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Analyzing Radiological and Nuclear Terrorism:  
θωερτψυιοπασδφγηϕκλζξχϖβνµθωερτψ
Threat assessments and policy implications 
 
 
υιοπασδφγηϕκτψυιοπασδφγηϕκλζξχϖβν
Kayvon Afshari 
New York University 
µθωερτψυιοπασδφγηϕκλζξχϖβνµθωερτ
Professor Elana DeLozier 
Nuclear Proliferation and Terrorism 
ψυιοπασδφγηϕκλζξχϖβνµθωερτψυιοπα
October 12, 2010 
 

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 Introduction
While the general public tends to conflate radiological and nuclear terrorism and greatly
fears both, these two threats are fundamentally different. Although radiological dispersal devices
are very crude weapons, the process of employing an RDD faces many constraints, and as a result
the terrorist threat is low. On the other hand, nuclear weapons are extremely sophisticated
devices, which require significant financial and technical resources beyond terrorist capabilities.
Consequently, the terrorist nuclear threat is almost impossible.
Nonetheless, the various constraints to a radiological terrorist attack have holes and
weaknesses in them, which this paper seeks to address. The somewhat porous roadblocks
terrorists face include accessibility, source security and safeguards, portability and transportation
hindrances, the risk of detection, as well as a “layered defense”. This threat assessment leads to
the conclusion that we must be weary of overreacting to the radiological or nuclear terrorist
threat. The logical policy implication of this argument is that law enforcement should focus on
fortifying the somewhat permeable defense against radiological terrorism as a higher priority than
spending resources on defending against nuclear terrorism.
Radiological Terrorism
Addressing a key advantage of defense against terrorism, Michael Levi writes, “It has
often been said that defense against terrorism must succeed every time, but that terrorists must
succeed only once. This is true from plot to plot, but within each plot, the logic is reversed.
Terrorists must succeed at every stage, but the defense needs to succeed only once.”1 This section
explores the stages within each terrorist plot to use a radiological dispersal device, identifies the
key hurdles that ensure the threat remains low, and proposes policy implications.
First, terrorists must identify a useful and threatening radioactive source among those that
are available. Radioactive material is used for commercial, medical, and industrial purposes;
however, only a small fraction is useful to terrorists. Those with large amounts of radioactivity
have the potential to create more harmful RDDs, but are more lethal to even suicide terrorists
attempting to execute an attack. Sources that are more easily transportable are more vulnerable to
theft. Materials that are readily dispersible also present a greater RDD risk than solid sources.
One of the key characteristics is the type of radioactive decay: alpha, beta, or gamma
radiation. Alpha only travels about one to two inches, is unable to penetrate skin, and is extremely
                                                        
1
Michael Levi, On Nuclear Terrorism (Cambridge: Harvard University Press), 11.

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harmful only if ingested or rubbed in the eyes. Therefore, terrorists do not desire alpha emitting
radioactive sources. Beta is about 100 times more penetrating than alpha radiation but loses its
penetrating power when it is shielded by something like an aluminum plate. It can cause burns to
the skin and is capable of creating genetic defects. Hence, terrorists are more likely to seek beta
emitters than alpha emitters. Gamma rays, which typically accompany alpha and beta, are high-
energy waves that travel like light. As a result, they have a very strong penetrating power, can
penetrate the human body, and are harmful to internal organs. Thick material like concrete is
needed to adequately shield gamma rays. Consequently, terrorists are most likely to seek
gamma-emitting radioactive sources. Because there are several source requirements, terrorists are
limited to the small fraction of the existing millions of sources that presents a high security risk.2
Second, terrorists must break past the barricade of source security to acquire the material
they have identified. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is responsible for controlling
and securing that small fraction in the United States and requires about 20,000 licensees to
maintain constant surveillance of the “more hazardous sources.”3 However, there are rectifiable
weaknesses in this constraint. In a covert investigation, the Government Accountability Office
(GAO) was able to create a bogus business that obtained a license and a supplier’s agreement to
deliver radioactive material. As a result, the GAO recommended that the NRC improve its
screening of new license applications, conduct periodic reviews of license examiners, and explore
options to prevent license counterfeiting.4 On the other hand, the GAO was unable to get a license
for its bogus business from an Agreement State, states that assume the regulatory authority of the
NRC, because state license examiners said they would visit the company office first.5 Only 35
states are currently registered as Agreement States and they may be more effective local monitors
than the federal NRC.
Source security is pivotal line of defense that can stop a radiological terrorist plot from
moving from the theoretical to the actual. Policy must reflect this importance and require on-site
visits before issuing licenses as well as incentivize more states to sign on as Agreement States.

                                                        
2
Four Faces of Nuclear Terrorism, Charles Ferguson and William Potter, 265.
3
Charles D. Ferguson, Tahseen Kazi, and Judith Perera, “Commercial Radioactive Sources:
Surveying the Security Risks,” Moneterey Institute’s Center for Non Proliferation Studies, 47.
4
Actions taken by NRC to Strengthen its Licensing Process for Sealed Radioactive Sources Are
Not Effective, July 12, 2007.
5
Actions Taken by NRC to Strengthen…

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 If terrorists are unable to obtain sources through counterfeiting, they may attempt to steal
material in order to move past this stage of the plot. The physical security around facilities with
radiological sources presents a major hindrance, and yet requires improvement. While security
around power plants tends to be very high, research reactor security is typically lighter.
Additionally, research reactor spent fuel typically contains fewer fission products, and would
therefore not require as many special precautions by a terrorist to prevent a lethal dose. They also
typically weigh much less than commercial assemblies, making them easier to haul away.6
Because these sites may be an easier target, beefing up their security should be a priority.
If a terrorist group were able to acquire a radioactive source, the third hurdle is
transportation, since the ability to travel undetected while being exposed to a radioactive source
represents a portability constraint. The nature of the source and its half-life are a major concern in
this stage. The half-life is the time it takes for a radioisotope to decay by half and become a new
isotope in its process of becoming a stable atom. Radioactive sources with very long half-lives
(thousands or millions of years) emit radiation very slowly; hence, they are useless to terrorists.
On the other hand, sources with short half-lives (several minutes or days) emit radiation quickly
and could potentially kill a terrorist before reaching the intended target. Consequently, terrorists
desire radioactive sources with medium half-lives (within the span of a human life) because they
allow enough time to reach the intended target and they decay quickly enough to be a concern for
potential victims.
The fourth hurdle terrorists face while transporting a portable, high-risk, medium half-life,
gamma-emitting radioactive source is radiation detection technology, a somewhat porous
roadblock with room for improvement. Many law enforcement officials are equipped with
personal radiation detectors, which are convenient because of their size but are not as sensitive as
other equipment. Most detect gamma radiation but are unable to detect alpha or beta radiation.
Although gamma radiation is indeed the most concerning, technological advancements including
more sensitive PRDs that can also detect alpha and beta radiation would improve this line of
defense. Additionally, ensuring that all officers who patrol high-value targets are equipped with
PRDs and know how to operate them will fortify this defense.
Radiation portal monitors are much larger pieces of very sensitive equipment located at
points of entry and checkpoints to inspect cargo. With RPM inspection it is difficult to distinguish
                                                        
6
Four Faces of Nuclear Terrorism, 262.

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between signals that detect a high-risk radioactive source and those that indicate low-risk or
background radiation, which nevertheless trigger a signal. Drawing the line is a difficult
balancing task and an inherent weakness in this important form of radiation detection. Increased
funding for research and technological improvements in order to better detect and distinguish
could go a long way in reinforcing this detection defense.
The fifth challenge is the actual dispersion of radiation and it would be relatively
straightforward. Crude “dirty bombs” simply require conventional explosives, which can be
readily acquired or made by terrorists, and would disperse radiation along with its blast.7
Alternatively, terrorists could employ non-explosive means like an aerosol can to spray a
radioactive source, or even placing a chunk of radioactive material in a concealed location.
Because this final obstacle is the simplest of the five steps, it is crucial that law
enforcement remain vigilant in the first four steps. Improving NRC licensing, increasing the
amount of Agreement States, beefing up research reactor security, arming and educating officers
with PRDs, and funding research into improving radiation detection are all policy adjustments
that will make each of the stages more difficult for terrorists. Even if all these lines of defense
failed, the effects of a successful “dirty bomb” would likely be less disastrous than the general
public imagines. In fact, more people would likely die from the conventional blast than from the
effects of radiation. The greater effect may be the disruption, as civilians may not know how to
respond upon hearing about a radiological weapon, potentially hampering emergency crews.
Residents may be weary of returning to their homes even after being assured by officials that the
radiation has receded. These are all contingencies that require emergency planning but the best
defense is to undertake the policy adjustments that will keep this threat level low.
Nuclear Terrorism
While the five stages to a radiological terrorist attack are somewhat penetrable, the route
to employing a nuclear weapon is fundamentally different and much less navigable. While the
consequences of a nuclear attack are horrific and the intended threat is real, the financial and
technical requirements are so far beyond terrorist capabilities that the vulnerability is almost zero.
Therefore, the risk of nuclear terrorism is almost impossible or extremely low.
The route to a nuclear attack includes the nuclear fuel process— mining, conversion,
enrichment, and sometimes reprocessing— and building either a gun-type or implosion weapon.
                                                        
7
Four Faces of Terrorism, 279.

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The steps of enrichment, reprocessing and building the bomb are of particular concern here and
are all require prohibitively sophisticated and expensive techniques.
The goal of uranium enrichment is to obtain increasingly pure samples of uranium-235.
This isotope is desired because it is fissile, meaning that its nuclei are likely to undergo enough
nuclear fissions to create a chain reaction that can be harnessed for energy in a reactor or an
explosion in a weapon. The most common process involves spinning uranium hexafluoride in a
gas centrifuge at extremely precise rotations-per-minute. This process separates the slightly
heavier uranium-238 from the uranium-235, leaving the U-238 around the outer rim and the
U-235 toward the center. The procedure is not perfect and thus must be repeated throughout a
cascade of centrifuges until enough U-238 is removed to achieve the desired purity of U-235.
The centrifuge process is identical whether the goal is nuclear energy or a nuclear weapon.
A civilian program must repeat the process until 3-5% U-235 purity is achieved whereas a nuclear
weapon requires 90% purity. Either way, the process is beyond the scope of terrorist capabilities.
Designing and developing centrifuges is a difficult and expensive process, not to mention
operating the centrifuges to spin at the precise rotations-per-minute to separate isotopes.
Alternatively, a terrorist group could opt for the plutonium route, which presents its own
set of unique difficulties. Plutonium-239 is the fissile isotope desired, yet it does not exist in
nature and must be acquired and extracted using a nuclear reactor and a reprocessing plant, both
facilities to which terrorists do not have access or the capability to build. Essentially, enriched
uranium that goes through a nuclear reactor eventually becomes spent fuel. During the process,
some of the U-238 nuclei will capture another neutron and become U-239. With a half-life of 23
minutes, this isotope rapidly undergoes two beta decays and becomes Pu-239.
The Pu-239 is still mixed with a great deal of U-238 and other fission products and must
be extracted in a reprocessing plant. The most common extraction procedure is a chemical
process known commonly as PUREX (an acronym for Plutonium-Uranium Extraction). First, the
irradiated fuel is dissolved in nitric acid to remove fine insoluble solids. Then the remaining
material goes through a liquid-liquid extraction process that separates the heavier plutonium from
the uranium. Not only is this a sophisticated chemical process, but also trade in the relevant
chemicals (including tributyl phosphate) is heavily monitored. It would be extremely difficult for
terrorists to acquire or properly use the necessary chemicals to extract Pu-239 from spent fuel.

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 Whether a terrorist group opts for the uranium or plutonium route, the task of building the
weapon poses another wall. There are two pathways: building a gun-type weapon using uranium
or building an implosion weapon using either plutonium or uranium. The gun-type weapon design
is simpler, but requires more uranium; the implosion weapon is a more difficult project, but can
be accomplished with less plutonium or uranium.
The gun-type weapon is the simpler design because it does not require as sophisticated
explosive or electronic components as the implosion weapon does.8 This device uses chemical
explosives to “shoot” one subcritical mass, a mass unable to sustain a chain reaction, of weapons-
grade uranium into another at a high speed, like a bullet is shot from a gun. The two masses
collide and form a supercritical mass, which is greater than the amount to sustain a fission chain
reaction, creating a large amount of energy and a nuclear explosion. The lower level of
sophistication of designing this bomb puts it conceivably within arms length of terrorist
capabilities, although it would certainly not be easy. The more difficult task in achieving this goal
remains acquiring enough weapons-grade uranium to make it an option.
Still, the gun-type weapon would be the choice of terrorist groups because creating an
implosion weapon requires advanced explosive components and fusing systems.9 In an implosion
weapon, chemical explosives compress the volume of a subcritical mass of either U-235 or
Pu-239, thereby becoming supercritical and producing a nuclear explosion. While less fissile
material is required than a gun-type, designing the conventional explosives is prohibitively
sophisticated. In order to properly decrease the volume and increase the density of the plutonium
or uranium pit, it is imperative that the explosives be placed uniformly around the pit and
detonate simultaneously. This is extremely difficult to gauge, and would mostly likely require
several nonnuclear experiments to determine the appropriate amount of explosives, positioning,
and timing of detonation, increasing the probability of detection. In fact, while the US was
confident that gun-type “Little Boy” would cause a nuclear explosion without prior tests, the
implosion method was tested over New Mexico before “Fat Man” was dropped over Nagasaki.
Perhaps because of these many constraints, some have suggested terrorists could steal
weapons-grade uranium; in fact, facilities housing these materials are extremely well guarded.
Others have advised that a nation-state could furtively pass a nuclear weapon along to terrorists;

                                                        
8
Nuclear Threat Initiative, “Two Types of Fission Weapons”, Online.
9
“Two Types of Fission Weapons”.

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in reality, no government trusts a terrorist group enough to detonate a nuclear weapon without it
being traced back to the original source. Countries are effectively deterred from doing so.
Clearly, nuclear weapons are an inauspicious goal for terrorist groups and therefore a
lower priority for the defense. Mastering the nuclear fuel cycle, especially enrichment and
reprocessing, is the most prohibitively difficult stage. While the implosion weapon is much too
sophisticated for terrorists, a gun-type weapon could conceivably be developed. Again, in
pursuing this route, terrorists are shackled by their inability to acquire enough weapons-grade
uranium. It is a true testament to the difficulty of the nuclear fuel cycle that enriching uranium has
remained the exclusive achievement select nation-states.
Conclusion
A better understanding of the constraints surrounding a radiological or nuclear attack
offers a more astute perspective than the popular imagination of the ‘doomsday scenario’. And
while this paper argues that the radiological terrorist threat is low and the nuclear terrorist threat is
extremely low, there are real policy steps that have been outlined to maintain or even reduce that
probability. Generally, we must focus on the radiological threat as a higher priority than the
nuclear threat. Improving our source security by better license screening methods and pressuring
more states to become Agreement States can keep a radiological plot in the realm of theory.
Beefing up research reactor security can plug a gap in physical security. Funding research into
improved radiation detection as well as ensuring that patrollers near high value targets are armed
and educated in their use can stop a plot that is already in motion.
On the nuclear front, the defense’s best ally is the difficulty in the nuclear fuel cycle.
Nonetheless, we must continue to ensure the high-level of security around enrichment and
reprocessing sites in order to protect against theft. One of the most promising proposals already in
motion is the creation of a nuclear fuel bank under the supervision of the IAEA, ensuring that
trusted nation-states have a reliable foreign source of nuclear fuel without having to develop
indigenous enrichment or reprocessing facilities, further limiting the possibility of theft.
Finally, reflecting on the defense’s role within Levi’s framework of a layered defense
offers an insightful perspective to our inherent advantage in the game: that we only need to be
successful at one stage in order to foil the plan entirely. However, given the potential for loss of
life and the emotional, visceral response to terrorism, we must nevertheless strive to be successful
at every stage.

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