MSNBC
Lab officials slow to act on breach
Los Alamos wildfire delayed probe, DOE official says
WASHINGTON, June 13 � A Department of Energy security official
testified Tuesday that officials at Los Alamos National
Laboratory made no effort to question 85 employees who had access
to missing computer hard drives containing nuclear secrets for
more than two weeks after the hardware was found to have
disappeared. Another week passed before senior DOE officials were
notified of the disappearance of the computer drives from a
locked container in a high-security vault at the lab, which the
official characterized as �a potential case of espionage.�
UNDER QUESTIONING by members of the House Commerce Oversight and
Investigations Subcommittee, Energy Department security chief
Eugene Habiger said that none of the 85 Los Alamos lab employees
who had access to the high-security vault containing the hard
drives were questioned in the two weeks after the hard drives
were discovered missing on May 7.
He said the delay occurred because lab officials were
concentrating on protecting the lab from the adancing wildfire
that forced the evacuation of lab employees the next day and
destroyed hundreds of homes in the town of Los Alamos, N.M.
�I think it was a focus on a catastrophic event that was
occurring, that many people�s lives were at risk,� Habiger said.
�THEY DON�T BELIEVE IT IS ESPIONAGE�
Meanwhile, Energy Secretary Bill Richardson said that
despit the fact that a week-long investigation by the FBI and DOE
had come up empty, he continues to believe that the drives have
been misplaced rather than stolen.
�My experts tell me they don�t believe it is espionage,�
he said. �They believe it is probably a misplacement of some of
these records. ... We are taking every conceivable security step
to find these drives. We need a week or so to determine exactly
what happened.�
Richardson also warned of consequences for any lab or DOE
employees found to have violated security procedures.
�I am outraged by the security lapses that have taken place,� he
said. �We are not going to tolerate this. There will be
accountability and disciplinary action.�
Coming only months after a Los Alamos scientist was
arrested on espionage charges, the disappearance of the hard
drives brought immediate political pressure on Richardson, who
had assured members of Congress that security at the national
weapons labs had been shored up.
White House spokesman Joe Lockhart said Tuesday that
Richardson retains President Bill Clinton�s confidence.
�We�ve done an enormous amount as far as changing the
security culture at the Department of
Energy, at the labs,� Lockhart said. �I think we have to
wait and see, and get some of these questions answered to see
what more we have to do.�
TIMING OF DISCOVERY DISPUTED
Habiger also disputed a report by NBC News that the
disappearance of the nuclear secrets was discovered well before
the fire that forced employees to evacuate Los Alamos in May. Law
enforcement sources, speaking on condition of anonymity, told the
network that the hard drives were found to be missing from the
10-by-20-foot vault two months before the disappearance was
announced on Monday.
Habiger said that 28 people had full access to the vault where
the drives were stored � though they were required to obtain
passwords and log their entry into the chamber � while another 57
employees were able to enter the vault under escort.
He said that a full-scale search for the missing hard
drives began on May 24, two days after the lab reopened in the
wake of the fire. Senior DOE officials were not notified of the
disappearance until June 1, Habiger testified.
�Someone should have informed us much earlier in the
process,� he acknowledged under questioning.
The next day, the Energy Department informed the FBI. The
FBI then sent a large team out to Los Alamos to begin the
investigation. At the same time, the CIA was brought in for
assistance.
Habiger said that investigators from the DOE and FBI had
conducted 90 interviews in the past week and would begin
administering polygraph tests to the workers on Wednesday.
COUNTERTERRORISM PLANS
The nuclear secrets on the hard drives include America�s
plans for countering nuclear terrorism, sources told NBC News.
One official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said, �You
could say it would be devastating� if the materials fell into the
wrong hands.
The secret material was stored in containers in a vault in Los
Alamos� most highly classified area, the so-called �X Division,�
where designers of nuclear weapons do their work.
The hard drives contain data pertaining to the
government�s Nuclear Emergency Search Team, which responds to
nuclear accidents and terror threats. The missing information was
intended to be used to make nuclear devices safe in emergencies.
There was also material regarding Russian nuclear programs.
A person familiar with the status of nuclear secrets at
Los Alamos told NBC that the lab had been plagued by bad record
keeping. The labs, that person said, do not always know where
material is at any one time.
That, he said, is the difference between material that is
described as �missing� and material that is sloppily handled, or
not returned to its proper location because of negligence. There
is �tons of stuff� moved around the lab and a lot of co-mingling
of materials from research that is both classified and
nonclassified.
EVACUATION HAMPERED INVESTIGATION
The investigation has been hampered by the evacuation of
approximately 8,500 lab employees were evacuated between May 8
and May 22 at the lab because of the fire. They started returning
in phases after May 22. Officials repeatedly have said that all
nuclear material was safeguarded and not threatened by the fires.
�Our inquiry has been conducted during a period in which
employees are still recovering from the effects of a major
emergency disaster,� Habiger said Tuesday in a statement. �Part
of the laboratory�s rigorous process for resuming operations has
included a look at the physical integrity of all its buildings
and security systems.�
�This is an extremely serious matter, and we are taking
swift actions to deal with it,� said John Browne, director of the
federal weapons research lab in New Mexico. Browne said in a
statement that �certain and appropriate� disciplinary action
would be taken �if the inquiry reveals that individuals did not
fulfill their responsibilities� in safeguarding the material.
SERIES OF EMBARRASSMENTS
The disappearance of the drives is the latest in a series
of major embarrassments for the Los Alamos laboratory and the
Department of Energy. Former lab scientist Wen Lo Hee was charged
last year with mishandling secret files at Los Alamos amid
suspicions that he passed nuclear-weapons secrets to China.
Lee was arrested in December and awaits trial. Although
under investigation for three years in connection with the
alleged loss of U.S. nuclear secrets to China, Lee has not been
charged with espionage.
A member of the legal team defending Wen Ho Lee told NBC
News he was pleased to hear that there were more missing tapes at
Los Alamos, since his client is charged with downloading similar
weapons data and being unable to account for it, and indicated he
thought it would advance his case.
NBC News� Jim Miklaszewski, Andrea Mitchell, Joel Seidman,
Pete Williams and Robert Windrem, MSNBC�s Tom Curry and The
Associated Press contributed to this report.
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