Quarter Pentagon’s bomb vulnerabilities accidentally revealed: Idiots! Almost as bad as bungles in ‘The Solomon Scandals.’ Any ideas for BRAC-133, Mr. Trump?

Update: Jim Moran has since told me there was no quid pro quo, that the real estate developer's contributions were part of an arrangement by which he contributed to many races at once. I appreciated his responding and will let readers judge for themserves.

imageI’ve already told how the $1B Quarter Pentagon, aka BRAC-133, part of the Mark Center near me in Alexandria, Virginia, would be a big, fat terrorist target—I’ve even done a video. I’ve also pointed out how the office layout will provide more security for bigshots than flunkies.

And now the Washington Examiner reports: “The Pentagon mistakenly posted online plans for its new office building in Alexandria, showing exactly how big a bomb would have to be to destroy the facility.

"The 424-page Army Corps of Engineers document detailed the bomb-proofing design of the Mark Center near the intersection of Interstate 395 and Seminary Road, into which 6,400 defense workers are expected to move this fall, raising questions about security not only at the new office building but other Defense Department sites…

"Reuters news service, which first discovered the document online, reported that the Mark Center was designed to withstand the blast from 220 pounds of TNT-like material if it's detonated outside the Mark Center's security perimeter, or 55 pounds if the perimeter is breached. That limit is a fraction of the size of the bombs used in attacks against the World Trade Center in 1993 and an Oklahoma City office building in 1995."

In The Solomon Scandals, I write of a bungled government-occupied building. It would appear that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineer and friends are outplotting me.

As a lifelong lib Dem who knows where Barack Obama was born, I won’t be voting for Donald Trump if he runs, but maybe he’ll have ideas as to what the taxpayers can do with BRAC-133 rather than see it used for high-security offices. Turn it into a casino? Or maybe sell it to rich terrorists so they won’t bomb it? In the government’s place, even with the $1B already spent, I’d “decommission” BRAC ahead of time or turn it into a high-rise prison, ideally housing (among the other inmates) the bureaucrats responsible for this mess. A prison might actually be safer for people living near by.

Note: Normally  I’d avoid the I word—here’s to civility and all that—but then again, it wasn’t very polite of the Corps to plop down this ill-conceived terrorist-bait in an already-congested area. Meanwhile Rep. Jim Moran is correctly pointing out flaws in the Army’s environmental assessment report playing down the traffic nightmare. Who rigged the report? And what about the people responsible for the security bungles? Heads should roll.

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David Rothman

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