------- Index of Articles

NUCLEAR
Greens sue Britain over nuclear fuel plant
Depleted uranium: devastation at home and abroad
'India Has the Resolve ... to Resist This Terrorism'
Terrorism in India
Briefing Book: Secret History of the ABM Treaty
IBM to Build Second Blue Gene Supercomputer
LAWMAKERS PROD ENERGY DEPARTMENT ON ROCKY FLATS PLUTONIUM SHIPMENT
INEEL DECLARED A NATIONAL USER FACILITY
Tunnel fire cited as cause for nuke waste changes
Groups Warn of Calamity if A-Plants Are Attacked
Coalition Demands Shutdown of Indian Point Reactors
$1.67 Billion For Pentagon Counterterrorism Bid
White House, Hollywood elite to meet
Nuclear waste expert to be nominee to lead DOE branch

MILITARY
Experts See F.B.I. Missteps Hampering Anthrax Inquiry
Past Lessons Guide Transit Planning for Attack
Splits open in UK-US alliance
Northrop Seals Deal to Buy Newport News
German government faces collapse over war row
North Korean missile
N. Korea Said Trying to Sell Missiles
A Long Road West for Russia
50 US cluster bombs found in Pak
Pakistan Tries to Split Army From Mullahs
Shackles Off, Russia's Muslims Are Still Chafing
Putin Rules Out Possibility of Sending Russian Troops to Afghanistan
Bush Seeks New Volunteer Force for Civil Defense
Commando audits
U.S. Commander, Saying Rebels Need Help, Hints More Troops
Shadowy U.S. Military Presence in an Afghan Town
A Homeland Pep Talk

ENERGY AND OTHER
GREENPEACE SAYS SOLAR ENERGY MEANS INDEPENDENCE
Land-Based Ecosystems Won't Head Off Global Warming
Carbon Dioxide Emissions Up 3.1 Percent in 2000
Cold War Research Baby Teeth Found
The Humanitarian Front

POLICE / PRISONERS
Ashcroft Plan Would Recast Justice Dept. in a War Mode
Lawmakers Debate Sending in the Troops -- at Home
As U.N. Meets, bin Laden Tape Sets Off Alarms

ACTIVISTS
Mexico frees two jailed environmentalists
Nader's Party Is in the Green
Homes not Bombs Shuts Down Space Warfare Facility
Does Anybody In This Country Get It?
curse the WTO


-------- NUCLEAR

-------- britain

Greens sue Britain over nuclear fuel plant

by Matthew Jones,
Reuters:
9/11/2001
http://www.planetark.org/avantgo/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=13203

LONDON - Two environmental groups began a legal challenge in London's High Court yesterday against Britain's decision to give the go-ahead for a controversial plant to begin manufacturing nuclear fuel.

A six-metre (20 ft) high model of a nuclear missile accompanied Greenpeace and Friends of the Earth as their lawyers argued that the government had acted unlawfully in October when it decided to allow state-owned British Nuclear Fuels (BNFL) to launch the Sellafield MOX Plant in Cumbria, northwest England.

"The MOX plant is not only an environmental threat and a potential terrorist target, but simply does not make business sense," Greenpeace executive director Stephen Tiddle told reporters outside the court.

The green lawyers said the government had not showed sufficient economic justification for the plant, as required by tEU law, because its 470 million pound ($690 million) cost was not taken into account when assessing its commercial viability.

It was also argued there was insufficient evidence there would be enough customers for the fuel - a mixture of highly-toxic plutonium and uranium oxides.

Greenpeace and Friends of the Earth say launching the plant would lead to more plutonium production at Sellafield.

Some nuclear experts believe it would be relatively easy to extract plutonium, which could be used in a nuclear device, from MOX fuel rods.

BNFL said it was awaiting the outcome of the judicial review before the plant.

BENEFITS V COSTS

A government-commissioned study, conducted by consulting firm Arthur D. Little and published in July, said the plant would deliver net financial benefits of 216 million pounds.

The report also said the cost of not opening the plant could run into hundreds of millions of pounds largely due to potential loss of future contracts for THORP, BNFL's nuclear reprocessing plant.

The Sellafield MOX Plant has lain idle since 1996 because regulatory approval to start-up was repeatedly withheld over fears it would not make any money.

BNFL says the MOX plant can be profitable and that it already boasts a healthy order book from overseas customers. The group also dismisses suggestions it would be easy to extract plutonium from MOX to make a nuclear device.

More legal battles face BNFL, which had its partial privatisation shelved in 2000 after a scandal erupted when it was discovered staff had falsified data on pilot batches of MOX fuel sent to customers.

On Friday, the Irish government will ask the Hamburg-based International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea, to order an immediate suspension of the MOX's plant's authorisation and to stop the international movement of radioactive material associated with the plant in and around the Irish Sea.


-------- depleted uranium

Depleted uranium: devastation at home and abroad

Date: Fri, 9 Nov 2001 01:17:52 -0800 (PST)
From: Roger Herried <rogerh@energy-net.org>

Radiation Bulletin (part II)

"The little fox is still. The dogs of war have made their kill." These are the words of famous Black poet and writer Langston Hughes, commenting on war. He couldn't have said it better.

Few communities have felt the impact of war more than Hunters Point. The impact of war is not felt just overseas, in a distant country. It is right here in our own backyards: death and illness from radiation exposure, chemical exposure, and the economic devastation that ensues when the military moves on and leaves the mess behind.

The bombing of Afghanistan by U.S. government forces has direct ties to Hunters Point. It was at the Hunters Point Naval Shipyard that a radioactive material called depleted uranium (DU), currently being used in the bombing of Afghanistan, was first tested by the Navy.

The United States now has hundreds of thousands of tons of depleted uranium piled in heaps outdoors at DOE facilities. It is 99.5 percent of what is left when the most fissionable isotope (one of three) is extracted from naturally occurring uranium. The extracted uranium is used in nuclear weapons or nuclear fuel for nuclear reactors. The 99.5 percent that is discarded cannot be put back into the mines it came out of because, after crushing and processing, the volume is greater than before it was removed from the mines. "Depleted uranium" does not mean it is not radioactive - it is very radioactive and very dangerous to all living things.

The Department of Defense got the bright idea of using depleted uranium in weapons because: it is very dense, which gives it greater penetrating power to destroy tanks, etc.; it is "pyrophoric," which means that upon impact, it explodes into fire and smoke, creating submicroscopic radioactive particles which travel great distances and can remain suspended until it is "rained out" of the atmosphere; it is cheap, and passes the responsibility for disposal from DOE on to civilians (that means us) and the environment.

Since depleted uranium is so radioactive, it will continue acting internally on living things long after the battlefield has been cleared - with delayed effects, which impact soldiers and civilians for the rest of their lives. The half life of uranium is 4.5 billion years - in ten half-lives radioactivity becomes an insignificant amount. In 45 billion years it will no longer be a danger. In other words, it's "fun" for the DOD, it's "cheap" for the arms manufacturers (who reap good profits by making it), and "good riddance" says DOE (with 480,000 tons on hand).

The Navy first tested depleted uranium munitions in 1977 at Hunters Point. From the USS Bigelow, the Phalanx Weapons System fired 3,000 rounds of depleted uranium penetrators per minute. The tests exceeded expectations and production started in 1978 to fill orders for 23 U.S. Navy and 14 foreign military systems.

The Army A-10 Thunderbolt II, nicknamed "the Warthog," fired most of the depleted uranium munitions in the Gulf War, between 300 to 800 tons. The Abrams Tank, the Marines M-60, the U.S. F-16 and U.S. Apache helicopters have been fitted to fire DU munitions. Many cruise missiles contain DU balance weights.

The use of DU is not being covered up, but the health hazards have been. Gulf War Syndrome not only killed, maimed, and made soldiers sick, they brought it home. In a study of 251 Gulf War veterans' families in Mississippi, 67 percent of their children were born without eyes, ears or a brain, had fused fingers, blood infections, respiratory problems or thyroid and other organ malformations.

The U.S. has manufactured and tested depleted uranium in 39 states. The cleanup bill - just for the depleted uranium - at the Jefferson Proving Ground in Indiana would be $7.8 billion. The DU has not been cleaned up, but DOD has closed the area. Communities living near these test ranges will continue to be exposed and suffer health problems.

For 40 years, the Sierra Army Depot in Northern California has burned millions of tons of old munitions - including 20 times more DU than was used in the entire Gulf War. The radioactive smoke and ash, full of heavy metals, phosgene gas and dioxins, contaminated local communities as well as that of many Native Americans living downwind - especially the Pyramid Lake Paiute Reservation.

The health problems in those communities have been horrendous. The Sierra Army depot burned old munitions in open pits - and was the single largest contributor to air pollution in California - 17-23 percent. Norman Harry, former Pyramid Lake Tribal Chairman, and Nevada Senator Harry Reid, worked with others to shut it down. A month ago, Lassen County refused to renew the burn permit for the Sierra Army Depot - finally.

The United States has used DU weaponry in the Gulf War, Kosovo, Serbia, Vieques Island, and Torishima Island near Okinawa, Japan; and sold DU to at least 23 countries at great profits. As mentioned earlier, DU is part of the arsenal the U.S. and British military forces are using against Afghanistan.

The depleted uranium that has contaminated the Gulf States since the Gulf War can be detected on gamma meters in Greece and Bulgaria on windy days. It's the weapon that "keeps giving"... and keeps killing.

DU is also used as ballast in commercial and military planes. On Sept. 11, a hijacked plane crashed into the Pentagon. Dr. Janette Sherman, research associate with the Radiation and Public Health Project, had spoken a few days earlier at a Sept. 6 press conference in Hunters Point. After the Sept. 11 attacks, Dr. Sherman notified the Nuclear Information and Resource Service that she detected elevated levels of radiation in her home, located seven miles from the Pentagon. Dr. Sherman still had a gamma meter she had borrowed for her visit to Hunter's Point. The EPA, the FBI, and other federal agencies, including HMRU (Hazardous Materials Response Units), USAR teams, the local fire department and the Virginia HAZMAT were notified, and an investigation began at the Pentagon.

A pile of rubble from the crash was found to be radioactive, but EPA official Bill Bellinger of the agency's Region III Environmental Radiation Monitoring Office was unconcerned when contacted by Diane D'Arrigo from the Nuclear Information and Resource Service. Bellinger indicated that it was probably depleted uranium and mentioned that americium 241could also be scattered around the crash site. He was convinced that depleted uranium is not radiologically toxic, but commented that it is more of a hazard when aerosolized.

Firefighters, Pentagon personnel, and communities nearby did breathe the smoke and ash from the fire. The agencies that are supposed to be protecting us are not. There was no follow-up investigation.

And what about the World Trade Center in New York? Radiation issues almost never get coverage from mainstream media. It is a taboo subject, a silent killer, as Hunter's Point residents know too well.

The true patriots in this country are two women: Barbara Lee for saying "no" to needless further devastation of an already war-torn country, and Dona Spring, who brought the issue to the table in the Berkeley City Council. Berkeley is the only city in the United States to pass a resolution calling for an end to the bombing of Afghanistan.

Whether or not we agree with the military action in Afghanistan, our soldiers have fought for hundreds of years to give us the right to say yes ... or no. War is how our "leaders" bleed us, too. It is economically, radiologically and chemically devastating at home as well as abroad.

Leuren Moret, an environmental geologist and independent scientist, is president of Scientists for Indigenous People. Moret wrote the foreword to Akira Tashiro's new book, "Discounted Casualties, The Human Cost of Depleted Uranium." Tashiro, a Japanese journalist from Hiroshima, includes in this work over 40 interviews and color photos depicting the devastation caused by uranium in the U.S., the United Kingdom, the Persian Gulf, Kosovo, and Japan. The interviews can be read in English online, or you can request to receive copies via email by visiting www.chugoku-np.co.jp/abom/uran/index_e.html. Leuren Moret can be reached at leurenmoret@yahoo.com.

Useful links: For an article about how DU is currently being used to bomb Afghanistan, visit www.zolatimes.com/V5.44/afghan_uranium.html.

For information about the testing of DU in Hunters Point Shipyard via the USS Bigelow and the Phalanx Weapons System, visit www.spar.navy.mil/ships/ddg995/wep-phal.html.

To read an article about the use of DU as ballast in commercial as well as military planes, www.antenna.nl/wise/uranium/dhap997.html.

The Radiation and Public Health Project website is located at www.radiation.org.

Visit the Nuclear Information and Resource Service at www.nirs.org.

-------- india / pakistan

'India Has the Resolve ... to Resist This Terrorism'
Interview with Indian Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee

Special to washingtonpost.com
Friday, November 9, 2001
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A64626-2001Nov8?language=printer

Indian Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee responded to written questions submitted to him by Washington Post editors.

Q: What concerns do you have about the American-led war against terrorism? Has the U.S. campaign been defined too narrowly, not taking fully into account India's concerns about terrorism?

Vajpayee: The ongoing campaign in Afghanistan is against the perpetrators of the brutal terrorist attacks in the United States on Sept. 11, the al-Qaeda network and its supporters and hosts in Afghanistan, the Taliban. They are a major, but not the only, source of terrorism in the world. I see this -- and President Bush has also said this -- as the beginning of the war against the global terror network. The war against terrorism will have to be fought on a global scale, against terrorist groups everywhere. Safe haven offered by some countries with shelter, resources, training camps and arms have helped terrorist groups to build up a worldwide web of terror networks, with its hub in our western neighborhood. There is a strong, almost seamless, link between the terrorist groups operating against India and the United States. Therefore, if the aims of the war are to be achieved in full, the entire network will have to be destroyed.

Q: What specific steps have you seen the United States take since Sept. 11 to address India's concerns on terrorism? Do you consider them adequate? What further steps should the U.S. take soon?

Vajpayee: We appreciated the U.S.A.'s categorical confirmation, after the brutal terrorist attacks on Oct. 1 on the Jammu and Kashmir State Assembly [parliament], that terrorism everywhere would be condemned equally forcefully. I welcome the U.S. decision to proscribe the Pakistan-based Jaish-e-Mohammed, Harkat-ul-Mujahideen, and Lashkar-e-Toiba. This would have a salutary effect on other terrorist organizations targetting India.

We also hope that, in the context of our collective campaign against terrorism, the United States would succeed in persuading Pakistan to stop sponsoring terrorism against India.

Q: Last month, American aircraft struck a dormitory in Kabul used by the Harkat-ul-Mujahideen. Was this attack based on information from India or conducted at India's request? Have there been other attacks on Afghanistan-based militants that India has sought from the United States?

Vajpayee: The killing in Kabul, of terrorists belonging to the Pakistani-based Harkat-ul-Mujahideen (HuM), comes as no surprise to us. We have known for a long time that groups such as the HuM which have been created by Pakistan's intelligence agencies for terrorism in India, also have close links with the Taliban. Pakistan has been using the Taliban-controlled territories of Afghanistan for training and other support to terrorism, directed against India. The recent killing is merely one additional piece of evidence that highlights the close nexus between Pakistan, Pakistan-based terrorist groups and the Taliban.

Q: What concerns do you have about the Bush administration's policy pronouncements on Kashmir? Do you worry that the Bush administration shares Pakistan's view that the Kashmir issue is central to the Indo-Pakistani relationship and that the popular sentiments of Kashmiris must be taken more into account in addressing the issues?

Vajpayee: All U.S. administrations, past and present, have been aware of India's position on Jammu and Kashmir. They have also been aware of the fact that the state has had elections regularly to elect the people's representatives. The people of the State have suffered over the years from terrorist attacks which have claimed thousands of innocent lives. Thus, if there is a central issue in the India-Pakistan relationship, concerning Jammu and Kashmir, it is the cross-border terrorism, which we have had to counter.

Q: What role would you like to see the United States play in seeking a solution to the issue of Kashmir? What role would you like to see the United States play in settling the border dispute between India and Pakistan?

Vajpayee: The Shimla Agreement and the Lahore Declaration are bilateral agreements that have been freely entered into by India and Pakistan. These are the cornerstones of our bilateral relations, and commit both countries to address all outstanding issues peacefully, through direct bilateral dialogue. There can be no place whatsoever for any third party involvement, in any aspect of our bilateral relations. When two people can speak the same language, why should either side suddenly seek an interpreter?

Q: Bush administration officials said they have told both India and Pakistan to avoid escalating tension over Kashmir. What have you been told in this regard and what steps have you taken in response?

Vajpayee: The events of the recent years speak for themselves. We have always exercised restraint in the most difficult situations, just as we have taken every initiative for dialogue with Pakistan. When Pakistani forces crossed the Line of Control in Kargil in 1999, we did not respond through attacks on their territory. When calls for jihad against India are made from Pakistan, we do not respond with similar offensive rhetoric. We have already conveyed to the United States that we have no intention of complicating the current agenda and the operations in Afghanistan. We do, however, have a legitimate right to take whatever action we can in our country to thwart and respond to terrorism. This is what I had written to President Bush. Restraint, like dialogue, has to be a two-way process.

Q: India's apparent decision to open fire on Pakistani military positions across the line of control on the eve of Secretary Powell's visit to New Delhi was seen in Washington as an attempt by India to send a message to the U.S.? Was a message intended in this event, and if so, what was it?

Vajpayee: There is sufficient mutual confidence, openness and candour in India-U.S. relations today. There is no need for either of us to use any means other than speech or written texts to send messages to each other! A large group of terrorists were making a bid to cross our border from the Pakistani side. We took action to stop them. We have had to resort to this step from time to time to prevent large scale infiltration into India by terrorists from Pakistan.

Q: What concerns do you have that [Pakistan] President Musharraf is allowing greater latitude for the activities of anti-Indian militants to compensate for this participation in the anti-Taliban effort?

Vajpayee: Pakistan has not ended its sponsorship of cross-border terrorism in India. On Oct. 1, terrorists attacked the State Assembly in Srinagar. The leaders of a Pakistan-based terrorist group openly claimed responsibility for these attacks. This does seem to beat out what you have said. Pakistan must realize that it cannot support the campaign against international terrorism on one hand while sponsoring terrorist groups in India on the other.

India has the resolve, strength and stamina to resist this terrorism.

Q: Within a broad-based future government to replace the Taliban regime, how large a role must the Northern Alliance have? Many American analysts in Washington assert that the Northern Alliance alone does not have enough support in the south to win allegiance from Pashtuns and thus guarantee a stable long-term government. Do you agree?

Vajpayee: For peace and stability to be restored in Afghanistan, it is essential that a broad-based, representative multi-ethnic government is established, free from outside interference. The last decade of civil strife in Afghanistan was mainly on account of military foisting the Taliban regime on the people of Afghanistan.

As an important ethnic group, Pashtuns will naturally have to find adequate representation in any future multi-ethnic government in Afghanistan. However, the nature and structure of this future government will have to be decided by the Afghan people themselves. India have always had close historical ties with the Pashtuns of Afghanistan. Several Pushtun families, who escaped the conflict in Afganistan, have in fact sought refuge in India for the past 20 years.

Q: Would you accept a dominant role for Pashtun elements in the future Afghan government and could Pashtun commanders and tribal leaders who have supported the Taliban play a prominent role in this future government?

Vajpayee: There is a very strong consensus amongst the Afghan people for the establishment of a broad-based, multi-ethnic government, with adequate representation for all ethnic groups. As I have stated before, the exact nature and structure of this government will have to be determined by the Afghan people themselves. The Afghans are far too proud a people, to accept a government imposed from outside.

It would be a grave mistake to include any element of the Taliban in a future Afghanistan government. The international community cannot afford to live with an Afghanistan that continues to export terrorism and violent ideologies to the rest of the world.

Q: In your opinion, what are the main themes of Indian popular reaction to the war in Afghanistan? Are you concerned that opposition to the war domestically may constrain your own ability to act in alliance with the U.S. as the crisis unfolds?

Vajpayee: The Indian people have been victims of international terrorism for over two decades. We all understand that only strong measures are needed to root out the scourge of terrorism. The Indian people are acutely aware that the campaign in Afghanistan can at best be only one phase in a much longer and more difficult campaign that has to be joined if terrorism is to be defeated. Terrorism could not have acquired its current proportions without the active aid and abetment by countries who sponsor terrorism as instruments of foreign policy.

Q: Where is the BJP in its evolution? What steps must it take to become a clear majority party at the national level in India? Can that status be achieved, and how long will it take?

Vajpayee: The BJP is a political party in India with a distinct agenda. The popular appeal of this agenda can be gauged from the fact that the party won the largest number of seats in Parliament in the last two general elections in our country. We have joined together with other parties to form a coalition government. In doing so, each of the coalition partners has had to give up some part of its agenda. Such compromises are expected in a democracy.

I think the BJP has a dynamic agenda and will, in course of time, succeed in gaining an absolute majority of seats in our Parliament.

Q: President Musharraf has himself acknowledged that the American-led military actions in Afghanistan are generally unpopular with the Pakistani people but has continued to provide a range of support for the effort. How concerned are you about the stability of Musharraf's government?

Vajpayee: As a neighbor of Pakistan, we have always been concerned at the direction in which Pakistan's society has been moving. This is the direct consequence of the shortsighted policies pursued by Pakistan's military-dominated establishment ever since its creation in 1947. Pakistan must realize that the sponsorship of groups practicing terrorism and propagating extremist ideologies, eventually poses a threat to Pakistan's own long-term stability.

Q: How confident are you about the security of Pakistan's nuclear weapons? What steps would you encourage either Pakistan or the United States to take to secure these weapons? What preparations should be taken for the eventuality that the weapons could fall into militant hands?

Vajpayee: The question about the security of Pakistan's nuclear weapons should be addressed to the Pakistan government. It is not for us to answer for them. India has for years voiced serious concern about their nuclear weapon programme, its clandestine ways, their aims and ambitions, and the frightening identification of extremists and jihadis with those nuclear weapons. It is to be hoped that the official Pakistani claims about the safety and security of their nuclear weapons would be backed by actions on the ground and safeguards against unauthorised access.

Q: How would you describe for Americans India's nuclear weapons doctrine? How does that doctrine apply to this crisis? Does the possibility of an unstable Pakistani government raise new questions or concerns for India's nuclear policies?

Vajpayee: India's nuclear doctrine is purely defensive. Our minimum credible deterrent is based on no-first-use of nuclear weapons. We do not wish to get into any arms race and are fully committed to a unilateral moratorium on nuclear test explosions. Instability in Pakistan leading to unauthorized access to their weapons would certainly be a matter of grave concern. It is for this reason that India had suggested in Lahore in 1999 a set of nuclear C8Ms to begin with. We re-emphasized this at the Agra summit in July this year. However, we have not received any indication of Pakistan's willingness to respond.

----

Terrorism in India

November 9, 2001
Washington Post
Embassy Row,
James Morrison
http://www.washingtontimes.com/world/20011109-39834448.htm

U.S. Ambassador to India Robert Blackwill is trying to reassure India that the Bush administration considers terrorism against Indian civilians as serious as terrorism against Americans.

Mr. Blackwill also wants India to understand that U.S. cooperation with India's archrival Pakistan in the war in Afghanistan will have no negative impact on the growing U.S. relationship between Washington and New Delhi.

The new U.S. ambassador explained American interests in the subcontinent in an interview in this week's edition of the Indian-American newspaper India Abroad. His interview helped set the tone for today's meeting between President Bush and Indian Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee in Washington.

Mr. Blackwill said the war against Osama bin Laden's Afghan-based al Qaeda terrorist network is not confined to Afghanistan.

"The president has said the war on terrorism has to deal with terrorism against India," he said.

India yesterday suffered another terrorist attack when 10 persons, including a year-old child, were killed in explosions and shootouts in the disputed Kashmir region, where India accused Pakistan of sponsoring militant separatists.

"Dealing with terrorism in India must be part of the global war against terrorism," Mr. Blackwill said.

He also expressed understanding for India's concern about U.S. cooperation with Pakistan.

"We have assured the government of India frequently that we will take no steps with Pakistan that endanger India," he said.

Mr. Blackwill added that the United States can have good relations with both countries.

"We do not believe this is a zero-sum game," he said.

The ambassador also reiterated U.S. policy toward Kashmir, saying India and Pakistan must resolve the issue themselves.

"We do not see a role for an intermediary evolution in American policy toward Kashmir. We are not going to get diplomatically involved in Kashmir," he said.

Mr. Blackwill said Mr. Bush and Mr. Vajpayee, in their first face-to-face meeting, also will discuss India's nuclear-weapons program. The United States recently lifted sanctions imposed on India and Pakistan after each country conducted nuclear tests in 1998.

"We continue to be interested in the future of India's nuclear-weapons arsenal just as India is interested in the future of the U.S. nuclear arsenal," he said.

-------- treaties

Briefing Book: Secret History of the ABM Treaty

National Security Archive Update,
9 November 2001
From: Michael Evans <mevans@GWU.EDU>

Electronic Briefing Book No. 60:
THE SECRET HISTORY OF THE ABM TREATY, 1969-1972

Declassified Documents Show How the U.S. and USSR Reached Agreement on the Controversial Treaty that Is At the Center of Next Week's Bush-Putin Summit

http://www.nsarchive.org/NSAEBB/NSAEBB60/

Washington, D.C., 8 November 2001 - The most difficult topic to be discussed by Presidents Bush and Putin at the Crawford, Texas, summit next week, now that Russia is an ally in anti-terrorism operations, will be the Bush administration's intention to withdraw from, abrogate or rewrite (depending on what is negotiable) the ABM Treaty of 1972. Newly declassified documents posted on the Web today by George Washington University's National Security Archive reveal the previously secret inside story of the ABM negotiations, explaining why the U.S. and the USSR agreed that the Treaty was in their best interest, and how it specifically restricts what the Bush administration can do on missile defense. The documents, edited by Archive senior analyst William Burr, are entitled "The Secret History of the ABM Treaty, 1969-1972" and are available at http://www.nsarchive.org/NSAEBB/NSAEBB60/

Other U.S. administrations have chafed at the ABM Treaty but the Bush White House is the first to consider withdrawal. As national security adviser Condoleeza Rice has explained, the "treaty is so restrictive that anything you do that isn't ground-based that you use in an ABM mode, so to speak, is a violation of the treaty" (Los Angeles Times, 7/27/2001). New documents from the Nixon administration, including a never-before published record of one of national security adviser Henry Kissinger's back-channel telephone conversations with Soviet ambassador Anatoly Dobrynin, show how the ABM Treaty took the form and content it has, and why its architects found it useful to negotiate such a restrictive agreement. The documents reveal that:

-Nixon and Kissinger initially opposed strict limits on ABMs in order to strengthen U.S. retaliatory capability against a Soviet nuclear attack;

- The Soviets shocked Nixon and Kissinger by accepting a U.S. proposal to limit ABMs to defense of national capitals [national command authority/NCA], thereby undermining U.S. ABM plans presented to Congress;

- Kissinger would later profess to be puzzled by the initial U.S. offer: "I can't understand how it happened that we accepted NCA ... I often make mistakes but usually I know why afterward";

-One of thorniest negotiating issues was a U.S. initiative for a ban on space-based and advanced laser-type ABM systems, which the Soviet military was reluctant to accept; later the Reagan administration tried to reinterpret treaty language on "future" weapons systems in order to allow SDI development

- Nixon's negotiators accepted limitations on future U.S. freedom of action as a necessary trade-off to prevent Soviet development of Ms and reduce incentives for both sides to ratchet up nuclear arsenals

According to Ambassador Raymond L. Garthoff, a member of the original SALT negotiating team and an historian of detente associated with the Brookings Institution, "these well-chosen documents give valuable insight into the SALT negotiating process, not only the Kissinger back channel to the Soviet leadership but also the front channel that produced the ABM treaty."

THE NATIONAL SECURITY ARCHIVE is an independent non-governmental research institute and library located at The George Washington University in Washington, D.C. The Archive collects and publishes declassified documents acquired through the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). A tax-exempt public charity, the Archive receives no U.S. government funding; publication royalties and donations from foundations and individuals support its budget.

-------- u.s. nuc facilities

-------- california

IBM to Build Second Blue Gene Supercomputer

New York Times
November 9, 2001
By REUTERS
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/technology/tech-tech-ibm-supercomputer.html?searchpv=reuters

NEW YORK - IBM Corp.said on Friday it will build a supercomputer that is smaller and 15 times speedier than the current fastest computer, enabling users to solve complex questions more quickly and opening the door for its commercial use.

The new computer is expected to be used for everything from weather modeling to studying genomics data and running commercial database applications, IBM said.

It is the second computer planned as part of an expanding five-year, $100 million project called Blue Gene which IBM began in 1999 with the intention of studying proteins. ``Our initial exploration made us realize we can expand our Blue Gene project to deliver more commercially viable architectures for a broad customer set and still accomplish our original goal of protein science simulations,'' Mark Dean, vice president of systems for IBM Research said in a statement.

IBM is working on the new computer, which is called Blue Gene/L, with the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, a Livermore, California research lab that is part of the Department of Energy's National Nuclear Security Agency.

Blue Gene/L is expected to be completed in 2004, about 1-1/2 years before the other Blue Gene computer, called Blue Gene/C. That is in part because it will be smaller and slower than the Blue Gene/C.

But it will be more than fast enough to expand beyond the scientific and technical applications that it is working on with Livermore, IBM said. The company is looking for a partner to work on commercial applications, like Web serving and hosting, financial modeling, and data searching.

FASTER, CHEAPER, SMALLER

Blue Gene/L will have a processing speed of 200 teraflops, or 200 trillion calculations per second. That's slower than Blue Gene/C's anticipated 1,000 trillion calculations per second, but about 15 times faster than the world's current fastest computer, which is called ASCI White.

ASCI White is located at the Livermore lab and was made for the Department of Energy's Accelerated Strategic Computing Initiative, or ASCI, and unveiled in June of 2000. ASCI White runs at 12 trillion calculations per second, or 12 teraflops.

In addition to being faster than ASCI White, the Blue Gene/L will consume 15 times less power than ASCI White and teraflop for teraflop, is up to 50 times smaller.

``We get the same amount of computation at roughly one-tenth to one-fiftieth of the space required,'' said Bill Pulleyblank, director of exploratory server systems at IBM.

Computing power aside, ASCI White is still several times larger than the Blue Gene/L will be. It's about the size of two basketball courts, while Blue Gene/L could fit into one-half of a tennis court, IBM said.

In addition, he said, Blue Gene/L will be able to solve some problems in days rather than weeks, which can be important for commercial applications.

``If it takes us three or four days of computation to help an airline build its crew schedule for next month, that's fine as a planning tool,'' Pulleyblank said. ``But if we're trying to run that to respond to a snow storm which just hit LaGaurdia (airport), coming back three or four days later to tell how the people are going to be rerouted is not satisfactory.''

The Blue Gene computers would run on chips that contain cells, or processors with both memory and communications circuits. The ASCI White uses off-the-shelf processors with a souped-up version of IBM's commercial operating system.

-------- colorado

LAWMAKERS PROD ENERGY DEPARTMENT ON ROCKY FLATS PLUTONIUM SHIPMENT

Congressman Mark Udall's Newsletter
From: <ima_co02iq@mail.house.gov>
Date: Fri, 9 Nov 2001

In a letter to Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham, Gov. Bill Owens, Senator Wayne Allard and Congressman Udall urge him to resolve a conflict over the plutonium shipment schedule from Rocky Flats to DOE's Savannah River Site in South Carolina. They also asked him to outline how any solution with South Carolina may impact the plutonium shipment schedule and ultimate cleanup and closure of Rocky Flats.

In order for DOE to accomplish the cleanup and closure of Rocky Flats, the surplus plutonium at the site must be safely removed and disposed of at the Savannah River facility. Due to budgetary decisions by the DOE, South Carolina officials have expressed opposition to receiving surplus plutonium from Rocky Flats. This situation has created concerns about the removal and shipment of plutonium from Rocky Flats-especially about the schedule to cleanup and close Rocky Flats by the year 2006. DOE officials have indicated that they are working to resolve this issue so as not to place the plutonium shipments at risk.

"We in Colorado need to make sure that whatever happens between DOE and Savannah River will not result in impacts top our cleanup and closure efforts at Rocky Flats. This letter indicates that we are united in Colorado in seeing this resolved and that we want to make sure that the continued cleanup of Rocky Flats is not harmed," said Udall.

-------- idaho

INEEL DECLARED A NATIONAL USER FACILITY

November 9, 2001
ENS
http://www.ens-news.com/ens/nov2001/2001L-11-09-09.html

IDAHO FALLS, Idaho, The Safety and Tritium Applied Research (STAR) facility at the Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Lab (INEEL) has been declared a "national user facility," opening the facility's resources to increased scientific research from around the world.

"By designating STAR a national user facility, the department is increasing accessing to this important research facility for scientists and researchers across the world," said Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham. "INEEL has a reputation of being an outstanding research facility in the area of fusion safety and I am pleased to open this facility to new and different research. Supporting fusion safety research is another example of the way the INEEL applies technical expertise to support DOE's major missions in science, energy and environment."

The STAR facility houses specialized systems for investigating the consequences of accidents in fusion reactors. Scientists believe fusion can be an almost infinite source of energy, but learning to safely harness the reaction is a tremendous challenge.

The facility is designed to host a number of experiments to determine how tritium, the fuel in a fusion reaction, interacts with other materials used to produce a fusion reaction. The STAR facility is now hosting a collaboration between the United States and Japan to explore a number of fusion safety research initiatives.

In addition, Abraham said that the department's Environmental Management Science Program has awarded INEEL $1.5 million in grant funding over the next three years for research to support the department's Environmental Management cleanup program.

The grants, to fund research initiatives to develop new approaches to dealing with the disposition of high level waste and the deactivation and decontamination of facilities, are part of 45 research grants totaling $39 million.

-------- nevada

Tunnel fire cited as cause for nuke waste changes

Las Vegas SUN
November 02, 2001
By Mary Manning <manning@lasvegassun.com>
http://www.lasvegassun.com/sunbin/stories/text/2001/nov/02/512568174.html

Gov. Kenny Guinn and state attorneys have asked the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to immediately amend rules that apply to the shipment of radioactive waste.

Guinn's request came after the release of a study that factored in the presence of nuclear waste in a July 18 accident in Baltimore, where a train hauling toxic materials derailed in a tunnel. The accident led to a fire that shut down a portion of the city for more than a week.

State officials have asked for a formal hearing concerning the report.

If Yucca Mountain, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas, is approved by the Department of Energy to store 77,000 tons of the nation's high-level radioactive waste, the nuclear waste would be shipped to the site from locations throughout the county.

The report, "Radiological Consequences of Severe Rail Accidents Involving Spent Nuclear Fuel Shipments to Yucca Mountain: Hypothetical Baltimore Rail Tunnel Fire Involving SNF (spent nuclear fuel)," was released to the public Thursday.

The report analyzes the hypothetical release of radiation that subsequently blows 43 miles from a leaking nuclear waste container. Radioactive waste from the Calvert Cliffs reactor in Maryland would pass through the Baltimore tunnel en route to Yucca Mountain.

The analysis relied on weather and environmental conditions that were present during the five-day fire.

A "worst case" blaze could cause seals on either end of a metal container to crack, subsequently releasing enough radiation to expose 345,493 people and cause eight to 50 cases of cancer, the report says.

Total cleanup costs were estimated at $13.7 billion.

"In order to reduce a longterm dose, significant decontamination of the affected areas would be required, along with the likely relocation of a large number of households and businesses most affected," wrote the study's authors, Matthew Lamb and Marvin Resnikoff of Radioactive Waste Management Associates.

If an appropriate evacution and decontamination plan was in place, exposures could be "significantly" reduced, the report said, although the warning system must improve. Although Civil Defense sirens were activated as a result of the fire, residents became confused and did not immediately turn on televisions or radios, the report said.

"Regardless, the scenario involving a spent nuclear fuel cask in a situation similar to the Baltimore tunnel fire would be disastrous," the 20-page report concluded.

Guinn sent a copy of the report to Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev.

"As you will see from the report, the consequences of such an accident involving spent fuel would be disastrous," Guinn wrote in a separate memo.

"It's definitely another arrow in our arsenal," Reid spokesman Nathan Naylor said.

Two years ago Nevada asked the NRC to review rules -- adopted in 1983 -- that outline how nuclear facilities would be protected against terrorism. The NRC has not responded to the state's request.

NRC Chairman Richard Meserve has ordered such a review, which is ongoing, an NRC spokesman said Thursday.

On Oct. 16, a Washington-based law firm that is working for the state in its fight against Yucca, asked Meserve for a formal hearing on the transportation of nuclear waste and security measures in place at DOE facilities throughout the country.

"The Sept. 11 terrorist attacks against New York City and Washington, D.C., have, unfortunately, proven the state of Nevada's petition to be prophetic," wrote Washington attorney William Briggs Jr. of Ross, Dixon & Bell L.L.P., to Meserve.

------- new york

INDIAN POINT
Groups Warn of Calamity if A-Plants Are Attacked

New York Times
November 9, 2001
By ROBERT WORTH
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/11/09/nyregion/09NUKE.html?searchpv=nytToday

Environmentalists and public officials, including three members of Congress and nine members of the State Legislature, presented a petition to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission yesterday, warning that the Indian Point nuclear plants, 35 miles north of Midtown Manhattan on the Hudson River, are vulnerable to terrorist attack and should be shut down until they can be made safe.

A group of those who signed the petition, including Andrew M. Cuomo, the former secretary of Housing and Urban Development, and Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the chief prosecuting attorney for Riverkeeper, an environmental group in Garrison, N.Y., gathered on the steps of New York's City Hall to stress their position.

"If the American Airlines Flight 11 that flew down the Hudson River had, instead of hitting the twin towers in New York, banked left and hit the twin towers of Indian Point, we would have a much more dire situation than we're facing now," Mr. Kennedy said.

Security has been high at the plants since Sept. 11, with National Guard troops standing guard and Coast Guard cutters running round- the-clock patrols on the Hudson River. Federal officials say that there is no need to close the plants and that safety improvements have been made since Sept. 11.

But the petitioners, who included two members of the City Council and more than two dozen state and local officials from the area around the plants, said those measures were not enough. They said a terrorist attack could cause a disastrous release of radiation at Indian Point, whose two reactors are in the most densely populated area around any nuclear plant in the country. About 20 million people live within a 50-mile radius of the plants.

Jim Steets, a spokesman for Entergy, the company that owns the plant, said that closing it would accomplish nothing, and that it would be far harder for a jet to hit the plants than a large target like the World Trade Center. He added that even a direct hit would not necessarily cause a meltdown that would result in a wide release of radiation.

"The evacuation plan does consider a worst-case scenario, and even then you would have 8 to 10 hours to evacuate," Mr. Steets said.

The evacuation plan, which is reviewed every two years by the federal government and is based on the removal of people within a 10-mile radius of the plants, has come under fire in recent weeks, with many local officials saying publicly that they do not believe it is practical.

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission, in reviewing safety measures after the Sept. 11 attack, is trying to determine what would happen if a large aircraft were to hit a nuclear plant like Indian Point, said Neil Sheehan, a spokesman for the agency.

But Mr. Kennedy and others said yesterday that federal regulators had never tested the security of the spent fuel at the plant, which contains far more radioactive material than the reactors themselves but is not protected by a containment structure, as the reactors are.

Those concerns have been echoed at plants elsewhere in the country in recent weeks. On Nov. 1, the House Energy and Commerce Committee voted to require the N.R.C. to review the potential for attacks on nuclear plants.

Several speakers at City Hall yesterday emphasized that although safety was a concern at all of the nation's nuclear plants, it made sense to shut down Indian Point because of its proximity to the New York metropolitan area and because use of the plants is less necessary during the winter, when energy is not as likely to be in short supply.

---

Coalition Demands Shutdown of Indian Point Reactors

By Cat Lazaroff
November 9, 2001
ENS
http://www.ens-news.com/ens/nov2001/2001L-11-09-06.html

WASHINGTON, DC, The nuclear reactors of the Indian Point power plant should be closed indefinitely, a coalition of environmental and civic groups and elected officials said Thursday. The coalition told the Nuclear Regulatory Commission that the plant, located just 40 miles north of New York City, poses far too great a risk to the nation's largest city in the event of a terrorist attack.

With a petition filed with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), the coalition called on the agency to order an immediate shutdown of the Indian Point facility and to keep it closed until a full review of the plant's vulnerabilities and safety systems is conducted. Indian Point's two functioning nuclear reactors are located on the Hudson River about 40 miles north of mid-town Manhattan.

Indian Point includes three reactors - Unit 2 (left), Unit 3 (right) and Unit 1 (center, now shut down) (Photo courtesy Entergy)

Citing catastrophic risks to public health and safety and to the world's financial center, the coalition stated that the events of September 11 "clearly demonstrate that the plant's status needs to be reexamined."

While not calling for a permanent shutdown at this stage, the coalition argued that the enormous safety risks Indian Point poses to the region cannot be justified by the plant's limited economic benefit - namely providing a cheap source of power in the summer months when electricity demand is high. The coalition pointed out that with summer over, now might be the best time to close down both Units 2 and 3 and take the opportunity to study the plant's ability to operate safely.

"In light of the September 11th suicide bombing and Indian Point's proximity to the country's most densely populated metropolis, prudence dictates that the plant be shut down until Entergy demonstrates that it can protect the public from a terrorist attack," said Alex Matthiessen, executive director of Riverkeeper, one of the groups leading the campaign.

Entergy Corporation purchased the Indian Point 1 and 2 reactors from Consolidated Edison in September. Indian Point 1 has been shut down and in storage since the early 1970s. Entergy purchased Indian Point 3 from Con Edison in November 2000.

The petitioners are asking the NRC to assess the vulnerability of Indian Point to terrorist attacks, review the adequacy of existing security systems and evacuation plans, and to make recommendations on how to minimize the facility's risks to public safety.

One NRC study found that a catastrophic meltdown of the Indian Point 3 reactor could lead to more than 200,000 deaths (Photo courtesy New York Power Authority)

The coalition also asked the NRC to order an immediate transfer of the plant's highly radioactive spent fuel rods from a wet cooling pool system, where they are now, to a dry cask system - a technology that could significantly increase the security of the spent fuel.

"The plant's vulnerability to a major terrorist attack has never been studied," noted Matthiessen. "Yet we do know the risks are real and grave. Some 20 million Americans live within Indian Point's 50 mile fall out zone that could be irradiated following a meltdown or spent fuel fire. At the time Indian Point 2 was licensed in 1974, one of the Atomic Energy Commission's own officials said that siting a plant so close to New York was 'insane.'"

On September 11, when two hijacked airplanes were flown into the twin towers of the World Trade Center, some experts immediately wondered what the effect would have been if the terrorists had targeted a nuclear power plant. While the NRC at first said the heavily shielded containment towers around all reactors would protect against the release of nuclear radioactivity, the agency later changed its tune.

The NRC admitted last month that it "did not specifically contemplate attacks by aircraft such as Boeing 757s or 767s" - the types of planes used to destroy the World Trade Center towers and heavily damage the recently fortified Pentagon.

While the containment buildings that shelter nuclear reactors are able to withstand severe events including hurricanes, tornadoes and earthquakes, "nuclear power plants were not designed to withstand such crashes," the agency said in a statement. "Detailed engineering analyses of a large airliner crash have not yet been performed."

Entergy spokesperson Jim Steets said closing the Indian Point plant would not make it safer, and noted that the plant is a far smaller target than the massive, 110 story tall World Trade Center towers. Even a direct hit by a plane would not necessarily lead to a meltdown of the reactors' nuclear fuel, or a widespread release of radiation, Streets said.

If a meltdown did result, the plant has an evacuation plan, as required by the NRC, and that plan accounts for even the worst case scenarios, Streets argued. The federal government reviews such plans every two years, and requires that they include the complete evacuation of all people within a 10 mile radius of the plant within eight to 10 hours after an accident - a proposal not everyone believes is feasible.

Robert F. Kennedy Jr., an environmental lawyer who works with Riverkeeper, an organization dedicated to revitalizing the Hudson River (Photo courtesy New Hampshire College)

"If the United Airlines jet that traveled down the Hudson Valley en route to the twin towers had instead banked a left turn into one of Indian Point's twin reactors, the resulting disaster would have been even more horrific than the World Trade Center catastrophe," said Robert Kennedy, Jr., chief prosecuting attorney for Riverkeeper. "Given the southerly direction of prevailing winds in the Hudson Valley, a meltdown or major radioactive release at Indian Point could result in death and chronic radiation sickness for thousands if not tens of thousands of the region's citizens and render much of the New York metropolitan area permanently uninhabitable."

Paul Leventhal, president of the Nuclear Control Institute (NCI), noted that simply shutting down the reactors would not substantially reduce the consequences of a radioactive release, were terrorists to successfully penetrate the plants and destroy their essential safety systems. But during a shutdown of just 20 days, Leventhal argued, officials could take steps that would reduce the number of people who might die immediately after a core meltdown and containment breach by 80 percent.

The number of potential long term cancer deaths could be slashed by 50 percent during a brief shutdown, according to a preliminary analysis by NCI.

Leventhal pointed out that removing the fuel from the reactors - something than can be done between six and eight days after shutdown - would allow security forces to focus their protection on the spent fuel pools where this highly radioactive fuel, as well as all fuel previously removed from the reactors, is now stored.

Most of the radiation at Indian Point is stored in spent fuel pools designed as only a temporary repository for the nuclear waste. Spent fuel pools are particularly vulnerable because they lie outside the containment domes and tend to be poorly protected in cement or metal buildings.

In 1982, Congress directed the federal government to identify a centralized site to safely store the nation's spent fuel. A controversial site at Yucca Mountain, Nevada, is currently the only site under consideration as a permanent repository for spent nuclear fuel, but the facility is years away from being ready to accept nuclear wastes.

Paul Leventhal, president of the Washington DC based Nuclear Control Institute (NCI) (Photo courtesy NCI)

"Taking the straightforward step of a temporary reactor shut down to reduce the risks and consequences of a successful terrorist assault will help the 20 million people who live and work in the New York metropolitan area sleep a little easier," said NCI's Leventhal. "It will also allow the plant operator and public officials at all levels to develop and to test defensive measures for the reactor and the spent fuel pool that are sufficient to repel the new terrorist threat."

"That threat, made manifest on September 11, is at least 19 suicidal and sophisticated terrorists attacking from four different directions," noted Leventhal. "Until Indian Point can be protected against that threat, it should not be allowed to operate. Unless Indian Point is shut down, there will not be the financial and political imperative to get the job done right."

Indian Point's two reactors supply 1800 megawatts of power to New York City and Westchester County, enough to power 1.8 million homes. The Pace University Energy Project contends that because there are numerous sources of power around the region, removing Indian Point from the grid would not affect energy reliability, even in the peak summer months.

As to the price of electricity, "During the non-summer months of September through May, an absence of Indian Point power would have a negligible effect on the region's electricity prices," said Dick Ottinger, dean emeritus and professor of law at the Pace Energy Project.

"With the new circumstances we face, there's absolutely no justification for not shutting the reactors down, at least until next summer, and using the time to get a better handle on the risks," Ottinger said.

The coalition believes that a successful attack on the spent fuel pools could lead to a catastrophic fire and a widespread release of radiation. Depending on the size of the fire and wind direction, New York City could be cloaked in radioactive material.

Coalition members pointed to a 1982 NRC study that attempted to estimate the "peak" number of deaths and casualties that would result from a meltdown at Indian Point. Under a meltdown scenario at Indian Point 3 alone, the agency predicted up to 50,000 non-cancer radiation sickness deaths within a year of an accident, up to 14,000 additional deaths over time due to cancer, and up to 167,000 cases of ongoing radiation related health problems.

The group also pointed to another 1982 NRC study on the economic impacts on Westchester County. According to the study, a meltdown at Indian Point 3 would result in a loss of $314 billion, in 1982 dollars, to Westchester's property and commercial interests. Adjusted for inflation and a quadrupling of real estate prices since 1982, the figure could be closer to $2.3 trillion, in 2000 dollars, the coalition said.

Including the effect on New York City and other surrounding counties would result in a figure in the tens of trillions of dollars in economic losses.

The petition to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission is available at:
http://www.nci.org/01NCI/11/NRCPetition.htm

-------- us nuc politics

House Panel Allocates $1.67 Billion For Pentagon Counterterrorism Bid
$50 Million Is Earmarked To Test Equipment to Detect Portable Nuclear Weapons

By Dan Morgan
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, November 9, 2001; Page A12
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A64799-2001Nov8?language=printer

In the first attempt by Congress to adjust the defense budget to new security threats, a key House committee has added $1.67 billion for Pentagon counterterrorism efforts, including $50 million to test equipment that could detect small, smuggled nuclear devices.

Under a plan approved by the House Appropriations Committee -- and strongly recommended in an unclassified report by the independent Defense Science Board -- Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld would have 180 days to select four military sites for the tests, which would involve trying to pinpoint the presence of nuclear materials or even a warhead, sources said.

Advanced detection devices exist at several of the nation's nuclear laboratories and have been used by the Energy Department's Nuclear Emergency Search Team.

But scientists and congressional officials said this week that they have never been brought together in a way that would enable local law enforcement agencies to ferret out suitcase-size weapons smuggled into U.S. ports or past border guards.

The broader test of the equipment is ordered in a new counterterrorism title added to a $317.4 billion defense appropriations bill for 2002 that could reach the House floor next week. Although the test had not been requested by the Pentagon, congressional officials noted that President Bush has voiced concern about the threat from a small nuclear device.

Speaking by phone Nov. 6 to a Warsaw conference on terrorism, Bush warned that Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda organization was "seeking chemical, biological and nuclear weapons," making it a "threat to civilization itself."

The defense bill, which was revised after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks in New York and Washington, reflects heightened concerns over the nation's vulnerability to unconventional warfare. It allocates $11.8 billion to the counterterrorism account, with increases for defense against weapons of mass destruction, chemical-biological warfare and cyber-attacks, as well as for nonproliferation programs in Russia.

"We spent a lot of energy designing and rearranging our bill after September 11th in a way that would reflect other challenges, whether cyberwar or briefcase bombs," said Rep. Jerry Lewis (R-Calif.), who chairs the committee's defense panel.

The bulk of the funds in the new counterterrorism account -- $7.8 billion -- still go to Bush's top priority of ballistic missile defense, a priority that could run into criticism as the defense measure works its way through Congress.

Although the Appropriations Committee cut nearly $500 million from the administration request for missile defense, some senior members express concern that the huge commitment drains funds that could be used to confront more immediate threats.

Rep. John P. Murtha (D-Pa.), ranking member on the defense appropriations subcommittee, this week stressed the need to beef up funding of human intelligence-gathering and training and organizing state National Guard units within the national effort.

"There's a war going on," Murtha said. "We think more money is needed for counterterrorism."

According to a White House budget analysis done earlier this year, the administration's counterterrorism budget for national security agencies grew by 3 percent. That compared with a 59 percent increase for missile defense.

At the same time, the defense spending bill, following the president's recommendation, imposes a 10 percent cut in the funding of "threat reduction programs" aimed at preventing the nuclear, chemical and biological weapons in the former Soviet Union from falling into the hands of terrorists.

According to Roger L. Hagengruber, a Sandia National Laboratory scientist who directed an advisory task force for the Pentagon on unconventional nuclear defense, advanced capabilities exist that could guard against the threat to the country from a small nuclear bomb.

These include unmanned sensors, radiation detectors and imaging tools emitting gamma rays and neutrons that can penetrate shields to locate highly enriched uranium, Hagengruber said.

The challenge, he added, will be to integrate them in a permanently deployable system that could be operated relatively cheaply by law enforcement personnel to check ships and trucks in busy harbors or border crossing points.

The House committee called on the Pentagon to run the tests at diverse military sites that might include a port, an air base and installations with heavy traffic. "There's no question this has to be done," Murtha said. "These are the kind of things we want to be prepared for."

The report produced for the Pentagon and the Defense Science Board by Hagengruber's advisory group estimated that 1,500 tons of "weapons capable" nuclear materials exist in Russia. It said that a weapon could be made from around four pounds of such material and that it could weigh as little as 20 pounds for a device delivered by an artillery piece.

Worldwide, about 5,000 tons of weapons-capable material is available. Short of a nuclear weapon, the Science Board report said, terrorists might be able to produce a "radiological dispersal device" that would use a conventional explosive to spread toxic plutonium or strontium-90 over a wide area.

--------

[It's really hard to visualize Hollywood as being "liberal" -- other than with sex and violence. et]

White House, Hollywood elite to meet

November 9, 2001
By Jennifer Harper
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
http://www.washingtontimes.com/national/20011109-12951586.htm

Slow change may be afoot in big media as New York and Hollywood attempt to shed their old traditional liberal skins for the sake of the national interest.

With Osama bin Laden appearing on prime-time and news coverage often tainted by misinformation, disinformation and flippant journalists, the need for a one-two punch from America's mighty news and entertainment complex has become more compelling - and realistic. Terrorism takes an intangible toll on the public psyche, warranting reprisal from the broadcast and film arsenal.

A formidable group of media heavies has received an invitation from the White House, and not for a chance to sleep in the Lincoln Bedroom. Tuesday afternoon, 40 top executives got a simple fax, asking them to convene Sunday with President Bush's senior adviser, Karl Rove, at the Peninsula Hotel in Beverly Hills.

"The anticipated outcome of the meeting would be an initial plan encompassing several substantive ways we can lend support to our nation's cause," the single-page announcement advised. "We assure you that this will be a private, confidential, working meeting of the most senior administration officials and entertainment industry principals only. No press or elected officials will be present."

The acceptance list now includes News Corp. Chairman Rupert Murdoch, Viacom chiefs Sumner Redstone and Jonathan Dolgen, Motion Picture Association of America's Jack Valenti and Sherry Lansing, chairman of Paramount Pictures.

Will we return to the Hollywood of World War II, when John Wayne made patriotic features and Army Air Corps Capt. Ronald Reagan appeared in some 400 motivational films? Maybe.

Mr. Valenti was reserved. "It has nothing to do with the kind of movies we make," he told the Hollywood Reporter yesterday. "But there are other ways to help."

Documentary films, public service announcements, trailers in movie theaters and messages broadcast to Afghanistan are among the possibilities, he said.

There was a dress rehearsal for all this Oct. 17 when White House aides met informally with Hollywood creatives, seeking suggestions for a possible media role in the war on terrorism. Organizers have upped the ante: sending a senior White house official like Mr. Rove to Hollywood, Mr. Valenti said, was a savvy move.

The agenda remains shrouded in mystery. Washington and Tinseltown are mum, though some critics already fret that "propaganda" will result.

White House spokeswoman Ari Fleischer assured reporters yesterday that his office "has great respect for the creativity of the industry and recognizes its ability to educate at home and abroad." The invitation itself stressed the need to "communicate, educate and inspire."

Some insiders have faith. "Hollywood can contribute in positive ways without becoming a propaganda organ" one top executive told Variety.

But all is not idyllic in broadcast relationships. In the December Talk magazine, ABC's "Politically Incorrect" host Bill Maher announced he expects to lose his job next year because of inopportune comments he made after the September 11 attacks. Mr. Maher had called recent U.S. military actions "cowardly."

The Radio-Television News Directors Association took the Defense Department to task for renewing an exclusive contract with Space Imaging Inc., which the group says denies "media access" to satellite imagery over Afghanistan.

"Taxpayer dollars are being used to preclude the media from adequately informing the public," wrote President Barbara Cochran to Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld.

Meanwhile, MSNBC President Erik Sorenson complained that fingerpointing "patriotism police" plague news coverage, while actor George Clooney called Fox News Channel's Bill O'Reilley "Joseph McCarthy" after the conservative host said Hollywood "weasels" were merely seeking publicity during a recent telethon fund-raiser for terrorism victims.

It was CBS' Dan Rather and ABC's Peter Jennings, Mr. Clooney said, who were the real "journalists."

• Contact Jennifer Harper at jharper@washingtontimes.com or 202/636-3085.

-------- us nuc waste

Nuclear waste expert to be nominee to lead DOE branch
Position requires oversight of proposal for Yucca Mountain repository

Las Vegas Review-Journal
Friday, November 09, 2001
By STEVE TETREAULT
http://www.lvrj.com/lvrj_home/2001/Nov-09-Fri-2001/news/17413129.html

WASHINGTON -- A national laboratory program manager who has worked for more than 20 years on nuclear waste issues is being tapped by President Bush to head the office that is considering Yucca Mountain in Nevada as a repository for spent nuclear fuel.

The White House announced Thursday that the president intends to nominate Margaret S.Y. Chu to head the Office of Civilian Radioactive Waste Management, a branch of the Department of Energy.

Les Shephard, a spokesman for Sandia National Laboratories, said Chu until recently was director of the Nuclear Waste Management Program Center at the Albuquerque, N.M., labs. She presently is on assignment in Washington for Sandia, he said.

Sandia's nuclear waste management program is a 160-person office that has conducted research on Yucca Mountain; the Waste Isolation Pilot Project in New Mexico; nuclear waste programs at the Hanford reservation in Washington; and repository programs in Japan, Korea, Sweden, Germany and Switzerland.

Chu, who has a doctorate in physical chemistry, has worked at Sandia since 1980, the White House said. Her jobs have included deputy manager of the Waste Isolation Pilot Project, and manager of the Environmental Risk Assessment and Waste Management Department. She was involved in the certification of WIPP, and development of various nuclear waste disposal regulations.

Efforts to reach Chu Thursday night were not successful.

Once Bush follows through with a nomination, Chu will be considered by the Senate for the job. The post has been vacant since Bush took office in January. The office's most recent director was Ivan Itkin, a Clinton appointee. Lake Barrett, a veteran DOE manager, has been serving as acting director.

If confirmed, Chu will take over what is viewed as one of the most challenging projects in the government: exploring the development of an underground repository that could contain radioactivity from 77,000 tons of spent nuclear fuel for 10,000 years. Yucca Mountain, 100 miles northwest of Las Vegas, is the only site being studied.

Chu would oversee 160 federal employees in Washington and Nevada, and 1,500 government contract workers. The budget for the program is $375 million, some $70 million less than the Energy Department requested from Congress.

Nevada officials said they know little about Chu.

"Her big job is going to be how to deal with a restricted budget and to try to get all the work done that they've committed to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. It will be a big balancing act," said Steve Frishman, technical policy coordinator for the Nevada Nuclear Projects Agency.


-------- MILITARY

-------- biological weapons

THE INQUIRY
Experts See F.B.I. Missteps Hampering Anthrax Inquiry

November 9, 2001
THE NEW YORK TIMES
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/11/09/national/09INQU.html

This article was reported and written by William J. Broad, David Johnston, Judith Miller and Paul Zielbauer.

The federal inquiry into the anthrax attacks has stumbled in several areas and may have missed opportunities to gather valuable evidence as criminal investigators have been unable to fully grasp the scientific complexities of the case.

Government officials, scientists and investigators said the Federal Bureau of Investigation's initial unfamiliarity with the intricacies of anthrax had contributed to a series of missteps and other possible errors.

The F.B.I. came under withering criticism this week in Congress for the lack of progress in the investigation, and bureau officials acknowledged in interviews that they had been forced to turn to outside experts for advice on how to investigate the most serious bioterrorism attack in the nation's history. But they said the inquiry was following a logical strategy.

In a plan announced yesterday by Attorney General John Ashcroft, the bureau, and other parts of the Justice Department, would be revamped to better prevent terror attacks, and the government would use new powers to tap lawyer-client conversations with defendants in terrorist cases.

Several experts, including some on whom the F.B.I. has relied, said the anthrax investigation had taken some wrong turns.

Shortly after the first case of anthrax arose, the F.B.I. said it had no objection to the destruction of a collection of anthrax samples at Iowa State University, but some scientists involved in the investigation now say that collection may have contained genetic clues valuable to the inquiry.

Criminal investigators have not visited many of the companies, laboratories and academic institutions with the equipment or capability to make the kind of highly potent anthrax sent in a letter to Senator Tom Daschle, the majority leader. Where investigators have conducted interviews, they often seemed to ask general questions unlikely to elicit new evidence, several laboratory directors said.

Just this week, more than a month after the first death from inhalation anthrax, the F.B.I. issued a subpoena asking laboratories for the names of all workers and researchers who had been vaccinated against anthrax. And the F.B.I. is only now establishing electronic bulletin boards to allow members of scientific groups to interact with criminal investigators working the case.

"The bureau was caught almost as unaware and unprepared as the public was for these events," said Bill Tobin, a former forensic metallurgist who worked for the F.B.I. crime laboratory in Washington. "It's just unrealistic to ask 7,000 agents to overnight become sufficiently knowledgeable about bioterrorist agents and possible means of theft of those items and how they might be disseminated lethally to an American populace."

There is no reason to believe that any of the investigators' actions contributed to their inability to identify clear leads in the anthrax attacks that have killed four people and led to the treatment of thousands of others.

John Collingwood, the F.B.I.'s spokesman, said last night: "We have a plan and are proceeding based in large part on what the people we are consulting with told us would be the most productive places to begin. We reached out to scientists and public health officials on the best way to proceed."

Asked about the course of the bureau's investigation, a senior F.B.I. official who spoke on condition of anonymity said: "This is a learning curve for everybody. Every single day, if not hourly, we're all learning something about this. If you take several weeks back, the learning curve, we were all behind it."

Evidence Disappears Last month, after consulting with the F.B.I., Iowa State University in Ames destroyed anthrax spores collected over more than seven decades and kept in more than 100 vials. A variant of the so-called Ames strain had been implicated in the death of a Florida man from inhalation anthrax, and the university was nervous about security.

Now, a dispute has arisen, with scientists in and out of government saying the rush to destroy the spores may have eliminated crucial evidence about the anthrax in the letters sent to Congress and the news media.

If the archive still existed, it would by no means solve the mystery. But scientists said a precise match between the anthrax that killed four people and a particular strain in the collection might have offered hints as to when that bacteria had been isolated and, perhaps, how widely it had been distributed to researchers. And that, in turn, might have given investigators important clues to the killer's identity.

Martin E. Hugh-Jones, an anthrax expert at Louisiana State University who is aiding the federal investigation, said the mystery is likely to persist. "If those cultures were still alive," he said, they could have helped in "clearing up the muddy history."

Ronald M. Atlas, president-elect of the American Society of Microbiology, the world's largest group of germ professionals, based in Washington, said the legal implications could be large. "Potentially," he said, "it loses evidence that would have been useful" in the criminal investigation.

The F.B.I. says it never explicitly approved the destruction of the cultures, but never objected either.

A law enforcement official said that when approached by the Ames laboratory about the destruction of its anthrax inventory, the Omaha F.B.I. office consulted with the Miami F.B.I. office, which was responsible for the initial anthrax case in Florida. He said Miami investigators, after consulting with scientists, had advised the Omaha office that the Ames strain was so widespread that it had no investigative or evidentiary value. "Based on that there were no objections," to the destruction of the material by the Iowa laboratory, the official said.

Several experts said the episode underscored how the bureau traditionally has had trouble understanding the language, and the demands, of science.

"There's a chasm between what's going on in the courtroom and forensic arena," said Mr. Tobin, the former F.B.I. scientist, who has criticized the bureau's investigative methods. The flow of scientific data, he said, "just doesn't seem to make it" into criminal investigations.

And a senior federal scientist familiar with the germ investigation added: "You're still dealing with the mentality that says anthrax is anthrax is anthrax, and doesn't realize that there are deeper signatures."

Intertwined with the mystery of the Ames strain's history is the question of whether it was used in America's abandoned effort to develop anthrax as a weapon from 1943 to 1969, when President Richard M. Nixon renounced germ warfare.

The scientific literature is contradictory. A 1986 paper by Army researchers said the strain did not arise until 1980. But a paper in 2000 by Dr. Hugh-Jones, Paul J. Jackson of the Los Alamos National Laboratory, Paul Keim of Northern Arizona University and five other anthrax researchers asserted that the Ames strain had played a central role in the biological warfare program in the United States.

If true, that could raise the question of whether the perpetrators of the current crimes had learned of the American recipe or even found and exploited lost anthrax stockpiles.

Caree Vander Linden, spokeswoman for the Army's germ defense laboratory at Fort Detrick, Md., said officials there had not investigated whether the Ames strain was used in the old weapons program.

The Iowa State archive was destroyed on Oct. 10 and 11, after relatively brief deliberations with the F.B.I., said Julie Johnson, an official in environmental and safety at Iowa State.

It is unclear if the F.B.I. understood that Iowa State had destroyed many strains of anthrax or that the origins of the Ames strain were cloudy. Larry Holmquist, a spokesman for the F.B.I. in Omaha, which runs the bureau's Iowa operations, said the rationale for the destruction was that the strain had been "sent out to numerous places" around the globe in the past "40 or 50 years."

Tom Ridge, the White House director of homeland security, confirmed publicly that the tainted letters contained the Ames strain on Oct. 25, two weeks after the destruction.

Iowa State says it won destruction approval not only from the F.B.I. but also from the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which are involved in the federal investigation.

James A. Roth, a microbiologist at the College of Veterinary Medicine who presided over the destruction, said the university's records on its anthrax strains were extremely limited and that the labeling on the vials themselves was often cryptic, leaving officials unsure exactly how many strains the university had.

Even so, "we think they had all the strains already," he said of the F.B.I. and the C.D.C.

The oldest strain in the collection dated to 1928. If the Ames strain was similarly old, experts said, it is conceivable that the potent germs were distributed far more widely than conventional wisdom holds.

Since the destruction, Dr. Roth said, the university has heard nothing from the bureau about anthrax. As for whether the destroyed strains might have clarified the origins of Ames, he said, "now we'll never know."

Questioning Scientists

The F.B.I. has been pressing its investigation in New Jersey, where the letters originated.

When two men from the F.B.I. and the New Jersey State Police arrived last month at the Waksman Institute of Microbiology at Rutgers University in New Jersey, scientists there saw it as a natural step in the anthrax investigation.

Staffed with microbiologists familiar with how the deadly bacteria grow and filled with the sophisticated laboratory equipment involved, the institute, just 38 miles from the Trenton post offices where the letters were postmarked, was a natural place for investigators to ask detailed questions.

But the two investigators, escorted by the university's head of security, asked the the laboratory's director, Dr. Joachim Messing, only a few general questions about growing bacteria and never mentioned specifically what they were looking for. Finally, Dr. Messing said, he felt obligated to volunteer that his laboratory did not handle anthrax.

"I couldn't give you a clue what they were after," Dr. Messing said in an interview this week. "I asked the person from the F.B.I. if he knows anything about bacteria, some very simple questions, and it was very clear that he didn't have the background to make evaluations."

Tracking the F.B.I.'s investigation near Trenton, and beyond, shows that agents seemed to have passed over some potential opportunities for developing leads.

Though investigators are consulting some members of professional organizations like the American Society for Microbiology and the American College of Veterinary Microbiologists, the F.B.I. is only now establishing an Internet bulletin board to permit members of those groups to pass information to the bureau's leadership, a senior F.B.I. official said.

"That's in the works," he said.

Top bureau officials also appeared to be unaware of last month's international chemical and pharmaceutical convention, ChemShow, in New York City, which attracted hundreds of chemical and pharmaceutical equipment manufacturers, engineers and technicians.

"If they weren't crawling around that show, they should have been," said Richard Barbini, a chemical engineer and salesman for Arde Barinco Inc., in Norwood, N.J., a pharmaceutical equipment maker. "There's all kinds of people there from many different countries, a lot of people who know a lot" about what it takes to make anthrax.

The senior F.B.I. official said he was not sure if any agents had attended the show, and a bureau spokeswoman said the agency would not comment on the matter.

In New Jersey, the F.B.I. has been in regular contact with the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey in Newark, which works with infectious bacteria, but special agents have yet to call bacteria experts at the university's Robert Wood Johnson Medical School in Piscataway, said Michael A. Gallo, a professor of environmental community medicine.

F.B.I. officials say that their investigation is proceeding methodically in an uncharted area and that questions will eventually be asked in all appropriate places.

Several microbiologists suggested that agents should focus on companies that sell new and used laboratory equipment that could reduce anthrax to the micron-size particles found in the letter sent to Mr. Daschle's office last month. That equipment would include either a jet mill or a spray dryer, each of which can be used to reduce bacteria into ultrafine, inhalable powder.

Some companies that deal in that equipment said F.B.I. agents had called seeking detailed information, while others said they had been asked only general questions. Others said they had not been called at all.

A sales official at Spray Drying Systems Inc., of Randallstown, Md., a company that sells spray dryers, said the company had not heard from investigators.

But agents from the Boston F.B.I. office visited some companies, including Sturtevant Inc. in Hanover, Mass., which manufactures jet mills, said a company executive who asked that his name not be used.

"He was asking very good questions," the executive said of the agent.

Eventually, the executive said, he gave the agent lists of his customers and competitors. "There's dozens and dozens and dozens of used equipment dealers out there," he said. "Even the F.B.I. doesn't have enough people to track down the number of machines that are in commerce in the world."

Though they are still compiling a complete list of places anthrax is stored in this country, federal investigators have already visited a number of laboratories, germ warehouses, universities, government agencies and even veterinarians in their search for clues in the anthrax attacks, one federal investigator involved in the inquiry said.

So far, he said, a range of government agencies that maintain anthrax, including the National Institutes of Health and the Food and Drug Administration, have been asked to account for their specimens in detail, and to provide samples to compare with those used in the bioterror attacks.

In addition, organizations like the New Jersey Veterinary Medical Association and the New Jersey Pharmacists Association, which has set up a hotline to the F.B.I. to report large orders for anthrax vaccines, said that at least one of their members had been contacted by the F.B.I.

And at the American Type Culture Collection, a vast bioresource center that sells germs, based in Virginia, Nancy Wysocki, a vice president, said the center had "a very close working relationship with many of the federal agencies, including the F.B.I."

F.B.I. agents have also spoken to some pharmaceutical companies, including some based in New Jersey, company executives said. Some have been open with the bureau, others have asked, for legal reasons, for agents to present a subpoena before they would grant access to their files.

"We want to know what you have for anthrax, we want to see the documentation, we want to know who has access to it, where it's shipped from, who works with it, we want to know the protocols," said a senior F.B.I. official. "We're not going to leave these facilities until every question is answered."

Many university laboratories in New Jersey, Pennsylvania and New York have not been contacted in the investigation.

"I haven't seen neither hide nor hair of them," said Dr. John E. Lennox, a professor at Penn State University's microbiology department, though anyone interested in producing anthrax could find what they need in his laboratory. "There isn't anything they would require that isn't in my lab," he said.

But Dr. Sulie Chang, chairwoman of the biology department at Seton Hall University in New Jersey, said F.B.I. agents called her several weeks ago, saying that they were contacting biology departments throughout the state.

Dr. Chang said they wanted to know if any students had shown a sudden interest in anthrax. In fact, she said, a student there had given a 15-minute presentation on the topic recently and she gave the agents his name. She said she did not know whether they followed up.

Dispute Over Daschle Letter

The F.B.I. was confronted with differing assessments of the anthrax found in the letter to Senator Daschle, a dispute among experts that illustrates the government's slowly evolving understanding of how to investigate an anthrax attack.

An initial analysis by the United States Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases, which specializes in biodefense, found that the material was very pure, very concentrated and highly dangerous. The Fort Detrick laboratory began studying the Daschle letter on Oct. 15 and delivered its first assessment to the bureau that night, a spokesman said.

Two days later, the F.B.I. sent a sample for additional testing to Battelle, a military contractor in Ohio that does secret work for the Pentagon and other government agencies.

Officials said the Army laboratory had irradiated part of the anthrax spores before studying them, a safety technique that leaves their aerodynamic and other characteristics undisturbed.

Apparently unaware that the Army laboratory had irradiated the material, Battelle used a different method, officials said, placing the anthrax in an autoclave and killing the spores with intense pressure and steam. Two officials said that this produced a far lower estimate of the concentration level and prompted Battelle scientists to conclude that the material was more likely to clump together, and thus less likely to waft through the air, than the Army scientists had estimated.

Both laboratories delivered reports to the F.B.I. on Oct. 22. One administration official said Fort Detrick found that the Daschle anthrax contained as much as one trillion spores per gram, much more than had been detected by Battelle.

Scientists quickly recognized that the tests had been conducted differently and agreed that Battelle should do a second study using irradiated material. A shipment was sent to Battelle on Oct. 25, one official said, which subsequently produced estimates similar to those of the Army scientists.

While the different findings created intense controversy in scientific circles, senior law enforcement officials said they had had virtually no effect on their conclusion that the material was very dangerous or on what they had told senior officials.

But officials said senior officials at the Department of Health and Human Services were sufficiently curious about the disagreement that they had asked the Army scientists to discuss their findings in person on Oct. 23. Officials said this week that the incident reflected how unaccustomed the bureau was to managing a complicated investigation that turned on scientific analysis.

---

THE SUBWAYS
Past Lessons Guide Transit Planning for Attack

New York Times
November 9, 2001
By JAMES GLANZ and RANDY KENNEDY
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/11/09/nyregion/09SUBW.html?searchpv=nytToday

http://graphics.nytimes.com/images/2001/11/09/nyregion/09subw.1.jpg
James Estrin/The New York Times

The difficulty of quickly escaping the subway and the ease with which biological agents can spread have long worried transit officials.

Yesterday morning was the kind that has come to be considered normal in the subway.

A "suspicious substance" on a stairway at the 59th Street station, disrupting service on the A, B, C and D lines for an hour during the rush. "Suspicious powder" at the 205th Street station, snarling D service in the Bronx, and more powder at 34th Street, suspending service on part of the B, D and F lines. All of the reports turned out to be false alarms.

For the last month, as the specter of anthrax attacks has grown, every morning's descent into the subway has become a journey into uncertainty and overcrowding for thousands of passengers, who wonder when the system will return to normal.

Transit officials warn that it could be a very long time. They, along with federal agencies and research scientists, are now operating the system as if a nearly unthinkable prospect could occur: a biological or chemical attack in the confined spaces of the subway.

Still, this is not the first time scientists and transit officials have considered that prospect and tried to gauge the vulnerability.

In June 1966, Army scientists smashed light bulbs filled with bacteria believed to be harmless in the New York subway and found that the agent was carried for miles, confirming their worry that a deadly agent could be spread widely and quickly through the subway.

And in the last several years, computer models have been produced to simulate how something like anthrax might move through the subway system. Again, the results were disturbing.

For health and law enforcement officials, though, there has been an upside to the disquieting research, for they have used the lessons learned to consider how best to respond. For instance, new technologies include a recently developed foam to destroy chemical and biological agents.

Officials are extremely reluctant to divulge details of any new response plans that have been put in place in many cities or to describe work on technologies that could make subways safer.

But the officials say they have made progress in improving their emergency planning and in laboratory research efforts.

Some of those new possibilities have already emerged from labs and are being tested in subways, said Jonathan Kiell, a spokesman for the Energy Department's National Nuclear Security Administration, which has a program to finance research and testing of new technologies for countering biological and chemical threats.

Cheryl Johnson, a spokeswoman for the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority, said officials planned to use some of the new technologies, including chemical sensors and computerized alert systems, in a simulated subway attack that may happen sometime this year. "The intent, of course, is to share the results of the program with transit agencies in this country and around the world," Ms. Johnson said yesterday.

The difficulty of quickly escaping from a subway, combined with the way in which the drafts created by moving trains could spread chemicals or biological agents, has long worried transportation officials.

"The subway is a problem, let's just put it that way," said Dr. William Dunn, a mechanical engineer at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, who works with the Energy Department program, called Protect, an acronym for Program for Response Options and Technology Enhancement for Chemical/Biological Terrorism. "And we're trying to address it."

On the most practical level, those efforts involve making detailed emergency plans and testing them. "We continue to review emergency plans, and at this point feel as comfortable as you can in this environment," said Tom Kelly, a spokesman for the Metropolitan Transportation Authority in New York.

Mr. Kelly refused to divulge more details, but people involved with Local 100 of the Transport Workers Union say they have been reassured by the precautions that the transportation authority has taken so far to deal with the possibility of a biological attack.

When suspicious substances are reported, they said, police officers and transit workers immediately begin a procedure of evacuating the station, stopping train service, closing the doors of the trains in the station and turning off their motors, to minimize the possibility that powders or gases could be swirled or spread by the trains.

Transit officials have apparently also been vigilant about ensuring that no workers untrained in dealing with hazardous materials go near suspicious substances or try to clean them up, actions that could also serve to spread the substance.

As officials review and practice those measures, said Allen Morrison, a spokesman for the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, "there's a great reluctance to go into a lot of details on security plans." But he said that officials at the Port Authority, which controls the PATH trains, the three major local airports and several bridges and tunnels, were eager to let riders know that chemical and biological terrorism had been considered in those plans.

New ways of coping with those worries are also beginning to arrive from research laboratories. In an article published in Tunnel Management International in April, J. Greg Sanchez, project engineer in capital program management for New York City Transit, a unit of the transportation authority, described the development of a computer program that can simulate biological and chemical attacks in a subway and assess the effectiveness of specific emergency plans.

The research, which Mr. Sanchez and two scientists at Argonne National Laboratory performed as part of the Protect program, is meant to help develop guidelines for saving lives in a real attack. "We are trying to develop intelligence as to what mitigations are out there," Mr. Sanchez said.

In other research sponsored by the program, Sandia National Laboratories has developed a foam that can destroy both chemical and biological agents and prevent them from spreading through the air. The foam has become available commercially in the last year, said Dr. Larry Bustard, a technical manager at Sandia.

The Environmental Protection Agency has said that the foam was used in the cleanup of mailrooms on Capitol Hill that were contaminated with anthrax. But subway officials are guarded about whether they have obtained it.

"One way that it could get deployed is in devices similar to fire extinguishers," Dr. Bustard said. "You could have a situation where a subway car or a train could be carrying some of these things."

-------- britain

Splits open in UK-US alliance

Ewen MacAskill and Richard Norton-Taylor
Friday November 9, 2001
The Guardian
http://www.guardian.co.uk/waronterror/story/0,1361,590474,00.html

British ministers privately expressed frustration yesterday with the US prosecution of the war against terrorism, the first sign of serious differences between London and Washington since the attacks on September 11.

Although Tony Blair saw his quick trip to Washington this week as an opportunity to cement Britain's position as the No 1 ally of the US, unease is growing in Whitehall.

There is concern on both the military and diplomatic fronts over the Israeli-Palestinian conflict; the bombing strategy; perceived lack of US consultation with its allies; and insufficient US focus on the humanitarian crisis.

The British government is also intent on opposing the expansion of the war beyond Afghanistan and is horrified at elements within the Pentagon pushing for an all-out assault on Iraq.

The handling of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is the main source of dispute, with Downing Street and the Foreign Office worried that dithering in Washington in its handling of the peace process risks alienating Arab opinion, which is seen as crucial in the coalition against terrorism.

Mr Blair, who experienced at first hand last week during a trip to the Middle East the extent of Arab anger, pressed President George Bush in Washington on Wednesday to apply pressure on Israel to return to peace talks.

But Mr Blair suffered a rebuff yesterday when it emerged that Colin Powell, the US secretary of state, will not be making a long-heralded speech at the UN general assembly this weekend in support of the creation of a Palestinian state. The speech had been flagged as a historic shift in US policy towards Israel, representing a significant move towards the Palestinian position.

It has been expected for two months. Even on Wednesday, as Mr Blair was on his way to Washington, Downing Street was briefing that Mr Powell was poised to take a firm line with Israel.

One British minister said that the content of Mr Powell's speech was not in doubt, just the timing. The minister said the Israeli prime minister, Ariel Sharon, had acted abominably in recent weeks.

Mr Bush is to make a speech to the general assembly tomorrow, but Foreign Office sources said he was unlikely to use the opportunity to make the historic statement.

There is also rising anxiety within Whitehall that after Afghanistan the Bush administration may turn its sights on Iraq.

Mr Bush said on Wednesday that the bombing of Afghanistan was just the start of the war on terrorism.

One British minister said that bombing Iraq would be catastrophic because women and children would be killed and the consequences for the US and Britain in the Arab world would be unimaginably dangerous.

He warned that US and British embassies in the Arab world would have to close and British civilians would have to be advised to leave the area. He feared that moderate Arab regimes would be swept away.

The sense of frustration also applies to defence and military circles. British defence officials recognise that Washington is calling the shots. But there is growing impatience about US delays in deploying and giving tasks to ground troops, including some 100 SAS troops believed to be in Afghanistan or nearby.

One senior minister even spoke disparagingly about General Tommy Franks, the US commander of Operation Enduring Freedom, describing him as an "artillery man" reluctant to commit infantry.

British military planners made it clear they are extremely concerned about the failed raid by US rangers on targets near Kandahar on October 20 and the decision to release a video of it for propaganda reasons.

There are some 70 British military officers assigned to the Florida headquarters of Gen Franks. They are said to be providing valuable advice, yet there is a growing feeling in London that it is not being publicly recognised, defence sources say.

"You're not the only ones," one well-placed source said yesterday, referring to Washington's failure to acknowledge publicly Britain's contribution.

British defence sources point to what they say is the valuable task carried out by RAF pilots refuelling American aircraft and undertaking reconnaissance over Afghanistan.

The sense of frustration in Britain is echoed in Germany where a row has erupted over whether the US had requested the 3,900 troops Berlin has earmarked for operations in Afghanistan.

The US defence secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, initially denied having made the request for German troops.

-------- business

Northrop Seals Deal to Buy Newport News
$2.6 Billion Accord Creates Biggest Warship Builder

By Renae Merle
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, November 9, 2001; Page E03
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A64957-2001Nov8?language=printer

Northrop Grumman Corp. yesterday agreed to buy Newport News Shipbuilding Inc. in a deal worth $2.6 billion that will create the world's largest builder of warships.

The deal ends six months of wrangling for Newport News, the nation's only builder of nuclear aircraft carriers. The 115-year-old company had agreed to be purchased by Falls Church-based General Dynamics Corp., which builds nuclear-powered submarines, but ran into resistance from antitrust regulators.

If approved by shareholders, the deal ends a wave of consolidation in the military-shipbuilding industry that began in the early 1990s. "At this point there are no large properties that aren't spoken for," said Loren Thompson, a defense consultant who works at the Lexington Institute, a think tank.

Northrop Grumman said that there would be no "significant" layoffs but that there were some obvious redundancies in the companies' headquarters.

Newport News at first will be run as a subsidiary and eventually will be combined with Northrop's other shipbuilding operations, company spokesman Randy Belote said. The company estimated that it will take a little more than a year to complete the integration.

Northrop Grumman already is the largest publicly traded employer in the Washington region, with about 16,000 employees. The acquisition of Newport News adds 17,800 Virginia-based employees.

The new Northrop subsidiary will be run by Thomas Schievelbein, Newport News's executive vice president and chief operating officer. William Fricks, Newport News chairman and chief executive, will retire when the deal is complete.

The Newport News and Northrop Grumman boards have approved the deal, but Newport News stockholders still must tender their shares for it to become final. Northrop Grumman officials said they expect to close the deal by the end of the month.

Newport News stockholders will receive $67.50 in either stock or cash. The stock-and-cash aspect of the deal is worth $2.1 billion. Northrop Grumman also agreed to assume $500 million of Newport News's debt.

Northrop Grumman is one of the leading U.S. defense contractors, with a long history of building warplanes, such as the B-2 bomber and much of the Navy's Super Hornet fighter jet. The company entered shipbuilding this year when it bought Litton Industries Inc., the leading builder of conventionally powered ships for the Navy. That acquisition gave Northrop large shipyards in Mississippi and Louisiana.

In 1999, General Dynamics and Litton each tried to buy Newport News but were rebuffed by antitrust regulators. In April 2001, General Dynamics agreed with Newport News to acquire the company for $2.1 billion in cash. Two weeks later, Northrop, which had just completed its acquisition of Litton, made its bid.

Northrop Grumman argued that a Newport News-General Dynamics merger would create a monopoly among nuclear-ship builders.

The Justice and Defense departments recently endorsed Northrop Grumman's proposal, and the Justice Department sued to block the deal with General Dynamics. That prompted General Dynamics and Newport News to abandon their merger agreement.

Northrop Grumman shares yesterday closed up 1.9 percent at $97.95. Newport News shares closed up 0.7 percent at $67.75.

-------- germany

German government faces collapse over war row
War on Terrorism: Coalition

By Imre Karacs in Berlin
09 November 2001
UK Independent
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/europe/story.jsp?story=104017

The German government came to the brink of collapse yesterday when Joschka Fischer, the Foreign Minister, threatened to resign over his Green party's reluctance to support the country's first combat mission since the Second World War.

A stormy meeting of the Greens was adjourned for a second time, with 15 MPs still refusing to endorse their government's decision to dispatch up to 3,900 troops to the war zone. At least two Social Democrat MPs belonging to Chancellor Gerhard Schröder's party are also planning to vote against the deployment next week.

The bill authorising the deployment is almost certain to go through because two of the three opposition parties have pledged their support. But the government may not muster the necessary majority from its own ranks for what is regarded in Germany is the most important decision for a generation. Failure to whip in line its own MPs would damage its prestige at home and Germany's standing abroad.

"The contribution we want to make is also an expression of our readiness to take account of Germany's increased responsibility in the world," Mr Schröder told the Bundestag.

Mr Fischer is reported to have told colleagues that he will step down if he does not get the Greens' wholehearted support. That would probably be the end of the "Red-Green" coalition, which keeps Mr Schröder in power. Leaving the government could spell political suicide for the Greens, who are struggling in opinion polls at about five percent, the threshold for parties to achieve parliamentary representation.

Aware that the majority of Germans oppose the deployment of their troops in Afghan-istan, the Chancellor and his Foreign Minister used yesterday's parliamentary debate to try to sweeten the pill. Mr Schröder insisted: "We are not talking about German participation in air strikes or the mobilisation of combat troops." Reports probably leaked by the government suggest that German troops would be based in Uzbekistan, far from the real action. What is increasingly clear is that this will be a token engagement - "an expression", in Mr Schröder's words, "of our readiness to take account of Germany's increased responsibility in the world".

The Chancellor and his Foreign Minister stressed that Germany had no choice in the matter. Mr Fischer said: "You can discuss a lot - even criticise a lot, for all I care - about the strategy pursued by the United States. But the core question is whether we want to leave the US, our ally that is responding to this attack, standing alone."

Frantic efforts were under way last night to ease the conscience of defectors. The Greens are proposing an amendment that stresses Germany's humanitarian aid for the Afghan people. The new version also calls for diplomatic and political solution for the Middle East. Mr Fischer hopes such a formula will allow a few pacifist MPs to sign up for the full package, bombs and all.

However, those on the left wing of the Greens, as well as some in the Social Democrat party, already feel that Germany went beyond the constitution by participating in international peace-keeping efforts in the Balkans.

The vote to allow German troops to go to Kosovo led to fury in the Green party, resulting in a physical assault on Mr Fischer at one point. Attitudes have hardly softened since then, and some on the left wing intend to make a stand for the sake of what they believe is the spirit of the original Green movement.

-------- korea

North Korean missile

November 9, 2001
Inside the Ring, Notes from the Pentagon.
Bill Gertz and Rowan Scarborough
http://www.washingtontimes.com/national/20011109-29655144.htm

North Korea is developing a new cruise missile that will provide a major boost in firepower for the reclusive communist government, U.S. intelligence officials said. The new missile's engine was tested in September at a development facility in North Korea and the marks from the rocket exhaust were detected by U.S. reconnaissance equipment. At first, the missile was difficult to identify by intelligence analysts because its air frame was wider than most of rockets in the North Korean arsenal. The arsenal includes short-range Scuds, medium-range Nodongs and long-range Taepodongs. One official told us the solid-fueled missile is either a new surface-to-surface missile or a surface-to-air missile. A second official said the missile appears to be a new anti-ship cruise missile. Analysts believe China may have provided assistance - either know-how or parts - for the new missile.

----

N. Korea Said Trying to Sell Missiles

New York Times
November 9, 2001
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-US-North-Korea.html?searchpv=aponline

WASHINGTON (AP) -- North Korea, rebuffing U.S. nonproliferation efforts, is trying to sell missiles to three or four countries in Asia and the Middle East, a Bush administration official says.

The official refused to identify the countries but said Thursday they are concentrated in an area west of China to the Mediterranean Sea. There was no confirmation, but North Korea and Egypt were said to have reached final agreement on a missile sale.

A decade of crisis in North Korea's economy has brought widespread hunger and starvation. Missile sales have been among the country's few reliable sources of foreign currency.

North Korea has a long-range missile capability, but the official, briefing an Associated Press reporter on condition of anonymity, did not discuss the range of the missiles Pyongyang has on the sales block.

Unease over the North Korean missile program has provided impetus for the Bush administration's insistence that a national missile defense system be built.

North Korea has abided by a moratorium on missile flight tests that began in 1998, but the official said Pyongyang is thought to be working on rocket motors or other aspects of missile development.

In previous years, North Korean missile sales to countries such as Iran and Syria have been a sore point for the United States.

During its final months in office a year ago, the Clinton administration engaged in serious negotiations with North Korea aimed at weaning Pyongyang from its missile program in exchange for economic benefits.

After President Clinton left office, President Bush ordered a review of North Korea policy, then offered in June to reopen negotiations. The North Koreans have yet to respond.

North Korea is believed to have engaged in hundreds of transactions over the years related to missile sales. During negotiations with the Clinton administration, North Korean officials at one point said they would abandon their missile export program only if the United States would compensate for lost sales.

The Bush administration has offered to resume negotiations at any time or place. Pyongyang has shown no interest and halted a promising start toward accommodation with South Korea that began last year. Nonetheless, North-South reconciliation talks were resuming Friday in North Korea.

The Bush administration remains skeptical about North Korea's intentions. Gen. Thomas Schwartz, commander of U.S. forces in South Korea, testified in March that North Korean leader Kim Jong Il ``stubbornly adheres to his `military first' policy, pouring huge amounts of his budget resources into the military at the expense of the civilian sector.''

He said a North Korean chemical and biological weapons capability threatens the 37,000 U.S. forces in South Korea and the country's civilian population centers.

``They could deploy both chemical and biological weapons on missiles,'' Schwartz said.

In his offer last June to resume talks, President Bush said he wants the discussions to include North Korea's extensive military deployments north of the demilitarized zone.

In an address to businessmen last week, Secretary of State Colin Powell discussed the domestic situation in North Korea in bleak terms.

``It is no coincidence that one of the poorest, most distressed countries on the face of the earth, North Korea, is known as the Hermit Kingdom,'' Powell said.

``They don't let anyone come in except under the most controlled circumstances. They will not let ideas come in. They will not let their people know what is going on in the rest of the world. And as a result, they cannot even feed their own people and have little hope for the future until they do start to open up.''

On the Net: Library of Congress page on North Korea: http://lcweb2.loc.gov/frd/cs/kptoc.html

-------- nato

A Long Road West for Russia
Despite Warming Relations, Integration Is a Distant Prospect

By Susan B. Glasser and Peter Baker
Washington Post Foreign Service
Friday, November 9, 2001; Page A28
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A64568-2001Nov8?language=printer

MOSCOW, Nov. 8 -- For all the ambitious talk about Russia's historic opportunity to integrate into the West, the effort to open a small NATO information office in Moscow illustrates how difficult it will be to achieve that goal.

To set up an outpost of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization here took years of wrangling over matters of protocol large and small. After the ribbon had been cut in February, it took another six months to actually open the office. Even today, a long-promised military liaison mission has yet to open.

The delays, caused by mutual distrust, bureaucratic inertia and a failure of the two sides to communicate with each other, suggest that Russia has a long way to go before it can claim a seat in Western institutions and integrate into the global economy.

"Our standards are totally different," said Viktor Kuvaldin, a political analyst at the Gorbachev Foundation, a research center founded by the former Soviet leader who struggled to westernize his country. In any practical sense, Kuvaldin said, the hope of melding Russia into the West "is not an issue of today or tomorrow."

As Russian President Vladimir Putin prepares to fly to the United States next week for a summit with President Bush in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, the relationship between the two countries has undergone a profound shift, rekindling hopes that Russia could become a partner of the West.

Bush and Putin appear likely to seal a landmark deal that would deeply cut strategic nuclear arsenals while allowing the United States to pursue testing of a missile defense system without abandoning the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty of 1972.

Putin has expressed a desire for deeper ties to the West in other spheres as well. "It is also in our best interest to integrate Russia in the contemporary international community in every sense of the word, in defense, political, security," he told ABC's "20/20" this week.

But that desire may be frustrated by hurdles to joining international organizations -- including the World Trade Organization, NATO and the European Union -- any time soon. At the moment, policymakers do not expect Russia to become a member of the WTO until 2004 at the earliest; membership in NATO and the EU could be a decade away, even if both Russia and the organizations pursue it.

Even something as straightforward as granting Russia permanent normal trading status with the United States has proved beyond Bush's ability to deliver by next week's summit in Washington and Crawford, Tex. Under the Jackson-Vanik amendment of 1974, Russia must undergo an annual review of its emigration policies to renew its trade privileges, a formality by now, but one Moscow considers demeaning. Bush hoped to lift that requirement in time for the summit, only to discover he could not gain congressional approval until the spring.

"There is much talk about a new alliance, but very little systematic work has been done within the administration in either country as to what kind of changes one needs," said Sergei Karaganov, chairman of the Council on Foreign and Defense Policy, a private group with close ties to the government. "There's a need for a bigger process, and very quickly, or the momentum will be lost."

"We have to change not only Russia's attitude toward the West but Western and particularly American attitudes toward Russia," former acting prime minister Yegor Gaidar said in an interview. "It's not easy, but I hope the American political elite will have the imagination to do this."

Russia's relationship with NATO suggests how difficult this could be. The issue will be one of several major items on the agenda at the Bush-Putin summit, but it's unlikely that "concrete down-to-earth plans that can be implemented will come out of it," said a NATO official familiar with the talks. Instead, the two leaders are likely to "confirm and re-stress that we should go down the road of cooperation, while leaving it up to creative thinkers on both sides to push through ideas which are still in the development stage."

In effect, both Russia and the West have already acknowledged that "the present relationship is unsatisfactory for both of them," the official said, but are not even close to producing a plan to change it. Indeed, the most promising development since Sept. 11 has simply been new interest by Putin and NATO in creating "an informal circuit" of communication to bypass the bureaucracy.

The prospect of Russian membership in NATO presents a host of hard questions, from the philosophical, such as redefining the mission of an alliance born out of the Cold War, to the practical, such as identifying what either side would be willing to give up. For instance, would Russia abandon lucrative arms deals with such countries as Iran, Iraq and China? And would the West make up the considerable funds that cash-strapped Russia would lose from its $4 billion-a-year arms trade?

Most officials and analysts agree Russia does not come close to meeting current NATO membership criteria, which require among other things a transparent military budget, firm civilian control over the armed forces and strong guarantees of democratic freedoms. While Russia might want an exemption, NATO would be hard-pressed to justify creating a different standard.

"We are in a deadlock right now," said the NATO official. "Russia doesn't want to [have to] apply to become a member, and NATO cannot hand them an open invitation without upsetting the nine other countries currently going through the application process."

As a result, instead of membership, most policymakers in Moscow and Washington and at NATO headquarters in Brussels are focused simply on reinventing Russia's ties to the alliance. But even with that, the cultural and political barriers remain formidable.

"On the one hand, people have recognized that the NATO-Russia relationship needs to be fixed, and there are a lot of ideas out there as to how to do that," said Robert Nurick, director of the Carnegie Endowment's Moscow Center. "But institutionally, these wheels grind slowly. If left up to the bureaucracy to do it, it would take forever."

Formally, Russia works with NATO through a body called the Joint Permanent Council, set up in 1997 to assuage Moscow when the alliance admitted former Soviet satellites such as Poland. However, many in Moscow view it as a figurehead, as Karaganov put it. Instead of being "19 plus one," as it was dubbed, Russians consider it "19 against one."

Vladimir Lukin, the deputy speaker of the lower house of parliament, said he favors a program under which Russia, while not necessarily becoming a member, "would have stature to participate in military and political planning a priori, before decisions are made. Discussions are no longer enough; we need to find a way to prepare common positions."

Russia may be closer to strengthening its economic ties with the West, as foreign investors begin trickling back after the 1998 financial crisis, and the WTO works to craft a membership deal in negotiations scheduled to begin next year. Even before the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, Putin had impressed many foreign economists by pushing market reforms that eluded his predecessor, including a new land code allowing the sale and purchase of urban property and a flat-rate tax code for personal and corporate income.

The newfound friendship between Russia and the West has helped cement foreign business leaders' confidence that Putin is headed in the right direction. Just last week, ExxonMobil officials announced they would proceed with long-stalled plans to develop oil fields near Sakhalin Island off Russia's eastern coast, declaring themselves finally satisfied not only with regulatory and tax reforms but also with the improved spirit between Washington and Moscow. The oil giant intends to spend $4 billion over five years, the largest single investment in Russia's history and more than the $2.5 billion in total direct foreign investment in the first half of this year.

Yet the big deals have not overshadowed the continuing difficulties of other Western firms trying to operate in an environment without a reliable court system or corporate governance.

Sawyer Research Products, an Ohio-based crystal quartz producer, offers a cautionary tale. In the 1990s, Sawyer invested in a plant in Vladimir, not far from Moscow, but in recent months has seen its factory and $8.2 million investment seized by a partner allied with local government officials and local courts.

Gary Johnson, president and chief executiv