U.S. port security unlikely to stop nukes: experts

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Bush administration efforts to screen U.S.-bound cargo for radioactive weapons are unlikely to stop a determined militant group from smuggling nuclear material onto American soil, experts said on Thursday.

Peter Zimmerman of Kings College, London, and Jeffrey Lewis of Harvard, who have researched the task of building an improvised nuclear device, said anyone hoping to hatch a nuclear attack on the United States would most likely build the weapon on American soil.

That would require them to smuggle highly enriched uranium from abroad. But packaging material as common as aluminum foil could shield the uranium from scanning devices meant to detect radioactivity.

"I am not presently optimistic that current efforts to inspect and scan will have any payoff against highly enriched uranium," said Zimmerman, a nuclear physicist who is director of the Kings College London Center for Science & Security Studies.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/security_usa_ports_nuclear_dc

"I feel safe with Bush/Cheney in office"....talk about brain-dead!