Radiological Weapons of Terror

Recent Presidential speeches have highlighted the threat posed by chemical and biological terrorism. But what about the first leg of the Nuclear, Biological and Chemical (NBC) triad? This paper examines the potential threat to US interests from radiological weapons of terror, including both nuclear weapons, and radiological dispersion devices (RDDs), devices that intentionally use radiation to harm. There are four main factors that increase the risk of nuclear and radiological terrorism to US vital interests: first, technical knowledge is more readily available due to the Internet. Second, there has been a marked increase in source availability with the economic collapse of Russia. Third, security procedures are extremely lax, employing demoralized workers and utilizing grossly inadequate procedures. Finally, despite a decrease in the overall number of terrorist incidents, these attacks are becoming more lethal. These four factors taken together strongly suggest that it is only a matter of time before a nuclear or a radiological terrorist attack is levied against a vital US interest.But what if an attack occurs?