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American Morning

Post-9/11 Energy Dept. Funds Cut 93 Percent

Aired April 24, 2002 - 08:14   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: After 9/11, the White House promised no price would be too high, no inconvenience too great when it came to protecting Americans from terrorists. But a recent budget decision implies that may not be the case. An Energy Department request for nearly $380 million in emergency funds to improve security for nuclear weapons and waste was reportedly cut by 93 percent.

In a letter last month to the Office of Management and Budget, Energy Secretary Spence Abraham said, "Failure to support these urgent security requirements would be unwise." And he added, "We are storing vast amounts of materials that remain highly volatile and subject to unthinkable consequences if placed in the wrong hands."

So is the Bush administration risking a possible nuclear disaster?

Joining us now from Austin, Texas, Dr. George Friedman, Chairman of Strategic Forecasting, a global intelligence group specializing in security.

Welcome back to A.M. Good to see you, Dr. Friedman.

GEORGE FRIEDMAN, CHAIRMAN, STRATFOR: Good to see you, Paula.

ZAHN: Let's talk a little bit more about this letter that Energy Secretary Abraham wrote. And in a letter to the Office of Management and Budget, he suggests that stockpiled and refurbished weapons managed by his department are vulnerable to terrorists. So why did the administration make this move if that's the case?

FRIEDMAN: Well, I doubt because the administration is indifferent to the problem. There are a bunch of reasons. First, they have received a supplemental budget and there's a real question of whether or not they're spending the money as efficiently as they should. Secondly, there's a bureaucratic fight going on. The Energy Department has had some serious problems with security. The FBI and other intelligence organizations have been arguing they should take over security from the Department of Energy, which that's not its core business anyway. And this is part of the battling over who gets to protect the stockpile.

And finally, there's several political reasons. The president wants to put in a very lean budget. This is like motherhood and apple pie, you cut this the Democrats are probably going to come back and replace it anyway. So the Republicans are going to look good having a lean budget and they're probably going to get the money after all anyway.

ZAHN: And then they blame it on the Democrats?

FRIEDMAN: Well, there's a little positioning like that. So there's a lot of bureaucratic infighting. And then there really is a serious question of whether the Department of Energy is making the best use of the money it already has.

ZAHN: Let's talk a little bit about what this money would have been earmarked for. And we're going to put up on the screen some of the things it would have paid for -- equipment to detect explosives in packages and vehicles, better perimeter barriers and fences and firewalls and intrusion detection equipment for computers.

Are these unreasonable requests?

FRIEDMAN: No, they're really reasonable, but the only question is, since they've been spending quite a bit of money on security before, is why are those things not in place already and why do we need $400 million to upgrade it? I mean it's not as if the Department of Energy hasn't received a great deal of money for protecting our nuclear devices. The question is have they really spent it the right way?

One of the things, also, to remember is that this is really not the place where al Qaeda is going to get its nuclear material. They're going to find it in Kazakhstan. They're going to get it from the Iraqis, from a lot of places.

Our security around these sites isn't that bad. Certainly there's always a possibility of upgrade, but when you take a look at all the things we could be spending money on, this sounds scary, but it may not be the most vulnerable site.

ZAHN: All right, so you say the present security isn't all that bad. You could possibly upgrade it if you wanted to. So are you telling us this morning you don't think these sites are as vulnerable as some other people think they are?

FRIEDMAN: Well, I think, you know, in the security business you always want money spent on you and you're going to make, as with Y2K, you're going to make the worst case possible for how serious the things are. But, in fact, American nuclear sites are fairly well protected and if I as an intelligence expert were to be concerned about where the al Qaeda is going to get weapons, it's not going to be American sites. There are a lot of things overseas that are a lot less secure where they're likely to get to the sites. And I'd like to see some money being spent on securing those sites.

So it's simply a question of relative vulnerability. It's not that anything can't be considered vulnerable. But to say that it's a calamitous situation really overstates it.

ZAHN: During the Clinton administration so much was made of some of the lapses in national security, particularly within the Energy Department. Do you think that's all but over or could we face more of those same problems?

FRIEDMAN: No, and that's one of the questions, you know, has the Department of Energy cleaned up its act sufficiently that it can be trusted to take care of these things? And I think one of the arguments being made inside the administration is look, even if we're going to spend an awful lot of money on protecting nuclear devices, do we really want to give it to the Department of Energy that had the problem with leaks of material on nuclear design to the Chinese, that had lost control of its hard drives. There are a lot of people who feel the Department of Energy isn't very good at securing the things it does and a lot of people argue, look, the Department of Energy wasn't created to be a security agency. It does what it does, let the other security agencies do their job.

ZAHN: Well, thank you for giving us both sides of the story there. You were very efficient at doing that this morning.

Dr. George Friedman, it's always good to have you on the air.

FRIEDMAN: Good to be here.

ZAHN: Thanks.

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