"The Nuclear Expert Who Never Was" Scott Ritter

"I can’t say for certain when Albright became “Doctor” Albright. A self-described “physicist,” he allows the term to linger, as he does the title “former U.N. inspector,” in order to create the impression that he possesses a certain gravitas. David Albright holds a master of science degree in physics from Indiana University and a master of science in mathematics from Wright State University. I imagine that this résumé permits him to assign himself the title physicist, but not in the Robert Oppenheimer/Edward Teller sense of the word. Whatever physics work Albright may or may not have done in his life, one thing is certain: He has never worked as a nuclear physicist on any program dedicated to the design and/or manufacture of nuclear weapons. He has never designed nuclear weapons and never conducted mathematical calculations in support of testing nuclear weapons, nor has he ever worked in a facility or with an organization dedicated to either.  

At best, Albright is an observer of things nuclear. But to associate his sub-par physics pedigree with genuine nuclear weapons-related work is, like his self-promotion as a “former U.N. weapons inspector,” disingenuous in the extreme. His lack of any advanced educational training as a nuclear physicist, combined with his dearth of practical experience with things nuclear, is further exacerbated by his astounding assumption of the title Doctor. In 2007 Albright received an honorary doctorate of humane letters from Wright State University. This honorary award is a recognition that should never be belittled, but it in no way elevates Albright to the status of one who has undergone the formal educational training and has actually earned a doctorate, especially in the demanding field of nuclear physics. While I cannot find any evidence of Albright promoting his honorary title in a manner that indicates direct fraud on his part (i.e., falsely claiming to be a Ph.D. in physics), there are far too many instances where he is referred to by those who interview him as being both “Dr. Albright” and a “physicist” that the uninformed reader might be misled into believing that the two were somehow connected."  truthdig

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I first met Albright when the supposed but non-existant Iraqi nuclear weapons program was under discussion.  His credentials were unchallenged.  Perhaps they should have been.  Where does ISIS get its money?  pl

http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20080626_the_nuclear_expert_who_never_was/

Comments

[Retired (once-Serving)Patriot]

I believe ISIS is a simple way for the IC (or those in the IC with political agendas) to air allegations of dubious merit but great PR, diplomatic and political impact.

Of course, one has to ask which nation's IC pays the freight? It seems as a non-profit, the source of their funds should be discoverable.

RP

[Charles]

I'd like to see a more substantive discussion of why Albright is wrong instead of taking Ritter's word that Albright must be because he 'only' has a Masters and Ritter didn't run into him while working for the UN.

A Masters in Physics doesn't make him a physicist? What are the accepted standards for the title? Was Oppenheimer a Physicist before he became Oppenheimer? And Ritter can assess Albright's physics pedigree based on his BA in Russian History?

Albright hasn't promoted himself as a PhD but we condemn him because "some reporters" referred to him as Dr? Who? Why is that his fault?

Maybe if we are looking into peoples' background to determine if they are credible (and I think that is valid), we should evaluate Ritter's credibility in light of his conviction on sex charges with a minor. I'll listen to Ritter's points on the facts of the issue, but I don't think I would accept anything he said on someone's character. He has little credibility there.

[turcopolier]

Charles

Your comments sound like defense of an asset. pl

[E L]

Dear Colonel:
In re Albright: Credential inflation is a common disease. Romney claims to be a "job creator" when, in fact, Bain and Co., which he headed, almost always proposed massive job cutting as the prime remedy for suffering companies. Bachmann claims she was a tax attorney when, in fact, was basically a tax collector for the IRS. Cain, Gingrich and Perry make all sorts of borderline false accomplishment claims too numerous to list.
You need to give yourself a little promotion too to, say, retired Imperial Legate or something. And rent a uniform from the Gaddafi collection for your blog photo. Berlusconi could probably loan you an appropriate throne. And refer to your self as PaLa a la a recently retired football coach.
Ain't life grand?

[J]

'Asset'? Hmmm........an 'Israeli' asset perhaps, receiving Israeli coin through various and sundry laundry schemes perhaps? ISIS says that it gets its coin from Private and Public Foundations (and some U.S. Govt. Institutions who apparently have hired ISIS for some reason or another). It has long been understood that many 'Foundations' front for Governments, Governments like Israel.

I'm tired of the tail wagging the dog, aren't you? Time to put that 'tail' between two 2X12s in a hydraulic vise with its motor turned on as we walk away to leave the 2X12s to their devices upon that 'tail'.

Americans Military Personnel have died as a direct result of that tail wagging the dog, had our D.C. had some backbone and stood up to that 'tail', maybe those American Military Personnel would be alive today.

[J]

All,

This one IMO 'threads' to the discussion regarding purported nuclear credentials that never were, 'pumping' reports into the 'fake realm', and the tail continuing to wag the dog.

Seems that Israel has no intention on telling U.S. what they are up to. Yet we give them closer to $26 Billion annually instead of the official $3.075 Billion annual, not to mention all those toys (GBU28s) we give them courtesey of U.S. taxpayers, and such. This one bites wouldn't you agree?

Israel refuses to tell US its Iran intentions - Telegraph
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/israel/8886543/Israel-refuses-to-tell-US-its-Iran-intentions.html

AND.....it appears that Mossad/MEK are already hard at work 'inside' Iran once again committing state-sponsored Terrorism:

Mossad-MEK May Have Bombed Iranian Missile Base, 40 Dead and Wounded « Tikun Olam
http://www.richardsilverstein.com/tikun_olam/2011/11/12/mossad-mek-terror-bombing-at-irg-base-causes-massive-explosion-at-least-15-dead-many-wounded-some-severely/

[Babak Makkinejad]

A Master's Degree in Physics will give you the ability to comprehend theoretical and experimental work in Physics and allied sciences.

The design of nuclear weapons is somewhat related to nuclear engineering, in the same way that design of high explosive bombs are related to internal combustion engine's controlled explosions.

In both cases, the path from Physics to Engineering is complex as there are very many areas of ancillary knowledge that goes into an engineered system.

That is why someone with a Master of Science degree in Physics cannot work - from the get-go - in any engineering field without further training.

That is why students study in Mechanical, Electrical, Chemical, and Aerospace Engineering departments and not Physics or Applied Physics.

Now, there is no program to which you could apply: there is no Department of Nuclear Bomb Engineering.

So a Master of Science physics degree recipient must be completely self-taught in these fields, relying on open source published reports. I think this will take years of effort, I would guess about a decade or more to gather and digest all this information.

And just like any solid engineering education program, there has to be laboratory exercises and design home-works to cause the student to practice his newly acquired knowledge. Now I am fairly certain that as a self-taught person in design of nuclear weapons, there is no educational software that you can purchase to exercise your newly acquired knowledge. Nor are there any professors to whom you can send your design to be graded.

All of which, at least to me, would indicate that such a person could offer educated guesses but not be considered and expert for an expert would, by definition, require hands-on training.

[Phil Giraldi]

Ritter's morals might be questionable but he certainly has a solid track record as a weapons inspector. The question is, does Albright actually know anything about nuclear weapons development apart from what any physicist with training comparable to his would know? If he is just coming out with information that is completely derivative he should not be regarded as an expert and accorded credibility on that basis. There are unfortunately a lot of agenda driven frauds floating around out there who have only limited knowledge of what they espouse and almost all of them are part of the neocon war machine. I would cite as additional examples "terrorism experts" Evan Kohlmann and Steve Emerson.

[Bobo]

When it comes to "Hatchet Jobs" I always look for motivation.
Mr Ritter was sentenced to 18 to 66 months prison time in October of this year for sexual predator crimes. His expertise as a weapons inspector was earned as an officer in the Marine Corp though he left after 12 years with the rank of major. He received his education degree while in military service.

Mr Ritter is a blowhard and a destructive human being without credibility. I do not know Mr Albright but somehow he has upset an idiot.

[steve]

I'm not here to inflate Ms. Bachmann's credentials, but if she worked in an attorney capacity for the IRS district counsel, regional counsel, or national counsel she could easily have tried multi-million dollar tax deficiency cases in Tax Court, or District Court if they were special assistant district counsel, as well as initiating criminal tax prosecutions.

I knew many of those folks in Houston and they would regularly go up against the largest energy companies in the world--Shell springs to mind--and against their dozens of highly paid white shoe lawyers.

What astounds me is that I see no evidence of Ms. Bachmann having that sort of talent.

[The beaver]

Correct! Most probably during his undergraduate studies, he may have touched one or 2 courses in nuclear physics along with other courses in maths, chemistry and other classical and modern physics to get his bachelor degree in a fundamental science.
Surprisingly, instead of specializing in any of the modern physics branches or applied physics for that matter, he went for a Masters in Maths -going back to square one.

[securecare]

List of those funders they have made public.

http://isis-online.org/about/funders/

[Roy G.]

There is also another bogus 'nuclear weapons expert,' Vyacheslav Danilenko, identified in the IAEA report. Gareth Porter broke the story earlier this week:

http://www.counterpunch.org/2011/11/10/irans-soviet-nuclear-scientist-never-worked-on-weapons/

Of course, Israel is widely believed to be behind this disintel. From the article:

The unnamed member state that informed the agency about Danilenko’s alleged experience as a Soviet nuclear weapons scientist is almost certainly Israel, which has been the source of virtually all the purported intelligence on Iranian work on nuclear weapons over the past decade.

Israel has made no secret of its determination to influence world opinion on the Iranian nuclear programme by disseminating information to governments and news media, including purported Iran government documents. Israeli foreign ministry and intelligence officials told journalists Douglas Frantz and Catherine Collins about the special unit of Mossad dedicated to that task at the very time the fraudulent documents were being produced.

In an interview in September 2008, Albright said Olli Heinonen, then deputy director for safeguards at the IAEA, had told him that a document from a member state had convinced him that the “alleged studies” documents were genuine. Albright said the state was “probably Israel”.

//

The interesting thing is that Israel has a pipeline to the IAEA even though they are emphatically NOT a member, BUT they have friends who are members.

This is the question that needs to be asked every time Israel makes threats about Iran's nuclear program: Why isn't Israel a member of the IAEA?

[Anna-Marina]

There is an illegal apsect of the US financial and military support to Israel.
"the United States insistence on keeping Israel’s nuclear capability an open "secret" is engineered, among other things, to keep United States aid to Israel flowing, especially as a key legal condition of receiving such aid is for recipient countries to be signatories to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, which Israel refuses to sign."
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=27612

[confusedponderer]

I have never really been convinced that Ritter was not perhaps 'stung'. Not unprecedented for character assassination and Ritter certainly had made plenty of enemies by daring to say that Saddam had no WMD. But maybe I am reading too much into this.

I recall that among pro war US right wingers I knew in 2003, raised on a steady diet of Little Green Footballs, Weekly Standard and National Review Rnline, he was detested as a 'Saddamite'.

[William R. Cumming]

Does Dr. David Kay have a PhD in physics or nuclear engineering [is there such a degree?]?

[J]

Colonel,

Is OSD Panetta panning before the cameras, or is he really serious?

Leon Panetta warns against Iran strike

US defence secretary says military action against Iranian nuclear sites could have unintended consequences for the region
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/nov/11/leon-panetta-warns-iran-strike

[kao_hsien_chih]

I think his background is in policy, not sciences, and his Ph. D. is accordingly from a policy school, not a science program.

[Carl O.]

First of all, people should read the entire Ritter piece. Secondly, it's not just Ritter. He recieved back up from one Alexander DeVolpi, a 40 year veteran of Argonne National Laboratory and a nuclear physicist with experience as an engineer and in arms control.

He wrote the following in response to Ritter's critique and to those who responded in defense of Albright:

"Aside from Albright’s book compilation on fissile materials, there are some other useful contributions he has made to arms control and non-proliferation, such as his interpretation of country-specific proliferation activities. Dave’s a friendly guy, but I always found him shallow on experience, and — now realizing that he was once on the research staff of Princeton University's Center for Energy and Environmental Studies — I have a better understanding of his predisposition and educational preparation. With no substantive foundation he has expressed himself as philosophically opposed to nuclear power. This is not uncommon, particularly with academics associated with Princeton who evince no hands-on or other practical field experience regarding nuclear-weapons, nuclear-reactor technology, or verification methodology."

DeVopli's entire article is here:
http://knol.google.com/k/nuclear-expertise-how-defined-how-abused#

DeVolpi's bio is here:
http://knol.google.com/k/alexander-devolpi/-/1gsyt5k142kc5/0#

[walrus]

"Bobo" appears to be doing a hatchet job on Scott Ritter. I wonder where he is from?

Mr. Ritters sexual behavior has no connection with his weapons inspector expertise...or lack of it.

[oofda]

Roy G. -- Israel IS a member state of the IAEA.

[crf]

Ha. That's a fairly good article, thanks for sharing the link.
My favourite part:

"Too often one hears or implies, “If you knew what I knew....” Yet, in 50 years of access to sensitive information, I don’t recall insider access displacing fundamental science, engineering, or logic."

This is so true.

[Andy]

It's been a a couple of years since I last read this article. It's just as incoherent as I remember. At one point Ritter writes this:

Albright has spent the past decade building a solid reputation as an analyst of nuclear issues. One only need look at the impressive work he and ISIS have done on the issue of North Korea to understand the potential he brings to the table as an outside observer on nuclear matters. Informed interest, combined with sustained access to critical personalities on both sides of an issue, makes for insights and opinions that contribute in a positive manner to the overall public discourse. No one who is interested in facilitating informed debate, discussion and dialogue about issues such as those facing us in North Korea, Iran and elsewhere can deny the value Albright brings to the table. That his insight into these matters should be shared with members of the media is likewise something that should be encouraged.

Then, a few paragraphs later, without any irony, he says this:

It is high time the mainstream media began dealing with David Albright for what he is (a third-rate reporter and analyst), and what he isn’t (a former U.N. weapons inspector, doctor, nuclear physicist or nuclear expert). It is time for David Albright, the accidental inspector, to exit stage right. Issues pertaining to nuclear weapons and their potential proliferation are simply too serious to be handled by amateurs and dilettantes.

Which Scott Ritter am I supposed to believe? That's the most glaring inconsistency, but hardly the only one. Personally, I think the article tells us more about Scott Ritter than it does about David Albright.

[confusedponderer]

I feel some clarification is needed:

#1 Israel is a member state of the IAEA since its founding year, 1957.

#2 Israel is not a party to the NPT.

From Israel's statement to the IAEA General Conference of 2010 (p.7/11) [pdf]]:

... accession to international treaties , is the sovereign right of any state to decide, whether it consents to be bound by any treaty. The Agency itself is required to carry out its activities "with due observance of the sovereign rights of states", as clearly stipulated in Article III (D) of IAEA's Statute. Indeed, the advancement of states accession to international treaties, does not fall within the mandate of the Agency. As a matter of well-known fact, Israel is not the only member state in the IAEA's MESA region that has exercised it's sovereign right not to accede to the NPT, due to its national security considerations. Yet Israel is the only state that has been singled out, and is called upon to make a decision, which is against its best national interests ...

Emphases from the original. What the man says is legally perfectly correct.

Now what about Iran? The recent IAEA report [PDF] states (p.9):

While the Agency continues to verify the non-diversion of declared nuclear material at the nuclear facilities and LOFs declared by Iran under its Safeguards Agreement, as Iran is not providing the necessary cooperation, including by not implementing its Additional Protocol, the Agency is unable to provide credible assurance about the absence of undeclared nuclear material and activities in Iran, and therefore to conclude that all nuclear material in Iran is in peaceful activities

Emphases mine. Since it is Israel's right as a sovereign state to not ratify the NPT, then it is Iran's right not to accede to the additional protocol.

The report uses, frankly, inflammatory language. It is not for the IAEA to find or judge whether a state should or should not enter into an additional treaty or treaty annex. Period. In that report, Mr. Amano exceededs his mandate.

Public civil servants are servants to the treaty and must not interfere with state sovereignty, and must not exceed the mandate given to them by the member states. That is a logical and indeed, inevitable, reflex of state sovereignty. The recent IAEA report doesn't live up to that standard.

[confusedponderer]

When I wrote "Public civil servants" I wanted to write "International civil servants".