Foreword to The Survival Guide, 05 March 2003
In the aftermath of September 11 I researched a story for New Scientist about the risks of terrorists attacking the Sellafield nuclear reprocessing complex in Cumbria. Given that waste tanks there contained some of the highest concentrations of radioactivity anywhere in the world, it seemed sensible to ask some questions.
Unfortunately, there were few answers forthcoming. The line I kept getting from government departments and regulatory agencies was that it would be wrong to go into detail about safety measures because this would help terrorists. British Nuclear Fuels, the state-owned company that runs Sellafield, even refused to say what type of fire extinguishers it had.
In editing The Survival Guide, I have encountered the same kind of knee-jerk official secrecy from other government officials. The Home Office, the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and the Department for Transport all declined to talk about their contingency plans. Trust us, they were saying, we've got it covered. We just can't tell you how.
But people in 21st century Britain don't like being patronised. They see governments elsewhere, like in the United States, being more honest with their electors. They know that secrecy is sometimes necessary, but they suspect that it is often used to disguise inadequacy.
Happily, however, things seem to be changing. In recent months there have been signs that the British government is prepared to be more open about the measures it takes to guard against terrorism. I hope that this guide, founded firmly on fact not propaganda, will help that process. People are not so naïve that they have to be protected from unpleasant truths.
In the last hundred years human ingenuity has devised numerous unpleasant ways of inflicting human suffering. Many of the weapons we now fear in the hands of terrorists originated in, and have been used by, countries that regard themselves as civilised. The purpose in describing such weapons here is not to cause alarm, or to help the terrorists, but the reverse. Understanding the origins and effects of what we have created - and what to do about it - could be essential for our survival.
