Suspected Al-Qaeda Operative Allegedly Hoped to Kill Former U.S. Presidents Bush, Carter

From Thursday, August 14, 2008 issue.

A suspected al-Qaeda operative who attended college in the United States hoped to kill former U.S. Presidents Jimmy Carter and George H.W. Bush, United Press International reported yesterday (see GSN, Aug. 13).

Aafia Siddiqui, 36, was arrested last month in Afghanistan and extradited to New York to face federal charges after she allegedly grabbed a gun and tried to shoot a U.S. officer during an interrogation.  Authorities have said that Siddiqui was carrying chemical substances, information on chemical weapons and a list of possible targets in New York at the time of her capture.

Prosecutors charged in a criminal complaint at the end of July that the Pakistani native intended to attack the White House and to kill the former leaders, employing a biological agent to poison Carter’s water, ABC News reported.

Her attorney disputed the claims.

“They used the same stuff 40 years ago ... against the Black Panthers, against the Attica Brothers ... a list of targets in their possession,” said Elizabeth Fink.  “Why would anyone be in Ghanzi, Afghanistan, walking around with a list of landmarks of New York?  These people are nuts and don't even know how to lie” (United Press International, Aug. 13).

“Of course they found all this stuff on her.  It was planted on her,” Fink added.  “She is the ultimate victim of the American dark side” (Associated Press/Yahoo!News, Aug. 14).

Authorities believe that Siddiqui, a graduate of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, posed a real threat, the New York Daily News reported today.

“We are talking about a woman who is brilliant, who is fanatical and a potential killer and who was clearly fantasizing about landmarks in New York City and elsewhere,” Representative Peter King (R-N.Y.).  “She shows that the danger is broader than the image we have of terrorists — uneducated males with a lot of time on their hands” (Grace/Gaskell, New York Daily News, Aug. 14).

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Expert’s Death Rolls Back al-Qaeda WMD Capability

From Monday, August 11, 2008 issue.

The reported death of an al-Qaeda chemical and biological-weapon specialist late last month would drastically undermine the organization’s ability to independently develop a weapon of mass destruction, the Associated Press reported yesterday (see GSN, Aug. 4).

Abu Khabab al-Masri, who died in a U.S. drone-launched missile attack in Pakistan, was known as a “mad scientist” who engineered chemical experiments in Afghanistan prior to the U.S.-led invasion in 2001.  A video obtained by CNN in 2002 shows a group of dogs being killed by a chemical believed to be hydrogen cyanide while a person identified as al-Masri speaks in the background.

Al-Masri also gave out biological and chemical-weapon assembly instructions starting in 1999, according to the United States, which had offered $5 million for his death or capture.

"If he is out of the picture, al-Qaeda's weapons of mass destruction capability has been set back, which would make this one of the more effective strikes in recent years," said Arthur Keller, a former CIA case officer who headed efforts to track him down in 2006.

“Al-Qaeda has no shortage of people adept with explosives, and I know that al-Masri promulgated training manuals for poisons," he said, "but I'm not sure how skilled any of al-Masri's proteges may be at synthesizing chemical weapons or toxins."

Building chemical weapons is a difficult task, Keller said.  "You need both education and hands-on experience to produce decent-quality chemical weapons or toxins."

There were no indicators that al-Masri was still involved in chemical weapons efforts after fleeing Afghanistan for Pakistan.  He was still believed to be providing training for al-Qaeda operatives, according to U.S. officials.

The U.S. intelligence community had long considered al-Masri “frightening,” said Brian Glyn Williams, a University of Massachusetts Islamic history expert who recently completed a government WMD study.

"From the U.S. government perspective, he was seen as a major threat.  His potential to develop primitive weapons of mass destruction was not taken lightly by U.S. law enforcement and intelligence agencies," Williams said.

RAND Corp. analyst Seth Jones said al-Qaeda could recover from the setback.

"The death of Abu Khabab al-Masri has a short-term impact on al-Qaeda's operations by eliminating a competent senior leader," Jones said.  "Over the long run, however, al-Qaeda has demonstrated an ability to replace most of its leaders that have been captured or killed" (Kathy Gannon, Associated Press/Google News, Aug. 10).

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U.S. WMD Preparedness Efforts Incomplete, Former Defense, State Department Officials Say

From Thursday, August 14, 2008 issue.

The United States has yet to complete implementation of a 2002 national strategy on dealing with the threat posed by weapons of mass destruction, former senior officials from the Defense and State departments said in a Boston Globe commentary published today (see GSN, Dec. 13, 2002).

Former Assistant Defense Secretary Ashton Carter and former Undersecretary of State Robert Joseph served on a 14-person review panel for the Pentagon’s Defense Threat Reduction Agency.  They found that work remained in carrying out the three components of the Bush administration anti-WMD plan:  prevention, protection and response.

“Those three pillars levy three broad requirements on the Defense Department:  It must be able to prevail in all WMD threat environments, from war to terrorist attack; it must maintain a credible nuclear force to deter WMD use by hostile states; and it must make a strong contribution to government-wide efforts to prevent, protect against, and respond to WMD proliferation and terrorism,” according to the commentary.

“Within the Defense Department, these activities are spread across a large number of civilian and military offices and commands.  With so many factions, no one is truly in charge.  While there is awareness within the Defense Department leadership of the importance of combating WMD, it is not given sufficient priority in practice or in budgeting,” Joseph and Carter added.

The Defense Threat Reduction Agency has not received adequate support for its mission as the lead Pentagon agency on countering WMD threats, the former officials said.  These missions include creating new bioterrorism countermeasures, preparing for an atomic attack on a U.S. city, and developing radiation sensors to keep nuclear weapons from being smuggled into the country.

“The agency's funding limitations reflect a broader issue of insufficient clarity, priority, and purpose in efforts to combat WMD.  Powerful military and civilian advocates are needed in the Defense Department to recognize the importance of these missions and the agency's unique potential to support them,” Carter and Joseph said.

The agency should also be more involved in certain areas, including expanded checks to ensure the safety and security of deployed nuclear weapons and helping to make the Cooperative Threat Reduction program a worldwide initiative, according to the commentary (see GSN, July 30).

“With its unique capabilities and exemplary dedication, the Defense Threat Reduction Agency has done much — within available resources — to advance national and international missions to counter WMD,” Carter and Joseph wrote.  “However, it requires substantially more resources and senior-level support to realize its full potential in helping to confront the WMD threats of today and tomorrow.  The new administration must not just say that combating WMD proliferation and terrorism is its highest national security priority; it must act accordingly” (Carter/Joseph, Boston Globe, Aug. 14).

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Nuclear Exporting Nations Question India Trade Waiver

From Friday, August 15, 2008 issue.

Diplomats close to the Nuclear Suppliers Group said the organization is unlikely to support a U.S.-drafted waiver that would give India access to international nuclear trade for the first time in decades, Reuters reported yesterday (see GSN, Aug. 14).

Representatives from the 45-nation group of nuclear exporters are scheduled to meet next week in Vienna to consider the exemption.  Diplomats representing several NSG states said, though, that the current document is weaker than earlier U.S. offers, that some parts were simply not acceptable, and that it would violate present U.S. laws regarding nuclear trade with India.

“I would be very surprised if that would happen,” said one diplomat.  “There are no conditions.  Obviously what is missing is that (the waiver) is void if there is another atomic test.”

“I think a majority of countries feel that the current draft is very weak and there is no conditionality at all. ... I don't really think that the U.S. [officials] expect that they are able to pass this draft,” said a second source.

A waiver is not likely to pass unless it stipulates a review and potential cessation of trade should India take certain actions, such as another nuclear test or restricting inspections of its civilian nuclear facilities.  That access was included in the planned U.S.-Indian nuclear trade deal and cemented when the International Atomic Energy Agency governing board approved a safeguards deal with India.

Should the exporter nations fail to back the exemption during meetings next week and in early September, they might not take action on the matter before the U.S. Congress ends its session next month ahead of the U.S. presidential election in November.  That could put the waiver, along with the nuclear trade deal between New Delhi and Washington, in a state of suspension (Boris Groendahl, Reuters/Yahoo!News, Aug. 14).

The Nuclear Suppliers Group makes its decisions by consensus.  New Zealand is seen as one possible obstacle to the exemption, but Disarmament Minister Phil Goff said Wednesday that no decision had been made, the New Zealand Herald reported.

“We know that there’s a lot of momentum and pressure for countries to agree to an exemption being given,” Goff said.  “But we have genuinely held and sincere concerns that we want to see addressed.”

Goff met Monday with Indian Deputy Foreign Secretary Hardeep Singh Puri to discuss the matter.

“I indicated that New Zealand had not reached a final position, that it was giving the issue careful and serious consideration, which we are, that we would be working with like-minded countries like Austria, Sweden, the Netherlands, Ireland.

“Is granting an exemption something that would weaken the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty and are the advantages of having greater controls over India’s nuclear industry outweighed by the disadvantage of weakening the NPT?” Goff said.

Representatives of the NSG states are expected to consider a number of issues during their meeting next week, Goff said, including whether to require that the waiver be suspended should India test another nuclear weapon; India’s possible acceptance of the Additional Protocol to its IAEA safeguards deal, which would allow for more intrusive inspections of the nation’s nuclear sites; and how to ensure India does not receive enrichment equipment or other technology that could be put to weapons purposes (Audrey Young, New Zealand Herald, Aug. 14).

Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh today said that nuclear trade with the United States would be crucial for the continued development of his nation, United Press International reported.

The agreement would “open up new opportunities for trade in dual-use technologies, opening up new pathways to accelerate industrialization of our country,” Singh said in his independence day speech.

Singh said the deal “will enable us to provide electricity to meet the needs of our farmers, our artisans, our traders and our industry,” according to the Press Trust of India.

India’s nuclear energy program is being hurt by lack of access to necessary material and technology, Singh said (United Press International, Aug. 15).

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U.S. Air Force Promises Better Nuclear Security

From Wednesday, August 13, 2008 issue.

The U.S. Air Force’s new top officer vowed yesterday to “work with a vengeance” to improve the handling of nuclear weapons, a priority highlighted by security lapses that triggered the recent firing of the service’s two most senior officials (see GSN, July 22).

Gen. Norton Schwartz was sworn in as Air Force chief of staff yesterday, replacing Gen. Michael Moseley who resigned under pressure in June.  The upheaval was initiated after Air Force personnel last year lost track of six nuclear-armed cruise missiles (see GSN, April 4) and erroneously shipped nuclear missile fuse technology to Taiwan in 2006 (see GSN, March 25).  Air Force Secretary Michael Wynne was also forced to resign (see GSN, July 15), but his designated successor Michael Donley has not yet received U.S. Senate confirmation.

“[The] bottom line is we lost focus,” Schwartz told reporters at a briefing yesterday.  “We did, and that focus is coming back.”

He promised to restore high standards among Air Force nuclear crews (see related GSN story, today).

“It is a mission where anything less than perfection is not acceptable and that is the standard.  That certainly is the standard of the folks that brought that to us through the years.  And we will return to that standard,” he said.

Schwartz and Donley have won a promise from Defense Secretary Robert Gates to reverse planned cuts to the numbers of Air Force personnel, and some of the 14,000 additional troops now proposed would be directed to nuclear missions, Schwartz said (Greg Webb, Global Security Newswire, Aug. 13).

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Science Panel Backs Conventional Trident Missile

From Friday, August 15, 2008 issue.

By Elaine M. Grossman
Global Security Newswire

WASHINGTON — An independent panel today advised that the U.S. Navy develop and field a conventional version of its nuclear-armed Trident D-5 missile, a Defense Department initiative that has received scant support thus far from a skeptical Congress (see GSN, March 20).

In a 192-page report, commissioned by lawmakers in 2006 (see GSN, July 24, 2006), the National Academy of Sciences experts take issue with a Capitol Hill decision to eliminate this year’s funding for the Conventional Trident Modification. 

“The committee disagrees with the congressional decision not to fund testing of [the] CTM [missile] in 2008, and recommends instead that Congress fund” Conventional Trident Modification research and development “at a level sufficient to achieve early deployment if tests confirm system effectiveness,” writes the group, composed of 18 national defense and nuclear weapons experts.

The Navy missile was to be the first weapon developed and deployed for a new mission called “prompt global strike,” in which terrorist targets or rogue nations could be attacked within just one hour of a launch command.  Currently, nuclear weapons are the only tools in the U.S. military arsenal available to hit urgent targets halfway around the world in such short order.

Lawmakers last year decided that the Navy project would be limited to basic research and development and must share a $100 million budget in fiscal 2008 with an array of other “promising conventional prompt global strike technologies.”  Critics on Capitol Hill cited concerns that, if launched from the same Ohio-class submarines that carry an identical nuclear weapon, a conventional D-5 ballistic missile might be mistaken for a nuclear salvo and elicit a violent response from other atomic powers like Russia or China (see GSN, Dec. 13, 2007).

In its report, the NAS Committee on Conventional Prompt Global Strike Capability argued that virtually any long-range weapon built for the mission might introduce some risk of the nuclear “ambiguity” that Congress seeks to avoid.

Calling nuclear ambiguity “an understandable concern” with the Conventional Trident Modification, the panel said that the risk of a conventional prompt global strike attack “being misinterpreted and leading to a nuclear attack on the United States could be mitigated and managed through readily available mechanisms.”

These “cooperative measures” might include “providing information to bilateral partners about the [conventional prompt global strike] system, its operation and the doctrine for its use; immediately notifying of launches against countries; and installing devices (such as continuous monitoring systems) to increase the confidence that conventional warheads had not been replaced by nuclear warheads,” according to the report, “U.S. Conventional Prompt Global Strike: Issues for 2008 and Beyond.”

However, some critics of the conventional Trident option contend that land-based missile systems are better suited to reducing ambiguity and building confidence abroad.

“Some conventional prompt global strike systems, like some of the ground-based concepts, have gone out of their way to separate themselves from nuclear systems ... and [we] could open these to [international] inspections,” one former military officer with considerable strategic policy experience said today.  “The Navy submarine is nowhere near as open to inspection as the bomber or the ICBM.”

The Army and Air Force have developed concepts for land-based conventional missiles that could be based at installations that house no nuclear weapons.  Their launches might appear markedly different from those of current ICBMs, their warheads could be verified through on-site inspections and their activities could be monitored by spy satellites, said the former official, who was not authorized to address the matter publicly and requested anonymity.

The National Academy of Sciences panel found there are a number of “credible scenarios” in which a prompt global strike weapon might be useful, and noted that there are multiple future technologies that might augment or replace a submarine-based ballistic missile for the mission.

Threats might include “a ballistic missile launcher poised to launch a nuclear weapon at the United States or at an ally,” a “gathering of terrorist leaders or a shipment of weapons of mass destruction during a brief period of vulnerability,” or “an adversary’s command-and-control capability as the leading edge of a broader combat operation,” the report states.

“In light of the appropriately extreme reluctance to use nuclear weapons, conventional prompt global strike could be of particular value in some important scenarios,” according to the science panel, “in that it would eliminate the dilemma of having to choose between responding to a sudden threat either by using nuclear weapons or by not responding at all.”

The panel describes seven potential weapon systems that might be capable of undertaking the mission, including a couple of concepts that the committee itself developed:

— Existing systems:  These include tactical aircraft, cruise missiles, armed unmanned aerial vehicles and bomber aircraft.  Any of these would have to be deployed within range of a surprise threat to be successful at hitting the target within a 60-minute time frame.

— Conventional Trident Modification:  The Navy concept involves converting two D-5 missiles on each of the Navy’s 12 deployed ballistic missile submarines from nuclear- to conventionally armed.  Available as early as 2011, each missile could carry as many as four re-entry vehicles with precision-targeting capability.

— Conventional Trident Modification-2:  This committee concept calls for a missile that uses just two of the D-5’s current three rocket stages, allowing for a bigger payload and additional options for the kind of munitions delivered.  This version, which could be ready by 2013, would still achieve the weapon’s objective 4,000-nautical-mile range, according to the report.

— Submarine-Launched Global Strike Missile:  The Navy’s mid- to long-term concept would be launched from so-called “SSGN” Ohio-class submarines, converted for conventional missions.  This intermediate-range weapon, deployable before 2015, could carry a single, heavy warhead for attacking some hard targets or, like the CTM missile, could dispense kinetic-energy projectiles against buildings, vehicles or human targets.

— Conventional Strike Missile-1:  This Air Force concept for a boost-glide weapon would launch like a ballistic missile from U.S. land installations and then fly at hypersonic speeds into its targets with considerable range and maneuvering capability.  It could carry payloads similar to the Submarine-Launched Global Strike Missile but might not be available until 2016 or later.

— Conventional Strike Missile-2:  This committee concept is for a variant with longer glide time than the initial CSM weapon, allowing extended range and increased capability to dispense multiple munitions, the document explains.  Such a weapon, potentially available between 2018 and 2024, might also be able to dispense intelligence-gathering modules or offer re-attack capability, among other features.

— Hypersonic Cruise Missiles:  Calling these concepts “long-term alternatives,” the panel said such fast weapons could be launched from long-range aircraft, or deployed at sea or in foreign nations.  Possibly available for fielding between 2020 and 2024, hypersonic cruise missiles might offer “considerable capability” for dispensing smart munitions or surveillance modules, the report states.

The committee addressed additional concerns about the prompt global strike mission, including some critics’ view that detailed and reliable intelligence is rarely available to support a short-notice attack.  In light of such worries, a fielded weapon should “be employed only on the order of the president,” the panel advised.

Committee members also recommended that the U.S. government undertake “a comprehensive study of the military and diplomatic implications” of fielding and potentially using conventional prompt global strike capabilities. 

The assessment should consider “factors such as the potential for inappropriate, mistaken, or accidental use; the implications for nuclear deterrence and crisis stability (including ambiguity considerations); the impact of [weapon] overflight and debris [potentially affecting foreign nations]; and the implications for arms control and associated agreements,” the panel states.

The publication was preceded by an interim letter report in May 2007.  Today’s document is the NAS committee’s final report, according to the panel.

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North Korea Rejects Nuclear Verification Demands

From Wednesday, August 13, 2008 issue.

North Korea has rejected components of a U.S. plan to verify the Stalinist state’s claims regarding its nuclear programs, the Yomiuri Shimbun reported today (see GSN, Aug. 12).

An agreed verification plan would be the next step in carrying out the 2007 deal in which Pyongyang pledged to give up its nuclear program in exchange for economic, security and diplomatic benefits.  North Korea would likely achieve its goal of being removed from the U.S. list of state sponsors of terrorism after accepting a plan, but Washington says any program must cover the regime’s suspected uranium enrichment and nuclear proliferation operations alongside its known plutonium program.

The draft verification plan submitted last month also called for full access by inspectors to all North Korean nuclear sites.

Top North Korean nuclear negotiator Kim Kye Gwan dismissed the U.S. plan and demanded that his nation be considered a nuclear power, one source told Yomiuri.  Kim’s’ remarks reportedly angered U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill, Washington’s top envoy to the negotiations that also involve China, Japan, Russia and South Korea.

North Korea appears to be playing a waiting game with the Bush administration, which leaves office in January.  The administration so far has maintained a hard line on verification, but might not be able to hold that position as its time runs out.

Pyongyang, meanwhile, wants to keep its nuclear weapons and not have them subject to inspection, according to one former U.S. official.  It might use delays to disablement of plants at the Yongbyon nuclear complex to push Washington to amend its verification requirements, sources said (Takeo Miyazaki, Yomiuri Shimbun, Aug. 13).

Sung Kim, U.S. special envoy for the six-party talks, is scheduled to leave for Beijing today for talks with Chinese officials on the verification issue, the Associated Press reported.  There were no indications that he would meet with North Korean officials before closing the trip this weekend (Associated Press I/Yahoo!News, Aug. 12).

Elsewhere, North Korea and Japan today agreed on a new investigation of Pyongyang’s abductions of Japanese citizens in the 1970s and 1980s, AP reported.

The Stalinist state in 2002 returned five abductees and said that eight others had died.  Tokyo has not accepted that claim and has withheld support from Pyongyang during the six-nation nuclear process.

The investigation is set to begin quickly and end this fall, AP reported following two days of talks in China between Japanese and North Korean officials.  The Japanese Foreign Ministry said the deal requires North Korea to keep Japan updated on the investigation, to provide Tokyo with complete access to locations, people and records, and finally to send any survivors home.

In return, Japan would eliminate some of the sanctions it has imposed on North Korea (Jay Alabaster, Associated Press/Yahoo!News, Aug. 13).

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Study of U.S. Nuclear Handling Nears Completion

From Wednesday, August 13, 2008 issue.

By Katherine McIntire Peters
Government Executive

WASHINGTON — A panel of former U.S. Defense Department executives and national security specialists reviewing nuclear weapons management will make recommendations soon to Defense Secretary Robert Gates regarding Air Force failures in nuclear stewardship (see GSN, June 13).

The panel's full report covering all the military services is expected later this fall.

In June, Gates tapped former Defense Secretary James Schlesinger, who served in the Nixon and Ford administrations, to lead the Task Force on Nuclear Weapons Management, following an internal investigation into Air Force lapses that led pilots to fly nuclear weapons unknowingly from North Dakota to Louisiana last August and accidentally ship ballistic missile fuses to Taiwan in 2006, a mistake that was discovered only earlier this year.

As a result of that initial Defense Department investigation, Gates fired the Air Force's top civilian and military leaders, Air Force Secretary Michael Wynne and Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Michael Moseley, explaining in a June 5 press briefing that "the focus of the Air Force leadership has drifted with respect to perhaps its most sensitive mission."

The investigation that led to the firings was conducted by Adm. Kirkland Donald, director of Naval Nuclear Propulsion and the senior military official responsible for nuclear weapons safety (see GSN, June 19).  According to Gates, Donald identified "a substantial number of Air Force general officers and colonels potentially subject to disciplinary measures, ranging from removal from command to letters of reprimand."

One senior Air Force official told Government Executive that as many as 20 officers could be disciplined as a result of the lapses.

"Individuals in command and leadership positions not only fell short in terms of specific actions, they failed to recognize systemic problems, to address those problems, or where, beyond their authority to act, to call the attention of superiors to those problems.  Each had the leadership responsibility to identify and correct or flag for others the structural, procedural and performance deficiencies identified in just a few weeks by Adm. Donald," Gates said.

Gates said he would ask the Schlesinger task force, the members of which he named on June 12, to consider the findings and recommendations of the Donald investigation and to suggest changes in Air Force policies, procedures and organization within 60 days.  A broader Defense-wide review by the task force was to be completed in 120 days.

On Monday, Defense spokesman Air Force Lt. Col. Todd Vician said the task force still was working on the first stage of its review regarding service matters. The 60-day time frame did not specify work days or calendar days, he said.  The assessment and recommendations will be released at Gates' discretion after he is briefed, Vician said.

Gates made clear that the roots of Air Force stewardship failures have been in the making for more than a decade.  "Years ago the career path for Air Force personnel in the nuclear field was well-established and prestigious.  However, the overall mission focus of the Air Force has shifted away from this nuclear mission, making it difficult to retain sufficient expertise," he said, noting that the service has not compensated for the diminished expertise through training and active career management.

Action was required on two fronts, Gates said:  "First, fixing the structural, procedural and cultural problems; and second, ensuring accountability."  He has made accountability a central theme of his leadership.

Gates said he would ask the new Air Force secretary and chief of staff, once confirmed, "to evaluate each of the individuals identified by Adm. Donald as bearing responsibility in the recent incidents and systemic problems, to determine whether and what disciplinary measures are warranted, and whether or not they can be part of the solution to the problems identified by the investigation" (see related GSN story, today).

The Senate confirmed Gen. Norton Schwartz as chief of staff on July 31, but Senator Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.) put a hold on the nomination of Michael Donley to become Air Force secretary.  Cantwell told Gates in a letter she was doing this in part because she was frustrated with the Air Force's handling of a $35 billion contract to buy new refueling tankers. Boeing Co., based in Washington state, lost a bid for the deal earlier this year when the Air Force awarded the contract to a team led by Northrop Grumman Corp. and the European aerospace firm EADS.  After a critical review of the contracting process by the Government Accountability Office, the contract was reopened and Gates put Defense in charge of the new bidding process instead of the Air Force.

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Second Guilty Plea Wraps Up Las Vegas Ricin Case

From Tuesday, August 12, 2008 issue.

A cousin of an admitted biological toxin maker pleaded guilty yesterday to concealing knowledge of his relative’s crime, the Associated Press reported (see GSN, Aug. 11).

In federal court in Utah, 54-year-old Thomas Tholen acknowledged not alerting authorities when he learned as early as 2005 that his cousin Roger Von Bergendorff had produced a quantity of ricin, a potentially lethal biological agent.

Authorities seized a stash of ricin containers earlier this year from a Las Vegas motel where Von Bergendorff had stayed.   He pleaded guilty last week to possessing the biological toxin and is expected to receive a 37-month sentence as part of a plea agreement (see GSN, Aug. 5). 

In exchange for Tholen’s guilty plea, prosecutors agreed to recommend a sentence of probation only, AP reported.  Tholen is set to receive his sentence in October and Von Bergendorff in early November (Paul Foy, Associated Press/Google News, Aug. 11).

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Hair on Mailbox Not From Anthrax Suspect

From Thursday, August 14, 2008 issue.

Human hairs found in the mailbox used in 2001 to send envelopes carrying anthrax spores do not belong to the U.S. Justice Department’s sole suspect for the attacks that killed five people, the Washington Post reported today (see GSN, Aug. 13).

The FBI focused on U.S. Army microbiologist Bruce Ivins in early 2007 as the suspected anthrax mailer; the researcher committed suicide late last month as federal prosecutors were reportedly preparing to press charges against him. 

The unmatched hair in the Princeton, N.J., mailbox was the latest piece of evidence to emerge that complicates the conclusions of a federal probe widely challenged by skeptics.

Attorney Paul Kemp yesterday questioned where his former client "could have possibly stored this anthrax without any employees seeing it, or if he took it home, why there was no trace" of the substance found in his house, his car, his safe-deposit box or his locker at the U.S. Army Research Institute of Infectious Diseases at Fort Detrick, Md.

The scientist’s friends and former co-workers have called for the FBI to release details on the forensic investigation used to narrow the source of the anthrax in the mailings down to a flask controlled by Ivins.

The U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee yesterday said it would question FBI Director Robert Mueller at a Sept. 17 hearing, where Senator Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) plans to grill the official how the bureau honed in on Ivins.

The House of Representatives Judiciary Committee intends to summon senior FBI officials to a hearing next month.

Meanwhile, sources said that Ivins is now believed to have waited until the evening of Sept. 17, 2001 to travel to the Princeton, N.J. mailbox and send the anthrax.  A previous report indicated he might have dropped off the first batch of envelopes while away from work for several hours during the day.  Instead, Ivins apparently left the office early on the morning of the mailings, refueled his car, took a meeting outside the laboratory and then briefly returned to his workplace.

He then drove through the night to mail the anthrax in New Jersey, investigators contend.  However, the probe has failed to find evidence directly establishing Ivins’s presence at the mailing site on either day anthrax-filled envelopes were deposited there (Carrie Johnson, Washington Post, Aug. 14).

Documents released on the investigation last week have received significant scrutiny from researchers, conspiracy theorists and amateur analysts, the Associated Press reported.

"I think it's going to be one of the great conspiracy theories, like whether we landed on the moon or whether Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone" in the 1963 shooting of President John Kennedy, said Edward Lake, a retired computer specialist who maintains an extensive online collection of information on the case.

Courtney Hodges, a graduate student in biophysics at the University of California at Berkeley, added:  "There are a lot of people in science who are weird or unstable. … I don't consider myself among the hard-core conspiracy theorists, that this is a total cover-up.  It looks more like bungled investigation."

Other theorists maintained the attacks were part of a formal U.S. operation aimed at rallying the nation around military action.  A cover-up investigation later blamed Ivins for the attacks, many contended.

The case will continue drawing attention because it was “as dangerous as it could possibly be and also deeply mysterious,” said Mark Fenster, a University of Florida law professor who authored a book on conspiracy speculation (Matt Apuzzo, Associated Press/Google News, Aug. 13).

Former U.S. Senator Tom Daschle (D-S.D.) said he believes the FBI tracked down the true perpetrator of the mailings, USA Today reported today.

Daschle, whose office was targeted by one of the mailings, had expressed strong skepticism about the case given the Justice Department’s earlier and mistaken focus on former Fort Detrick researcher Steven Hatfill (see GSN, Aug. 11).  However, he concluded after a Justice Department briefing that "the evidence is pretty compelling.”

He said he was most convinced by the FBI’s use of forensic techniques to genetically link the anthrax in the mailings to Ivins’s supply of the agent.

"That's as close to a smoking gun as I think you're going to get," Daschle said.

He added that he and Senator Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) might have been among the targets of the mailings because their positions on abortion rights and the U.S. Patriot Act differed from Ivins’s stances.  The scientist might have carried out the attacks to help win greater U.S. support for anthrax vaccine research, Daschle said (Kiely/Leinwand, USA Today, Aug. 14).

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Biodefense Lab Price Tag Rises by at Least $200M

From Friday, August 15, 2008 issue.

The planned U.S. National Bio- and Agro-Defense Facility is expected to cost no less than $200 million more than originally anticipated, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported today (see GSN, Aug. 11).

Congress in 2006 authorized $451 million for the biodefense research site.  The Homeland Security Department now estimates the cost at anywhere from $648 million to $939 million, based on which of six possible locations is selected.

The increased price tag is due to inflation in construction costs and $75 million to $140 million in extra expenses related to each specific site, costs not covered by the original congressional action, according to Homeland Security laboratories chief Jamie Johnson.

One possible site for the facility is Athens, Ga., where residents attended two public hearings yesterday.  Some area residents argue that the disease agents held at the site would pose a threat to humans and animals, and could have an adverse effect on the local water supply and the neighboring Botanical Garden of Georgia.

“I support all the good goals,” said Richard Cooke of Watkinsville.  “I don’t support them here.  Accidents happen.  We all know that.”

Supporters of bringing the facility to Georgia said it would create hundreds of jobs.

“A $60,000 job can change someone’s life,” said Watkinsville City Councilman Brian Brodrick.  “That’s the kind of green we should respect.”

It is expected to cost slightly less than $680 million to build the facility in Athens.  The least expensive location would be in Mississippi, where construction is estimated at $648 million.  Building the laboratory at the site of the facility it is replacing, the Plum Island Animal Disease Center in New York, is the most costly option at $939 million.  The other candidate sites are in Kansas, North Carolina and Texas (Ken Foskett, Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Aug. 15).

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Newport Depot Finishes Off Chemical Stockpile

From Tuesday, August 12, 2008 issue.

The Newport Chemical Depot in Indiana last week completed destruction of its stockpile of chemical warfare material, the U.S. Army announced (see GSN, July 30).

The facility for almost four decades stored 1,269 tons of liquid VX nerve agent in bulk containers.  Chemical neutralization of the material began in May 2005 and ended Friday.

“This day marks a tremendous milestone for the workers at Newport, the citizens of Indiana and the rest of the world,” Conrad Whyne, head of the Army Chemical Materials Agency, said in a press release.  “Newport's stockpile has been safely eliminated, which brings the United States one step closer to fulfilling the commitment of destroying our nation's chemical weapons.”

The United States has now eliminated 55 percent of a chemical agent arsenal that originally stood at more than 30,000 tons, completing operations at Newport, Johnston Atoll and the Aberdeen Proving Ground in Maryland.  Operations continue at four U.S. sites and have yet to begin at two storage depots (see GSN, July 8).  The Chemical Weapons Convention requires the United States to finish off its full stockpile by 2012, though U.S. officials have acknowledged they cannot meet that deadline.  Congress had mandated that work be completed by 2017.

Treatment of caustic wastewater produced by neutralization at Newport is expected to be completed within a matter of weeks at a private plant in Port Arthur, Texas.  The Army would then ask the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons to verify completion of operations at the Indiana site (U.S. Army Chemical Materials Agency release, Aug. 11).