Ungkap Kelemahan Keamanan Trident, Perwira AL diburu Polisi

HMS Vanguard kapal selam nuklir ber rudal balistik kelas Trident.(Foto : Reuters)

InternationalSenin, 18 Mei 2015 - 17:15 wib
Ungkap Kelemahan Keamanan Trident, Perwira AL diburu Polisi Rahman Asmardika - Okezone

LONDON - Seorang perwira angkatan laut Kerajaan Inggris (Royal Navy) menjadi buruan kepolisian dan Royal Navy setelah menerbitkan sebuah berkas yang memuat dugaan kelemahan keamanan yang ada di kapal selam nuklir Trident milik Inggris.
Perwira bernama William McNeilly itu menyatakan bahwa kapal selam kebanggaan Ingris itu adalah sebuah ‘bencana yang menunggu untuk terjadi.’ Dia menyebutkan sebanyak 30 kelemahan dalam keamanan yang ada pada Trident.
Dalam 19 halaman dokumen tersebut, McNeilly menyebutkan beberapa masalah yang terjadi di Trident dapat dengan mudah dimanfaatkan oleh teroris dan pihak lainnya untuk menyusup. Dia mengatakan bahwa kekurangan tenaga pekerja di kapal selam nuklir itu membuat Trident rentan untuk disusupi, selain pengawasan dan standar keamanan terutama di ruang kontrol yang sistem kode pinnya telah rusak dan barang bawaan tidak diperiksa.
“Lebih sulit untuk masuk ke sebuah klub malam daripada ke ruang kontrol, dengan kode pin yang rusakdan penjaga yang tidak memeriksa orang yang masuk. Hanya dibutuhkan seseorang yang membawa bom ke dalam (Trident) untuk melakukan serangan teroris terburuk yang pernah dilihat Inggris dan dunia,” tulis McNeilly seperti dikutip Guardian, Senin (18/5/2015).
Dia juga menyatakan kekecewaannya terhadap rantai komando yang tidak melakukan apa pun untuk memperbaiki hal tersebut. Pihak Kementerian Pertahanan Inggris menolak mengakui kebenaran berkas McNeilly dan menganggap isinya mengandung pandangan pribadi dan bersifat subjektif.
Dalam laporannya, pria berusia 25 tahun itu melampirkan foto paspor dan identitas Royal Navy-nya. Dia mengaku menyebarkan berkasnya untuk menimbulkan kesadaran dan menghilangkan pandangan adanya sebuah sistem sempurna yang diyakini oleh banyak orang diterapkan di Trident.
Pembaharuan kapal selam nuklir Trident, menjadi salah satu agenda dari Partai Konservatif yang dipimpin oleh Perdana Menteri Inggris David Cameron dalam pemilihan umum lalu. Rencana ini mendapat tentangan dari partai lawannya, terutama Partai Buruh dan Scottish National Party (SNP) yang mendesak Trident untuk dihancurkan.
(hmr)
okezone

Trident whistleblower William McNeilly claims it is easier to enter sensitive nuclear weapons installations than 'most nightclubs'

Navy investigates after Able Seaman posted safety concerns on internet blog

The Royal Navy was investigating claims by one of its servicemen that security and safety around Trident nuclear submarines are inadequate and the programme is a “disaster waiting to happen”.
After going absent without leave, Able Seaman William McNeilly took the extraordinary step of posting an 18-page report on the internet entitled “The Secret Nuclear Threat”, and subtitled: “Do you have any idea how close we are to a nuclear disaster every single minute?”
In the document, the submariner raised issues ranging from food hygiene to allegations that a submarine had been on patrol with a hydraulics fault that prevented it from carrying out a test to see whether it was possible to launch its missile.
Mr McNeilly, 25, from Belfast, alleged that security checks were so lax that it was “harder to get into most nightclubs” than it was to get into sensitive parts of the Faslane submarine base on the Clyde.
He claimed that while on patrol in HMS Victorious this year, he was told that alarms on the Trident nuclear submarine’s missile control and monitoring station had been muted so crew members didn’t have to listen to them.
He also claimed crew members had told him about floods on the submarine and a fire while in port that would have left 50 sailors dead if it had happened at sea.He also wrote, “I learnt that HMS Vanguard is in the worst of the worst condition.”
He said he repeatedly raised these and other concerns through the chain of command, but “not once did someone even attempt to make a change”.
Mr McNeilly’s claims were greeted with alarm by the SNP last night, which campaigned for Trident to be scrapped during the election. The party’s Westminster leader Angus Robertson said the report read as “a nightmare catalogue of serious safety breaches” and called for the Ministry of Defence to make public the results of its investigation.
He added: “Failure to follow standard safety procedures is unacceptable in any workplace but on a Vanguard submarine on patrol it could result in extreme tragedy not just for those on board but indeed for the entire planet.”
The Royal Navy admitted that it was looking at the claims in Mr McNeilly’s dossier, as well as his unauthorised publication of it.
One source said: “There are some things that are immediately and transparently obvious as being untrue – although we do take it seriously and will be looking at it.”
In an official statement, a Navy spokesperson said: “The document contains a number of subjective and unsubstantiated personal views, made by a very junior sailor, with which the naval service completely disagrees.
“Whilst it is right that the contents of this document are considered in detail, we can be clear that in itself it does not pose any security risk to our personnel or operations.
“The Royal Navy takes security and nuclear safety extremely seriously.  The naval service operates its submarine fleet under the most stringent safety regime and submarines do not go to sea unless they are completely safe to do so.”
The spokesperson added: “The Navy is concerned for the whereabouts and well-being of Able Seaman McNeilly and is working closely with civilian police to locate him.”
In his report Mr McNeilly, who failed to return from leave on 11 April, describes himself as “an engineering technician submariner for the UK’s Trident IID5 strategic weapons system”.
He begins his report by calling for public support in addressing his concerns, writing: “I am a strategic weapons systems engineer who has sacrificed everything to tell the public how close it is to a nuclear catastrophe.
“I’ve sacrificed my freedom, time with my family and friends, a good paying career, my life savings, possibly my life itself; just to get this information out to the public. This is more like David vs Superman than David vs Goliath, alone I have no chance, but you the people are the kryptonite.”
He says that although his top secret security clearance was only “pending”, he was able to listen to meetings on HMS Victorious in which onboard incidents were discussed by hiding behind a computer in the navigation centre.

independent

Navy whistleblower on run after exposing alleged Trident safety failings

MoD launches investigation into claims of Able Seaman William McNeilly, who says he will hand himself into police

The Royal Navy’s Trident-class nuclear submarine Vanguard. Photograph: PA

Josh Halliday
Monday 18 May 2015 12.39 BST

Able Seaman William McNeilly, 25, a newly qualified engineer, claimed that Britain’s nuclear deterrent was a “disaster waiting to happen” in a report detailing 30 alleged safety and security breaches, including a collision between HMS Vanguard and a French submarine during which a senior officer thought: “We’re all going to die.”
McNeilly wrote that a chronic shortage of personnel meant that it was “a matter of time before we’re infiltrated by a psychopath or a terrorist; with this amount of people getting pushed through”.
The police and the navy launched a hunt for McNeilly after he failed to report back for work last week at the Faslane submarine base on the Clyde. But on Monday morning he said he would hand himself over to the authorities despite facing a possible prosecution under the Official Secrets Act 1989.

William McNeilly’s Royal Navy identity card. Photograph: William McNeilly/Scribd.com/Handout

Speaking to the BBC, McNeilly said: “I’m not hiding from arrest; I will be back in the UK in the next few days and I will hand myself in to the police.
Prison – such a nice reward for sacrificing everything to warn the public and government. Unfortunately that’s the world we live in. I know it’s a lot to sacrifice and it is a hard road to walk down, but other people need to start coming forward.”
In the 19-page report, titled The Secret Nuclear Threat and published online alongside a picture of his UK passport and Royal Navy identity card, McNeilly said he wanted “to break down the false images of a perfect system that most people envisage exists”.
He described bags going unchecked and said it was “harder getting into most nightclubs” than into control rooms, with broken pin code systems and guards failing to check passes. “All it takes is someone to bring a bomb on board to commit the worst terrorist attack the UK and the world has ever seen,” he wrote.
McNeilly, who said he was on patrol with HMS Victorious from January to April, accused navy bosses of covering up a collision between HMS Vanguard and a French submarine in the Atlantic Ocean in February 2009.
At the time Ministry of Defence officials played down the incident and said the Vanguard had sustained only “scrapes”. But McNeilly said a navy chief who was on board at the time told him afterwards: “We thought, this is it – we’re all going to die.”
The more senior submariner allegedly told McNeilly that the French vessel “took a massive chunk out of the front of HMS Vanguard” and grazed the side of the boat. Bottles of high-pressured air came loose in the collision, he claimed, meaning the British submarine had to return slowly to Faslane to prevent them from exploding.
He also raised concerns about a number of his fellow seamen, including one whose hobbies he claimed were killing small animals and watching extreme pornography. Another submariner, whom he named only as “Pole”, had threatened to kill two fellow navy personnel and was routinely aggressive, McNeilly claimed.
He described how HMS Vanguard’s missile compartment doubled up as a gym, leading to potentially disastrous mishaps when seamen dropped weights near the boat’s missile firing system.
McNeilly said he raised these and other concerns through the chain of command on multiple occasions, but that “not once did someone even attempt to make a change”.
The whistleblower also revealed that there had allegedly been a fire in the missile compartment when the boatwas in harbour. He claimed the blaze was sparked by overheated cables setting light to stacks of toilet roll. “The chief said if it had been at sea there would’ve been about 50 dead bodies on three deck because of the amount of people struggling to find an emergency breathing system,” he claimed.
McNeilly said his decision to go public was “the easiest yet most painful” of his life, and that he had “sacrificed everything” to make the claims.
He wrote that he was hopeful of receiving a pardon from David Cameron when he handed himself in to the police. “I also believe it’s in the prime minister’s best interests to release me. Prosecuting someone for alerting the people and the government to a major threat isn’t a good image for any government,” he added.
Angus Robertson, the Scottish National party leader in Westminster, described the claims as extremely concerning and said the allegations add weight to calls to scrap Trident altogether.
He said: “It reads as a nightmare catalogue of serious safety breaches aboard and alongside these nuclear-armed submarines ... Shortages of all types of crew on these submarines has been well-documented and the description of personnel in extremely stressful situations must be alarming given the huge responsibility some of these sailors are given.
“Failure to follow standard safety procedures is unacceptable in any workplace but on a Vanguard submarine on patrol it could result in extreme tragedy not just for those on board but indeed for the entire planet.”
A Royal Navy spokeswoman said on Monday that the service disagreed with McNeilly’s assessment, describing the report as containing “a number of subjective and unsubstantiated personal views”.
The spokeswoman said it was right for the allegations to be investigated but that the publishing of the report did not pose a security risk. She added: “The Royal Navy takes security and nuclear safety extremely seriously and we are fully investigating both the issue of the unauthorised release of this document and its contents.
“The naval service operates its submarine fleet under the most stringent safety regime and submarines do not go to sea unless they are completely safe to do so.”
the guardian