Nuclear attack: Terrorists vs U.S.

August 24, 8:54 AMHomeland Security ExaminerJohn Duffey

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The Gulfstream G450 is the latest Long Range Exec Jet.

Few people want to think about the possibility of being successfully attacked by terrorists and/or terror sponsoring nations using nuclear weapons. Many would like to think that the United States government is on top of things and watching all avenues of approach. But, the sad truth is that it isn’t looking everywhere it should be looking. The reality of the situation is that the Department of Homeland Security is grossly overwhelmed. From Customs to the Coast Guard the United States suffers from poor technology, low personnel & equipment numbers, brutal budget restrictions, and poor training programs. The obvious avenues of approach are covered well more to provide the citizenry with a false sense of security than anything else.

Confidential discussions with leaders throughout the Homeland Security Network of agencies reveal that the prevention of an atomic attack is not thorough in the United States. In fact, they indicate that nontraditional infiltration and detonation avenues are barely known and those that are known are barely covered. The entire East Coast of the United States is at risk of a nuclear attack, ranging through New York, D.C., Atlanta, and Orlando. With the Secretary of Homeland Security declaring that America is safe from any such attack one is left with asking, “How national security professionals think that it could happen?”

A briefing before national security professionals has revealed a particularly spooky scenario. One that is sure to run chills up the spine of anyone who learns of it and how unprepared the United States remains. It is an attack scenario that could occur at any moment and without any warning whatsoever. Naturally, those who know of it within the government are highly reluctant to allow themselves to be named.

Let’s go into an imaginary world for a moment. Imagine that a nuclear warhead built in Tehran, Iran and developed jointly by Iran, North Korea, and Russia becomes a multi-megaton reality. With the United States and its allies out of Iraq, Iran has an established transport pipe-line to Syria, a close political and religious ally. Imagine that a Gulfstream or Hawker long-range executive jet is modified internally to carry the warhead on a one way trip to the United States.

The aircraft departs Tehran, with its cargo, and lands at a Syrian Air Base located near Damascus for re-fueling and final checks of its deadly cargo. From Damascus, Syria the aircraft flies to an airport inside Bosnia. There, sympathetic officials who have been well compensated pencil-whip a non-existent customs inspection and allow refueling. It is then off again.

Traveling across Europe at near sound speeds, the aircraft follows a properly filed and normal flight plan. Its pilots maintain radio contact with various centers and draw no unusual attention to it as it continues on. There are no established radiologic detection mechanisms for aircraft traveling at high or low speeds. Thus, the aircraft and its cargo continue on without detection. Many long range executive aircraft are capable of traveling from countries such as Bosnia or Hungary through to New York and many East Coast Cities, such as Charleston or even Atlanta, without having to refuel. There would be no need to stop in advanced technology capable airports or U.S. allied countries.

The aircraft flies normally across Europe, over Greenland, and over Iceland as it moves towards the final destination. Again, it continues to fly without its cargo being detected as U.S. airspace begins to get nearer. According to anonymous sources, there are no aircraft in the skies with super sensitive detectors in U.S. airspace searching for radiological signatures. It is an assumption that has not been directly inferred but hasn’t been squashed or corrected by the DHS, either. People just assume that U.S. technology exists to detect this rather simply approach by enemy force. The reality is that such an approach would happen without hindrance or detection. That is what makes this scenario so worrisome to national security experts, military strategists, and the public in general.

When the aircraft enters American Airspace it continues on to whatever city airport, most likely an international airport, it has listed on its flight plan. As it approaches the airport, the co-pilot walks to the back of the plane and performs the final arming processes following the controlled decompression of the cabin. Decompressing the cabin allows a barometric pressure sensitive detonator to have a more accurate reading of altitude. It will detonate the bomb at a given altitude which is detected by air pressure. Altitude is key in maximizing the effect of a nuclear explosion.

The aircraft enters a normal approach and descent slope as rendered by the tower. Nobody will know that they are within seconds of a massive and catastrophic explosion. When the aircraft reaches the key altitude it detonates. For a city like Atlanta, the key altitude is reached at a distance from the airport but over the center of the city. When it explodes, the entire city is instantly washed in temperatures as high as the surface of the sun, massive shock waves, and extremely lethal high frequency radiation such as Gamma and X-Rays. In a second, millions of Atlantans would be vaporized, buildings would be demolished, and Hell would literally exist on the surface of the Earth. It could happen to any city in the Eastern United States.

If asked, official DHS spokespersons and public relations specialists will hesitate before stating that the United States is secure from such an attack and that the likelihood of such a thing is so statistically low that it simply won’t happen. Really? Well, when asked for information on what is in place to prevent it, procedures, detection equipment, air patrols, etc, they say that it is sensitive or that they are not fully familiar with the details of what is in place but that something is in place. The one thing that is never heard from the DHS is a solid, detailed, and well articulated plan and process for dealing with such an attack. An examination of awarded contracts and budget line items show little, if any funding and/or effort towards the prevent ion of just such a scenario.