Rather than stealing nuclear material and making a bomb, could terrorists steal and use an already assembled nuclear weapon?
Possibly. Nuclear weapons are generally better secured than some stocks of HEU and plutonium are. Nevertheless, the United States is spending hundreds of millions of dollars beefing up security for its own nuclear weapons complex sites, and hundreds of millions more helping Russia improve security for its warhead sites. A stolen nuclear weapon might be very difficult for a terrorist group to detonate. Many nuclear weapons are equipped with electronic locks making it impossible to set off the weapon without putting in the appropriate code or figuring out a way to bypass the lock. Unfortunately, on older Russian tactical nuclear weapons, such locks are thought to be absent in some cases and relatively easily bypassed in others. U.S. strategic nuclear weapons also do not incorporate such locks, and some other countries’ weapons may also lack them. In addition, modern nuclear weapons are typically equipped with devices that prevent the weapon from going off until it has passed through its
Related Questions
- Rather than stealing nuclear material and making a bomb, could terrorists steal and use an already assembled nuclear weapon?
- Could terrorists deliver a nuclear weapon, or the fissile material required to build one, into the United States undetected?
- How much nuclear material would terrorists need to make a bomb?
