Nuclear terrorism: what can we learn from South Africa’s development of nuclear devices?

ABSTRACT Traditional assessments of nuclear terrorism threats primarily focus on the motivation of terrorist organizations to go nuclear, the availability of know-how, and the opportunities to obtain fissile material. The organizational challenges of implementing the construction and detonation of an improvised nuclear device are not often systematically explored. To contribute to a more comprehensive understanding of the threat, this article aims to study South Africa’s Peaceful Nuclear Explosives programme to verify and further refine the idea of an effectiveness-efficiency trade-off for terrorist organizations pursuing a nuclear terrorism plot.