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Friday, Mar 01, 2002
nuclear ward
"Execution of the classified "Continuity of Operations Plan" resulted not from the Cold War threat of intercontinental missiles, the scenario rehearsed for decades, but from heightened fears that the al Qaeda terrorist network might somehow obtain a portable nuclear weapon, according to three officials with firsthand knowledge. U.S. intelligence has no specific knowledge of such a weapon, they said, but the risk is thought great enough to justify the shadow government's disruption and expense."
"A bipartisan commission, headed by Howard Baker and Lloyd Cutler, concluded that the United States should be spending some $3 billion per year over the next ten years to help Russia control its nuclear weapons and weapon-grade nuclear materials. Rather than spend less than one percent of the current defense budget on dramatically curtailing the potential spread of nuclear weapons and materials to terrorists or unfriendly regimes, the Bush administration is trying to save money in this area. It is spending only one-third of the proposed amount to help Russia safeguard its nuclear weapons and materials and find alternative work for nuclear physicists a woefully inadequate amount if we are truly attempting to quell nuclear proliferation."