Terrorists, Explosives, and Security Issues

Acetone Peroxides are particularly scary compounds because the materials they are assembled from are so easy to get, they can be made at home, and the stuff is exceedingly unstable.

Unstable; I link that term in my mind with mental health. If a person is unstable they can go off at any time. The unpredictable sequelae can do massive damage. No one quite knows what will set off an “explosion”. Acetone Peroxides in the hands of terrorists are in that class of explosives that are unpredictable, unstable and darn hard to detect.

Security issues with explosives have been on the news continually for several years but the first time I heard about acetone peroxide explosives was after the terrorist bombings of the London subway system. Even then it did not sink in until the arrests on August 10, 2006 of several terrorists plotting to use the acetone-peroxide type explosives on transatlantic airplanes.

The security issues raised here are legion. 

• First is the overall broad category of identifying and watching the possible terrorists among us. 

• Second is the huge variety of materials that can be used by terrorists to do massive harm to innocent people, economies, and nations. 

• Third is how easy it is to get recipes on making explosives on the internet or in your local library.