Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
Crevice brought renewed attention to this precursor. When Joel Hinrichs, who
blew himself up outside a football stadium on the campus of Oklahoma University
in 2005, tried to purchase ammonium nitrate, he was denied. In light of these
countermeasures, Al-Qaeda has simply switched to liquid explosives. The 2006
Trans-Atlantic bombers were looking to use nexamethylene triperoxide diamine,
which is produced by mixing hydrogen peroxide and hexamine with citrus acid.
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Theft
An interesting study for future researchers would be to find out how many weapons
and explosives stolen across the United States each year are used in terrorist attacks.
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In 2008, 31,000 pounds of ammonium nitrate were stolen from various loca-
tions across the country.
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From January 1998 through December 2001, 27,000 pounds of high explosives
were stolen from construction sites, mining quarries, and demolition companies.
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In December 2005, 400 pounds of high-powered plastic explosives was stolen
from Cherry Engineering, a company owned by a scientist used by Sandia
National Laboratories. The stolen items included 150 pounds of C-4, 250
pounds of thin sheet explosives, and 2500 detonators.
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One of the most famous examples of weapons theft by terrorists revolved around
the Goma-2 dynamite that was provided to the 3/11 Madrid bombers. Spaniard
José Emilio Suárez Trashorras, who stole the Goma-2 dynamite from the Asturias
coal mine where he worked, supplied the explosives. He was introduced to the
groups through an intermediary he met in jail.
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State Sponsorship/Third Party Support
When one thinks of state sponsorship of terrorism, thoughts immediately turn to coun-
tries such as Iran and Syria, two countries, along with Cuba and Sudan, that populate
the U.S. State Department's list of state sponsors of terrorism. In the 1970s through
the 1990s, the list was longer, as Soviet Bloc countries supplied and supported terrorists
such as Carlos the Jackal; Libya was a major sponsor of state terrorism as well sup-
porting groups from the Abu Nidal group to the PIRA. The use of proxies to conduct
attacks gives the state sponsor plausible deniability for responsibility for the attack.
Libyan support of the PIRA proved to be a major boost for PIRA operations
in the 1980s. Now, in the wake of the release of Pan Am bomber, Abdelbaset al-
Megrahi, a number of victims groups in the United Kingdom are seeking repara-
tions from Libya for supplying weapons to the PIRA. Libyan support of the PIRA
took place between two time periods that spanned between 1972 and 1975 and
again in the 1980s. During the first period, it is believed that the Qaddafi govern-
ment supplied over $10 million to the PIRA.
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The Libyan shipments stopped in
