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Army to Study Moving Some U.S. Chemical Weapons By Chris Schneidmiller WASHINGTON — The U.S. Army acknowledged yesterday that it has been directed to study relocating part of its chemical weapons stockpile, while a coalition of groups that have sprung up around disposal facilities pledged they would fight to keep the munitions from crossing state lines (see GSN, Jan. 18). “While the Army may not be concerned about health and safety, we certainly are, and if they try to ship chemical weapons to Utah, they better hope the trucks have reverse because we’ll force them to go back,” Jason Groenewold of the Healthy Environment Alliance of Utah said during a teleconference with reporters. Plans developed in the late 1980s called for chemical weapons disposal facilities to be built alongside the eight storage depots containing the munitions. Under the terms of the multilateral Chemical Weapons Convention, the United States is required to destroy its full stockpile by 2007, but is also allowed to request a five-year extension. U.S. officials plan to seek the extension to 2012, according to an Army Chemical Materials Agency press release issued yesterday (see GSN, Oct. 31, 2003). Defense Department documents leaked last week indicated that construction on the Pueblo, Colo., and Blue Grass, Ky., chemical neutralization facilities could be delayed until 2011, just one year before the extended treaty deadline. The Pentagon on Jan. 10 ordered the Army’s Chemical Materials Agency to evaluate alternatives that would allow the United States to meet the April 2012 deadline. Among the alternatives is “relocation of some of the chemical weapons stockpile located at various storage sites across the United States,” according to the CMA press release. The agency is scheduled to brief the Defense Department on its findings on March 21. “We’re working on it,” said CMA spokesman Greg Mahall. “It’s way too early in the process to tell you anything concrete.” Mahall noted, however, that a study does not automatically indicate that transportation would be the chosen alternative. Colorado’s U.S. senators, Wayne Allard and Ken Salazar, were assured during a meeting Tuesday with Pentagon officials that chemical weapons would not be moved from Pueblo and that neutralization would remain the disposal technology, said Salazar spokesman Cody Wertz. They are scheduled to receive monthly updates on plans for the site. Speakers at yesterday’s press conference expressed skepticism over Defense Department pledges, and said they fear the Army means to ship all of the munitions from Colorado and Kentucky to disposal facilities that are already operating or scheduled to soon begin work. More than 3,000 tons of mustard, sarin and VX agents are stored at the two sites. They are contained in more than 880,000 weapons said Chemical Weapons Working Group director Craig Williams. Williams said a source “inside the government” told him that a study of moving materials from Colorado for destruction at the Tooele Chemical Agent Disposal Facility in Utah is already under way. Mahall said he knew of no such study. Transporting the weapons by truck or train creates the possibility for accidents or terrorist acts that could endanger nearby populations, relocation opponents argue. Communities around recipient sites would also become “dumping grounds” for other areas’ armaments, they said. Williams said he believes the government favors relocation as a “cost-saving option” that would allow it to avoid building two additional disposal buildings. A public law enacted under the fiscal 95 defense authorization act forbids transportation of any “part of the chemical weapons stockpile” from one state to another. Former Army Undersecretary James Ambrose in 1988 also ruled out relocation “because it posed greater public health and safety risks than on-site disposal.” “Any portion of the stockpile shipped to other sites would be much more vulnerable to sabotage or terrorism than that remaining at those installations where currently stored and protected by Army resources adequate to that task,” Ambrose wrote in his record of decision. Chemical Materials Agency director Michael Parker pledged in yesterday’s press release that safety “will be a cornerstone of any alternatives we consider.” The Jan. 10 Pentagon directive requires the Army to address the issue of security when studying relocation. It is unlikely that the law banning weapons transportation would be overturned, officials said. The other option would be for the president to declare a national security need to move the weapons, said Angela de Rocha, spokeswoman for Allard. Disposal sites at Tooele, Anniston, Ala., Pine Bluff, Ark., and Umatilla, Ore., are all potential recipients for weapons from the Kentucky and Colorado storage depots, Williams said. He said the soon-to-open Pine Bluff site is perhaps the most likely to receive weapons. Pine Bluff is already permitted to accept nonstockpile chemical weapons, and there has been less attention to chemical weapons issues in Arkansas, he said. “You have people united at other sites and we’ve been kind of passive,” said Evelyn Yates of Pine Bluff for Safe Disposal. She vowed to “go everywhere I can and tell people everywhere that if we don’t join together we’re going to become the dumping ground.” Williams and other speakers at yesterday’s press conference said they would work with, government officials, lawmakers and the courts to block weapons transportation if the Defense Department chooses that option. The only way to ensure the munitions stay in their present homes is for Congress to fully and immediately fund construction disposal sites at Colorado and Kentucky, Williams said. Lawmakers in potentially affected states have already expressed their displeasure with the slowdown and consideration of moving the weapons. “Senator Allard fully expects that at the end of the day they will be destroying [chemical weapons] in Pueblo,” de Rocha said.
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