Surprise!
Actually, I think I knew this, at least part of it, but I frankly had forgotten completely about it with the demise of the Soviet Union. You see, a rather sizable chunk of our nuclear weapons are stored in Europe. Yes, that's right. US nuclear warheads are sitting in storage in our NATO allies backyards, and some of those allies have apparently not told their citizens about that fact. Nor have they been as vigorous in securing those weapons as the US suddenly feels is necessary.
One of the sites is in The Netherlands, and that country's De Telegraaf thought it worth an article.
The storage depot for U.S. nuclear weapons in the Netherlands does not meet U.S. security requirements. This is evident from a report by the U.S. Air Force that Time magazine was able to get its hands on.
The nuclear bombs are allegedly at the Volkel air base. The base in the province of Brabant is, for that matter, not the only storage place that fails to meet the requirements. Safeguarding is also weak at bases in Belgium, Germany and Italy. There is a shortage of properly trained personnel and fences are in urgent need of repair. ...
The Dutch Ministry of Defense has never confirmed that the weapons are stored at Volkel. According to [Krista] Van Velzen [weapons specialist of the Socialist Party in the Lower House], such secrecy leads to “irresponsible risks” and “the Cabinet must inform the Lower House about this disturbing American investigation and take action.”
The investigation by the US Air Force came after the rather embarrassing lapses in security in this country, which resulted in a world wide survey of any other problems in securing the nukes.
Now, it's bad enough that nobody in this country, including the Air Force, has been paying attention to such details surrounding the security of these WMD for years. What's especially disturbing, however, is that for the past eight years, the Republicans have been yapping about how soft Democrats have been on security issues. Hey, some yahoo in Texas decided to ignore a pretty direct warning about the threat of an imminent direct attack on the US by terrorists. Now we learn that he and his cohort didn't even consider the fact that those same terrorists just might consider our nuclear stockpile in Europe easy pickings.
And here's the kicker: it's not like we just have a stray missile or two located in Europe.
The U.S. stores approximately 350 nuclear bombs in Europe, in six NATO countries.
And yet, as far as I can tell, not one US news outlet noted the problem with security with those weapons in Europe.
Man, have we got a long road ahead of us.
One of the sites is in The Netherlands, and that country's De Telegraaf thought it worth an article.
The storage depot for U.S. nuclear weapons in the Netherlands does not meet U.S. security requirements. This is evident from a report by the U.S. Air Force that Time magazine was able to get its hands on.
The nuclear bombs are allegedly at the Volkel air base. The base in the province of Brabant is, for that matter, not the only storage place that fails to meet the requirements. Safeguarding is also weak at bases in Belgium, Germany and Italy. There is a shortage of properly trained personnel and fences are in urgent need of repair. ...
The Dutch Ministry of Defense has never confirmed that the weapons are stored at Volkel. According to [Krista] Van Velzen [weapons specialist of the Socialist Party in the Lower House], such secrecy leads to “irresponsible risks” and “the Cabinet must inform the Lower House about this disturbing American investigation and take action.”
The investigation by the US Air Force came after the rather embarrassing lapses in security in this country, which resulted in a world wide survey of any other problems in securing the nukes.
Now, it's bad enough that nobody in this country, including the Air Force, has been paying attention to such details surrounding the security of these WMD for years. What's especially disturbing, however, is that for the past eight years, the Republicans have been yapping about how soft Democrats have been on security issues. Hey, some yahoo in Texas decided to ignore a pretty direct warning about the threat of an imminent direct attack on the US by terrorists. Now we learn that he and his cohort didn't even consider the fact that those same terrorists just might consider our nuclear stockpile in Europe easy pickings.
And here's the kicker: it's not like we just have a stray missile or two located in Europe.
The U.S. stores approximately 350 nuclear bombs in Europe, in six NATO countries.
And yet, as far as I can tell, not one US news outlet noted the problem with security with those weapons in Europe.
Man, have we got a long road ahead of us.
Labels: Nuclear Weapons
posted by Diane at 3:30 PM
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