On Monday June 3, leaders from dozens of states will gather at the United Nations in New York to sign the new Arms Trade Treaty (ATT). The ATT will—for the first time— establish common international standards that must be met before states authorize transfers of conventional weapons or export ammunition and weapons parts and components.

Over time, the ATT can help tip the scales in favor human rights and human security when states consider arms transfers. As Secretary of State John Kerry said April 2: “It will help reduce the risk that international transfers of conventional arms will be used to carry out the world’s worst crimes, including terrorism, genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes.”

In order to realize the full potential of the treaty, however, leading states beginning with the United States must promptly sign and ratify the treaty and begin the hard work of implementing and enforcing the national laws required to meet the standards established by the ATT.

The United States played a key role in the negotiations on the Arms Trade Treaty, it helped overcome the blocking actions of Iran, North Korea, and Syria, and was crucial to winning the overwhelming support of the UN General Assembly for the treaty on April 2. The vote was 155 in support, 3 opposed, and 22 abstentions. Now, President Obama can help build support for the treaty and move it closer toward entry into force by agreeing to be among the first world leaders to sign the pact on June 3.

Unfortunately, the Barack Obama administration has not yet signaled whether it will be among the first nations to sign, even though there is no serious legal or technical issue that should hold-up U.S. signature on the ATT.

That’s a shame because President Obama should be leading from the front, not trailing behind.

Hesitation on the part of the President only gives the world’s other major arms dealers, such as China and Russia, a cynical excuse not to sign and ratify the Arms Trade Treaty.

By signing the ATT, President Obama would also send a strong message regarding the illegality of arms transfers to the Assad regime in Syria and other gross human rights abusers.

The ATT prohibits arms transfer authorizations to states if the state “has knowledge at the time of authorization that the arms or items would be used in the commission of genocide, crimes against humanity, grave breaches of the Geneva Conventions of 1949, attacks directed against civilian objects or civilians protected as such, or other war crimes.” Assad is clearly guilty of such offenses.

The Arms Trade Treaty will help to bring other states up to the standards for arms transfers that are already built into U.S. law and practice. The treaty also:

• requires states to establish regulations for arms imports and exports in eight major categories: battle tanks; armored combat vehicles; large-caliber artillery systems; combat aircraft; attack helicopters; warships; missiles and missile launchers; and small arms and light weapons;
• requires states to assess the potential that the transfer “could be used to commit or facilitate serious violations of international humanitarian law” and “international human rights law,” terrorism, organized crime, and take into account the risk of serious acts of gender-based violence or acts of violence against women and children. If there is an overriding risk of any of these negative consequences, states are required not to authorize the export;
• requires that all states establish effective regulations on the export of ammunition and weapons parts & components, which often allow conflicts to continue long after original arms transfers have been executed;
• requires regular, annual reporting on all arms transfers, which would help improve transparency and public accountability for states’ actions; and
• calls for regular conferences of states parties to review implementation of the treaty and developments in the field of conventional arms, which should allow states to consider new types of conventional weapons that may emerge.

U.S. signature for the ATT would solidify the United States’ strong commitment to preventing mass atrocities and protecting civilians from armed conflict.

And contrary to the false assertions of the NRA, the ATT has no effect whatsoever on the legal rights of U.S. citizens to keep and bear arms. In fact, the treaty recognizes the “legitimate trade and lawful ownership, and use of certain conventional arms for recreational, cultural, historical, and sporting activities, where such trade, ownership and use are permitted or protected by law.”

In the absence of a strong statement of the United States’ intention to sign in the very near future—and no later than when the President attends the September 2013 UN General Assembly meeting in New York—the administration’s credibility and seriousness on the issue will be undermined.

Failure by the White House to sign the ATT soon will also undercut the many U.S. allies who support the treaty—including the U.K., France, Germany, Australia, and Japan—and momentum toward the treaty’s formal entry into force will be slowed.

The Arms Trade Treaty (ATT) represents an important, historic step forward in dealing with the unregulated and illicit global trade in conventional weapons and ammunition, which fuels wars and facilitates criminal violence and human rights abuses across the globe—from Syria to Sudan, from Democratic Republic of Congo to Colombia, from Mali to Mexico, and beyond.

Mr. President, it is time to make it clear you will sign the Arms Trade Treaty.

In recent years, cyber attacks and the threats they pose have grown in sophistication, from low-level disruption and data theft—which are still a majority of cyber attacks—to high-level espionage and destruction.

Stuxnet, a piece of malware believed to be responsible for destroying approximately 1,000 centrifuges in Iran’s Natanz nuclear facility in late 2009 and early 2010, was a game-changer. For the first time, a computer virus was used to destroy a piece of physical infrastructure and the world took notice. The power of such a capability is clear today, but what happens once a wide range of counties and actors acquire equally sophisticated and powerful capabilities and there is no longer a technological gap between the United States, its allies, and the rest of the world?

While the prospect of a sophisticated cyber attack that could cripple critical infrastructure is currently unlikely, the potential is an ever-growing concern for government policy makers and military officials and has prompted a growing public debate about how to deal with the problem.

Should a country rely exclusively on its ability to defend and harden these critical networks against such attacks or should it also invest in new offensive cyber capabilities so that it can preempt or retaliate against such attacks? What can deter a state from launching major cyber attacks?  Can states negotiate “rules of the road” for cyber behavior to help mitigate the threat?

Some policy makers and military leaders suggest that some cyber attacks fall under the nuclear deterrence umbrella. However, the threat of nuclear retaliation to a major cyber attack is neither proportional, nor credible, in stopping (deterring) high-level catastrophic cyber attacks against a nation’s critical infrastructure by other states, including the nuclear weapons complexes. As a result, nuclear deterrence cannot usefully be applied to the cyber realm and a more practical and effective approach to making cyberspace more secure and stable is needed.

U.S. Cyber Policy

Over the past four years, the United States has clarified its declaratory policy over how it views cyberspace and actions within it by state and non-state actors. In May 2009, President Obama said that cyberspace would be treated as a “strategic national interests” where the U.S. would “deter, prevent, detect, and defend against attacks.”

In May 2011, the White House released the International Strategy for Cyberspace. The document said, “When warranted, the United States will respond to hostile acts in cyberspace as we would to any other threat to our country.” It went on to say, “[the United States] reserves the right to use all necessary means—diplomatic, informational, military, and economic—as appropriate and consistent with international law, in order to defend our Nation, our allies, our partners and our interests.”

In a November 2011 cyber report to Congress, the Defense Department said, “the President reserves the right to respond using all necessary means to defend our Nation, our Allies, our partners, and our interests from hostile acts in cyberspace” and those “response options may include using cyber and/or kinetic capabilities provided by DoD” as long as such responses are proportional and follow international law of armed conflict.

According to the November 2011 report to Congress, “Deterrence in cyberspace, as with other domains, relies on two principle mechanisms: denying an adversary’s objectives and, if necessary, imposing costs on an adversary for aggression.” Achieving these objectives in cyberspace, however, has proven difficult for policy makers.

Nuclear Deterrence?

Some policy experts have reached back to the Cold War toolkit for ideas and are suggesting that there is a role for nuclear weapons to deter high-level, sophisticated cyber attacks by other nations against critical U.S. infrastructure. In February 2013, a Defense Science Board (DSB) task force released a report that recommended the United States continue to invest in its nuclear arsenal in order to deter highly sophisticated cyber attacks against its critical infrastructure and nuclear weapons systems by other nation states.

The study was commissioned by then-Undersecretary of Defense William Lynn to look at the resiliency of the Defense Department networks and weapons systems to cyber attacks. According to the report, the Pentagon has not kept up with “cyber adversary tactics and capabilities” and is “not prepared” to defend against a sophisticated cyber attack and would take years to build an “effective response” to the threat. It went on to say that the threat is “serious, with potential consequences similar in some ways to the nuclear threat of the Cold War.”

Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, left, and Fang Fenghui, chairman of the People’s Liberation Army General Staff, in Beijing on April 22, 2013. (Image Source: Andy Wong/Pool via Getty Images)

Foreign leaders are also comparing the threat of a serious cyber attack to one of a nuclear weapon. China’s Chief of the General Staff General Fang, after a recent meeting with the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Dempsey, said, “If control is lost over security in cyberspace, the effects can be, and I don’t exaggerate, at times no less than a nuclear bomb.”

The DSB said the only way to deter against such a devastating attack is to invest in cyber, conventional—including investing in Prompt Global Strike—and nuclear weapons. The report is careful to stress the need to invest in better cyber defenses and other, non-nuclear responses, so that a nuclear response is not the only option. However, the report states, “Nuclear weapons would remain the ultimate response and anchor the deterrence ladder.”

The DSB recommendation not only contradicts the decades long trend of reducing the role of nuclear weapons in deterring non-nuclear threats; it is inconsistent with the policies established by the 2010 Nuclear Posture Review (NPR) report. During the Cold War, both the United States and Russia held a broader definition of the role that nuclear weapons would play in deterring attacks. The two adversaries amassed nuclear weapons to deter and/or prevail in a nuclear exchange; to deter or respond to an overwhelming conventional attack; and to deter or respond to biological and chemical threats.

Over time, the role of U.S. nuclear weapons to deter strategic attack has been narrowed. The 2010 NPR, which lays out the current roles and missions of the U.S. nuclear weapons, came close to stating that nuclear weapons should only be used to deter a nuclear attack.

The NPR states that, “the fundamental role of U.S. nuclear weapons, which will continue as long as nuclear weapons exist, is to deter nuclear attack on the United States, our allies, and partners.”  The NPR also says that role of nuclear weapons to deter “non-nuclear attacks—conventional, biological, or chemical—has declined significantly.” The NPR stated that the “United States will continue to reduce the role of nuclear weapons in deterring non-nuclear attacks.”

The NPR makes no specific mention of the use of nuclear weapons to deter cyber attacks by other countries. The NPR states, for the first time, that it “will not use or threaten to use nuclear weapons against non-nuclear weapons states that are party to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).”

DSB justified its recommendation by sighting part of the NPR that said, “[the United States] would only consider the use of nuclear weapons in extreme circumstances to defend the vital interests of the United States and its allies and partners;” a catastrophic cyber attack would meet this threshold the report said.

However, the threat of using nuclear weapons to respond to cyber attacks by other states against U.S. critical infrastructure is not a realistic nor an effective response to cyber attack because:

• Cyber attacks lack the destructive and existential threat of nuclear weapons;
• A nuclear response to a cyber attack is not proportional;
• Threatening to respond with a nuclear weapons lacks credibility in adversaries’ eyes;
• Cyber deterrence in general is difficult to achieve; and
• The policy would provide a new rationale for nuclear proliferators.

First, cyber attacks do not pose the same catastrophic threat nuclear weapons present. While it has been reported that the United States critical infrastructure is vulnerable to cyber intrusions and potential attacks, the likelihood of such attacks and their potential effects have been exaggerated by policy makers who lack the technical knowledge to predict accurately what effects a cyber attack might have on much of the critical networks.

With the exception of a cyber attack against a nuclear power plant that causes a nuclear meltdown—which is theoretically possible but very unlikely—there is no cyber attack with the destructive force of a “limited” nuclear attack involving less than 100 nuclear weapons, which could kill tens of millions of Americans immediately.

Even if an adversary were able to take down the power grid of the entire East Coast with a highly sophisticated cyber attack, leaving at-risk people populations and transportation systems vulnerable, such an attack would not have the nearly the same impact as the use of a few nuclear bombs on American cities.

This does not mean that there are not real vulnerabilities that need to be addressed before cyber weapons become even more capable and destructive. But for now, they are not.  The United States should therefore focus on hardening these networks and working with the international community to establish rules of the road to decrease risk.

In March 2013 National Intelligence Director James Clapper presented the “Worldwide Threat Assessment” before Congress and said, there is a “remote chance” that over the next two years the United States will see a major cyber attack against its critical infrastructure, producing “long-term, wide-scale disruption of services, such as regional power outage.” However, it also said China and Russia “are unlikely to launch such a devastating attack” outside a “military conflict or crisis.”

Second, the law of armed conflict requires that states respond to aggressive acts of force proportionally. If cyber attacks lack the destructive force of nuclear weapons then responding to one with a nuclear weapon is not a proportional response. If China launched a cruise missile and took down a power plant, it would be disproportional to respond with launching a nuclear warhead at China. Now imagine that instead of a cruise missile, a cyber attack is launched against the industrial control mechanism for the power plant and takes it offline. Does that somehow now warrant a nuclear response? No.

Third, U.S. adversaries are not likely to consider the threat of a nuclear response to a highly sophisticated or catastrophic cyber attack as credible. If, as a policy, nuclear weapons are included to deter any level of attack or behavior, it tends to lower its effectiveness. For the United States, a conventional military response is more appropriate and can more easily be calibrated to respond to highly sophisticated cyber attack and would therefore be seen as a more credible response by any potential adversary.

Fourth, a policy where nuclear weapons are used as deterrent against potential cyber attacks would have a negative effect on preventing nuclear proliferation. If responding to cyber attacks with nuclear weapons becomes an acceptable form of deterrence, it could legitimize other states’ nuclear weapons ambitions.

Fifth, deterring cyber attacks, whether low- or high-level, is generally difficult to achieve. The United States is more dependent on its information networks than many of its adversaries are, making it more difficult to threaten retaliation through cyberspace. In contrast to nuclear weapons, there are many more actors, state and non-state, that have cyber capabilities and less is known about these capabilities. And the technological bar for creating highly sophisticated cyber weapons is continuing to drop, allowing even more actors to have the capability of inflicting harm in the networks.

Finally, there is the attribution challenge. It could take months, years, if ever, for a country to definitively find who was responsible for a cyber attack. Now, many experts have stated that deterring cyber threats at the highest level of national security—state vs. state—is not as difficult because it still relies on traditional intelligence gathering and current geopolitical relationships and attitudes. However, traditional intelligence gathering and analysis makes mistakes and attribution often takes time, even against kinetic attacks..

A More Progressive Approach

United States is already investing and should continue to invest in defensive capabilities to build-up the resiliency of its critical infrastructure networks to cyber attack. If critical networks are more difficult to compromise, then adversaries will be less likely to target them. And, the further global integration of information networks makes it less likely that states will seek to disrupt or attack other states’ cyber networks because the economic effects would be too great for both countries.

The U.S. should also engage further the international community to establish acceptable “rules of the road” for state behavior in cyberspace. And, it is important that current international law be recognized as a guide for developing these cyber rules and adjusted in order to make sense in the new and different technological environment.

Several states, including the United States, have begun to discuss the establishment of cyberspace norms. The United Kingdom has hosted two international conferences on the subject. In September 2011 Russia and China proposed a code of conduct for cyber behavior. In 2011, the UN re-established the mandate for a group of governmental experts on developments in the field of telecommunications and international security. The United States and China recently discussed the possibility of opening a dialogue on the issue.

The adoption of a policy of using, or threatening to use, nuclear weapons in response to a major cyber attack by other states against U.S. critical infrastructure is not appropriate and is not an effective deterrent. Instead, the U.S. should continue to work with the international community to establish acceptable “rules of the road” that would hold states accountable and help impose some measure of restraint on all states’ cyber behavior.

By Ian Williams 

(Image Source: Singapore Customs Authority)

May 31st marks the 10^th anniversary of the Proliferation Security Initiative (PSI), a non-binding international effort to stop the trafficking of weapons of mass destruction and related materials. Member states are currently holding their first PSI High Level Political meeting in five years.

The May 27-29 meeting is a critical opportunity for the Obama administration to take action on its pledge from the 2010 National Security Strategy to turn the initiative into a “durable international effort.” It will also give the administration a chance to answer critics who have accused it of allowing the WMD interdiction initiative to wither and atrophy.

An Evolving Initiative

The Proliferation Security Initiative was formed in May 2003 in response to the failed interdiction of the So San, a North Korean freighter carrying ballistic missiles to Yemen. U.S. and Spanish naval forces cooperated to interdict the vessel, but the Yemeni government insisted the missile shipment was the product of a legitimate transaction in accordance with international law.

The episode, along with concerns about the illicit trade in nuclear weapons technology, prompted the George W. Bush administration to launch the Proliferation Security Initiative. The initiative’s purpose is to increase participating states’ capacity to interdict consignments of WMD related materials while in transit.  Often described as “an activity, not an organization,” PSI carries the hallmark of having no permanent institutional structure. There is no headquarters, no secretariat, and no standing committees.

Membership in the PSI only requires a state to endorse a shared Statement of Interdiction Principals (SIP), which provides the framework for cooperative action on interdictions. This low bar for entry has allowed the PSI to expand rapidly. To date, 102 states have endorsed the SIP.

Participating states share intelligence, best practices, and participate in training exercises, such as Deep Sabre, a multinational maritime interdiction exercise conducted in the South China Sea in 2005. These activities are organized on an ad hoc basis by the PSI Operational Experts Group (OEG). The OEG is comprised of 21 states, which meet the somewhat subjective criteria of being the “most active and strongly engaged” members. The OEG convenes on a periodic basis to plan future activities, discuss recent interdiction operations and other relevant matters.

PSI proponents argue that the initiative’s non-institutional nature is in fact its greatest strength. Without a codified structure, the focus of PSI rests on action, rather than procedure. This model of non-institutional multilateralism is very much a reflection of the frustrations felt by the initiative’s architects towards international institutions and accompanying bureaucracy.

However, because of its lack of self-sustaining institutions, the PSI requires active stewardship and consistent participation from member states. Without such constant care and attention, the PSI is vulnerable to gradual deterioration.

Neglect?

Recently, the Obama administration has been criticized by some Republican congressmen for allowing the PSI to “languish,” and encouraged increasing interdiction efforts. There is some evidence to suggest PSI activity has declined since 2009, at least quantitatively.

According to State Department records, the number of OEG meetings that occurred during the Bush administration numbered between 3-5 per year. Since 2009, that number has declined to 1-2 per year.  The number of PSI-related training exercises and activities has also declined by around half.

The administration has countered these critiques, by pointing out that there have been numerous interdictions of WMD consignments in transit under its watch. David Asher, Center for a New American Security senior fellow and former George W. Bush administration official, noted in a recent interview that more interdictions have occurred during President Obama’s time in office than during the early years of PSI during the Bush Administration.

However, it is very difficult to confirm any details about PSI operations through open sources, since so very few interdictions are ever made public. Moreover, the overall lack of transparency makes it difficult for open source analysts and think tanks to assess the overall success of the initiative. It also makes it hard to evaluate how the initiative could be improved.  Even the discussions that take place at OEG meetings are generally kept secret and only brief concluding statements are released.

A Way Forward

Nevertheless, Aaron Dunne at the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) has been able to slice through the initiative’s opaqueness and produce an insightful report on the current challenges facing the PSI and give some sound recommendations on ways to improve its efficacy.

Released in May, the report says that most PSI interdictions occur while vessels suspected of transporting WMD related materials are in port, rather than on the high seas in international waters. This is in contrast to the popular perception that most PSI operations involve commandos in black masks storming freighters filled with centrifuges. As much as that captures the imagination, it does not reflect the “operational reality” of PSI, at least not most of the time.

However, Dunne also finds that much of the PSI activities such as training exercises, as well as the composition of OEG delegations, are still militarily oriented. Reorganizing OEG delegations to be more representative of national customs authorities, and including more customs personnel in training exercises are two ways the PSI could be improved, Dunne argues.

The SIPRI report also suggests that strengthening the legal underpinnings for interdictions would enhance PSI. The PSI does not create new law – national or international. It merely acts as a mechanism to enforce existing law.

Currently, much of the legal basis for PSI actions stems from UN Security Council Resolution 1540, UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, and the Convention on the Suppression of Unlawful Acts. Dunne recommends that all OEG members must sign, ratify and implement these treaties and resolutions, or be expelled from the OEG.

Furthermore, Dunne recommends that a set of minimum national laws and practices should be more clearly defined for member states. As most interdictions take place within national territories, the development of national legal regimes criminalizing the transport of WMD related materials is critical for PSI enhancement. After all, the interdiction of the So San did not fail because of a failure of intelligence sharing or military cooperation, but rather because of a lack of legal authority to seize the missiles.

The Time is Now

These reforms, which are in no way exhaustive of the full range of recommendations laid out in SIPRI’s report, are just some examples of the kinds of steps that can be taken to enhance and reinvigorate PSI. The 10^th anniversary meeting currently taking place in Warsaw is an opportunity to update the initiative on the basis of the lessons learned over the past ten years, and to make sure it remains a useful tool in the battle against proliferation for years to come.

The International Atomic Energy Agency’s (IAEA) May 2013 quarterly report on Iran’s nuclear program indicates that Tehran is continuing to move forward on its nuclear program, installing more advanced centrifuges and building-up its stockpiles of uranium enriched to 3.5 percent and 20 percent, and moving forward on construction of its heavy water reactor at Arak.

The report findings underscore the urgent need to intensify negotiations with Tehran to resolve the political questions surrounding Iran’s nuclear program and to resolve the outstanding questions regarding the potential military dimensions of the program, but, at the same time, the findings reinforce earlier assessments that Iran remains years away from obtaining a deliverable nuclear arsenal.

Key Highlights:

• Iran’s stockpile of 20 percent enriched uranium, now at 182 kilograms, remains below the estimated 240-250 kilograms which, when further enriched to weapons grade, would be enough for one nuclear weapon.

• While Iran has now installed 689 advanced (IR-2M) centrifuges at Natanz, these centrifuges are not yet producing enriched uranium.

• The number of centrifuges enriching uranium to 20 percent at Fordow remains constant at 696.

• No progress has been made in negotiations between Iran and the IAEA on the scope and sequence of the agency’s investigation into Iran’s nuclear activities with possible military dimensions.

20 Percent Stockpile Still Short of a Bomb’s Worth

According to the May 2013 report, Iran has produced 324 kilograms of uranium enriched to 20 percent at its Natanz and Fordow enrichment facilities. Only 182 kilograms remain in the stockpile as uranium hexafluoride gas, an increase of 15 kilograms since the IAEA’s February 2013 report on Iran.

In total, Iran has produced 324 kilograms of 20% enriched uranium. The other 142 kilograms of 20% percent material has been converted to uranium oxide to make fuel plates for the Tehran Research Reactor, which produces medical isotopes. This leaves Iran below the 240-250 kilograms which, when further enriched to weapons grade, (over 90 percent enriched U-235) is enough for one bomb.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a September 2013 speech at the UN General Assembly that accumulating that level of 20 percent enriched materials is a “red-line” that would precipitate an Israeli attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities.

In the prior report, from February 2013, the IAEA noted that Iran had produced 280 kilograms of uranium enriched to 20 percent, of which 113 kilograms had been slated for conversion into uranium oxide powder.

Uranium oxide can be converted back into uranium hexafluoride form, but it is unclear how much of the material would be lost in the process. Although the exact amount of wastage is not known, experts assess that it could be as much as 60 percent. Iran has the capabilities to reconvert the power to gas form and given the current amount of uranium oxide in the February 2013 report; reconversion could take as little as between 1-2 weeks. However, it would be difficult for Iran to complete the conversion without the IAEA inspectors noticing.

Additionally, Iran is unlikely to break out of the nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) with only one bomb’s worth of uranium enriched to 20 percent. At the current rate of production, it would be several years before Iran has enough 20 percent material for several bombs if it chose to do so. Also, a sufficient quantity of weapons-grade uranium is only component of a nuclear weapon. Iran would still need to build a device and mate the warhead to a delivery vehicle before it would have a working nuclear arsenal. Iran has not demonstrated the capability to do either and it would likely take Iran more time to master these steps.

More Advanced Centrifuges at Natanz

According to the May 2013 report, Iran is continuing to install advanced centrifuges, the IR-2M, at its Natanz Fuel Enrichment Plan. Iran now has 689 IR-2Ms installed, 509 more than was reported in February, but they are not yet producing enriched uranium.

Iran’s Natanz nuclear plant (image source: BBC).

Iran informed the IAEA in January 2013 that it would begin installing the IR-2Ms in February. Iran has said that when running, the IR-2Ms will produce reactor grade uranium, which is enriched to 3.5 percent. Fereydoun Abbasi, head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran, said in Tehran on Feb. 13 that Iran is “carrying out the installation” of the new centrifuges and would be “starting them up gradually.” As of the February 2013 report, Iran had installed 180 IR-2 centrifuge casings.

The IR-2M is a second-generation model based on Iran’s original gas centrifuge, the IR-1.While these centrifuges are likely to be more efficient than the IR-1s that Iran using for producing enriched uranium to both 3.5 percent and 20 percent levels, it is unclear how much more efficient they will be because it is unlikely that Iran has been able to produce or procure the highest-grade of materials for the IR-2Ms. Experts assess that a tripling or quadrupling in efficiency might be realistic, but that it is difficult to estimate until the machines are operating in cascades.

In the remaining halls at the Fuel Enrichment Plant, Iran has 13,555 IR-1 centrifuges producing uranium enriched to 3.5 percent. Iran installed 886 of IR-1s since the last report. In total, Iran has a stockpile of 6,357 kilograms of uranium enriched to 3.5 percent. While Iran has produced more materials enriched to 3.5 percent, some of it has been further enriched to 20 percent. As of the February 2013 report, that number was 5,974 kilograms.

The February report also noted that, for the first time, Iran had installed two new types of centrifuges, the IR-6 and the IR-6S, in the research and development area at Natanz’s Pilot Fuel Enrichment Plant and was feeding natural uranium into the single machines, and in the case of the IR-6S, cascades. The new IAEA report says that Iran installed the IR-5 at the Natanz research and development area for the first time.

Fordow Remains Unchanged

According to the May 2013 IAEA report, the number of centrifuges enriching uranium at Fordow remains at 696, as it has since the facility began operations in 2011. The 696 centrifuges are enriching uranium to 20 percent in four cascades.

Fordow is designed to hold 2,976 centrifuges in 16 cascades, of which 2,710 have been installed. As of the February 2013 IAEA report, an additional 11 cascades had been vacuum tested and are ready to begin enriching uranium. Only 1 cascade remains incomplete.

Arak

The May 2013 reports says that Iran is also continuing to make progress on its heavy water reactor at Arak, despite UN Security Council resolutions calling on Tehran to halt construction. The Arak reactor has been a project of concern for many years due to the fact that it could provide a second route by which Iran might produce fissile material for nuclear weapons.

Iran’s Arak reactor located southwest of Tehran (Hamid Foroutan/ISNA/Associated Press)

The IAEA reports that on March 10, 2013, Iran informed the Agency that it planned to produce 55 fuel assemblies for the Arak reactor by August 2013. Iran says it plans to complete the reactor in 2014 and use it to produce medical isotopes.

In May, 2013 Iran provided “some information regarding the reactor vessel recently received at the IR-40 Reactor site. Nothwithstanding, as reiterated by the Agency in a letter to Iran dated 8 May 2013, an updated DIQ for the IR-40 Reactor is urgently required.”

The prior report, from February 2013 noted that on November 26, 2012, the Agency verified a prototype IR-40 natural uranium fuel assembly for Arak before its transfer to the Tehran Research Reactor (TRR) for “irradiation testing.” This would be the first time TRR has been used to test fuel for the Arak reactor.

Spent fuel produced by heavy water reactors can be more easily reprocessed to extract plutonium, which can be used to produce nuclear weapons. Independent experts assess that if Arak functions at optimal capacity, it could produce sufficient plutonium to yield 9 kg annually, after separation, enough for approximately 1.5 nuclear weapons.

However, Iran does not have a reprocessing facility for separation, having revised its declaration to the IAEA regarding Arak in 2004. The revision eliminated plans for a reprocessing facility at the site. Tehran maintains that it does not intend to build a plant to separate plutonium from the irradiated fuel that the reactor will produce.

No Progress on IAEA Investigation into PMDs

Iran also continues to refuse to cooperate fully with the IAEA’s investigations into activities with possible military dimensions (PMDs). According to the May 2013 report, the IAEA and Iran have made no progress on negotiating an approach to the agency’s investigations on these activities.

The IAEA’s November 2011 report laid out in detail the information collected by the agency regarding Iran’s alleged past nuclear weapons activities. The May 2013 report does not present any new evidence or information regarding these potential military activities.

Since early 2012, the IAEA and Iran have been discussing a way forward—through a “structured approach”—for the agency to investigate these alleged activities, but have been unable to reach an agreement. The parties met most recently for the 10^th time in Istanbul on May 15. After the meeting Deputy Director General Herman Naekarts reported that the IAEA and Iran were unable to finalize the structured approach. No new date to continue negotiations was announced.

While the IAEA has stated it is committed to dialogue it is unclear how long they will keep negotiating with Iran over the structured approach. In a December 2012 speech at the Council on Foreign Relations, IAEA Director General Yukiya Amano said that talks should not continue “without producing any concrete result.”

In May 15 testimony to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs Wendy Sherman said that the talks between Iran and the IAEA should not continue indefinitely without a result and that at some point Amano will have to tell the Security Council that it must take further action.

Sherman said she was not sure if this would happen at the Board of Governors meeting in June or September. Sherman is the top U.S. representative to the P5+1 (China, France, Germany, Russia, the United Kingdom, an the United States) negotiations with Iran.

Time to Accelerate Progress of P5+1 and Iran Negotiations

Iran has not yet made the decision to pursue nuclear weapons, and if it were to do so, it remains years away from a deliverable arsenal.

Obtaining the necessary amount of fissile material enriched to weapons-grade is only one step. Iran also would have to design a warhead, fashion the uranium hexafluoride gas into the metallic form needed for the warhead, and conduct an explosive test of that design to assure its reliability. To do so, Iran would likely expel IAEA inspectors, which would alert the international community to its true intentions.

Former Secretary of Defense Panetta estimated in 2012 that it would take about a year to produce a bomb and then 1-2 additional years to fit it to a delivery vehicle, similar to the estimate from the International Institute for Strategic Studies.

However, the time available to conclude an interim confidence-building arrangement that halts Iran’s production of 20% uranium and secures more extensive IAEA monitoring, in exchange for the supply of medical isotopes and limited sanctions relief should not be wasted.

The resumption of negotiations between Iran and the P5+1 in 2013 was a positive step, but both sides need to show more flexibility and pragmatism to achieve a breakthrough. Further rounds of talks should be scheduled soon after Iran’s June election to resolve the long-running standoff.

The revised package that the P5+1 brought to the “Almaty II” negotiations on April 5-6 represents a step in the right direction. It proposed a halt to production of uranium enriched to 20 percent, which remains the primary concern of the United States and the P5+1, as well as offering limited but significant sanctions relief to Iran. The parties should think creatively about how this proposal could be modified and sequenced to build confidence and prevent escalation.

Ohio class ballistic missile submarine USS West Virginia (SSBN 736) transits the Atlantic Intracoastal Waterway as it returns to Naval Submarine Base Kings Bay, Ga. from a patrol mission. (U.S. Navy photo Mass Communication Specialist 1st Class Kimberly Clifford/Released)

By Tom Z. Collina

In these days of high-stakes budget battles on Capitol Hill, it is typical for budget managers to point at someone else’s program as the problem. But when everyone starts pointing at the same program, you know it’s in trouble.

And everyone—including the Navy—seems to be pointing their fingers at the Navy’s $100 billion program to build 12 new nuclear-armed submarines, known as the Ohio Replacement or the SSBN(X).

On May 10, the Navy sent its much-anticipated FY2014 long-range shipbuilding plan to Congress. The plan lays bare why the new sub is in hot water. In his cover letter to the report, Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel wrote, in an understatement, that “there will be resourcing challenges…largely due to investment requirements associated with the SSBN(X) program.”

The report itself is more blunt. It says that if the Navy funds the SSBN(X) “from within its own resources,” the program will “take away from construction of other ships in the battle force such as attack submarines, destroyers, aircraft carriers and amphibious warfare ships. The resulting battle force will not meet the requirements of the [2012 Navy Force Structure Assessment] and will therefore not be sufficient to implement the [Defense Strategic Guidance]. In addition, there will be significant impact to the shipbuilding industrial base.”

Under the heading “Major Risks,” the report says that if the Navy is unable to essentially double its shipbuilding budget, “plans to recapitalize the Nation’s nuclear deterrent and the Navy’s conventional battle force will have to be dramatically changed…”

And the Navy is not yet factoring sequestration into its budget. As Vice Adm. William Burke, deputy chief of Naval Operations Warfare Systems, said April 30, sequestration would cause the Navy “to both reduce procurement as well as retire existing ships, leaving us with a Navy in the vicinity of 200 ships, at which point we may not be considered a global navy.”

Do We Need 12 New Subs?

Each SSBN(X) will cost about $6 billion. During procurement and construction of 12 boats from FY2021 to FY2035, the Navy would need on average $19.2 billion per year for shipbuilding. The FY2014 pre-sequester request is $10.9 billion. Where will the extra $8 billion per year come from? No ones knows.

The Navy would like the money to come from outside “its own resources” to pay for “the Nation’s nuclear deterrent.” This is wishful thinking, and may help explain why the administration is backing away from the 12-boat requirement. STRATCOM Commander Gen. Robert Kehler testified at a May 9 House Strategic Forces Subcommittee hearing that “I think the ultimate number of submarines that we procure is still an open question.”

The Navy’s ability to reduce the number of SSBN(X)s it needs to buy is limited by the current nuclear policy guidance, which determines how many targets must be held at risk by U.S. nuclear weapons, and thus how many submarines must be on station at all times.

The Obama administration has all but completed a revised nuclear policy, which will hopefully solve the problem. By reducing the number of submarines that need to be on patrol, the Navy can buy fewer of them and save an estimated $15 billion over the next decade alone. This would be a win-win for the Navy, allowing it to meet its nuclear deterrent requirements and still maintain a global fleet.

U.S. Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel speaks with reporters about Syria during a press conference in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates on Thursday, April 25, 2013. (Image source: AP)

By Daryl G. Kimball, Greg Thielmann, and Kelsey Davenport

The U.S. intelligence community “assesses with varying degrees of confidence, that the Syrian regime has used chemical weapons on a small scale in Syria, specifically, the chemical agent sarin,” according to information released by the White House on April 25 in a letter to Senators Levin and McCain.

The U.S. allegations follow letters written to the UN Secretary General by both France and the United Kingdom, and public allegations by Israel, that chemical weapons have been used in the Syrian civil war on multiple occasions since December 2012.

Despite the mounting evidence, it is important to emphasize that the U.S. assessment of chemical weapons use is not yet definitive. The April 25 letter said that the “chain of custody is not clear” making it difficult to determine how the exposure occurred and “under what conditions.”

This assessment increases the urgency of empowering the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) to thoroughly investigate the very serious possibility that the Syrian government has authorized the use of internationally banned chemical weapons against its own people.

Next Steps

Now, the international community must unite in efforts to achieve a full investigation of the evidence. In particular, the UN Security Council should meet to outline a course of action to prevent any further use of chemical weapons, including ensuring that the Syrian Government permits and facilitates access by the team the UN Secretary General has called on to conduct the investigation.

Despite having requested that UN investigate a possible chemical weapons attack that took place on March 19, Syria is currently refusing to allow inspectors to enter the country, unless the UN agrees to confine its investigations to that single incident.

All states, particularly Syrian allies such as Russia and Iran, should urge Syrian strongman Bashir al Assad to allow the UN investigation into the past use of chemical weapons to go forward unhindered and reiterate that the use of chemical weapons by any party in the Syrian conflict is unacceptable and individuals involved will be held accountable.  Iran, as a victim of massive Iraqi chemical attacks in the past, has a particular responsibility to condemn chemical weapons use.

The United States and the international community must take the allegations of chemical weapons use seriously and step up efforts to investigate these allegations and pressure the regime to allow UN inspectors unfettered access to Syria.

However, any military intervention must be carefully considered. Such an intervention would not necessarily prevent further use of chemical weapons. In fact, it could increase the chances that Assad will follow through on his threat to use chemical weapons more broadly or cause the military conflict to spread into neighboring countries.

Sen. Jeanne Shaheen speaks at ACA’s event at the National Press Club on April 11, 2013

By Tom Z. Collina

Four years after the historic speech in Prague laying out his nuclear policy priorities, President Barack Obama must now decide which issues to focus on in his second—and last—term.

The administration accomplished many important arms control and nonproliferation milestones since April 2009, such as the New START treaty, the Nuclear Posture Review, the Nuclear Security Summits, and the 2010 NPT review conference consensus, but much is left to be done, as this ACA fact sheet underscores.

To better understand the nuclear policy to-do list and help inform priorities, ACA held a press conference (transcript available) on April 11 with Senator Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH), who sits on both the Armed Services and Foreign Relations committees; Lt. Gen. Frank Klotz (USAF, ret.), former Commander, U.S. Global Strike Command; Amb. Steve Pifer, Director, Brookings Arms Control Initiative; and Amb. James Goodby, Research Fellow, Hoover Institution at Stanford University.

All speakers supported the view that the Obama administration must take advantage of the next few years to jumpstart action on the unfinished parts of the Prague nuclear weapons risk reduction agenda.

The panel underscored the opportunity and the importance of U.S. leadership in four key areas:

• Concluding another round of strategic arms reductions with Russia (either a formal treaty or informal understanding) below the ceilings set by the 2010 New START treaty and if possible new measures addressing tactical and stored nuclear warheads;
• Reinvigorating programs to prevent nuclear terrorism through better controls on weapons-usable nuclear materials, especially in troubled regions;
• Moving ahead with the President’s commitment to pursue ratification of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) beginning with careful reconsideration by the U.S. Senate;
• Jumpstarting stalled efforts to begin Fissile Material Cutoff Treaty (FMCT) negotiations in Geneva through alternate approaches.

Sen. Shaheen on Nuclear Reductions, Nuclear Security, and the Test Ban Treaty 

In her remarks, Sen. Shaheen noted that 50 years ago “President Kennedy famously said that he was haunted by the possibility that the United States could face a rampantly growing number of nuclear powers in our world.”

“At the time, he predicted that by 1975, there could be as many as 20 countries with nuclear weapons.  Well, fortunately, due to strong forward thinking, American leadership and innovative diplomacy, we have so far averted that nuclear nightmare.

“The last several months, however, have tested the limits of our non-proliferation regime.  It’s been one bad news story after another in the WMD world.  Iran’s centrifuges keep spinning and negotiations seem to be stuck.  North Korea’s belligerent leadership threatens to push Northeast Asia over the edge.  And Syria’s chemical weapons are at risk. I’m afraid we may be quickly reaching an important crossroads, one where we either prove President Kennedy wrong for a little while longer or find out that his nightmare prediction was simply a half century too soon,” she warned.

“As we watch the threat of proliferation grow more complex and diffuse, our focus and resource commitments need to match the severity of the challenge that we face. We need to demonstrate to the world that the United States will continue to lead in curbing the threat posed by nuclear weapons around the globe,” Sen. Shaheen said.

Sen. Shaheen went on to say that: “I believe that the United States and Russia can go lower than the New START numbers.  Reports suggest that the administration is indeed considering further bilateral reductions in our deployed strategic weapons… [A]ny further consideration of reductions should be combined with robust reinforcement of America’s security commitments around the globe, particularly as North Korea and Iran’s nuclear programs threaten some of their closest allies.  The United States will do what is necessary to defend our friends in the face of these threats.”

“In addition to bilateral discussions with Russia,” Sen. Shaheen said, “I think it’s important for all of us to shift more focus, time and resources back to the threat of nuclear terrorism.  It remains one of our gravest dangers.

“To date, we’ve largely kept nuclear materials out of terrorists’ hands, but when it comes to nuclear terrorism in our world, the reality is that the international community can’t afford to make a single mistake.  We can’t be complacent because one miscalculation, one unprotected border, one unsecured facility could all lead to a mushroom cloud somewhere in the world.  We need to remain vigilant, to think ahead and to anticipate where the next threats will come from.

“That’s why, in the coming weeks, I’ll be working with my colleagues in the Senate Foreign Relations and Armed Services Committees to introduce new legislation aimed at modernizing our Cooperative Threat Reduction and Non-Proliferation Assistance programs and expanding them more comprehensively into the Middle East and North Africa.  We all know that the proliferation threat in this already dangerous and unstable region is growing.”

On the CTBT, Sen. Shaheen said: “There’s a lot of work to be done before taking up CTBT.  But that just means we should start now to chart a path forward for its eventual consideration.”

Klotz on the CTBT 

Lt. Gen. Klotz noted that progress on nuclear weapons risk reduction efforts “will, obviously, depend upon the state of U.S.-Russian relations going forward,” but he also observed that “much will also depend upon achieving a greater degree of consensus on nuclear weapons and arms control policy within the U.S. body politic and within the beltway.”

“That,” Klotz said, “requires two different but not necessarily mutually exclusive beliefs be taken into account.  The first belief that must be taken into account is that appropriately sized nuclear forces still play an essential role in protecting the U.S. and allied interests.  And the second belief is that the United States must continue to lead international efforts to limit and to reduce nuclear arsenals, to prevent proliferation and to secure nuclear materials….this is precisely the approach that the president adopted in his 2009 Prague agenda.”

Klotz argued that “senior administration and congressional leaders must be willing to speak to the basic principles of a consensus that addresses both arms control, including continued reductions and non-proliferation, as well as investing in resources necessary to maintain and, where necessary, to modernize the nuclear weapons complex and nuclear deterrent forces even at lower numbers.”

On the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, Klotz said, “the Obama administration clearly has its work cut out for it in forging the coalition necessary to secure the Senate’s consent to ratification.  And even if it eventually succeeds, that task is likely to take a while.  But in my own personal view, speaking personally, the logic for moving forward and ahead on ratification of the CTBT is inescapable.

“The United States has, in effect, already paid the price of treaty membership by having unilaterally refrained from nuclear explosive testing for over 20 years.  The political bar to a resumption of testing is pretty high and unlikely to be surmounted absent some dramatic shift in the international security environment,” Klotz said.

“Additionally, as part of paying the price, the United States has already made a substantial investment in the tools necessary to assess weapon reliability without nuclear explosive testing, as well as in the means necessary to detect clandestine testing by others,” he added.

“While the United States probably garners some credit for exercising a self-imposed moratorium, it is likely to be in a far better position to rally international pressure against would-be proliferators and to constrain regional arms races if it ratifies CTBT.  And it is clearly in the national security interest of the United States and of our friends and allies to do just that,” Klotz asserted.

Securing ratification of the CTBT will “require political leadership and political skill on both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue and on both sides of the aisle to succeed.  Such, by the way, has always been the case with major treaties and with major pieces of domestic legislation, many of which seemingly had little prospect of success at the outset, but ultimately became part of the law of the land and of the global community,” he concluded.

Amb. Pifer on Nuclear Cuts Beyond New START 

Amb. Pifer outlined options for furtherU.S.-Russian reductions beyond New START. He argued that ideally, “it’s now time to bring all the weapons on the table – strategic, non-strategic, deployed, non-deployed – and have a single aggregate limit that would cover all of those weapons.”

He suggested that the next phase should seek to establish a limit of 2,000 to 2,500 total weapons on each side for the United States and Russia, of which there should be a limit on deployed strategic warheads of 1,000 on each side.

The negotiation of a “big treaty would not be an easy agreement to reach,” Pifer noted. “It would not be an 11-month negotiation as was New START.  You’re talking two to three years at least.”

“An alternate approach,” Pifer suggested, would be to put the different classes of weapons on “two tracks.” The first step, he said, would be to achieve a quick agreement on reducing deployed strategic weapons by taking the New START Treaty and simply amending it to reduce the ceilings on strategic deployed warheads from 1,550 down to 1,000 and the 700 limit on missiles and bombers down to 500, and then the 800 launcher limit down to maybe 600.  Another approach might simply be to accelerate the implementation of the New START deployed strategic warhead limits.

“This agenda is very much worth pursuing,” he argued. “There’s the opportunity to make the United States and American allies safer and more secure.  I think looking to the medium term, there are some chances for some possibly significant cost savings in terms of having to build fewer systems, say, 10 to 15 years down the road.  And I also think that if the United States and Russia are moving to further reduce their nuclear arsenals, it enhances their credibility on the non-proliferation agenda.”

Amb. Goodby Outlines Options to Jumpstart Action on the CTBT and FMCT 

Amb. James Goodby suggested that we should thinking about how to focus efforts on some of the highest priorities over the next two years. This, he said involves taking into account “the rise of China as a great power and second, there are a series of regional issues that have the potential for nuclear war if we’re not careful: the Middle East – think of Iran; South Asia, where I think the potential for nuclear conflict is very high; and in Northeast Asia,” he said.

“If you look at those objectives and if you apply the idea that we ought to try to have something achievable in the next couple of years,” he suggested the following priorities for the administration: “One is the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, a second is the cutoff of production of fissile material for use in weapons.”

On the CTBT, “what I would recommend is that we begin with an attempt to strengthen the existing moratorium. The existing moratorium is not an agreement among the states that adhere to this idea of not testing.  It has no common understanding in and of itself as to what a nuclear explosion is.  It has no means of verification, aside from the national technical means, and what is provided by the increasingly effective international system as part of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty office run out of Vienna,” Goodby noted.

“The P-5 could very easily, in my view, talk about a definition, which, essentially, would say a nuclear explosion is any explosive event that leads to a self-sustaining chain reaction of any duration.  Now, that was really the understanding that the people who negotiated the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty had.  But the Senate has complained because in the treaty itself, you don’t find that language.  I suspect you could probably reach an agreement in the P-5 on language like that and I think that later on would help with ratification,” Goodby said.

“A second matter is we could, I think probably negotiate an agreement that will provide for some type of transparency possibly at nuclear tests sites in China and Russia,” Goodby proposed. He suggested that an executive agreement or an understanding among the P-5 by the fall of 2013, which would make Senate approval more achievable and possible “by the end of next year.”

On the FMCT, Goodby argued, “it’s time to drop the fiction that we’re going to be able to negotiate a treaty in Geneva in the conference on disarmament.” Instead, he urged, we should be looking to the P-5 for a joint declaration that says “we will not produce fissile materials for use in weapons.”

“I suspect you could get an agreement along the P-5 on that because basically that is their policy now,” he said.  “Most of them have declared it – China has not – but I think they could easily do that.  Beginning with that, you would move again out, I’m thinking not of the P-5 as a stopping point but as a bridge head to move beyond that.”

The full transcript of the briefing is available online here.

North Korea parades a KN-08 in April 2012. Experts believe it is a mock-up.

Enduring the continuous barrage of nuclear missile threats coming out of North Korea in recent days is not for the faint-hearted. But seeking to separate the real from the rhetorical is an essential task for policy-makers, pundits, and the public.

What is clear is that North Korea is not likely to have nuclear-tipped missile capable of threatening the U.S. mainland for quite some time. However, North Korea can launch on short notice a devastating artillery attack on the ten million inhabitants of Seoul, the capital of South Korea.

North Korea could also launch missile attacks on cities in both the South Korea and Japan. Although it is possible that these missiles may already or could soon have a capability to deliver a few nuclear weapons, they almost certainly do not have a reliable capability to do so today.

If North Korea ever develops a credible threat to launch nuclear-tipped ballistic missile warheads against the United States and its allies, it will be the certain prospect of retaliation rather than the uncertain prospect of successful interception by missile defenses that will stay the hands of the leadership in Pyongyang.

Having spent some years in government seeking to answer policy-makers’ questions about complicated technical issues when critically relevant information is unavailable, I wanted to suggest a couple of tips to readers. Following this guide will lead one to some reassuring conclusions as well as some continuing reasons for concern:

Start with what is known

• In this case, we know that North Korea has processed plutonium from its now inoperative Yongbyon reactor that could be used as fissile fuel for nuclear weapons and we know what that amount was.  Plutonium was used in at least the first two of North Korea’s three underground nuclear tests.  This would leave North Korea with sufficient plutonium to build 4-8 nuclear weapons, depending on the sophistication of the design.

• North Korea has centrifuges to enrich uranium to the high level necessary to be used as fuel for nuclear weapons. We do not know about the amount of North Korea’s highly enriched uranium stockpiles. We do not know whether a uranium device was used in the third nuclear test.

• We do not know whether North Korea has created a warhead small enough and sophisticated enough to put on the tip of a ballistic missile. North Korea claimed its third nuclear test on February 12, 2013 was a miniaturized warhead, but there has been no independent verification of that claim.

• We know that North Korea has several hundred operational short-range ballistic missiles based on variants of the Soviet “Scud,” a Cold War weapon Moscow used for both nuclear and conventional weapons delivery.

• North Korea has some dozens of Nodong medium-range ballistic missiles, a single-stage, Scud-derived missile with a range of around 1,300 kilometers.

• What appear to be longer-range systems, the Musudan intermediate-range ballistic missiles or BM-25, with a range of around 3,000 kilometers, and the 5,000+ km-range KN-08 intercontinental-range ballistic missile have been paraded in Pyongyang, but some suspect these missiles may be mock-ups.

• Missiles that have never been flight-tested are not operational weapons. In the case of the Musudan and the KN-08, experts have raised good reasons to doubt the capabilities the North Koreans have sought to convey.

Read carefully (and between the lines of) intelligence community reports

• When intelligence agencies deliver pronouncements that generate headlines, such as in the cherry-picked disclosure of Rep. Doug Lamborn in yesterday’s House Armed Services Committee budget hearing, it should be read slowly and taken in context.

• When the intelligence community wants to communicate something it knows, you will see “high confidence” attached to the judgment. The line generating headlines from an unclassified paragraph of the report was: “D.I.A. assesses with moderate confidence the North currently has nuclear weapons capable of delivery by ballistic missiles…”  “Moderate” suggests a best guess, but also implies there are reasons for doubt.

• The qualifier attached to the headline assessment was: “…however the reliability will be low.” “Low reliability” suggests that the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency assesses North Korea would not be confident that its system would be able to successfully actualize a potential capability.

• Quoting from a classified report, even from an unclassified paragraph, should raise warning flags. The unwillingness of Gen. Martin Dempsey to discuss the matter in an open hearing made clear that the context for the judgment was absent (and raises questions about the ethics of Rep. Lamborn’s gambit).

• It is important to understand the context in which an intelligence agency judgment is rendered and whether it represents a coordinated view of the intelligence community. Director of National Intelligence James Clapper quickly disassociated himself from the DIA statement Lamborn quoted, adding that “it would be inaccurate to suggest that the North Korean regime has fully developed and test the kinds of nuclear weapons referenced in the passage.”

• Subsequent statements by Secretary of State Kerry on April 12 cast further doubt on the conclusion reflected in the headlines coming out of the hearing. Kerry said  in Seoul: “We do not operate on the presumption that [the North Koreans] have that fully tested and available capacities.”

We are left with a lack of certainty about North Korean intentions and capabilities, but we know enough to conclude that there is still time to diplomatically engage North Korea on missile and nuclear testing before Pyongyang acquires a credible nuclear arsenal that would threaten the United States and its allies.

The Barack Obama administration’s fiscal year 2014 budget request proposes spending $7.87 billion for National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) Weapons Activities, which would be an increase of $654 million, or nine percent above the 2012 enacted level, and $300 million more than the Continuing Resolution for fiscal year 2013.

The cost of the NNSA’s ambitious B61 bomb life extension program may exceed $10 billion. Cost-effective alternatives are available.

And as John Fleck of the Albuquerque Journal notes in a report he posted Wednesday, “The Obama administration’s budget request, being rolled out today, calls for a 23 percent increase in the budget for U.S. nuclear weapons research, manufacturing and maintenance over the next five years,” according to a budget summary document (PDF, page 371) released by the Office of Management and Budget.

So long as the United States has a nuclear arsenal, funding for the core programs to maintain an effective arsenal will be needed, but that can be accomplished in a more cost-effective manner.

Unfortunately, the administration’s proposal for increased NNSA weapons activities spending doesn’t take into account the fiscal headwinds now blowing across the federal budget and it ignores some common-sense cost savings strategies on some of the most costly projects.

Because the administration’s fiscal 2014 budget request is above the levels mandated by the Budget Control Act, the NNSA budget request and future years budget increases are not sustainable or realistic. As a result, it will be up to Congressional budget appropriators to make the tough, practical choices about what is really necessary and what is affordable, or else allow the across-the-board budget cuts mandated by “sequestration” to go forward.

According to the administration’s fiscal year 2014 NNSA budget wish list, the funding would cover cost increases for nuclear weapon life extension programs, such as: upgrades to the W76 and B61 nuclear weapons; initiating new upgrades for the W78 and W88 nuclear weapons; and improving or replacing aging facilities, such as the Uranium Processing Facility; adding funds for tritium production and plutonium manufacturing and experimentation.

The base NNSA weapons activities budget includes programs to sustain the existing stockpile by maintaining the underlying science, surveillance, and other support programs.

NNSA Weapons Activities Funding:

FY 2011 Appropriation:         $6.87 billion
FY 2012 Appropriation:         $7.21 billion
FY 2013 Request:                    $7.58 billion
FY 2013 CR:                             $7.58 billion (excludes sequester reduction)
FY 2014 Request:                    $7.87 billion

As Congress reviews the NNSA budget request, it must recognize the importance of core stockpile surveillance and maintenance work for the existing stockpile and take a harder look at the increasingly costly and overly ambitious warhead upgrade projects, known as life-extension programs (LEPs), particularly the B61 nuclear gravity bomb LEP, which accounts for a large portion — perhaps as much as $500 million — of the NNSA’s fiscal year 2014 budget request.

Costly B61 Nuclear Bomb Upgrades

The NNSA had estimated last year that the B61 LEP will cost about $7 billion and produce its first rebuilt bomb in FY 2019. But in July 2012, a Pentagon review projected that the program would cost $10.4 billion and take three years longer. Four hundred B61s are reportedly planned for refurbishment, at roughly $25 million per bomb.

The United States currently keeps about 180 tactical B61s in Europe to assure allies of the U.S. commitment to NATO. However, U.S. and NATO military leaders recognize that U.S. strategic nuclear forces—not tactical forces in Europe—provide the ultimate guarantee of Alliance security. Moreover, some NATO members, such as Germany, have called for the B61 to be removed from Europe. It is possible that a future agreement between Russia and the United States would, as the Senate has directed, address tactical nuclear weapons, which could reduce or eliminate these warheads. Thus, tactical B61 bombs might not be deployed a decade from now, when the proposed rebuilding program would be complete.

Even if tactical B61s remain in service, there is no rush to rebuild them. B61s, like all modern nuclear weapons, have two components (neutron generators and gas transfer systems) that have limited life and are replaced on a regular basis. However, the scope of the B61 LEP goes well beyond these limited life components and involves replacing hundreds of other non-­‐nuclear parts, such as switches, foams, and cables, as well as the bomb’s uranium secondary.

These parts are continually assessed by the stockpile surveillance program, run by Sandia National Laboratories, and, according to scientists with weapons expertise, there is no evidence that they need to be replaced soon. Moreover, the strategic B61­‐7 already underwent significant upgrades in 2009. Leaving aside the limited‐life parts, it does not appear that the B61 LEP must be completed by 2022, as NNSA asserts.

Alternatives

Thus, Congress should mandate that NNSA and the labs explore more cost-efficient alternatives. For instance, by simply replacing the limited life components in the weapon, the bombs could remain in service for at least another 10 years. This would save billions and provide the time necessary to complete the W76 warhead life extension program, and determine whether there will be B61s in the U.S. nuclear arsenal before the United States makes multi-billion dollar investments to upgrade the weapon.

Another option would be to scale­‐back the B61 program by replacing only the parts that are known to be at the end of their lives and only for the weapons that are likely to still be deployed a decade from now.

For example, the NNSA could only upgrade the strategic B61‐7, of which there are an estimated 120 in service, and replace only the limited-­‐life parts and possibly the radar. As for the roughly 180 tactical bombs based in Europe, such limited upgrades could be made only for those planned to be deployed into the 2020s. This scaled­‐back approach could save billions of dollars more.

(Image Source: Missile Defense Agency – FTM-16 E2a Flight Test)

By Tom Z. Collina, Daryl G. Kimball, and Greg Thielmann

Today, Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel announced adjustments to U.S. missile defense plans designed to counter a potential limited attack involving a small number of unsophisticated long-range ballistic missiles that could, at some point in the future, be developed by states such as North Korea and Iran.

The Obama administration’s decision to cancel the fourth phase of its missile defense plans in Europe is a prudent move given that the technology involving the Standard Missile 3-IIB is not ripe and given the fact that the Iranian long-range missile threat has yet to materialize. Phase four of the European Phased Adaptive Approach (EPAA) is a system that may not work against a threat that does not yet exist.

As explained in detail in an article in Foreign Policy, the decision on phase four should reduce Russian concerns about the impact of these deployments on their sophisticated nuclear-tipped ICBMs and facilitate Russian support for further, reciprocal reductions in still bloated U.S. and Russian nuclear arsenals, which would benefit U.S. and global security.

The Pentagon’s plan to deploy 14 more ground-based strategic interceptors at Fort Greely in Alaska would add a very modest, mostly symbolic response to North Korean nuclear and missile saber-rattling. The 30 ground-based strategic interceptors already in Alaska and California are, at best, only useful to counter a simple, limited ballistic missile attack from North Korea or Iran.  When they were deployed in 2004, they were not ready for prime time. Today, it remains unclear whether these ground-based interceptors can work effectively and they should be subjected to much more rigorous field-testing before taxpayer resources are spent on a system that is ineffective.

As missile expert Michael Elleman writes in this month’s issue of Arms Control Today, North Korea still has a long way to go before it can credibly threaten the United States with nuclear weapons. It is likely to be years away from fielding an ICBM, which could deliver a nuclear warhead to the U.S. mainland. There is still time to halt and reverse current trends before North Korea’s nuclear capabilities become more substantial.