They returned to Albuquerque airport on Christmas day — when everybody else was heading in the opposite direction to Honolulu. They drove back to Los Alamos and settled back in their apartment. One main decision they reached while discussing their plans was not to start a family until the smoke, literally, cleared out.
Chapter 3
Nagib, who was no longer supervised by Dr. Brian LeClerk, resumed work in his new position as the head of the section in charge of developing better analytical procedures to determine the isotopic composition and state of the fissile materials, the enriched uranium and plutonium, used in the nuclear warheads. This was part of the stockpile stewardship project for which the Lab was responsible. It was well known that nuclear weapons had a limited lifetime mainly due to the natural decay of the radioactive materials of construction as well as to chemical processes like corrosion or degradation. Therefore samples had to be taken periodically from warheads that were dismantled for this purpose. By "better analytical procedures" the management meant more accurate, more robust, higher throughput, faster and less expensive analytical methods. Nagib seized the opportunity to call for a meeting with the people from the operations division who were responsible for sending the samples and explained that no analytical result was worth the paper it was printed on (not literally, of course, as results were conveyed by computer software and electronic spreadsheets) if the sample was not a true representative of the bulk of the material. He insisted on having his own laboratory team collecting the samples. The operations division people, especially their manager Dr. Max Level, automatically objected saying that the responsibility for sampling was theirs, as had been the custom for decades. The argument went on and on for several minutes with each side insisting that they should be in charge of the sample collection and as they could not reach an agreement they decided to go to the senior management for a ruling and made an appointment with the Deputy Director of the Lab for the next day.
Nagib returned home that evening and told Alia about the debate and explained that by getting responsibility for sampling he would gain access to the actual warheads and the storage area which could help facilitate their plans. Alia said that the name of Dr. Max Level sounded very familiar but could not recall from where. She asked Nagib if he wanted tea or coffee and went into the kitchen to switch on the electric kettle and make two cups of tea. Suddenly Nagib heard her laughing hysterically and when he rushed into the kitchen he saw her bent over the kitchen counter and holding her belly. Nagib thought that she was ill or suffering cramps but saw that her right hand was pointing at the kettle and wondered if she had been electrocuted so quickly unplugged the kettle. With great difficulty, still laughing hysterically, Alia stood upright and pointed to the line signifying the maximum amount of water that should be used to boil water. He looked closely at the line that prescribed the words Max Level and also burst out laughing.
Nagib and Max Level presented their arguments about taking the responsibility for sample collection and the Deputy Director listened impatiently to both of them and after ten minutes cut them short and said that he had more important things on his agenda. He ruled that for a trial period of five weeks samples would be collected by Nagib's laboratory personnel and if this led to improved results they would continue this practice but if no significant progress was found then the old procedures would be reestablished. Nagib and Max were both displeased with this decision which probably indicated that it was a wise one. When they left the Deputy Director's office they set an appointment with their senior staff members to discuss the details for implementing the decision.
Nagib brought his chief analytical chemist who was in charge of carrying out the analyses and his senior technician who did most of the actual sampling. Dr. Max Level brought his own executive officer who was the mechanical engineer in charge of dismantling the warheads selected for periodic testing and evaluation and the chemical engineer who oversaw the sample collection. Nagib emphasized that his team would not interfere with the dismantling procedure but would only be present as observers of this stage, and they would then guide Max's people to perform the sample collection to ensure that representative samples were collected from all the components of the dismantled warhead. Max did not like being supervised by people who knew nothing about the dismantling and sampling of the unique components, and he avidly rejected the notion of having his team's work criticized or even observed by academic laboratory types who knew nothing of the real world of nuclear weapons. He expressly told Nagib that receiving samples and analyzing them in the laboratory was miles removed from physically handling and disassembling the delicate, highly radioactive components. Nagib said that he was well aware of that and his people would not touch anything or intervene with work and, as he stated before, would only ascertain that the samples collected were truly representative of each component. Max had to accept this as decreed by the Deputy Director, but then raised the point that Nagib had been concerned about and feared — allowing only people with high level security clearance to participate. Nagib played it cool by saying that he would make sure that his staff got the appropriate clearance, worrying that he may fail to get approved which would undermine the whole exercise from his point of view.
It took three weeks but two of Nagib's laboratory staff received the required security clearance and participated in the dismantling and sampling of operational nuclear warheads. The samples they brought were no different than those that had been received by the analytical laboratory in the past. So Nagib was concerned that the whole matter would lead to nothing and it would be hard for him to explain to the Deputy Director what the fuss was all about. He decided that he personally had to get involved and that necessitated upgrading his own security level. He asked Alia, who worked in the Lab's security office, if this could be expedited and she told him she would speak to her boss who was the Head of the Security Office, Colonel (Ret.) Dick Groovey. Her boss agreed to set up a meeting with Nagib and see what could be done.
Nagib entered the Security Office and was greeted with warm smiles from Alia's colleagues and then ushered into the conference room where the Col. Groovey was seated. The Colonel picked up a thick file that was placed in front of him and looked at Nagib with a stern face. He asked Nagib to repeat his life's story and Nagib did so briefly going over his early years in Palestine and describing at length his life in the USA, emphasizing that he felt privileged to be an American citizen and honored to be able to contribute to the security of his adopted country. The Colonel's expression did not change throughout this whole tirade and he asked Nagib if he still had contact with his relatives in the Palestinian Authority. Nagib said that he exchanged a phone call with his parents on their wedding anniversary and they called him on his birthday. He stressed that they had not attended his wedding or even met his wife. The Colonel stiffly admitted that Alia was a model worker and very dependable and reliable. He concluded the meeting by saying that he would be able to issue the requested clearance if Nagib would successfully pass a polygraph test, to which Nagib promptly agreed.
Nagib sat quietly while the security investigator who was a senior member of the American Polygraph Association hooked him to the polygraph. Nagib had prepared for the test by reading about the polygraph in Wikipedia (where else?). He knew that the machine recorded his blood pressure, pulse rate, respiration rate and skin conductivity (perspiration) while required to answer some questions. He was also aware of the fact that its reliability was questionable and it was regarded by many scientists as nothing more than pseudoscience. He was asked to answer some trivial questions, honestly at first and then to deliberately lie as part of Control Question Technique, he did so without flinching. Then the more serious part of the test began. He was asked about details of his personal history which he had no problem answering truthfully without hesitation. He was then asked the real key questions: