Monday, December 04, 2006

Hmmm...

From Pajamas Media. "Litvinenko Burial: Alexander Litvinenko’s father, Walter, will bury his son in the Islamic manner. The younger Litvinenko “was born an Orthodox Christian but had close links to Islamist rebels in Chechnya [and] had requested to be buried according to Muslim tradition after converting to Islam on his deathbed.” (Times of London)" AJ Strata had a theory that Litvinenko was a buyer for Polonium 210 who accidentally got some on himself, rather than a victim of Putin's malevolence. Now if that were true, what does the Times of London suggests about who he was buying it for? Notice that nothing is proved, but then nothing is excluded.

15 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Wretchard said, "AJ Strata had a theory that Litvinenko was a buyer for Polonium 210 who accidentally got some on himself, rather than a victim of Putin's malevolence"

The nature of this element is that it won't kill you unless it takes residence inside your body, and in an amount that suggests that an accidental exposure can be ruled out, leaving homocide or suicide.

12/04/2006 03:26:00 PM  
Blogger wretchardthecat said...

From the United Nuclear website. One of those Internet mail order companies selling Polonium 210.

A SPECIAL NOTICE ABOUT POLONIUM-210

With the recent news of Polonium-210 being used as a poison, a good deal of
incorrect information has been passed around (primarily by the media) concerning the Polonium isotope and radioactive materials in general. It's important to get the facts correct. The general public is quite ignorant when it comes to knowledge about radioactive materials and radiation in general.

The amount of Plonium-210, as well as any of the isotopes we sell is an 'exempt quantity' amount. These quantities of radioactive material are not hazardous - this is why they are permitted by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) to be sold to the general public without any sort of license. Although we do sell these isotopes, distributors such as United Nuclear Scientific Supplies (and just about any isotope distributor) do not actually stock them. All isotopes are made to order at an NRC licensed reactor in Oak Ridge Tennessee. When the isotope is made, it is shipped directly to the customer from the reactor to insure the longest possible half-life.

The exempt quantity amount of Polonium-210, or any of the radioactive isotopes sold is so small that they are essentially invisible to the human eye.
In the case of needle sources, the radioactive material is electroplated on the inside of the eye of a needle.

You would need about 15,000 of our Polonium-210 needle sources
at a total cost of about $1 million - to have a toxic amount.

Polonium-210 and other toxic radioactive isotopes in your environment: ( yikes! radioactive materials are all around us )

Amercium-241 is a similar toxic Alpha radiation emitter.
Instead of a half life of 138 days like Polonium-210 has, it has a half life of over 450 years. It is far more toxic - and there is 10 times more than the 'exempt quantity' amount in every smoke detector in your home.

Another extremely common use for Polonium-210 is anti-static brushes found in almost all photographic shops. These brushes have a significant amount of Polonium-210 in them. A very popular Plonium-210 charged brush is called the "Staticmaster" (see image to left). The Polonium-210 in these brushes emits alpha particles (positively charged helium atoms) that collide with molecules of air, creating a supply of ions sufficient to neutralize both positive and negative static charges.

Aside from weak Alpha radiation, products that contain much more penetrating Beta and Gamma radiation are also all around you. Common bright red/orange Fiestaware dinner plates and cups are made with a ceramic glaze that contains Uranium. These dinner plates and cups are almost 100 times more radioactive than the small 'exempt' radioactive isotopes we sell...
and remember, you EAT off of Fiestaware.

If you really wanted to poison someone, you would of course have to come up with a way to remove the invisible amount of material from the exempt sources - which is just about physically impossible and combine them together. Of course you would also need that 15,000 exempt sources.

In addition, there are dozens of other far more toxic materials, such as Ricin and Abrin, both of which can easily be made, and are also undetectable as a poison and untraceable.

Although it obviously works, Polonium-210 is a poor choice for a poison.

Another point to keep in mind is that an order for 15,000 sources would look a tad suspicious, considering we sell about 1 or 2 sources every 3 months. ....

For those of you with a slightly warped sense of humor, we do sell a Polonium-210 coffee mug...

12/04/2006 04:45:00 PM  
Blogger enscout said...

Litvinenko sounds like a shady character & his Chechen bro's were most likely a dangerous bunch & very closely watched by Russian intelligentsia.

Seems like he has been playing with fire & finally got burned.

Given the nature of the substance, it sounds more & more plausible that this was some sort of macabre suicide.

Another Muslim martyr? For what cause?

12/04/2006 04:54:00 PM  
Blogger enscout said...

C4:
It's possible that he was a patsy for the Chechens - a way for them to use his status, both as a dissident and as one with some notoriety, to discredit Putin.

Nothing suprises me anymore.

BTW, nice short post. :o)

12/04/2006 05:54:00 PM  
Blogger Das said...

slightly OT (but not much)

C4,

I know you like to think that your bold anti-Semitism separates you from the crowd; your inverted vanity whispers to you that you are some kind of strong man, that running your hand over the ovens of Auschwitz and brushing of the soot would be nothing to you, like clipping your fingernails (unlike the revulsion we poor, weak Jew-loving souls here at BC would feel).

I suspect you take a perverted delight in watching clips of allied bulldozers sweeping Jewish cadavers into deep pits and then, on a dime, talking about evil Jewish conspiracies and nests of secret Jewish power in the world. No, for you C4, Jewish vicitimzation only confirms the power of Jewish conspiracy in the world.

You're anti-Semitism is sick, C4; take your Auschwitz guard mentality and shove it.

12/04/2006 06:39:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Chris said, "Was he eliminated? Did he commit suicide and in a way that would reflect poorly on Putin and the FRS?"

There's a radioactive trail all the way back to one source in Russia, there's another sick gentleman with a smaller dose, there's a restaurant that's glowing in the dark, there's a lot of strained relations between the UK and Putin, and there's a lot of exposure for the mob (when mobsters traditionally hate exposure) leading to only one possible answer: Litvinenko knew there was a contract out on his life, and these people WILL find you, so he decided to go out by his own hand in a way that would both shine unwanted light on the mafia and paint Vlad Putin with a tar brush. The last minute conversion to Islam tweaked Putin that much more by making him yet another "Chechnyan" "martyr".

12/04/2006 06:44:00 PM  
Blogger wretchardthecat said...

If a man was murdered on the street with a disintegrator ray the fact of the availability of the new murder weapon is at least as interesting as the identity of the triggerman. The point being that we may see more polonium 210 deaths. But will we see mass deaths or are they going to keep this under positive control? Whoever "they" are.

12/04/2006 07:08:00 PM  
Blogger Deuce ☂ said...

I have no idea where this Litvinenko thing is going. If it were a book, I would throw it down. When I found out he wanted to be buried as a Muslim, I no Longer care who wasted his sorry ass.

12/04/2006 07:09:00 PM  
Blogger Db2m said...

If homicide, then there was both deliberate administration and accidental exposure(s) due to unkempt handling, as evidenced by the exposure trail.

If martyr/suicide, then there was both deliberate self-administration and accidental exposure(s) due to unkempt handling, as evidenced by the exposure trail. The attempt to damage Putin would be both an act of sabotage against a sovereign government, and either a deliberate or unintended act of terrorism (fear triggered amongst the civilian population).

The homicide scenario, I think, is easier to swallow.

The martyr/suicide scenario, I think, is more difficult to digest.

12/04/2006 07:15:00 PM  
Blogger Boghie said...

From the "United Nuclear Website" entry excerpted by Wretchard:

The exempt quantity amount of Polonium-210, or any of the radioactive isotopes sold is so small that they are essentially invisible to the human eye.
In the case of needle sources, the radioactive material is electroplated on the inside of the eye of a needle.

You would need about 15,000 of our Polonium-210 needle sources
at a total cost of about $1 million - to have a toxic amount.


I would be very interested to see what 15,000 'needle source' sized samples would look like. And, a million bucks. And, enough to contaminate multiple sites and other folks - I think another person was killed.

Another question, it is rather obvious from the procedure described that attaining such a large sample would take time, be expensive, and rather difficult. It also sounds rather risky. In America, it has to comme fron Oak Ridge - that ain't standard stuff plopping out of the sewers of our medical centers. Is the generation of this material limited to hreeder reactors?

12/04/2006 08:20:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Why would anyone chose to commit suicide with this stuff? It sounds like a damned painful way to die.

This reminds me too much of the old KGB way of showing their interlocuter that they meant serious business.

Remember when Hezbollah kidnapped and murdered that Soviet spy about 15 years ago or so? And in return, the KGB kidnapped a member of Hezbollah - did atrocities to his body, killed him and then returned the body. And after that Hezbollah behaved with the Russians.

It sounds like Litvinenko was screwing around big time with this nuclear material. Was he getting ahold of it for his Islamist chechen buddies?

Death by polonium seems to me like an effective warning and a deterrent, the kind the KGB ued to be so adept at sending.

12/04/2006 11:14:00 PM  
Blogger RWE said...

The bizarre thing about this death is that it is so comic-book-like, right up there with a gold table, a laser and "No, Mr. Bond, I expect you to die."

So why would anyone do it this way? There are so many easier and surerer ways to kill people and most of them can be procured at Wal-Mart.

True, Communist agents have used such things as a poisoned umbrella spike to kill people in the West, but that method at least offered a degree of covert methodology - while leaving a distinct message to other defectors.

It could be that they were sending a message - or else we really are dealing with an equivalent of a Goldfinger.

12/05/2006 06:05:00 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Alcibiades wrote, "Why would anyone chose to commit suicide with this stuff? It sounds like a damned painful way to die."

Vee haff other more painful vays.

12/05/2006 06:37:00 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

This is one of the most bizzare events in a long time. The comments by United Nuclear that it costs over $1m to acquire enough of the stuff to kill someone (and now we have more than one infected) would certainly point to sponsorship by a state or similarly powerful organization. Not to mention the delivery mechanism required. The obvious trail back to Moscow almost forces me to think of a setup to frame Putin, if it wasn't for this:

http://www.keepmedia.com/pubs/OpinionJournal.com/2006/11/27/2134212?extId=10053
"Mr. Berezovsky... had no reason to kill Litvinenko, whose views he shared and whom he had helped since his arrival in the U.K. in 2000...
In November 1998, Litvinenko revealed a plot to kill Mr. Berezovsky who, at the time, was the deputy head of the Russian security council...
In December 2001, a Russian police official, in announcing a warrant for Mr. Berezovsky's arrest, said, "We know what he eats for breakfast, where he has lunch and where he buys his groceries." This was followed up in September 2003 with an unsuccessful attempt to kill Mr. Berezovsky with a needle camouflaged as a pen...
in June the Russian State Duma passed a law allowing the president to authorize attacks by the FSB on "terrorists" in foreign countries...
Two of the political figures murdered in Russia in recent years were trying to investigate the [1999 Moscow apartment] bombings...."

12/05/2006 04:18:00 PM  
Blogger Kayle said...

Sanchmo

Actually, what United Nuclear said was that it would cost over $1 million to acquire a lethal dose of Polonium-210 from them in "exempt" quantities over the Internet. I suspect that if you were to go through a vetting process you could buy Po-210 in larger quantities at a considerably lower cost from them. I also suspect that Russian sources are likely to be a lot cheaper and less discriminating.

12/06/2006 05:53:00 AM  

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