Dec 12 2006
Litvinenko Dosage Was Massive
There is an article out today which helps put the dosage of Polonium 210 into perpsective, and a history lesson which would dictate the Litvinenko incident was not an assassination. It is the only recorded death by Polonium 210, and clearly demontrates Polonium is not a weapon of assassination:
A low-dose exposure was blamed for causing the death of Irene Joliot-Curie, the daughter of Marie Curie, who first isolated polonium.
Irene died in 1956 of leukemia caused by accidental exposure when a sealed capsule of the metal exploded on her laboratory bench. Polonium’s alpha rays damage DNA, although in Irene’s case they took more than 10 years to do their deadly work.
Litvinenko passed away much more quickly. On Nov. 23, the 43-year-old died in a London hospital from the intense radiation polonium emits, having ingested it sometime in late October. Even though the dose of poison was tiny — maybe no more than the weight of a speck of dust — it was deadly.
…
The maximum safe body burden of polonium is only 7 picograms (7 trillionth of a gram). It appears that Litvinenko was given something like a milligram (a thousandth of a gram), which is a billion times the safe level. Polonium-210 is regarded as one of the most dangerous substances known because it ejects alpha particles.
The history shows ten years before the first accidental exposure to what must have been a large amount of Polonium dust took its victim. True, the Curie’s were scientists and they took precautions. But an assassin would have to consider this example a poor result. The assassin theory has mutiple conflicting assumptions. First the assassin is sophisticated so he/she selects this exotic weapon. Then it turns out they know little about the weapon and the trail it leaves:
Whoever the assassin was, he or she had some method of concealing the poison before it was given to Litvinenko. The hidden poison would be undetectable because this isotope emits almost no telltale gamma rays. However, polonium has a tendency to leak from containers. This probably explains why traces have been found in five airliners, particularly those used for flights to Moscow. (Passengers in those aircraft were not at risk.)
Where Litvinenko was poisoned is still not known. But wherever he went after he was poisoned, he left traces of polonium, including his home in the north London suburb of Muswell Hill, a sushi restaurant near Piccadilly Circus where he dined with a friend, a luxury hotel where he met two unidentified Russians, and the home of Russian billionaire exile Boris Berezovsky. His room in the hospital was the most contaminated.
So was this a smart assassin? Apparently not. But why hire a low brow (and low budget) assassin to deliver a poison which costs tens of millions of dollars? That makes no sense either. Polonium 210 is useful as a weapon. Very useful. But that use has nothing to do with poison pills in tea. That is not an effective use of Polonium 210. Its role in a nuclear device or dirty bomb is much more deadly and cost effective. Now, you don’t need to tell a smuggler exactly what they are smuggling when you want to transport contraband. And smugglers might not think or even know about the trail Polonium 210 can leave. If I was in on the smuggling and then took ill, I would spend some serious time negotiating an air tight role as a whistle blower to get as light a sentence as possible in any prosecutions. The radiation poisoning would be punishment enough in many people’s minds.
On a slightly separate topic I would expect people involved in a smuggling ring that went bust like the Litvinenko incident might have to start running for cover. And that is apparently what we see.
Paris. A key witness in Litvinenko case,
Andrey[Evgeny; ajstrata] Limarev, has disappeared from his home in the French Alps, the Echo of Moscow Radio reported citing a statement of News Ru. Limarev is a former Federal Security Service agent and a colleague of Alexander Litvinenko, who was poisoned recently in London. Some time ago, Limarev accused a former agent of the Federal Security Service, of Litvinenko’s death. Limarev told the British press that he would be the next victim. A day later, he went missing.
l which will be twisted by those trying to divert attention from themselves as some sort of act by Putin. Clearly someone is trying to hide something and some form of cleaning up is taking place.
Major Update: I can confidentally predict Lugovoi has signed a plea agreement in this matter:
Russian businessman Andrei Lugovoy, a presumed key witness in the case on the death in London of former FSB officer Alexander Litvinenko, has flatly dismissed media reports alleging that Russian and British investigators repeatedly interrogated him on Tuesday.
“There have not been any investigatory actions today. I have only signed a protocol on not divulging preliminary investigation secrecy, and the signing of a protocol is not, as it is known, an investigatory action,†he told ITAR-TASS.
Berezovsky and Goldfarb and Zakayev must be getting pretty concerned about now. They do seem awefully eager to please all of a sudden. It is not good to pollute the home of someone who has given you shelter.
BTW, here is an interview of Lugovoi in Der Spiegel from a while back which is interesting. I have meetings today but will try to drop in and blog when I can. Update: This is fascinating reading and I hope I can join the debate later today, but one thing that should be noted about Polonium 210 poisoning is it can happen over time. If a person repeatedly visits a location where Polonium 210 is being handled one can build up the toxin to the point it becomes deadly. I only note that because Lugovoi and Kovtun stated Litvinenko was claiming to be poisoned as early as Oct 16th. I would wager this smuggling effort, if it is one, went on for months and involved many more carriers than we are seeing reported now.
On the other hand, radioactive thallium’s half-life of 73 hours makes it more ideal than polonium 210 (138 days half-life) if you want to cover your trail. Perhaps someone didn’t want the trail covered, and/or gave the assassins false information about what they were utilizing.
If I wanted to “send a message” to the ex-pat community in London, I would select a target who was very well known within that community but not very well known outside of it.
If I wanted to poison Litvinenko, I would choose an assassin who he did not know, was not connected to him in any way, and who if contaminated by the poison, could become ill and possibly die without anyone noticing. It would be delivered in such a way as not to kill bystanders near the target.
If I wanted to poison anyone on the planet, I would provide an assassin with one dose of the poison because I wouldn’t want to risk it being used without direct control on another target. I might possibly provide one backup dose in the case the first was damaged or lost but that would be all.
If this is a government hit, it is going to go down in textbooks as how not to do it and make the FSB the laughing stock of the intelligenc world.
CP – it’s unlikely the Russian government or the FSB are behind it for exactly those reasons (insofar as either are monolithic). More likely rogue elements. If Berezovsky and/or his associates were really behind a smuggling ring, why announce to the world that the Chechens have a bomb missing a vital ingredient and make a deal of informing the authorities about the fact?
Gotta sleep anyway… it’s almost 1.
Night, rosenkreutz. Do you work for the red cross?
One possibility brought up by German press is the fact that someone could have contaminated areas in order to disguise real facts. For instance, if someone says – I went to X, and they find Po there, that claim is substantiated. But in reality, if an accident during a smuggling operation happened, one of the first things they’d do would probably be to cover their tracks by contaminating some areas which were unimportant for their real purpose.
An unnamed Russian businessman who flew from Moscow to Hamburg on October 28 with Mr Kovtun is also being sought. Police believe this flight was used to transport polonium-210 into Europe.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,3-2501273,00.html
Also allegedly details of the contamination of Kovtun and Lugovoy will be made public? Friday
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/971a8a8c-8a34-11db-ae27-0000779e2340.html
So any talk that the “source” of the polonium has been traced to a particular facility is more likely false than true and that initial claim from the Evening Standard has never been confirmed.
I found the Der Speigel interview of Lugovoi and Kovtun to be fascinating and revealing, probably unintentionally so:
–We can assume that Lugovoi and Kovtun are indeed working together, given the complicated nature of the security they had devised, and the fact that they were living together.
–Kovtun is a liar. He had to have known that radiation caused his massive hair loss, or at least it was not due to his own shaving following too long of a session in a tanning salon.
–The two both distanced themselves from Litvinenko, saying they found him to be strange, uncouth, and obsessed with politics. This is strange, coming from two suspected assassins. It is not so strange if the more likely suspicion is a smuggling ring.
–Both claimed to be bored by politics, whereas Litvinenko had a keen interest. This is a very unlikely topic of conversation given the lengths the reporters went through to obtain the interview. They seem to suggest that Litvinenko could have been the victim of a politically motivated hit.
–I found the interview to be strangely devoid of meaningful content. What was their point? They did not profess innocense, they did not put forth any viable theories.
This interview furthers the theory that the three men were working together, most likely for Berezovsky. The most immediate follow-up question is: What was Berezovsky up to? If he were working in conjunction with the Chechnens/AQ, what was he getting out of it? Could he be so motivated that he would willingly sacrifice a western city or two in return for a shot at a Moscow coup?
My God!
Gotta, well, one of the reasons could be to squeeze this one in: “Litvinenko declined the offer of gin but appears to have said yes to tea. But Kovtun, unlike Lugovoi, said: “I can’t remember that clearly today. He came into the bar 10 minutes after us, we’d already had some alcohol, and I paid more attention to my cigar.””
Lugovoi previously claimed Litvinenko didn’t drink or eat anything.
How does a person “get over” radiation contamination? Wait until the urine is clear? And then what – die 10 years later? I read somewhere that 2% of the PO210 per day is released thru the urine. As to when Litvinenko’s hair fell out – it had to have been around November 15 or so after he moved to the second hospital. I can’t find any exact date. Kovtun’s hair disappeared maybe around Dec. 1 or so – also guessing here but estimating. (he had no hair 5 days before he was admitted to the Moscow hospital whenever that was) So maybe two weeks later. It is a great mystery whether these two are dying or faking. The only clear thing is that Lugovoy seems certain he will survive based on the PR campaign he is running including that interview with der Spiegel.
Exactly, Sue.
Now you see why all of this polonium contamination all over everything indicates someone handling a large quantity because such a tiny quantity is needed for poisoning that if it “leaked” … it would be gone. It isn’t like an assassin would have a vial of polonium dust. He would have one or two small crystals that he would dissolve and that is it. There wouldn’t be a lot of material to contaminate half of London with.
Such a particle would drop into a carpet and probably stay there until the polonium decayed. We are talking about many particles of the stuff. Not something that would likely come from an assassin but would likely come from someone who has been trafficking in the material or had physical contact with someone building a dirty bomb or otherwise having physical contact with the material.
We really need to find out where this stuff has been going and collect it immediately.
Gotta Know – also they lied in that interview about an a.m. meeting for which there appears to be a bus ticket which proves Litvinenko went to the Millenium before the sushi bar. Of course they didn’t know that the ticket existed at the time of the interview.
The point of that interview in my opinion was to give the “appearance” of wanting to get their story out – that they were “marked” in Russia or contaminated by Litvinenko himself – these were their two theories – that they had nothing to hide and were available to the press – Lugovoy hasn’t shut up for more than a day or two since this whole thing started. Now Kovtun is talking too as he also gave an interview to der Spiegel saying he’d be out of the hospital in a week. This is massive PR
Lizarde1, I am very surprised that the disposal rate of Po is so small. Why didn’t they pick up on this earlier in the hospital? They seemed so sure it was thallium. Why? I thought it was because the Po traveled rather quickly through his system that it was harder to determine exactly what the poison was.
edit – maybe the detection method necessary for detecting Po is so specialized they wouldn’t do it if they didn’t have some good clinical indications of it.
“This is massive PR”
Yes Lizarde1, I agree. That is their profession.
What I find curious is why they went to Russia, if indeed there were no tie to the Russian government. It could be that they had returned soon after the contamination and could not easily get out of the country after the horse was out of the barn. But if not, they are alive and well at the pleasure of the government.
This is where we enter the realm of pure speculation…thanks to those that posted the older articles about the various players, the background info can provide clues. I find it to be particularly disturbing that both Berezovsky and Litvinenko have discussed the smuggling of WMD and components on multiple occasions in the past. With these sorts of stories there is no such thing as coincidence.
Crosspatch hang in there, we need you.
Gotta:” find it to be particularly disturbing that both Berezovsky and Litvinenko have discussed the smuggling of WMD and components on multiple occasions in the past. With these sorts of stories there is no such thing as coincidence”
You mean blowing the whistle on these efforts makes THEM suspect..Hmm. I’m afraid I can’t agree.In fact, I find that ludicrous.
Gotta Know – I believe Lugovoy returned to Russian Nov. 20 from Armenia when he said in an interview that he saw his name mentioned in connection with the illness of Litvinenko and he immediately gave an interview – you can probably google that interview. Kovtun went back to Russia on Nov.3 but I don’t know where he was after that until he gave the der Spiegel interview. These people were always comfortable in Russia despite the Hamburg residency of Kovtun. I still wonder why Kovtun went to Germany and what he was doing there – he didn’t go to see his ex wife, her mother, her new boyfriend and somebody elses kids – and why did he hide out with them?
Clarice I’m not talking about whistle-blowing, what I mean is that they have discussed this openly in the past, probably to their detriment. For example, I have never taken an interest in drug smuggling, and I have never smuggled drugs. But I have talked about tropical fish repeatedly in the past, and have visited aquariums many times–and lo and behold, I have a 72 gallon fish tank today.
It doesn’t prove or disprove anything, but does establish a proclivity for that sort of activity.