Military security chemical

A subtle but important consideration in the development of technology to meet chemical and biological threats is the different requirements for homeland versus military security. The tools and methods are similar, but the deployment strategies might be very different. Research in the chemical sciences must address these differences. 

With the shift in the balance of power from the coal to the chemical industry, the geographical center of the nitrogen industry moved from the coal mining district of Rhineland-Westphalia first to the Rhine valley, then to the brown coal district in central Germany for reasons of military security. 

Resistance to physical shocks and vibration required careful attention to selection of rugged components and to securing electrical and vacuum systems, wiring, connectors, components, and boards. Chemical ionization (Cl) was used for the first time in a fieldable military detector because of the advent of rugged turbomolecular pumps capable of handling the gas load from the Cl reagent. 

Threats of Concern Terrorist acts can be the most problematic to defend against since they may be more extreme or malevolent than other crimes focused on monetary gains or outcomes with less malicious intent. Plus terrorists may use military tactics not often provided for in base chemical facility design. Chemical facility security must be considered in context with local and national homeland security and law enforcement activities, as well as with emergency response capabilities. There is a practical limit to the ability of a chemical site to prevent or mitigate a terrorist act. Above a certain level of threat, the facility needs to rely on law enforcement and military services to provide physical security against extreme acts of intentional harm. The security posture must be risk-based, and so extremely robust security measures are not always applicable or necessary. 

Ideally, in a perfect world, all chemical facilities would be secured in a layered fashion (aka the barrier approach). Layered security systems are vital. Using the protection in-depth principle, requiring that an adversary defeat several protective barriers or security layers to accomplish its goal, chemical industry infrastructure can be made more secure. Protection in depth is a term commonly used by the military to describe security measures that reinforce one another, masking the defense mechanisms from the view of intruders, and allowing the defender time to respond to intrusion or attack. 

This research was sponsored by the Deputy Assistant to the Secretary of Defense for Chemical and Biological Defense and was carried out jointly by RAND s Center for Military Health Policy Research and the Acquisition and Technology Policy Center of the National Defense Research Institute. The latter is a federally funded research and development center sponsored by OSD, the Joint Staff, the unified commands, and the defense agencies in the fulfillment of national security objectives involving the development and acquisition of drugs and biologies, mostly vaccines, for CBW defense. 

In order to make the Encyclopedia ascompactas possible we used abbreviations, many of which are the same as used in Chemical Abstracts except that periods after abbreviations are omitted. A list of abbreviations symbols, code letters and special designations of items connected with explosives, propellants, pyrotechnics, ammunition and weapons is included in this work. This list is placed immediately before the Encyclopedia proper (see Abbreviations, pp Abbr 1-59) and also includes abbreviations and code letters for various Ordnance establishments, industrial installations and scientific institutions, both US and foreign. Some additional abbreviations are given in a supplementary list (see Abbreviations, pp Abbr 59-65). Wherever we have been able to do so and are permitted by security regulations, the meaning of code letters on ammunition, weapons and other military items is briefly explained... 

The terrorist CW threat differs fundamentally from the military CW threats of the past. Essentially, it is driven by accessibility of the material. On the one hand, there has to be concern about the security of existing CW stockpiles. But it is equally important to ensure that terrorist organizations cannot get access to relevant precursor materials or toxic industrial chemicals to produce their own make-shift chemical weapons. A related concern is the presence of toxic industrial chemicals in manufacturing, storage and transport, and the danger of deliberate releases of these chemicals by attacks with conventional explosives. 

In essence, this book is a landmark publication in the field of toxicology of CWAs/CWMD, as it provides comprehensive coverage of these chemicals and emphasizes current and novel issues that have not previously been addressed. It is hoped that this book will aid not only academicians but lay persons in community preparedness at local, state, and federal levels to protect civilians, military personnel, animals, wildlife, and the environment from chemical attacks by terrorists, dictators, and other adversaries. This book will be an invaluable source of information for homeland security, the Department of Defense, the Department of Veteran Affairs, the Department of Defense Research Estabhshment, diagnostic labs, poison control centers, federal, state and local authorities, forensic scientists, pharmacologists, toxicologists, chemists, biologists, environmentalists, teachers, students, and libraries. 

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