ABC of conflict and disaster:Weapons of mass destruction threats and responses

Weapons of mass destruction (WMD) include chemical, biological, and radiological agents with the potential to cause death at low doses and with serious long term health effects in survivors.This article...

The United States and its allies invaded Iraq in 2003 with the declared intention of removing Saddam Hussein's regime. Although it was determined after the war that Iraq did not possess weapons of mass destruction (WMD), removing a regime believed to be in possession of WMD raises the possibility that the post-9/11 US security policy is more willing than previously believed to tolerate the risk of precipitating a WMD exchange. In future crises, policymakers may conclude the risk of WMD use during a preemptive attack or disarming strike is lower than the risk of a terrorist attack utilizing such weapons. This article will examine the potential for intra-conflict deterrence when a state confronts an enemy that possesses WMD--most likely chemical weapons (CW) or biological weapons (BW). It will contend that, despite creating an increased risk of a WMD attack, the invading state can take steps to reduce the likelihood of being met by a WMD response. It begins by exploring the relevant literature on deterrence and intra-war negotiation in an effort to develop a framework for deterrence while at the same time restraining conflict below a desired threshold. The case study of the 1991 Persian Gulf War is then analyzed in an attempt to draw lessons on whether, and if possible how, intra-conflict deterrence might work and implications for developing a theoretical understanding of likely deterrence scenarios. Finally, the article will consider lessons applicable to future conflict capable o flowering the likelihood of the use of such weapons. The 2006 National Security Strategy of the United States (NSS)-reiterating what was first enunciated in the 2002 NSS--declares that the United States is willing to preempt threats and accept risk in disarming the possessors of WMD: The greater the threat, the greater is the risk of inaction--and the more compelling the case for taking anticipatory action to defend ourselves, even if uncertainty remains as to the time and place of the enemy's attack. There are few greater threats than a terrorist attack with WMD. To forestall or prevent such hostile acts by our adversaries, the United States will, if necessary, act preemptively in exercising our inherent right of self-defense. (1) This declared policy has been followed by several efforts designed to aid the United States in responding to such threats. The George W. Bush Administration has affected a shift in nuclear policy by creating the New Triad of nuclear and nonnuclear strike forces, active and passive defenses, and revitalized defense infrastructure capabilities. It also developed several new diplomatic initiatives--the Proliferation Security Initiative, Global Initiative to Combat Nuclear Terrorism, negotiated disarmament of Libya, and a flexible approach to India's nuclear program--all designed to counter the actions of authoritarian states possessing WMD. Yet, despite these initiatives, the most attention has centered on the declared policies of preemption, regime change, and forceful disarmament. Deterring first-use of WMD is one of the most challenging issues facing nations interested in confronting states that possess such a capability. There are a number of states that now possess, or claim to possess, an assortment of WMD--nuclear, CW, and BW. With the possible exception of North Korea, the United States has an inferred policy of taking action against such states prior to the completion of nuclear weapon programs. A number of these states also happen to be located in areas of conflict involving the US military. Building a theoretical understanding of the strategies most likely to deter first-use would be of obvious benefit to America's foreign policy objectives and global stability. There are few examples of the United States taking military action against states possessing WMD. The 2003 war in Iraq presents an opportunity to examine US strategy related to possible WMD use by a regime that is aware it is being targeted. …

The problem of secondary contamination following chemical agent release

During the past decade, concerns about possible terrorist acts involving weapons of mass destruction (WMD) led Congress and the President to adopt a comprehensive counterterrorism plan focused on preventing a chemical, biological, or nuclear attack and enhancing domestic preparedness. The agency of choice for domestic consequence management has been the Department of Defense. Of the $1.4 billion appropriated in the FY 2000 budget specifically for WMD response, over half went to DOD. [1] Overreliance on the military for domestic WMD protection, however, may diminish the military's warfighting capability and holds the potential for infringement of individual rights. Presidential Decision Directive 39 (PDD-39), signed in 1995, and the Defense Against Weapons of Mass Destruction Act of 1996 are the cornerstones of the United States' WMD terrorism strategy. This strategy is divided into four elements: intelligence and warning; prevention and deterrence; crisis and consequence management; and acquisition of equipment and technology. While crisis management involves the criminal aspect of dealing with a WMD attack, consequence management (CM) involves treating victims of the attack, searching for survivors, ensuring the containment of victims who are infected or exposed, and cleaning up the attack area. A number of agencies are involved in domestic preparedness. The National Security Council is the interagency consequence management coordinator; the Justice Department, through the FBI, handles crisis management and is responsible for preventing an attack; the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) is responsible for consequence management after an attack; and first-responders include local municipalities and state governments. But DOD has been assigned a disproportionate amount of domestic consequence management responsibilities. This is due to the national security threat of WMD terrorism and the historical reliance on the military to solve complex domestic issues. The assumptions that led to PDD-39 and the Federal Response Plan may no longer be applicable, however, as new information and analysis draw differing conclusions on the threat of WMD terrorism. This article will discuss the Defense Department's role in domestic consequence management following a catastrophic terrorist attack. Catastrophic terrorism, weapons of mass destruction, and all refer to the use of nuclear, chemical, or biological agents to bring about a major disaster with death tolls of ten thousand or higher. [2] The scope of this article will be limited to the discussion of superterrorism and not include other types of terrorism, such as conventional terrorism or small-scale chemical or biological weapons (CBW) terrorism. Pan Am 103, Khobar Towers, and the East African embassy bombings were incidents of conventional terrorism, for example, and the Aum Shinrikyo's sarin attack in Tokyo was an example of small-scale CBW terrorism. While the threat is no less serious, the low probability and unique political circumstances of an incident of nuclear terrorism exclude such weapons from this discussion. [3] Bringing the Issue into Focus Four events of the 1990s significantly sharpened the nation's perception of chemical-biological warfare and catastrophic terrorism. First, Saddam Hussein used his intermediate-range Scud missiles to demonstrate the paralyzing possibility of operating in a contaminated environment during the Persian Gulf War. Second, the World Trade Center bombing in 1993 demonstrated that foreign terrorists could not only operate on American soil, but could launch a chemical attack. [4] Third, the Oklahoma City bombing in 1995 proved that domestic terrorists could harm the nation. And fourth, the sarin gas attack in the Tokyo subway by the Aum Shinrikyo cult made chemical warfare a reality. The United States responded to the threat of terrorism, particularly superterrorism, when President Clinton signed PDD-39 in June 1995, PDD-62 in May 1998, and the 1997 National Defense Authorization Act. …

Weapons of mass destruction (WMD) best portray the twisted use of technological achievements against the human species. Despite arm control efforts, WMD threat continues to exist and even proliferate. This in turn calls for improvement in defensive measures against this threat. The modern soldier is exposed to a number of chemical, biological, and radiological agents in military and peace operations, while civilians are mainly exposed to terrorist attacks. Regardless of origin or mode of action, WMDs and other noxious agents aim for the same - to make an organism dysfunctional. Because their effects are often delayed, these agents are hard to spot on time and treat. This review presents a biomedical aspect of agents used in warfare and terrorism, including polonium-210, depleted uranium, salmonella, anthrax, genetically modified bacteria, cobweb-like polymer fibre, sarin, and mustard gas.

It has been almost two decades since the notion of ‘net assessment’ preoccupied strategic thought during the Cold War. It has not been revisited in a sustained manner since a flurry of articles and...

Biological weapons are not just topics for contemporary novelists but found their way into classical literature long ago. Shakespeare has Hamlet's father's ghost describe, ‘Upon my secure hour thy uncle stole, with juice of cursed hebona in a vial, and in the porches of my ears did pour the leprous distillment.’ (Act 1, Scene 5) Indeed, neither the act nor the accusation is new. Jews in Europe were accused of poisoning wells to cause plague in the Middle Ages. Japanese planes in World War II dropped plague‐infested fleas over Chinese cities and villages. Murder or terrorism with biological or chemical agents is not a far‐fetched scenario—it has been used before. Criminal cases in the USA include various uses of biological agents in the last decades. The Rajneesh Foundation used Salmonella bacteria in 1984 to poison ten restaurant salad bars in the city of The Dalles, OR, hoping it would influence an election in its favour. A separatist group calling itself ‘Republic of Texas’ used Botulinum , HIV and rabies in 1998 and 1999 to threaten judges. Three members were later charged with conspiracy to use weapons of mass destruction and the eldest, Johnnie Wise, was sentenced to 24 years in prison. In 1977, Diane Thompson, a nurse from Texas, was sentenced to 20 years for intentionally contaminating doughnuts with Shigella dysenteriae in order to achieve personal revenge. > In 1998 and 1999, a separatist group from Texas used Botulinum, HIV and rabies to threaten judges The particular risk of biological agents, when used as weapons, is their extreme uncontrollableness. An infectious agent can easily spread from the original victim to relatives or colleagues. Particularly at risk are the medical personnel who treat victims without knowing what kind of infection they are dealing with. More unpredictable are the number of people and …

The prospect of terrorists deploying weapons of mass destruction (WMD) is often referred to as the foremost danger to American national security. This danger has become more realistic because of al-Qaeda's expanding global network and the expressed willingness to kill thousands of civilians. In the past four years, numerous media reports have documented the group's ongoing quest for WMD capabilities; many reports have detailed al-Qaeda members’ attempts to manufacture or obtain certain chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear (CBRN) agents to use in WMD against targets in the West and the Middle East. Yet the question remains: Does al-Qaeda's current WMD capability match its actual intent? While most studies of the group have focused on its explicit desire for WMD, allegations of CBRN acquisition, and the killing potential of specific CBRN agents, few open-source studies have closely examined the evolution of al-Qaeda's consideration of WMD and, most notably, the merit of actual CBRN production instructions as depicted and disseminated in the group's own literature and manuals. The following report will examine the history of al-Qaeda's interest in CBRN agents, the evolution of the network's attitude toward these weapons, and the internal debate within the organization concerning acquisition and use of WMD. More so, the following research will assess the validity of actual CBRN production instructions and capabilities as displayed and disseminated in al-Qaeda's own literature and websites.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) of the United States Department of Justice is one of the United States' principal investigative and law enforcement agencies. Its assigned missions and responsibilities in counterintelligence and counterterrorism makes it a member of the U.S. intelligence community. Its number one priority is to protect the Nation from terrorist attacks. The FBI is the lead agency for assessing and investigating weapons of mass destruction (WMD) threats and incidents, coordinating investigations among agencies, and managing the law enforcement and investigative response to an incident. The FBI's capabilities to combat the threat of WMD include: the FBI Laboratory Division with increasing forensic capabilities and its extensive network of Federal and State laboratories for analysis of WMD materials; the WMD Directorate within the National Security Branch, which coordinates all FBI responses to WMD threats; the FBI's Directorate of Intelligence, whose intelligence analysts within the WMD Directorate collect, analyze, and disseminate intelligence related to the WMD threat; and the FBI's partnerships with domestic and international law enforcement and intelligence agencies. The FBI plays a critical role in the U.S.'s prevention and response to biodefense, a critical component of WMD.

Photograph by Gonzalo Echeverria (2010)Declaring War Soon after Al Qaeda’s terrorist attacks on 11 September 2001, the Bush Administration described its new grand strategy: the “Global War on Terror”. This underpinned the subsequent counter-insurgency in Afghanistan and the United States invasion of Iraq in March 2003. Media pundits quickly applied the Global War on Terror label to the Madrid, Bali and London bombings, to convey how Al Qaeda’s terrorism had gone transnational. Meanwhile, international relations scholars debated the extent to which September 11 had changed the international system (Brenner; Mann 303). American intellectuals adopted several variations of the Global War on Terror in what initially felt like a transitional period of US foreign policy (Burns). Walter Laqueur suggested Al Qaeda was engaged in a “cosmological” and perpetual war. Paul Berman likened Al Qaeda and militant Islam to the past ideological battles against communism and fascism (Heilbrunn 248). In a widely cited article, neoconservative thinker Norman Podhoretz suggested the United States faced “World War IV”, which had three interlocking drivers: Al Qaeda and trans-national terrorism; political Islam as the West’s existential enemy; and nuclear proliferation to ‘rogue’ countries and non-state actors (Friedman 3). Podhoretz’s tone reflected a revival of his earlier Cold War politics and critique of the New Left (Friedman 148-149; Halper and Clarke 56; Heilbrunn 210). These stances attracted widespread support. For instance, the United States Marine Corp recalibrated its mission to fight a long war against “World War IV-like” enemies. Yet these stances left the United States unprepared as the combat situations in Afghanistan and Iraq worsened (Ricks; Ferguson; Filkins). Neoconservative ideals for Iraq “regime change” to transform the Middle East failed to deal with other security problems such as Pakistan’s Musharraf regime (Dorrien 110; Halper and Clarke 210-211; Friedman 121, 223; Heilbrunn 252). The Manichean and open-ended framing became a self-fulfilling prophecy for insurgents, jihadists, and militias. The Bush Administration quietly abandoned the Global War on Terror in July 2005. Widespread support had given way to policymaker doubt. Why did so many intellectuals and strategists embrace the Global War on Terror as the best possible “grand strategy” perspective of a post-September 11 world? Why was there so little doubt of this worldview? This is a debate with roots as old as the Sceptics versus the Sophists. Explanations usually focus on the Bush Administration’s “Vulcans” war cabinet: Vice President Dick Cheney, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfield, and National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice, who later became Secretary of State (Mann xv-xvi). The “Vulcans” were named after the Roman god Vulcan because Rice’s hometown Birmingham, Alabama, had “a mammoth fifty-six foot statue . . . [in] homage to the city’s steel industry” (Mann x) and the name stuck. Alternatively, explanations focus on how neoconservative thinkers shaped the intellectual climate after September 11, in a receptive media climate. Biographers suggest that “neoconservatism had become an echo chamber” (Heilbrunn 242) with its own media outlets, pundits, and think-tanks such as the American Enterprise Institute and Project for a New America. Neoconservatism briefly flourished in Washington DC until Iraq’s sectarian violence discredited the “Vulcans” and neoconservative strategists like Paul Wolfowitz (Friedman; Ferguson). The neoconservatives' combination of September 11’s aftermath with strongly argued historical analogies was initially convincing. They conferred with scholars such as Bernard Lewis, Samuel P. Huntington and Victor Davis Hanson to construct classicist historical narratives and to explain cultural differences. However, the history of the decade after September 11 also contains mis-steps and mistakes which make it a series of contingent decisions (Ferguson; Bergen). One way to analyse these contingent decisions is to pose “what if?” counterfactuals, or feasible alternatives to historical events (Lebow). For instance, what if September 11 had been a chemical and biological weapons attack? (Mann 317). Appendix 1 includes a range of alternative possibilities and “minimal rewrites” or slight variations on the historical events which occurred. Collectively, these counterfactuals suggest the role of agency, chance, luck, and the juxtaposition of better and worse outcomes. They pose challenges to the classicist interpretation adopted soon after September 11 to justify “World War IV” (Podhoretz). A ‘Two-Track’ Process for ‘World War IV’ After the September 11 attacks, I think an overlapping two-track process occurred with the “Vulcans” cabinet, neoconservative advisers, and two “echo chambers”: neoconservative think-tanks and the post-September 11 media. Crucially, Bush’s “Vulcans” war cabinet succeeded in gaining civilian control of the United States war decision process. Although successful in initiating the 2003 Iraq War this civilian control created a deeper crisis in US civil-military relations (Stevenson; Morgan). The “Vulcans” relied on “politicised” intelligence such as a United Kingdom intelligence report on Iraq’s weapons development program. The report enabled “a climate of undifferentiated fear to arise” because its public version did not distinguish between chemical, biological, radiological or nuclear weapons (Halper and Clarke, 210). The cautious 2003 National Intelligence Estimates (NIE) report on Iraq was only released in a strongly edited form. For instance, the US Department of Energy had expressed doubts about claims that Iraq had approached Niger for uranium, and was using aluminium tubes for biological and chemical weapons development. Meanwhile, the post-September 11 media had become a second “echo chamber” (Halper and Clarke 194-196) which amplified neoconservative arguments. Berman, Laqueur, Podhoretz and others who framed the intellectual climate were “risk entrepreneurs” (Mueller 41-43) that supported the “World War IV” vision. The media also engaged in aggressive “flak” campaigns (Herman and Chomsky 26-28; Mueller 39-42) designed to limit debate and to stress foreign policy stances and themes which supported the Bush Administration. When former Central Intelligence Agency director James Woolsey’s claimed that Al Qaeda had close connections to Iraqi intelligence, this was promoted in several books, including Michael Ledeen’s War Against The Terror Masters, Stephen Hayes’ The Connection, and Laurie Mylroie’s Bush v. The Beltway; and in partisan media such as Fox News, NewsMax, and The Weekly Standard who each attacked the US State Department and the CIA (Dorrien 183; Hayes; Ledeen; Mylroie; Heilbrunn 237, 243-244; Mann 310). This was the media “echo chamber” at work. The group Accuracy in Media also campaigned successfully to ensure that US cable providers did not give Al Jazeera English access to US audiences (Barker). Cosmopolitan ideals seemed incompatible with what the “flak” groups desired. The two-track process converged on two now infamous speeches. US President Bush’s State of the Union Address on 29 January 2002, and US Secretary of State Colin Powell’s presentation to the United Nations on 5 February 2003. Bush’s speech included a line from neoconservative David Frumm about North Korea, Iraq and Iran as an “Axis of Evil” (Dorrien 158; Halper and Clarke 139-140; Mann 242, 317-321). Powell’s presentation to the United Nations included now-debunked threat assessments. In fact, Powell had altered the speech’s original draft by I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby, who was Cheney’s chief of staff (Dorrien 183-184). Powell claimed that Iraq had mobile biological weapons facilities, linked to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. However, the International Atomic Energy Agency’s (IAEA) Mohamed El-Baradei, the Defense Intelligence Agency, the State Department, and the Institute for Science and International Security all strongly doubted this claim, as did international observers (Dorrien 184; Halper and Clarke 212-213; Mann 353-354). Yet this information was suppressed: attacked by “flak” or given little visible media coverage. Powell’s agenda included trying to rebuild an international coalition and to head off weather changes that would affect military operations in the Middle East (Mann 351). Both speeches used politicised variants of “weapons of mass destruction”, taken from the counterterrorism literature (Stern; Laqueur). Bush’s speech created an inflated geopolitical threat whilst Powell relied on flawed intelligence and scientific visuals to communicate a non-existent threat (Vogel). However, they had the intended effect on decision makers. US Under-Secretary of Defense, the neoconservative Paul Wolfowitz, later revealed to Vanity Fair that “weapons of mass destruction” was selected as an issue that all potential stakeholders could agree on (Wilkie 69). Perhaps the only remaining outlet was satire: Armando Iannucci’s 2009 film In The Loop parodied the diplomatic politics surrounding Powell’s speech and the civil-military tensions on the Iraq War’s eve. In the short term the two track process worked in heading off doubt. The “Vulcans” blocked important information on pre-war Iraq intelligence from reaching the media and the general public (Prados). Alternatively, they ignored area specialists and other experts, such as when Coalition Provisional Authority’s L. Paul Bremer ignored the US State Department’s fifteen volume ‘Future of Iraq’ project (Ferguson). Public “flak” and “risk entrepreneurs” mobilised a range of motivations from grief and revenge to historical memory and identity politics. This combination of private and public processes meant that although doubts were expressed, they could be contained through the dual echo chambers of neoconservative policymaking and the post-September 11 media. These factors enabled

Chemical warfare differs from conventional warfare, such as explosives, in the sense that the toxicity of the chemicals used is very dangerous to the combatants in the battlefield, or to the civil population being affected during a war or as a result of a terrorist attack. The threat is amplified by concealment and low cost and relatively easy production of these agents, which renders them weapons of mass destruction. It becomes essential in such a situation that soldiers wear protective clothing, respirators, face masks, gloves, etc. Initially German troops unleashed chemical warfare agents, such as mustard agent, HD, during World War I in 1915, and this resulted in much more concern during World War II. Thus research on decontamination of chemical and biological warfare agents (CWAs) has been the subject of serious interest in many research laboratories since World War II. Mustard gas or bis(2-chloroethyl) sulfide is one of the highly cytotoxic, readily methylating CWAs that are regulated under the 1993 Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC). It covalently binds to DNA bases or forms disulfide bonds with the thiol groups. This readily leads to programmed cell death or the mutated DNA leads to cancer. The simultaneous danger associated with this toxic agent is its high skin penetration owing to its high lipophilicity, which results in immediate blister formation and huge uptake through skin within a short duration of exposure (Ivarsson et al . 1992). Conventional modes of decontamination involve activated charcoal or other such heavy physical adsorbants of the contaminant. When compared with technologies employing conventional catalysts and reactive sorbents, which are specific and sometimes time-consuming, nanotechnology-based nanomaterials are highly reactive, nonselective and multifunctional in character. Current development of nanoparticles such as MgO, Al 2 O 3 , Fe 2 O 3 , ZnO and TiO 2 and their incorporation into nanofibers impart enhanced catalytic, disinfection and sensing capabilities, photo-protection capability, and stain-resistance and self-cleaning properties. The testing of these materials in textiles and protective clothing against CWAs showed that they have potential as replacement technology in such applications.

Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) has become serious issue especially after Cold War why symetric war perception has changed. In Cold War era, armament competition has been based for two blocks which has been between NATO and Warsaw Pacts. So Cold War has also involved to control of the armament process. Two blocks has signed treaties or agreements about disarmament concept. Conventional and nuclear arms were the main discussion issues in that era. Beside those arms, biologic or chemical arms has been intensively used in Vietnam War. Ideologic competition has required military solidarity with the super powers. USA and USSR have sold weapons to their allies in not only Europe continent but also to Asia, Africa, Southern America. The countries which have been asministrated by dictators have had WMD through the super power’s competition. Currently the main problem, WMD can not be controlled by the treaties or agreements. After the dissemination of Soviet Bloc, WMD has been captured by different forces which some of them non-state actors. Dictators can not be controlled by any force. Super powers has founded balance in Cold War. New era has indicated to world public opinion main contradiction has not been among West and East, in fact it is among North and South. Southern countries’ people feel they are pressed by Northern countries. Islamic fundamentalism is accepted instead of Marxism by the Arabs for resistance to developed countries. Arabs do not trust to their dictators. Al Queda has emerged from these injury emotions, it has been based on global environment. Islamic fundemantalism facilitates to use WMD, to realize terror attacks. 9/11 events has shown us, asymetric war has been realized by terror organizations, they are also non-state actors and they have not regular forces. Pre-emptive or preventive strike concept has been resourced from these terror strikes. In US strategies WMD has been coded as Chemical Biologic Radiological Nuclear Explosive (CBRNE) weapons. In this paper, WMD will be considered as tool of new world order and asymetric war era.

Weapons of mass destruction, WMD

The term ‘Mass Destruction Weapons’ encompasses any intentionally negative event caused by biological, chemical and nuclear agents. A more specific definition could be: all those harmful agents which cause death or injury to people in a non-conventional way and which damage, often irreversibly, the environment. There are similarities between non-conventional biological, chemical and nuclear agents and the spreading of pandemics. CBRN agents cause a psychological effect, such as fear and anxiety. The psychological impact gets a maximum after a terrorist attack or after the use the use of non-conventional weapons. For instance, the public opinion felt such sense of anxiety after the terrorist attack in the Japanese subway with the nerve agent, sarin, or in other occasions. Chemical toxic agents may have biological effects too and their dispersion in air could cause pandemic effects when they are in high concentration. The poor knowledge about Mass Destruction Weapons on population produces panic and a deep psychological impact. The defence actions against this kind of pandemics are prevention and education: prevention means informing population and organizing a national task force for rapid intervention and countermeasures; education means the organization of a proper information at School and in Academia about mass destruction weapons, their negative effects and the defence from them, with obligatory courses.

Residents of a community who are intentionally exposed to a hazardous biological, chemical, or radiological agent (including medical first-responders and other civil defense personnel who live in that community) will exhibit a spectrum of psychological reactions that will impact the management of the incident. These reactions will range from a variety of behaviors of normal people under abnormal circumstances that either will help or hinder efforts to contain the threatening agent, deliver medical care, and reduce the morbidity, mortality, and costs associated with the disaster, to the development of new, or exacerbation of preexisting, mental disorders. Anticipating the decisions that people will make and actions they will take as the crisis develops is hindered by the limited number of previous disasters that bear crucial similarities to a terrorist attack with a weapon of mass destruction. Such actions, therefore, could serve as models to predict community reactions. One result of a study that attempted to fill in these gaps suggested that medical first-responders and their spouses/significant others may require separately crafted information and advice to reduce the potential for disharmony within the family that could affect job performance during the crisis. For those persons who exhibit emotional lability or cognitive deficits, evaluation of their psychiatric signs and symptoms may be more difficult than imagined, especially with exposure to nerve agents. Appreciation of these difficulties, and possession of the skill to sort through them, will be required of those assigned to triage stations. The allocation and utilization of mental health resources as the incident unfolds will be the responsibility of local consequence managers; these managers should be aware of the results of a recently-held workshop that attempted to reach consensus among experts in disaster mental health, based on the peer-reviewed literature, on the efficacy and safety of various approaches to early psychological interventions for victims of mass trauma and disasters. Thus, psychological factors are likely to be significant in the management of a terrorist incident that involves an agent of mass destruction. Emergency medical workers with managerial responsibilities, whether limited in scope or community-wide, should be aware of these factors, and should train to handle them through effective risk communication as part of their planning and preparation.