| Submit your comments on this article |
| Home Front: WoT |
| US monitored domestic Muslim sites for possible nukes |
| 2005-12-23 |
| In search of a terrorist nuclear bomb, the federal government since 9/11 has run a far-reaching, top secret program to monitor radiation levels at over a hundred Muslim sites in the Washington, D.C., area, including mosques, homes, businesses, and warehouses, plus similar sites in at least five other cities, U.S. News has learned. In numerous cases, the monitoring required investigators to go on to the property under surveillance, although no search warrants or court orders were ever obtained, according to those with knowledge of the program. Some participants were threatened with loss of their jobs when they questioned the legality of the operation, according to these accounts. Federal officials familiar with the program maintain that warrants are unneeded for the kind of radiation sampling the operation entails, but some legal scholars disagree. News of the program comes in the wake of revelations last week that, after 9/11, the Bush White House approved electronic surveillance of U.S. targets by the National Security Agency without court orders. These and other developments suggest that the federal government's domestic spying programs since 9/11 have been far broader than previously thought. The nuclear surveillance program began in early 2002 and has been run by the FBI and the Department of Energy's Nuclear Emergency Support Team (NEST). Two individuals, who declined to be named because the program is highly classified, spoke to U.S. News because of their concerns about the legality of the program. At its peak, they say, the effort involved three vehicles in Washington, D.C., monitoring 120 sites per day, nearly all of them Muslim targets drawn up by the FBI. For some ten months, officials conducted daily monitoring, and they have resumed daily checks during periods of high threat. The program has also operated in at least five other cities when threat levels there have risen: Chicago, Detroit, Las Vegas, New York, and Seattle. FBI officials expressed concern that discussion of the program would expose sensitive methods used in counterterrorism. Although NEST staffers have demonstrated their techniques on national television as recently as October, U.S. News has omitted details of how the monitoring is conducted. Officials from four different agencies declined to respond on the record about the classified program: the FBI, Energy Department, Justice Department, and National Security Council. "We don't ever comment on deployments," said Bryan Wilkes, a spokesman for DOE's National Nuclear Security Administration, which manages NEST. In Washington, the sites monitored have included prominent mosques and office buildings in suburban Maryland and Virginia. One source close to the program said that participants "were tasked on a daily and nightly basis," and that FBI and Energy Department officials held regular meetings to update the monitoring list. "The targets were almost all U.S. citizens," says the source. "A lot of us thought it was questionable, but people who complained nearly lost their jobs. We were told it was perfectly legal." The question of search warrants is controversial, however. To ensure accurate readings, in up to 15 percent of the cases the monitoring needed to take place on private property, sources say, such as on mosque parking lots and private driveways. Government officials familiar with the program insist it is legal; warrants are unneeded for monitoring from public property, they say, as well as from publicly accessible driveways and parking lots. "If a delivery man can access it, so can we," says one. Georgetown University Professor David Cole, a constitutional law expert, disagrees. Surveillance of public spaces such as mosques or public businesses might well be allowable without a court order, he argues, but not private offices or homes: "They don't need a warrant to drive onto the property -- the issue isn't where they are, but whether they're using a tactic to intrude on privacy. It seems to me that they are, and that they would need a warrant or probable cause." Cole points to a 2001 Supreme Court decision, U.S. vs. Kyllo, which looked at police use -- without a search warrant -- of thermal imaging technology to search for marijuana-growing lamps in a home. The court, in a ruling written by Justice Antonin Scalia, ruled that authorities did in fact need a warrant -- that the heat sensors violated the Fourth Amendment's clause against unreasonable search and seizure. But officials familiar with the FBI/NEST program say the radiation sensors are different and are only sampling the surrounding air. "This kind of program only detects particles in the air, it's non directional," says one knowledgeable official. "It's not a whole lot different from smelling marijuana." Officials also reject any notion that the program specifically has targeted Muslims. "We categorically do not target places of worship or entitles solely based on ethnicity or religious affiliation," says one. "Our investigations are intelligence driven and based on a criminal predicate." Among those said to be briefed on the Muslim were Vice President Richard Cheney; Michael Brown, then-director of the Federal Emergency Management Administration; and Richard Clarke, then a top counterterrorism official at the National Security Council. After 9/11, top officials grew increasingly concerned over the prospect of nuclear terrorism. Just weeks after the World Trade Center attacks, a dubious informant named Dragonfire warned that al Qaeda had smuggled a nuclear device into New York City; NEST teams swept the city and found nothing. But as evidence seized from Afghan camps confirmed al Qaeda's interest in nuclear technology, radiation detectors were temporarily installed along Washington, D.C., highways and the Muslim monitoring program began. Most staff for the monitoring came from NEST, which draws from nearly 1,000 nuclear scientists and technicians based largely at the country's national laboratories. For 30 years, NEST undercover teams have combed suspected sites looking for radioactive material, using high-tech detection gear fitted onto various aircraft, vehicles, and even backpacks and attaché cases. No dirty bombs or nuclear devices have ever been found - and that includes the post-9/11 program. "There were a lot of false positives, and one or two were alarming," says one source. "But in the end we found nothing." |
| Posted by:Dan Darling |
| #22 Islam didn't exist in the 3rd century. Oh! I take your point. And agree. |
| Posted by: CrazyFool 2005-12-23 23:33 |
| #21 I think we should all be guided by the principle of WWJBD |
| Posted by: DMFD 2005-12-23 20:00 |
| #20 The more you guys talk about this scenario, the less bad it seems. |
| Posted by: Speamble Jolurong7657 2005-12-23 17:27 |
| #19 ZF - true, but it would be the end of the Dem party, some national capitals, and the pretense that we can get along with Islam. Mass deportations and extrajudicial justice would result. Islam would be pushed from the 7th to the 3rd century |
| Posted by: Frank G 2005-12-23 17:10 |
| #18 ZF - Point well taken, but I was just trying to build on the point made by doc earlier. |
| Posted by: BigEd 2005-12-23 15:58 |
| #17 BigEd: Washington DC will be habitable in 50,000 years... Hiroshima and Nagasaki were habitable within months of being irradiated. And those were relatively primitive, dirty bombs, that were probably large compared to what Muslims will be able to work up. A total of 70,000 died in both cities. I think DC will lose some people, but it won't be the end, of the DC or of these United States. |
| Posted by: Zhang Fei 2005-12-23 15:17 |
| #16 1)what's wrong with monitoring anything, specially possible radiation. 2)I thought that utilities, etc monitor for possible excess radiation |
| Posted by: Hupemp Thremp9092 2005-12-23 15:11 |
| #15 You get 'em Ed! |
| Posted by: Leon Clavin 2005-12-23 13:53 |
| #14 US monitored domestic Muslim sites for possible nukes The past tense is a bit worrying. Posted by: gromgoru 2005-12-23 13:18 Detectors only need to be installed once if they remain working/transmitting :-) |
| Posted by: Frank G 2005-12-23 13:27 |
| #13 US monitored domestic Muslim sites for possible nukes The past tense is a bit worrying. |
| Posted by: gromgoru 2005-12-23 13:18 |
#12  Hovasse at tripod.com Female reporters for "US News and World Report" meet in a gendersegrated meeting to hear about severance pay. The Grand Mufti of "Bin Laden City", formerly New York City, decreed no longer may women work outside the home. The spokewoman, accompanied by a member of the new religious police, said the terminated US News employess would get an extra bonus because it was the magazine's reporting on radiation monitoring which gave the "true voices of Islam" a heads up and they were able to change their plans. Washington DC will be habitable in 50,000 years... |
| Posted by: BigEd 2005-12-23 12:33 |
| #11 Federal officials familiar with the program maintain that warrants are unneeded for the kind of radiation sampling the operation entails, but some legal scholars disagree Here, after learning about your warrant, just let me have a few moments to "tidy up" the place. Officials also reject any notion that the program specifically has targeted Muslims. "We categorically do not target places of worship or entitles solely based on ethnicity or religious affiliation," says one. "Our investigations are intelligence driven and based on a criminal predicate." WHY THE HELL NOT this PC attitude is driving me nuts. Yeah like lets scan the nursing homes too, don't stop just patting down the little old ladies at airport security. We need to stop leaking this sensitive material. |
| Posted by: Jan 2005-12-23 11:52 |
| #10 {image} Posted by doc That's exactly what they want. |
| Posted by: Bomb-a-rama 2005-12-23 11:06 |
| #9 and Richard Clarke, then a top counterterrorism official at the National Security Council. And he was there through 9/11, and I bet he knew about those wire taps, and, he got rich from a Bush-basing book. Not accusing, just wondering.. |
| Posted by: Sherry 2005-12-23 10:51 |
| #8 Hope the ACLU and DNC are on the sample list. |
| Posted by: RWV 2005-12-23 10:45 |
#7  |
| Posted by: doc 2005-12-23 10:19 |
| #6 Another chance for a left wing own goal. LEFT: "How DARE the US look for Nukes on it's soil." Sane Americans: "Time to take the medicine moonbat" |
| Posted by: Bright Pebbles 2005-12-23 09:56 |
| #5 Regular unnamed Wait for cries of 'Racism!' from CAIR and the left. |
| Posted by: CrazyFool 2005-12-23 09:53 |
| #4 In search of a terrorist nuclear bomb, the federal government since 9/11 has run a far-reaching, top secret program to monitor radiation levels at over a hundred Muslim sites in the Washington, D.C., area, including.. If it's top secret, why are y'all blabbing this out? |
| Posted by: Bomb-a-rama 2005-12-23 09:23 |
| #3 You know, this _is_ the same left that's always accusing RKBA activists of wanting to legalize atomic bombs. |
| Posted by: Phil 2005-12-23 09:10 |
| #2 The feds are welcome to come sniff my property anytime, but U.S. News and the NYT had better not set one foot here. Treasonous muck-rakers. |
| Posted by: Darrell 2005-12-23 08:30 |
| #1 thanks for leaking this cat turds, CAIR outrage 9...8...7...6... |
| Posted by: Fed Up 2005-12-23 08:03 |