Ding-Dong: It's FedEx With A Nuke

A recent article from Janes Defense Weekly demonstrates the recent efforts undergone by US Customs to protect Americans against the smuggling of weapons for use in a terror attack. Unfortunately, the prognosis is not good with sufficient technology almost five years off in the future:

The scanning of large cargo consignments such as those conveyed by unit load devices (ULDs) or intermodal containers also takes place, although no equipment is yet available that will automatically screen for explosives. Many industry experts believe that it will be at least five years before reliable, fully automated equipment is widely available to perform this function. Current equipment is only able to scan contents and identify the presence of unknown objects and contraband, as well as other areas of concern, and remains reliant on well-trained operatives for effective front-line use.
-from Janes

This issue was discussed in the Presidential Debates, but only briefly. Cargo is likely to be our greatest weakness in our efforts against terror attacks, second only to our pourous borders with Canada and Mexico. Watch the movie The Jackal and get a step-by-step tutorial on how to smuggle weapons into the US from Canada.

Its OK. We are talking FedEx here, the package probably will get lost anyways



In all seriousness, this is a scary topic. Millions of packages get sent about each day, the odds of something malicious getting spotted is nearly nil.

Yeah, lost with some dude who gets shipwrecked.

Was that really a satellite phone in that one package?

What happened to good old sniffer-dogs?

I wonder how much of the international cargo that transports around the world is actually checked? One could conceivably disguise the constituent parts for a suitcase nuke as seperate parts in imported automobiles. Unless customs has geiger counters...which I seriously doubt.

It may work for all the parts, but the radioactive material would get screened out.

Originally posted by wecomeinpeace
What happened to good old sniffer-dogs?

I wonder how much of the international cargo that transports around the world is actually checked? One could conceivably disguise the constituent parts for a suitcase nuke as seperate parts in imported automobiles. Unless customs has geiger counters...which I seriously doubt.

I heard someone say recently that if you wanted to get a nuke into NYC, all you have to do is wrap it in a bale of marijuana. The US black market is a thriving economic marketplace as evidenced in the book Reefer Madness. As long as the US pursues policies which create a black market for drugs, labor, sex, etc. there will be sophisticated smuggling networks which can easily be used for more nefarious purposes than dope.

Tom Clancy's recent book Teeth of the Tiger outlines a quid pro quo offer between European terrorists who maintain a significant black market network there and South American drug runners who have a lock on the US's black market smuggling network. The deal in the book was: we get your coke into Europe, you get our terrorists into the US and arm them. Sounds plausible to me. How many times has Clancy been right before? A lot.

I read somewhere that Long Beach Harbor is very vunerable-it is one of the largest ports in the world and only 5% of the containers are checked. Which puts the L.A. area and California coast at particular risk.

The truth of the matter is:

If someone wants to kill you (or someone) bad enough, nobody is going to be able to help you. Not your government, not your Fedex delivery guy, not your neighbours.

I see so many people so concerned about their safety, people that are SO scared that some foreign terrorist might kill them, and these are the same people that don't wear seatbelts.

It really is kind of ludicrous when you look at it closely. If you can.


So I guess the first step is realizing that there are NO guarantees that you'll be on this planet tomorrow. A bus could run you down, you could choke on a pretzel, you could catch Hepatitis B from a mouse that sneaks into your house and licks you.

Next step is you live your life despite it.

I may be way off here, I have been in the past, but to me, there's no guarantees for anything, so you just have to deal with it and move on.

Otherwise, if you're constantly looking behind you, the terrorists have won.

j

There are no sure fire ways of course. That goes without saying. But that doesnt mean that amazing attention should not be givin and we need to shoot for absolute security. Even though that goal is nearly unatainable.

The best analogy I can come up with is regarding car theft:
No matter what you install/do to your car, nothing will prevent a determined proffesional thief from taking your car. But by making your car slightly harder to steal than the one next to it you have averted a % of thefts. Also you avert "would-be" theives that dont have the adequate skill.

So to tie this back into national security: If we strive to make our country as secure as possible, we would have averted all but the most determined threats. And by making things as tight as possible, you are by default reducing the amount of room these determined terrorists can operate. Basically we arent going to give away any "freebies"

And I am all for that

[edit on 30-11-2004 by skippytjc]

Originally posted by wecomeinpeace
Unless customs has geiger counters...which I seriously doubt.

Perhaps not geiger counters but something even better. They have delveloped a new handheld mechanically cooled germanium radiation spectrometer.

Dubbed Cryo3, the spectrometer, which consists of hermetically encapsulated germanium detector, utility vacuum housing, micro cooler, and controller, weighs 10 pounds. The low power requirements mean that Cyro3 can operate up to eight hours on two rechargeable lithium ion batteries.

In the past in order to attain the high energy resolution of germanium detectors, the germanium had to be cooled to 90 K in a laboratory setting using liquid nitrogen.

www.sciencedaily.com...

Ok, fancy tech is super, but only effective when it's use is across the board.
This:

Dubbed Cryo3, the spectrometer, which consists of hermetically encapsulated germanium detector, utility vacuum housing, micro cooler, and controller, weighs 10 pounds. The low power requirements mean that Cyro3 can operate up to eight hours on two rechargeable lithium ion batteries.

plus this:

I read somewhere that Long Beach Harbor is very vunerable-it is one of the largest ports in the world and only 5% of the containers are checked. Which puts the L.A. area and California coast at particular risk.

equals 5% of the containers being checked with Kryptonite-powered laser-scanners. Back to square one.

In some cities the harbour/customs is pretty close to the metropolitain area, so if a smuggled nuke was set to go off upon inspecting the container it might take alot of suburb with it anyway....