Tag Archives: nuclear terrorism

Nuclear weapons past, Nuclear energy future

WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama’s recent vow that ­the United States will have an atomic arsenal as long as nuclear weapons exist casts a historical shadow over this season of nonproliferation and disarmament agreements. While some find the promise reassuring, others believe it is in violation of the Non-Proliferation Treaty.

Obama’s pledge during the recent Nuclear Summit in Washington that the United States will not use nuclear weapons against non-nuclear states has been hailed by his Secretary of State, Hillary Rodham Clinton, as a milestone in U.S. national security policy. But others think that the vow, and other aspects of Obama’s broader ­nuclear agenda, do little to solve ­age-old challenges and contradictions, and may even exacerbate them.

With New START, an arms reduction treaty just signed by ­Obama and Russian President Dmitry Medvedev­, paired with the release of the Nuclear Posture Review and progress with the Nuclear Summit, steps toward a future without nuclear weapon­s have been taken, albeit they’re baby-sized, some experts say. ­This reflects ­the political leanings of Washington at the moment and the Obama administration’s desire to keep any hope of real progress alive more than it does any substantive progress, according to Leonard Spector, deputy director of the non-partisan James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies in Washington.

“The real tricky detail is how to keep the deterrent viable,” Spector said in an interview. “Republicans say we need a new or refurbished nuclear weapon; Obama wants to refurbish facilities, but probably doesn’t want to see a new weapon. The politics are such that to get the START treaty ratified, they need Republicans and they don’t want to do something that would antagonize them.”

Obama’s comments are aimed not only at getting ­Republicans on board, but also at reassuring U.S. citizens, allies and partners that Washington will protect them from ­the threat of nuclear warfare. “A reliable deterrent is needed for politics, but it’s also just sound policy,” Spector said.

However, critics say the Obama administration’s actions expose the White House to charges of hypocrisy. They ask: how can the United States try and persuade other countries to dismantle or not pursue unapproved nuclear programs at a time when it refuses to take similar steps on its own? ­­Some point to ­Article­ F­our ­of the ­ Non-Proliferation Treaty, which ­offers the “inalienable right … to develop research, production and use of nuclear energy for peaceful purposes.” Others cite ­Article Six, which requires treaty parties to pursue disarmament “in good faith.”

“Nuclear newcomers take Article Six more seriously than Washington,” ­Steven Miller, director of Harvard’s International Security Program, said during a forum on the “Global Nuclear Future’’ at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs in February.  Such conflicting interpretations become particularly heated when nuclear energy capabilities are restricted on the grounds of nonproliferation, Miller said. In a time characterized by climate change and terrorism – two concepts that will surely grow to be more and more intertwined – determining how to move the world toward green nuclear energy and away from nuclear weapons capabilities is truly the challenge of this nuclear era, nuclear experts say.

The recently released Nuclear Posture Review ­, the Congressionally-mandated blueprint for long-term U.S. nuclear policy and strategy—dovetails with Obama’s stated desire to change the framework of the international nuclear energy debate. Suggestions include reducing incentives for countries to have their own uranium enriching abilities, establishing international fuel banks and pursuing an agreement of fuel suppliers to take back waste. There’s no hinting at allowing nuclear plant technology into countries where enriched uranium might be used for weapons, even if it is ostensibly for nuclear power.

“These ideas don’t work or they are infeasible,” said Sharon Squassoni, director of the Proliferation Prevention Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. “Ultimately, I think this is a shortsighted policy that has its roots in the conundrum that we face under the non-Proliferation Treaty.”

Ellen Tauscher, secretary of state for arms control and international security, acknowledged in a recent speech prior to the unveiling of the new nuclear agenda that U.S. policy has created the feeling of a “chokehold” on other countries’ nuclear energy abilities, denying their NPT rights.

With the ambitious Nuclear Summit in Washington now closed, having served as the signing ground for several unprecedented promises, monitoring the actual implementation of these treaties will be the true test of whether a nuclear weaponless, green energy future is achievable, experts say. They note that signers of the NPT promised disarmament and access to nuclear energy 40 years ago, but the need for further disarmament and nuclear energy agreements continues today.

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Nuclear summit caps U.S. policy shift

CHICAGO — The Nuclear Security Summit in Washington reflects a new hierarchy of nuclear danger, one where Cold War-era superpower antagonism rides well behind the threat posed by terrorist groups.

“The possibility of a state attack with nuclear weapons is essentially zero, at least for the United States,” said Barry Kellman, director of the International Weapons Control Center at the DePaul University College of Law. “Raising relatively the threat of nuclear terrorism makes a lot of sense.”

The announcement Monday that Ukraine – a former republic of the Soviet Union – would relinquish its stockpile of highly enriched uranium seems to affirm the shift in the United States’ nuclear threat assessment: nuclear material theft represents a greater danger than any ballistic missile launch.

In an afternoon press conference during the two-day summit, Robert Gibbs, the White House press secretary, called Ukraine’s announcement a “landmark decision.”

The statement caps nearly a week of diplomatic maneuvering by the Obama administration, which has placed terrorism at the fore of nuclear defense policy.

On April 6, the Defense Department released a restructured Nuclear Posture Review (NPR), which states, “The United States will not use or threaten to use nuclear weapons against non-nuclear weapons states that are party to the NPT [Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty] and in compliance with their nuclear non-proliferation regime.” Days later, President Obama signed a new nuclear disarmament treaty alongside Russian President Dmitri Medvedev in Prague, which pledges a one-third arms reduction among nations that once sought to guarantee “mutually assured destruction” to the other. (pdf of the treaty)

That “Cold War era of bipolar military confrontation,” states the NPR, “is poorly suited to address the challenges posed by suicidal terrorists.”

The Nuclear Security Summit aims to address that threat. “The summit is dedicated to nuclear security and the threat of nuclear terrorism,” stated deputy national security advisor Ben Rhodes during a Friday press briefing, according to a White House transcript. “[It’s] intended to rally collective action behind the goal of securing all vulnerable nuclear materials within four years.”

That goal impelled the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, on Jan. 14, to push the Doomsday Clock one minute further away from midnight. “It’s great progress in the right direction,” said BAS Executive Director Kennette Benedict of the summit. “Highly-enriched uranium is available in many more sites than the nuclear bombs themselves.”

The Doomsday Clock currently stands at six minutes until midnight.

Nine countries, according to the Federation of American Scientists, currently hold nuclear arsenals: The United States; Russia; France; China and the U.K. are members of the NPT. India, Pakistan and North Korea are not signatories; Israel remains an undeclared nuclear power.

At the press conference, Brennan ranked the consequences of a nuclear terrorist attack “the most devastating, as well as the most lasting,” compared with a biological, chemical or conventional attack. He called the ability to detonate a nuclear device “the ultimate and most prized goal” of terrorist groups.

Asked by reporters for solid evidence of a nuclear-based terrorist threat, Brennan cited “a strong body of intelligence,” and mentioned 2001 court documents suggesting Al Qaeda’s effort to acquire fissionable material. (In 2001, Al Qaeda informant Jamal Ahmed Al-Fadl testified to an attempt by the terrorist group to obtain uranium in Sudan during the mid 1990s [see the testimony].)

The Nuclear Security Summit drew representatives from 46 countries, and has been widely reported as the largest such gathering called by an American president since the United Nations’ charter was signed in 1945 in San Francisco. In addition to the Ukrainian pledge, the New York Times reported Chinese President Hu Jintao has agreed to negotiate new sanctions against Iran.

Monday was also marked by the release of “Securing the Bomb 2010,” an analysis of global nuclear security, by the Nuclear Threat Initiative, a Washington-based advocacy group co-chaired by CNN founder Ted Turner and Sam Nunn, the former Democratic senator from Georgia. “The threat of global nuclear war has become remote, but the risk of nuclear attack has increased,” the report reads, reiterating the need to secure weapons-usable nuclear materials.

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