This week in Baghdad, the P5+1 group (the United States, China, France, Germany, Russia, and the U.K.)–led by EU Foreign Policy chief Catherine Ashton–met for two days with the Secretary of the Supreme National Security Council of Iran, Saeed Jalili, and his team on Tehran’s disputed nuclear program.

As the diplomats met inside a guest house in the fortified Green Zone, the world waited anxiously for some tangible progress. While each side presented revised versions of earlier proposals to resolve their respective concerns, the meeting concluded without an agreement on concrete confidence-building steps, and they announced they will meet again in Moscow June 18-19.

Given the infrequency of serious, direct talks with Tehran, the outcome in Baghdad is not surprising. Nevertheless, an initial confidence building deal is still within reach if both sides show some flexibility.

The top priority must continue to be–as the P5+1 insists–that Iran halts its accumulation of 20 percent-enriched uranium (which is above normal fuel-grade and closer to weapons grade) in exchange for fuel assemblies for its Tehran Research Reactor.

This would be a win-win for both sides and reinforce the principle that Iran will only enrich according to its civilian power needs, and could serve as a basis for a broader deal to limit the size and scope of its enrichment program as a whole. A deal to halt enrichment above normal fuel grade would provide negotiators with more time and space to address other key issues.

While an agreement on initial confidence building steps was not reached in Baghdad, it is clear that both sides are exchanging serious proposals that could produce results in the next round. For its part, Iran must follow though on the tentative deal with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) on inspections of key sites and personnel to ensure that any weapons-related experiments have been discontinued and the P5+1 must indicate what specific steps Iran must take on its nuclear program in order to delay additional international sanctions measures and begin to remove those already in place.

Iran clearly wants to avoid tougher sanctions–particularly the European oil embargo set to begin next month–but the P5+1 are unlikely to give up that leverage before tangible steps are taken by Iran, such as giving the IAEA necessary access to sites and personnel and halting enrichment to 20% in exchange for fuel supplies for its Tehran Research Reactor.

Iran made it clear once again in Baghdad that it will not compromise its so-called right to enrich uranium.

But under the nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, such rights do come with responsibilities. The position of United States and its negotiating partners has been–correctly–that under very strict conditions Iran would, sometime in the future, having responded to the international community’s concerns about nuclear weapons-related experiments, have such a right under IAEA inspections.

The IAEA’s New Report on the Iranian Nuclear Program

The importance of full Iranian cooperation with the IAEA and progress on concrete confidence building steps in Moscow was further underscored by today’s report from the IAEA Director General Yukiya Amano to the Board of Governors.

The IAEA’s May 25 report indicates that Iran continues to make steady progress enriching uranium to 5% U-235 (from 5451 kg in Feb. 2012 to 6197 in May 2012) and 20% U-235 (from 95.4 kg to 145.6 kg), but has still not installed more advanced centrifuges that could significantly increase its uranium enrichment output.

And, despite recent progress towards an agreement on a “structured approach” with the IAEA to resolve outstanding questions about experiments with possible military dimensions, the IAEA report makes it clear that Tehran is still not providing the information necessary for the Agency to resolve outstanding concerns.

The IAEA report also notes that Iran appears to be operating a heavy water production plant and continuing construction on a heavy water reactor now being built near Arak, which could be used to produce plutonium for bombs.

The Agency is also reporting that it has gathered additional information since its November 2011 report that “further corroborates its analysis” about possible experiments at the Parchin site, and the Agency continues to seek prompt access to that site.

The Director General “invites Iran to expedite final agreement on the structured approach, as agreed with Mr Jalili in Tehran on 21 May, 2012, and urges Iran to engage the Agency on the substance of these issues as soon as possible, including by providing early access to the Parchin site.”

In other words, it is past time for Iran’s supreme leader and his team to provide the transparency necessary to ensure that his religious fatwa against nuclear weapons is genuine. If, as the Iranians want, some delay of additional sanctions down the road, Iran must promptly follow-though on the tentative deal with the IAEA on inspections to verify that any weapons-related experiments have been discontinued and halt 20% enrichment at all of its enrichment facilities in exchange for fuel supplies for its Tehran Research Reactor.

Both sides need to focus on achieving concrete results at the next round of talks in Moscow to sustain progress toward the overdue actions necessary to prevent a nuclear-armed Iran.

Yet the United States and Russia must solve the missile defense puzzle if they hope to get on with reducing their nuclear arsenals below the limits set by the 2010 New START Treaty. Both nations have a keen interest in reducing the nuclear threats they face, stopping nuclear proliferation and terrorism, and redirecting scare dollars to higher defense priorities.

A new report, chaired by former STRATCOM commander Gen. James Cartwright, who oversaw U.S. nuclear forces under President George W. Bush and then served as vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, calls for deep reductions in U.S. and Russian arsenals. The report, which laments that differences over missile defense are blocking the arms reduction process, includes a little-noticed but potentially game-changing approach to breaking the current impasse.

Gen. Cartwright and his coauthors go after the root cause of the problem: Moscow, they say, is not just concerned that the European missile system might be capable of intercepting a few Russian missiles.  Rather, Russian leaders are worried about the U.S. capability to launch a pre-emptive nuclear attack and then use strategic missile interceptors planned for deployment in 2020 (the SM-3 IIB) and thereafter to deny a Russian retaliatory strike.

To those outside the Russian military, this fear sounds misplaced. It is unthinkable that the United States would launch a first strike against Russia or anyone else. Yet Cold War worst-case planning lives on, according to Gen. Cartwright (who was directly involved in such planning), and still drives the U.S.-Russian strategic relationship.  As the report puts it, “The bilateral nuclear arms control process and even the broader U.S.-Russian relationship has stalled” over this misunderstood Russian fear.

If fear of a U.S. surprise first strike that could “decapitate” Moscow’s nuclear forces is really driving Russian thinking, then small-bore proposals, such as limiting the capability of U.S. interceptors in Europe, will not succeed. Instead, Gen. Cartwright is proposing to fundamentally change U.S. nuclear posture to remove any credible threat of a U.S. pre-emptive first strike.

“By removing the technical threat of a surprise U.S. nuclear first strike, the United States could no longer theoretically decimate the bulk of Russia’s strategic forces, and the specter of U.S. missile defenses mopping up a small number of surviving Russian missiles after the strike would evaporate,” the study says.

How to remove this outdated first-strike threat is the focus of Gen. Cartwright’s proposal, which includes making an 80 percent reduction in U.S. nuclear forces, taking those forces off alert, and retiring all U.S. intercontinental ballistic missiles, or ICBMs. Once this is done, “U.S. missile defense deployment would not pose nearly as great a technical threat to Russia, improving the prospects for a new round of fruitful U.S.-Russian nuclear arms negotiations,” the report says.

This is a very different approach to untangling missile defense than has been taken so far. Yet it is high time to shift U.S. forces away from their current capability to launch a surprise first strike, even if no one on this side of the Atlantic believes that to be even a remote possibility. From a hard-boiled military perspective, capability is everything and, according to Gen. Cartwright, this is a capability we no longer need.

The Obama administration is in the process of reviewing U.S. nuclear weapons policy to formulate its position for the next round of arms control talks. Removing any credible threat of a first strike against Moscow, along the lines that Gen. Cartwright suggests, should be considered as a key part of the next round of talks to facilitate future bilateral arms reductions and missile defense cooperation.

Twenty years after the Cold War’s end, there’s no need for Russian leaders to be lying awake at night worrying about a U.S. first strike, especially if that fear is standing in the way of reducing the Russian nuclear threat to the United States. The United States has stressed time and again that its nuclear forces and missile interceptors are not aimed at Russia. It’s time to bring U.S. nuclear force structure in line with its declaratory nuclear policy. —TOM Z. COLLINA

At their May 20-21 summit in Chicago, NATO leaders missed an important opportunity to change the Alliance’s outdated nuclear policy and open the way to improving European security by the removal of the remaining 180 U.S. nuclear bombs in Europe, which serve no practical military value for the defense of the Alliance.

The Alliance’s Deterrence and Defense Posture Review (DDPR) was launched at NATO’s Lisbon summit in November 2010 primarily to resolve differences among allies on the future role of nuclear weapons. The result is an indecisive document that dodges the main issues separating allies around nuclear deterrence and it fails to advance President Obama’s and the Alliance’s stated goal of reducing the role and number of nuclear weapons.

Muddled Declaratory Policy

In the DDPR, NATO allies recognize that negative security assurances can have “a positive effect” in discouraging proliferation by assuring non-nuclear weapon states that they will not be subject to nuclear blackmail or attack. Yet, NATO fails to draw the right lessons from this analysis.

At the insistence of France, there is no unified policy on the basic purpose of nuclear weapons for the Alliance. Instead, the DDPR repeats the vague phrase from the 2010 Strategic Concept: “The circumstances in which any use of nuclear weapons might have to be contemplated are extremely remote.”

The DDPR goes on to recognize that the three owners of nuclear weapons within NATO (the United States, the U.K., and France) will determine how and when to use or threaten to use their nuclear weapons: “Allies note that the states that have assigned nuclear weapons to NATO apply to these weapons the assurances they have each offered on a national basis, including the separate conditions each state has attached to these assurances.” It erroneously characterizes this as giving comfort to non-nuclear weapon states in conformity with their NPT obligations, as France has so far resisted giving any such guarantees.

This leaves NATO’s joint nuclear policy in a mess, with different policies governing those nuclear weapons assigned to NATO depending upon the state that owns them, and other NATO states having no say in the matter.

At Chicago, NATO leaders should have clarified that the fundamental purpose of nuclear weapons for the entire Alliance is to deter a nuclear attack by a potential adversary and that all of NATO pledges not to use or threaten to use nuclear weapons against members of the nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty that are non-nuclear-weapon states.

Such a policy would have brought NATO into alignment with the nuclear doctrine of the United Kingdom and with the results of the 2010 U.S. Nuclear Posture Review Report, which states that: “the fundamental role of U.S. nuclear forces is to deter nuclear attacks against the U.S. and our allies and partners.”

Such a formulation, if fully embraced by NATO, would have signaled the Alliance is serious about reducing the salience of nuclear weapons and is prepared to take concrete actions to fulfill its 2010 Lisbon summit pledge to create the conditions for a world without nuclear weapons.

Instead, the DDPR makes it clear that NATO will continue to maintain and even modernize the remaining 180 U.S. forward-deployed B-61 nuclear gravity bombs in Belgium, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, and Turkey. The DDPR notes that: “Allies … will ensure that all components of NATO’s nuclear deterrent remain safe, secure, and effective for as long as NATO remains a nuclear alliance.”

The life extension program for the B61 and upgrades to the dual-capable aircraft that can deliver them will come at significant financial cost. And because the B61 modernization program would increase the military capabilities of weapons deployed in Europe by improving accuracy on target, Russia might use this as an excuse to continue investing in the upkeep of its own tactical nuclear arsenal.

Dubious Linkages

As was expected, the DDPR conditions further progress in reducing the role and the number of forward-deployed U.S. nuclear weapons in Europe to progress in discussions with Russia on transparency measures on tactical nuclear weapons.

The DDPR says: “NATO is prepared to consider further reducing its requirement for non-strategic nuclear weapons assigned to the Alliance in the context of reciprocal steps by Russia, taking into account the greater Russian stockpiles of non-strategic nuclear weapons stationed in the Euro-Atlantic area.”

“Allies look forward to continuing to develop and exchange transparency and confidence-building ideas with the Russian Federation in the NATO-Russia Council, with the goal of developing detailed proposals on and increasing mutual understanding of NATO’s and Russia’s non-strategic nuclear force postures in Europe.”

It is encouraging that a process to revise the nuclear status quo has finally begun: NATO members are finally prepared to discuss tactical nuclear arms control and transparency with Russia; and the DDPR now tasks the officials in Brussels to explore options for reduced reliance on the weapons.

However, NATO’s decision to hang on to these obsolete relics will not likely provide the meaningful leverage vis-à-vis Russia, which views its tactical nuclear weapons primarily as a means to compensate for NATO’s convention military superiority and Chinese forces. Because of the divisions in NATO over its nuclear deployments in Europe, and their likely withdrawal over the long-run, there is actually a perverse incentive for the Russians to stall on any agreement on tactical nuclear arsenals.

In order to put greater pressure on Russia to reciprocate, Alliance members must provide meaningful leadership.

Following the Chicago summit, President Obama and other Alliance political leaders should send a clearer signal that they will actually begin the process of withdrawing the existing U.S. tactical weapons from Europe and halt the planned modernization of the B61 nuclear gravity bombs assigned to NATO.

By agreeing to remove these nuclear relics from Europe and beginning the process with some early withdrawals of the B61s, NATO would eliminate Russia’s long-standing and cynical excuse not to begin discussions on tactical nuclear arms control, and increase pressure on Russia to account for and to further consolidate its own larger stockpile of battlefield nuclear bombs, which may number as many as 2,000.

Vague Requirements

The DDPR concludes that the alliance’s existing nuclear force posture “currently meets the criteria for an effective deterrence and defense posture” and it refers to an unspecified “requirement for non-strategic nuclear weapons assigned to the Alliance,” but fails to explain what political or military function they actually serve.

It is past time for NATO to explicitly acknowledge that these battlefield nuclear bombs no longer serve any meaningful or credible military role in the defense of NATO. They do little, if anything, to assure allies who feel threatened by Russia.

As the current U.S. ambassador to NATO, Ivo Daalder, wrote in Arms Control Today sixteen years ago:

“…U.S. nuclear weapons can now be removed from Europe—they no longer serve the political or military function they once did.”^[i]

His statement is even more valid today.

The devastating power and collateral effects of such weapons make them inappropriate tools against non-nuclear targets, while the possible loss or theft of these weapons poses additional dangers.

Top U.S. officials, including White House adviser Gary Samore, have also acknowledged that “whatever military mission they serve could of course also be accomplished through the use of systems that are not tactical systems based in Europe.”

The DDPR itself implicitly acknowledges that the Alliance’s nuclear deterrence capabilities do not require the presence of the 180 B61 nuclear gravity bombs stationed in Europe, but instead, those requirements are met by the strategic nuclear arsenals of Alliance members.

The DDPR states that:  “The supreme guarantee of the security of the Allies is provided by the strategic nuclear forces of the Alliance, particularly those of the United States; [and] the independent strategic nuclear forces of the United Kingdom and France ….”

Bottom Line

The U.S. tactical nuclear weapons deployed in Europe are more of a liability than an asset.

To engage Russia in a process that begins to reduce its far larger tactical nuclear arsenal, NATO must recapture that bold vision of the 1991-92 Presidential Nuclear Initiatives—which led the withdrawal and dismantlement of thousands of forward-deployed U.S. and Soviet tactical nuclear weapons.  Instead, NATO has revived an East-West mindset that makes decisions about the future of U.S. non-strategic nuclear weapons in Europe contingent upon Russian steps.

It is past time to complete the process that was begun two decades ago of withdrawing non-strategic nuclear weapons from Europe to motivate Russia to follow suit.

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

By Tom Z. Collina 

The House Armed Services Committee’s (HASC) May 9 vote to build a third strategic missile interceptor site on the East Coast by the end of 2015 is generating a great deal of controversy, and for good reason. A close look at the HASC proposal shows that it is premature at best.

House Republicans, such as Rep. Michael Turner (R-Ohio), are using a forthcoming classified report by the National Research Council (NRC) to justify their proposal for an East Coast site. However, Rep. Turner is cherry-picking the NRC’s results to support his position.

NRC’s recommendations make it clear that the current West Coast interceptor system is not effective, and would have to be completely redesigned, retested and rebuilt before it could be installed on the East Coast. HASC’s requirement to deploy the third site by late 2015 is thus highly unrealistic.

The United States already has two Ground-based Midcourse Defense (GMD) sites on the West Coast, with 30 interceptors deployed in California and Alaska, to handle a potential attack from North Korea. The GMD system has not had a successful intercept test against a cooperative target since 2008, with two failures in 2010.

The Obama administration is building another interceptor system in Europe, known as the Phased Adaptive Approach (PAA), to handle potential attacks from Iran. The system’s Phase IV, to be deployed in 2020, would seek to intercept long-range missiles that could reach the United States. Neither North Korea nor Iran has yet deployed long-range missiles that could reach the United States.

The main conclusions of the NRC report, called Making Sense of Ballistic Missile Defense: An Assessment of Concepts and Systems for U.S. Boost-Phase Missile Defense in Comparison to Other Alternatives, were made public in an April 30, 2012 letter from committee co-chairs L. David Montague and Walter B. Slocombe to the chairman and ranking member of the HASC.

The letter states that, “The current GMD system has serious shortcomings, and provides at best a limited, initial defense against a relatively primitive threat. However, it can be fixed.” To do so, the NRC suggests a new two-stage Ground-Based Interceptor (GBI) that is smaller and faster (6 km/sec) than the current GBI and a new “more capable” kill vehicle. In other words, their “fix” includes a completely new interceptor system, which will take significant time and money to develop.

Only after the new interceptor and kill vehicle are ready, then the NRC says the system could be deployed initially at a third site “in the northeastern part of the U.S.,” and thereafter used to replace the GBI system on the West Coast, for a total of 100 deployed interceptors. No timeframe is given.

The NRC report states that this plan would make Phase IV of the European PAA redundant, and thus that phase should be cancelled. In addition, the Bush administration’s plan (since abandoned by the Obama administration) for a third site in Poland would not have been effective as it would have used a derivative of the GBI, which the committee recommends replacing.

In addition, the NRC report found that boost-phase intercept is not feasible, and thus mid-course intercept is the most promising means of intercepting long-range ballistic missiles. Even so, the NRC notes that an effective mid-course system must confront the “discrimination challenge,” which means it must be able to tell the difference between real target warheads and decoys.

The NRC analysis raises some crucial points that actually undercut arguments for an East Coast site:

1. The current West Coast GMD system is not working and needs to be replaced, and a third site should not be built until new technology is developed and tested. Such a process is not likely to be completed by HASC’s deadline of late 2015.
2. The proposed East Coast site is an alternative to EPAA Phase IV; we do not need both.
3. The East Coast system, like all mid-course intercept plans, would be vulnerable to decoys and other countermeasures, for which no answer has been found after decades of trying.

Given the NRC’s concerns about the current GMD system, it is not clear why it would recommend a new East Coast system before getting the West Coast system right. In any case, in light of the NRC’s findings, the HASC proposal to build a new site by late 2015 seems woefully out of touch with technical reality.

NOTE: This post follows up on an article published in Arms Control Today, May 2, 2012

To the surprise of many, NATO foreign and defense ministers agreed on a draft text of the Deterrence and Defense Posture Review (DDPR) report during their April 18-19 Brussels meetings. The agreement on the 3½-page draft was possible because Germany, France, the United Kingdom, and the United States presented other allies with a compromise proposal, which was adopted with only minor revisions.

Even though the document still has to be approved by heads of state and government at the May 20-21 Chicago summit, it is very likely that this classified draft will be adopted without major changes, according to confidential conversations with diplomats and officials from more than half a dozen NATO member states and from NATO headquarters.

The DDPR report apparently does not change any aspect of NATO’s current nuclear posture as outlined in the Strategic Concept agreed in Lisbon in November 2010. But some believe that it can provide the flexible basis for future revisions of NATO’s nuclear policy—and the deployment of some 180 U.S. nuclear gravity bombs in five European NATO countries—if and when the alliance chooses to act. The document was described by one official familiar with the deliberations as the foundation for change, but not the change itself.

Concrete adjustments, however, will not likely emerge in NATO nuclear planning or practices until well after the NATO summit—unless NATO leaders in Chicago give the sort of clear guidance for follow-on discussions that has been lacking up to now.

France has been a major obstacle to change. The French government has resisted the continuation of the NATO nuclear deterrence dialogue beyond Chicago, having been skeptical of the need for the DDPR in the first place. In an April 20 interview, a senior French diplomat directly involved in the negotiations said that through the DDPR report, “NATO members have reconfirmed the Alliance’s posture, as it was agreed in Lisbon. The DDPR report reinforces the fundamentals of that posture, which is a good thing as a robust deterrence and defense posture rests first and foremost on Alliance unity. In many ways, allies have come to the conclusion: ‘If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.’”

Transparency Measures and Arms Control

NATO has apparently agreed on an approach by which it will seek discussions with Russia on reciprocal measures to address the remaining forward-deployed U.S. nuclear weapons in Europe and the larger number of Russian tactical nuclear weapons that are on Russian territory. The German magazine Der Spiegel on April 30 cited the DDPR report as saying that NATO intends to “consider options to further reduce tactical nuclear weapons” if Russia undertakes reciprocal measures.

According to diplomatic sources, NATO has agreed to offer proposals to Russia to increase transparency and build confidence on tactical nuclear weapons, yet some of the diplomats interviewed are skeptical that Russia would engage in such discussions anytime soon. The French diplomat said: “at no stage did anyone propose that the alliance take unilateral measures to increase transparency on nuclear weapons.”

In the DDPR report, the allies apparently decided to set up a new committee to inform discussions on nuclear arms control and confidence building, replacing the WMD Control and Disarmament Committee (WCDC). Germany argued that the committee “should continue to exist beyond the NATO summit,” France was opposed. Despite agreement to establish this new committee, the allies must still work out whether and how they will continue their discussions of NATO’s nuclear posture beyond the summit.

In interviews, diplomats said the DDPR will not contain a mandate for this new committee and that its terms of reference will be an issue for discussion after the Chicago summit. It took the alliance 10 months to agree on such a tasking for the DDPR itself.

The French diplomat said: “There will be no formal continuation of the DDPR. The report settles the key issues that had to be discussed.” He conceded that “NATO will continue to adjust different elements of its deterrence and defense posture, including its nuclear posture, as it has done in the past since 1949. Thus, the relevant NATO committees will continue to discuss the pertinent issues.” Others, however, insisted that the DDPR draft text preserves the character of discussions under the DDPR, and will frame future conversations.

What Are NATO Nuclear Weapons For?

A peculiar compromise was apparently reached on NATO’s future declaratory policy. In discussions on the DDPR some, including Germany, had argued that NATO should take on board the negative security assurances (NSAs) that the United Kingdom and the United States issued in 2010 for parties to the nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) that are in compliance with their nonproliferation obligations. France, which has not issued similar assurances, has consistently refused to discuss the issue, arguing, for example, that NATO has no legal authority to issue NSAs. According to several sources, NATO in the DDPR report will now “acknowledge” the different nuclear doctrines of the three NATO nuclear-weapon states, but the DDPR apparently has not produced a single, unified NATO policy on the role of nuclear weapons assigned to NATO, nor a unified assurance declaration.

The French diplomat said that “there was a small handful of states that wanted NATO to have a declaratory policy” but pointed out that “none of the three NATO nuclear-weapon states was ready to have NATO issue negative security assurances” because the authority to release nuclear weapons remains in the hands of possessor states. Others sources said that the United States and United Kingdom were ready to agree to some form of joint NATO declaratory policy without legally binding NSAs, but were unable to overcome French opposition.

This suggests that even after months of discussions the DDPR has not moved much, if at all, beyond the language in the Strategic Concept of 2010 on the role of nuclear weapons.

One question left for the summit is to decide whether to make the report public. Our sources says that only one country (not France) appears to be opposing this. Given the general nature of the text, classifying it would be clearly be counterproductive because it would demonstrate that the alliance is unable to engage with its publics.

A Preliminary Assessment

While NATO has completed its homework in drafting the DDPR report in time for the summit, it has not finished the work necessary to provide a sustainable, coherent nuclear posture for the new century. In the view of some, the DDPR was set up to adjust the mix of military assets necessary to defend NATO and help make the transition away from Cold War-era defense involving the stationing of U.S. forward-deployed nuclear bombs in Europe under current nuclear sharing arrangements.

Unfortunately, it appears that NATO has so far failed to resolve its internal differences and ambiguities on these matters, leaving this issue to be dealt with later. For now, it is likely that NATO will be left with inconsistent nuclear doctrines, no clear declaratory policy, and publics left out of the discussion.

Senior U.S. officials have stated that “whatever military mission” tactical nuclear weapons serve “could of course also be accomplished through the use of systems that are not tactical systems based in Europe.” But NATO continues to tie its hands by linking changes in its nuclear posture to Russian reciprocal measures.

As we argue in a detailed article— “The NATO Summit: Recasting the Debate Over U.S. Nuclear Weapons in Europe”—in the May edition of Arms Control Today, NATO leaders need to issue a clear tasking to the successor committee to the WCDC, so that it can come up with proposals on how NATO can best support the nuclear arms control process between the United States and Russia.

The allies also need to give guidance to the relevant NATO committees to propose a detailed set of options on how the alliance can replace existing nuclear sharing arrangements. This is necessary to improve the relationship with Russia and to send a strong message to the 2015 NPT Review Conference that the alliance is living up to its commitment to reinforce arms control, promote disarmament and create the conditions for a world free of nuclear weapons.

If NATO allies do not jointly move in this direction, they will inevitably stretch alliance unity and cohesion. The more progressive member states already feel the pressure from their own publics and fellow non-nuclear-weapon states to reduce reliance on nuclear deterrence generally and end nuclear sharing specifically. The DDPR report does not preclude such change, but NATO leaders at Chicago will need to do better and give future discussions on NATO’s nuclear posture meaning and direction.

Image Source: U.S. Representative Michael Turner Photo

By Kelsey Davenport

Lawmakers attempting hold New START implementation hostage to budget increases were stuck a serious blow last week when the House and Senate Appropriations committees lined up in support of the administration’s decision to zero out funding for the Chemistry and Metallurgy Research Replacement Facility (CMRR) and delay construction of the building for at least five years.

Neither appropriations committee moved to restore any funding for the CMRR when they voted on the fiscal year 2013 budget for the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA). The proposed facility is intended to support plutonium pit production activities at the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico – which NNSA officials now say can be met with existing facilities.

Republican lawmakers, such as Representative Michael Turner (R–Ohio), claim that the administration’s decision to cut CMRR violates a commitment made by President Obama during the New START debate to fund “nuclear modernization” at levels outlined in 2010. Since then, the Congress has reduced funding for the administration’s budget requests for NNSA weapons activities and Congress approved the bipartisan Budget Control Act. Although the administration’s FY2013 $7.6 billion request for National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) weapons activities is 4% lower than projected in 2010, it is still  5% higher than the 2012 enacted budget–a large increase in tough budget times.

Nevertheless, in March of this year Rep. Turner introduced legislation which would block New START implementation until the administration certifies that NNSA weapons activities programs are being funded to the projected 2010 levels, including restoration of CMRR’s construction budget.

Rep. Turner may offer amendments along these lines to the House defense bill next week, despite testimony from NNSA and the Department of Defense that completing CMRR at this time is not necessary to maintain the nuclear stockpile and fiscally irresponsible, given budget constraints.

The appropriations votes further isolate Rep. Turner’s position. Even in the Republican controlled House, there was no move to restore funding for CMRR in committee. The accompanying report requested only that NNSA provide further information on the U.S.’s plutonium strategy during the delay period.

The appropriation passed by each committee also reflected the administration’s decision to prioritize construction of the Uranium Processing Facility (UPF) at the Y-12 facility in Tennessee. Both the House and Senate committees recommended the $340 million requested to accelerate UPF construction.  The Senate committee report, however, stipulated that $180 million not be made available until the design of the facility was 90 percent complete and the costs and construction schedule for the building are submitted.

The construction budget for CMRR and UPF falls into the NNSA’s weapons activities account. The Senate Appropriations committee fully funded the administration’s top line request of nearly $7.6 billion for weapons activities. The House Appropriations version of the legislation came in at $7.5 billion, $65 million below the request.

Life Extension Programs

The administration received less support in its decision to reprioritize spending on life extension programs (LEPs), which also fall into NNSA’s weapons activities account. Two warheads, the W76 and the B61, are currently being refurbished by the NNSA. The W76 warheads are deployed on Ohio-class submarine-launched ballistic missiles; whereas the B61 is a gravity bomb delivered by the U.S. bomber fleet and certified NATO aircraft. While the scope and costs of the B61 LEP have been a matter of Congressional concern in the past, lawmakers disagreed with the administration’s decision to slow production of the W76.

In the fiscal year 2013 budget request, the administration indicated that it planned to reduce the production rate of the refurbished warheads and cut the funding request to $175 million. The Senate appropriations committee approved a $30 million increase for the W76 LEP, bringing the appropriation to nearly $205 million. The report language stated that the shift in funding would cause a three-year delay in completing the program. In addition, it said that the administration’s justification for the decrease, namely shifting funds to support the B61 LEP, is not an efficient use of funding because the B61 program is already behind schedule.

The House Appropriations committee report also added $45 million to the W76 LEP, bringing its recommended appropriation to $220 million. The report cited the increased funding as necessary to “sustain” the level of production output.

The administration requested $369 million for the B61. The House committee funded the LEP at the requested level, while the Senate recommended an appropriation of $339 million, a $30 million decrease.

The committee report cited carry over balances from the previous year as the reason for the reduction and expressed concern over delays in the B61 LEP schedule, which is preventing a full cost, schedule and scope from being produced for consideration. The report further stipulated that no funding be used for the program until the cost, schedule and scope are submitted by NNSA.

EU's High Representative Catherine Ashton and U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

By Peter Crail

An April 27 Los Angeles Times story reports that “U.S. officials said they might agree to let Iran continue enriching uranium up to 5% purity, which is the upper end of the range for most civilian uses, if its government agrees to the unrestricted inspections, strict oversight and numerous safeguards that the United Nations has long demanded.”

The story says that the prospect for such an arrangement “would be a significant concession” on the part of the United States and “a shift in the U.S. position that Iran must halt all enrichment activities.”

The conclusions drawn by the L.A. Times misreads the history of the U.S. position and U.S. efforts to resolve the Iran nuclear issue with the P5+1.

Although there has long been a preference on the part of the United States and many of its allies for zero enrichment in Iran (indeed, opposition to the spread of any uranium enrichment capability to any additional countries has been long-standing U.S. policy and an important nonproliferation principle), the potential to discuss with Iran the conditions under which it could continue enrichment is not new. In fact, it is built into the proposals that the P5+1 have offered Iran since 2006, spanning the George W. Bush and Barack Obama administrations.

Then as now, the P5+1 require Iran to suspend uranium enrichment. The 2006 proposal, and it’s 2008 update, include a review mechanism for that suspension to determine whether concerns over Iran’s nuclear activities had been fully resolved, thereby meeting key conditions under which Iran could potentially resume enrichment. That proposal is still on the table.

Such a review mechanism appears consistent with what a senior administration told the LA Times:

“A senior administration official said that if Iran fulfills U.S. and other world powers’ demands for strict enforcement of U.N. monitoring and safeguards, “there can be a discussion” of allowing low-level domestic enrichment, “and maybe we can get there, potentially.”

The shift by the Obama administration appears to be more a matter of its willingness to publicly state that there could be conditions under which Iran could maintain some enrichment capabilities, rather than a willingness to entertain the idea in the first place.

In March 2011, Secretary Clinton told the House Foreign Affairs Committee regarding Iran’s claimed right to enrichment, “it has been our position that under very strict conditions Iran would, sometime in the future, having responded to the international community’s concerns and irreversibly shut down its nuclear weapons program, have such a right under IAEA inspections.”

As White House WMD Coordinator Gary Samore said in an Arms Control Today interview the following month:

“What Secretary Clinton said has made explicit what has always been implicit in our policy, going back to the Bush administration, that if Iran were to satisfy the UN Security Council that its nuclear intentions were peaceful, then we would have no objection to Iran engaging in the full suite of peaceful nuclear activities.”

The most critical shift by the Obama administration was lifting the precondition that the United States would not hold talks with Iran as part of the P5+1 until Iran already carried out a key goal of those talks, suspending uranium enrichment. In doing so, Washington showed that it is far more committed to reaching a peaceful resolution to the nuclear file.

While a negotiated solution in which Iran abandons enrichment would be ideal—Iran does not need to enrich uranium because it imports its nuclear fuel and enrichment capabilities should be consolidated rather than spread—there is no foreseeable peaceful resolution that does not entail potential Iranian enrichment.

Allowing the perfect to be the enemy of the good could result in another regional conflict, an Iranian nuclear weapon, or both. The debate needs to shift to the steps Iran needs to take to prove its claims that it is not seeking and will not seek nuclear weapons to meet the conditions under which it could carry out its rights under the NPT.

As the House Armed Services Committee marks up its version of the fiscal 2013 defense authorization bill, some strange proposals are emerging. Perhaps the oddest, from Rep. Michael Turner (R-Ohio), chair of the strategic forces subcommittee, is to build another ground-based missile defense (GMD) site on the east coast by 2015.

But wait. The United States already has two GMD sites on the west coast, with 30 interceptors deployed in California and Alaska, to handle an attack from North Korea. And the Obama administration is building another interceptor system in Europe, known as the Phased Adaptive Approach (PAA), to handle attacks from Iran. Never mind that neither country has yet deployed long-range missiles that could reach the United States.

Before we rush out and build another GMD site on Rehoboth beach, lets see how the current systems are doing.

Even on the surface, it is clear that missile defense is a hard job. The GMD system has not had a successful intercept test against a cooperative target since 2008, with two failures in 2010, and the PAA’s Standard Missile-3 (SM-3) IB failed its first flight test in 2011.

But dig a little deeper and you’ll find that neither system has been tested against a realistic target including decoys.

This is a big deal, because one of the most significant challenges to a successful intercept of a target warhead in outer space, known as midcourse intercept, is that the attacker can add numerous decoys or countermeasures to confuse and overwhelm the defense. If the defense cannot distinguish a real warhead from a fake, then it must shoot interceptors at all of them. Interceptor missiles would be in limited supply and are much more expensive to produce than decoys. Both the GMD and the SM-3 system are designed to intercept targets in space.

The Defense Science Board, an advisory group to the Pentagon, addressed this issue in a little-noticed September 2011 report, saying that “the importance of achieving reliable midcourse discrimination cannot be overemphasized.” Missile defense is “predicated on the ability to discriminate” real warheads from other targets, “such as rocket bodies, miscellaneous hardware, and intentional countermeasures,” the report said.

One way to pre-empt this challenge is for the defense to try to intercept a target missile before it has released its warhead and decoys. Intercepting missiles in their boost phase, while the rocket booster is still firing, is “currently not feasible,” according to the report. Instead, the report considers “early intercept,” defined as the interval between boost and warhead release. That phase, according to the report, lasts about 100 seconds.

The report concludes that early intercept, a mission that has been proposed for the missile interceptor system in Europe, “requires Herculean effort and is not realistically achievable, even under the most optimistic set of deployment, sensor capability, and missile technology assumptions.” The main problem is that defensive missiles would not be able to reach the target quickly enough. “[I]n most cases 100 seconds is too late” to prevent the release of decoys, the report found, and “intercepts would have to be achieved well inside this timeline.”

‘Shooting at Missile Junk’

The Defense Science Board report goes on to say, “If the defense should find itself in a situation where it is shooting at missile junk or decoys, the impact on the regional interceptor inventory would be dramatic and devastating!” If the defense cannot prevent the release of decoys, it must be able to distinguish real targets from fakes. However, according to the report, “discrimination in the exo-atmosphere [i.e., space] is still not a completely solved problem.”

This is a vast understatement. J. Michael Gilmore, the Pentagon’s director of operational testing, testified before the House Armed Services Strategic Forces Subcommittee on March 6 that “comprehensive quantitative assessments” of U.S. missile interceptor systems “is still a number of years away.”

Gilmore testified before the same subcommittee last year that the closest the MDA has come to conducting a test against decoys was the GMD system test in December 2008, called FTG-05. “Although simple countermeasures were planned for FTG-05,” he said, “a malfunction prevented deployment.” The next two tests, FTG-06 and FTG-06a, successfully deployed simple countermeasures; but the “kill vehicles malfunctioned before they could complete their intercepts in the countermeasures environments,” he said.

Missile defense on the east coast? Let’s see if we can tackle the decoy problem first.

Trident D-5 missile fails to perform in flight test.

Sometimes former national security heavyweights still have some insights on nuclear weapons policy–sometimes they don’t.

In an oped in The Washington Post today, Former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger and General Brent Scowcroft make the incorrect presumption that the Barack Obama administration’s ongoing review of nuclear force requirements and planning for the next round of nuclear reductions is based on “an abstract preconceived determination” for nuclear weapons policy.

The two former national security officials cite a February Associated Press report on the Nuclear Posture Review (NPR) Implementation Study, which cited an unnamed source who erroneously claimed that President Obama had ordered the Pentagon to develop plans to reduce the deployed strategic arsenal to 300 warheads. That report has been dismissed by senior administration officials, who called it “wildly overwritten.”

Kissinger and Scowcroft then proceed in their oped to state some standard principles for consideration as the United States considers further nuclear reductions, all of which are specifically addressed in the NPR.

They should both know better or at least hire better research assistants. Just last week, Assistant Secretary of Defense for Global Strategic Affairs Madelyn Creedon testified before the House Armed Services Committee and said:

“.. the presidentially directed NPR follow-on analysis … is underway. This analysis will culminate in updated nuclear guidance, which will in turn inform the Administration’s policy decisions regarding potential future nuclear weapons reductions while strengthening deterrence of regional adversaries, enhancing strategic stability vis-à-vis Russia and China, and continuing assurance of our allies and partners. The analysis will not revisit the principles or conclusions of the NPR; rather, it is a key component of the NPR’s implementation. 
 
In fact, in performing this analysis, we focused on achieving the five strategic objectives that the Nuclear Posture Review established: 
 
· Preventing nuclear proliferation and nuclear terrorism; 
 
· Reducing the role of U.S. nuclear weapons in U.S. national strategy; 
 
· Maintaining strategic deterrence and stability at reduced nuclear force levels; 
 
· Strengthening deterrence and assuring U.S. allies and partners; and 
 
· Sustaining a safe, secure, and effective nuclear arsenal. 
 
Last year, Principal Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Policy Jim Miller explained to the House Armed Services Committee that DoD has been assessing deterrence requirements against these metrics.” 

On March 25, President Obama himself spoke on the subject, noting:

“My Administration’s nuclear posture recognizes that the massive nuclear arsenal we inherited from the Cold War is poorly suited for today’s threats, including nuclear terrorism.  Last summer, I therefore directed my national security team to conduct a comprehensive study of our nuclear forces.  That study is still underway.

But even as we have more work to do, we can already say with confidence that we have more nuclear weapons than we need.  Even after New START, the United States will still have more than 1,500 deployed nuclear weapons, and some 5,000 warheads.  I firmly believe that we can ensure the security of the United States and our allies, maintain a strong deterrent against any threat, and still pursue further reductions in our nuclear arsenal.“

Clearly, The Washington Post needs to fact check their opeds a bit better and Kissinger and Scowcroft need to get a briefing from officials in the Obama administration on the topic.

All that said, everyone should keep in mind that significant changes in outdated U.S. nuclear war-fighting strategy and further reciprocal reductions in U.S. and Russian arsenals are possible and prudent.

A commonsense, 21st century evaluation of nuclear deterrence should lead to the conclusion that no more than a few hundred strategic warheads—deployed on highly survivable delivery systems—can provide more than enough firepower to deter nuclear attack by any current or future adversary. Other than Russia, only one other U.S. adversary has nuclear weapons on long-range ballistic missiles (China with 50).

As the Pentagon’s new 2012 defense strategy says: “It is possible that our deterrence goals can be achieved with a smaller nuclear force.”

Iran's chief nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili and EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton in Istanbul

By Michael Brzoska, Oliver Meier, and Götz Neuneck

In a climate of escalation, the outline of a lasting and peaceful resolution of the conflict over Iran’s nuclear activities can be sketched with a good degree of clarity and certainty. Seven necessary elements of a compromise package can be condensed from the many political debates and expert discussions about Iran’s nuclear program. All of these should be acceptable to the United States, the EU and Iran.

However, as is often the case in such situations, the major problem is not defining the outline of a sustainable solution, but reaching it. While a compromise outcome is fairly simple to describe, the way towards such a solution is strewn with political obstacles, as the level of mistrust on both sides remains extremely high. Furthermore, it is by no means certain that leaders on both sides possess the political will and sufficient clout to take the risks involved in seeking a jointly acceptable solution.

Yet, the alternatives are even worse. Continuing the current course of confrontation instigates Iran to improve its capability to build nuclear weapons if it chose to do so. Military escalation is not likely to lead to a solution of the conflict and increases the danger of an escalation of violence in the region.

Elements of a Solution to the Dispute over Iran’s Nuclear Activities

What elements would a sustainable compromise package that is acceptable to both the West and to the Iranian leadership have to contain?

First, the West and the international community more broadly need to accept that enrichment of uranium takes place in Iran. A permanent abandonment of enrichment, as some have called for, is unrealistic, if only because there are no political actors in Iran would support such a step. Thus, Iran must be allowed to enrich uranium for civil purposes and in compliance with extended safeguards commitments.

However, if Iran wishes the United States and the EU member states to accept a compromise that includes uranium enrichment, it will also have to be prepared to take steps to assure that such activities are for peaceful purposes only.

As the second element of a stable settlement, Iran must ratify and implement in a binding fashion an Additional Protocol for the inspection of its nuclear activities. In contrast to the “comprehensive safeguards protocol”, which restricts the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to the inspection of declared facilities and nuclear material, the Additional Protocol allows the IAEA to carry out – under certain conditions – inspections anywhere in the country. The Additional Protocol is therefore necessary to provide confidence that Iran is not carrying out a secret nuclear program. Iran has already signed an Additional Protocol but has stopped its implementation and has not ratified it.

As the third element, Iran must limit its uranium enrichment program. Being able to enrich uranium brings a country closer to nuclear weapons capability. The more efficient the enrichment capacity and the higher the degree of enrichment, the more rapidly weapons-grade material can be produced and used to make a nuclear device. Iran can justify, with reference to the use of such material in the energy generation programs in other countries, enrichment of uranium to a level of up to 5%.

More problematic is enrichment to a level of 20 %, ostensibly for use in its Teheran research reactor. However, this reaction only needs small amounts of 20% material. Based on the public justifications of its nuclear program, Iran should be willing to restrict enrichment activities, and generally limit the enrichment level to 5% material. If it can be agreed that one or more states can supply Iran with fuel for its Tehran Research Reactor, there would be no need to make an exception for the enrichment of 20% enriched material exclusively for that reactor. Restrictions of this kind would be more palatable to Iran if other states committed themselves to similar restrictions, thus removing the stigma of “special treatment” for Iran.

If proliferation-sensitive activities (particularly uranium enrichment) were conducted at a multilateral facility or managed by an international consortium, this would provide additional assurances, which would make a compromise solution more acceptable to the West. Teheran has in the past suggested similar approaches. A number of useful technical proposals have also been made that seek to make it more difficult to misuse civil uranium enrichment capabilities for military purposes. Technical details of how restrictions on uranium enrichment should be monitored could be worked out as soon as Iran accepts the concept in principle.

As the fourth element of a compromise package, Iran would have to give up the production of plutonium and the reprocessing of spent fuel. There is no current or planned civilian use for plutonium in Iran. The planned heavy water reactor at Arak, which will produce plutonium, presents additional dangers because it could easily provide plutonium for a military nuclear program. Yet, Arak does not make much sense in economic terms.

A commitment not to bring Arak into operation would be a means of building trust, and the abandonment of plutonium separation is seen in the West as a necessary precondition for a diplomatic solution. Here, too, similar undertakings by other states would help to make it easier for the Iranian leadership to agree.

The fifth element is the clarification of existing suspicions about past or current activities related to a possible nuclear weapons program. This does not necessarily require Iran to admit that it has breached the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). For instance, an IAEA commission could, in a confidential procedure together with Iran, clarify whether, when and how suspicious activities were discontinued. A precedent already exists: South Africa’s secret nuclear weapons program was dismantled in this way to the satisfaction of all concerned.

In return, the West must provide Iran with security guarantees. This is the sixth element. The United States, the UK, and France need to declare that Iran is fulfilling its obligations under the NPT and give formal guarantees that they will neither attack nor threaten to attack Iran with nuclear weapons. In addition, the United States needs to join France and the UK in granting the comprehensive security guarantees to Iran (which also covers attacks using conventional weapons) that were part of the offer made by European states in earlier negotiations. This could make reference to the ban on wars of aggression contained in the UN Charter.

Seventh, the West needs to gradually lift the sanctions that have been imposed as a reaction to Iran’s nuclear program. An agreement would need to be reached on the milestones for reversing the various sanctions, step by step. Parallel discussions on confidence-building with regard to Iran’s missile program and questions of maritime security would support efforts to reach agreement on the Iranian nuclear program. However, before both sides return to a regular dialogue on other matters, the dispute over the nuclear programme will need to be defused.

Obstacles on the Path to a Solution

While it is relatively easy to sketch out a compromise package consisting of the elements outlined above, in the current situation it will be difficult to implement such a solution. Two particularly serious obstacles stand in the way. The biggest hurdle is the high level of mutual mistrust. In the West, the majority of the political class is convinced that Iran is moving towards the development of an atomic bomb. Given Iran’s technical capabilities, it is impossible not to conclude that Iran is getting closer to being able to build nuclear weapons. Yet, other non-nuclear weapon states party the nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, including Brazil, have invested in enrichment facilities and are producing enriched uranium. But Brazil, unlike Iran, has not been found by the IAEA to be in noncompliance with its safeguard obligations and it does not face sanctions.

From the Iranian point of view, the West is applying double standards, and this is seen as a sign of hostile intentions towards Iran. The Iranian leadership believes that it is being singled out for punishment in order to justify Western support for regime change – potentially via the application of Western military force. As a first step towards a lasting compromise, it is therefore essential to mutually increase trust in the other side’s serious intention to seek a compromise solution.

The second major obstacle to a peaceful solution is differences regarding the form and content of a compromise package. There is no unity among the various political actors in Iran. Nor does the West speak with a single voice. In Teheran, various factions are using the nuclear issue to strengthen their positions in the domestic political power struggle.

The proposed “red lines” put forward by politicians in the West also vary widely. Here, too, the conflict with Iran is embedded in the domestic political context, including the U.S. presidential elections. These are perhaps the worst possible circumstances in which to try to reach agreement on a compromise that requires difficult concessions by both sides.

In the short-term, it will be crucial to prevent a military escalation through concrete confidence- and security-building measures. By actively participating in the conference planned for December 2012 on a WMD-free zone in the Middle East, and by ratifying the Comprehensive Nuclear Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT), Iran can actively contribute to building trust. Equally, Western support for the goal of a WMD-free zone in the Middle East and further steps in the area of nuclear disarmament, such as the ratification of the CTBT by the United States could strengthen Iran’s willingness to compromise. These measures would indicate a readiness on the part of the West to reduce its own stockpiles of nuclear weapons.

However, such steps will not sufficiently reduce the currently high levels of mistrust to enable negotiations on a compromise solution to go forward. In order for this to happen, further measures and actions will be necessary, which not only seek to defuse conflicts but also attempt to establish and expand regional cooperation – from Afghanistan, via efforts to combating drug production and trafficking, to tackling piracy in the Persian Gulf. Neighbors, such as Turkey and Saudi Arabia, should also be involved in the regional dialogue.

The political recognition of existing realities and the abandonment of efforts aimed at regime change in Iran would serve to increase confidence under existing conditions. The West needs to accept that political change in Iran can only come out of the country itself. Iran needs to end aggressive rhetoric directed at its regional neighbors and at Israel. Whether it will prove possible to achieve the compromise sketched above in practice thus depends above all on domestic political developments in Iran, the United States and Israel.

Prof. Dr. Michael Brzoska is director and Prof. Dr. Götz Neuneck is deputy director of the Institute for Peace Research and Security Policy at the University of Hamburg (IFSH). Dr. Oliver Meier is a research at IFSH and international representative of the Arms Control Association.

Note: This essay will also appear in the German-language journal Welttrends.