CIAO DATE: 05/03

The Problem with Redundancy Problem: Will more nuclear security forces produce nuclear security?

Abstract

After the September 11th, 2001 terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, many scholars, journalists, and public officials expressed fears about the security of nuclear facilities in the United States. Terrorists could attack military bases, weapons in transit, or nuclear weapons production and dismantlement plants in order to steal a weapon or its components. Terrorists might attack nuclear power reactors, nuclear materials storage sites, nuclear waste transportation vehicles, or nuclear research facilities, with two basic motives in mind: to cause a conventional explosion, spreading radioactive materials in the area; or to seize the nuclear materials, which could be used for building either a dirty bomb (a radiological weapon) or, conceivably, a primitive nuclear bomb.

Full Text (PDF format, 27 pages, 207 KB)

Accepted for publication in Risk Analysis: An International Journal