The Nation - News from Aug. 10, 1986

The Army has assigned convicted felons, alcohol and drug abusers and mentally ill or medically disabled people to guard nuclear and chemical weapons at sites across the country, an Army audit has found. Security agents of questionable reliability have exposed such weapons to possible theft by terrorists, the Army Audit Agency said. Army officials’ failure to perform proper background checks on civilian guards also may have left vulnerable secret war plans and a satellite communications site that sends data to the White House, the report added. Auditors suggested the poor quality of many of the Army’s 15,000 civilian security guards could be traced to high turnover.