ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the dangers and vulnerabilities to terrorist attack facing the 103 commercial nuclear reactors currently operating in the United States. It shows that commercial nuclear power has done little to enhance US energy security, and nothing to enhance national security. After surveying the internal and external hazards the chapter explores the implications for both energy security and national security. The "great nuclear bandwagon" was characterized by an astonishing sanguinity regarding nuclear power's unique problems: the potential for nuclear weapons proliferation, nuclear reactor accidents, and the problem of spent fuel disposal. Besides safety considerations, one of the most serious consequences of the decision to use enriched uranium in nearly all US reactors and most of those in the rest of the world, has been to facilitate the global proliferation of nuclear weapons. The great fear among terrorism specialists is that anti-western terrorist groups may be able to obtain highly enriched uranium from states.
