Several years ago I expressed my opinions about incineration at a meeting held in the Anniston Community Center. I stated that I believed that incineration was the best course to follow to destroy our chemical weapons stockpile and that I had faith in the ability and integrity of those working at Westinghouse. I did, however, have one reservation which I shared with the large audience. That was the fact that the Army was the executive agency for the program. Although I had full faith in the local personnel at Westinghouse, I had deep concerns about the Army’s involvement. My experience with the Army provided me with some insight into the power of “bean counters” whose mission is to get things done at the least cost, often with scant regard for safety, the environment, morale, long term consequences, etc.
Perhaps, I thought, some federal agency whose mission focused on public health, safety and environmental protection would be a better executive agent.
That did not happen. For some time I continued to be a vocal supporter of incineration as the best way forward, in spite of my reservations. Over time, however, my faith in the ability of the very capable and honorable people at Westinghouse to prevail over Washington bean counters began to waiver. I ceased being an active supporter of incineration, but did not swing all the way to what I thought was a rather hysterical, sometimes bizarre, opposition to incineration.
The Army’s recent decision to change the incineration schedule has led this moderate to become an opponent to incineration as currently planned. The Army admits that the change would be at a “slight increase” in risk to our community, but should be pursued in the name of efficiency and cost cutting.
I hope that our local and state leaders will work with our congressional delegation, and the courts if necessary, to force the Army and the Defense Department to put incineration on hold while we rethink what needs to be done and how best to do it.
How dangerous would it be to keep the stockpile as is? Yes, there are leakers, but the close surveillance of the stockpile and the immediate isolation of leakers has been successful. Yes, a terrorist could hijack a commercial airliner and crash into a bunker. But how much deadly agent would survive such a crash?
What would be the risk of transporting the stockpile to Johnston Island or some other remote site for destruction? We were able to move our entire stockpiles in Europe and Okinawa without incident.
Given the close relations between us and the Russians, how driven are we by the treaty deadlines? Continued storage while we consider other methods of destruction might be acceptable, in both treaty terms and the risk of delaying destruction.
No matter how we answer these questions, we must have a viable program or protection of our citizens in the event of an accident. The federal government brought these weapons here. It has the obligation to do everything necessary to alert, evacuate, and/or shelter those at risk from an incident. Thus far, the Army and FEMA have not performed very well in this arena.
Whatever we do, we must move this program to an agency that will not bury it in a myriad of competing programs. THAT NEEDS TO BE DONE NOW.
Should The Star print this admittedly long missive, I hope it will energize the citizens of this region to demand that our safety be the first consideration, in reality, not just PR statements.
A moratorium on incineration and the whole program in a non-Defense agency would go a long way towards restoring our faith that the federal government will do the right thing.
Daniel E. Spector, Ph.D.
Chemical Corps Historian, retired
Jacksonville
