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U.S. Fuel Cycle: Mock Terrorists Stole U.S. Nuclear Weapon Materials U.S. nuclear weapons and production facilities are vulnerable to terrorist infiltration, according to a Project on Government Oversight report to be released today, which found that the country’s 10 nuclear weapons facilities failed to stop mock terrorists in more than half of security drills conducted by U.S. military teams. The report is based on information from whistleblowers and classified Energy Department material. U.S. Army and Navy teams acting as mock terrorists were able to penetrate facilities’ security and obtain nuclear material in several tests. “The mock terrorists gained control of sensitive nuclear material which, if detonated, would have endangered significant parts of New Mexico, Colorado and downwind areas” in an October 2000 drill at Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, the report said. In an earlier test at Los Alamos, an Army Special Forces team hauled away weapons-grade uranium in a garden cart. Navy SEALs in a test at the Rocky Flats site near Denver escaped with plutonium by cutting a hole in a chain link fence. In both cases, the teams stole enough material to build several nuclear bombs. The security lapses were particularly worrisome because the facilities were warned that the drills would be taking place, said Danielle Brian, manager of the Project on Government Oversight. “These are tests where the security forces are necessarily dumbed-down so that they know the tests are coming,” Brian said. “They are very restrictive tests [but] they’re still losing half of the time.” (Hedges/Zeleny, Chicago Tribune, Oct. 5).
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