United States-United Kingdom:  British Lawmaker Suspects Secret Nuclear Weapons Collaboration

By David Ruppe
Global Security Newswire

WASHINGTON — British lawmaker Alan Simpson suspects the United States and the United Kingdom have been secretly collaborating to research and develop a new generation of nuclear weapons, including possibly low-yield ones.

“I think that is not only what is possible, I think that is what has been going on for some time.  That is my belief,” he said in a recent interview with Global Security Newswire. 

Simpson, who opposes developing such weapons, saying they might encourage insecurity and proliferation by some states, said his suspicions are fueled by more than 250 exchange visits by U.S. and British nuclear weapons scientists last year.

“We know that [there have been] transfers of huge numbers of staff between the U.S. and the U.K. programs,” he said.

A Labor Party backbencher who is one of the Labor government’s most outspoken critics on national security issues, the House of Commons member said his case is bolstered by previous secret U.S.-British nuclear weapons collaboration and the Bush administration’s push to develop nuclear weapons for attacking underground bunkers and incinerating chemical and biological weapons stores.

In addition, he said the government has dodged his requests for more information.

Spokesmen for the British and U.S. nuclear weapons establishments rebutted elements of Simpson’s charges but refused to comment on the nature of the scientific exchanges.

“The U.K. is not planning any new nuclear weapons, nor are we modifying current systems to lower their yield,” said Alan Price, head of communications for the United Kingdom’s national laboratory, the Atomic Weapons Establishment (AWE), in e-mailed comments.

“Cooperation takes place across areas of mutual scientific interest, but we do not comment on the details,” he said.

“I think it’s quite hard to pin down exactly what they’re doing because it’s such a secretive area,” said Nicola Butler, an analyst with the Acronym Institute.

“Having said that, I think the U.K. is following very closely what the Bush administration is doing because … the U.K. [nuclear weapons capabilities are] so dependent on the U.S., she said.

No Channeling

U.S. National Nuclear Security Administration spokesman Bryan Wilkes denied a specific point of Simpson’s theory, saying U.S. scientists were not involved in any work on nuclear weapons with yields below five kilotons, an activity that has been prohibited by a 1993 law.

“We’re not breaking the law,” he said.

Commenting on Simpson’s charges, he said, “The implication is we’re not able to do [the research], but there are all of these visits, so ‘Could it be the Americans are getting this done through their allies?’” Wilkes said.

“I don’t know about the Brits … but we’re just not doing any work on it at all, even vicariously.  We’re not doing it through anybody, or channeling it, or anything like that,” he said.

Responses Questioned

Using a standard parliamentary procedure for obtaining information, Simpson in recent months has submitted lists of questions regarding the exchange visits and various activities of the AWE.

According to responses provided by government ministers, AWE staff in 2002 made 182 visits to U.S. government and contractor facilities and U.S. officials made 103 visits to similar facilities in the United Kingdom.

Such visits by AWE staff increased throughout the 1990s, from 110 in fiscal 1991 to 136 in fiscal 1995, and to 235 in fiscal 1999, according to a 1999 report jointly produced by Simpson.

The British government also identified U.S. sites that AWE staff visited, including the three major U.S. national nuclear laboratories, other university research laboratories, a dozen U.S. corporate facilities, and some military and Energy Department locations.

The government refused, however, to explain the purposes of the visits, citing a national security exemption law.  The NNSA similarly would not disclose their nature in response to questions from GSN.

The refusal, Simpson said, implies some controversial work is underway, beyond the cooperative stockpile maintenance work the two countries admit to.

If the exchanges were only for ensuring the stability of the existing stockpile, Simpson said, “you would have thought that it was in their interests, not just domestically but internationally, to be seen to be having a vigorous program about the maintenance and security.”

Simpson put his suspicions directly to the government, asking, “whether scientific endeavours at AWE include research on new designs for nuclear warheads.”

“The reply I got was rather vague and evasive …  They weren’t answering that,” he said.

The response, similar to one provided GSN by AWE’s Price, said there were no “plans” for a new weapon and that the government was pursuing a policy of maintaining capabilities to build new weapons if such a plan emerged.

“There are no current plans for any replacement for [the] Trident [strategic ballistic missile] and no decisions are yet needed.  In line with the 1998 Strategic Defense Review, it is our policy to maintain the capability to design and produce a successor weapon should this prove necessary,” the government said.

Some Work Permitted by Policies

That response was significant not just for its indirectness, Simpson said, but because it referenced an ambiguity in current British policy that might permit such work, short of actually building the weapons.  British scientists may be designing and developing a new weapon under the rationale of maintaining skills and capabilities to do so, he said.

“What they don’t say is that this minimum capability is to design and produce a successor [to Trident], and I think that gives them a fairly broad umbrella that they can shelter under,” Simpson said.  “I don’t know how you can maintain a capability to design and produce a successor generation if you are not doing work on what that successor generation might be like,” he added.

Price told GSN the United Kingdom maintains a “robust capability” to ensure the safety and reliability of the current British nuclear arsenal, consisting of fewer than 200 Trident warheads.

The United States has had a similar policy since the mid-1990s, following its decision to halt nuclear test explosions and to create the Stockpile Stewardship program in their place.  The September 1994 Nuclear Posture Review stated a still-existing Energy Department requirement to “maintain the capability to design, fabricate and certify new warheads.”

NNSA spokesman Wilkes acknowledged that under that policy U.S. scientists could design, research and develop new nuclear weapons, as long as they have yields greater than five kilotons.

“There’s nothing prohibiting us,” he said. 

No Formal Involvement

Simpson said his allegations are supported by the secret U.S.-British collaboration during the 1960s and 1970s to upgrade the Polaris ballistic missile, the Trident missile’s predecessor.  The work occurred over 12 years, involved 5,000 people at one point, and cost more than 1 billion pounds, before the British government acknowledged its existence and cost, he said.

“It was done in almost complete secrecy.  Congress didn’t even discover that this program was even in existence until the new weapons system was almost in existence,” he said.

Currently, neither nation has publicly indicated any plans to develop specific new nuclear weapons.

However, the Bush administration has expressed an interest in developing or modifying nuclear weapons to produce new capabilities.  It is pursuing congressional approval this year to continue research on modifying an existing higher-yield bunker buster and to research and develop new nuclear weapons, including low-yield ones, through a program called the Advanced Concepts Initiative.

The “current weapons stockpile cannot hold at risk a growing category of potential targets deeply buried in tunnel facilities, possibly containing chemical, biological, nuclear or command and control facilities,” said then-NNSA Administrator John Gordon in congressional testimony last year.

He said the goal was to produce options for future “production and deployment.”

The initiatives this year, though, have become politically charged, with congressional Democrats and some Republicans expressing criticism.  Bush administration officials now say they seek removal of the 1994 ban on low-yield production only to foster scientific freedom.

“We do not have anything specific in mind,” Wilkes said.

The aim, he said, is to eliminate overly restrictive constraints on scientific inquiry: “Scientific freedom.  Rights for scientists.”

Advanced Concepts Initiative

Simpson asked the British government if the United Kingdom is contributing to or receiving research and development information from the Advanced Concepts Initiative.

The government responded, “Exchanges of information on a wide field of technologies take place between the United Kingdom and the United States under the auspices of the 1958 Mutual Defense Agreement.  There is no formal U.K. involvement in the U.S. Advanced Concepts Initiative or the Advanced Nuclear Weapons Concepts research program under the 1958 agreement.”

Simpson says he opposes developing such weapons that might be used for purposes other than deterrence and retaliation, and believes their development should be disclosed and debated within British society.

Otherwise, “You create on the international level a degree of uncertainty and confusion amongst your allies and potential enemies about whether you’re lowering your own threshold within which you would be prepared to use nuclear weapons,” he said.

With respect to suspected proliferators North Korea and Iran, he said, “If you were in those countries, and you were looking at what both the U.S. and the U.K. were able to get away with in terms of the development of substrategic nuclear weapons, would you feel reassured that you would be safe or not from the threat of attack or the actual attack with nuclear weapons?”

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United States I:  The Pros and Cons of New Nuclear Weapons

By James Kitfield

National Journal

Even as anti-nuke demonstrators were organizing protests around the country to commemorate the early August anniversaries of the U.S. bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945, the U.S. Strategic Command held a little-publicized meeting of senior Bush administration officials yesterday to advance plans for a new generation of nuclear arms.  Proponents of the plan argue that the United States needs to tailor smaller, “bunker-buster” nukes in order to threaten underground nuclear facilities that may be built by such nations as North Korea and Iran.  Opponents counter that manufacturing a new generation of nuclear weapons will deal a severe blow to the international arms control regime and break down the firewall separating nuclear and conventional arms, leading to greater nuclear proliferation and the increased possibility of a nuclear war.  What both sides agree on, however, is that nuclear proliferation is emerging as the single greatest threat to U.S. national security, and that America is at a crossroads in determining how to deal with it.

In recent interviews, National Journal correspondent James Kitfield spoke with leading voices on both sides of the argument.  C. Paul Robinson is director of Sandia National Laboratories, one of the nation’s three primary nuclear weapons labs, and a former chief negotiator at the U.S.-U.S.S.R. Nuclear Testing Talks in Geneva during the 1980s.  Joseph Cirincione is director of the Nonproliferation Project at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington, and a co-author of Deadly Arsenals: Tracking Weapons of Mass Destruction.  Following are edited excerpts of their separate interviews.

National Journal:  The one point of agreement that emerges in the debate about the Bush administration’s 2002 Nuclear Posture Review is that the fundamental equation of nuclear deterrence has been forever altered by the dissolution of the Soviet Union, the proliferation of nuclear technology, and the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.  Is that a fair assumption?

C. Paul Robinson:  Deterrence has changed dramatically since the end of the Cold War, and we’re still sorting out what that means for our nuclear posture and the future.  As Russia becomes more of a friend than an enemy, we are no longer confronted with a nation that threatens our very existence.  I spent many sleepless nights during the Cold War worrying about stability matrixes and first-strike, “use-them-or-lose-them” calculations.  That kind of Armageddon scenario is now a distant worry.

I still worry, however, about the proliferation of nuclear materials and technologies from Russia, because in many respects it’s a Third World nation now, and in the Third World everything is for sale.  I regret that as a nation we haven’t been bolder in developing a Marshall Plan for Russia that would help it reach at least a minimum level of prosperity, which is the best antidote to that kind of proliferation.  That problem is related, in turn, to what I believe is our greatest emerging threat — rogue states armed with nuclear or other weapons of mass destruction.

NJ:  Given such seismic events as the dissolution of the Soviet Union and the Sept. 11 terror attacks, doesn’t it make sense to re-evaluate our strategic ability to deter aggression?

Joseph Cirincione:  Absolutely, and we should be taking a new look at our deterrence posture.  But it’s important for people to understand that this is not what the Bush administration is doing.  The January 2002 Nuclear Posture Review directed the departments of Energy and Defense to begin development of new nuclear weapons, and to formulate new policies to accommodate such weapons.  As a result, the nuclear weapons labs have re-established advanced-warhead concept teams to explore modifications of existing weapons, and to develop low-yield weapons and nuclear earth-penetrators that can be used against hardened targets.  So the Bush administration has already decided that we need new nuclear weapons, and they are now going ahead implementing policies to reach that goal step by step.  They understand that this is a very controversial decision, however, so they have adopted “salami” tactics — they are slicing off a little bit at a time.

NJ:  Are the labs developing new nuclear weapons?

Robinson:  That depends on how you define “new.”  If we take a warhead off the shelf that we designed and tested in the past, and then put it on a new delivery vehicle, is that a new nuclear weapon?  We will probably have to manufacture new copies because we produced only a few originally, but it is not a new design, nor will we need to test it.  I can categorically state that no one is proposing returning to nuclear testing.

The main point is that the world is not static.  Over the past decade, nations have gone to school on our conventional military capabilities, and many of them have adopted a strategy of moving their high-value targets out of our reach by locating them in deeply buried tunnels and inside mountains.  If you want to know who the main culprits are, just look at which nations are buying these huge tunnel-boring machines.  You’ll find that North Korea, Iran, Syria and Libya have all built a lot of underground facilities.  We keep having to relearn this lesson that the world is not stupid, and potential adversaries will constantly take actions to better their strategic position and counter our strengths.  I would argue that the United States must respond by maintaining a robust deterrent against whatever is hidden in those underground facilities.

NJ:  Does the United States need a low-yield, nuclear bunker buster to hold an enemy’s underground facilities at risk?

Cirincione:  This argument that we need mini-nukes as earth penetrators is based on a lie.  Every independent study done on this issue has concluded that for any target buried more than 50 yards underground, you would still need a very large nuclear warhead.  Mini-nukes of a kiloton or less just don’t get the job done.  The big nukes you would need in order to reach a truly deep underground bunker, meanwhile, would kick up so much dirt that you would have a major problem with radioactive fallout.

More to the point, there are multiple ways of attacking underground facilities using conventional weapons that would be more effective.  With repeated precision strikes using conventional earth-penetrating bombs, you can bore deeper and deeper until you reach your target.  You could use high-temperature thermo-baric weapons that have the advantage of destroying biological and chemical agents and pathogens.  You could use precision-strike or Special Operations forces to seal the exit and entrance tunnels to an underground facility.

NJ:  Are there viable conventional alternatives to nuclear bunker busters?

Robinson:  Our primary focus is still to accomplish this with conventional weapons, and we work hard on that problem.  Nuclear weapons remain a blunt instrument of last resort.  We’ve conducted more than 4,000 penetrator tests at Sandia since the 1960s, however, and we have a lot of data on the problem.  Basically our tests show that conventional penetrators don’t work very well.  In the aftermath of the bombing campaign against Serbia, for instance, we discovered that we did very little to no damage against buried targets.

So if we can find ways to strike these buried targets with conventional weapons, we will.  If we can’t, however, we need to look at what can be accomplished with a nuclear earth-penetrator that causes the least possible amount of collateral damage.  That leads you away from two-stage, thermonuclear weapons to smaller-yield, lighter weapons with high reliability.  A national command authority confronted in a crisis with the prospect of killing 40,000 people with a thermonuclear weapon in order to take out a bunker is probably going to decide not to.  If we could design a bunker buster that would kill an estimated 2,000 to 3,000 people, on the other hand, the answer would probably be yes if the situation was critical.  Those are the weapons the Bush administration gave us the OK to begin researching about a year ago, because our scientists felt handcuffed by restrictions that were in place at the time.

NJ:  Would rogue nations be deterred from acquiring weapons of mass destruction, or building underground bunkers, if they knew their facilities could be reached by nuclear earth-penetrators?

Cirincione:  The Bush administration has adopted this arrogant attitude that the United States can take the dramatic step of developing these weapons, and there will be no international repercussions or imitators.  If the most powerful nation the world has ever known says it needs a new class of nuclear weapon to defend itself against weapons of mass destruction, however, why don’t other countries also need them?  Why doesn’t Iran, which has actually been attacked by chemical weapons?

The real danger of this concept is that it blurs the lines between nuclear and conventional weapons, making nukes just another tool in the toolbox that could be used for tactical battlefield purposes.  In that sense, this argument is less about deterrence than war fighting.  We already have plenty of doomsday weapons in our arsenal if all we’re trying to do is scare people.  They are planning on using these weapons.  And if the United States were to use them, it would cross a threshold that has not been breached since the Truman administration.  That in turn would encourage other nations to develop and use nuclear weapons in a similar manner.  That’s not in the United States’ national security interests.  Given that we have never accepted a nuclear weapon into our arsenal without testing — with the exception of the Hiroshima bomb — the path the Bush administration is on also greatly increases the likelihood that the United States will return to nuclear testing, which would be a terrible blow to the nonproliferation regime.

NJ:  Will developing a nuclear bunker buster likely lead to new testing?

Robinson:  I don’t think we will need new testing, because the warhead we are talking about has already been tested.  As I said earlier, we would need to start production of new warheads again.

I continue to abide by my statements that we’re a long way from going back to nuclear tests.  Having said that, I helped write the safeguards that were written into the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty ratification protocols, which essentially stated that the president of the United States would withdraw from the treaty and return to testing if a serious problem developed in the U.S. nuclear arsenal that required testing for a solution.  The point I’m making is, the United States has been willing to abide by these treaties only as long as they do not conflict with our essential security posture.

NJ:  How do you respond to arms-control experts who charge that remanufacturing a new class of nuclear bunker busters violates the Nonproliferation Treaty, which commits the United States to “pursue negotiations in good faith on effective measures relating to the cessation of the nuclear arms race” and “to nuclear disarmament?”

Robinson:  I was in the Reagan administration when we debated what exactly was meant by Article VI of the NPT, and it seems to me that the end state of total nuclear disarmament that the treaty envisions will occur around the same time that the lamb lies down with the lion.  And I always argued that even at that point, the lamb still won’t get much sleep.

In truth, I believe that the NPT was intended more as a confidence-building measure than as a real arms-control treaty that we were willing to bet our country’s survival on.  We would never have negotiated an arms control treaty with the ridiculous verification inspections by the International Atomic Energy Agency prescribed in the NPT, which missed the programs in Iraq and Iran and even Israel.  Where has the IAEA spent the most money in terms of inspections?  In Germany, Canada, and Japan.  Why?  Because it is a confidence-building measure among friendly countries eager to prove they are not violating it.  It was never set up to catch cheaters.  That’s why I disagree with people who infer that the NPT is a real arms control treaty.  It’s not.

NJ:  Is the NPT more a gentlemen’s agreement than an arms control treaty?

Cirincione:  That’s just nonsense.  President Bush just negotiated a treaty on strategic nuclear weapons with Moscow that has no verification regime, yet he still insists that it’s vital to our national security.  The NPT was the beginning of what became a comprehensive, interlocking network of treaties, agreements and enforcement mechanisms designed to stop the proliferation of not only nuclear weapons, but also chemical and biological weapons.  It established a legal and diplomatic framework for a non-nuclear future, and it has worked.  Instead of the 20 to 25 nuclear nations that President John F. Kennedy predicted, we now have eight worldwide.  That’s still eight too many, but that’s not a bad track record.

As the nuclear states continue to move toward ever-smaller arsenals as called for in the NPT, we will continue to devalue nuclear weapons globally.  That’s the whole crux of the matter: Given our overwhelming conventional military superiority, the United States is more secure in a world where nuclear weapons are devalued and dwindling as opposed to a world where we and others are developing new nuclear weapons for new uses.

Now, there are certainly enforcement problems with the nonproliferation regime, as there are with all international and national laws.  Does that automatically mean the laws are useless?  No, it means we need to get better at enforcement and adapting them to new circumstances.  There’s no question that we need to toughen IAEA inspections and to take a fresh look at some of the fundamental tenets of the nonproliferation regime.  Some people in the Bush administration think the first thing you do in such a circumstance is tear down the bridge you’re standing on.  I argue instead that we need to strengthen the bridge.

NJ:  Do you credit the NPT for slowing the march of nuclear proliferation?

Robinson:  I think the North Atlantic Treaty extending our nuclear umbrella to our European allies did much more to prevent nations from going nuclear than the NPT, and will do more in the future as more Eastern European nations join NATO.  That’s why I argue that we should also extend that umbrella further from Japan to encompass Southeast Asian nations such as South Korea, Thailand, Singapore and the Philippines.

NJ:  Do you ever worry that the United States’ aggressive strategy of pre-emption, coupled with our overwhelming conventional military capability, might convince some nations that nuclear weapons are their only deterrent against us?

Robinson:  The National Security Strategy lays out very carefully the conditions that might prompt pre-emption, which are basically limited to those instances when the threat of many American deaths is imminent and you have the nexus of rogue states with weapons of mass destruction and links to terrorists.  Having said that, a friend of mine recently pointed out that the United States was not deterred from going to war by Iraq’s supposed arsenal of chemical and biological weapons.  We haven’t responded nearly as quickly to North Korea’s announcement that it has nuclear weapons.  Some people could draw the lesson that the United States can be deterred by nuclear weapons, but not by chemical or biological ones.  I can’t argue with that conclusion.

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North Korea:  Washington Ready to Offer Nonaggression Agreement

The Bush administration announced yesterday that it is prepared, with its allies in the region, to offer a joint written nonaggression guarantee to North Korea, the Washington Times reported (see GSN, Aug. 7).

“There should be ways to capture assurances to the North Koreans — from not only the United States, but we believe from other parties in the region — that there is no hostile intent among the parties that might be participating in such a discussion,” said U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell, noting that an assurance may a be more practical alternative to a formal treaty because a treaty would have little hope of being approved by Congress.

“When one comes up with such a document, such a written assurance, there are ways that Congress can take note of it without it being a treaty or some kind of pact.  A resolution is something like that — taking note of something,” he added.

Diplomats from South Korea and Japan, meanwhile, are scheduled to visit U.S. officials next Wednesday and Thursday to plan their negotiating strategies in talks with North Korea (Nicholas Kralev, Washington Times, Aug. 8).

“I believe the United States has arranged its proposal to North Korea between yesterday (Wednesday) and today,” said Wi Sung-lac, director general for the North American Affairs Bureau in the South Korean Foreign Ministry (Korea Herald, Aug. 8).

Chinese vice foreign minister Wang Yi, meanwhile, has arrived in North Korea to discuss the impending talks (James Brooke, New York Times, Aug. 8).

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United States II:  Conference Examines Bush Plans for Nuclear Weapons; Gore Lashes Out at White House

U.S. officials held a one-day conference yesterday to discuss U.S. nuclear policy and possible changes to the U.S. nuclear weapons arsenal.  Officials from the U.S. Defense and State departments, the Energy Department’s National Nuclear Security Administration, the National Security Council, the Air Force and the Navy were expected to attend the closed meeting (see GSN, Aug. 5).

Pentagon spokesman Maj. Michael Shavers said the meeting would address ways to maintain the reliability of U.S. nuclear weapons without testing them, but a leaked agenda included the discussion question, “What is the uncertainty in confidence and potential risk threshold for a test recommendation — what would demand a test?” (CBSNews.com, Aug. 7).

The agenda also indicated that officials would discuss the viability of low-yield nuclear weapons (BBC News, Aug. 8).

In comments on U.S. nuclear weapon policy prepared for a speech yesterday, former U.S. Vice President Al Gore yesterday lashed out at the Bush administration plans.

“This administration has rejected [the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty] and now, incredibly, wants to embark on a new program to build a brand new generation of smaller (and it hopes, more usable) nuclear bombs.  In my opinion, this would be true madness,” Gore said (Federal News Service transcript, Aug. 8).

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Iran:  Inspectors Due in Iran Next Week

A team of inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency is scheduled to visit Iran next week to discuss the Additional Protocol, which would allow for greater international monitoring of Iranian nuclear activities (see GSN, Aug. 6).

Iranian officials are currently debating the merits of the protocol agreement.

The team will also carry out some inspections, allowed by current agreements, in the next few days, according to the IAEA (IAEA release, Aug. 8).

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United States III:  Air Force Conducts Successful Minuteman 3 ICBM Test

The U.S. Air Force Wednesday successfully tested a Minuteman 3 ICBM, according to the Santa Maria Times (see GSN, June 11).

The missile, armed with three dummy warheads, was launched from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California toward targets southwest of the Kwajalein Missile Range in the Pacific Ocean (Janene Scully, Santa Maria Times, Aug. 8).

Russia’s early warning system registered the Minuteman test, according to ITAR-Tass (ITAR-Tass, Aug. 6 in FBIS-SOV, Aug. 6). 

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North Korea:  Pyongyang Wants Talks in Early September

North Korea wants to hold multilateral talks on the current nuclear standoff during the first week of September, Reuters reported today (see GSN, Aug. 5).

The talks, which will include the United States, China, South Korea, Russia and Japan, are set to be held in Beijing.  China, however, is pushing for the negotiations to begin on Aug. 21 or 25.

The United States also favors August talks, before the September U.N. General Assembly meeting begins in New York, according to a report in the Yomiuri Shimbun.

A senior Japanese official said Wednesday that negotiations could take place this month.

“Late August has not been ruled out,” he said (Reuters, Aug. 7).

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South Asia:  India, Pakistan Could Hold Talks After Next Month

Pakistan may soon suggest several dates for the resumption of peace talks with its South Asian rival India, the Times of India reported today (see GSN, July 10).

Pakistan could “shortly” propose two or three dates for talks between the Pakistani and Indian foreign secretaries, a diplomat said.  Such talks are expected to be held after a U.N. General Assembly session scheduled to begin next month, according to the Times.  A Pakistani newspaper has reported that India wants the talks to be held in the Pakistani capital of Islamabad (Times of India, Aug. 7).

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Russia:  Moscow to Construct Three New Ballistic Missile Submarines by 2010

Russia plans to build three new ballistic missile submarines by 2010, Russian Deputy Defense Minister Col. Gen. Alexei Moskovsky said Tuesday (see GSN, July 1).

Moskovsky said Russia plans to construct three new Borey-class submarines armed with Bulava sea-launched ballistic missiles (Interfax, Aug. 5 in FBIS-SOV, Aug. 5).  The Russian newspaper Pravda reported in May that the Borey-class submarine can launch missiles from a submerged depth of 55 meters while the submarine is moving at a speed of up to 6 knots.  The submarine can also operate for 100 days without docking, Pravda reported (Pravda, May 26). 

Last year, Russia completed work on the Dmitri Donskoi, a modified Typhoon-class submarine that was to serve as a trial platform for the Bulava missile, according to the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists’ Nuclear Notebook.  The Bulava is the naval version of the Topol-M ICBM (Mike Nartker, GSN).

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Libya:  Russia to Increase Nuclear Cooperation

Russia plans to increase its nuclear cooperation activities with Libya, Interfax reported Monday (see GSN, Aug. 5).

The two countries have agreed that Russian experts will help resume work on the earlier-planned Sultan nuclear power plant at the Gulf of Sidra, as well as upgrade the Tajura nuclear research center, a diplomatic source in Moscow said.  Russia also welcomed Libyan leader Col. Muammar Qadhafi’s recent suggestions that he is willing to allow international inspectors to visit Libyan sites, a high-ranking Russian diplomat said (Interfax, Aug. 4 in FBIS-SOV, Aug. 4).

The Tajura facility houses a 10-megawatt light-water nuclear reactor and currently operates under International Atomic Energy Agency safeguards, according to the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace’s Deadly Arsenals.  The Sultan nuclear plant was originally intended to be a 440-megawatt light-water nuclear reactor, but was suspended (Mike Nartker, GSN, Aug. 7).

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Iran I:  Tehran Reports “Positive” Talks With IAEA Legal Experts

Iran this week held “positive and constructive” talks with legal experts from the International Atomic Energy Agency, Reuters reported today (see GSN, Aug. 5).

The legal team arrived in Tehran Monday to discuss Iran’s possible signing of the Additional Protoco to its IAEA safeguards agreement, which would allow for more intrusive monitoring of Iran’s nuclear activities.  The talks were set to continue today, the state-run Islamic Republic News Agency announced.

Conservatives in Iran have denounced the Additional Protocol.

“The notion that accepting the Additional Protocol will exculpate Iran is an infantile and amateurish supposition,” said Hossein Shariatmadari, editor of the hard-line Kayhan newspaper.  “The only thing which can foil the plot hatched jointly by America, the European Union and the International Atomic Energy Agency against Islamic Iran is our withdrawal from the NPT [Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty],” he added (Reuters/Yahoo!News, Aug. 6).

Members of the reformist-dominated legislature, however, are pushing for Iran’s accession to the protocol.

First Deputy Speaker Mohammed Khatami called for leaders to sign the protocol to build confidence with the international community.

“Iran has always welcomed cooperation on global issues,” he said (IRNA/BBC Monitoring, Aug. 6).

Pakistan Denies Nuclear Assistance

Pakistan yesterday denied a Los Angeles Times report that said Pakistani nuclear scientists had assisted Iran in developing a nuclear weapon (see GSN, Aug. 4).

“Pakistan’s commitments, affirmed at the highest level, that it would not export any sensitive technologies to third countries remains unquestionable,” the Pakistani embassy in Washington said in a statement (Pakistan Embassy release, Aug. 5).

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Iran II:  Tie Russian Nuclear Assistance to Additional Protocol, Report Says

By David McGlinchey
Global Security Newswire

WASHINGTON — Russia should continue its nuclear assistance to Iran only if Tehran agrees to allow intrusive international monitoring of its nuclear activities, according to a report from a Russian think tank released last month (see GSN, Aug. 5).

Iran is currently considering signing the Additional Protocol to its International Atomic Energy Agency safeguards agreement, which would allow the agency to conduct unannounced inspections and environmental testing.  A team of legal experts is currently in Tehran discussing the fine points of the agreement (see related GSN story, today).

In an effort to boost its nuclear industry, Moscow is helping Tehran build a nuclear plant in the southern Iranian city of Bushehr.  The United States has accused Iran of clandestinely developing nuclear weapons, and using the Bushehr technology to aid that effort.  Iranian leaders have denied the charges and said that the nuclear development is to provide power to their burgeoning population.

“Russia must stiffen its position on Iran’s accession to the Additional Protocol and directly link further cooperation in the field of nuclear power engineering to the resolution of this question,” wrote Vasily Lata and Anton Khlopkov of the PIR Center in Moscow.

Russia should also demand that Iran return used nuclear fuel from Bushehr to Moscow, so that it could not be used to develop fissile material for nuclear weapons, the report says.

“Negotiations over the details of the protocol on the return of the SNF [spent nuclear fuel] have been going on a long time; however, to date no agreement has been signed,” according to the report (see GSN, July 17).

Lata and Khlopkov played down the potential for Iran to apply Russia’s civilian nuclear assistance to a nuclear weapons effort.

An Iranian opposition group this year revealed several secret nuclear facilities in Iran, including a centrifuge enrichment plant at Natanz.  U.S. officials said that these sites are part of Tehran’s nuclear weapons program.  The report acknowledges the enrichment site as a cause for concern and says that there are reasons to worry about Iran’s intentions. 

“The fact that Iran’s nuclear fuel cycle facilities (from the uranium mines to the uranium enrichment plant …) and launchers for the Scud-B, Scud-C, and Shahab attack missiles are located in the same region is an additional reason for concern,” the report says.

Iran’s nuclear and missile technologies could come together within the next three years, according to the report.

“The authors’ estimates indicate that by 2006, one year after the enrichment complex at Natanz has become operational, Iran will have acquired the technical capability to join the club of states that possess nuclear missile capabilities,” the report says.

Still, the authors urged Moscow to remain involved in Iran’s nuclear industry.  According to the report, the Bushehr work provides the Russian economy with more than $1 billion and about 20,000 jobs.  Moscow is currently negotiating with Washington over possible U.S. funding for improved containers to transport spent nuclear fuel back to Russia, according to the report.

Ultimately, the report says that the light-water reactor development at Bushehr does not help Iran develop nuclear weapons.

“At the present time there are no good reasons making it worthwhile for Russia to harm its trade and economic relations with Iran,” the report says.

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United States:  Nevada Does Not Want Pit Production Site

Nevada officials this week issued their opposition to the U.S. Energy Department’s consideration of the Nevada Test Site as the location for a new facility to produce plutonium triggers, or “pits,” for nuclear weapons, according to Energy Daily (see GSN, Aug. 1).

In comments submitted in response to Energy’s draft environmental impact statement on the Modern Pit Facility, Nevada officials said the department did not consider “the potential stigmatizing effects” of the facility on the state, Energy Daily reported.  Nevada officials also said the department could not be counted on to operate the facility safely due to its record of favoring weapons production over safe operations at other nuclear weapons sites.

“DOE’s track record in this regard at almost all its facilities is atrocious, and nothing in the draft EIS demonstrates that DOE has learned the management, oversight and ‘cultural’ lessons of the past,” the officials said in their comments (George Lobsenz, Energy Daily, Aug. 6).

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Iran:  IAEA Legal Team in Tehran to Discuss Additional Protocol

Legal experts from the International Atomic Energy Agency arrived in Tehran yesterday to hold talks on the possibility of Iran signing the Additional Protocol to its IAEA safeguards agreement that would allow more intrusive monitoring of Iranian nuclear activities (see GSN, Aug. 4).

The three-member team met with Iranian government lawyers to discuss the fine points of the agreement, according to Saber Zaeimian, a spokesman for the Iranian nuclear agency.

The United States has accused Iran of secretly developing nuclear weapons under the guise of a civilian nuclear energy program.  Washington is “working with the IAEA to make sure that they do not continue on this course, which is unacceptable,” according to White House spokesman Scott McClellan.

Islamic conservatives in Iran, however, have been urging government leaders to reject the Additional Protocol (Associated Press/Yahoo!News, Aug. 4).

Mahmoud Hashemi Shahrudi, the top Iranian judiciary official, supported the anti-protocol push.

“The Iranian leadership, with the support of the people, will not give in to pressure, and the representatives of the people and the students will resist America’s aim to impose its will by force,” he said (Beirut Daily Star, Aug. 5).

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North Korea I:  Six-Party Talks Might Not Be Unified Against Pyongyang

The four countries that join the planned multilateral talks with the United States and North Korea might not line up squarely on Washington’s side, Reuters reported today (see GSN, Aug. 4).

The talks are scheduled to include North Korea, the United States, Japan, South Korea, China and Russia.

“The U.S. is expecting it to be five pressuring one; will it?” said Ralph Cossa, head of the Hawaii-based Pacific Forum Center for Strategic and International Studies think tank.  “Certainly everyone agrees that North Korea has to give up its nuclear weapons but most also want the U.S. to offer some carrots.  So there will be pressure on both North Korea and the U.S. at the meeting,” he added (Jane Macartney, Reuters/Yahoo!News, Aug. 5).

North Korea, meanwhile, stopped its radio and megaphone propaganda campaign across the demilitarized zone this weekend.  Pyongyang is attempting to win friends before the talks begin, the New York Times reported.

“Ultimately the North Korean game is to split South Korea and other countries away from the United States,” said Marcus Noland, a Korea expert at the Institute for International Economics in Washington.  “Ultimately the North Koreans want their charm campaign to soften up South Korea and other countries and make them less likely to back the United States in any kind of coercive diplomacy,” he added (James Brooke, New York Times, Aug. 5).

The White House, meanwhile, has defended last week’s speech by Undersecretary of State for Arms Control and International Security John Bolton.  Bolton called North Korean leader Kim Jong Il a “tyrannical dictator” (see GSN, July 31).

“He was speaking for the administration,” White House spokesman Scott McClellan said yesterday, “and I think his remarks last week reiterated things we’ve previously said” (CNN.com, Aug. 4).

State Department spokesman Philip Reeker said the comments had been cleared by administration officials before the speech was given.  North Korea said it would not negotiate with Bolton in the future, but Reeker said that the U.S. delegation to the talks would be selected by U.S. President George W. Bush and Secretary of State Colin Powell (State Department transcript, Aug. 4).

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International Response:  “Secondary Proliferators” Helping to Circumvent Nonproliferation Regimes

Arms control experts are concerned that a newly established distribution network, consisting of lesser-developed nations, could help countries to circumvent existing nonproliferation regimes to obtain the materials and equipment needed to develop nuclear weapons, the San Francisco Chronicle reported Sunday (see GSN, June 20).

The success of Iran and North Korea — two lesser-developed nations — in obtaining the equipment and materials needed to develop nuclear weapons has raised concerns that other lesser-developed countries, as well as terrorist organizations, could follow suit, according to the Chronicle.  There are also concerns that Iran and North Korea, as well as other countries, could be serving as “secondary proliferators” by providing materials and equipment to other countries.

“There’s been increased concern about those new suppliers,” said Jon Wolfsthal, deputy director of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace’s Nonproliferation Project.  “The last year has really brought it home in spades, in large part because of Pakistan and their reported role in spreading the centrifuge technology.  If they haven’t been the primary suppliers, they have been the professors,” he said.

The growth of this proliferation network has raised concern among arms control experts that the current nonproliferation mechanisms — international treaties and national export control systems — may be inadequate, the Chronicle reported.

“Even guys like me, who support the treaties and want to see them flourish, understand that realistically they are not enough anymore,” said Leonard Spector, a nonproliferation expert at the Monterey Institute of International Studies.

“You have to say that there’s more going on than we can manage with the traditional tools,” Spector said.  “What has changed is that by the end of the Cold War, the countries working on getting the bomb were threatening to us, in this country.  That was a major, major change,” he said.

Another concern is that these secondary proliferators have also begun exchanging information on how to circumvent existing controls, such as by establishing front companies to obtain WMD-related materials, according to the Chronicle.

“The face of proliferation has changed a lot in recent years,” said Robert Einhorn, a senior adviser at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.  “It isn’t terribly new; we saw this in the ‘90s.  But what we’re seeing more of is, these countries are turning to each other for components and subcomponents and technology that they didn’t have before,” he said (James Sterngold, San Francisco Chronicle, Aug. 3).

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North Korea II:  Preventing Nuclear Smuggling Is Top Priority, Study Says

By David McGlinchey
Global Security Newswire

Preventing North Korea from smuggling nuclear weapons is the most important task facing the United States in the crisis on the Korean Peninsula, according to a study released Friday (see GSN, Aug. 4).

As the latest nuclear standoff nears its first anniversary, North Korea appears ready to re-enter multilateral talks and discuss U.S. concerns about Pyongyang’s nuclear development.  Pyongyang appears to have given in to U.S. demands that South Korea and Japan be involved in the negotiations.  The six-party talks will also include Russia and China.

The most pressing danger, however, is not a North Korean nuclear attack but rather the threat of nuclear proliferation, according to a simulation conducted by the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.  Experts assembled at CSIS in May to role-play a response to the North Korean crisis.

“North Korea is dangerous but somewhat contained,” according to a report from the simulation.  The “greatest risk is posed by proliferation … stopping the transfer of nuclear weapons is crucial,” the report says.

Experts from CSIS sounded a cautious tone last week on the possibility of talks with Pyongyang.

“Negotiations, if they do take place, are only the first step in the process of dealing with North Korean proliferation,” said Anthony Cordesman, a CSIS expert in strategy.

The talks may offer little hope for a lasting solution to the crisis, according to Robert Einhorn, a senior CSIS adviser and a former senior nonproliferation official at the State Department.

“With the North Koreans sounding increasingly as if they are determined to acquire and retain nuclear weapons, and the deeply divided Bush administration ambivalent at best about reaching an agreement with a regime it considers untrustworthy and repugnant, there is little basis for optimism about the next round of Beijing talks,” Einhorn said.

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China:  Chinese Students Stole Data on U.S.-Licensed Material, Pentagon Says

Two Chinese students at U.S. universities have provided China with U.S.-developed data that has enabled Beijing to produce a material that could be used in long-range ballistic missiles, the Washington Times reported today (see GSN, Aug. 1).

According to a U.S. Defense Department report, the two students — one at Iowa State University and the other at Pennsylvania State University — provided China with data to develop Terfenol-D, a material that can be used in a multiple warhead missile stage.  The data was stolen within the past three years, an FBI official said.

“This is a classic example of how the Chinese collect dual-use military technology,” the FBI official said.  “Students come here; they get jobs; they form companies,” the official added.

China is using students and scientists to help develop military technologies, according to the Pentagon report.  Beijing also uses “husband-wife teams,” the FBI official said (Bill Gertz, Washington Times, Aug. 5).

The FBI believes China has established more than 3,000 “front” companies to aid in its espionage activities, according to the Associated Press.  The bureau has listed China as posing the greatest espionage threat to the United States in the next 10 to 15 years, AP reported.

“They figured out that what they want is throughout the United States, not just embassies, not just consulates,” FBI Assistant Director for Counterintelligence David Szady said.  “It’s a major effort,” he said.

To help stem that threat, the FBI has begun strengthening its counterintelligence efforts, transferring more than 160 agents to counterintelligence duties and establishing counterintelligence operations in all bureau field offices, according to AP.  FBI officials have also begun to hold meetings with representatives from businesses and universities to assess potential espionage threats (Curt Anderson, Associated Press/Boston Globe, Aug. 4).

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United States I:  Senior Officials to Meet Thursday to Discuss Nuclear Arsenal

About 150 U.S. officials are expected to meet this week at U.S. Strategic Command headquarters to discuss the future of the U.S. nuclear weapons arsenal, according to Reuters (see GSN, Aug. 1).

The meeting, scheduled for Thursday at Offutt Air Force Base near Omaha, Nebraska, will involve officials from the U.S. Defense Department, Energy Department, State Department, the National Nuclear Security Administration and the National Security Council, said Pentagon spokesman Maj. Michael Shavers.  The meeting will be chaired by Pentagon official Michael Wynne, acting undersecretary for acquisition, technology and logistics.

“They’re going to take a look at the status of the nation’s nuclear stockpile, particularly with an eye toward the Moscow Treaty that says we’ve got to get our stockpile numbers down, and how do we do that in a manner that still allows us to maintain a credible nuclear deterrent,” Shavers said, referring to the U.S.-Russian Strategic Offensive Reductions Treaty (see GSN, July 24).

Some arms control experts are concerned, however, that the meeting could lead to resumed U.S. nuclear testing and the development of new nuclear weapons, according to Reuters.  The meeting could result in the determination of a military requirement for a new type of nuclear weapon, said Daryl Kimball, executive director of the Arms Control Association.

“Traditionally, once there has been a stated need by the uniformed military for a new weapon to deal with some contingency or some threat that’s out there, that has been the catalyst for design, engineering, development and testing of nuclear weapons,” Kimball said (Will Dunham, Reuters/Planet Ark, Aug. 5).

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United States II:  Watchdog Group Calls for Y-12 Plant to Shut Down

The Oak Ridge Environmental Peace Alliance said last week that the U.S. Energy Department should shut down the Y-12 nuclear weapons plant in Oak Ridge, Tenn., until criticality safety procedures are improved, according Energy Daily (see GSN, Dec. 6, 2002).

The group has issued a report saying that some nuclear warheads and fissile materials were stored at the facility under leaking roofs, exposing them to flooding in the event of heavy rains and creating a criticality hazard.  In addition, warheads and fissile materials are stored in various types of containers, leading to confusion among Y-12 workers as to proper criticality measures, according to Energy Daily.

NNSA spokesman Steven Wyatt, however, has denied that the Y-12 facility was unsafe, saying its operations complied with regulatory requirements.

“Contrary to the claims raised by the Oak Ridge Environmental Peace Alliance, the Y-12 National Security Complex operates in a safe manner that protects worker and public health and safety,” Wyatt said (see GSN, July 30;George Lobsenz, Energy Daily, Aug. 5).

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North Korea:  Pyongyang Says Talks Will Begin Soon

North Korea said today that it will soon begin negotiations in Beijing with five other nations in an attempt to end the nuclear standoff on the Korean Peninsula (see GSN, Aug. 1).

“Six-party talks for a solution to the nuclear issue between the D.P.R.K. and the U.S. will be held in Beijing soon thanks to the former’s initiative and peaceful efforts,” said a spokesman from the North Korean Foreign Ministry.  “As the multilateral talks are slated to take place as called for by the U.S. side so far, the forthcoming talks will clearly show the world community whether the U.S. has a true willingness to make a switchover in its policy toward the D.P.R.K. or not,” the spokesman added.

A South Korean official said the talks would probably begin this month rather than September, Reuters reported (Reuters/Washington Post, Aug. 4).

North Korea agreed to the talks after Washington said it was willing to meet directly with diplomats from Pyongyang within the multilateral format.  North Korean officials have long demanded direct talks with the United States.

“Some time ago, the U.S. informed the D.P.R.K. through a third party that the D.P.R.K.-U.S. bilateral talks may be held within the framework of multilateral talks,” the Foreign Ministry spokesman said.

U.S. President George W. Bush said the United States will not enter into a “bilateral agreement” with North Korea.

“There are now five nations and North Korea sitting at a table,” Bush said.  “The discussions will be all aimed at convincing (North Korean leader) Mr. Kim Jong Il to change his attitude about nuclear weaponry,” he added (Pan/Kessler, Washington Post, Aug. 2).

North Korea, however, said it would not negotiate with U.S. Undersecretary of State for Arms Control and International Security John Bolton.  During a recent speech in South Korea, Bolton called North Korea’s Kim a “tyrannical dictator.”

“Such human scum and bloodsucker is not entitled to take part in the talks,” said the North Korean Foreign Ministry (Soo-jeong Lee, Associated Press/Chicago Tribune, Aug. 4).

The Foreign Ministry added that due to Bolton’s “political vulgarity and psychopathological condition,” North Korea has “decided not to consider him as an official of the U.S. administration any longer, nor to deal with him” (Glenn Kessler, Washington Post, Aug. 4).

Regardless of who attends the summit on behalf of the United States, U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell said Washington will not trade aid for security.

“We’re not doing nonaggression pacts … we, as a practice, don’t do that.  But there are ways to talk about security, and there are ways to talk about intent,” he said (Agence France-Presse, Aug. 4).

Washington, Tokyo Consider Inspection Teams

Meanwhile, the United States and Japan are considering whether to form inspection teams — separate from the International Atomic Energy Agency — to investigate North Korean nuclear facilities.  The potential inspection teams could be used if an agreement is reached to end the nuclear standoff and would include experts from the United States, Japan, China, South Korea and Russia.

Although they would be indepentdent, the teams would would cooperate with the U.N. nuclear watchdog, Agence France-Presse reported (Agence France-Presse/Yahoo!News, Aug. 3).

Plan for War, Woolsey Says

The U.S. public’s rejection of war on the Korean Peninsula has undermined U.S. officials trying to influence China to intercede with North Korea, according to former CIA chief James Woolsey and retired Air Force Lt. Gen. Thomas McInerney.

In a Wall Street Journal commentary, the two said that China is the only nation with any leverage over North Korea, and that improving U.S. readiness to attack North Korea would signal China that the Washington would act if Beijing does not.

As for military planning, the two said the United States cannot limit military action to surgical strikes on nuclear facilities.

“We must be prepared to win a war, not execute a strike,” the two wrote.

Woolsey and McInerney advocated overwhelming air power and improved air defenses.

“The U.S. should begin planning immediately to deploy the Patriot tactical ballistic missile defense system plus Aegis ships to South Korea and Japan, and also to reinforce our tactical air forces by moving in several air wings and aircraft carrier battle groups, together with the all-important surveillance aircraft and drones,” they wrote.  A U.S. air attack would be overwhelmingly successful, they added.

“North Korea’s geriatric air defenses — both fighter aircraft and missiles — would not last long.  As the Iraqis understood when facing our air power, if you fly, you die,” according to the commentary.

The two officials estimated that North Korea could be defeated in 30 to 60 days (Woolsey/McInerney, Wall Street Journal, Aug. 4).

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Iran:  French Officials Report Advanced Iranian Nuclear Program

French officials completed a classified report in May that claims that Iran is close to developing a nuclear weapon, the Los Angeles Times reported today.

The report calls on other nations to practice “the most serious vigilance on their exports to Iran and Iranian front companies.”

Iranian officials have also been receiving extensive assistance from foreign experts, according to the Times.  North Korean scientists have been working in Iran, and Iranian officials reportedly established a resort on the Caspian Sea for their exclusive use, according to sources in the country and foreign intelligence agencies.  Abdul Qadeer Khan, a Pakistani nuclear scientist, has also been assisting the Iranian program, according to the Times.

“Pakistan’s role was bigger from the beginning than we thought,” said a Middle Eastern intelligence official.

Russia has been working with Iran to build a nuclear reactor at Bushehr.  Iran, however, is also building a heavy-water reactor that is more likely to be used in weapons development.  Gholamreza Aghazadeh, the president of Iran’s atomic energy agency, said the heavy-water reactor is for research purposes and could be used to make radioisotopes for medical applications.

Experts, however, said the reactor causes concerns.

“For Iran, there is no justification whatsoever to have a heavy-water plant,” said Gary Samore, director of nonproliferation programs at London’s International Institute for Strategic Studies and a former Clinton administration security official.

A senior U.N. official said “the heavy-water plant sticks out like a sore thumb” (Douglas Frantz, Los Angeles Times, Aug. 4).

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United States:  Pentagon Considering Development of “Hypersonic” Bomber

U.S. Defense Department officials last week met with representatives from defense contractors to discuss plans to build a “hypersonic” bomber to help combat WMD proliferation, according to the London Sunday Times (see GSN, July 14).

Project Falcon [Force Application and Launch from the Continental United States] calls for developing the Hypersonic Cruise Vehicle, to be designed to fly at a top speed of 6,000 miles per hour directly from the United States to attack countries threatening to use weapons of mass destruction, according to the Sunday Times.  The HCV, expected to be operational by 2025, would take off from a conventional runway and could carry up to 12,000 pounds of bombs.

Prior to the launch of the HCV, the Pentagon first plans to construct a smaller Common Aero Vehicle, which is scheduled to be operational by 2010, the Sunday Times reported.  The CAV would be launched from a rocket or from a conventional airplane and would fly at the HCV’s top speed.  It would also be able to carry up to 1,000 pounds of weapons (Peter Almond, London Sunday Times, Aug. 3).

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