Operation Groundhog
Operation Groundhog was a reported joint US-Kazakh-Russian program to secure radioactive residues of Soviet-era nuclear bomb tests, primarily with the intent of preventing their usage in other weapons of destruction, particularly terrorist access to fissile material. In 2003, a report appeared in Science Magazine explained that over the previous four decades, as a result of more than 450 nuclear detonations in the northeastern region of Kazakhstan, particularly around the Semipalatinsk test site, area the area was contaminated with a significant amount of radioactive material that could potentially be utilised to create a dirty bomb.