Nuclear Terrorism and Rational Choice submitted by Simen Andreas Ellingsen M. Sc. for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy King's College London University of London Department of War Studies 2009 - 1 - Abstract The prospect of nuclear terrorism, terrorist acts plutonium); and the strategic interplay between with nuclear fission explosives, is analysed by means terrorist and government in the case where the of rational choice theory, a methodology borrowed terrorist has acquired a nuclear weapon and must from economics which has hitherto not been decide whether to use it to attack, for extortion systematically applied to nuclear terrorism. The (blackmail) or to deter an attack upon his own methodology allows the formalisation and interests. modelling of key choices faced by both the aspiring Several key conclusions reached are of direct nuclear terrorist and a potential target government policy applicability. A simple decision theoretical in order to work out best strategies under the analysis shows that heavy emphasis on HEU over assumptions that the players are rational and plutonium in safeguards measures is justified. It is intelligent. demonstrated that relative deterrence (by denial) of Four relevant decision situations are studied: The nuclear terrorism in favour of conventional means is terrorist’s choice of whether to embark on an possible, and the conditions for which are found. It is ambitious and expensive nuclear project or to stay found, moreover, that to use an acquired nuclear with tried and trusted conventional methods; The weapon for blackmail or deterrence purposes is choice of fissile material for a terrorist bent on almost never preferable for a terrorist, and the best building a nuclear weapon: highly enriched uranium response of a government to an explicit nuclear (HEU) and plutonium as fissile material; The terrorist threat is almost always forceful response. government’s choice of prioritising between branches of fissile materials safeguards (HEU versus - 2 - Table of Contents - 1 - Introduction, Literature review and methodology 9 1.1 Chapter overview 9 1.2 Definitions and terms 10 1.3 The nuclear terrorism dispute: Would they? And could they? 12 1.4 Notable recent contributions to nuclear terrorism research 17 1.5 Previous applications of game theory to terrorism 19 1.6 Conclusion 20 - 2 - Methodology: problems and strengths of rational choice theory 21 2.1 Chapter outline 21 2.2 Rational choice and terrorism 21 2.3 Game theory and decision theory: concepts and an example 22 2.4 Claimed capabilities of rational choice models 24 2.5 Criticisms of rational choice models on philosophical grounds 24 2.6 The sociologist criticism 26 2.7 Criticism on the grounds of poor performance 26 2.8 Reduction of a state to a single mind 27 2.9 Are terrorists rational? 30 2.10 Evaluating the utility of gaming 31 2.11 Conclusion 32 - 3 - Keeping fissile materials out of terrorist hands: HEU, plutonium and a prioritised response 33 3.1 Research question 34 3.2 Literature overview and outline of chapter 34 3.3 Terrorist preference: HEU 34 3.4 Making a crude Pu implosion device 35 3.5 Availability of nuclear materials: safeguards and challenges 42 3.6 Conclusions so far 46 - 4 - Safeguards: HEU vs. Plutonium —a formal analysis 47 4.1 Chapter overview 47 4.2 Introduction to the methodology and a toy model 47 4.3 The model 50 4.4 Numerical estimation of parameters 55 4.5 A numerical example for further analysis 61 4.6 Assumptions and limitations of the model 65 4.7 The gains of gaming 67 4.8 Conclusions 68 - 5 - The HEU/Plutonium choice: From the Terrorists' Point of View 69 5.1 Research question and outline 69 5.2 Acquiring the material: strength or stealth? 69 5.3 A different angle 71 5.4 The choice of fissile materials from the terrorist's point of view 72 5.5 Analysis: the price of time and the fear of failure 77 5.6 Fissile material in small batches: the hodgepodge bomb 83 5.7 The gains and weaknesses of gaming 84 5.8 Conclusion: policy implications 85 - 3 - - 6 - Deterring terrorists from attempted use of nuclear weapons 87 6.1 Research question and scope 88 6.2 Chapter outline 88 6.3 The literature on terrorism and deterrence 88 6.4 The model 94 6.5 A discussion of means of deterrence in light of a simulation 96 6.6 The advantages of gaming versus a qualitative approach 105 6.7 Conclusions and policy implications 106 - 7 - Nuclear blackmail and other strategic uses of a terrorist nuclear weapon 108 7.1 Research question and chapter outline 108 7.2 Example: al Qaida 109 7.3 Principal issues of use or non-use 110 7.4 The credible threat 111 7.5 Scenarios and incentives 112 7.6 Strategic interplay of nuclear blackmail: a gaming approach 115 7.7 The merits of modelling 122 7.8 Conclusions and policy implications 123 - 8 - Conclusions and outlook 125 8.1 Conclusions from research chapters 125 8.2 Comparing policy implications of different chapters 128 8.3 The proof of the pudding: has the research approach been effective? 129 8.4 Where to from here? 131 Appendices - A - List of seizures of attempted smuggling of fissile materials 136 - B - Numerical programme used in chapter 6 138 - C - Some mathematics 140 C.1 Functions 140 C.2 Graphs and plots 141 C.3 The derivative: the slope of the function 141 C.4 Functions of two variables and the partial derivative 142 C.5 Summation of power series 144 - D - Some thoughts on a 'Second Line of Defence' 145 D.1 Second layers in literature and policy: a brief review 145 D.2 A diagrammatic outline of the paths to nuclear terrorism 149 D.3 Value for money in second layers: the challenge 149 D.4 A simple model of nuclear terrorism countermeasures 150 D.5 Outlook: Optimum funding and organisation of of the 'second line of defence' 153 D.6 Some early conclusions 154 Bibliography Dissertations 154 Books and monographs 154 Reports (governmental and non-governmental) 156 Papers, articles, reviews and chapters in edited volumes 157 Other documents 162 Speeches, testimonies and transcripts 162 Press reports and op.ed.s 163 Web pages and software 163 - 4 - List of Abbreviations CBP US Customs and Border Protection CIA Central Intelligence Agency CSI Container Security Initiative C-TPAT Customs Trade Partnership Against Terrorism DoD US Department of Defense DoE US Department of Energy DoS US Department of State EU The European Union FBI Federal Bureau of Intelligence FY Fiscal Year GAO US Government Accountability Office ICBM Intercontinental Ballistic Missile HEU highly enriched uranium kT Kilotonne (1 million kg) TNT LEU low enriched uranium MOX mixed-oxide fuel MPC&A Materials Protection, Control and Accountability NNSA (US DoE) National Nuclear Security Administration NPT Non-Proliferation Treaty NRDC US Natural Resources Defense Council NSG Nuclear Suppliers Group NYC New York City OTA Office of Technology Assessment PSI Proliferation Security Initiative Pu Plutonium SIS Secret Intelligence Service (UK) U Uranium UK The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland UN United Nations US The United States of America WW2 The Second World War - 5 - List of figures Illustration 1.1.: Papers on nuclear terrorism in a 'would-could' diagram. .....................18 Illustration 1.2.: A cartoon representation of the research approach (author's sketch)..19 Illustration 4.1: Utility function of toy game. .......................................................................48 Illustration 4.2.: Model utility function with two free variables........................................49 Illustration 4.3.: Layout of safeguards game: HEU vs. Pu.................................................50 Illustration 4.4.: Damage area of a 10kT bomb at Grand Central Station New York......57 Illustration 4.5.: Contour plot of numerical example utility function...............................62 Illustration 4.6.: Zoom of figure 4.5 with two possible scenarios and best responses. ..63 Illustration 4.7.: Contour plot of same utility function with incremental expenditure. 64 Illustration 4.8.: Contour plot of same utility function with fixed total cost....................64 Illustration 5.1.: The HEU/Pu game seen from the terrorist's point of view...................73 Illustration 5.2.: Plot of the fraction on the left side of eq. (5.6)..........................................75 Illustration 5.3.: Expected waiting time, equation (5.19). ...................................................81 Illustration 5.4.: The deterrence time, equation (5.20). ........................................................81 Illustration 6.1.: The game of nuclear vs. conventional strategy. ......................................95 Illustration 6.2.: Average payoff per round for different values of δ. .............................98 Illustration 6.3.: The standard deviation of accumulated payoff per round..................101 Illustration 6.4.: Standard deviation relative to expected payoff as functions of δ.......102 Illustration 7.1.: Simple decision theoretical model of nuclear terrorist blackmail. .....115 Illustration 7.2.: The general layout of the two-player nuclear blackmail game...........116 Illustration 7.3.: The game in its simplest embodiment...................................................119 Illustration 7.4.: Generalised game: response could fail, dismissal has cost..................121 Illustration 7.5.: The game assuming A>G and nonzero direct attack failure rate........121 Illustration 7.6.: The game of fig. 7.5 with forceful response penalty..............................122 Illustration B.1.: Structure of programme of chapter 6......................................................138 Illustration B.2.: The programme structure in more detail (with pseudocode).............139 Illustration C.1.: Examples of functions: 'Costa function' (left) and BMI (right)...........142 Illustration C.2.: A graph of a function of one variable.....................................................142 Illustration C.3.: A 3D graph with a single maximum.......................................................143 Illustration D.1.: A simple model of second layers............................................................151 Illustration D.2.: Different paths to a nuclear weapon. ....................................................152 - 6 - List of Tables Table 4.1: Estimated economic impact of terrorist attacks. ................................................56 Table A.1: List of smuggling incidents with fissile materials...........................................136 - 7 - Preface First and foremost I thank my supervisors who half of the research period. I have been allowed the have supported my work in innumerable ways necessary flexibility which allowed me to keep throughout these years. Professor Peter D. working on my 'London PhD', and the understanding Zimmerman (now Prof. Emerit.) got me interested in from my fluid mechanics teaching boss, Professor the subject of nuclear terrorism in the first place and Lars Sætran, has been instrumental and enabled me to persuaded me to move to London and embark on the fly to London for supervision. Likewise my work which was to result in this thesis. His immense supervisor in Trondheim, the brilliant Professor Iver knowledge and wise guidance has been a major help Brevik has been supportive all along, even if my rate and inspiration, and without his encouragement this of production has been slow over the last year from project would not have made it past the first year. the burden of doing two PhDs simultaneously. Equally heartfelt thanks go to Dr. James Acton who Finding my way through the bureaucracy of the has invested enormous time and energy to get me British university system would have been a daunting through the last stages of this project. After taking task for me, had it not been for the great amount of over as my 'unofficial' supervisor he has worked help and service I received from Gill Woods and through every page of each chapter with painstaking Helen Fisher at the Department of War Studies. I thoroughness, often several times, and rooted out a could hardly have done this without you! large number of inconsistencies, factual errors and Of great importance was the support and logical flaws. Much of the honour for the completion encouragement I received from three of my fellow of this work belongs to James whose combined PhD students at War Studies through many a dark knowledge and persistence I could not have managed hour during my year in London, my good friends without. Graham Gerard Ong-Webb, Valerie Arnould, and I received much help during the initial stages of the Bhavini Rama. Gerard was also the one to get me project from Dr. Morten Bremer Mærli, who helped started with rational choice theory in the first place me write the project proposal and get me introduced and persuaded me to take the course Game Theory for to the non-proliferation community in Norway. Much Political Science at London School of Economics with encouragement and inspiration was also received him. from Dr. Steinar Høybråten at the Norwegian Defence Further thanks should go to my family for support Research Establishment, for which I am grateful. Dr. and patience throughout, and to my friends, primarily Michael S. Goodman moreover provided me with Erik who suffered my stressful presence during a year extremely useful feedback on the introductory of living in the same apartment. chapters of the thesis, and certain parts of the formal Last, but most importantly, my thanks go to my analysis in the thesis was inspired and aided by wife Inger whose caring and support has kept me discussions with my office mate and fellow physicist afloat through many a dark hour. I don't think I'd Kristian Etienne Einarsrud. have finished this project without your indefatigable Beatus homo, qui invenit sapientiam, et qui affluit encouragement. You'll hopefully be seeing a little prudentia. more of me in the evenings now this thesis is handed in. I am grateful for all the support I have been given Qui gloriatur, in Domino glorietur. at the Department of Energy and Process Engineering at the University of Science and Technology in Trondheim, Norway, my employer during the second - 8 - journalists6 and politicians alike have seen the - 1 - possibility of terrorists acquiring and detonating a real nuclear weapon, painting perhaps the grimmest Introduction, Literature review picture of a terrorist attack imaginable. A coarse and methodology calculation by Bunn and co-workers7 estimates the consequences of a terrorist nuclear weapon of yield 10kT if detonated at the Grand Central train station, New York, on a normal day of the week. Such a bomb Although the freezing international climate of the would reduce around one square kilometer of a city to Cold War seems to have thawed considerably, the burning rubble8. The number of dead is nuclear threat is according to many analysts, as conservatively put at 500,000 and the direct economic prevalent as ever. Director General of the IAEA, cost to more than $1 trillion. The indirect and long- Mohamed El Baradei, for one, concluded in 2005 that term costs, both in money and life, will likely be much 'the threat of nuclear war has never been greater'1. higher, and, former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan Much as the calculi of deterrence and massive nuclear has predicted, the economic plummet following the retaliation may have become less prevalent, nuclear incident will cast millions of people worldwide into arms could be gaining newfound strategic importance hardship and poverty9. for smaller actors: against a technologically advanced The imminence of the above described threat, and adversary it is a weapon that, even in small numbers, how to deal with it, has been the source of debate for can immediately compensate for inferior conventional several decades. The aim of this thesis is to move the capacities. Nuclear weapons 'no longer represent the debate further by analysing different relevant frontier of technology' Betts sums up; 'Increasingly, scenarios and possible countermeasures by means of they will become the weapons of the weak'2. Non- formal models and rational choice methodology. state actors count among those who could see such potential. 1.1 Chapter overview Recent events have shown with terrifying clarity I review the existing literature on nuclear terrorism that the new breed of terrorists is not averse to killing and show that although a number of important civilians in the hundreds and thousands for what they contributions have been made and progress has been see as the ultimate cause, and the notion by Jenkins significant over the last decade or so, the discussion that 'terrorism is theatre' and 'terrorists want a lot of has tended to focus on terrorists' nuclear intent and people watching, not a lot of people dead'3 has been capability. I argue that a fruitful avenue for further called into question by many analysts4. research progress is to step beyond these questions Yet the successful detonation of an atomic bomb by and analyse scenarios and consequences given a terrorist group could dwarf even the attack on the World Trade Center on September 11, 20015. Scholars, bomb was 65 times the energy release of September 11, relative difference in damage could be considerably larger 1 E. Follath & G.M. Mascolo 'Al Qaida also wants the Bomb' Der than this. BBC 'The Destructive Forces Unleashed' (September Spiegel (February 8 2005)* 18 2001)* 2 Richard K. Betts 'The New Threat of Mass Destruction' Foreign 6 E.g. the op.ed. in New York Times the very morning this Affairs 77:1 (1998) p.27 thesis was sent for printing: Jeffrey Goldberg 'On Nov. 4, 3 Brian Michael Jenkins 'Will Terrorists Go Nuclear?' RAND Remember 9/11' The New York Times op.ed. (September 9, paper (November 1975)* p.4 2008)* 4 Including Jenkins himself: Brian Michael Jenkins 'The New 7 Matthew Bunn, Anthony Wier and John P. Holdren Age of Terrorism' Chapter 8 of Kamien (ed.) The McGraw-Hill Controlling Nuclear Warheads and Materials report of the Project Homeland Security Handbook (New York:McGraw Hill, 2006)* Managing the Atom (Belfer Center for Science and p.118. International Affairs, Harvard University, 2003)* 5 The total energy released in the terrorist attacks on Lower 8 See figure 4.4. The area would stretch from the southern end Manhattan - the kinetic energy of the two planes, the of Central Park to Madison Square Park, and Times Square, exploding aircraft fuel and the potential energy released as the UN building, the Theatre District and Madison Square the two buildings collapsed - has been calculated to add up to Garden would all be in ruins. approximately the equivalent of 0.2 kilotonnes (kT) of TNT. 9 Kofi Annan, Secretary-General of the United Nations, 'A While some perspective is offered by this, such numbers are Global Strategy for Fighting Terrorism' Keynote Address to not directly comparable due to the very different way in the Closing Plenary of the International Summit on which the energy is released. While the yield of the Hiroshima Democracy, Terrorism and Security (Madrid, 10 March 2005)* - 9 - assumptions about the nature and stature of the like other authors before13 I interpret 'terrorism' in an terrorist. Rational choice methodology is proposed as operational sense, reserving the right to use the term a means to achieve this end. somewhat pragmatically, recognising that I will inescapably - despite my best efforts to avoid bias - 1.2 Definitions and terms take 'the view from the west'. The restriction of terrorism to non-state actors I define 'terrorism' as excludes e.g. 'terror balance' between states. Many protesters of recent wars have dubbed state actions Acts or threats of strong violence targeting 'terrorism' - I merely note that this disaccords with the civilians usually including destruction of definition employed herein. civilian property, including planning of such Furthermore, the definition of nuclear terror is acts or threats, by non-state actors with the narrow and will only include true nuclear explosions. purpose of creating a condition of fear, Other authors include such actions as nuclear drawing attention, creating instability, and sabotage (destruction of nuclear instalments for affecting an audience beyond the victims radiological contamination) and radiological directly targeted. dispersion weapons14. These means are disregarded The definition is adapted from that used by Maerli10. I here, for manageability, but also because the scale of define 'nuclear terrorism' as the threat and the set of feasible countermeasures pertaining to each of these branches differ greatly, Terrorism whose primary means is making a distinction natural. Much as for example a explosion by nuclear fission or fusion, or failed nuclear explosive (a 'fizzle') might have similar reasonably educated attempts at such. destructive effect as a large radiological dispersion device15, the former is included in the definition for its A 'terrorist' is a person guilty of terrorism, a 'nuclear attempted nuclear explosion, the latter is not. terrorist' one guilty of nuclear terrorism. I will include only 'reasonably educated attempts' A few notes to the definitions chosen are called for. at nuclear explosives, to exclude hypothetical cases There exists no real consensus amongst analysts as to where terrorists employ, for example, non-fissile how 'terrorism' should be defined, and there are a materials in the misguided belief that it will somehow number of alternatives to choose from11. The most cause a nuclear yield16. Furthermore I will demand for important problem pointed out is that the notion of threats of nuclear explosions to be plausible before terrorism is often in the eye of the beholder: 'one counting them as 'nuclear terrorism', to exclude man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter'12. The obvious hoaxes, a number of which have surfaced definition chosen herein emphasises the violence and over the years17. the dread terrorism deliberately inspires, while The definition of nuclear terrorism includes placing no restrictions as to what might be the nuclear fusion for completeness. A home-made device overarching political motive behind the attack. Also, utilising nuclear fusion is a scenario so far-fetched it is destruction of property alone is not defined as nowhere discussed, yet were terrorists to acquire a terrorism if it may not be perceived as a threat of violence. No particular effort has been made to delve 13 Robin Frost 'Nuclear Terrorism Post-9/11: Assessing the into the deep waters of philosophy in this respect, and Risks' Global Security 18:4 (2004) p.398. 14 e.g. Charles D. Ferguson and William C. Potter with Amy Sands, Leonard S. Spector and Fred L. Wehling The Four Faces of Nuclear Terrorism (New York:Routledge, 2005)* 10 Morten Bremer Maerli Crude Nukes on the Loose?: Preventing Nuclear Terrorism by Means of Optimum Nuclear Husbandry, 15 Richard L. Garwin 'The technology of megaterror' Technology Transparency, and Non-Intrusive Fissile Material Verification PhD Review 105:7 (2002) p.66 dissertation (University of Oslo, 2004) p.13 16 For example, a 'nuclear bomb recipe' was discovered on an al 11 Mark Burgess 'Terrorism: The Problems of Definition' Center Qaida friendly web page prescribing the use of the non-fissile for Defense Information (August 2002)*. See also Thomas J. material radium for a nuclear weapon. This would not be a Badey 'Defining international Terrorism: A Pragmatic 'reasonably educated' attempt. Sammy Salama and Lydia Approach' Terrorism and Political Violence 10:1 (Spring 1998) Hansell 'Does Intent Equal Capability?: Al-Qaeda and pp.90-107. Weapons of Mass Destruction' The Nonproliferation Review 12:3 (2005) p.636. 12 Paul K. Davis and Brian Michael Jenkins Deterrence & Influence in Counterterrorism: A Component in the War on al 17 Michael Levi On Nuclear Terrorism (Cambridge, MA: Harvard Qaeda (RAND, 2002)* p.67. University Press, 2007) p. 120 - 10 -