Could Terrorists Build a Nuclear Bomb?

We know they are shopping for materials. I say with the right funding and the right contacts, they could.

 

Not without great help from experts. Better chance of buying finished ones.
I doubt the continued potency of the so called suitcase bombs, but greedy nuclear weapons experts are all over the place.

 

Shakes head...

We have people in custody now (see GITMO) that were educated in the US and received degrees in Engineering. They are smart enough already.

 

A nuclear bomb is far more likely to be built by a rogue nation such as North Korea or Iran than by a loosely grouped band of terrorists with no stable, secure base. I think it would be difficult to refine uranium, assemble a nuclear warhead & delivery system in a cave or mobile lab.

The greatest nuclear threat from terrorists is probably to cause a reaction at an already existing nuclear facility, particularly one in a heavily populated area.

 

I found this article on line (Popular Science)

http://www.popsci.com/popsci/generaltech/article/0,20967,1017201,00.html

From the article But of more than a dozen nuclear-arms experts I interviewed, almost all agreed that assembling a crude nuclear bomb, though extremely difficult, is by no means impossible.

I don't think they need a delivery system if they are suicidal bombers.

Years ago there used to be a lot of talk about how easy it really would be if someone had uranium, and Hollywood did a spoof movie about a high school student building one. I have always hoped that the chatter was caused by that movie and not that the movie was based on any kind of reality, but I've wondered ever since.

[ August 01, 2005, 10:46 AM: Message edited by: TexasSky ]

 

Ya think?

I think the odds are high for that Daisy considering we actually gave North Korea a nuclear technology as a humanitarian gesture and both programs in NK and Iran have been widely discussed by US foriegn policy leaders.

Yeah we didnt think people in caves could fight a war with Russian soldiers either...

 

TS -
A couple of years ago a boy scout irradiated his neighbors trying to earn a merit badge. See story here:

http://www.mindfully.org/Nucs/Radioactive-Boy-Scout1nov98.htm

Makes you ponder the possibilities doesnt it?

 

Ya think?

I think the odds are high for that Daisy considering we actually gave North Korea a nuclear technology as a humanitarian gesture and both programs in NK and Iran have been widely discussed by US foriegn policy leaders.

Yeah we didnt think people in caves could fight a war with Russian soldiers either... </font>[/QUOTE]That must be why we were so quick to fund, train, and arm those people in caves...along with alittle help from our allies in Pakistan of course. Apparently they didn't think people in caves could beat the Russian soldiers on their own either.

But, it's probably taboo to talk about all that now.

 

Their enemy was our enemy. We supported them because they didnt want to be a communist nation - the only problem with that was, nobody saw the other option (Taliban). You have to give most of the credit to the Afghanistani fighters regardless of how much help they received, they are a tough group (most of which are now what is commonly known as Northern Alliance although that is not the real name of the group).

Do not be fooled into thinking Pakistan is a real ally.

 

I was never fooled into thinking Pakistan was our allies. Just as I'm not confused that Al Qaida, "literally 'the database,' was originally the computer file of the thousands of mujahideen who were recruited and trained with help from the CIA to defeat the Russians."

Quote Taken From This Article and expaned here...

More On Al Qaida Here

SOURCE

 

Could Terrorists Build a Nuclear Bomb?

Well, with the news I just Posted "London Bombings Mastermind is MI6 Asset" I guess if you have the right friends in high enough places protecting you anything is possible.

 

Yes, quite a bit, thanks.

Good, you agree with me.

Why would we have funded them for ten years if we didn't think they could fight? That makes no sense at all, emeraldcityangel.

 

Daisy,

The terrorists aren't "loosely grouped", and the only reason we have hope that they don't have a stable, secure base is our hope that we destroyed those bases when we bombed Afghanistan.

They are terrifyingly well organized. The September 11th attack wasn't just some kids waking up that morning and choosing to hijack a plane.

 

"The" terrorists? Which terrorists? There are many disparate groups who have rivalries as well as ties. Or had - nothing like a common enemy to unite groups.

Assuming you mean what we've termed "al Qaida", yes, it is loosely grouped. If they had a single, stable base, when we bombed the smithereens out of Afghanistan and invaded with massive, international forces, we would have destroyed them. Last I heard, they've grown and branched into Iraq, where we have yet to eradicate them, and possibly Syria, Jordan and Iran.

I agree, but that's not the same thing at all.

Nor did any of them actually construct a bomb or other conventional, traceable, detectable weapon. Using simple, extremely low-tech box-cutters, nineteen people, who may not have ever met each other before that week, killed some three thousand.

[ August 01, 2005, 04:50 PM: Message edited by: Daisy ]

 

"The" terrorists? Which terrorists? There are many disparate groups who have rivalries as well as ties. Or had - nothing like a common enemy to unite groups. </font>[/QUOTE] There is actually truth in both arguments... though knowing Daisy's bias, I am sure that this was a slap at Bush.

The Islamic terrorists do not have the kind of command structure we are used to. Their unity comes primarily from their religious objective- to make the world Muslim by any necessary means. One of those means is to destroy those who are seen as infidels like Jews, Christians, and ideological secularists.

Being tied by ideology rather than a static command structure gives them very short lines of communication and enables them to cooperate situationally.

The question I have been dying to ask a genuine liberal for awhile is: What would you do and why? Or else, what would you have done? If it weren't Iraq in focus, it would have been Afghanistan... causing recruits to join them. Do you really think they wouldn't have found a recruiting slogan without Iraq? Do you think that these people are actually doing this because of Iraq? They were engaging in terrorism 26+ years ago... when no less of a peace maker than Carter was President.

The terrorists fear Iraq becoming a functioning democracy. That is a fact. We can only conjecture what kind of base of operation Iraq would be under Saddam to attack our forces in Afghanistan. We can only speculate on how much power Hussein might be garnering by now as the only Islamic leader to poke the US in the eye and get away with it.

Islamic terrorists hate and desire to destroy everyone who doesn't agree that everyone should become a Muslim.

Hatred is a powerful motivator... and it allows people to rationalize extreme behavior. I believe the question is less a matter of whether terrorists can get nukes or not and more a question of what the best political strategy is to keep them from using them... I don't think the "play nice" ideas most liberals seem to support would work.

So far, the Bush policy of taking the war to the enemy's back yard has worked.

 

The Al Qaeda training camps were located in several Middle Eastern nations. The evidence found after September 11th indicated a highly organized group. There were 24 camps known to exist before the bombing of Afghanistan.

Don't make the mistake of thinking that because you can't see it on the evening news it is disorganized. There were dozens of underground operations during WWII that fought the Nazi's. From French Resistors to POW escapes to people hiding and feeding Jews.

 

You brought up a good negative comparison...

The post WWII Nazis attempted to preserve and later resurrect their ideology. They kept the distinct and disciplined chain of command used in Germany before and during the war. Orders were given top down on a routine basis. This made them predictable and fairly easy to defeat.

The terrorists do organize for training. They do communicate goals, targets, and strategies. They don't seem to be dependent on top down guidance and constant communication. They are more autonomous and self-sufficient at the operational level.

 

Only as far as he has alienated us from the Islamic world by the Iraq war. This is something that we as a nation did, so I can't blame him alone as much as my biased heart would like to.

Thanks for the compliment - the "genuine liberal" was directed at me, right?

We're stuck now. I would not abandon Iraq to the insurgents and imported terrorists. We should support the moderates, such as there are still, as vigorously as possible. If the Iraqis democratically elect an Islamic, shari'ia based government, I don't know what we can do. Either we allow democracy or we do not....I really don't know.

I would have worked with the heads of the other nations, sharing information and offering incentives (carrots & sticks), to stamp out the terrorist organizations within their borders. I would have sponsored voter education where appropriate and continued to have monitor elections (and allow our own to be monitored as a good example).

Not so effectively. We made a pretty solid case for devastating Afghanistan - that Osama bin Laden was based there and his organization along with the Taliban were responsible - enough that most the world's nations gave us moral if material support.

They objected to our presence in their Holy Lands in Saudi Arabia, but they're gripe was as much against the Fahds as with the Westerners. The royal family is widely considered corrupt, irregiligious and exploitative of poorer Moslem nationals.

To a large extent, yes.

Who? Al Qaida? Terrorism in the West or war among themselves and against Israel? I'm not being facetious here - I don't know what exactly you're referring to.

Carter did barter the peace agreement between Egypt and Israel. It still stands.

Opinion.

Only conjecture is correct.

He didn't get away with it. He had only a glimmer of his former power. Furthermore, his government was secular - the Wahabi fundamentalists would loved to have overthrown him and institute a proper Islamic government. It appears we have done it for them.

If you equate Moslem terrorists with Islamic terrorists, then that is not true, but if you limit the definition of "Islamic terrorist" to those who terrorize for the Islamic cause, then, of course, it is true by definition.

Yes, that cuts across religious and cultural boundaries.

Well, lots of Moslems are dying, if that's a good thing.

24 separate camps is not a stable, secure base, is it?

You keep pretending that I have said they were not organized when I have said the opposite. Why?Someone as intelligent as you claim to be should not fail so persistently at reading comprehension, so I can only guess that you're simply not reading my posts all the way through, whether deliberately or because of issues of your own. Either that you enjoy knocking down strawmen; I don't know. I hope I'm missing something here.

 

Everyone on this thread so far has missed connecting the dots to this:

http://www.csmonitor.com/2004/0202/p07s02-wosc.html

Now the question begs to be answered - are there others like him and if so, how many, and of course, al Qaeda has enough money to buy nuclear secrets and scientists - even from an Iranian government or an unemployed Russian nuclear scientist - and Russia has unaccounted-for nukes. Where are they?

The first suggested date in the "chatter" for al-Qaeda's "American Hiroshima" is on August 6, 2005 - the 60th anniversary date of our first nuclear bomb dropped on Hiroshima.

And I do believe Tom Tancredo's comments re: this couldn't have come at a better time.

Of course, a President couldn't make similar comments and get by with it, but a lowly Congressman can and can drive the point home effectively.