I have written several commentaries about the event titled “Rocky Flats Then and Now:  25 years After the Raid.” This one will be posted earlier because it is about the panel discussion titled “Secrecy and Its Fallout,” and I was originally listed as a panelist. (See the commentary posted June 4^th for an explanation.) Nat Miullo, listed as “Former Environmental Protection Agency Inspector at Rocky Flats” was on this panel, and he gave an engaging and personable introduction about how he arrived at that position. He said his father, and he spoke of him in admirable terms, had worked in the military in positions that required secrecy and had discouraged him from accepting the position overseeing Rocky Flats. Mr. Miullo had, as I understood him, worked on waste issues at the Rocky Mountain Arsenal, and his father said Rocky Flats would be more difficult.  He went against his father’s advice and accepted the Rocky Flats assignment. He commented that security requirements were carefully followed at Rocky Flats and none of the people working there were going to break those laws. He discussed how he filed the application for a security clearance and was frustrated at how long it took for the investigation to be completed. Mr. Miullo described that he was prevented from seeing some operations at Rocky Flats even after he received his clearance, but explained that there were strict “need to know requirements.” He did not dismiss the logic of those requirements, and I recall he even said workers with clearances were not allowed to see what was going on outside their buildings unless they had “a need to know.” He said that he was led into some areas blindfolded because there were operations that he did not need to see to do his job, but “Over time that was overcome.” Continue reading →

I attended several of the panel discussions about the twenty-five year anniversary of the raid of Rocky Flats, and commend the organizers. The event was well attended. It was obvious that there are still high emotions about the Rocky Flats mission and its legacy.

Len Ackland, one of the organizers, gave a good sketch of Rocky Flats history. He did say something I thought was surprising, if my notes are correct. He said there is a fundamental controversy about secrecy of weapons production. I would expect that critics of Rocky Flats would believe that protecting that kind of information would be crucial to at least slowing nuclear proliferation.  He mentioned the number of nuclear weapons remaining in the world, and I doubt anyone wishes for more countries to begin building them.

I have some specific comments about the event, and one I do not want to forget is how much I admired Jack Weaver for his participation in the opening event. I also greatly appreciated that Phil Saba stood up after one of the panel discussions to say he came from a job that was dangerous to Rocky Flats where safety came first. I also appreciated Ken Frieberg’s wonderful discussions of how production information was guarded as secret and environmental information was open to everyone. Of course Jon Lipsky, the FBI agent in charge of the Rocky Flats raid, attempted to discredit that statement by saying the waste characterization reports filed by the plant as required by law were marked as “Unclassified Nuclear Information (UCNI)” I expect he knew that the reports contained information about piping diagrams and waste volumes that could be used by interested agents to perform “reverse engineering” to identify processes used at Rocky Flats. Those reports contained “waste processing” information, and not “environmental” information. What Ken said was true.   Continue reading →