areas could be 
avoided. The original request for TVA land to be used for the 
course was 650 acres. Bronner has said the golf course and 
planned convention complex across the Tennessee River in 
Lauderdale County must complement each other in order to make the 
project economically feasible.
 
Bronner said the decision about whether the project is to proceed 
needs to be made quickly.
 
"By the end of the month or the first of next month, we've either 
got to say yes or no," he said. "If we're not going to do this 
project, we need to move on to something else."
 
Paul Kittle, head of the University of North Alabama's biology 
department who is involved in a group that is trying to preserve 
the reservation intact, said he's not an expert on the slag area. 
However, he said he has spoken with TVA officials who have 
acknowledged to him that some radioactive materials are on the 
site.
 
"I've been told it's primarily radon but well within acceptable 
guidelines," Kittle said. "Everyone is exposed to radon. It's a 
natural radioactive gas that comes from the ground.
 
"I've been told it would be possible to put top soil on that area 
and use it for outdoor recreation such as a golf course. I think 
that's probably true."
 
Kittle said TVA officials have also told him that if someone 
wanted to construct a building on the property they would first 
need to cap the property with a thick layer of clay. That would 
prevent the radon from accumulating inside the building, which 
would make the gas potentially hazardous.
 
He said TVA has apparently studied the slag area extensively and 
actually used dirt from the slag area last year to cap an area 
south of Reservation Road that was potentially hazardous.
 
"If TVA determined they could move it and haul it across the road 
to use it elsewhere, it must not be that bad," Kittle said.
 
Bronner was critical of Kittle and others who have publicly tried 
to kill the development of the golf course on the reservation 
property.
 
Ray Vaughan, a lawyer and executive director of WildLaw, has 
filed suit accusing TVA of violating federal law by saying it 
conditionally endorses the RSA project. The condition involves 
the environmental assessment of the reservation property.
 
Citizens for Saving the TVA Walking Trail and Nature Area has 
also organized locally to fight the golf course development.
 
"Those environmentalists who have been jumping up and down and 
yelling haven't been doing a very good job," he said. "A lot of 
what they're saying is simply not true. There's not old timber 
out there and nothing significant that we can't stay away from, 
with the exception of the walking trails. And we'd leave better 
and more walking trails. All the endangered things and the areas 
they say is significant is by the water, and we're not going to 
be doing anything by it.
 
"Beyond that, there is a potentially serious problem out there, 
and none of the professor Kittles of the world have said a word 
about what that slag area could mean.
 
"What irritates me is the environmentalists who have been running 
their mouths when they should be concerned about something like 
this."
 
Kittle said his position on the use of the TVA property has not 
changed.
 
"I still believe as I stated from the start that there are 
sensitive environmental areas that cannot be worked around and 
would be impacted by the golf course," he said. "There is a 
mature forest there deserving of protection.
 
"There are also significant archaeological resources on that 
site. They have determined there are archaeological resources so 
significant that they are about to begin a Phase 2 assessment, 
which is a more in-depth study.
 
"I think TVA will determine as they continue the environmental 
study that there are a lot of sensitive areas that will make that 
area incompatible for a golf course."
 
Mike Goens can be reached at 740-5740 or 
mike.goens@times-daily.com [mike.goens@times-daily.com] .

*****************************************************************
 30 Pro-Yucca groups' political giving criticized
   
Friday, March 15, 2002
 Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal 
 
Opponents: $29 million given to parties over 10 years; proponents defend
contributions 
By KEITH ROGERS 
REVIEW-JOURNAL 

Groups opposed to the federal government's plans for burying 
highly radioactive waste in Yucca Mountain said Wednesday that 
nuclear power industry backers funneled more than $29 million 
over 10 years to political parties in hopes of gaining support 
for the project. 

"It amounts to legalized bribery and we've got to change that," 
said Paul Brown, a director for one of the groups, the 
Progressive Leadership Alliance of Nevada. 

Brown's organization and other nonprofit watchdog groups 
including Common Cause, the Sierra Club and Citizen Alert, a 
statewide environmental group, released a study on so-called soft 
money from pro-nuclear lobbyists to focus attention on campaign 
reform measures in Congress. 

Steve Kerekes, a spokesman for the Nuclear Energy Institute, a 
lobbying arm of the nuclear power industry, said the institute 
has done nothing wrong with its political contributions and 
outreach programs. 

"The bottom line is the numbers are inflated. The second point 
is, this is a democracy," he said in a telephone interview from 
Washington, D.C. 

Asked about tens of thousands of dollars that anti-nuclear 
activists claim the Nuclear Energy Institute spent on trips for 
members of Congress to Las Vegas and Yucca Mountain, Kerekes said 
federal laws were followed. 

But Andy Draheim, West Coast representative for Common Cause, 
defended his group's analysis of political contributions from 
Yucca Mountain supporters. 

"With so much money changing hands, it casts such a cloud of 
doubt over the decision-making process," Draheim said. 

Kalynda Tilges, nuclear issues coordinator for Citizen Alert, 
said the magnitude of the contributions is evidence that the 
government's decision to entomb nuclear waste in the mountain, 
100 miles northwest of Las Vegas, "has never been based on 
science." 

"That is strictly a political decision," she said.
 
webmaster@lvrj.com Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal, 1997 - 
*****************************************************************
 31 YUCCA MOUNTAIN: Senior manager set to retire

Sen. Harry Reid testifies via videoconference to, from left, Russ 
Dyer, Yucca Mountain site characterization project manger; Carol 
Hanlon, Yucca Mountain geologist; and Lake Barrett, acting 
director of Office of Civilian Radioactive Waste Management 
during the Energy Department public hearing on the possible site 
recommendation of Yucca Mountain in this Sept. 5 file photo. 
Barrett confirmed Thursday that he plans to retire from the 
government. Photo by K.M. Cannon.


Friday, March 15, 2002
 Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal 
 
Barrett cites 'personal reasons' in stepping aside 
By STEVE TETREAULT 
STEPHENS WASHINGTON BUREAU 

WASHINGTON -- The Energy Department's senior manager for Yucca 
Mountain confirmed Thursday he plans to retire from the 
government later this spring. 

Lake Barrett, 56, has been deputy director of the Office of 
Civilian Radioactive Waste Management since 1993, and three times 
served as acting director for extended periods, most recently for 
the past 14 months. 

Barrett, who had been expressing to colleagues a desire to 
retire, said his decision was cemented last week when the Senate 
confirmed Margaret Chu to head the nuclear waste program. 

Chu, who will begin the job next week, is a government science 
manager who has headed the Nuclear Waste Management Program 
Center at Sandia National Laboratories. 

"After an orderly transition to the new director, I intend to 
retire" perhaps by May, Barrett said. "Personal reasons would be 
the official reason, but I've got things to do" with family. 

"I've been doing this for 10 years and it was time," he said. 
"I've never worked 10 years in a job." 

As to his plans, "I'll figure that out when I get there," he 
said. "I was always planning that when a director was confirmed, 
it would be time." 

Barrett confirmed he was leaving after he delivered an annual 
Yucca Mountain budget presentation to the House energy and water 
subcommittee. He told panel members it would be his final budget 
talk. 

Barrett helped guide the $7 billion Yucca Mountain program to an 
endorsement last month by President Bush. The president named the 
Nevada ridge 100 miles northwest of Las Vegas as the government's 
designated repository for spent nuclear fuel and high-level 
radioactive waste. 

In recent months, however, management of the program has drawn 
criticism from the General Accounting Office, and members of the 
presidentially appointed Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board 
have questioned some of the research conducted by Yucca Mountain 
scientists. 

In challenging the safety of nuclear waste burial in their state, 
Nevada officials also have targeted Barrett for criticism. Bob 
Loux, director of the state's nuclear waste project office, said 
state officials may miss Barrett as a foil. 

"I guess he's performed OK in the role," Loux said. "It's an 
incredibly tough job that nobody wants. Anybody would have a 
hard, hard time being cannon fodder for the shots we've fired at 
him." 

Steve Kraft, head of the high-level nuclear waste program at the 
Nuclear Energy Institute, said Barrett is "probably one of the 
most expert managers in the Department of Energy. You don't see a 
whole lot of people like Lake working in these programs." 

"A lot of people in Nevada say a lot of negative things about the 
program but Lake Barrett always took that to heart and demanded 
excellence out of his people and his contractors," Kraft said. 

Barrett, a mechanical and nuclear engineer, has been involved in 
the government's nuclear waste disposal effort since 1985 except 
for a three-year period in the early 1990s when he managed the 
Energy Department's Rocky Flats site outside Denver. 

Before joining the Energy Department, Barrett was a site director 
for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and was among those 
responsible for cleaning up the Three Mile Island reactor site, 
which experienced a partial meltdown in 1979.
 
webmaster@lvrj.com Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal, 1997 - 
*****************************************************************
 32 Shoshone to testify against measure

Friday, March 15, 2002
 Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal 
 
Leaders: Money could open door for nuke waste dump 

By KEITH ROGERS 
REVIEW-JOURNAL 

Western Shoshone National Council officials said Thursday they 
will testify next week against a measure before a U.S. Senate 
committee that calls for distributing $129 million from a trust 
fund among an estimated 10,000 tribal members. 

The council fears that accepting payments for some 24 million 
acres of historic Shoshone land across Nevada and in parts of 
California, Utah and Idaho would allow the federal government to 
take over the land, including Yucca Mountain where the Energy 
Department wants to bury high-level nuclear waste. 

"It is our belief that if this money is paid out, ultimately the 
government will say we've been paid for the land. ... That would 
open the gates for Yucca Mountain," said John Wells of Las Vegas, 
the council's Southern Representative. 

Sponsored by Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., the bill known as the 
"Western Shoshone Claims Distribution Act," is scheduled for a 
March 21 hearing before the Senate Indian Affairs Committee. It 
calls for setting aside about $1.3 million for educational 
assistance grants for tribal members and distributing the rest of 
the trust fund, about $129 million, to tribal members who are at 
least one-fourth Western Shoshone. 

Western Shoshone Chief Raymond Yowell and the council's secretary 
of state, Ian Zabarte, are expected to attend the hearing. 

Wells said a minority of Western Shoshones have sought payments 
from the fund. "Those people who want money are not 
representative of (tribal) governments," he said. 

The money stems mostly from interest accumulated from a 1979 U.S. 
Supreme Court decision to award Western Shoshones $26 million 
based on a 1946 Indian Lands Claims Commission decision to 
compensate the tribe for gradual encroachment on their homeland 
by the U.S. government. 

"We oppose this bill," Wells said. "As we've been stating for 
years and years and years, the Western Shoshone nation is not for 
sale." he said of 40,000 square miles of the Great Basin.
 
webmaster@lvrj.com Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal, 1997 - 
*****************************************************************
 33 Letter: Nevada can solve nuclear challenge
 
Las Vegas SUN
 
March 15, 2002 

 Last month's site recommendation of Yucca Mountain is just one 
step in a long process, but it was a significant milestone and 
showed commitment by this administration to solve this national 
challenge, and that's all it is -- a challenge.

 Scientifically, it can be done safely, but it's also political, 
so who knows what will happen. I applaud President Bush and 
Secretary of Energy Spencer Abraham because to do nothing is no 
solution and only passes the challenge to future generations.

 Right now the waste is scattered across the country at over 130 
locations in over 30 states. A little common sense tells me it's 
better to have the waste in one central location in a remote 
desert that is already dedicated to nuclear purposes. And that 
land is not going to be used for anything else, so why not make 
this federal project pay all of us if we are called upon to help 
solve this challenge.

 I am one in what appears to be the slight majority because the 
media doesn't really cover who supports the study and the 
benefits that may be out there. But I'm with Mayor Oscar 
Goodman's comments from a couple of years ago that we should take 
the federal government for everything they have.

 Let us back the trucks up to the Treasury and pay us if we are 
going to be the solution to this environmental challenge.

 GEORGE GRAFTON 

All contents copyright 2002 Las Vegas SUN, Inc.
*****************************************************************
 34 UK: MOX Demo Plant Gets Green Light
 
THE WHITEHAVEN NEWS
 
Thursday, March 14, 2002
 
The Sellafield plant, in which Mox fuel pellets were were given 
faked specifications, has finally been allowed to re-start.
 
Four BNFL process workers were sacked for gross misconduct and 
the company's chief executive John Taylor was forced to resign 
after it was discovered that pellets had been sent from 
Sellafield to Japan, with falsified data.
 
For BNFL it led to an international scandal with loss of 
confidence among its nuclear customers world-wide and a refusal 
by Japan to put any new orders BNFL's way.
 
Batches of pellets, a mixture of plutonium and uranium to go in 
modern energy-making nuclear reactors, were falsified in MDF - 
the Mox demonstration facility which was allowed to manufacture 
the material so BNFL could prove the process for a fullscale 
production plant. MDF had to shut down and workers were 
re-trained.
 
Now, hard on the heels of the £370 million fullscale plant (SMP) 
getting the green light after years of delay the pilot facility 
has been granted its licence to go back into operation.
 
BNFL says the demonstration facility will carry out support 
trials for the production plant and play an important role in its 
future operation.
 
Since the introduction of plutonium - a point of no return - SMP 
is making a gradual build up to the manufacture of its first Mox 
fuel to meet customer orders.
 
The first contract to be met was with a European customer but 
Sellafield spokeswoman Ali Dunlop said details were confidential.
 
Asked whether any new orders had been won from Japan (BNFL's 
biggest overseas customer) she said: "We have a commitment from 
Japanese customers to supply them with mixed oxide fuel."
 
n Only last week BNFL was finally given an international 
all-clear to have the rogue pellets, which were shipped to Japan, 
returned to Sellafield.
 
"Returning this fuel will bring to an end a chapter in BNFL's 
operations from which many lessons have been learned," said 
company chief executive, Norman Askew. 
*****************************************************************
 35 UK: Copeland Wants Money in Exchange for Nuclear Dump
 
THE WHITEHAVEN NEWS
 
Thursday, March 14, 2002
 
Copeland Council has sent off its views on a possible nuclear 
waste dump. On Tuesday afternoon the council faxed its opinions 
on the issue to the London headquarters of DEFRA. The 
consultation report was sent just in time to meet a deadline of 
that day.
 
The report on the build-up to a possible nuclear waste repository 
by 2005 includes clear signs that Copeland wants a monetary 
payment for hosting the nuclear waste.
 
The policy report from the council states: "The cost borne by the 
community in general, and the council in particular, in taking a 
responsible line in discussion and policy formulation and 
assessment regarding management of the nation's waste is 
considerable, and ought to be recognised. Currently there is no 
mechanism for this.
 
"The council, on behalf of the community, will need to be heavily 
involved in national policy development over the next three 
years, if those policy solutions are to be successful in winning 
the support of the general public. This onerous, though 
invaluable, work has a cost and a way of meeting it through local 
government finances or otherwise must be found.''
 
The report also refers to the need for "infrastructure and 
investment" in return for the "blighting" effect of hosting a 
nuclear waste store.
 
Coun George Clemments commented on the nuclear waste issue: "My 
personal view is as long as it is done safely and properly we 
should go along with it.'' Coun John Henney said: "Wherever the 
preferred site is identified, the local people need to have the 
final veto.''
 
nCopeland Council is also fighting off Whitehall pressures for a 
fast track approach to big planning issues such as the possible 
nuclear waste dump.
 
The Copeland Executive voted to tell Whitehall it objected to a 
Green Paper proposal to allow developers to speed up such big 
applications as airports and nuclear plants.
 
*****************************************************************
 36 Removal of nuclear fuel from Russian submarines under way 

BBC Monitoring Service - United Kingdom; Mar 15, 2002

Text of report by Russian news agency ITAR-TASS

Murmansk, 15 March: Specialists of the Murmansk Shipping Line 
have begun to load spent fuel assemblies from the nuclear 
reactors of submarines and nuclear-powered icebreakers onto a 
special train at the base of the Atomflot [English: nuclear 
fleet] technological repair enterprise. A group of reporters were 
given the opportunity to be at the scene today.

The train comprises only four carriages. Each of the carriages 
has three 40-tonne containers with walls 30 cm thick. They are 
made from rustproof steel and can withstand explosions, fires and 
even a fall from a height of 10 metres. Naturally, radiation 
leaks are completely ruled out. These are the technical details.

Much work remains to be done in removing spent fuel assemblies 
from the Kola peninsula. According to the press office of the 
Murmansk Shipping Line, which is taking part in this programme, 
spent nuclear fuel assemblies in almost 100 nuclear-powered 
submarines of the Northern Fleet that are no longer part of the 
force composition and are to be recycled, as well as those in the 
Andreyev Bay, and spent fuel from nuclear-powered icebreakers, 
are to be unloaded and dispatched.

This work has intensified noticeably since the second special 
train was built with financial aid from neighbouring Norway.

Source: ITAR-TASS news agency, Moscow, in Russian 0853 gmt 15 Mar 
02 /BBC Monitoring/ © BBC.
*****************************************************************
 37 Russian fifth-generation nuclear submarine nearing completion 

BBC Monitoring Service - United Kingdom; Mar 15, 2002

Text of report by Russian news agency ITAR-TASS

Moscow, 15 March: The construction of the first Russian 
fifth-generation nuclear-powered submarine from the Borey series 
is nearing completion in Severodvinsk. Northern Fleet Commander 
Admiral Gennadiy Suchkov told reporters today that the strategic 
nuclear-powered missile-armed submarine Yuri Dolgoruky will join 
the Northern Fleet. According to Suchkov, the Moscow government 
has been participating in the construction of the newest 
nuclear-powered submarine on equal terms.

Construction of the main fifth-generation nuclear-powered 
submarine Yuri Dolgoruky began at the Sevmashpredpriyatiye 
shipyard in Severodvinsk in October 1996. This series of 
strategic missile-armed submarines was given the name Borey. 

According to experts, a cruiser of the Borey family will lag 
somewhat behind Russian nuclear-powered submarines of the 
preceding generation of the Typhoon class, but will surpass them 
considerably in the power of its missile armaments. 

Regarding its combat capabilities, the Yuri Dolgoruky surpasses 
existing vessels of its class twice or thrice over, and even some 
promising submarines, because of its low noise level and other 
parameters that make it difficult to detect in the waters of the 
world's oceans, even from space.

Strategic missile-carrying nuclear-powered submarines of the 
Borey family will be the mainstay of the Russian navy in the 21st 
century together with the multipurpose strike nuclear-powered 
submarines of the newest series, the main vessel of which is the 
Gepard nuclear-powered submarine that joined the navy in December 
of last year.

The navy's commander-in-chief, Vladimir Kuroyedov, believes that, 
"given that the role of the submarine fleet in the country's 
defence strategy is increasing, the Russian navy should be armed 
with 12-15 strategic, and about 50 multipurpose, nuclear-powered 
submarines". Four nuclear-powered submarines of the newest 
designs are currently on the stocks at Severodvinsk in accordance 
with the state order.

Source: ITAR-TASS news agency, Moscow, in Russian 1030 gmt 15 Mar 
02 /BBC Monitoring/ © BBC.
*****************************************************************
 38 Russian minister satisfied with US explanation of nuclear 
strategy 

BBC Monitoring Service - United Kingdom; Mar 15, 2002


Shannon, 15 March: Russian Defence Minister Sergey Ivanov is 
satisfied with Washington's explanations concerning an American 
press report, claiming that Russia is on the list of the 
countries against which the USA could use its nuclear weapons.

"There are several explanations that satisfy us," the minister 
told Russian journalists here on Friday [15 March]. He stopped 
over at Shannon (Ireland) on his way from Washington to Moscow.

"As a defence minister, I realise perfectly well that a military 
establishment, irrespective of the country to which it belongs, 
has to plan the possible developments on the basis of any 
scenario," Ivanov stated. "Moreover," he noted, "such planning 
takes into account the worst versions, too. In principle, I have 
long since stopped being astonished by super-frank types of 
plans, including those that envisage the use of nuclear weapons," 
the minister said...

Source: ITAR-TASS news agency, Moscow, in English 0957 gmt 15 Mar 
02 /BBC Monitoring/ © BBC.
*****************************************************************
 39 Pentagon Report Discusses Nukes

      Guardian Unlimited | World Latest | 

[UP] 

Friday March 15, 2002 8:00 AM
 	
WASHINGTON (AP) - The military wants to develop nuclear bombs 
that could destroy - not just disturb - deeply buried and 
fortified underground targets, according to excerpts from a 
classified Pentagon report. 

The report, called the Nuclear Posture Review and completed in 
January, said more than 10,000 underground military facilities 
exist in more than 70 countries. 

About 1,400 of the underground facilities are considered 
specially important because they house weapons of mass 
destruction, ballistic missiles or top-level military command 
stations, the report said. ``At present the United States lacks 
adequate means to deal with these strategic facilities,'' it 
said. 

The U.S. military's only earth-penetrating nuclear weapon, known 
as the B61-Mod 11 gravity bomb, cannot penetrate many types of 
terrain in which hardened underground facilities are located, it 
said. 

``Given these limitations, the targeting of a number of hardened, 
underground facilities is limited to an attack against surface 
features, which does not provide a high probability of defeat of 
these important targets,'' it said. The extensive excerpts were 
posted Thursday by GlobalSecurity.org, an Internet site that 
specializes in military and intelligence topics. Portions were 
reported last weekend by the Los Angeles Times and New York 
Times. 

On Wednesday, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld publicly 
lamented the disclosures and said the person who leaked the 
information had violated federal criminal law. 

John Pike, director of GlobalSecurity.org, said in an interview 
Thursday that he saw no reason to believe that publication of the 
information would harm U.S. national security. He declined to say 
how he obtained the excerpts. 

``The point is to let the voters and taxpayers read it for 
themselves,'' he said. 

Last weekend's news reports about the Nuclear Posture Review 
emphasized that it names countries against which the United 
States might use nuclear weapons - including five non-nuclear 
states. 

The report said the United States needs to develop nuclear 
weapons better suited for striking targets in countries that 
could be involved in ``immediate, potential or unexpected 
contingencies.'' It said these are North Korea, Iraq, Iran, Syria 
and Libya. 

``North Korea and Iraq in particular have been chronic military 
concerns,'' it said. ``All sponsor or harbor terrorists, and all 
have active WMD (weapons of mass destruction) and missile 
programs.'' 

Some or all of those five also have extensive underground 
military facilities. A key theme in the report is that the United 
States needs to modernize its nuclear force and develop a more 
flexible array of weapons that can be used to deter attack by 
unpredictable countries like North Korea. 

As part of that approach, the report stressed the need to develop 
nuclear weapons that are more effective against deeply buried 
targets. U.S. military officials have said for years they are 
greatly concerned about the vast number of tunnels and 
underground military facilities in North Korea. 

The report proposed developing an earth-penetrating nuclear 
weapon with a much lower yield than would be required with a 
nuclear weapon designed to explode at the surface. ``This lower 
yield would achieve the same damage while producing less fallout 
- by a factor of 10 to 20 - than would the much larger-yield 
surface burst,'' it said. 

``For defeat of very deep or larger underground facilities, 
penetrating weapons with large yields would be needed to collapse 
the facility'' 

The report set a goal of fielding ``a new level of capability'' 
against these targets by 2012. It said the Defense and Energy 
departments will begin a joint effort in April to decide whether 
an existing 5,000-pound warhead would provide significantly more 
penetrating power than the current B61-Mod 11 nuclear warhead. 

The report also said the Pentagon and Energy Department are 
working on ``agent defeat weapons'' - arms that could immobilize, 
neutralize or destroy chemical and biological weapons. Concepts 
under study include thermal, chemical, or radiological 
``neutralization'' of chemical or biological materials in storage 
facilities; also being considered are bombs to immobilize the 
materials. 

On the Net: The report excerpts at 
http://www.globalsecurity.org/wmd/library/policy/dod/npr.htm 
  
Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2002
*****************************************************************
 40 The Penalty Was Steep for a Missile Defense Whistle-Blower 

March 15, 2002 

By ARIANNA HUFFINGTON, Arianna Huffington writes a syndicated 
column.

Last week saw the release of a report from the General Accounting 
Office that details how the Pentagon, two major military 
contractors--TRW and Boeing--and a team of MIT scientists 
exaggerated the success of the nation's first missile defense 
test, turning an embarrassing failure into a phony triumph.

As attention-grabbing as this sounds, the report is not really 
news to anyone who has followed the case of Nira Schwartz and the 
U.S. government versus TRW and Boeing.

Schwartz, a scientist and computer expert, was hired in 1995 by 
TRW to test the key component of the missile defense system: the 
ability of our missiles to discriminate between incoming enemy 
warheads and harmless decoys. She soon discovered that the 
technology being used was fatally flawed. Alarmed by her 
findings, she approached her boss and insisted that TRW reveal 
the problem to the Pentagon. The company responded by firing her.

Two months later, Schwartz sued TRW under the False Claims Act, 
asserting that the defense contractor had knowingly defrauded the 
American people. The lawsuit is now in the discovery stage. In 
the six years it has taken the case to work its way through a 
legal maze, ongoing tests, including the $100-million debacle 
highlighted in the GAO report, have only confirmed Schwartz's 
findings.

By any yardstick, this is a shocking story, affecting both our 
national security and the nation's fiscal health. According to a 
recent estimate by the Congressional Budget Office, the price tag 
for a missile defense system would be more than $230 billion. 
Worse, by sacrificing the Antiballistic Missile Treaty on the 
altar of a missile defense shield that has been proved not to 
work, we are ushering in a new era of nuclear proliferation that 
will make the world a far more dangerous place.

Rep. Howard L. Berman (D-Mission Hills), who requested the GAO 
report on TRW, makes it clear that he has no "theological 
problem" with a missile defense shield.

"If you can prove to me," he said, "that we can build a system 
capable of intercepting missiles from rogue nations, and that it 
will not bring with it the consequence of restarting an arms 
race, then I'm open to it. But the report raises way too many 
questions about concealment and fundamental flaws in the 
technology."

It's not like the information about test failures and fraud has 
been flying under the radar. After a judge finally unsealed 
Schwartz's suit, the story ended up on the front page of the New 
York Times in March 2000, followed by a Dan Rather interview with 
Schwartz on CBS.

So the question becomes: What will it take for this story to 
penetrate Washington's defenses against critical information 
affecting national policy?

"The government's system of checks and balances has badly failed 
at every level throughout this process," said Ted Postol an MIT 
missile defense expert. "What it's going to take now is stirring 
the public imagination and outrage."

Perhaps it will take dramatizing Schwartz's story and turning her 
into the Erin Brockovich of the nuclear arms debate.

It can be difficult to picture Schwartz as the heroine in a David 
versus Goliath struggle. She speaks haltingly in a soft, thickly 
accented voice (she emigrated from Israel in 1984). But as she 
tells her story, it is clear that this is a woman on a moral 
mission.

"We've wasted a decade and billions of dollars," she said, "in a 
quest for a missile defense shield based on a technology that 
will never work."

Her commitment to exposing the truth has come at a high price. A 
gifted scientist with a PhD in physics and engineering and the 
holder of 24 U.S. patents, Schwartz has found herself effectively 
blackballed since filing her suit, unable to land a job in her 
field despite having sent out more than 300 resumes.

It's a disturbing precedent, especially given the Bush 
administration's obsession with secrecy and our elected 
representatives' unwillingness to take on a popular wartime 
president.

In this kind of political climate, we need courageous 
whistle-blowers like Schwartz more than ever. Schwartz is "like a 
21st century Paul Revere who is warning that this fundamentally 
flawed technology will not protect the American people," said 
Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass.), who has requested a congressional 
hearing on this issue. 

Copyright 2002 Los Angeles Times
*****************************************************************
 41 Washington’s risky nuclear dance 

Commentary by Marc Sirois 

Strictly speaking, US nuclear policy should not be regular fodder 
for a newspaper whose coverage focuses on the Middle East. When 
more than half of the countries mentioned on a possible American 
hit list are in this part of the world, however, the subject 
cannot help but land close to home. This makes particular the 
general fear that on George W. Bush’s watch, the assumptions that 
have kept the nuclear genie in its bottle since 1945 are in 
danger of being cast aside ­ and with them the thin slices of 
morality and abject horror that block humanity from the slippery 
slope of self-destruction. 

The argument began even before the first atomic bomb was tested 
in the New Mexico desert a few weeks before two were dropped on 
Japanese cities. Many of the very scientists who helped conceive, 
design and build the devastating weapons worried that actually 
using them ­ especially on populated areas ­ would be 
irretrievably wrong. The plutonium- and uranium-based devices in 
question had only a tiny fraction (2-5 percent) of the power 
carried by today’s hydrogen-fueled (thermonuclear) warheads, but 
some of their creators felt that they had developed an entirely 
new level of destructive force that bore no comparison with 
existing weapons. They called for a warning to be issued to Japan 
and/or for a demonstration blast on some uninhabited island. 

That a new order of magnitude had been reached in terms of 
destructive power was beyond question, but the counter-argument 
was that there was nothing intrinsically different about atomic 
weapons apart from the fact that one plane could be used to level 
a city instead of hundreds. Besides, proponents of a no-notice 
attack argued, an invasion of Japan after “softening it up” with 
conventional strategic bombing would entail hundreds of thousands 
of American casualties, not to mention more than a million 
Japanese ones. Vague warnings were put out, but a demonstration 
blast was thought too risky because the technology was so new and 
fissile material in such short supply that a malfunction would 
not only fail to impress the Japanese but also use up an 
unacceptable proportion of precious “ammunition.” 

The White House was then occupied by one Harry Truman, a highly 
unimaginative man who had taken office on the death Franklin 
Roosevelt just a few months earlier. He had not known about the 
Manhattan Project, but once its work was done, he was persuaded 
to use the weapon, at least in part because the first stirrings 
of the Cold War were already making themselves felt and he wanted 
to show Joseph Stalin that Washington could not be intimidated 
into abandoning its prerogatives in postwar Europe. He was also 
convinced that the US atomic monopoly could never be undone by 
what he described as “those damned Asiatic Russians.” 

Both Hiroshima and Nagasaki were destroyed by fission bombs, 
devices that work by splitting the nuclei of atoms of fissile 
material in an almost instantaneous chain reaction that releases 
vast amounts of energy. After the war, the US military estimated 
that it would have taken some 1,200 tons of incendiary bombs, 400 
tons of high-explosive bombs, and 500 tons of anti-personnel 
fragmentation bombs to match the damage inflicted by the single 
atomic device that flattened Hiroshima. But that bomb was 
equivalent to “only” 13 kilotons (i.e. 13KT, or 13,000 tons of 
dynamite); the latest US warhead, the W-88, is capable of yields 
of up to an astounding 475KT. Unlike an atomic device, a 
thermonuclear one works by fusing lighter elements into heavier 
ones. The end product weighs less than the ingredients that went 
into it, however, with the difference being transformed into 
energy in the form of tremendous heat and a powerful blast wave. 
It has even been suggested that hydrogen weapons constitute as 
big a leap from atomic ones as the latter did from conventional 
explosives. 

The Soviet Union’s disproving of Truman’s racial theories 
resulted in a high-stakes stand-off that lasted for four decades. 
Never before had humanity possessed the ability to wipe itself 
out, and while the prospect of a nuclear Armageddon was certainly 
a frightening one, at least it had the benefit of keeping World 
War III from breaking out. Neither Washington nor Moscow wanted 
any part of a terrifying new reality: Mutual Assured Destruction 
(MAD). It may well have been that only profound insecurity kept 
the Korean, Vietnam, and 1973 Arab-Israeli wars, for instance, 
from evolving into cataclysmic confrontations between East and 
West. But that insecurity has to be shared for it to be 
effective; where it was absent, the big players in the Cold War 
adopted a different strategy by pledging not to use nuclear 
weapons against countries that had forsworn them (unless they 
were protected by the nuclear umbrella of another power). This 
not only helped reduce tensions between the superpowers and 
weaker nations, but also augured against the spread of nuclear 
weapons. 

All of this is more than technical mumbo-jumbo or gratuitous 
recounting of history, especially if one happens to live in or 
near one of the countries mentioned in the Pentagon’s recent 
review of nuclear policy. Not surprisingly, the possible targets 
listed therein include China and Russia, two other nuclear powers 
that potentially pose credible strategic threats to the United 
States. The formulation of a more aggressive nuclear posture 
vis-a-vis these two nations is worrisome because it risks 
reviving the perils of the Cold War, but their ability to reply 
in kind somehow makes the report less threatening to them. The 
consequences of a change in US nuclear policy are far more 
worrisome for a country like North Korea, which while possibly 
possessing some form of atomic weapon has not yet developed a 
reliable means of delivering one and so is incapable of deterring 
what is referred to in Doomsday vernacular as a “first strike.” 

Needless to say, the same lack of a credible deterrent also 
applies ­ to varying degrees ­ to the four Middle Eastern states 
singled out in the Pentagon document: Iran, Iraq, Libya, and 
Syria. Unlike Israel, which is reliably estimated to have 
approximately 200 nuclear warheads and the ability to deliver 
them, these four countries have all signed the Nuclear 
Non-Proliferation Treaty. All have at one time or another been 
accused ­ usually by the United States and Israel ­ of seeking to 
develop various kinds of weapons of mass destruction, but only 
Iraq has ever been shown to have actively violated the pact (it 
has also used chemical munitions against both Iranian troops and 
its own Kurdish population). The others either have or are 
suspected of having biological or chemical weapons, but it is 
hard from the point of view of realpolitik to see the inherent 
malfeasance in such activity when Israel is known to possess them 
as well. This is especially true at a time when these countries, 
with the exception of Iraq, have been steadily moderating their 
behavior and becoming increasingly unlikely to initiate any form 
of hostilities ­ direct or otherwise ­ against the United States 
or its interests. Tehran and Washington had been in the midst of 
a slow but steady rapprochement until Bush’s “axis of evil” 
campaign, Syria has clearly indicated its willingness to make 
peace with key US ally Israel, and even Libya has made lengthy 
strides in repairing its relations with the United States and 
other major Western countries. 

So why would Washington choose now to rattle the nuclear saber? 
The optimistic answer is that the review and its public airing 
are merely the product of a few Pentagon planners who see in the 
aftermath of Sept. 11 an opportunity to acquire all sorts of new 
toys. Bush has already pushed through the largest increase in 
defense spending since the Reagan administration resolved to 
spend the Soviet Union into the ground, so the generals have 
reason to hope that they can go on a prolonged shopping spree. 
Many of them envision retirement in cushy jobs within the 
aerospace industry, and their resumes will be that much more 
impressive if they have helped arrange the spending of a few 
billion tax dollars on a few exotic gadgets designed to blow up a 
mountain from underneath. In this best-case scenario, any new US 
nuclear posture will only serve as a pretext for the acquisition 
of new weapons systems destined, thankfully, never to be used. 

The less encouraging answer is that, having been shocked by the 
terrorist attacks on Sept. 11 and frustrated by the number of 
conventional bombs it took to collapse the caves in which members 
of Al-Qaeda and the Taleban sought shelter, US military planners 
are genuinely trying to change the way America fights its wars. 
In this scenario, the Pentagon really expects to use the new 
weapons it acquires, and it wants the nuclear threshold to be 
lowered accordingly. And in case anyone thinks it wasteful to 
prepare for the destruction of primitive natural hideaways that 
may never again pose such a problem, the planners have thrown in 
bunkers and other hardened targets (such as underground weapons 
laboratories that may or may not exist) as other potential uses 
for the items on their wish list. 

The danger here is that unlike wordy Canadian journalists, Middle 
Eastern military commanders do not have the luxury of idly 
analyzing the question of whether the United States is really 
planning to pulverize their countries or is just beating its 
chest. Like their American counterparts, they also have a 
responsibility to plan for contingencies, and if their 
non-nuclear status is no longer a guarantee against being turned 
into radioactive wastelands, they have little choice but to 
develop their own deterrents. How the proliferation of such 
weapons might increase America’s security ­ or anyone else’s ­ is 
a mystery. 

Much of the problem stems, of course, from the issue of Iraq. The 
Bush administration seems determined to make war on that country 
so that it can get rid of Saddam Hussein and erase whatever 
progress he has made in developing nuclear or other 
unconventional weapons. The Arab world is almost unanimously 
against any such adventure, but not because there is any love 
lost for Saddam: People here are simply tired of watching Iraqi 
children die and don’t want them subjected to another shooting 
war. George W. Bush is surely no fan of wiping out civilians, 
either, but a forthright assassination of Saddam would provoke 
all sorts of criticism and might even break US law. Hence we have 
a nuclear hit list built around Iraq and the resultant 
possibility that hundreds of thousands of people might die 
because the president of the United States lacks the guts to have 
a bullet put in a single individual’s brain. 

Marc Sirois is the Managing Editor of THE DAILY STAR   
  
Copyright© 2001 The Daily Star. All rights reserved.   
*****************************************************************
 42 Pentagon Report Discusses Nukes
 
Las Vegas SUN
 
March 14, 2002 
 
WASHINGTON (AP) - The military wants to develop nuclear bombs 
that could destroy - not just disturb - deeply buried and 
fortified underground targets, according to excerpts from a 
classified Pentagon report. 

The report, called the Nuclear Posture Review and completed in 
January, said more than 10,000 underground military facilities 
exist in more than 70 countries. 

About 1,400 of the underground facilities are considered 
specially important because they house weapons of mass 
destruction, ballistic missiles or top-level military command 
stations, the report said. "At present the United States lacks 
adequate means to deal with these strategic facilities," it said. 

The U.S. military's only earth-penetrating nuclear weapon, known 
as the B61-Mod 11 gravity bomb, cannot penetrate many types of 
terrain in which hardened underground facilities are located, it 
said. 

"Given these limitations, the targeting of a number of hardened, 
underground facilities is limited to an attack against surface 
features, which does not provide a high probability of defeat of 
these important targets," it said. 

The extensive excerpts were posted Thursday by 
GlobalSecurity.org, an Internet site that specializes in military 
and intelligence topics. Portions were reported last weekend by 
the Los Angeles Times and New York Times. 

On Wednesday, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld publicly 
lamented the disclosures and said the person who leaked the 
information had violated federal criminal law. 

John Pike, director of GlobalSecurity.org, said in an interview 
Thursday that he saw no reason to believe that publication of the 
information would harm U.S. national security. He declined to say 
how he obtained the excerpts. 

"The point is to let the voters and taxpayers read it for 
themselves," he said. Last weekend's news reports about the 
Nuclear Posture Review emphasized that it names countries against 
which the United States might use nuclear weapons - including 
five non-nuclear states. 

The report said the United States needs to develop nuclear 
weapons better suited for striking targets in countries that 
could be involved in "immediate, potential or unexpected 
contingencies." It said these are North Korea, Iraq, Iran, Syria 
and Libya. 

"North Korea and Iraq in particular have been chronic military 
concerns," it said. "All sponsor or harbor terrorists, and all 
have active WMD (weapons of mass destruction) and missile 
programs." 

Some or all of those five also have extensive underground 
military facilities. A key theme in the report is that the United 
States needs to modernize its nuclear force and develop a more 
flexible array of weapons that can be used to deter attack by 
unpredictable countries like North Korea. 

As part of that approach, the report stressed the need to develop 
nuclear weapons that are more effective against deeply buried 
targets. U.S. military officials have said for years they are 
greatly concerned about the vast number of tunnels and 
underground military facilities in North Korea. 

The report proposed developing an earth-penetrating nuclear 
weapon with a much lower yield than would be required with a 
nuclear weapon designed to explode at the surface. "This lower 
yield would achieve the same damage while producing less fallout 
- by a factor of 10 to 20 - than would the much larger-yield 
surface burst," it said. 

"For defeat of very deep or larger underground facilities, 
penetrating weapons with large yields would be needed to collapse 
the facility" 

The report set a goal of fielding "a new level of capability" 
against these targets by 2012. It said the Defense and Energy 
departments will begin a joint effort in April to decide whether 
an existing 5,000-pound warhead would provide significantly more 
penetrating power than the current B61-Mod 11 nuclear warhead. 

The report also said the Pentagon and Energy Department are 
working on "agent defeat weapons" - arms that could immobilize, 
neutralize or destroy chemical and biological weapons. Concepts 
under study include thermal, chemical, or radiological 
"neutralization" of chemical or biological materials in storage 
facilities; also being considered are bombs to immobilize the 
materials. 

On the Net: The report excerpts at 
[http://www.globalsecurity.org/wmd/library/policy/dod/npr.htm] 

All contents copyright 2002 Las Vegas SUN, Inc.
*****************************************************************
 43 Russia Satisfied With US Nuke Reasons
 
Las Vegas SUN
 
March 15, 2002 

MOSCOW- Russia is satisfied with U.S. explanations about a 
contingency plan that could allow nuclear strikes against Russia 
and six other nations, Russia's defense minister said Friday 
after talks in Washington. 

Officials from Iran and North Korea - also on the list of 
potential targets - hit back angrily. 

U.S. officials provided Russia with explanations "that satisfy 
us," Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov told reporters in Shannon, 
Ireland, on his way back from the United States, according to the 
ITAR-Tass and Interfax news agencies. 

The leak of a classified Pentagon nuclear planning document had 
threatened to overshadow Ivanov's visit. Last weekend's news 
reports about the Nuclear Posture Review listed as potential 
targets Russia and China, both nuclear powers, as well as Iran, 
Syria, Iraq, North Korea and Libya. 

Russian officials, whose country has enjoyed warmer relations 
with Washington in recent months because of Moscow's support for 
the U.S.-led campaign in Afghanistan, have questioned why the 
plan lumps Russia together with some of Washington's fiercest 
foes, such as Iraq and North Korea. 

But in his talks with Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and 
Secretary of State Colin Powell, Ivanov steered clear of any 
public signs of irritation. "Being a defense minister, I 
understand well that the defense ministry of any country must 
plan any kind of developments," Ivanov said Friday. 

Ivanov's talks with U.S. officials focused on working out a deal 
on nuclear arms cuts that both sides hope to secure in time for 
President Bush's visit to Russia in May. 

"There remain differences in approach to the text of the future 
agreement," Ivanov said. "But I wouldn't say that it's an 
impasse." 

He said the main sticking point is Russian concern over U.S. 
plans to store decommissioned weapons instead of destroying them. 

Bush agreed last December to reduce U.S. arsenals of long-range 
nuclear warheads by two-thirds to 1,700 to 2,200. Putin said 
Russia could go as low as 1,500. 

In Greece, Iranian President Mohammad Khatami said on Friday that 
the U.S. planning document was a threat to "all humanity." 

After a meeting with Greek Orthodox Church Archbishop 
Christodoulos, Khatami said: 

"The powers that threaten other peoples with nuclear weapons 
threaten not just these peoples but all humanity." 

For a third straight day, North Korea's Stalinist regime accused 
the U.S. government of planning a nuclear war on the Korean 
peninsula, and claimed that it has the ability to retaliate. 

"If the U.S. inflicts a nuclear holocaust upon the DPRK, the 
former's mainland will not be safe either," said Rodong Sinmun, 
the official newspaper of the North's ruling Workers' Party. 

All contents copyright 2002 Las Vegas SUN, Inc.
*****************************************************************
 44 Powell Promises Nuclear Restraint
 
Las Vegas SUN
 
March 15, 2002 
 
WASHINGTON (AP) - As the Bush administration weighs possible 
confrontation with Iran and Iraq, Secretary of State Colin Powell 
said Friday the United States would stand by a 24-year pledge not 
to use its nuclear arsenal against non-nuclear nations. 

In an interview with The Associated Press, Powell also said that 
he hoped Israel's pullback of troops and tanks on the West Bank 
would continue but that the withdrawal may not be permament. 

A Pentagon policy review that surfaced last weekend raised the 
prospect of the United States possibly using its powerful nuclear 
stockpile in a wide range of conflicts. 

President Bush's denunciation earlier of Iran, Iraq and North 
Korea as an "axis of evil" and the U.S.-led campaign against 
terrorism already had raised chances of using American military 
power generally. 

Bush said at a news conference Wednesday he was leaving "all 
options on the table" as the Pentagon reworks its nuclear weapons 
policy to deter any attack on the United States, including from 
non-nuclear states such as Iraq, Iran, Libya and Syria. 

A U.S. pledge not to use nuclear weapons against non-nuclear 
states was taken by President Carter's administration in 1978 and 
reaffirmed, most recently, by the Clinton administration in 1995. 

"We have not changed our policy," Powell said Friday, reaffirming 
that commitment. 

He also offered assurances that the United States did not have 
nuclear missiles targeted on Russia or any other nation. But, he 
said, to be "perfectly honest," a missile can be redirected 
quickly and "we have nuclear weapons obviously that are capable 
of being targeted." 

By contrast, Powell said up to 13,000 of the 28,000 long-range 
nuclear weapons in the U.S. stockpile during the Cold War were 
targeted on the Soviet Union and its allies, even at specific 
streets. 

Reports of the new policy review named Russia, China, Iran, Iraq, 
Syria, North Korea and Libya as potential targets of a U.S. 
nuclear strike. 

Russian officials reacted angrily. But, Powell said, "once they 
got over the headlines" and received an explanation from 
administration officials, "they could see that, if anything, they 
should feel less threatened than they might have before reading 
the study." 

The United States and Russia are in the midst of negotiating 
cutbacks of about two-thirds in their arsenals of long-range 
nuclear warheads. 

Powell said the agreement would be legally binding, as Russia had 
insisted from the outset, in the form of a treaty or a memorandum 
of understanding, either of which would be submitted to Congress 
for approval. 

The agreement will be about three pages long, he said, and 
provisions for inspections to make sure the terms are carried out 
could be in the accord or be extended from previous agreements. 

On the Middle East, Powell demanded a complete Israel military 
withdrawal from the West Bank and Gaza in a telephone call Monday 
to Sharon. The demand was couched in terms of improving prospects 
for American mediator Anthony Zinni, who is shuttling between 
Sharon and Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat to try to work out a 
truce. 

"What the Israelis said they would do, and I have this on 
high-level assurance, is executing staged withdrawals, and we are 
seeing staged withdrawals," Powell said Friday. "There is nothing 
permanent about staged withdrawals. Obviously you could take a 
tank out of reverse and put it back in forward." 

But, he said he hoped the withdrawals would continue while Zinni 
tries to set up security talks with Israel and the Palestinians, 
both separately and in three-way meetings. 

"The aim is to get them talking to each other," Powell said. 

Turning to another subject, Powell said said Libyan leader 
Moammar Gadhafi has been trying to show a "more positive and 
benign face to the world" but that there was clear evidence he is 
attempting to develop weapons of mass destruction. 

"I think it's idiotic on his part. I don't know why he continues 
to do it. But as long as he continues to do it, we will continue 
to watch carefully," he said. He said Libya's weapons program 
"should be of concern to the whole civilized world." 

On Cuba, Powell said that country was an anachronism in an 
otherwise democratic hemisphere, and he predicted the eventual 
demise of its communist system. "I think historic forces and 
pressures are such that Cuba eventually will be part of this 
American revolutionary 21st century. How it will happen, I don't 
know. ... We are not getting ready to invade." 

All contents copyright 2002 Las Vegas SUN, Inc.
*****************************************************************
 45 The nuclear war: opportunities and possibilities 

Pravda.RU 

Los Angeles Times on March 9 about the possible low-capacity 
nuclear strike on several countries, including Russia, has become 
a very controversial issue. “The USA is getting ready for the 
nuclear war” – this is what the Russian headlines say on the 
subject. However, it goes about something totally different"> Los 
Angeles Times on March 9 about the possible low-capacity nuclear 
strike on several countries, including Russia, has become a very 
controversial issue. “The USA is getting ready for the nuclear 
war” – this is what the Russian headlines say on the subject. 
However, it goes about something totally different--> 

Mar, 14 2002   

  
The information, which was published in the Los Angeles Times on 
March 9 about the possible low-capacity nuclear strike on several 
countries, including Russia, has become a very controversial 
issue. “The USA is getting ready for the nuclear war” – this is 
what the Russian headlines say on the subject. However, it goes 
about something totally different: the USA is getting ready for 
the totally new world order, which is a lot worse for Russia. 

What is really new in the message that America could use the 
nuclear weapon of low capacity in the military theatre of East 
Europe? Leonid Brezhnev and Margaret Thatcher could talk about it 
too back in the time, when they were at power. Everybody, who 
studied the regulations of the armed forces, knows what to do in 
case of a nuclear attack: to hold a Kalashnikov stretching your 
arms in front of you in order not to allow the melted metal to 
drop on your boots. The new factor here is that Russia and China 
were listed as the countries, which did not have the nuclear 
potential of their own. In other words – it is not dangerous to 
use the nuclear weapons against those countries. 

Needless to mention that any kind of the nuclear strike against 
our country will lead to a very powerful retaliation of Russia’s 
Strategic nuclear force. No one would look into the question if 
the nuclear attack was of low capacity or not. This is actually 
the ground of the security system of the world, which has been 
based on the possibility for the nuclear super-powers to destroy 
each other together with the entire humanity. 

What are they actually talking about, when they say “nuclear 
weapon of low capacity?” As far as the USA is concerned in this 
respect - the American officials mean the Tomahawk cruise 
missiles, first and foremost. These missiles can carry one 
warhead with the nuclear charge of not more than 600 kilotons, 
which is an excessive figure for the use in the military theatre. 
Twenty kilotons and even less than that is fairly enough for 
destroying the secret command posts, communication centers and 
people of the enemy. The US army also has the aircraft bombs at 
its disposal, the bombs, which have accent laser lighting of a 
target. These bombs can be used not on the bomber planes only but 
also on F-16 fighter jets. But today it is more about the 
psychological factor of war – even a possibility to use this kind 
of weapon can paralyze the will of the potential enemy that does 
not have the opportunities for a nuclear strike in return. 

The information, which was published in the Los Angeles Times is 
most likely another way to show the psychological and political 
pressure on the potential enemy. But it is much more interesting 
that Russia and China were put on the list of the possible 
targets, in spite of the fact that both Russia and China have the 
nuclear arsenals. 

One may say that Russia does not have the tactical nuclear arms 
anymore – they are being processed and utilized now. The entire 
nuclear power of our country is concentrated in the Strategic 
nuclear force, the total power of which makes up over four 
thousand nuclear charges. Specialists say that the attack of ten 
hits on such a possible enemy as the USA will be enough to cause 
the huge damage, so one may assume that the power of the Russian 
Strategic nuclear force is more than enough. So far. 

The Russian Strategic nuclear force consists of the strategic 
aviation, the nuclear subs and, most importantly, the missile 
troops of the strategic purpose. There are two kinds of the 
battle planes, which can carry the nuclear weapon: one of them is 
TU-95MS turbo-prop aircraft that is capable of carrying four 
cruise missiles. However, both the planes and the missiles have 
become obsolete, they are about to be through with their 
guarantee resources. 

There are also over 20 up-to-date TU-160 aircraft, each of them 
is capable of carrying 12 cruise missiles, but there is a problem 
with the production of those missiles. In addition to that, many 
of them are out of order and can not be used. 

The situation with the military duty leaves much to be desired. 
There is a deficit of fuel, and everyone has forgotten about the 
constant military duty. The crews are not in the cockpits, they 
are in the sober and clean-shaven state, but near their planes. 
The ongoing degradation of the missile attack caution system 
makes these efforts become a simple ritual: if there is an 
attack, then 100% of our strategic bombers will be destroyed on 
the airbases. 

Since we do not consider the variant of our country to have the 
nuclear attack first, then one may say that the aviation 
constituent of our Strategic nuclear force can be considered as 
non-existent. Even if a miracle happens, and one of our TU-160 
jets takes off and reaches a missile-launching point (not more 
than 1.5 kilometers far from the USA’s cost), then its incomplete 
set of cruise missiles will most likely be intercepted by the 
anti-missile defense of the enemy. Five or ten years later, when 
the USA are through with the re-equipment of their army, the 
chances of our bomber planes will be restricted with their 
technical state and the level of obsolescence. 

The Russian nuclear submarines pose a threat, which is way more 
serious: some fifteen missile submarines. The Typhoon submarines 
are capable of carrying twenty missiles on board. Each of those 
missiles have a separating heads, and each of those heads have 
ten warheads. Russia is formally armed with six submarines like 
that, but there are at least four of them that operate, and at 
least one of them is on duty. The rest of them can launch their 
missiles without going into the sea, but they all can be quickly 
destroyed for the mentioned reason. However, even one sub can win 
the nuclear war, having launched 200 nuclear charges. 

But what will happen with the permanently fading navy in five or 
ten years? There are seven Delta-4 subs that can carry 16 SS-N-23 
missiles with separating heads, with four warheads each, but 
their gradual obsolesce is the issue of a closer perspective. 

There are 14 Delta-3 subs for the time being, which can carry 16 
SS-N-18 missiles, but in ten years there can be nothing left from 
these subs. The missile troops of the strategic purpose are the 
main constituent of the Russian Strategic nuclear force. There 
are 154 inter-continental SS-18 (Satana) ballistic missiles of 
about 1500 nuclear charges. This is enough to destroy all 
possible and impossible enemies. They will be on the military 
duty for five or ten years more, until START-2 treaty comes into 
effect, but then their resources will be exhausted. There are 
also 150 SS-19 ballistic missiles (some 900 warheads), but their 
resources are calculated for the period of ten years. There are 
also about 40 SS-25 ballistic missiles (railway basing), but they 
will be useless in five or ten years as well. Furthermore, one of 
the presidents made a decision, according to which these missiles 
are not mobile anymore. They are situated on the bases, the 
location of which is very well known to a possible enemy. Three 
hundred and sixty mobile Topol missiles will also have their 
resources exhausted in five or ten years. 

There is an up-to-date, purely Russian missile Topol-M, the 
resource of which is meant for the period of more than 20 years. 
But there have been only 30 of them manufactured so far, and it 
is a monoblock missile. President Putin said once that there 
could be separating heads installed on Topol-M missiles, but it 
would be three warheads only, not ten, like on SS-18. 

If Ilya Klebanov, the former vice premier, said that Russia had 
produced six Topol-M missiles in 2001, then we will be having not 
more than 100 monoblock ballistic missiles by the year of 2012, 
when Russia’s entire Strategic nuclear force is out of date and 
order. If they are equipped with separating heads, then there 
will be 300 nuclear charges in total, which is 15 times as less 
than nowadays. 

It is worth saying that the USA will most likely have a different 
ABM system by the year 2012, for the system that America is 
working on now, has been criticized a lot. Indeed, even if the 
system is 90% efficient, 400 warheads will reach their targets 
anyway, and this is more than enough to cause the unacceptable 
damage to the States. Furthermore, even if Russia possesses two 
or three hundreds of nuclear charges by 2012, then the 90% 
efficiency of the ABM system will not save America from the 
inadmissible damage. 

There should be 200-300 nuclear charges left after the first 
attack of the possible enemy, which is not less than 100 
missiles. Alas, Russia should have not less than 1000 warheads by 
the year 2012 to feel calm – 300 Topol-M missiles. 

Votkinsky Zavod is the only enterprise in Russia, which deals 
with the production of the ballistic missiles. The information, 
which said that the management of the factory was controlled by 
some local mafia, was exaggerated. I know the managers of this 
company in person, and I can be rather ironic about their “links” 
with mafia. 

The designer of Topol-M missile, Yury Solomonov said at the 
meeting with the deputies of the Russian parliament that the 
production of those missiles was funded on the level of 18% in 
2001. Even if the production were backed up on the level of 100%, 
only one-third of the need in the Strategic nuclear force would 
be satisfied. What does it all mean? 

Russia will become “one of the nuclear powers” by 2010-2012, like 
England, China, France nowadays. If the USA launches its nuclear 
attack, then Russia will be able to answer with solitary launches 
of its ballistic missiles. America’s National ABM system will 
face the conditions of a testing area, under which the system 
will be able to give good results. This was the ground for the 
possible nuclear attack of low capacity on the probable enemy, 
including Russia. In the nearest future Russia will not be able 
to oppose to such intentions, which may prove to become one of 
the means of the psychological pressure. 

However, this kind of “psychology” can not leave China 
indifferent. China has nothing to do, but to deploy a nuclear 
group of its own during five or ten years, with not less than 
1000 warheads. China can do that. Then it will be India’s turn, 
and then Pakistan’s, Israel’s – another arms race is on the way. 
The list may go on with Indonesia, North Korea, Iran, Saudi 
Arabia, but Russia does not seem to take the top position on the 
list. 


Anatoly Baranov PRAVDA.Ru 


Translated by Dmitry Sudakov 
*****************************************************************
 46 'No longer the weapons of last resort'

IHT: 

Mary McGrory 
Friday, March 15, 2002 	   	
 	    
Nuts about nukes        

WASHINGTON It's one of two things. The Nuclear Posture Review is 
a harmless piece of paper serving up warmed-over Clinton 
doctrine, "a working document" leaked by some subversive 
show-off. Or else it is a farewell to arms control and 
nonproliferation, the work of doomsday planners who have at last 
succeeded in selling their idea that nuclear weapons are no 
different from the conventional kind and equally useful in 
combat.

The Bush administration, led by Secretary of Defense Donald 
Rumsfeld and Secretary of State Colin Powell, is busy spinning 
the review's insignificance.

Rumsfeld has had the novel experience of playing host to an 
official whose country found its name on the target list that is 
a feature of the review. He and Sergei Ivanov, Russia's defense 
minister, got around it by saying what great friends and partners 
the United States and the Kremlin have become since the end of 
the Cold War.

The Pentagon reviewers may seem to be activating the nuclear 
trigger by asserting that America will use nuclear weapons 
against any nation threatening biological or chemical warfare. 
Hitherto, non-nuclear states were exempt from U.S. nuclear 
attack, but the president says he has to have every possible 
option.

For some, the review offered a trip down memory lane. The 
advocacy of small nuclear weapons brought back memories of 1964, 
when the Republican presidential contender Barry Goldwater 
traversed the country peddling tactical battlefield nukes no 
bigger than a fountain pen. The public did not buy. It wasn't the 
size of the weapons, it was their radioactivity that concerned 
people. Goldwater was vaporized by Lyndon Johnson.

"It was bizarre then," says the Carnegie Endowment's nuclear 
sage, Joseph Cirincione, of Goldwater's crusade. "It's bizarre 
now."

"We are saying that nuclear weapons are no longer the weapon of 
last resort but weapons of first choice," he says. His succinct 
summary of the meaning of the review: "It means that the nuclear 
nuts have seized control of the policy apparatus." Most military 
men agree that battlefield nukes are not an option. Among them 
has been Colin Powell, who, in his autobiography, "My American 
Journey," wrote disparagingly of their utility. Powell has been 
assiduous in defending the administration against charges of 
extremism and unilateralism. Some think he swallows hard before 
fashioning his rationalizations, but a united front is more 
essential than ever, with the vice president making a tour to 
convince 11 nations that the United States is a prudent, 
painstaking country that could be trusted to run a tidy and 
effective effort in evicting Saddam Hussein from Iraq.

"Our heads are spinning," said Senator Lincoln Chafee of Rhode 
Island, a moderate Republican who succeeded his father in the 
Senate. John Chafee was a champion of arms control. "This is a 
time when we should be befriending people, not threatening them. 
We need all the allies we can get." 

The Washington Post 	

Copyright © 2002 the International Herald Tribune All Rights 
Reserved
*****************************************************************
 47 Nuclear Warhead Study Aims at Buried Targets 

(washingtonpost.com)
 
Friday, March 15, 2002; Page A16 

Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham told the Senate Armed Services 
Committee yesterday that $10 million is being spent this year on 
a study of whether an existing nuclear warhead can be modified 
for use as an earth-penetrating weapon to destroy hardened 
underground targets.
 
"This is a modification of a weapon . . . not the development of 
a new warhead," Abraham said. He said the Pentagon is also 
studying whether there are new ways to attack bunkers and other 
hardened targets with conventional weapons.
 
Abraham assured the panel that no work is being done "at this 
point" on a new low-yield warhead despite reports that the 
Pentagon's classified nuclear posture review supports the 
development of such a weapon.
 
Since 1994, Congress has prohibited research and design 
development work on any new warhead with a yield of five 
kilotons, the equivalent of 5,000 tons of TNT, or more.
 
At yesterday's hearing, committee Chairman Carl M. Levin 
(D-Mich.) said that developing a new warhead or modifying an 
existing one may "signal to the world that there is a new and 
broader range of contingencies in which the United States would 
consider using nuclear weapons."
 
Levin hinted that he might try to eliminate or limit the funds 
for the modification study when the committee votes on the fiscal 
2003 authorization bill for the Defense Department.
 
-- Walter Pincus 


                       © 2002 The Washington Post Company
*****************************************************************
 48   Russian, U.S. defense officials say legally binding document on 
nuclear cuts likely 

 Bostonherald.com E-NEWS 

Associated Press Wednesday, March 13, 2002

WASHINGTON - Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said Wednesday 
it is likely that the United States and Russia will come up with 
some type of legally binding document outlining their mutual 
pledge to cut nuclear weapons by two-thirds.

 President Bush and Russian President Vladimir Putin ``have 
agreed that they would like to have something that would go 
beyond their two presidencies,'' Rumsfeld said at a news 
conference after two days of meetings with Russian Defense 
Minister Sergei Ivanov.

 Referring to Ivanov's call for a legally binding document 
outlining that pledge, the American defense secretary said: 
``Some sort of a document of that type is certainly a 
likelihood.''

 Ivanov said he would like to see good progress toward such a 
document so that it could be signed at a May summit by Putin and 
Bush in Russia.

 ``We believe there should be a legally binding document which 
would be comprehensive and understandable for the whole world, 
and which would also reflect the transparency we need to achieve 
between the two countries,'' Ivanov said.

 Rumsfeld also sought to reassure Russian officials and the world 
that the United States is not eyeing Russia as a potential target 
of nuclear weapons.

 The disclosure last weekend of an internal U.S. nuclear review 
naming Russia and six other countries as potential threats 
alarmed the Kremlin and leaders of other countries.

 ``Without getting into the classified details, I can say that 
the review says nothing about targeting any country with nuclear 
weapons,'' Rumsfeld said.

``The United States targets no country on a day-to-day basis.''

 Echoing the comments of other Bush administration officials 
since news reports of the document appeared, Rumsfeld said the 
Nuclear Posture Review was not a planning document for possible 
U.S. action, but merely ``sets out prudent requirements for 
deterrence in the 21st century.''

 Russian officials had been briefed on the document in January, 
Rumsfeld said.

 The document does, however, note that Russia has formidable 
nuclear weapons and ``prudently takes this into account,'' 
Rumsfeld said.

 But the relationship between the United States and Russia has 
undergone such a fundamental improvement that the two countries 
no longer view each other as adversaries, Rumsfeld said.

 ``The United States seeks a cooperative relationship with 
Russia, which moves away from the mutually assured destruction 
(policy) of the past,'' Rumsfeld said.

 On Tuesday, Ivanov had told reporters ``it's quite natural'' 
that he would want to discuss the review with the people who 
prepared it. He told reporters that Rumsfeld's public statements 
about the report accurately reflect its contents.

 ``Secretary Rumsfeld briefed you on the true situation, and I 
don't have anything to add here,'' Ivanov told reporters.

 Secretary of State Colin Powell and Condoleezza Rice, the 
president's national security assistant, also have assured Russia 
it is not being targeted.

 Ivanov also made clear that a U.S. plan to send military 
personnel to help train soldiers in the Republic of Georgia to 
fight terrorists remains a sensitive topic for Russia.

 Ivanov said the United States and Russia would need ``the most 
close cooperation'' to effectively help Georgia's government deal 
with the problem.

 Fighters trained in Afghanistan have escaped to the Pankisi 
Gorge area, which borders Russia's breakaway Chechnya, Ivanov 
said, and are ``full of new plans for terrorist operations.'' 
Russia ``cannot just sit and watch these activities 
indifferently,'' he said.

 The United States also believes fighters linked with the 
al-Qaida terrorist network are hiding in the crime-infested 
gorge. Ivanov said the United States is keeping Russia informed 
of its intentions, both the planned phases of training and the 
scope of that training.

 Rumsfeld said the United States has no plans to put any military 
personnel into the gorge itself, and is only sending ``relatively 
modest number of trainers over to assist them (Georgia) in 
training.''

 President Eduard Shevardnadze of Georgia also has sought to 
reassure Russian officials that Washington will not have a 
long-term military presence in the region.

 Georgia, eager to shed Russian influence and reach out to the 
West, has long refused Russian offers to help crack down in the 
gorge, and Shevardnadze admitted only recently that the gorge 
could house terrorists and welcomed U.S. offers of help.

 On Tuesday, Ivanov called on Bush at the White House to discuss 
the U.S. and Russian pledges to reduce nuclear stockpiles and the 
U.S.-led campaign against terror.

 Ivanov described the meeting as ``rather warm and productive'' 
and said he did not take up the Pentagon study with Bush.

 The National Security Council spokesman, Sean McCormack, said 
Bush had raised the issue of nuclear weapons, but ``only in the 
context of reiterating his commitment to reduce U.S. offensive 
nuclear arms to the range the U.S. is committed to.''

 Secretary of State Colin Powell on Tuesday told members of 
Congress that the number of U.S. nuclear weapons has dropped to 
fewer than 10,000 from the 20,000 that were in the arsenal when 
he was chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff a decade ago.

 Bush intends to go ahead with a plan to reduce the total of 
long-range U.S. nuclear warheads to between 1,700 and 2,200 over 
the next 10 years, Powell said.

 Putin has pledged a similar cutback, but would like it to be 
legally binding. Powell said Bush had no objection to the 
formality, but that it was not necessary now that the United 
States and Russia are no longer adversaries.
 
Copyright 2001 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This 
*****************************************************************
 49 Iran issues anti-nuclear warning - 

CNN.com - 

March 15, 2002
 	 	
ATHENS, Greece -- Any use of nuclear weapons could set off a 
global conflict that would threaten to destroy all humanity, 
Iran's president has warned. 
				 
Mohammad Khatami has used his five-day European trip as a forum 
to hit out at U.S. President George W. Bush, who has called Iran 
part of an "axis of evil" along with North Korea and Iraq. 
				 
"The powers that threaten other peoples with nuclear weapons 
threaten not just these peoples but all humanity," Khatami said 
following a meeting with the head of the Greek Orthodox Church, 
Archbishop Christodoulos. 
				 
"If we have such developments no one will be safe, not even the 
leadership ... who threaten to use nuclear force," Khatami 
continued, speaking through a translator. 
				 
A Bush administration report on nuclear strategies, which was 
leaked to the media, names Iran and several other nations as 
possible U.S. nuclear targets because of their vast arsenals and 
"longstanding hostility toward the United States and its security 
partners." 
				 
Iran is working with Russian engineers on a nuclear reactor that 
some Western analysts claim could produce weapons-grade material. 
Iran insists the planned reactor is only to meet power needs. 
				 
Khatami also urged for greater contact and cooperation between 
the world's monotheistic religions. He likening the world's three 
main monotheistic religions to a common tree with different 
fruit. 
				 
"We should examine our roots and try to collaborate in the path 
toward unity," Khatami told Christodoulos and senior Greek 
clerics. 
				 
"All monotheistic religions call on humanity to fight evil and 
seek freedom and peace and not terrorism." 
				 
Christodoulos called on Israelis and Arabs to reject violence in 
the name of religion. 
				 
"The Middle East has been transformed into a land of mourning, of 
wailing and lamentation ... they do not realise that the powers 
of hell are carrying on their wars using a religious passport," 
Christodoulos said. 
				 
Khatami is scheduled to return to Iran on Friday. 
		
Copyright 2002 The Associated Press.    All rights reserved. This 

*****************************************************************
 50  U.S. Optimistic on Deal Over Nuclear Weapons - 

The St. Petersburg Times.

#753, Friday, March 15, 2002   

COMBINED REPORTS

 WASHINGTON - U.S. President George W. Bush on Wednesday 
expressed optimism that a deal on nuclear-arms reduction would be 
ready for his summit meeting with President Vladimir Putin in 
May, and clearly moved from reluctance to enthusiasm about 
signing a formal agreement with his Russian counterpart. At a 
White House news conference, Bush also defended a Pentagon review 
of the nation's nuclear posture that included consideration of 
how these weapons might be used to destroy biological or chemical 
arms of an adversary like Iraq, Iran, Libya or Syria, even if 
those states are not nuclear powers.
 
"We've got all options on the table, because we want to make it 
very clear to nations that you will not threaten the United 
States or use weapons of mass destruction against us or our 
allies or friends," the president said.
 
He expanded on comments earlier in the day by Russia's Defense 
Minister Sergei Ivanov, who said "some specific results have been 
achieved" in two days of talks on nuclear-arms reductions with 
U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.
 
"I share the minister's optimism that we can get something done 
by May," Bush said. "I'd like to sign a document in Russia when 
I'm there. And it could be a good thing."
 
Although the president has said repeatedly that he is open to how 
a deal could be sealed with Russia, he has said just as often 
that a formal agreement was unnecessary.
 
Wednesday, however, he seemed to wholeheartedly embrace Russia's 
view.
 
Bush said he agrees "with President Putin that there needs to be 
a document that outlives both of us. And what form that comes in 
we will discuss."
 
American officials have said that even after the United States 
cuts its nuclear arsenal it might store hundreds of warheads to 
respond to future threats.
 
Asked to describe the Russian reaction, Ivanov seemed to indicate 
that Russia might also store some warheads.
 
"It is true that for some period of time, those warheads could be 
stored or shelved, but anyway, the time will inevitably come when 
those will have to be destroyed," Ivanov said.
 
Rumsfeld also said Wednesday that the U.S. and Russia are likely 
to come up with a legally binding document.
 
President Bush and President Putin "have agreed that they would 
like to have something that would go beyond their two 
presidencies," Rumsfeld said at a news conference after two days 
of meetings with Ivanov.
 
Referring to Ivanov's call for a legally binding document 
outlining that pledge, the American defense secretary said: "Some 
sort of a document of that type is certainly a likelihood."
 
The disclosure last weekend of an internal U.S. nuclear review 
naming Russia and six other countries as potential threats 
alarmed the Kremlin and leaders of other countries.
 
"Without getting into the classified details, I can say that the 
review says nothing about targeting any country with nuclear 
weapons," Rumsfeld said. "The United States targets no country on 
a day-to-day basis."
 
- AP, NYT
 
*****************************************************************
 51 Nothing 'prudent' about planning nuclear attacks

  [St. Petersburg Times Online: Opinion: Editorials and Letters]   
  
Letters to the Editors
 
© St. Petersburg Times
published March 15, 2002 

Expressing opinions other than those of the government is not 
popular at this time. Your articles, At what point would United 
States use nuclear arms? (March 11) and Report calls for smaller 
nuclear weapons (March 10) have "nuked" my resolve. 

I am in the class of "unpopular patriots" who have been 
questioning our (almost) daily loss of freedoms (in both the 
state and federal government), the gathering of power and 
promotion of agendas by those who realize that it is an 
advantageous time to do so, and the escalation of influence and 
spending in our military. 

I realize that at times, war is a necessary evil, but it seems 
that it is becoming the focal point, the main purpose and the 
excuse of our government. The use of "smaller nuclear weapons" is 
unacceptable. The entire free world should be horrified. 

The devastation to all forms of life by nuclear weapons is 
well-known and documented. Not only are we opening the door for 
the pollution and/or destruction of this planet, we are opening 
the door for "more usable" nuclear weapon use by every country 
that can build, beg, borrow or steal them. We are giving the 
world America's "okay" for their deployment. (Or do we think that 
we should be the only country allowed to do this?) 

I can't believe the American people will sit quietly by, with 
their eyes and mouths closed, and let the government go one step 
further with this line of thinking. 

Colin Powell has stated that "this is prudent military planning, 
and it is the kind of planning I think the American people would 
expect." (My dictionary defines "prudent" as: cautious, 
exercising sound judgment, decorously discreet.) 

Is this truly what the American people expect? Have we been so 
blinded by our grief and shock that we have taken a path of 
revenge that will destroy us and the planet? Will we allow 
ourselves to become a part of this "axis of evil" that is bent on 
"prudently" destroying our world? 

I love this country, with its amazingly diverse peoples and 
natural wonders. I do not vacation "abroad" when the opportunity 
arises; there are too many beautiful things here that I have yet 
to see and experience. 

I've always seen America as being an example of truth, freedom, 
compassion and justice for the world. What kind of example are we 
giving now? 

I'll end this with a quote by Albert Einstein: "The unleashed 
power of the atom has changed everything save our modes of 
thinking, and we thus drift toward unparalleled catastrophes." 

-- Mary Wolfe, Belleair Beach 

A nuclear option
 
Re: At what point would United States use nuclear arms? March 11. 

As a nuclear scientist (nuclear power, not arms), a Korean War 
veteran and a terribly concerned citizen of the United States, I 
feel the referenced article cannot go without comment. Michael 
Gordon completely misread the differences between using nuclear 
weapons as a deterrent during the Cold War and now as a deterrent 
in a war with terrorists. The Soviets had much to lose, as did 
we, so neither dared attack the other. Both had concern for 
deaths and destruction in their own country and realized there 
could be no winner. The terrorists have no country to protect and 
obviously no concern for how many deaths would result, so we must 
therefore use any device available to prevent their acquiring a 
weapon of mass destruction. If they can develop a fission or 
fusion bomb as the Soviets did, within weeks they would use the 
first one to destroy Israel and the second on Washington or New 
York City -- and they seem to prefer the latter. 

As I read the article, my mind kept comparing "lowering the 
threshold" with "lowering the bar," as in a sports event. In 
today's situation, the terrorists neither respect nor use any 
"threshold," and they obviously would bypass the "bar," as they 
have no rules or conscience. To make matters worse, the Muslim 
world leaders have not vigorously condemned the terrorists' 
actions. They simply say, "I do not agree with their killing so 
many people, but I do understand their anger." That attitude 
sanctions their actions, so they keep providing funds and 
suicidal operators who believe they will go straight to a heaven 
filled with servicing virgins. 

Also, being somewhat familiar with mountain warfare and the use 
of machine guns in a war, my heart goes out to our soldiers 
advancing on that solid, cold rock with no place to dig a 
foxhole. The terrorists, who are holed up in caves, do not even 
have to aim carefully; their bullets will ricochet around in all 
directions, making a rocky ravine a tracer bullet-filled hell. 

A perfect place to use a nuclear weapon would be in the mountains 
of eastern Afghanistan. As far as I can tell, those mountains 
have no value or purpose except to provide what Osama bin Laden 
thought was a perfect command post, training camp and retreat for 
his long-term terrorist war. A nuclear bomb would kill all 
terrorists over many square miles, and its radioactive fallout 
would prevent use of the mountains for a few years. 

This may be the best time and place to put a stop to terrorist 
actions in a

firm, no-nonsense manner, with no civilian casualties. 

-- Gilbert M. Brown, Dunedin 

*****************************************************************
 52 Nuclear Posture Review [Excerpts]
 
 Submitted to Congress on 31 December 2001. 
8 January 2002
 
Nuclear Posture Review Report
 
Foreword

 The Congress directed the Defense Department to conduct a 
comprehensive Nuclear Posture Review to lay out the direction for 
American nuclear forces over the next five to ten years. The 
Department has completed that review and prepared the attached 
report.

 Early on, we recognized that the new security environment 
demanded that the Department go beyond the Congressional mandate 
in developing a strategic posture for the 21st century. President 
Bush had already directed the Defense Department to transform 
America's military and prepare it for the new, unpredictable 
world in which we will be living. The result of his direction is 
the Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR). Building on the (QDR) this 
Nuclear Posture Review puts in motion a major change in our 
approach to the role of nuclear offensive forces in our deterrent 
strategy and presents the blueprint for transforming our 
strategic posture.

 This report establishes a New Triad, composed of:
 
  + Offensive strike systems (both nuclear and non-nuclear);
 
  + Defenses (both active and passive); and
 
  + A revitalized defense infrastructure that will provide new 
capabilities in

a timely fashion to meet emerging threats.

 This New Triad is bound together by enhanced command and control 
(C2) and intelligence systems.

 The establishment of this New Triad can both reduce our 
dependence on nuclear weapons and improve our ability to deter 
attack in the face of proliferating WMD capabilities in two ways:
 
  + The addition of defenses (along with the prospects for timely 
adjustments to force capabilities and enhanced C2 and 
intelligence systems) means that the U.S. will no longer be as 
heavily dependent on offensive strike forces to enforce 
deterrence as it was during the Cold War.
 
  + The addition of non-nuclear strike forces--including 
conventional strike and information operations--means that the 
U.S. will be less dependent than it has been in the past on 
nuclear forces to provide its offensive deterrent capability.

 The combination of new capabilities that make up the New Triad 
reduce the risk to the nation as it draws its nuclear forces 
toward the goal of 1,700-2,200 operationally deployed strategic 
nuclear warheads announced by President Bush on November 13, 
2001.

 The following is a summary of the highlights in this report.

 First and foremost, the Nuclear Posture Review puts the Cold War 
practices related to planning for strategic forces behind us. In 
the decade since the collapse of the Soviet Union, planning for 
the employment of U.S. nuclear forces has undergone only modest 
revision, despite the new relationship between the U.S. and 
Russia. Few changes had been made to the size or composition of 
the strategic nuclear force beyond those required by the START 
Treaty. At the same time, plans and funding for sustaining some 
critical elements of that force have been inadequate.

 As a result of this review, the U.S. will no longer plan, size 
or sustain its forces as though Russia presented merely a smaller 
version of the threat posed by the former Soviet Union. Following 
the direction laid down for U.S. defense planning in the 
Quadrennial Defense Review, the Nuclear Posture Review shifts 
planning for America's strategic forces from the threat-based 
approach of the Cold War to a capabilities-based approach. This 
new approach should provide, over the coming decades, a credible 
deterrent at the lowest level of nuclear weapons consistent with 
U.S. and allied security.

 Second, we have concluded that a strategic posture that relies 
solely on offensive nuclear forces is inappropriate for deterring 
the potential adversaries we will face in the 21st century. 
Terrorists or rogue states armed with weapons of mass destruction 
will likely test America's security commitments to its allies and 
friends. In response, we will need a range of capabilities to 
assure friend and foe alike of U.S. resolve. A broader array of 
capability is needed to dissuade states from undertaking 
political, military, or technical courses of action that would 
threaten U.S. and allied security. U.S. forces must pose a 
credible deterrent to potential adversaries who have access to 
modern military technology, including NBC weapons and the means 
to deliver them over long distances. Finally, U.S. strategic 
forces need to provide the President with a range of options to 
defeat any aggressor.

 To meet the nation's defense goals in the 21st century, the 
first leg of the New Triad, the offensive strike leg, will go 
beyond the Cold War triad of intercontinental ballistic missiles 
(ICBMs), submarine-launched ballistic missiles (SLBMs), and 
long-range nuclear-armed bombers. ICBMs, SLBMs, bombers and 
nuclear weapons will, of course, continue to play a vital role. 
However, they will be just part of the first leg of the New 
Triad, integrated with new non-nuclear strategic capabilities 
that strengthen the credibility of our offensive deterrence.

 The second leg of the New Triad requires development and 
deployment of both active and passive defenses--a recognition 
that offensive capabilities alone may not deter aggression in the 
new security environment of the 21st century. The events of 
September 11, 2001 underscore this reality. Active and passive 
defenses will not be perfect. However, by denying or reducing the 
effectiveness of limited attacks, defenses can discourage 
attacks, provide new capabilities for managing crises, and 
provide insurance against the failure of traditional deterrence.

 The third leg of the New Triad is a responsive defense 
infrastructure. Since the end of the Cold War, the U.S. defense 
infrastructure has contracted and our nuclear infrastructure has 
atrophied. New approaches to development and procurement of new 
capabilities are being designed so that it will not take 20 years 
or more to field new generations of weapon systems. With respect 
to the nuclear infrastructure, it needs to be repaired to 
increase confidence in the deployed forces, eliminate unneeded 
weapons, and mitigate the risks of technological surprise. 
Maintaining our ability to respond to large strategic changes can 
permit us to reduce our nuclear arsenal and, at the same time, 
dissuade adversaries from starting a competition in nuclear 
armaments.

 The effectiveness of this New Triad depends upon command and 
control, intelligence, and adaptive planning. "Exquisite" 
intelligence on the intentions and capabilities of adversaries 
can permit timely adjustments to the force and improve the 
precision with which it can strike and defend. The ability to 
plan the employment of the strike and defense forces flexibly and 
rapidly will provide the U.S. with a significant advantage in 
managing crises, deterring attack and conducting military 
operations.

 Constructing the New Triad, reducing our deployed nuclear 
weapons, and increasing flexibility in our strategic posture has 
resource implications. It costs money to retire old weapons 
systems and create new capabilities. Restoring the defense 
infrastructure, developing and deploying strategic defenses, 
improving our command and control, intelligence, planning, and 
non-nuclear strike capabilities require new defense initiatives 
and investments. However, these investments can make the U.S. 
more secure while reducing our dependence on nuclear weapons.

 The Quadrennial Defense Review established the foundation for 
America's post-Cold War defense strategy. Building on the 
Quadrennial Defense Review, the Nuclear Posture Review will 
transform the Cold War era offensive nuclear triad into a New 
Triad designed for the decades to come.

 Donald H. Rumsfeld Secretary of Defense
 

Body of the Report
 
"Nuclear weapons play a critical role in the defense capabilities 
of the United States, its allies and friends. They provide 
credible military options to deter a wide range of threats, 
including WMD and large-scale conventional military force. These 
nuclear capabilities possess unique properties that give the 
United States options to hold at risk classes of targets [that 
are] important to achieve strategic and political objectives." 
(p. 7) 

However, “U.S. nuclear forces, alone are unsuited to most of the 
contingencies for which the United States prepares. The United 
States and allied interests may not require nuclear strikes.” A 
“new mix” of nuclear, non-nuclear, and defensive capabilities “is 
required for the diverse set of potential adversaries and 
unexpected threats the United States may confront in the coming 
decades.” (p. 7) 

"Greater flexibility is needed with respect to nuclear forces and 
planning than was the case during the Cold War. The assets most 
valued by the spectrum of potential adversaries in the new 
security environment may be diverse and, in some cases, U.S. 
understanding of what an adversary values may evolve. 
Consequently, although the number of weapons needed to hold those 
assets at risk has declined, U.S. nuclear forces still require 
the capability to hold at risk a wide range of target types. This 
capability is key to the role of nuclear forces in supporting an 
effective deterrence strategy relative to a broad spectrum of 
potential opponents under a variety of contingencies. Nuclear 
attack options that vary in scale, scope, and purpose will 
complement other military capabilities. The combination can 
provide the range of options needed to pose a credible deterrent 
to adversaries whose values and calculations of risk and of gain 
and loss may be very different from and more difficult to discern 
than those of past adversaries.” (p. 7) 

"Advances in defensive technologies will allow U.S. non-nuclear 
and nuclear capabilities to be coupled with active and passive 
defenses to help provide deterrence and protection against 
attack, preserve U.S. freedom of action, and strengthen the 
credibility of U.S. alliance commitments. " (p. 7) "Missile 
defenses are beginning to emerge as systems that can have an 
effect on the strategic and operational calculations of potential 
adversaries. They are now capable of providing, active defense 
against short- to medium-range threats." (p. 11) 

U.S. military forces themselves, including nuclear forces will 
now be used to "dissuade adversaries from undertaking military 
programs or operations that could threaten U.S. interests or 
those of allies and friends." (p. 9) "Defensive systems capable 
of intercepting ballistic missiles may reduce the need for 
nuclear weapons to hold at risk an adversary's missile 
launchers." (p. 9) 

“A modern, responsive nuclear weapons sector of the 
infrastructure is indispensable, especially as the size of the 
operationally deployed nuclear arsenal is reduced.” (p. 10-11) 

“The planning process [for the New Triad] not only must produce a 
variety of flexible, pre-planned non-nuclear and nuclear options, 
but also incorporate sufficient adaptability to support the 
timely construction of additional options in a crisis or 
unexpected conflict." (p. 11) 

II. “CONTRIBUTIONS OF THE NEW TRIAD TO DEFENSE POLICY GOALS” 
(p.12)
 
(Assure, Dissuade, Deter, Defeat)
 
“ASSURE” —“U.S. nuclear forces will continue to provide assurance 
to security partners, particularly in the presence of known or 
suspected threats of nuclear, biological, or chemical attacks or 
in the event of surprising military developments. This assurance 
can serve to reduce the incentives for friendly countries to 
acquire nuclear weapons of their own to deter such threats and 
circumstances. Nuclear capabilities also assure the U.S. public 
that the United States will not be subject to coercion based on a 
false perception of U.S. weakness among potential adversaries. 
(p. 12) 

“Defense of the U.S. homeland and protection of forward bases 
increase the ability of the United States to counteract 
WMD-backed coercive threats and to use its power projection 
forces in the defense of allies and friends.” (p. 13) "DISSUADE" 
— "Systems capable of striking a wide range of targets throughout 
an adversary's territory may dissuade a potential adversary from 
pursuing threatening capabilities. For example, a demonstration 
of the linkage between long-range precision strike weapons and 
real-time intelligence systems may dissuade a potential adversary 
from investing heavily in mobile ballistic missiles." (p. 12) 

"Defenses can make it more arduous and costly for an adversary to 
compete militarily with or wage war against the United States. 
The demonstration of a range of technologies and systems for 
missile defense can have a dissuasive effect on potential 
adversaries. The problem of countering missile defenses, 
especially defensive systems with multiple layers, presents a 
potential adversary with the prospect of a difficult, 
time-consuming and expensive undertaking." (p. 13) 

"The capacity of the infrastructure to upgrade existing weapon 
systems, surge production of weapons, or develop and field 
entirely new systems for the New Triad can discourage other 
countries from competing militarily with the United States.” (p. 
14) 

“DETER” — “[Missile] [D]efense of U.S. territory and power 
projection forces, including U.S forces abroad, combined with the 
certainty of U.S. ability to strike in response, can bring into 
better balance U.S. stakes and risks in a regional confrontation 
and thus reinforce the credibility of U. S. guarantees designed 
to deter attacks on allies and friends.” 

"The [defense R and industrial] infrastructure must provide 
confidence in the reliability of the nuclear stockpile and the 
ability of command and control structures to withstand attack. 
More broadly, [it] helps to enhance deterrence of aggression by 
supporting improved U.S. capabilities to hold at risk high-value 
targets in the face of an adversary's efforts to conceal, harden, 
and disperse them." (p. 14) 

"DEFEAT” — "Composed of both non-nuclear systems and nuclear 
weapons, the strike element of the New Triad can provide greater 
flexibility in the design and conduct of military campaigns to 
defeat opponents decisively. Non-nuclear strike capabilities may 
be particularly useful to limit collateral damage and conflict 
escalation. Nuclear weapons could be employed against targets 
able to withstand non-nuclear attack, (for example, deep 
underground bunkers or bio-weapon facilities)." (p. 12-13) 

"Missile defenses could defeat small-scale missile attacks 
intended to coerce the United States into abandoning an embattled 
ally or friend. Defenses that provided protection for strike 
capabilities of the New Triad and for other power projection 
forces would improve the ability of the United States and its 
allies and friends to counterattack an enemy. They may also 
provide the President with an option to manage a crisis involving 
one or more missile and WMD-armed opponents." (p. 13) 

COMMAND, CONTROL, PLANNING, AND INTELLIGENCE (p. 15)
 
"As forces are incrementally changed to meet the New Triad force 
requirements, command and control (C2) becomes more critical to 
ensure the effectiveness of the elements of the residual force 
structure… Strike options will require intricate planning, 
flexibility, and interface with decision makers throughout the 
engagement process. Command and control will become more complex 
and the supporting systems and platforms will require 
augmentation, modernization, and replacement." (p. 15) 

“Accurate and timely targeting information can increase both the 
lethality of strike capabilities and the possibilities for 
non-nuclear strike capabilities to substitute for nuclear weapons 
or provide for the timely positioning of missile defense assets." 
(p. 15) 

DEFENSE POLICY GOALS AND RELATED NUCLEAR WEAPONS REQUIREMENTS (p. 
15)
 
"In a fluid security environment, the precise nuclear force level 
necessary for the future cannot be predicted with certainty. The 
goal of reducing, over the next decade, the U.S. operationally 
deployed strategic nuclear force to the range of between 1,700 
and 2,200 warheads provides a degree of flexibility necessary to 
accommodate changes in the security environment that could affect 
U.S. nuclear requirements." (p. 15) 

SIZING THE NUCLEAR F0RCE (p. 16)
 
“In setting requirements for nuclear strike capabilities, 
distinctions can be made among the contingencies for which the 
United States must be prepared. Contingencies can be categorized 
as immediate, potential or unexpected." 

“Immediate contingencies involve well-recognized current dangers… 
Current examples of immediate contingencies include an Iraqi 
attack on Israel or its neighbors, a North Korean attack on South 
Korea, or a military confrontation over the status of Taiwan." 

"Potential contingencies are plausible, but not immediate 
dangers. For example, the emergence of a new, hostile military 
coalition against the United States or its allies in which one or 
more members possesses WMD and the means of delivery is a 
potential contingency that could have major consequences for U.S. 
defense planning, including plans for nuclear forces.” (p. 16) 

Unexpected contingencies are sudden and unpredicted security 
challenges," like the Cuban Missile Crisis. "Contemporary 
illustrations might include a sudden regime change by which an 
existing nuclear arsenal comes into the hands of a new, hostile 
leadership group, or an opponents surprise unveiling of WMD 
capabilities." Ibid. 

'North Korea, Iraq, Iran, Syria, and Libya are among the 
countries that could be involved in immediate, potential, or 
unexpected contingencies. All have longstanding hostility toward 
the United States and its security partners; North Korea and Iraq 
in particular have been chronic military concerns. All sponsor or 
harbor terrorists, and all have active WMD and missile programs."

Ibid 

"Due to the combination of China's still developing strategic 
objectives and its ongoing modernization of its nuclear and non 
nuclear forces, China is a country that could be involved in an 
immediate or potential contingency." (p. 16-17) 

"Russia maintains the most formidable nuclear forces, aside from 
the United States, and substantial, if less impressive, 
conventional capabilities. There now are, however, no ideological 
sources of conflict with Moscow, as there were during the Cold 
War. The United States seeks a more cooperative relationship with 
Russia and a move away from the balance-of-terror policy 
framework, which by definition is an expression of mutual 
distrust and hostility. As a. result, a [nuclear strike] 
contingency involving Russia, while plausible, is not expected." 
(p. 17) 

(U) "Adjusting U.S. immediate nuclear force requirements in 
recognition of the changed relationship with Russia is a critical 
step away from the Cold War policy of mutual vulnerability and 
toward more cooperative relations.” (p. 17) (S) "Russia’s nuclear 
forces and programs, nevertheless, remain a concern.

Russia faces many strategic problems around its periphery and its 
future course cannot be charted with certainty. U.S. planning 
must take this into account. In the event that U.S. relations 
with Russia significantly worsen in the future, the U.S. may need 
to revise its nuclear force levels and posture." (p. 17) 

OPERATIONALLY DEPLOYED AND RESPONSIVE NUCLEAR FORCES
 
"The operationally deployed forces are sized to provide the 
capabilities required to meet the U.S. defense goals in the 
context of immediate, and unexpected contingencies. That is, a 
sufficient number of forces must be available on short notice to 
counter known threats while preserving a small, additional margin 
in the event of a surprise development. The 1700-2200 warheads 
the United States is scheduled to deploy in 2012 would constitute 
the operationally deployed force.” (p. 17) 

"The responsive force is intended to provide a capability to 
augment the operationally deployed force to meet potential 
contingencies … The responsive force … retains the option for 
leadership to increase the number of operationally delayed forces 
in proportion to the severity of an evolving crisis. A responsive 
force need not be available in a matter of days, but in weeks, 
months, or even years. For example, additional bombs could be 
brought out of the non-deployed stockpile in days or weeks. By 
contrast, adding additional weapons to the ICBM force could take 
as long as a year for a squadron in a wing. The responsive force 
[also] provides a reserve from which replacements can be provided 
for operationally deployed weapons that evidence reliability 
problems." 

US NUCLEAR FORCE SIZE
 
"Based on current projections, an operationally deployed force of 
1700-2200 strategic nuclear warheads by 2012 ...will support U.S. 
deterrence policy to hold at risk what opponents value, including 
their instruments of political control and military power, and to 
deny opponents their war aims. The types of targets to be held at 
risk for deterrence purposes include leadership and military 
capabilities, particularly WMD, military command facilities and 
other centers of control and infrastructure that support military 
forces.” 

“The planned force structure for 2012 comprises 14 Trident SSBNs 
(with two of the 14 in overhaul at any time) 500 Minuteman III 
ICBMs, 76 B-52H bombers, and 21 B-2 bombers." 

THE PATH FOR NUCLEAR REDUCTIONS
 
"A conceptual path toward an operationally deployed force of 
1,700-2,200 warheads in 2012 ... eliminates Peacekeeper ICBMs, 
removes 4 Trident SSBNs from strategic service, and downloads 
weapons from Trident SLBMs, Minuteman III ICBMs; and B-52H and 
B-2 bombers. This will result in 3,800 operationally deployed 
strategic nuclear warheads by 2007 (SLBM warheads for SSBNs in 
overhaul will not be counted as operationally deployed because 
those submarines are unavailable for alert patrols)." (p. 19) 

"Subsequent reductions below the 3,800 operationally deployed 
warheads can be achieved through a variety of methods. The 
precise method will be determined in the course of periodic 
reviews the Department will conduct beginning in 2003. The 
Secretary of Defense will direct that these reviews be undertaken 
with the participation of the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of 
Staff, the Commander in Chief of U.S. Strategic Forces Command, 
and the NNSA Administrator." (p. 19) 

III. CREATING THE NEW TRIAD

"To meet the demands of the New Triad, an overhaul of existing 
capabilities is needed. This includes improving the tools used to 
build and execute strike plans so that the national leadership 
can adapt pre-planned options, or construct new options, during 
highly dynamic crisis situations." (p. 23) "In addition, the 
technology base and production readiness infrastructures of both 
DoD and NNSA must be modernized so that the United States will be 
able to adjust to rapidly changing situations ....adjustments may 
be needed to match capabilities of the remaining nuclear forces 
to new missions... a need may arise to modify, upgrade, or 
replace portions of the extant nuclear force or develop concepts 
for follow-on nuclear weapons better suited is the nation's 
needs. It is unlikely that a reduced version of the Cold War 
nuclear arsenal will be precisely the nuclear force that the 
United States will require in 2012 and beyond.” (p. 23) 

“The FY04 DPG [Defense Planning Guidance] will provide guidance 
to coordinate and deconflict requirements for nuclear and non 
nuclear systems." (p. 24) “Initiatives reflected in the proposed 
FY03-07 Future Years Defense Plan (FYPD) include: 

  +     Mobile and Relocatable Targets. DoD proposed to develop a 
systems-level approach, applied across the Services, for holding 
at risk critical mobile targets. 

  +     Defeating Hard and Deeply-Buried Targets. DoD would 
implement a program to improve significantly the means to locate, 
identify, characterize, and target adversarial hard and deeply 
buried targets. 

  +     Long Range Strike. DoD will pursue a systems level 
approach to defeat critical fixed and mobile targets at varying 
ranges, in all terrain and weather conditions, and in denied 
areas. 

  +     Guided Missile Submarines (SSGNs). DoD has proposed to 
fund the conversion of four SSBNs, withdrawn from the strategic 
nuclear service, to SSGN configuration. 

  +     Precision Strike. Effort to increase the number of 
targets than can be attacked on a single mission. Elements 
include a “Multifunction Information Distribution System” to 
provide “a jam-resistant, secure, digital network for exchange of 
critical information for strike capabilities,” a “Joint 
Air-to-Surface Standoff Missile,” A “Small Diameter Bomb,” and 
the “Unmanned Combat Air Vehicle.” 

  +     New Strike System. "DoD will begin in FY03 to explore 
concepts for a new strike system that might arm the converted 
SSGNs. Desired capabilities for this new strike weapon include 
timely arrival on target, precision, and the ability to be 
retargeted rapidly.” (p. 24-25) 

Ballistic Missile Defense
 
"The President has stated that the mission for missile defense is 
to protect all 50 states, our deployed forces, and our friends 
and allies against ballistic missile attacks. The Department has 
rerganized its ballistic missile defense program. The program is 
pursuing missile defense based an the following guidance: 

  +     Missile defense is most effective if it is layered; that 
is, able to intercept ballistic missiles of any range in all 
phases of their flight. 

  +     The United States seeks effective defenses against 
attacks by small numbers of longer range missiles as well as 
defenses against attacks by larger numbers of short- and 
medium-range missiles. 

  + Missile defense systems, like all military systems, can be 
less than 100-percent effective and still make a significant 
contribution to security by enhancing deterrence and saving lives 
if deterrence fails." (p. 25) 

"Other than the PAC-3, the United States has not yet chosen 
systems for deployment; that decision will depend on the 
evolution of both technology and the threat. The Department is 
exploring a wide range of alternative approaches. There are two 
dimensions to the missile defense program: near-term emergency 
capabilities; and improved variants of these capabilities leading 
to more robust, operational systems. Several near-term and 
mid-term options (2003-2008) that could provide an emergency 
missile defense capability are under consideration, including:       

  +  A single Airborne Laser for boost-phase intercepts may be 
available for limited operations against ballistic missiles of 
all ranges;    

  +  A rudimentary ground-based midcourse system, consisting of a 
small number of interceptors taken from the test program and an 
upgraded Cobra Dane radar in Alaska, could be available against 
longer-range threats to the United States; and     

  +  A sea-based Aegis system could be available to provide 
rudimentary midcourse capability against short to medium-range 
threats." (p. 26) “Based on the technical progress of these 
systems, the United States could deploy operational capabilities 
beginning in the 2006-2008 period including: 

  + 2-3 Airborne Laser aircraft 

  + Additional ground-based midcourse sites 

  + 4 sea-based midcourse ships 

  + terminal systems, able to defend against shorter range 
threats: PAC-3, which began deployment in 2001, and THAAD, which 
could be available by 2008." (p. 26) 

"DOD will develop the low-orbit constellation of SBIRS-Low 
satellites to support missile defense. This system will provide 
capabilities to track enemy ballistic missiles and to assist in 
the discrimination of reentry vehicles and other objects in 
flight." (p. 28) 

Command and Control Intelligence 

[the Secretary of Defense] "established a Federal Advisory 
Committee (FAC) to conduct an independent, end-to-end review of 
all activities involved in maintaining the highest standards of 
nuclear weapons safety, security, control, and reliability." This 
"End-to-End Review" was conducted concurrently with the NPR but 
was not completed before the NPR deadline. While the review is 
not yet final, the FAC presented an "urgent preliminary finding 
to the Secretary subsequent to the events of September 11 
identifying the need to expand the current nuclear command and 
control (C2) architecture to a true national command and control 
conferencing system." (p. 26) 

"The attacks of September 11 dramatically highlighted the 
requirement for secure, wideband communications between fixed and 
mobile command centers and national decision makers. The 
Department is developing a secure wideband communications 
architecture and procedures … The Department will initiate a 
satellite communications system in FY03, the Advanced Wideband 
System (AWS), that incorporates interoperable laser 
communications and will be designed to meet the needs of the 
defense and intelligence community for wideband tactical, 
protected tactical (replaces Advanced EHF satellites) broadcast, 
and relay communications with a planned system first launch 
during FY09. The Department supports the effort to implement a 
secure, wideband capability on all strategic C2 platforms. 
Wideband complements, but does not replace, the requirement for 
assured, survivable, and enduring nuclear C2.” (p. 27) 

The "2001 Emergency Supplemental Appropriations Act for Recovery 
from and Response to Terrorist Attacks on the United States" 
provided immediate upgrades to aircraft for national leadership, 
and the Department has programmed funding for additional wideband 
upgrades including the E-4 National Airborne Operations Center 
aircraft. 

"Three Advanced Extremely High Frequency (AEHF) spacecraft are 
planned for an initial operating capability of FY08 that will 
provide nuclear-survivable (e.g. against high altitude 
electromagnetic pulse), anti-jam, low and medium data rate 
communications to strategic and tactical users." 

"The Department will initiate in FY03 an Extremely High Frequency 
(EHF) communications satellites program primarily for national 
and strategic users requiring nuclear protected communications in 
the mid-latitude and polar regions with a planned first launch 
during FY09. Survivable, jam-resistant, secure voice conferencing 
among principal nuclear C2 decision makers remains essential to 
facilitate discussions of tactical warning and assessment, 
response options, and force management." (p. 27) 

"... substantial investment in nuclear C2 cryptographic systems 
... new nuclear C2 capabilities must be leveraged with new 
technologies. (p. 27) Intelligence 

"Significant capability shortfalls currently exist in: finding 
and tracking mobile and relocatable targets and WMD sites: 
locating, identifying, and characterizing hard and deeply buried 
targets (HDBTs); [and] providing intelligence support to 
Information Operations and federated intelligence operations " 
(p. 28) 

"To provide continuous and persistent intelligence, surveillance, 
and reconnaissance of critical regions, the Department proposes 
to develop in its FY03-07 FYDP a "system of systems that consists 
of space, airborne, surface, and subsurface capabilities. Sensors 
for this system will include a mix of phenomenology, allow for 
agile and flexible response, and operate across the 
electro-magnetic spectrum." (p. 28) 

"New concepts for persistent surveillance - from air- and 
space-based platforms - including hyper-spectral imaging, are 
proposed in the FY03 budget. (ibid). 

"Intelligence for Information Operations (IO). Information 
Operations targeting, weaponeering, and execution requires 
intelligence collection of finer granularity and depth than is 
currently available. The intelligence community lacks adequate 
data on most adversary computer local area networks and other 
command and control systems. Additionally, there is limited 
analytical capability to exploit these networks using IO tools. 
Investments must continue in order to upgrade and, populate the 
Modernized Integrated Database to enable effective IO targeting, 
weaponeering, and combat assessment essential to the New Triad." 

Adaptive Planning (p. 29)
 
"The current nuclear planning system, including target 
identification, weapons system assignment, and the nuclear 
command and control system requirements, is optimized to support 
large, deliberately planned nuclear strikes. In the future, as 
the nation moves beyond the concept of a large, Single Integrated 
Operational Plan (SIOP) and moves toward more flexibility, 
adaptive planning will play a much larger role." 

"Deliberate planning creates executable war plans, prepared in 
advance, for anticipated contingencies. Adaptive planning is used 
to generate war plans quickly in time critical-situations. 
Deliberate planning provides the foundation for adaptive planning 
by identifying individual weapon/target combinations that could 
be executed in crises." 

"For contingencies for which no adaptive planning has been done, 
fully adaptive planning will be required. The desire to shorten 
the time between identifying a target and having an option 
available will place significant stress on the nuclear planning 
process as it currently exists. Presently 12-48 hours is required 
to develop a plan to attack a single new target, depending on the 
weapon system to be employed. A more flexible planning system is 
needed to address the requirements of adaptive planning." 

"To make the Strategic Warfare Planning System (SWPS) more 
responsive to adaptive planning scenarios, a comprehensive SWPS 
Transformation Study has been initiated and is being conducted by 
U.S. Strategic Command. Results will be available in late spring 
2002. To meet the requirements of adaptive planning, an upgrade 
of the existing nuclear C2 architecture is needed. 

DOD Infrastructure Issues
 
"DOD has identified shortfalls in current infrastructure 
sustainment programs far nuclear platforms. These include the 
following: solid rocket motor design, development and testing; 
technology for current and future strategic systems; improved 
surveillance and assessment capabilities; command and control 
platforms and systems; and design, development, and production of 
radiation-hardened parts." (p. 30) 

"In support of this effort, the Defense Science Board Task Force 
on System Technology for the Future US Strategic Posture is 
considering strategies for enhancing the ability of the U.S. 
technology base to deal with or hedge against uncertainties in 
the nature and timing of potential strategic threats, the 
capability of the technology and industrial base to respond in a 
timely manner, and the adequacy and responsiveness of science and 
technology programs related to possible future strategic 
capabilities. In addition, the U.S. Strategic Command Advisory 
Group on Strategic Platforms is addressing weapon system 
viability arid nuclear force readiness." (p. 30) 

The Current U.S. Nuclear Warhead Infrastructure
 
"Underinvestment in the infrastructure - in particular the 
production complex - has increased the risks that if substantial 
problems in the stockpile are discovered, future options to 
refurbish or replace existing designs will be limited. For 
example, although an interim pit production capability will be 
established later in this decade, no current capability exists to 
build and certify plutonium pits, certain secondary components, 
or complete warheads." (p. 30) 

"The need is clear for a revitalized nuclear weapons complex that 
will: ...be able, if directed, to design, develop, manufacture, 
and certify new warheads in response to new national 
requirements; and maintain readiness to resume underground 
nuclear testing if required." (p. 30) 

Stockpile Maintenance
 
"DOD and NNSA are in the preliminary stages of determining the 
requirements for nuclear warheads for the New Triad. As the New 
Triad is developed and fielded, DoD and NNSA will have to 
reassess how the warheads in the stockpile are characterized. At 
present, the warhead stockpile is divided into two categories: 
active and inactive: 

  + Active stock pile warheads are maintained in a ready-for-use 
configuration with tritium and other limited life components 
installed. They incorporate the latest warhead modifications. The 
active stockpile includes all deployed warheads, warheads for the 
responsive force, and logistics spares for each warhead type. 

  + Inactive stockpile warheads do not have limited life 
components installed, and may not have the latest warhead 
modifications. These warheads serve a number of purposes ranging 
from reliability replacements that act as a hedge against the 
discovery of a problem with a large number of active warheads, to 
the more predictable replacement of warheads consumed by quality 
assurance and reliability testing. This hedge is required because 
the United States will not have, for a decade or more, the 
capacity to produce certain new components for warheads. The time 
it would take to deploy warheads in the inactive stockpile 
depends on the delivery system, and availability of tritium gas 
and other limited-life components. These warheads or their 
components could also be used to provide new capabilities. This 
time would range from weeks in the case of bombers, to years in 
the case of ICBMs." (p. 31-32) 

"There are almost 8,000 warheads in the active stockpile today. 
As the initial nuclear warhead reductions are implemented, some 
warheads will be transferred from the active to the inactive 
stockpile. For example, the removal from strategic service of the 
4 SSBNs will result in the transfer of over 700 W76 warheads to 
the inactive stockpile. By 2012 approximately 3,000 warheads, now 
in the active stockpile, are planned to be transferred to the 
inactive stockpile or retired." (p. 32) 

"Some of the W87 Peacekeeper warheads will be redeployed on 
Minuteman ICBMs under the Safety Enhanced Reentry Vehicle (SERV) 
program Each W87 warhead will displace one W62, or three W78 
warheads currently deployed on Minuteman. To provide warhead 
diversity in the force, some SERV-modified Minuteman missiles 
would carry the W78 warhead. A number of W78 and W87 warheads 
will be retained as reliability replacements and surveillance 
assets to support the responsive force. In addition, the W62 will 
be retired by the end of Fiscal Year 2009. (p. 32) 

"The active stockpiles also includes the nonstrategic nuclear 
weapons.” "The United States will retain an inactive stockpile of 
nuclear weapons. The size of that stockpile is yet to be 
determined. It will be driven by the capacity of the nuclear 
weapon complex to refurbish and dismantle weapons. For example, 
today the complex can process - either refurbish or dismantle - 
roughly 350 weapons per year. If the NNSA's proposed plan is 
funded, that number should increase to roughly 600 per year." (p. 
32) 

"A major challenge for nuclear weapons programs over the next two 
decades will be to refurbish, and thereby extend the life of, at 
least seven types of nuclear warheads" [a table lists these as 
B61 -3, 4, 10; B61-7, 11; W76; W78; W80-0, 1; B83-0; B83-1; W87; 
and W88.] 

Restoring Production Infrastructure
 
"Warhead Assembly and Disassembly:...Plans are underway to expand 
the capacity and capability of the Pantex Plant to meet the 
planned workload for dismantlement and remanufacturing of 
existing weapons." (p. 33) 

"Uranium Operations: At least seven to eight years of effort will 
be required to restore the capability to produce a complete 
nuclear weapon secondary at the Y-12 Plant in Tennessee. 
Qualified processes for some material and manufacturing steps are 
not currently in place. Plans are underway to expand the capacity 
and capability of the Y-12 Plant to meet the planned workload for 
replacing warhead secondaries, and other uranium components." (p. 
33) 

"Plutonium Operations: One glaring shortfall is the inability to 
fabricate and certify weapon primaries, or so-called "pits". Work 
is underway to establish an interim capability at Los Alamos 
National Laboratory late in this decade to meet current demand 
created by destructive surveillance testing on the W88 warhead. 
For the long term a new modern production facility will be needed 
to deal with the large-scale replacement of components and new 
production." (p. 33) 

"Other Component and Material Production:... Tritium production, 
halted since 1988, is programmed to resume in FY03 with first 
deliveries to the stockpile scheduled for FY06. Additionally, 
warhead refurbishment plans require modern facilities at Y-12's 
Special Materials Complex for manufacturing unique materials." 
(p. 14) 

NNSA Initiatives for Nuclear Weapons Programs
 
"As a result of the NPR, NNSA will undertake several 
initiatives... Advanced Concepts Initiative:...There are several 
nuclear weapon options that might provide important advantages 
for enhancing the nation's deterrence posture: possible 
modifications to existing weapons to provide additional yield 
flexibility in the stockpile; improved earth penetrating weapons 
(EPWs) to counter the increased use by potential adversaries of 
hardened and deeply buried facilities; and warheads that reduce 
collateral damage. (p. 34-35) 

"To further assess these and other nuclear weapons options in 
connection with meeting new or emerging military requirements, 
the NNSA will reestablish advanced warhead concepts teams at each 
of the national laboratories and at headquarters in Washington. 
This will provide unique opportunities to train our next 
generation of weapon designers and engineers. DoD and NNSA will 
also jointly review potential programs to provide nuclear 
capabilities, and identify opportunities for further study, 
including assessments of whether nuclear testing would be 
required to field such warheads." (p. 35) 

"The [Feb. 2001 Foster] Panel recommendation that DOE/NNSA assess 
the feasibility and cost of reducing the time [to resume testing] 
to 'well below the Congressionally-mandated one year' (sense of 
the Congress as expressed in the 1996 Resolution of Ratification 
for the START II Treaty) was addressed as part of the NPR." (p. 
35) 

"Test Readiness is maintained principally by the participation of 
nuclear test program personnel in an active program of stockpile 
stewardship experiments carried out underground at the Nevada 
Test Site (NTS). There are two concerns about the current test 
readiness program." 

"First, ... the current 2-3 year test readiness posture will not 
be sustainable as more and more experienced test personnel 
retire. Not all of the techniques and processes required to carry 
out underground nuclear tests - including nuclear diagnostic 
instrumentation, containment, design and emplacement of 
diagnostic equipment in a vertical shaft, drillback and 
radiochemical analysis are exercised with the subcritical 
experimentation work carried out a the NTS.

As experienced personnel retire, it will become more difficult to 
train new people in these techniques, further degrading test 
readiness. This argues for an approach in which all key 
capabilities required to conduct underground nuclear tests are 
identified and exercised on projects making use of a variety of 
nuclear testing related skills." (p. 35-36) 

"Second, the 2-3 year posture may be too long to address any 
serious defect that might be discovered in the future." 

"Given the certainty of surprise in the future and the broad 
spectrum of threats, the United States also must have the 
capability to understand the technological implications of 
nuclear weapon concepts and countermeasures tested by other 
states, to ensure that U.S. weapons and delivery platforms 
(including advanced conventional strike systems) perform 
effectively. If necessary, this will enable the United States to 
initiate research into whether it needs to develop an entirely 
new capability - one that it not a modification of an existing 
weapon - in time to address the threat." (p. 36) 

"To address these concerns... NNSA proposes over the next three 
years to enhance test readiness by: augmenting key personnel and 
increasing their operational proficiency; beginning the mentoring 
of the next generation of testing personnel; conducting 
additional field experiments including additional subcritical 
experiments and test related exercises of appropriate fidelity; 
replacing key underground-test-unique components (e.g. Field Test 
Neutron Generators); modernizing certain test diagnostic 
capabilities; and decreasing the time required to show regulatory 
and safety compliance. DoD and NNSA will work to refine test 
scenarios and evaluate cost/benefit tradeoffs in order to 
determine, implement, and sustain the optimum test readiness time 
chat best supports the New Triad." (p. 36) 

Meeting Warhead Production Commitments to DoD . ...A key 
capability that must be recovered is manufacture of plutonium 
pits. In addition to our efforts to establish a limited 
production capability at Los Alamos, NNSA will accelerate 
preliminary design work on a modern pit manufacturing facility so 
that new production capacity can be brought on line when it is 
needed." (p. 36) 

People with Critical Skills
 
The DoD and NNSA will jointly support opportunities that provide 
end-to-end demonstration of integrated capabilities involved with 
warhead design, development, manufacturing, and warhead/weapon 
integration. A key objective is to exercise critical skills for 
adapting warheads to DoD weapon delivery systems; ...NNSA will 
include the following as goals for the new Advanced

Concepts Initiative: 

  + Transfer of warhead design knowledge from the current 
generation of designers to the next generation 

  + Exercise of DoD/NNSA program integration skills. 

Nuclear Force Sustainment and Modernization
 
"No plans to phase-out [dual-capable] F-15E; Phase-out F-16 once 
dual-capable JSF is deployed." 

[Concerning ICBMs] "The focus of the Department's efforts are to 
extend the life of the MM III weapons system until 2020 while 
beginning the requirements process for the next-generation ICBM" 

A comprehensive set of sustainment programs are planned or 
underway:    

  + Guidance Replacement Program (GRP)  

  + Propulsion Replacement Program (PRP)        

  + Propulsion System Rocket Engine (PSRE) life extension program 
("replaces aging components in the post-boost vehicle")    

  + Rapid Execution and Combat Targeting (REACT) service life 
extension program
	
  + Environmental Control System (ECS) 	

  + Safety Enhanced Reentry Vehicle (SERV) program. 

"The SERV program reconfigures the MM III ICBM to carry the Mk21 
reentry vehicle which is currently deployed on Peacekeeper 
missiles." (p. 41) 

"Peacekeeper deactivation will occur over a 36-month period 
[beginning in FY03] with missiles remaining on alert and fully 
mission capable throughout the deactivation period. ...The 
Department analyzed the role of the Peacekeeper against projected 
threats in the post-Cold War environment and judged that its 
retirement would not have an adverse effect on the sufficiency of 
U.S. nuclear forces. DoD plans to retain the booster stages for 
potential future uses such as space launch or target vehicles." 
(p. 41) 

"Follow on ICBM: The Air Force Systems Command (AFSPC) led the 
Ballistic Missile Requirements (BMR) Study (1998 to 2000) which 
documented a number of needs beyond the current baseline ICBM 
mission, such as extended range, trajectory shaping, strategic 
relocatable targets, and hardened deeply buried targets, that the 
next generation ICBM could address. The Land Based Strategic 
Nuclear Deterrence Mission Needs Statement (MNS) drew from the 
analysis done in the BMR study in documenting the need for ICBMs 
beyond 2020. To expand on the     MNS and address alternatives 
for the follow on ICBM, AFSPC plans to conduct an analysis of 
alternatives in FY04 and FY05 with an IOC by 2018. This work will 
ensure the requirements generation process and the acquisition 
process remain on track for the future ICBM force." (p. 41) 

"Trident SSBN: . ..The Administration intends to convert four 
SSBNs from the current force of 18 submarines to carry special 
operations forces as well as conventional cruise missiles. 
Achieving this force structure also requires converting four of 
the eight Trident I (C-4) SSBNs to carry the Trident D-5 missile. 
The Navy has extended the Trident hull life to 44 years. This in 
turn will require the DoD to extend the service life of the D-5 
SWS [Strategic Weapons System] as well. The first of the 14 
Trident SSBNs remaining in service will he retired in 2029." (p. 
42) 

"Trident II SLBM: ... DoD will fund the D-5 Life Extension 
Program, which continues production of D-5 missiles, and upgrades 
the guidance and missile electronics systems on existing 
missiles. The continued production of additional D-5 missiles is 
needed in order to prevent a shortage of missiles in the next 
decade." (p. 42) 

"Follow-on SSBN: ... DoD assumes the continued requirement for a 
sea-based strategic nuclear force. Therefore, the timeframe when 
the next generation SSBN will need to be deployed is about 2029 
when the first of the remaining operational Trident SSBNs is 
planned to be retired. The Navy is currently studying two options 
for future follow-on SSBNs: (1) a variant of Virginia-class 
nuclear attack submarines (SSN); and (2) a dedicated SSBN (either 
a new design or a derivative of the Trident SSBN) ... If the 
decision is made to develop a new dedicated SSBN, a program would 
have to be initiated around 2016 to ensure that a new platform is 
available in 2029." (p. 42) 

"Follow-on SLBM. A new SLBM would be needed in about 2029 to 
match the schedule for a follow-on SSBN. The Navy has begun 
studies to examine range-payload requirements and missile size, 
but no specific plans for a follow-on SLBM at this point other 
than extending the service life of the Trident D-5." (p. 42) 

"Common Missile. The Department of Defense doe not plan to pursue 
a common ICBM/SLBM ballistic missile at this time. However, the 
Air Force and Navy are currently cooperating in research and 
development on common technologies related to current and future 
ballistic missiles - the Guidance Applications Prograrn (GAP), 
Reentry Systems Applications Program (RSAP), Propulsion 
Applications Program (PAP), and Technology for the Sustainment of 
Strategic Systems (TSSS) programs." (p. 42-43) 

Heavy Bombers/Air Launched Cruise Missiles (p. 43)
 
Strategic Bombers. The Air Force plans to keep the current B-2 
and B-52 fleet operational far another 35-40 years. An aggressive 
sustainment and modernization effort for both platforms is 
required to support this plan. In particular, upgrades to 
communications, avionics, processors, radar systems, displays, 
and navigation equipment are essential to keep the fleet 
affordable and operationally relevant throughout this period. 

"Assured, worldwide, survivable two way connectivity between the 
National Command Authorities and the strategic bomber force is a 
fundamental element of strategic command and control. B-52s and 
B-2s must transition to Advanced Extremely High Frequency (AEHF) 
satellite communications in order to ensure continued 
Connectivity with National Command elements." 

"Situational Awareness (SA) and electronic countermeasures (ECM) 
remain the highest priority B-52 upgrades. The inability to adapt 
to and counter threats, the high failure rate of SA and ECM 
equipment components, parts obsolescence, and a vanishing vendor 
base severely limit the B-52's ability to operate in a combat 
environment. To that end, the Electronic Countermeasure 
Improvement, Situational Awareness Defense Improvement, and 
Low-Mid Band Jammer replacement programs are essential to 
ensuring the B-52 remains a viable combat asset beyond 2006." 

The B-52 also requires a highly reliable and accurate navigation 
system to conduct worldwide tasking and nuclear weapons 
deliveries. The Inertial Navigation system (INS) represents the 
heart of the B-52 navigation suite but is reaching the end of 
service life and is increasingly cost-prohibitive to support. The 
Avionics Mid-Life Improvement program addresses this issue by 
replacing the INS and other obsolete B-52 avionics components 
required for precision navigation and weapons delivery." 

Several upgrades are currently underway on the B-2. These 
upgrades include AHFM (Alternate High Frequency Material) which 
improves the ability to maintain the low observable materials of 
the aircraft: UHF/SATCOM upgrade; JASSM upgrade; Mk-82 Smart Bomb 
Rack Assembly upgrade; and Link-16 upgrade. 

"Air-Launched Weapons Systems. The Air Force recently determined 
that its current force of cruise missiles can be sustained until 
2030." (p. 43) 

"Follow-on Strategic Bombers" Based on current estimates, "a new 
bomber will need to be operational by approximately 2040. A need 
for additional or improved bomber capabilities could, however, 
move the 'need date' closer to the present... The Air Force 
recently funded a science and technology effort for the 
Long-Range Strike Aerospace Platform-X to further explore 
options." (p. 43-44) 

"Follow-on Air Launched Weapon Systems. There are no plans at 
this time for a follow-on nuclear ALCM... However, conventional 
cruise missile programs (such as the Extended Range Cruise 
Missile) are planned that could support an accelerated timetable 
if necessary, but would have to be modified to carry nuclear 
warheads." 

Dual-Capable Aircraft, DoD is considering options and their 
associated costs to either extend the life of the dual capable 
F-16C/Ds and F-15Es or make a block upgrade to the Joint Strike 
Fighter (JSF) aircraft... The Operational Requirements Document 
for the JSF requires that initial design permit nuclear 
capability to be incorporated at a later date (after IOC, 
currently scheduled for 2012) at an affordable price." 

"Dual-capable aircraft and nuclear weapons in support of NATO. 
DoD will not seek any change to the current posture in FY02 but 
will review both issues to assess whether any modifications to 
the current posture are appropriate to adapt to the changing 
threat environment. A plan is already underway to conduct a NATO 
review of U.S. and allied dual capable aircraft in Europe and to 
present recommendations to Ministers in summer of 2002. Dual 
capable aircraft and deployed weapons are important to the 
continued viability of NATO's nuclear deterrent strategy and any 
changes need to be discussed within the alliance." (p. 44) 

Tankers The current fleet of KC-135s will be operational for the 
next 35-40 years. The aging fleet will begin a long phased 
retirement starting in 2013 and continuing until approximately 
2040. The Air Force anticipates constant upgrades to avionics, 
displays, and navigation equipment over the coming years.

However, the current KC-135 fleet is not equipped with a 
survivable communications capability, limiting its effectiveness 
in a stressed environment. The Air Force is evaluating a 
follow-on tanker in conjunction with a follow-on common airframe 
air1ift and special missions platform. The service is also 
considering the lease or purchase of 100 off-the-shelf 767 
tankers as an interim measure prior to the need to produce the 
KC-X replacement platform. In developing altematives, 
consideration needs to be given to the possibility that aircraft 
will operate in a nuclear, biological and chemical weapons 
environment." (p. 44-45) 

Robust Flight Testing, Aging, and Surveillance. Air Force and 
Navy nuclear systems require robust flight-testing programs to 
provide operationally representative data on weapon system 
performance and to predict weapon system reliability and 
accuracy... Currently, only the D-5 missile system fulfils the 
required annual flight tests." (p. 45) 

"Nuclear Warhead Sustainment... The active stockpile quantities 
will be sufficient to arm the operationally deployed and 
responsive nuclear force, and provide sufficient logistics 
spares. The inactive stockpile will consist of warhead types in 
the active stockpile plus the W84 and B83 Mod 0, which have no 
active stockpile counterparts. The W62 warhead will be retired in 
FY09." (p. 45) 

"The NNSA his initiated a program to energize design work on 
advanced concepts at the three design laboratories. This 
initiative will be focused on evolving DoD requirements." (p. 46) 

Limitations in the Present Nuclear Force
 
"Today's nuclear arsenal continues to reflect its Cold War 
origin, characterized by moderate delivery accuracy, limited 
earth penetrator capability, high-yield warheads, silo and 
sea-based ballistic missiles with multiple independent reentry 
vehicles, and limited retargeting capability." 

"New capabilities must be developed to defeat emerging threats 
such as hard and deeply buried targets (HDBT), to find and attack 
mobile and relocatable targets, to defeat chemical or biological 
agents, and to improve accuracy and limit collateral damage. 
Development of these capabilities, to include extensive research 
and timely fielding of new systems to address these challenges, 
are imperative to make the New Triad a reality." 

Defeating Hard and Deeply Buried Targets
 
"More than 70 countries now use underground Facilities (UGFs) for 
military purposes. In June 1998, the Defense Science Board Task 
force on Underground Facilities that there are over 10,000 UGFs 
worldwide. Approximately 1,100 UGFS were known or suspected 
strategic (WMD, ballistic missile basing, leadership or top 
echelon command and control) sites. Updated estimates form DIA 
reveal this number has now grown to over 1,400. A majority of the 
strategic facilities are deep underground facilities. These 
facilities are generally the most difficult to defeat because of 
the depth of the facility and the uncertainty of the exact 
location. At present the United States lacks adequate means to 
deal with these strategic facilities. A detailed report on this 
issue was provided to the Congress recently (Report to Congress 
on the Defeat of Hard and Deeply Buried Targets, July 2001). (p. 
46) 

"To deny the enemy sanctuary in HDBTs requires timely 
identification and characterization of potential targets, 
realistic defeat alternatives, and accurate assessment of damage 
done by the attack. Achieving the desired level of capability 
requires the integration of Service and National systems into a 
robust, highly responsive system of systems capable of addressing 
the threat. Improved command and control and intelligence in 
support of the New Triad will be a key enabler to address this 
capability shortfall." (p. 47) 

"In general, current conventional weapons can only 'deny' or 
'disrupt' the functioning of HDBTs and require highly accurate 
intelligence and precise weapon delivery - a degree of accuracy 
and precision frequently missing under actual combat conditions, 
Similarly, current conventional weapons are not effective for the 
long term physical destruction of deep, underground facilities. 
(p. 47) 

"The United States currently has a very limited ground 
penetration capability with its only earth penetrating nuclear 
weapon, the B61 Mod 11 gravity bomb. This single-yield, 
non-precision weapon cannot survive penetration into many types 
of terrain in which hardened underground facilities are located. 
Given these limitations, the targeting of a number of hardened, 
underground facilities is limited to an attack against surface 
features, which does not does not provide a high probability of 
defeat of these important targets." (p. 47) 

"With a more effective earth penetrator, many buried targets 
could be attacked using a weapon with a much lower yield than 
would be required with a surface burst weapon. This lower yield 
would achieve the same damage while producing less fallout (by a 
factor of ten to twenty) than would the much larger yield surface 
burst. For defeat of very deep or larger underground facilities, 
penetrating weapons with large yields would be needed to collapse 
the facility." (p. 47) 

"To defeat HDBT it is necessary to improve significantly U.S. 
means to locate, identify, characterize, and target HDBTs. This 
objective also requires deliberate pre-planned and practiced 
missions and the development and procurement of several types of 
conventional earth penetrating munitions. A number of Special 
Operations Forces and information capabilities will need to be 
developed to support this goal. Investment and organization will 
yield a new level of capability for the stated objectives by 
2007, with new technologies deployed by 2012. One effort to 
improve the U.S. capability against HBDTs is a joint DoD/DOE 
phase 6.2/6.2A Study to be started in Apri1 2002. This effort 
will identify whether an existing warhead in a 5,000 pound class 
penetrator would provide significantly enhanced earth penetration 
capabilities compared to the B61 Mod 11." (p. 47) 

Mobile and Relocatable Targets
 
"One of the greatest challenges today is accounting for the 
location uncertainty of mobile and relocatable targets... To 
respond to this challenge, collection systems and techniques that 
defeat adversary relocation capabilities must be developed. 
Sensors must also be capable of defeating camouflage and 
concealment efforts and detecting and exploiting new command and 
control systems." 

"To locate successfully and maintain track on mobile targets 
until a weapon can be planned and executed, several enhancements 
need to be made to the current collection capability. Today's 
satellite constellation is not optimized for the current and 
developing mobile target challenge. Planned improvements to this 
constellation would provide the capability to rapidly and 
accurately locate and track mobile targets from the time they 
deploy from garrison until they return. Sensors with rapid 
revisit or dwell capability over deployment areas combined with 
automated exploitation sides are required to provide this 
capability." (p. 47-48) 

Defeat of Chemical and Biological Agents
 
DoD and DOE efforts are underway to counter the asymmetric use of 
chemical and biological weapons (referred to as agent defeat). 
Agent Defeat Weapon (ADW) concepts are being evaluated to deny 
access to, immobilize, neutralize, or destroy chemical or 
biological weapons. Overcoming uncertainties in intelligence 
regarding agent production and storage locations as well as 
physical geometries of known facilities and contents appear to be 
the largest challenges. A variety of ADW concepts are currently 
under study, including thermal, chemical, or radiological 
neutralization of chemical/biological materials in production or 
storage facilities, as well as several types of kinetic 
penetrators to immobilize or deny use of those materials." (p. 
48) 

Improved Accuracy for Effectiveness and Reduced Collateral Damage
 
"Desired capabilities for nuclear weapons systems in flexible, 
adaptable strike plans include options for variable and reduced 
yields, high accuracy, and timely employment. These capabilities 
would help deter enemy use of WMD or limit collateral damage, 
should the United States have to defeat enemy WMD capabilities." 
(p. 48) 

Nuclear Force Modernization
 
“The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff has initiated a 
Strategic Deterrent Joint Warfighting Capability Assessment to 
characterize the requirements for nuclear weapon systems in the 
2020 timeframe. The assessment is to be complete in early FY03." 
(p. 48) 

"DoD, in coordination with the NNSA, will evaluate nuclear weapon 
options to increase weapon system effectiveness and flexibility 
and to limit collateral damage. Capability improvements are 
likely to be needed to correct the limitations of the existing 
nuclear forces." (p. 49) 

V. NUCLEAR REDUCTIONS AND IMPLEMENTATIONS FOR ARMS CONTROL
 
Initial Reductions
 
"When these reductions [i.e. retire 50 Peacekeepers, remove 4 
Trident SSBNs, and convert B-1's to solely conventional role] are 
complete in FY06, the number of U.S. operationally deployed 
strategic warheads will be reduced by about 1,300 warheads 
accountable under the START I Treaty (based on attribution rules 
at the time these decisions were made). The four Trident 
submarines that will be removed from service will remain 
accountable under the START I Treaty." (p. 51) 

"The Department analyzed the role of the Peacekeeper against 
projected threats in the post Cold War environment and judged 
that its retirement would not have an adverse effect on the 
sufficiency of U.S. nuclear forces... Funding has been 
programmed, beginning in FY03, to retire these weapons in a 
phased approach to coincide with the Trident D-5 transition to 
the Pacific fleet and to retain and maintain the silos for future 
options. These silos, and the four Trident submarines converted 
to SSGNs, will remain accountable under the START I Treaty." 

"Additional strategic nuclear reduction will be achieved by 
lowering the number of warheads assigned to the operationally 
deployed force. By the end of FY07, U.S. operationally deployed 
strategic nuclear warheads should total no more than 3,800. The 
drawdown of the operationally deployed strategic nuclear warheads 
will preserve force structure in that, aside from the Peacekeeper 
ICBM and the four Trident SSBNs, no additional strategic delivery 
platforms are scheduled to be eliminated from strategic service. 
These reductions are to be completed between FY03 and FY07, and 
will result in approximately a 40% reduction in number of 
operationally deployed strategic nuclear warheads from the 
present.” 

Longer Term Reductions
 
"With regard to additional reductions beyond FY07, the United 
States plans to decrease the number of warheads on its ballistic 
missile force by "downloading." Regarding bombers, reductions 
will be made by lowering the number of operationally deployed 
weapons, i.e. those available for loading at operational bomber 
bases." 

"Warheads that will count as operationally deployed are: for 
ballistic missiles, the actual number of nuclear weapons loaded 
on the ICBMs or SLBMs; for bombers, those nuclear weapons located 
in weapon storage areas at bomber bases (except for a small 
number of spares)." 

START II Treaty
 
"...the Russian resolution of ratification, adopted in 2000, 
contains unacceptable provision contrary to the new strategic 
framework and establishment of the New Triad." 

De-Alerting
 
"U.S. forces are not on "hair trigger" alert and rigorous 
safeguards exist to ensure the highest levels of nuclear weapons 
safety, security, reliability, and command and control. Multiple, 
stringent procedural and technical safeguards are in place to 
guard against U.S. accidental and unauthorized launch." 

"The New Triad addresses concerns about the accidental or 
unauthorized launch of certain foreign forces. For example, it 
provides missile defenses to protect the United States, it 
allies, and friends against limited or unauthorized launches. It 
also will provide a spectrum of defensive and non-nuclear 
response options to an accidental or unauthorized launch, 
allowing the United States to tailor an appropriate response to 
the specific event and to limit the danger of escalation." 

"The elimination of the Peacekeeper ICBM will be phased to 
correspond with the introduction of the Trident II (D-5) missile 
in the Pacific. As they are eliminated, those Peacekeeper 
missiles remaining during the elimination process will be kept on 
alert to provide a necessary contribution to the U.S. portfolio 
of capabilities." (p. 54) 

"Following the initial phase of U.S. nuclear reductions, 
subsequent reductions will be achieved by downloading warheads 
from missiles and bombers. Force structure will be retained as 
the basis for reconstructing the responsive force. Delivery 
systems will not be retired following initial reductions and 
downloaded warheads will be retained as needed for the responsive 
force." (p. 54) 

The Comprehensive Test Ban
 
"The United States has not conducted nuclear tests since 1992 and 
supports the continued observance of the testing moratorium. 
While the United States is making every effort to maintain the 
stockpile without additional nuclear testing, this may not be 
possible for the indefinite future. Some problems in the 
stockpile due to aging and manufacturing defects have already 
been identified. Increasingly, objective judgments about 
capability in a non-testing environment will become far more 
difficult. Each year the DoD and DOE will reassess the need to 
resume nuclear testing and will make recommendations to the 
President. Nuclear nations have a responsibility to assure the 
safety and reliability of their own nuclear weapons." (p. 55) 

Transparency
 
"The START I Treaty includes provisions that provide a useful 
baseline of transparency for offensive strategic forces. Any 
additional transparency that may be useful to provide added 
confidence and predictability would be in the form of separate 
political commitments." 

*****************************************************************
 53  Opinion - Can Nuclear Weapons Make the World Safe? 

- The St. Petersburg Times.

#753, Friday, March 15, 2002   

By Marie Cocco

 AND in the sixth month, we went nuclear. On paper, anyway. Word 
from the Pentagon leaked to the Los Angeles Times that the United 
States government has changed the way it looks at The Bomb. It 
has, for more than two generations now, been seen as the ultimate 
horror. The mere thought of its use has been considered so 
terrifying that all discussion about nuclear weapons was required 
to have as its purpose the aim that they never be used again.
 
Now Pentagon planners think it would be dandy to have some new 
nuclear bombs that would be very useful, indeed, in taking out a 
dangerous bunker or cave or two. Or if it were time to go to war 
over Taiwan.
 
They thought they could keep this a secret. But it leaked, and so 
now we are told by the top spinners in U.S. President George W. 
Bush's administration that it's just a thought, a possible 
contingency plan for a contingency not immediately foreseen.
 
After all, we are supposed to feel safe again now. We just didn't 
know we were to stop worrying by learning to love The Bomb.
 
The thing about historic dates is that they are time for 
remembrance and time for taking stock. Last Monday marked six 
months since the day terrorists attacked the World Trade Center 
and the Pentagon.
 
The remembrance part went beautifully. New York gathered in 
person and in spirit near Ground Zero for a solemn, sunlit 
ceremony. It had the peculiar balance of emotion and grit the 
city brings to everything it does.
 
The White House ceremony was lovely. Flags of the assembled 
countries - 100 or so diplomats from around the globe attended - 
sprang to life in the March breeze. In a speech that sought to 
thank allies and keep them eager for our cause, Bush did not 
mention using The Bomb in the war on terror. It is not the type 
of thing you say in polite company.
 
The war in Afghanistan is going as well as could be expected. We 
are, at the moment, bogged down in the mountains fighting 
al-Qaida, but there is no way this crew ultimately can escape the 
overwhelmingly superior American military.
 
The trouble is not so much abroad - though there is, as yet, not 
one nation that has come forward to say it is square behind the 
administration's apparent intent of using military force, around 
the globe if necessary, to uproot terrorists. This was before the 
"axis of evil" morphed into the generals' axis for annihilation.
 
At home, things just do not seem right.
 
We pull toddlers out of airport security lines if their names 
turn up in the computer for a random frisk. There is no reason to 
believe a 3-year-old returning home from Disney is a terrorist. 
Still, we are told, precautions must be taken.
 
There is very good reason to believe a terrorist might check a 
suitcase with explosives into the belly of an airliner. Still, we 
are told, we cannot X-ray all checked bags. It costs too much. 
The machines are too unwieldy to install quickly.
 
There was, from the start, an official dismissiveness toward a 
congressional mandate to at least match all checked bags to a 
passenger. It's not done, even now, on connecting flights. Change 
in Chicago for a riskier ride.
 
This is our national decision: We will pay whatever it takes to 
dispatch the military around the world, and leave soldiers in a 
temporal hell for as long as it takes. We will, though, leave in 
place airline security gaps so wide you could pilot a B-52 
through them.
 
The Pentagon's nuclear strategy "re-assessment" now contemplates 
using nuclear weapons to deter - or respond to - a chemical or 
biological attack. So far the only deadly biological agent used 
against U.S. citizens was anthrax. It was sent through the mail 
not by a hostile outsider but, authorities believe, by some 
homegrown loner with access to our army labs. If the culprit is 
found we will, presumably, not nuke New Jersey.
 
The war on terror is permanent, and it has given rise to a 
permanent war mentality. That has its benefits. It is good that 
we are not, as a rule, mouthing off to harried airport security 
workers who, no doubt, think it's silly to force a pre-schooler 
to remove Pooh sneakers before proceeding to the gate.
 
The permanent war mentality lends legitimacy, too, to a belief 
that all will be well if we undertake just one more military 
campaign, in one more terrorist haven, with one or two more 
sophisticated weapons and maybe even the ultimate one.
 
This may make some feel safer. Personally, I'd like to see them 
X-ray checked bags.
 
Marie Cocco is an editorial writer and columnist for Newsday, to 
which she contributed this comment.
 
By James Pinkerton
 
OF course the Pentagon has scenarios for nuking other countries. 
That's what generals are supposed to do: When they aren't 
fighting, they're supposed to be planning the next fight. But if, 
as the 19th-century Prussian military strategist Karl von 
Clausewitz observed, "war is the continuation of politics by 
other means," then come the real questions: What is the political 
end that U.S. President George W. Bush's administration is 
seeking? Will continuing on to war achieve that end?
 
So far, the Bush team is hanging tough, even though such military 
speculation is frightening to the world, and maybe destabilizing 
to some allies. The Nuclear Posture Review, first revealed in the 
Los Angeles Times, lays out hypothetical circumstances for 
nuclear strikes against China, Iran, Iraq, Libya, North Korea, 
Russia and Syria. But no doubt if those countries had a freer 
press, their war plans against America would be fully exposed, 
too.
 
Of course, there's nothing new about such war planning. The late 
Herman Kahn was one of many military think-tankers who made a 
career out of armchair-strategizing about deterrence and 
overkill. He published two books, "On Thermonuclear War" (1961) 
and "Thinking About the Unthinkable" (1962). In one exercise, he 
outlined 44 levels of military escalation, from "Ostensible 
Crisis" to "Barely Nuclear War" to "Justifiable Counterforce 
Attack." Indeed, so eager was Kahn for precision that he even 
half-seriously suggested the creation of a computer-controlled 
"doomsday machine" that would eliminate the "unreliable" human 
factor in nuclear-warfare.
 
Happily, the politicians never surrendered to such Strangelovian 
suggestions, preferring to keep a human finger hovering just 
above the nuclear button all through the Cold War. Perhaps the 
political class remembered that World War I started in part 
because politicians surrendered their authority to a simpler 
technology - the technology of railroad-based mobilization. The 
issue in 1914 was getting one's troops to the frontier before the 
enemy. And, in those days, that meant relying on intricate but 
inflexible railway schedules to move men and material to the 
battle zone.
 
As the Oxford historian Niall Ferguson argues in his 1999 book, 
"The Pity of War: Explaining World War I," the ponderous 
imperative of war mobilization created its own war momentum. The 
Russian army, for example, knew that it would be the slowest to 
mobilize, so its generals wanted to be the first to mobilize. 
Indeed, once the order to gear up for war was made, the Russian 
chief of staff said that he would destroy his telephone, so that 
he could not receive a countermanding order.
 
And so, Ferguson wrote, "war by timetable" commenced, and 10 
million men died.
 
Today, Bush is unchallenged as commander-in-chief, but he still 
faces the challenge of sticking to his reported plan of removing 
Saddam Hussein from Iraq - possibly as soon as this autumn.
 
But assuming for the moment that Bush succeeds in all three of 
these missions, longer-term questions will remain. Specifically, 
how will the rest of the world react to these latest usages and 
considered usages of American strength, both conventional and 
nuclear?
 
Put simply, countries facing an American threat, real or 
imagined, face a choice: They can plan to accommodate, or they 
can plan to retaliate. And as the same Nuclear Posture Review 
reveals, the potential threat to the United States goes beyond 
the countries on the nuclear hit list. In all, 12 other countries 
have nuclear-weapons programs, 18 have ballistic missiles, 13 
have biological weapons, and 16 have chemical weapons.
 
In response, America's military planners will no doubt develop 
still more scenarios, planning tit for tat, tat for tit. That's 
necessary, but it's not sufficient. In the words of Georges 
Clemenceau, who led France to a Pyrrhic victory in World War I, 
"War is too important to be left to generals."
 
Thus, the task for the American president: He must demonstrate to 
a skeptical world that plans for winning wars today are in fact a 
plan for keeping the peace tomorrow. If he fails, then, with 
apologies to Clausewitz, politics will continue on into war, and 
then on to still more war.
 
James Pinkerton is a columnist for Newsday, to which he 
contributed this comment.
   
*****************************************************************
 54 The nuclear-posture review

Economist.com | 

What's new? 

Mar 14th 2002 
From The Economist print edition

The Pentagon's nuclear policy largely represents continuity, not 
change

JUST a bit of "prudent" planning, as the secretary of state, 
Colin Powell, would have it? Or a striking new departure in 
America's nuclear philosophy, as some supporters as well as 
critics insist? The confidential details of the administration's 
nuclear-posture review, sent by the Department of Defence to 
Congress in January, but extensively leaked to the press in the 
past week, have caused a stir. The New York Times, for one, 
compared the new plan to the action of a rogue state.

George Bush had been doing rather well at arms control. His 
promise last year to cut America's nuclear-weapons stockpile to 
the lowest number "consistent with our national security needs" 
had helped to mollify critics of his missile-defence plans. 
Russia's Vladimir Putin was sufficiently persuaded to describe Mr 
Bush's decision to withdraw from the Anti-Ballistic Missile 
treaty as merely a "mistake", and to take up the offer of deep 
cuts in nuclear weapons. They should come down from around 6,000 
deployed warheads on each side today to some 2,000 in future. Now 
the Pentagon has apparently upset everybody in two ways. First, 
it has expanded its official list of potential nuclear targets to 
include Iran, Iraq, North Korea, Syria and Libya alongside China 
and Russia. And it is also contemplating developing "limited" 
nuclear weapons for tactical use, such as blowing up underground 
stores of chemical weapons. 

In fact, the notion that America should think about the threats 
from countries illicitly seeking weapons of mass destruction is 
not new. Five years ago, the Clinton administration began 
reducing the number of weapons earmarked for use against targets 
in Russia, increasing those tagged for any future stand-off with 
China, say, over Taiwan. It also improved intelligence about 
covert nuclear, chemical and biological weapons programmes in a 
range of other countries, so that these too could be targeted, if 
need be, in a matter of hours.

Arguably, the new stance is even more ancient. In 1991 Mr Bush's 
father warned Saddam Hussein that if he used chemical or 
biological weapons during the Gulf war, he could expect the 
"strongest possible" retaliation. And in 1993, as the crisis over 
North Korea's plutonium production intensified, Bill Clinton said 
that an attack by North Korea on South Korea would be treated as 
an attack on America, and he declined to rule out a pre-emptive 
strike against North Korea's nuclear facilities.

Condoleezza Rice, the national security adviser, has argued that 
the "new" leaked plan is really just updating a long-standing 
policy. The way to deter adversaries from using weapons of mass 
destruction "is to be clear that it would be met with a 
devastating response." Iran, Iraq and North Korea are suspected 
of either having or trying to acquire nuclear and other sorts of 
weapons. Syria and Libya have chemical or biological ones. 
General Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, 
added that the Defence Department's review merely preserves for 
the president the options he might need "in case this country or 
our friends and allies were attacked with weapons of mass 
destruction, be they nuclear, biological, chemical or, for that 
matter, high explosives."

But are those options changing? Some weapons designers have long 
lobbied for new nuclear warheads, with lower yield and less 
fallout, to be used against deeply buried, hardened targets. Last 
month, before the full contents of the nuclear review were known, 
General John Gordon, head of the National Nuclear Security 
Administration, told Congress that a three-year study had been 
ordered into developing just such a nuclear-tipped bunker-buster 
and was looking at two possible designs. The study would include 
component and sub-assembly tests and simulations.

Will the designers eventually proceed to explosive testing of 
such weapons? That will be a decision for Mr Bush. Some weapons 
scientists argue that, even if needed, such weapons could be 
built using past designs, without further testing. At the time 
the nuclear review first went to Congress two months ago, the 
defence secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, insisted that there were no 
plans to resume testing, even though the document called for 
preparations to be made so that it could resume in less than the 
two-to-three years it would take now. 

At a time when Dick Cheney is touring Europe and the Middle East 
to stiffen spines over Iraq's defiance of UN disarmament 
resolutions, the administration seems relaxed that its secret 
nuclear thinking has received a more public airing. In any case, 
say officials, it is a "posture, not a plan". That distinction 
has been lost on some already. This week North Korea gave warning 
that if American "nuclear fanatics" launched a nuclear strike, 
this "would mean their ruin in nuclear disaster".

Copyright © The Economist Newspaper Limited 2002. All rights 
*****************************************************************
 55 North Korean party paper fears US nuclear attack 

BBC Monitoring Service - United Kingdom; Mar 15, 2002

Text of report in English by North Korean news agency KCNA

Pyongyang, 15 March: The Bush administration's plan for nuclear 
attacks, which focuses its nuclear strategy on some big powers 
and small countries that go against the grain with it and calls 
for pre-emptive nuclear assaults on them in case of "emergency", 
is, in essence, a nuclear strategy in the 21st century it worked 
out after re-examining its nuclear strategy in the era of the 
cold war, says Rodong Sinmun [Nodong Sinmun] today in a signed 
commentary.

Recalling that the US, considering nuclear weapons as "major 
means" for ensuring "national security", has persistently pursued 
the policy of using nuclear weapons before any others and 
expanded the scope of their use to small countries and those 
nations advocating independence against imperialism, the 
commentary goes on:

The Bush administration abandoned the commitment to the non-use 
of nukes, which was honoured by its preceding administrations, 
just as a pair of worn-out shoes. Its intention is to contain 
those independent countries one by one with a nuclear threat.

The US imperialists are keen to implement their policy of 
showdown after choosing the DPRK [Democratic People's Republic of 
Korea] as the main target of their nuclear strategy. The US 
assured the DPRK in the DPRK-US agreed framework that it would 
not use nuclear weapons against the DPRK and threaten it with 
them. However, it is openly clamouring about its possible use of 
nuclear weapons against the DPRK despite the fact that its 
nuclear activities are in the state of freeze. This can not be 
construed otherwise than a very irresponsible attitude.

The prevailing situation compels the DPRK to examine all the 
agreements it has reached with the US if the US persistently 
tries to use nuclear weapons against the DPRK it cannot but take 
a substantial countermeasure against it.

The DPRK has been exposed to a constant nuclear threat from the 
US and it is, therefore, fully ready to cope with a nuclear war. 
If the US inflicts a nuclear holocaust upon the DPRK, the 
former's mainland will not be safe either.

Source: KCNA news agency, Pyongyang, in English 0449 gmt 15 Mar 
02 /BBC Monitoring/ © BBC.
*****************************************************************
 56 Report finds funny credit at DOE sites 

Tri-Valley Herald
 	 	 	 
 Friday, March 15, 2002 - 3:12:59 AM MST 
By Glenn Roberts Jr.
STAFF WRITER 		
 	 
Friday, March 15, 2002 - -->Federal reviews of credit card use at 
Energy Department sites have identified "a number of complex 
schemes," including fraud, "ghost" purchases, kickbacks and the 
purchase of personal items such as hunting and lawn-care 
equipment. 

In a "Lessons Learned" report produced by the Energy Department 
Office of Inspector General, investigators said that several 
criminal cases have evolved from their reviews of government 
credit card misuse. 

Since 1998, the Inspector General's staff has conducted 20 
reviews at 11 Energy Department sites, including a review of 
Lawrence Livermore Laboratory credit card transactions in 1999. 

Livermore Lab is managed by the University of California system 
for the Energy Department. 

In 1998, the federal government established the SmartPay program, 
which allows federal and federal-contractor employees to make 
purchases using government-issued credit cards. In the 2001 
budget year, the program had an estimated volume of $219 million. 

"As a result of our reviews (at department sites), we found that 
employees misused government purchase cards to acquire home 
improvement items, hunting equipment and accessories, 
electronics, lawn equipment and power tools," investigators said 
in the report, which was issued in late February. 

The report cited the example of an employee at the Energy 
Department Idaho Operations Office who "misused a purchase card 
to purchase property for personal or non-contract use totaling 
$85,000," and allowed a coworker to charge $13,000 of 
"unallowable purchases" on the manager's card. 

Both were fired and both pled guilty to theft of government 
property, investigators said.
 
Another department employee charged $11,200 in nonofficial 
purchases, and had four different government credit cards -- 
three of which were authorized. That employee "submitted 
fraudulent invoices to the government to conceal the purchases," 
the report states. 

Based on their reviews, investigators recommended more 
comprehensive guidelines for credit card use, more aggressive 
steps to ensure compliance with policies, and a better database 
for tracking current cardholders and spending limits. 

During a review at an Energy Department lab, investigators 
discovered there were approximately 300 cardholders, though a 
department-maintained list showed just 14 cardholders there. 

In response to the report, department officials said they plan to 
complete an assessment of Energy Department contractor policies 
for card use, conduct periodic reviews to ensure compliance with 
card use policies, and "assess and eliminate unnecessary credit 
card issuance" at department sites, among other steps. 

Investigators concluded that purchase card programs do have 
benefits. "However, abuse of the purchase card could render the 
program ineffective and, potentially, lead to its termination."
 
©1999-2001 by MediaNews Group, Inc. and ANG Newspapers
*****************************************************************
 57 16-ton magnetic spectrometer installed at lab
 
This story was published Thu, Mar 14, 2002
 By Annette Cary Herald staff writer 

Bill Wiley's dream for a premier laboratory that would draw 
scientists from around the world to learn more about molecules 
was completed Wednesday.
 
When the William R. Wiley Environmental Molecular Sciences 
Laboratory was planned in the early 1990s, its design included a 
100-ton steel cage to hold the world's most advanced nuclear 
magnetic resonance spectrometer.
 
In much the same way as a hospital magnetic resonance imaging 
system allows doctors to see organs within the human body, more 
powerful nuclear magnetic resonance spectrometers allow 
scientists to see cells and molecules.
 
Even though the $228 million molecular sciences lab, or EMSL, 
opened in 1997, the steel cage to shield people and instruments 
from the powerful magnet of the spectrometer remained empty.
 
That changed early Wednesday.
 
Despite a gusty wind, a Lampson crane slowly lowered a 16-ton 
spectrometer through a hatch in the roof of EMSL at Pacific 
Northwest National Laboratory in Richland.
 
It's the most powerful and largest spectrometer of its type ever 
built. In 1993 it was a concept so advanced that engineering and 
building it took much longer than anticipated.
 
It was planned to arrive in 1996, but Oxford Instruments had to 
overcome several false starts.
 
"This is the final piece of Bill Wiley's dream," said Lura 
Powell, director of PNNL. Wiley, a former director of PNNL, died 
before the lab that bears his name was completed.
 
But Powell remembers hearing talk of the spectrometer that would 
be built for the lab in the early 1990s, long before she was 
recruited to come to Richland.
 
"(It looks at) much larger molecules and understands how large 
molecules interact with each other, which you can't do on other 
spectrometers," she said.
 
At its core is a huge superconducting magnet with the stored 
energy to stop a 30-ton truck driving 100 mph. That magnet will 
be used to manipulate the spinning of the nuclei of atoms, giving 
scientists information about their structure and how they are 
connected to other atoms.
 
EMSL scientists are interested in using its capabilities to study 
biological molecules, including damage to DNA.
 
Use of the spectrometer will be split evenly between Richland 
scientists and scientists worldwide who already are submitting 
research proposals. Uses also could extend to environmental and 
materials research.
 
The first studies are expected to begin in late summer.
 
However, EMSL already is using several other spectrometers. The 
largest -- 100 megahertz smaller than the new 900-megahertz 
spectrometer -- was sent to the lab by Oxford Instruments as it 
struggled to build the larger spectrometer.
 
Research using EMSL spectrometers has included how proteins 
behave in cell walls as part of work to understand how proteins 
work together to carry out the complex functions of individual 
cells.
 
The new spectrometer will allow scientists to look at larger 
proteins and proteins in more combinations. That's important 
because scientists believe most proteins don't act singly or even 
in pairs, but in larger groups.
 
PNNL scientists also are preparing to expand nuclear magnetic 
resonance technology to analyze radioactive samples in another 
spectrometer at Hanford. The planned lab will enable scientists 
to characterize radioactive tank waste stored at DOE sites, 
including Hanford.
 
Understanding the chemistry of radioactive waste is necessary to 
decide how it should be processed and stored, but its 
radioactivity hazards have made it difficult for scientists to 
study with traditional methods. 

Copyright 2002 Tri-City Herald. All rights reserved. This 
*****************************************************************
 58 FFTF backers seek commercial restart
 
This story was published Thu, Mar 14, 2002
 By Annette Cary Herald staff writer 

While the Department of Energy is working on an accelerated 
schedule to shut down the Fast Flux Test Facility, the reactor's 
supporters have been pitching a restart to industry.
 
So far no irreversible steps have been taken toward dismantling 
the Hanford reactor. But supporters need to have serious 
discussions under way with targeted businesses by June to 
convince DOE to halt the shutdown, said Claude Oliver of Citizens 
for Medical Isotopes and chairman of the Benton County 
Commission.
 
Oliver and Ben Bennett, the Port of Benton executive director, 
just returned from Washington, D.C., where they pushed for a 
commercial restart of the Hanford reactor.
 
DOE has said it has no use for it, and Tri-City area interests 
are working to get the reactor and related facilities -- with a 
combined replacement value of $2 billion -- declared surplus. 
They want to restart the reactor to make isotopes for medicine 
and other uses, such as irradiation of food.
 
In Washington, D.C., Bennett and Oliver emphasized that turning 
the reactor over to industry would save DOE the $200 million 
needed to decommission the reactor. "This preserves the assets of 
the U.S.," Oliver said.
 
They also talked up related facilities in the Hanford area, such 
as Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, which has conducted 
medical isotope research that has led to new medicines, and 
Washington State University Tri-Cities, which is starting a 
radiopharmaceutical program. The nation has just two 
comprehensive nuclear pharmacy programs at universities.
 
In the past 30 days the use of isotopes in medicine has taken 
major steps forward, Oliver said. The Food and Drug 
Administration approved a drug that uses medical isotopes to 
selectively target radiation to cancer cells in lymphoma 
patients.
 
As the FDA approves new nuclear medicines, the demand for 
isotopes increases dramatically. "DOE is getting out of the 
medical isotope business," Oliver said. "This is not bad to us. 
We're putting together the private sector players."
 
Oliver and Bennett also visited businesses interested in using 
the reactor, they said, although they declined to name them.
 
Organized labor also is pushing for a restart. National lobbyists 
have been educated about the project so they can help with the 
effort, said Mark Reavis, president of the Southeast Washington 
Central Labor Council. Organized labor also has been in talks 
with the governor and state legislators. 

Copyright 2002 Tri-City Herald. All rights reserved. This 
*****************************************************************
 59 Scientist hopes Oak Ridge tests will prove fusion theory 

- Friday, 03/15/02 

OAK RIDGE (AP) — Oak Ridge National Laboratory will begin 
experiments in a couple of weeks to determine whether it is 
possible to achieve nuclear fusion by using sound waves to build 
and collapse bubbles in a beaker of deuterium-laden acetone, a 
process known as bubble fusion.

Rusi Taleyarkhan, a researcher at the laboratory, was chief 
scientist on research published last week in Science magazine 
that detailed how he created nuclear fusion in a lab bottle. He 
collaborated with colleagues at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute 
and the Russian Academy of Sciences.

His findings were challenged by two of his colleagues at Oak 
Ridge, and the lab will now supervise more thorough experiments 
over the next six months to test Taleyarkhan's theory.

''It's our opportunity but also our responsibility to find out if 
nuclear fusion is going on,'' said Lee Riedinger, the 
laboratory's deputy director for science and technology, who will 
oversee the experiments. ''We would like to be the first to 
comment, to redo the experiment and say the result is this or 
that.''

Scientists worldwide have worked for decades to corral nuclear 
fusion, the same reaction that causes the sun and other stars to 
burn.

Billions of dollars have been spent on experiments to create and 
contain the super-hot fusion fuels in machines that have 
reproduced those conditions for only a few seconds at a time.

Riedinger and Taleyarkhan met Tuesday to discuss who would work 
on the team.

Two Oak Ridge experimental nuclear physicists, Dan Shapira and 
Mike Saltmarsh, probably aren't on the list. They went to 
Taleyarkhan's lab last summer to evaluate the bubble experiment 
and said they did not see the type of neutron emissions one would 
expect if nuclear fusion were taking place.

Taleyarkhan believes Shapira and Saltmarsh did not properly 
interpret their own nuclear data. He said the physicists' work 
actually supports his conclusions.
 
© Copyright 2002 The Tennessean
*****************************************************************
 60 'Jesse Culture': Bechtel Jacobs making progress 

Oak Ridger Online --> 

Story last updated at 1:38 p.m. on Friday, March 15, 2002

by Paul Parson 
Oak Ridger staff 

Bechtel Jacobs Co. has endured some harsh criticism over the past 
several months in the area of safety, but officials indicated 
Thursday the company is making progress with a specific goal that 
has been dubbed the "Jessie culture."

 Jessie Roberson, Department of Energy assistant secretary for 
Environmental Management, said Bechtel Jacobs is showing 
leadership and trying to be responsive in light of recent safety 
woes. Roberson joined U.S. Rep. Zach Wamp, R-3rd District, and 
other DOE officials on a visit to Oak Ridge Thursday.

 DOE last November revoked validation of Bechtel Jacobs' 
Integrated Safety Management System. DOE did so after the Defense 
Nuclear Facilities Safety Board, a federal watchdog agency, 
identified several deficiencies that were yet to be remedied 
despite the fact that DOE had pointed them out to Bechtel Jacobs 
well over a year ago.

 The system in question is a process that incorporates safety 
into management and work practices at all levels, addressing all 
types of work and all types of hazards, to ensure safety for the 
workers, the public and the environment.

 Wamp also said Thursday that Bechtel Jacobs -- DOE's cleanup 
manager -- is making significant progress in the area of safety. 
The congressman suggested the company is getting on track with 
the "Jessie culture," which he said was Roberson's goal of 
putting safety first.

 When asked if her office was dissatisfied with Bechtel Jacobs' 
overall performance, Roberson responded: "I guess I have a 
different opinion now."

 There has been speculation that changes -- possibly major ones 
-- could be made to Bechtel Jacobs' contract, especially since 
DOE's Oak Ridge Operations office is trying to obtain new funds 
for cleanup projects. DOE Under Secretary Bob Card indicated 
Thursday that might be the case.

 Bechtel Jacobs is in charge of nuclear cleanup activities at 
facilities under the jurisdiction of DOE's Oak Ridge Operations 
office, including the Oak Ridge K-25 site.

 The Oak Ridge Operations office submitted a proposal to DOE 
headquarters this week for a portion of an $800 million 
accelerated cleanup fund, which is only about a month old. Around 
$433 million of that account was recently awarded to cleanup 
efforts in Hanford, Wash.

 Roberson said Thursday she has seen Oak Ridge's proposal, adding 
that an agreement on the site's participation in the new cleanup 
program could be reached shortly. Although she declined to 
specify a dollar amount, Roberson said Oak Ridge can expect to 
get "meaningfully more" money.

 Bechtel Jacobs did not provide comment for this report.
 
Paul Parson can be contacted at (865) 220-5533 or 
pparson@oakridger.com [pparson@oakridger.com] .

All Contents ©Copyright The Oak Ridger 
*****************************************************************
 61 John Challens; Helped British Develop A-Bomb 

(washingtonpost.com)
 
By Associated Press Friday, March 15, 2002; Page B07 

LONDON -- John Challens, 86, the scientist who created the 
electrical firing circuits that detonated Britain's first atomic 
bomb, died of a heart ailment March 1 in Basingstoke, England.
 
He was one of a group of scientists who worked in secret at the 
Atomic Weapons Research Establishment at Aldermaston, now the 
Atomic Weapons Establishment, created in 1950 by Britain's 
then-Labor government to develop a nuclear deterrent.
 
Britain had been forced to go it alone after the United States 
stopped all collaboration in the atomic field, limiting Britain's 
access to nuclear weapons material and to the knowledge needed to 
produce atomic weapons.
 
On Oct. 3, 1952, in the Monte Bello Islands off the northwestern 
coast of Australia, Mr. Challens and another scientist made the 
final checks on the bomb, which had been loaded aboard the 
British frigate Plym. The device was detonated by the electronic 
firing circuits he invented.
 
Wallace John Challens was born in Peterborough in eastern England 
and graduated from University College in Nottingham in 1936. He 
then joined the War Office to research the physics of heavy guns.
 
In 1939, he worked on missile guidance systems at the rocket 
development establishment at Aberporth, Wales, and after World 
War II, he joined the British team that investigated Germany's V1 
and V2 buzz bombs.
 
In 1947, Mr. Challens was recruited to work on Britain's atomic 
project by William Penney, who had worked on the atomic bombs 
that the United States dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
 
Throughout the 1950s, he took part in British nuclear tests in 
Australia and later invented an electronic initiator to replace 
polonium as a firing agent.
 
In 1959, he became head of development at the research 
establishment, producing new warheads for the Royal Air Force and 
Royal Navy. He became deputy director in 1972 and later helped to 
modify the Polaris submarine's nuclear missile system so that it 
could penetrate Soviet defenses.
 
His first wife, the former Joan Stephenson, whom he married in 
1938, died in 1971.
 
Survivors include his wife, the former Norma Lane, whom he 
married in 1973, and two sons from his first marriage.
 

                       © 2002 The Washington Post Company
    
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have expressed a prior interest in receiving this information for 
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information go to: 
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