Andrew Bieniawski, who leads the US National Nuclear Security Administration’s efforts to “lock down” nuclear materials and prevent them from falling into terrorist hands, concedes that it may not be ultimately possible to prevent terrorists from detonating a device."My personal view” states Bieniawski, “is that there is a likelihood in our lifetime there will be a radiological dispersal device or an improvised nuclear weapon." In risk analysis terms, this means that such a catastrophic 5/5 impact event, when mapped over a 30-year period, could conceivably be allocated a probability of 3/5, dependent on location.
This poses questions over the wisdom of locating corporate HQs in potential target areas, such as major Western cities. In the UK, for example, such an event in London would be devastating since the nerve centres of so many major businesses are concentrated in such a small geographical area.
The United States, conversely, has much better inherent redundancy – and is therefore of much less utility to a terrorist seeking to inflict a nationally devastating blow - due to the distributed nature of corporate HQs across the country.
Read about Bieniawski's race against the terrorists at:
