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Fuel for nuclear bomb in hands of unknown Russian black marketeer, officials say
51–60 of 135 posts
Re: Fuel for nuclear bomb in hands of unknown Russian black marketeer, officials say
#52Earlier quoted context omitted.
> many ex-soviet states (i.e. Ukraine) were stuck with a nuclear arsenal they couldn't maintain and didn't want. An important side point: Ukraine definitely wanted nuclear weapons, in particular as a viable threat against being re-annexed by Russia. Ukraine gave them up only after receiving a solemn promise by the US and UK that they would protect Ukraine's territorial integrity. "On December 5, 1994 the leaders of U…
Remind me never to sign a memorandum with Britain or America...
I was thinking the same thing... but then I don't know that the current Ukrainian government has requested military assistance, have they?
Re: Fuel for nuclear bomb in hands of unknown Russian black marketeer, officials say
#53Earlier quoted context omitted.
> many ex-soviet states (i.e. Ukraine) were stuck with a nuclear arsenal they couldn't maintain and didn't want. An important side point: Ukraine definitely wanted nuclear weapons, in particular as a viable threat against being re-annexed by Russia. Ukraine gave them up only after receiving a solemn promise by the US and UK that they would protect Ukraine's territorial integrity. "On December 5, 1994 the leaders of U…
Remind me never to sign a memorandum with Britain or America...
Ukraine itself didn't learn from what happened to Poland in 1939. We had treaties that said we're to be aided by France and the UK...
Re: Fuel for nuclear bomb in hands of unknown Russian black marketeer, officials say
#54It's kind of odd that uranium smugglers write each other sales reciepts and label the samples. It seems like something you'd want to downplay in your paperwork...
"The guard found a receipt, written in Cyrillic, for the purchase of “uranium 235,” and then, after pulling apart an air compressor in the trunk, found a lead container inside with that label on it."
Everything about this whole thing seems kind of implausible, and poorly substantiated by anonymous "intelligence sources." Kind of reminds me the Valorie Plame incident.
Ahem.. I mean, we should all be very afriad, and obey the nearest authority figure!
Re: Fuel for nuclear bomb in hands of unknown Russian black marketeer, officials say
#55Re: Fuel for nuclear bomb in hands of unknown Russian black marketeer, officials say
#56Just got through reading "The Dead Hand", which is the story of the end of the Cold War. Highly recommended for those interested in how it all played out. http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B002PXFYPQ/ref=dp-kindle-re... It's frankly amazing that this hasn't happened much sooner. The amount of biological, chemical, and nuclear material lying around the former Soviet Union, basically guarded by people with starvation-le…
Some friends spent time volunteering at a charity in Russia in the early/mid 90s. When they went out, the charity had just been given an entire army base. Everything was left except the weapons – equipment, uniforms, personnel files, the lot.
If that's what a charity managed to acquire through official means, it's quite scary to think what others might have got their hands on.
And my friends got some very warm hats.
Re: Fuel for nuclear bomb in hands of unknown Russian black marketeer, officials say
#57Earlier quoted context omitted.
> many ex-soviet states (i.e. Ukraine) were stuck with a nuclear arsenal they couldn't maintain and didn't want. An important side point: Ukraine definitely wanted nuclear weapons, in particular as a viable threat against being re-annexed by Russia. Ukraine gave them up only after receiving a solemn promise by the US and UK that they would protect Ukraine's territorial integrity. "On December 5, 1994 the leaders of U…
Remind me never to sign a memorandum with Britain or America...
You think a shooting war between the US and Russia, or nuclear brinksmanship between Ukraine and Russia, would be preferable to what's happened instead?
Re: Fuel for nuclear bomb in hands of unknown Russian black marketeer, officials say
#58It's kind of odd that uranium smugglers write each other sales reciepts and label the samples. It seems like something you'd want to downplay in your paperwork... "The guard found a receipt, written in Cyrillic, for the purchase of “uranium 235,” and then, after pulling apart an air compressor in the trunk, found a lead container inside with that label on it." Everything about this whole thing seems kind of implausib…
trying to find a buyer for 39 kilograms of
highly-enriched uranium
one kilogram of highly-enriched uranium for
roughly $36 million
$330,000 as an initial payment
a small glass ampoule ... containing a blackish
powder
using genuine samples weighing a total of 5
grams as a lure
dozens of such samples on its shelves
meant to be the first of several shipments of
highly-enriched uranium totaling 10 kilograms
Also, I'd imagine a "receipt" in this case is not merely a set of carbon slips in salmon, canary and goldenrod. There are probably code words, used to mask meaning and ensure authenticity.
But hey, you never know. Maybe it was just a coffee stained napkin with the following written on it in ballpoint pen:
Dear Sergei,
I.O.U. $360M - re: 10kg U235 4 bombRe: Fuel for nuclear bomb in hands of unknown Russian black marketeer, officials say
#59If western intelligence knows about this and wants to get it off the black market, why don't they just buy it themselves? Surely the criminals selling it don't care where the money comes from.
Re: Fuel for nuclear bomb in hands of unknown Russian black marketeer, officials say
#60Just got through reading "The Dead Hand", which is the story of the end of the Cold War. Highly recommended for those interested in how it all played out. http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B002PXFYPQ/ref=dp-kindle-re... It's frankly amazing that this hasn't happened much sooner. The amount of biological, chemical, and nuclear material lying around the former Soviet Union, basically guarded by people with starvation-le…
Some friends spent time volunteering at a charity in Russia in the early/mid 90s. When they went out, the charity had just been given an entire army base. Everything was left except the weapons – equipment, uniforms, personnel files, the lot. If that's what a charity managed to acquire through official means, it's quite scary to think what others might have got their hands on. And my friends got some very warm hats.
It was -- and is -- an insane period of time to live through.
What concerns me is that during the last days of the old Soviet Union, they knew the jig was up. They knew it was all falling apart.
So they started hiding stuff. Everywhere. Papers were destroyed. Chemical and biological weapons were taken out and buried.
So there's one problem with "dangerous stuff we know about and we're worried that it's not being protected well", then there's an entirely different (and more dangerous) problem of "dangerous stuff we never acknowledged existed and nobody has records for where it is any more."