That’s what Mr. Obama is talking about.   “The risk of nuclear attack has gone up.”   That’s what he told the 47 nations assembled at the nuclear security summit in D.C.   The threat, he says, isn’t from some rogue nation, or the “Axis of evil.”  Remember those guys?  No, the threat is from terrorist organizations.  International criminal conspiracies like al Qaida.

No surprise that the threat is out there.  I am a little surprised that more hasn’t been done to curtail the problem.  Particularly by the administration of George W. Bush, which made so much noise about the “nuculur” threat.

Crank up the wayback machine.  Yours truly was attending a community meeting in the Los Angeles area.   A congresswoman was keynoting and the room was packed.  One of the congresswoman’s aides, a former colleague, informed me (with the understanding that it was not for attribution) that the real concern wasn’t another attack from a hijacked jetliner.  The big worry in Washington she said was over “missing nukes.”

The year of course, was 2001.   The nation was recovering from the attacks of 9-11 and the feds were worried about “missing nukes.”   I seem to recall she mentioned there were at least 3 missing nuclear devices that were particularly troublesome at that time, although the number could have been higher.  I had read about significant amounts of fissionable material that had gone missing following the collapse of the Soviet Union.  Putting that together with well financed terrorists wasn’t much of a stretch.

In the days that followed, international researchers continued to issue warnings.

‘”Ms Zaitseva added that with the collapse of the Soviet Union, a large amount of weapons-grade material was left without adequate protection.  She said the US-sponsored programme to secure nuclear components in the former Soviet Union has locked only one-third of the more than 600 tons of weapons-usable material.  “It’s just not protected. This is hot stuff. If you steal 20 kilograms of that material, you can build a nuclear weapon”.’ -BBC March, 2002

So, when George W. Bush, Dick Cheney and Condie Rice talked about the possibility of “mushroom clouds” over American cities, I took what they were saying seriously.

And now, two wars and more than 8 years later,  I am forced to wonder why the nuclear threat from terrorist organizations has only risen.