Today has been a leisurely day for me. I started out with yesterday's
NY Times article
on the CIA vs. Senate Committee Report of what new information was gained by torture.
I followed up a bit on one case:
Thwarting of Dirty Bomb and Capture of José Padilla
Quote:
The Case
José Padilla, who was accused of plotting a radiological dirty bomb attack inside the United States,
was one of the first American citizens designated an “enemy combatant.”
The Bush administration credited the interrogation of Abu Zubaydah
with uncovering the plot and leading investigators to Mr. Padilla.
His arrest has been held up for years as proof that waterboarding and other tactics worked.
Committee’s Conclusion
But Abu Zubaydah's information on Mr. Padilla was sketchy, and he provided it well before he was waterboarded.
Mr. Padilla, in fact, was arrested in May 2002, three months before the C.I.A. interrogation program began.
For all the publicity the Bush administration gave Mr. Padilla,
the committee revealed that the government never took his dirty bomb plot seriously.
It was based on a satirical Internet article titled “How to Make an H-Bomb,”
and the plot involved swinging a bucket full of uranium over one's head for 45 minutes.
One internal C.I.A. email declared that such a plot would most likely kill Mr. Padilla
but “would definitely not result in a nuclear explosive device.”
Another called Mr. Padilla “a petty criminal” and described the dirty bomb plot as “lore.”
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Now, if you want to see what has happened to this poor bastard,
here is the link to the
Wikipedia history, and to save time you can scroll down to the Timeline from 2002 - 2012.
But also be aware that after being sentenced in 2008 to 17 yrs in prison, ,
a federal judge in 2014 re-sentenced Padilla to 21 years.
Now if you don’t want to believe such a Keystone Cops story,
here is the link to a 4,432 word "How to Make a Hydrogen Bomb".
I 've quoted only the pertinent paragraph about 1/3rd the way down…
Rense.com
How To Build An H-Bomb
<snip>
...First transform the gas into a liquid by subjecting it to pressure. You can use a bicycle pump for this.
Then make a simple home centrifuge.
Fill a standard-size bucket one-quarter full of liquid uranium hexafluoride.
Attach a six-foot rope to the bucket handle.
Now swing the rope (and attached bucket) around your head as fast as possible.
Keep this up for about 45 minutes.
Slow down gradually, and very gently put the bucket on the floor.
The U-235, which is lighter, will have risen to the top, where it can be skimmed off like cream.
Repeat this step until you have the required 10 pounds of uranium.
(Safety note: Don't put all your enriched uranium hexafluoride in one bucket.
Use at least two or threebuckets and keep them in separate corners of the room.
This will prevent the premature build-up of a critical mass.)<snip>