-Caveat Lector-
October 28, 2002
Al Qaeda nukes are reality, intelligence says
By Neil Doyle
SPECIAL TO THE WASHINGTON TIMES
LONDON — Soon after September 11 last year, the notion that
al Qaeda might have nuclear weapons was largely dismissed by
intelligence professionals.
It is, however, a working assumption in security circles now that
the terror group does have nuclear capabilities. Al Qaeda's secret
nuclear stash is assumed to be somewhere in Afghanistan, although
finding it is proving to be as hard as locating Osama bin Laden.
The first clue came during Christmas, when low-grade uranium-
238 was discovered in tunnels near a former al Qaeda base in
Kandahar, Afghanistan.
U.S. officials said that enough material was found to make one
"dirty" radiological bomb, which involves combining nuclear
materials with conventional explosive to spread contamination over
a wide area.
The black market in radioactive materials has been booming for
some years, and the archives are littered with stories of smuggling.
In March 2000, for instance, customs officers in Uzbekistan
stopped a truck, destined for Quetta in Pakistan, that was carrying
10 lead-lined containers filled with strontium-90, enough to
manufacture scores of dirty bombs.
The uranium found in Kandahar is in theory suitable for a
radiological weapon, but not a fission bomb.
That the retreating fighters from al Qaeda and Afghanistan's
Taliban regime chose to leave this behind when they took to the
mountains fueled suspicion that their nuclear crown jewels went with
them.
Geoff Hoon, the British Defense secretary, hinted as much early
this year, when he said: "We are certainly aware that he has some
material that could contribute to a nuclear weapon."
There is no consensus among experts on whether al Qaeda
possesses working nuclear warheads, as Osama bin Laden
contended in an interview after September 11.
Rose Gottemoeller, senior associate at the Carnegie Endowment
for International Peace and assistant energy secretary for
nonproliferation in the Clinton administration, said: "I believe that the
chance that al Qaeda controls actual warheads is virtually nil.
"It is much more likely that they have acquired some nuclear
materials, but here the range could be very wide: from depleted
uranium or low-level radioactive sources [such as those used in
smoke detectors], all the way up to weapons-usable material —
highly enriched uranium or plutonium."
"I think it more likely that they have some kind of lower-level
sources than weapons-grade material, but this cannot be excluded,"
Miss Gottemoeller added.
"The origins for the lower-level materials could be very broad,
virtually worldwide; weapons-grade material is much more precious,
therefore proliferating countries tend to hold on to it.
"It is possible such material could have come to him from a
former Soviet nuclear facility, not only in Russia, but in Kazakhstan,
Georgia, Uzbekistan, Ukraine, etc."
A minority of specialists holds that al Qaeda already may enjoy
command and control over Pakistan's nuclear arsenal via close links
with the country's Inter-Services Intelligence, the agency credited
with creating the Taliban.
Others suggest that theft of military hardware is a more likely
possibility. One former Soviet GRU (military intelligence) agent says
he knows for certain that al Qaeda possesses small atomic
warheads.
"Mossad [Israeli intelligence] reported that bin Laden bought
tactical nuclear weapons from some former Soviet republics," he
said. "They are not the suitcase-type bombs that people often refer
to, but more the warhead-type munitions. These are the payloads of
short-range missiles, torpedoes, and the like." He declined to
elaborate.
Others believe that pilfering military warheads is unfeasible, but
that al Qaeda might have bought some of Russia's missing Cold
War-era "suitcase nukes" on the black market.
In 1997, the Red Army's former chief, Gen. Alexander Lebed,
acknowledged that 84 such devices were missing from the military's
inventory.
Atomic Demolitions Munitions (ADMs), as portable nuclear
weapons are formally known, are miniaturized warheads that were
developed by the United States during the Vietnam War. They were
designed for use against key infrastructure targets, such as bridges
and dams. The Soviets soon followed suit and produced their
version in huge quantities.
They were secretly buried near targets in the West by specially
trained GRU agents as part of a Soviet strategy to knock out key
government and military targets and hamper response to a nuclear
attack.
According to informed sources, these weapons constantly
circulated around the world in diplomatic baggage, and large
numbers were buried along Russia's borders for use as nuclear land
mines in the event of invasion. They were often disguised as
boulders.
Each has a yield of about 1 kiloton — equivalent to 1,000 tons of
TNT.
It has been estimated that one ADM could immediately kill
100,000 people if it exploded in a major city center, with hundreds of
thousands dying from cancer in the fallout.
ADMs have a shelf life of about eight years, after which they
need to be retrieved and sent to a laboratory for refurbishment.
One source said that a semi-skilled operative could set one off
easily, given the right codes. They can be set to detonate using an
built-in timer or can be triggered remotely with a mobile phone call.
Academics are not sure that terrorists have gotten their hands on
ADMs, but few will rule out the possibility.
Robert Sherman, director of strategic security at the Federation
of American Scientists, said that this is "more likely than getting a
ballistic missile warhead."
Paul Rogers, professor and head of the Center for Peace
Studies at the University of Bradford in Britain, said: "There were
unconfirmed reports that one or two Soviet-era tactical nuclear
weapons had got to Iran a few years ago. Apart from that, I do not
have any evidence that al Qaeda has access to such weapons."
However, one senior Western intelligence contact is adamant
that the terrorists do have a number of these weapons — nine, to be
precise. The price on the deal is put at $30 million, plus 2 tons of
opium per nuke.
"Reliable sources report that not only atomic munitions were sold
by the Russian underworld and smuggled into [Central Asia] during
the conflict between the U.S. and the Taliban, but that several
Russian nuclear technicians were hired by the Islamic
fundamentalists to try and make the weapons operational," the
Western source said.
According to Mr. Rogers, an ADM would cause cataclysmic
damage: "The effect of the [New York City World Trade Center]
plane-fuel explosion and the gravitational forces of collapse of the
two towers was about 600 tons of TNT equivalent, so an ADM would
destroy a couple of city blocks, or a major bridge, or an airport
terminal."
Western cities, however, may not be high on the target list if al
Qaeda is holding these as weapons of final resort. The group may
be planning to use them to achieve bin Laden's ultimate goal: the
creation of an Islamic superstate.
This could be achieved by using nuclear weapons to destroy the
oil industry in the Middle East and trigger an unprecedented global
economic meltdown, according to a report published late last year
by Decision Support Systems Inc., a private-sector intelligence and
risk-management consultancy.
In a "limited number of strategic positions," a small nuclear
device would expose the Middle East's oil infrastructure to massive
radiation, with sand spreading fallout on a vast scale. In addition,
hydrostatic shock waves transmitted through pipelines could destroy
production and delivery facilities over wide areas.
With most of the world's oil reserves inaccessible, the United
States no longer would have an economic interest in the region. And
there is a precedent for such a plan: Iraq's attempt to destroy the oil
fields in Kuwait during the 1991 Persian Gulf war.
Few experts doubt the feasibility of such a plan. Mr. Sherman
said: "If you presume perfect accuracy — that is, hand placement
within inches of where intended — there are very few objects that
would not be severely damaged by a small nuke.
"I presume that someone with a detailed knowledge of the oil
field could cause a cascading effect with great damage."
According to Mr. Rogers, the greatest threat lies further
downstream in the production process. "Such warheads would have
a limited effect against an oil field because well heads are normally
quite dispersed but could do substantial damage to a refinery or a
major pumping facility," he said.
Oil has been a sore point with bin Laden. Al Qaeda propaganda
prior to September 11 accused the United States of "robbing all
Muslims" of exactly $36.96 trillion by exploiting its oil interests in the
Middle East. It issued a pamphlet providing a long and detailed
breakdown of its calculations, explaining that this was why America
was responsible for poverty in the region.
The pamphlet ends with a vow of revenge, and what appears to
be a euphemistic reference of future intent: "O Muslims, the times
are critical indeed. Seek the approval of Allah quickly, for this is
imperative. Then it won't take as long for the American jinn [in
Islamic tradition, a powerful spirit lower than an angel] to be put
back into the bottle as it takes for the first light of dawn to turn into
the break of day."
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