New Elite Force Will Guard U.S. Weapons-Grade Nuclear Materials

WASHINGTON, DC, August 5, 2005 (ENS) - The Department of Energy is developing an "elite force" patterned after the U.S. military’s Special Forces to protect sites that contain weapons-grade nuclear material, but a new report by Congressional investigators warns that the implementation deadline of October 2008 might not be met. Managing the complexities of training, equipping and integrating the new force into the existing security system could take until 2010, the report estimates.

The new force will be deployed to thwart a potential terrorist attacks on government sites containing the special nuclear material used in weapons, such as plutonium or highly enriched uranium. The Department of Energy (DOE) recognizes that a successful attack could have devastating consequences for the site and surrounding communities.

The risks include theft for use in an illegal nuclear weapon, the creation of improvised nuclear devices capable of producing a nuclear yield, and the creation of so-called dirty bombs, in which conventional explosives are used to disperse radioactive material.

Five DOE sites contain special weapons-grade nuclear material - Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee, Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory, Argonne National Laboratory–West also in Idaho, the Savannah River Site in South Carolina, and the Hanford Site in the state of Washington.

The Plutonium Finishing Plant site on the Hanford Nuclear Reservation (Photo courtesy DOE Hanford)

The Government Accountability Office (GAO), the investigative branch of Congress, examined two things at the request of two powerful Republican committee heads - Senator Charles Grassley of Iowa, who chairs the Senate Finance Committee, and Congressman Christopher Shays of Connecticut who chairs the Subcommittee on National Security, Emerging Threats and International Relations of the House Committee on Government Reform.

The GAO was asked to determine first, the extent to which ESE protective forces are meeting the Energy Department’s existing readiness requirements, and second, the actions the department and its Office of Energy, Science and Environment must take to successfully defend against the terrorist threat identified in the most recent design basis threat issued in October 2004.

The Energy Department has an implementation deadline of October 2008 to meet the newly defined design basis threat.

The design basis threat (DBT) is a profile of the type, composition, and capabilities of an adversary. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission and its licensees, such as the five ESE sites, use the profile as a basis for designing safeguards systems to protect against acts of radiological sabotage and to prevent the theft of special nuclear material.

DOE officials told the Congressional investigators that they believe that the way the agency's nuclear sites, including those sites managed by ESE, currently train their contractor operated protective forces will not be adequate to defeat the terrorist threat contained in the 2004 design basis threat.

DOE Protective Force member (Photo courtesy GAO)

"In particular," the GAO reports, "some protective force officers believed that they would be outgunned and overwhelmed by the terrorist force identified in the 2004 DBT. In addition, some feared they could be surprised by a large terrorist force because of the sites’ security strategy and the physical layout of their sites."

In response, the DOE has proposed the development of an "elite force" that would be patterned after the U. S. military’s Special Forces to safeguard the sites containing weapons grade nuclear materials.

"Creating this elite force is a complex undertaking and will be a challenge to fully realize by the October 2008 implementation deadline," the Congressional investigators report.

One problem is that the protective forces are stretched already to keep up with current demands. Even before the issuance of the 2004 design basis threat, DOE officials became concerned about protective force preparedness because of intense demands placed on them following the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.

The need to increase security at DOE sites as rapidly as possible following the 9/11 attacks meant that DOE protective forces worked extensive overtime. Agency officials warned that increased fatigue, reduced readiness, and reduced training opportunities for protective forces would be the result. Today the Nuclear Regulatory Commission

A classified review of the effectiveness of the management of protective forces and protective force capabilities issued in June 2004 recommended a shift to an aggressive military-like, small-unit, tactical defense posture, which included enhanced tactical training standards to allow protective forces to move, shoot, and communicate effectively as a unit in a combat environment.

The review also recommended more frequent, realistic, and rigorous force-on-force performance testing and training for the DOE’s protective forces.

Based on this review, then Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham proposed the DOE elite force. A Protective Forces Working Group was convened to develop recommendations on policy, training and equipment.

Some sites are already responding to the elite force concept by increasing tactical training, and others plan to institute "training relief shifts," which will increase the amount of time protective force officers have available for uninterrupted training. Some sites also have ambitious plans for constructing new facilities to enable increased tactical training."

A portion of the 310 square mile Savannah River Site on the border of South Carolina and Georgia (Photo courtesy SRS)

The DOE has developed a preliminary draft implementation plan that lays out high-level milestones and key activities, but this plan has not been formally approved by the Office of Security and Safety Performance Assurance.

Development of the elite force may be impeded by the need to incorporate it into the DOE's streamlined overall security policy that has been in the works for nearly two years and is now scheduled for release this summer.

DOE security officials, as well as contractor protective force managers, see some of the agency's health and safety policies and practices as an impediment because they do not allow the kind of realistic and physically demanding training that is required for an elite force. According to these officials, revising these policies will require broad, high-level support within DOE.

Some DOE protective force requirements, such as medical, physical fitness, and training standards are mandated by DOE regulations. Changing these regulations, according to a DOE security official, would require DOE to follow rule-making procedures.

All these protective force policies and regulations, as well as broader DOE policies are contained in collective bargaining agreements between protective force unions and contractors and in protective force contracts, which also will need to be modified to create the kind of elite force that DOE believes is necessary to defeat the 2004 design basis threat.

A Department of Energy security guard (Photo courtesy DOE)

DOE field security officials and contractor protective force managers have expressed concern about finding ways for less capable protective force officers to move into different roles or retire from service with a sense of dignity.

"Because all the protective forces at the five ESE sites we visited operated, at the time, under separate contracts and separate collective bargaining agreements, there is no uniform benefit or retirement plan for protective forces, and these benefits, according to one contractor security official, differ considerably among sites," the GAO reports.

Some contractor protective force managers recognized that they needed such mechanisms as early retirement incentives and more attractive retirement packages to make the effective transition to an elite force. They believed, however, that they would not be able to provide these mechanisms, most of which are quite expensive, without DOE’s help.

"Officials from the one protective force contractor, which had a placement and income protection program for protective force officers who could no longer meet existing DOE requirements, said that payouts from the program have far exceeded contributions and that the program will have to be restructured in the near future," the GAO report states.

"Given these complexities, DOE security officials recently told us that implementing all the measures associated with the elite force concept will take about five years to complete," the GAO reports.

Argonne-West National Laboratory in Idaho (Photo courtesy DOE Argonne)

As for current readiness, the investigators determined that ESE protective forces generally comply with Energy Department standards for firearms proficiency, physical fitness levels, and equipment standardization and that the five ESE sites had the required training programs, facilities, and equipment.

Still, the investigators did find some weaknesses at ESE sites that could impact their protection.

For example, despite the importance of training exercises in which protective forces undergo simulated attacks by a group of mock terrorists, called force-on-force exercises, DOE neither sets standards for individual protective force officers to participate in these exercises, nor does it require sites to track individual participation.

The GAO also found that protective force officers at all five of the ESE sites reported problems with their radio communications systems. Specifically, according to 66 of the 105 protective force officers GAO interviewed, they did not always have dependable radio communications. Security officials stated that improvements were under way.

To successfully defend against the larger terrorist threat contained in the 2004 design basis threat by October 2008, DOE and ESE officials recognize that they will need to take several prompt and coordinated actions.

To ensure that DOE and ESE protective forces can meet the terrorist threat contained in the 2004 design basis threat, the Government Accoutability Office is making five recommendations to the Energy Secretary to, among other things, address weaknesses with protective officers’ equipment and coordinate ESE efforts to address the 2004 design basis threat.

The Department of Energy agreed with the report, accepted the GAO’s recommendations and provided an update on actions it anticipated taking to address these recommendations.