Wednesday, August 22, 2012
DOD Agreement Sheds Light on NNSA Problems
Anonymously contributed:
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Stephen Young, Washington representative and senior analyst
Union of Concerned Scientists
August 20, 2012
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http://allthingsnuclear.org/dod-doe-agreement/
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23 comments:
Watch out for trickery. Life extension plan may be "reinterpreted" as LIFE extension plan, a double down of the LIFE initiative on NIF.
Oh, what’s a few Billion$$$ among pals. After all, you have to admit NNSA’s doing an outstanding job with security (don’t blame Y-12 because the Threat Guidance didn’t include Nuns).
Hum, “multi-point safety and new detonators”, “scaled experiments,” which involve detonating half-size plutonium pits”, “the margin/surety capability”.
csworde 349Hey, this ought to get NTS fired up again.
The author, Steven Young, laments that the original document was designated FOUO and asked why.
The 7 possible FOUO designations are clearly defined, including such things as possible export control, personally protected information, non-disclosure agreements etc. The FOUO designation is accompanied by a signature block which describes which requirements apply.
If the requirement applies, the FOUO designation is required by public law. The public release of FOUO is controlled by a review and release process, generally by the governing (financing) agency. Pretty simple.
A less well known but equally valid reason for temporarily is if a document is incomplete, or in craft form and thus not ready for review and release.
DOE/NNSA is a completely broken, dysfunctional agency and they are taking their weapon research labs down with them. It's sad to watch and fixing it is hopeless.
DOD is not going to stand for this much longer, nor should they. It's probably only a matter of time, now, until what's left of the weapon labs and the rest of the nuclear weapons complex are ripped away from DOE and handed over to the DOD for oversight.
"DOD is not going to stand for this much longer, nor should they. It's probably only a matter of time, now, until what's left of the weapon labs and the rest of the nuclear weapons complex are ripped away from DOE and handed over to the DOD for oversight."
Unfortunately, DOD will not make this decision – Congress will & for whose benefit would you think?
DOD has labs of its own and may find reason to question continued support of the bloated weapons labs. The part of NNSA that DOD needs is a limited production capacity. It could serve many interests to move the production to DOD and leave the weapons labs to rot in DOE.
the subject of moving weapons complex (in some form or fashion) to DOD seems to come up every election year. i'm guessing no significant changes.
The Manhattan Project was run by the US Army Corps of Engineers, who spent most of their time working on dams for water projects that were overseen in Congress by the Water Committee (later on the Energy and Water Committee). So, if you want argue that it makes sense to leave NNSA where it is today, at least get the screwed up history correct.
DOD has research labs like Wright Patterson Lab that use supercomputers to do advanced simulations for modeling air flows around jet wings, ballistic explosions, material deformations, etc.
Also, like the NNSA labs, they also have a lot of interest in material science, nanotechnology, bio-warfare research, etc.
I doubt DOD would just take the nuclear weapons production complex and then "let the lab's rot". There is actually a lot in common between research done for stockpile stewardship and the type of issues that are also importance to DOD.
Since there are three weapons labs and three military service departments, simple math could dictate an appropriate distribution. LLNL to the Naval lab, SNL to the Air Force lab, and LANL to the Army lab. On second thought, this is probably too logical to be adopted by the power brokers in Washington.
LLNL to the Naval lab
Hahaha given history, that would be great! LLNL, a Naval research lab! I love it!
Tne Navy already has a research lab - it is NRL, in the Washington DC area. If you think the DoD can run a research lab better than NNSA I recommend that you try working at one, then see what you think. BTW - do you know the fate of Harry Diamond Lab?
I wonder if the culture at LLNL could be transferred into DOD if they took the labs over. It might be better for the DOD to just jettison the current DOE lab staff. LLNL prides itelf on indiviualism and competition between members, while the DOD supports teamwork and trust. Scientists vs soldiers: different mindsets that may require different working environments.
“…different mindsets that may require different working environments.”
Based on my own experiences & opinions I agree with you. My experience was with paramilitary organization where retired military bosses were managing & directing both former military types & professionals (eng/sci).
The comment about DOD supporting teamwork and trust and those qualities being self selected against in the NNSA labs does not hold in all cases.
In over thirty years of dealing with all three labs, they each have their own culture. SNL is excellent in teaming both inside and outside; LLNL is very good in teaming inside and good in teaming outside; LANL is poor at teaming inside and practically devoid of teaming outside.
I suspect that an examination of the funds into each lab from DOD would follow this trend of teaming ability.
August 27, 2012 9:09 AM
I agree it would best to jettison the LANL staff. Some trimming of LLNL could do as well. Sandia is the only bright spot in terms of the NNSA labs. DOD labs are much better run and make real things, none of this sand box crap and "I am so smart" nonsense that has dragged our NNSA labs and Universities down the drain. Once the NNSA labs are in DOD than I say get rid of the DOE it is a wast of the taxpayers money. NSF and NIH need to get the axe as well. People the free market needs pick winners not the government.
Ability to team should really be considered just a prerequisite for being sustained funding-wise. To fit into a DoD capabilities based strategic planning philosophy, a lab would HAVE to be able to play its part in initiatives with other participants. Any lab that think that it's an island that knows better than anyone else... is a lab that needs to be defunded. You could try to institute slow organizational change by rooting out the arrogant actors and changing the culture of the organization and emphasize a focus towards the customer/sponsor. Better just to shut it down and see these people try to survive in a real competetive environment.
Scooby's at it again, deleting truth in favor of fiction. Can't handle the facts.
Scooby has always been a duplicitous editor. It is his blog afterall.
I delete anything that has expletives.
Read rules.
Any problem with that?
Not sure why anyone here needs to use expletives at all. So many good examples of taunts, assaults, character assassination and expressions of anger or dismay all done very effectively without using expletives. In fact having fbombs just tunes people out.
You also delete any suggestion that former LLNL managers are incompetent.
There seems to be still quite a but remainig that are very unflattering about former and current LLNL managers. A few specific named individuals taking a serious beating.
Blog owner has complete control over the content. That's the way it works. You could post on the LANL blog too if you really need to get your message out. Many people read both.
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