Defense official: Nuke tests at NTS are likely

Jace Radke

Wednesday, Aug. 14, 2002 | 11:12 a.m.

Underground nuclear testing could begin at the Nevada Test Site in the next decade to ensure the reliability of the nation's aging nuclear arsenal, a Pentagon official said this morning.

Scientists have relied on computer modeling and other analytical tests since 1992, when the last weapon was detonated at the Test Site.

But Dr. Dale Klein, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld's assistant for nuclear, chemical and biological defense programs, said that the nation may need hard data to check the weapons.

"As time goes on there will likely have to be some tests preformed beyond the small scale," Klein said in an interview at Nellis Air Force Base. "There is no direct evidence that says we have to test now, but the stockpile is developing aging characteristics.

"We didn't think they would be in stockpile this long."

Klein, who will visit the Test Site tomorrow, said that while there has been no official move toward testing yet, he believes it will have to be done at some point, perhaps in the next five to 10 years.

"Looking at it from a scientific standpoint you need to have experimental data, to go along with the modeling and analytical study," Klein said. "Of course a return to testing would be a very difficult political issue. The science community looks at it from a standpoint of obtaining knowledge."

It would take two to three years to prepare the Test Site for a nuclear test, but the Bush Administration has asked for better preparedness so testing could be resumed quickly if needed.

Greg Mello, director of the Los Alamos Study Group, an association of scholars working for nuclear disarmament, disagrees with the need for future testing.

"The National Academy of Sciences released a study in July that said that testing is not needed to determine the reliability of the stockpile," Mello said. "This is nothing more than an ideological-driven agenda by the Bush administration to systematically undermine the test ban."

The size of any future nuclear experimentation at the Test Site, an Energy Department facility in the desert 65 miles northwest of Las Vegas, is something that would be determined if testing were to be resumed, Klein said.

"Science would drive the size of the testing," Klein said.

The Test Site, which is larger than Rhode Island, was home to more than 1,000 above and below ground nuclear weapons test between 1951 and 1992. It has a series of underground tunnels which have served as laboratories for many of the tests.

Peggy Maze Johnson, executive director of Citizen's Alert, an environmental group, said that the idea of resuming testing is unbelievable.

"Did we not learn our lesson the first time?" Johnson asked. "We're paying millions of dollars to downwinders in Utah. The destruction these tests cause is just amazing, not only to people, but to the earth."

The fact that the testing would be conducted underground is small comfort to Johnson.

"We have a groundwater study that we conducted at the Test Site that will be released in September, and we believe that the Test Site sits right above the Amargosa River," Johnson said. "Do they think that whatever they do out there won't seep down into the groundwater?"

Currently the site serves as a training ground for fire, medical and law enforcement personnel to learn how to respond to domestic terrorism. The facility's role could expand further with last month's Senate Bill that grants Nevada $35 million to expand counter-terrorism at the Test Site.

In addition the Energy Department may move an advanced laboratory and its weapons-grade nuclear materials from Los Alamos, N.M. to the Test Site because of growing security concerns. In 1997 a mock terrorist attack by Army Special Forces used a Home Depot shopping cart to take more than 200 pounds of nuclear materials from the Los Alamos facility.

If nuclear testing were to resume at the Test Site scientists could gain valuable information, Klein said.

"Whenever testing occurs we'll be able to gain information that couldn't have been attained 20 years ago, because of how much computers have improved over that time," Klein said.

Klein is responsible for helping to ensure that the country's nuclear arsenal is secure and reliable, as well as making certain that the country's military forces are trained against chemical and biological weapons.

A reassessment of the security of the nation's nuclear weapons was conducted after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, Klein said.

"Our devices are routinely moved, and we've reassessed what kind of security we use on our transportation paths and bases, as well as examining what our response would be to an attempt to obtain one of our devices," Klein said.