|
Prices Fall Dramatically for Secret Plans for Nuclear Weapons
From The OnionTop-secret information about the design, construction, and delivery of nuclear weapons has never been more affordable than it is today, CIA Director George Tenet announced Monday. ..... "These bargain prices will create more buyers, which will in turn widen the black market to include more sellers," Tenet said. "If this trend continues, then by 2010, nuclear secrets will be well within the reach of Uzbekistan, Morocco, and pretty much anyone else with enough money to buy a used car." ... CIA nuclear-weapons specialist Mitch Romano ... cited another example of plunging prices. "About six months ago, one of our wiretaps recorded the sale of plans for a two-foot, 12-megaton warhead to a Quebecois separatist cell for slightly more than $1 million," Romano said. "Yesterday, the plans surfaced again, this time on the Internet. It was eBay item #2899538529, and it had a âBuy it nowâ price of $18,500." Romano assured the public that the CIA has the seller, a San Diego-based car-audio retailer with the screen name of BatVette65, under strict surveillance. "Heâs got tons of new deals every week," Romano said. "Right now, heâs got plans for an artillery-launched supergun nuke and a set of blueprints for cool old vintage Soviet-era silos." ..... "Last week, we investigated reports that a cell in Edinburgh had sold classified British intelligence information to an American group," Woess said. "The group turned out to be the Young Republicans organization at the University of Virginia. NATO has since classified the group as a Class D potential nuclear threat," Woess added. At least one intelligence expert expressed trepidation over the booming nuclear-secrets economy. "It was an embarrassment to our country that Abdul Qadeer Khan sold nuclear secrets and technology to Iran, Libya, and North Korea," said General Mohammed Kanazwa, a senior officer for Pakistani military intelligence. "But it was all the more embarrassing when we found out that he had sold them in the âBargains Under $100â section of the Cleveland Plain Dealer." .... Posted by: Mike Sylwester 2004-04-08 |
| http://www.rantburg.com/poparticle.php?ID=29988 |