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Scientists say dirty bomb would be a dud
EFL - hattip to WND
The "dirty bomb" allegedly planned by terror suspect Jose Padilla would have been a dud, not the radiological threat portrayed last week by federal authorities, scientists say. At a June 1 news conference, the Justice Department said the alleged al-Qaida associate hoped to attack Americans by detonating "uranium wrapped with explosives" in order to spread radioactivity. But uranium’s extremely low radioactivity is harmless compared with high-radiation materials - such as cesium and cobalt isotopes used in medicine and industry that experts see as potential dirty bomb fuels. "I used a 20-pound brick of uranium as a doorstop in my office," American nuclear physicist Peter D. Zimmerman, of King’s College in London, said to illustrate the point. Zimmerman, co-author of an expert analysis of dirty bombs for the U.S. National Defense University, said last week’s government announcement was "extremely disturbing - because you cannot make a radiological dispersal device with uranium. There is just no significant radiation hazard"...
Which doesn't lessen the offense of Joe thought there was. And there remains the matter of the boom itself...
Padilla has been held by the U.S. military since 2002 as an enemy combatant, without charge and with little access to lawyers. The Bush administration has been criticized for denying a U.S. citizen normal access to the courts. The Supreme Court is considering whether the government, in defending against terrorism, has such power. Padilla’s lawyer, Donna Newman, said Wednesday of the dirty-bomb allegation that U.S. authorities "should have known that this was nonsense."
But did Joey? That's the question...
"When they frightened everybody, what were they trying to do, if they knew better? To show the administration is on top of things?" she asked. She wants the government to attempt to indict and try her client. "Maybe the problem is the evidence is so weak, it’s laughable," she said.
Hah, hah, hah. An AQ warrior trained in Afghanistan. I can’t beleive the authorities told us he was dangerous.
Comey said the news conference was called "to help people understand the nature of the threat" Padilla posed.
"He’s harmless and he wants to be your child's bus driver. Watch how I pat him on the head. See, he didn’t even growl."
Spokesman Corallo reaffirmed this week that it was Padilla who said uranium would be used. "If that’s what he planned," physicist Oelrich said of Padilla, "it shows he doesn’t know what he’s talking about and hasn’t done even rudimentary homework."
Let him loose. Our bad. From now on we must check a suspect’s SAT scores and college coursework before detaining him.
He wasn’t the only one, according to a Justice Department summary of interrogations. It said Abu Zubaydah, a top al-Qaida lieutenant now in U.S. custody, also envisioned a uranium device when urging Padilla to mount a U.S. attack. At another point, however, the summary said Zubaydah told Padilla the dirty bomb was "not as easy to do as they thought."
We collected all this dirt for nuthin.
Padilla claims "he was never really planning to go through with" any of the terrorist assignment, Comey told reporters.
It’s all a misunderstanding.
Posted by: Super Hose 2004-06-11
http://www.rantburg.com/poparticle.php?ID=35245