Nukes on a Blog

Welcome Remarks at Workshop on Teaching the Nuclear Fuel Cycle

noreply@blogger.com (Douglas B. Shaw) — Fri, 06 Apr 2012 12:30:00 +0000

Good morning, and welcome to The George Washington University’s Elliott School of International Affairs. I’m Doug Shaw, as associate dean here at GW’s Elliott School, and I am grateful for your participation in today’s workshop on Teaching the Nuclear Fuel Cycle: What do Policy Makers, Practitioners, and the Public Need to Know? I am particularly pleased to welcome Assistant Secretary of Energy for Nuclear Energy Peter Lyons, who I will introduce in a moment.

This event, and the Nuclear Policy Talks series of which it is part, responds to the mission of GW’s Elliott School to make the world a better place by conducting research on global human challenges, educating a new generation of leaders to respond to those challenges, and engaging the policy community facing those challenges every day.

Today’s discussion is particularly urgent.

We live in a dynamic moment in the understanding of the nuclear fuel cycle. Just last week in a speech at the Nuclear Security Summit in Seoul, South Korea, President Barack Obama said “We all know the problem: The very process that gives us nuclear energy can also put nations and terrorists within the reach of nuclear weapons,” and responded to that challenge by calling, among other things, for “an international commitment to unlocking the fuel cycle of the future.” In a short essay in The Huffington Post yesterday, President of the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation President Robert Gallucci responds to the urgent danger of nuclear terrorism by urging a ban on the production of fissile materials that would end the separation of plutonium from nuclear spent fuel and the enrichment of uranium to high levels. In yesterday’s Global Security Newswire, Elaine Grossman reported that the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission has deferred action on a petition from the American Physical Society urging that an assessment of proliferation risk should precede the licensing of each new enrichment or reprocessing facility. Informed opinions are converging on these important topics, but disagreements remain framed by differences in the perspectives of different expert communities. At GW, we are committed to helping to bring these communities into contact to better understand these important issues.

For nuclear security policy to progress on a productive and informed path, it is imperative that experts communicate effectively across their respective spheres of knowledge. Dr. James Doyle of Los Alamos National Laboratory identifies more than a dozen disciplines that constitute “nuclear security science.” Beyond the academy, communication between the policy, military, technical, business, scientific, and advocacy communities focused on nuclear technology is constrained, and there are few venues for the development of consensus or shared understanding. Efforts to assess proliferation risk and safety of nuclear energy choices are making progress, but this highly specialized knowledge is often developed and held within disciplinary and affinity group silos. These efforts do not yet respond to the need for greater communication across disciplines and communities.

Absent communication among these diverse expert groups, policy makers are constrained from the development of the best options to promote safety and security while the public is constrained from the development of opinions adequate to democratic decision making. Without this communication, efforts to educate a next generation of nuclear security leaders who can synthesize the insights of these various perspectives are impeded.

Responding to this problem requires a focused effort to combine the insights of technical, industrial, policy, and interdisciplinary scholarly communities around the proliferation implications of fuel cycle choices. The development of interdisciplinary nuclear curricula would mitigate these challenges by educating members of the next generation of nuclear security experts.

GW is taking on this challenge. The Nuclear Policy Talks series of which today’s event is part has brought more than 200 nuclear policy experts to campus in the last three years, ranging from Elliott School alumnae and New START negotiator, acting undersecretary of state for arms control and international security Rose Gottemoeller, to Senator Richard Lugar, to United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon to former Trident ballistic missile submarine commander turned GW Professor of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Murray Snyder. We are engaged in research on this topic, the 2010 MIT Press book Going Nuclear: Nuclear Proliferation and International Security in the 21st Century, co-edited by the Dean of GW’s Elliott School, Michael Brown, reflects. We are also developing new course offerings in this area, including a new graduate course this fall on nuclear materials science for non-technical students, to be offered by Professor of Chemistry and International Affairs Christopher Cahill, working on a grant from the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

We believe today’s discussion will support and enhance all these efforts. We will begin with remarks from Assistant Secretary Lyons, followed by a panel discussion on proliferation risk and nuclear fuel cycle choices, featuring prominent experts Sharon Squassoni, of the Center for Strategic and International Studies, who is a leading participant in the ongoing study at the National Academies on proliferation risk in the nuclear fuel cycle, Joseph Pilat from Los Alamos National Laboratories, and Seth Grae from the innovative nuclear fuel design firm Lightbridge, whose business model makes economic use of the differential in proliferation risk between fuel cycle choices. Over lunch, former head inspector of the International Atomic Energy Agency, Dr. Olli Heinonen, will share his expert perspective on the timely issue of Iran’s nuclear program. In the afternoon, a second panel will focus on the relationship between the reprocessing of spent nuclear fuel and global security, featuring the legendary expertise of Dr. Richard Garwin, the perspective of George Mason University Professor Allison MacFarlane fresh from service on the Blue Ribbon Commission on America’s Nuclear Future, and the industry perspective of Dororthy Davidson, Vice President of Nuclear Energy, Renewables, and Science Programs at AREVA Federal Services. Our third panel will reflect the work of a world-class team of experts, led by Dr. Michael Rosenthal of the Domestic Nuclear Detection Office of the Department of Homeland Security, that has recently completed a textbook manuscript on nuclear safeguards. In addition to Dr. Rosenthal, Ambassador Norm Wulf and Dr. Linda Gallini of the State Department will also address the crucial issue of safeguards. We are excited about this program and believe it to be unique, and are grateful to you for your participation.

So, without further discussion, it is my great honor to introduce The Honorable Dr. Peter B. Lyons, Assistant Secretary of Energy for Nuclear Energy. Dr. Lyons was confirmed by the Senate to this position a year ago next week, following two years of service as the Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary for Nuclear Energy.

The Honorable Peter B. Lyons was sworn in as a Commissioner of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission on January 25, 2005 and served until his term ended on June 30, 2009. At the NRC, Dr. Lyons focused on the safety of operating reactors and on the importance of learning from operating experience, even as new reactor licensing and possible construction emerged. He emphasized that NRC and its licensees remain strong and vigilant components of the Nation's integrated defenses against terrorism, and was a consistent voice for improving partnerships with international regulatory agencies. He emphasized active and forward-looking research programs to support sound regulatory decisions, address current issues and anticipate future ones. He was also a strong proponent of science and technology education, recruiting for diversity, employee training and development programs, and an open and collaborative working environment.

From 1969 to 1996, Dr. Lyons worked in progressively more responsible positions at the Los Alamos National Laboratory. During that time he served as Director for Industrial Partnerships, Deputy Associate Director for Energy and Environment, and Deputy Associate Director-Defense Research and Applications. While at Los Alamos, he spent over a decade supporting nuclear test diagnostics. Before becoming a Commissioner, Dr. Lyons served as Science Advisor on the staff of U.S. Senator Pete Domenici and the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources where he focused on military and civilian uses of nuclear technology, national science policy, and nuclear non-proliferation. Dr. Lyons has published more than 100 technical papers, holds three patents related to fiber optics and plasma diagnostics, and served as chairman of the NATO Nuclear Effects Task Group for five years.

Dr. Lyons was raised in Nevada. He received his doctorate in nuclear astrophysics from the California Institute of Technology in 1969 and earned his undergraduate degree in physics and mathematics from the University of Arizona in 1964. Dr. Lyons is a Fellow of the American Nuclear Society, a Fellow of the American Physical Society, was elected to 16 years on the Los Alamos School Board and spent six years on the University of New Mexico-Los Alamos Branch Advisory Board.

Please join me in welcoming The Honorable Peter Lyons.

Introductory remarks at Global Security Engagement Conference

noreply@blogger.com (Douglas B. Shaw) — Wed, 11 May 2011 14:06:00 +0000

Good morning, my name is Doug Shaw and I am an associate dean here at The George Washington University’s Elliott School of International Affairs.

It is an honor and a pleasure to welcome you to our campus for this important discussion of “Emerging Opportunities and Challenges in Global Security Engagement Programs. I’m grateful to all of you for participating in this important work, and particularly to the committee of conference organizers that has worked for several months to make this event possible. I am especially grateful to Ambassador Bonnie Jenkins, the State Department’s Coordinator for Cooperative Threat Reduction Programs for her vision to convene us here to explore a path forward toward Global Security Engagement.

The Elliott School is a great place for this discussion. Hopefully, our location will prove convenient for many of you. For those of you who haven’t been here before, the White House is that way, the State Department is over there, and the World Bank is around the corner and up the street.

Our location has been an important asset in the growth of the Elliott School. Originally founded in 1898 as the GW School of Comparative Jurisprudence and Diplomacy, we were renamed the Elliott School of International Affairs in 1988 and since then have grown into the largest school of international affairs in the country.

Our mission is a simple but important one: to create knowledge about important global issues, educate future leaders, and engage the public and policy communities to make our world a better place. In no topical area is this mission more urgent than the emerging field of Global Security Engagement and we are grateful that this conference and your presence will contribute to our ongoing efforts in knowledge creation, education, and policy engagement.

In terms of knowledge creation, GW’s Center for Nuclear Studies is home to one of the largest concentrations of nuclear physicists in higher education.

Nuclear physics has a distinguished history on this campus. In 1934, then GW President Cloyd Hecht Marvin decided to strengthen physics by hiring George Gamow who would become renowned for developing the big bang theory. The following year, they hired Edward Teller who would become the father of the American hydrogen bomb. And at GW on January 26, 1939 Nobel Laureate Niels Bohr reported the splitting of the uranium nucleus with a release of two hundred million electron volts of energy, heralding the beginning of the nuclear age. This important work in physics continues today, as the continued support of the Energy Department for our work and the International Atomic Energy Agency’s adoption of a description of neutron-proton interactions developed at GW’s Data Analysis Center as an international standard. Our science is top-shelf, and we are engaged in a University-wide discussion, led by Professor Chris Cahill in our Chemistry Department, to better understand and respond to the grand challenges of science that will emerge from the security challenges of the 21^st Century.

We are also grateful to have you here because this event will help engage young people in the important work of Global Security Engagement.

I am especially grateful to Ambassador Jenkins for making room for several Elliott School students at this conference. The Elliott School has a strong track record of educating leaders at the nexus of technology and security policy; our alumni include Assistant Secretary of State for Arms Control Verification and Compliance Rose Gottemoeller, Adam Scheinman of the National Security Council, and Jedidiah Royal of the Office of the Secretary of Defense. Several of my students are here with us today, and I hope their participation will spark and inform their interest in taking up this important work.

Finally, we are grateful that this conference will help us better engage the policy community.

GW’s Institute for Security and Conflict Studies hosts one of the most active event series on proliferation prevention in the world. Just over two years ago, renowned nuclear strategist Sir Lawrence Freedman visited the Elliott School and remarked on a “missing generation” of nuclear policy specialists. In an effort to learn more about and respond to this problem, we initiated a series of Nuclear Policy Talks – NPT – to bring leading specialists on all aspects of nuclear and nonproliferation policy to campus. When we break tomorrow, the number of expert presentations we have had on these topics on campus in the last two years will number more than 170, including remarks by United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki Moon, Senate Foreign Relations Committee Ranking Member Senator Richard Lugar, and Under Secretary of State for International Security and Arms Control Ellen Tauscher – twice. Video from a growing number of these talks is available at the Elliott School’s website, where you can also join the email listserve of more than 2,200 subscribers who receive regular updates about these events.

So, thank you all, again for participating and I look forward to a rich and productive discussion that will inform your work and our three part mission of research, teaching, and policy engagement.

arms control sweet spot

noreply@blogger.com (Douglas B. Shaw) — Thu, 13 Jan 2011 15:56:00 +0000

Draft outline of my spring course on Nuclear Proliferation and Nonproliferation

noreply@blogger.com (Douglas B. Shaw) — Fri, 15 Oct 2010 20:30:00 +0000

Substantive comments welcomed.

1: Technical requirements of nuclear proliferation

PART I: Nuclear Proliferation

2: Assessing nuclear proliferation

3. Explaining and predicting nuclear proliferation, part I

4: Explaining and predicting nuclear proliferation, part II

5. Security, alliance structure, and nuclear proliferation

6. Non-state actors, smuggling, and terrorism

7. Implications of a nuclear revival

PART II: Nuclear Nonproliferation

8: The global norm and the NPT bargain

7: Structuring international nuclear commerce

8: Safeguards and physical protection

10: Latency, Detection, and Warning

11: Enforcement and interdiction

12: Cooperative threat reduction

13: Counterproliferation by force

14: Security implications of the global nuclear system

A Dangerous Gap in Nuclear Education

noreply@blogger.com (Douglas B. Shaw) — Thu, 07 Oct 2010 20:01:00 +0000

Neglect of the study of nuclear weapons in higher education has resulted in a gap in the specialized knowledge needed today. In 2009 remarks at the Elliott School, Sir Lawrence Freedman observed a “missing generation” of nuclear policy experts. A quarter of the U.S. Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration staff will reach retirement age by 2013.[i] Half the International Atomic Energy Agency’s leadership will retire within five years.[ii] General Kevin Chilton who leads the U.S. Strategic Command observes: "We've allowed an entire generation to skip class."[iii] Various efforts respond to elements of this challenge: the Stanton Foundation’s nuclear security fellows program is supporting faculty development, the National Nuclear Security Administration’s Next Generation Safeguards Initiative is focusing resources on filling specific technical gaps, and the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies is innovating in the delivery of boutique graduate education. However, the vast majority of young Americans aspiring to careers in the executive and legislative branches of government, the defense contracting and consulting community, and the Washington non-profit sector will not receive formal education on nuclear issues. We remain dangerously unprepared for a future in which an increasing share of nuclear destructive potential will be recessed away from weapons deployment into the vagaries of nuclear fuel cycle operations.

[i] Bryan Bender, “Alarm over shortage of nuclear experts,” Boston Globe, April 3, 2010, link: http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2010/04/03/alarm_over_shortage_of_nuclear_experts/

[ii] James Doyle, Los Alamos National Laboratory, “Nuclear Security as a Multidisciplinary Field of Study,” link: http://www.lanl.gov/orgs/ndo/n4/documents/safe_ed_laur08-1896.pdf

[iii] General Kevin Chilton , “2009 Deterrence Symposium Opening Remarks,” July 29, 2009, link: http://www.stratcom.mil/speeches/24/2009_Deterrence_Symposium_Opening_Remarks

Teaching Nonproliferation: Hands on, Online, and Followed on

noreply@blogger.com (Douglas B. Shaw) — Fri, 06 Aug 2010 17:06:00 +0000

Last month I attended a terrific meeting on the topic of “Nuclear Security Education: The Intersection of Policy, Science, and Technology” hosted by the University of Tennessee Howard H. Baker, Jr. Center for Public Policy and Oak Ridge National Laboratory, sponsored by the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA).

I learned a lot, and came away convinced of three specific elements that should be included to prepare the next generation of nuclear nonproliferation practitioners. Nuclear security education should be hands on, online, with follow on.

Nuclear security education should be hands on, with experiential learning opportunities, physical exhibits, and field trips. Simulations of International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Board of Governors meetings and State Evaluation Exercises have been pioneered at the Monterey Institute’s James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies and, with interdisciplinary teams of nuclear engineering and international affairs students at the Nuclear Security Science Policy Institute at Texas Agricultural and Mechanical University (TAMU). Listening to former IAEA safeguards inspectors discuss the tools of their trade, I became intensely curious about those tools – and my students have responded very well to radiochemistry Professor Christopher Cahill’s efforts to bring uranium and detection equipment into the classroom. Field trips to the National Laboratories or working nuclear facilities suggest great promise.

Nuclear security education should be online, with great videos of lectures, simulations, and virtual reality experiences are available now. TAMU’s Nuclear Safeguards Education Portal contains top-shelf lectures on the fuel cycle; GW’s Elliott School has a Web Video Initiative with several great talks featuring a series of Nuclear Policy Talks by Rose Gottemoeller, Ellen Tauscher, Jayantha Dhanapala and others, and, of course, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology has a wealth of offerings in Nuclear Engineering, Physics, and Political Science. The Henry L. Stimson Center just introduced a great online game called “Cheater’s Risk” that allows students to explore proliferation pathways interactively in the context of a reacting international community trying to detect their efforts and Google Earth can help explore any location on the planet. Virtual reality (VR) is an exceptionally promising area – Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) is working on VR safeguards inspections that could be tailored for generic facility types or for specific facilities to prepare inspectors for specific inspection activities (or be displayed on their handheld or through a monocle during the inspection itself) and a simulation of detection of nuclear material on a container ship may also be in the works. Security considerations may keep some of these tools offline, but TAMU’s Bill Charlton reports the University of Denver has a nuclear reactor available in Second Life open to all.

Nuclear security education should be followed on, with linkages to additional education, professional societies, and job opportunities. NNSA sponsored six summer courses through the Next Generation Safeguards Initiative this summer at the National Laboratories and universities and the Center for Strategic International Studies Project on Nuclear Issues (PONI) is one of a growing number of networking opportunities for young people interested in learning more about nonproliferation. The Institute of Nuclear Materials Management is an important vehicle of validating and extending nonproliferation education. NNSA’s Nonproliferation Graduate Fellowship Program is one great pathway to a career in the field.

Great food for thought as those teaching on these topics prepare our fall courses.

A Walk the Senate should take

noreply@blogger.com (Douglas B. Shaw) — Fri, 16 Jul 2010 13:03:00 +0000

Last night's Washington opening of the American Ensemble Theater production of A Walk in the Woods could not be more timely.

Lee Blessing's Pulitzer-nominated play casts two people with the awesome responsibility to reduce the risk of nuclear war through negotiated arms reductions. This brilliant and well-acted play highlights the urgent necessity and daunting challenge of responding to the danger posed by nuclear weapons just in time, as the Senate Foreign Relations Committee is scheduled to take its most important vote on arms control in a generation by the end of the month. Statesmanship will be at a premium in consideration of this landmark agreement, as the new Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START) between the United States and Russia moves to the Senate floor where a two-thirds majority -- and therefore bipartisan cooperation -- will be necessary to ratify it.

In the play, negotiators John Honeyman and Andrey Botvinnik represent the Cold War adversaries, the United States, and the Soviet Union respectively. They struggle to reach an agreement. Many wish them to fail, and their argument, and friendship, resonate with the issues under debate over the new START Treaty.

Some argue that nuclear weapons make war too horrible for any "rational" leader to risk. Blessing's Soviet presciently observes how globalization complicates this delicate logic: "Once we only had to be rational in English and Russian." Today we must do so in more languages and perhaps with terrorists who have no territory or population for us to threaten. And as the Gulf oil spill attests, accidents happen. Nuclear weapons endanger human civilization.

Blessing's heroes offer hope by rising from their seats and opening their imaginations to each other. History agrees. In the years following the collapse of the Soviet Union, arms negotiators moved their work from Geneva's gilded halls to the sauna, the target range, and the pool - and over countless vodka toasts, we made a lot of progress.

A generation later, over 22 thousand nuclear weapons remain. This spring, U.S. and Russian negotiators concluded a new arms reduction treaty, but now face domestic politics in both countries. In Washington, the Senate began hearings on ratification of the new Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty earlier this month and will receive a new National Intelligence Estimate on its effects in a matter of days. Earlier this year, the U.S. Government proposed $180 billion in new spending related to nuclear weapons. Some political leaders argue that this is not enough - that we should resume nuclear explosive testing and develop new nuclear weapons. As Blessing observes of our efforts to escape nuclear annihilation, "sometimes the hawks eat a few doves."

Still, survival requires that someone take up this work, and the brave few who do have each other. Why should arms negotiators become friends? Andrey Botvinnik argues "because someone has to."

The United States and the world would be more secure if every Senator and staffer involved in foreign affairs saw this production.

Not all of them will, but you still can. Three of the five performances of this important production are already sold out, a few tickets remain for the 11:30 a.m. show on Saturday (July 17) and the 3:00 p.m. show on the following Saturday (July 24). Get your tickets now.

The Bomb: A New History (first of three reactions)

noreply@blogger.com (Douglas B. Shaw) — Wed, 23 Jun 2010 16:19:00 +0000

Reading Stephen M. Younger’s The Bomb: A New History over the weekend, I had three strong reactions, the first of which I summarize below. This is an interesting and important book and my students can expect to read (at least) chapters 4 and 8 this fall.

I found the argument thin for his conclusion that a “moderate” future U.S. nuclear weapons policy would include new nuclear weapons designs and probably new military capabilities for nuclear weapons to improve the American capacity to hold deeply buried targets at risk.

My principal objection is a modified version of the standard “dangling antecedent” objection to arguments about deterrent sufficiency.

Despite leaving me desperate for references throughout the text (owing to security considerations), Dr. Younger provides an unusually clear definition of U.S. deterrent sufficiency on page 216 as a force sufficient:

“to make it impossible for Moscow to eliminate our weapons and avoid devastating retaliation following a first strike.”

While he doesn’t treat with any detail how precisely this capability instrumentalizes fear to drive desired Russian behavior, this articulation is sound if we grant familiar assumptions often packaged as “rationality.” However, I find his appropriation of the time-proven budgeting technique of rounding up and doubling the required number of nuclear weapons (for potential system failures, refurbishment process, and – a little ominously – “special weapons for unique applications”) suggestive that he does not share my perspective that each nuclear weapon in the arsenal creates a marginal security risk and complicates negotiations on both disarmament and nonproliferation (that I argue offer security benefits).

My concern about a potential disconnect between ends and means in Dr. Younger’s argument becomes more problematic as he pivots to support his actual conclusion that we need new nuclear weapon designs for flexibility and reliability.

On flexibility, he argues that the absence of additional, lower-yield weapon designs – which he associates with the work of anti-nuclear groups (huge and maybe even excessive props to a very few smart and dedicated people) – force the United States

“to continue a policy of mutual assured destruction."

I see three problems here.

First, the mutuality of assured destruction is not a matter of U.S. policy; it is a condition imposed on the United States by others (principally Russia) and can only be relieved –if at all – in cooperation with them.

Second, our efforts to relieve ourselves of excessively large-yield nuclear weapons by designing and building smaller-yield nuclear weapons may be misinterpreted. Such misinterpretations could undermine international confidence in the already stressed Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) regime, and so, whatever we do in the service of global nuclear stability should be agreed to be in alignment with the NPT regime.

Finally, he far too easily dismisses the concern that lower-yield nuclear weapons would be destabilizing if misinterpreted by other governments as more usable, possibly lowering the perceived threshold of nuclear weapons use. On page 127 he asserts

“I believe that these arguments are seriously flawed and fail to appreciate the essential elements of strategic deterrence.”

Here the apparent necessity of offering 220 pages without a single footnote becomes a vice as I do not share his confidence in the absolute logical rigor of all the political processes that the

United States

hopes to frighten and/or reassure through our maintenance of a nuclear arsenal. Moreover, there is a notable disagreement about whether nuclear deterrence is absolute or delicate (expertly summarized by Dr. Jeffrey Lewis). Dr. Younger’s uniquely informed perspective on this topic would be very welcome. Without it, I remain unconvinced that additional flexibility in nuclear weapons capability is necessary for deterrent sufficiency.

On reliability, I find Dr. Younger’s argument more formidable. He argues that existing redundancy is eroding with underinvestment in U.S. nuclear weapons manufacturing capability and unavoidable drift away from the methods and materials of decades past (page 192).

His explicit openness to international inspection of a prospective future nuclear weapons replacement capability (page 219) may suggest a confidence-building step around which agreement could be built among key states. However, even the best technical ideas require political and diplomatic spadework to avoid potentially destabilizing misinterpretation. Furthermore, I am convinced that such negotiations are more likely to succeed when the United States is prepared to listen to our international partners and perhaps even adjust our plans to align with their perceived needs, when appropriate.

Dr. Younger’s thoughtful observation that

“improved transparency and inspection treaties with other countries would reduce the need to maintain nuclear forces larger than required and could conceivably enable us to eliminate them altogether”

(page 220) suggests a narrow point in the gulf between the technical and multilateral diplomatic communities focused on nonproliferation that might be bridged with the right sort of meetings and consultations. However, we are not starting from a blank slate but a position of deep suspicion and dissatisfaction among many non-nuclear weapons states parties to the NPT. I hesitate in criticizing Dr. Younger for focusing his important arguments on the future of nuclear weapons exclusively on Americans, but find I must do so remaining convinced that the bomb is everybody’s problem.

Higher Education and the Nuclear Summit

noreply@blogger.com (Douglas B. Shaw) — Thu, 15 Apr 2010 14:28:00 +0000

Menachem Wecker recently interviewed me about the Nuclear Security Summit and how it relates to higher education; the interview is available at The George Washington University homepage at http://www.gwu.edu/explore/gwtoday/learningresearch/defusingthenuclearthreat

Faculty Goals and Resource Needs for Nuclear Nonproliferation and Safeguards Education

noreply@blogger.com (Douglas B. Shaw) — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 18:42:00 +0000

Remarks Delivered by
Douglas B. Shaw
at the U.S. Department of Energy’s
Next Generation Safeguards Initiative Human Capital Development Conference
hosted by Los Alamos National Laboratory in cooperation with

Texas Agricultural and Mechanical University

Santa Fe, New Mexico
August 10, 2009

This spring, the celebrated deterrence theorist and historian of nuclear strategy Sir Lawrence Freedman visited the Elliott School and observed an imperative for higher education to respond to a “lost generation” of nuclear weapons specialists. Others have made similar observations.
In explaining his decision to host a July 2009 conference on “Waging Deterrence in the 21st Century,” General Kevin Chilton, commander of the U.S. Strategic Command, observed “I think we have allowed an entire generation to skip class, as it were, on the subject of strategic deterrence.”

In introducing the 2002 United Nations Study on Disarmament and Non-Proliferation Education, then Secretary-General Kofi Annan found it “striking for someone of my generation to think that an entire new generation of human beings is coming to maturity without an ever present terror of nuclear catastrophe. Yet it is so, and that is for the better. The downside, however, is ignorance of the real dangers that do exist, especially the legacy of nuclear weapons inherited from the last century. Moreover, the companion of ignorance is complacency: what we know little about, we care little to do anything about.”

Our host, Dr. James Doyle, wrote in his paper “Nuclear Security as a Multidisciplinary Field of Study,” that “[o]ver the next five years, some 50 percent of the IAEA’s top inspectors are expected to retire, taking with them key institutional knowledge and technical skills.” The challenge before us is as immediate and global as it is important.

I am grateful to Jim and Los Alamos National Laboratories for hosting this meeting, the National Nuclear Security Administration’s Next Generation Safeguards Initiative for making it possible, and to all of you for constituting such an exciting program. I am humbled to be included, but assure you that my students this fall will benefit substantially from this discussion.
Jim has asked me to address faculty goals and resource needs for nonproliferation and safeguards education. I will approach this task by reflecting on the four basic goals Jim identified in his paper. First, the interdisciplinary character of nonproliferation; second, the need to confront real-world problems; third, empowering students to balance the costs and benefits of nuclear technology; and finally, the incorporation of experiential learning. These are just a few ideas and my only pride in suggesting them is that the audience assembled to receive them is so capable of improving upon them.

I. Interdisciplinary Foundations

The first basic goal of nonproliferation education that Jim identifies is that graduate and undergraduate programs in nuclear security should “provide the necessary fundamentals in nuclear security science from across the physical and social sciences.” This observation echoes the observation of the United Nations study I mentioned earlier that “new formal and informal curricula should…adopt a multidisciplinary approach.”[1]

This is a huge task. Jim identifies more than a dozen disciplines as immediately relevant to nuclear security. Most colleges and universities are organized by disciplinary departments effectively stove-piping faculty credentialed hired, socialized, promoted, tenured, and evaluated in these disciplinary departments away from interdisciplinary collaboration. While there are countervailing initiatives and even trends, interdisciplinary work can be hazardous to the career prospects of many young faculty members.

Some institutions will find the organization of interdisciplinary programs easier than others, but from a vantage point inside the Elliott School of International Affairs, an explicitly interdisciplinary institution organically focused on responding to global human problems with policy engagement built into its mission on an equal footing with research and teaching, I can say with confidence that this will always imply tensions.

Managing these tensions and creating a strong foundation for nonproliferation education in several disciplines will require incentives to draw more faculty into this area of teaching. There are many ways to do this, three stand out to me as particularly achievable. Funding research on nonproliferation-related topics that engages the current methodological and scholarly debates in each relevant discipline could attract faculty to greater practical nonproliferation expertise while advantaging those who engage in scholarship on these topics in their pursuit of tenure and recognition within their disciplines. Similarly, creating faculty sabbatical opportunities with careful attention to their professional growth requirements could make it easier for more scholars to focus more energy on these topics. Finally, higher education environments vary considerably. Creating institution-specific partnerships would have the benefit of engaging the leadership of these colleges and universities to encourage their faculty with the spectrum of specific tools at their disposal.

II. Real-world Problems

Jim’s second basic goal is to “provide an understanding of the unique challenges that arise when applying these fundamentals to real-world problems.”

We may benefit here from a parallel effort undertaken by the Director of Columbia University’s Earth Institute, Professor Jeffrey Sachs in teaching sustainable development. In a recent op-ed co-authored by Sachs and Millennium Promise CEO John McArthur in the Chronicle of Higher Education, the authors describe the problems of sustainable development as:

“complex and interconnected, spilling across academic disciplines and often across national borders. Solutions will require theoretical knowledge and practical problem-solving skills, including the capacity to build and lead teams drawn from a variety of disciplines. This will require leaders who can cross boundaries of science, policy, geography, theory, and practice.”[2]

Sound familiar?

Their response at the Earth Institute, modeled on the Flexner Report of 1910 that “revolutionized and standardized systematic training for medical doctors in North America” undertook to assess current sustainable development education and make recommendations for a transformation of professional education – specifically, a new form of degree program they call the “master’s in development practice” to provide a grounding in several disciplines but also substantial “clinical” training to educate students to build interdisciplinary teams indifferent to their geographic location or dispersion responding to undertake case studies and field work. This effort, underwritten by a $15 million grant from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation aims at nothing less than the global transformation of an emerging profession.
Needless to say, $15 million is important among my suggestions for resources needed to stimulate new teaching for nonproliferation, but I suspect this effort has more to teach us about the integrative work of connecting our disciplinary perspectives into the formation of future nuclear security professionals. The Next Generation Safeguards Initiative could convene a discussion to define the future professions necessary for nuclear security and seed the establishment of model professional degree programs to support them, support a network of schools offering these types of programs, and regularly convene meetings like this one to establish a network of faculty teaching on nonproliferation and alumni who have received this training, perhaps forming the core of new professional organizations. These efforts should leverage other networks already under development, such as the United Nations annual reporting on Nonproliferation and Disarmament Education, the efforts of the International Association of University Presidents, and the work of pioneers in this field, particularly including the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies.

III. Understanding the Need to Balance Risks and Benefits

Jim’s third basic goal is developing “understanding of the need to balance the risks posed by nuclear technologies with their benefits.”

Nuclear technology has complex societal effects. The human tendency toward war made nuclear weapons inevitable, but nuclear weapons are thought to control this tendency, assuming human beings can control these weapons in the context of our fallibility. We identify nuclear terrorism and proliferation as the greatest threats to our security but make only modest investments in response.

The question of peaceful uses of nuclear technology is interwoven with the question of nuclear proliferation and terrorism and adds its own additional complexity. At its beginning, nuclear energy promised power too cheap to meter. Decades later, we still don’t know what it costs. National governments necessarily have a role to play in anything that contains so much promise and danger, but what that role should be is intensely contested.

What I take from this goal is that there are immediate and significant moral implications for our work as educators. Our students will live with challenges we can’t imagine today. For example, Rose Gottemoeller, who now serves as the Assistant Secretary of State for Verification, Compliance and Implementation tasked by President Obama to negotiate a new nuclear arms reduction agreement with Russia; Adam Scheinman, who played a leadership role in the established of the Next Generation Safeguards Initiative and now serves as the director for nonproliferation at the National Security Council; and Thomas Troyano, who leads the Office of Treaty Compliance in the Pentagon all studied security policy at the Elliott School in the 1980s. No case studies or fieldwork designed at that time could be perfectly relevant to today’s challenges. We need to open our students’ imaginations beyond today’s challenges. This is hard, but as scholars committed to revealing truth, our work is not value neutral. As Georgetown University President Jack DeGioia observes, “the truth makes demands of us.”

He approaches this problem through the creation of flagship courses, one on human rights and another on ethics and global development designed to get students talking about these value-laden topics outside the classroom by making them more visible and widening student interest.
High-profile speakers – like the Secretary of Energy or the White House Science Advisor – touring campuses would raise student awareness considerably. Awards and essay competitions – like the one that got Hans Blix interested in the field – have impacts that extend through time and beyond their winners. These kind of efforts hold promise for shifting the curve of awareness up across entire student bodies and widening the conversation to include ethical and political considerations in the uncontrolled real world with information and theoretical frameworks reliably supplied in the classroom.

IV. Experiential Learning

Jim’s last basic goal, to “include the opportunity for hands-on training (internships, lab experiments, [and] simulation exercises)” also aligns with the UN Study’s call for participatory learning, in particular role-playing and simulations.[3]

One valuable step would be technology and travel support to help connect classes at different institutions in simulations – simulations require a lot of energy from both students and faculty, the structure and added momentum of participants from other departments or institutions can reinforce these efforts.

Exhibits, models, and mock-ups – when students touch unusual objects that relate to unfamiliar subjects, they can better visualize the settings and processes relevant to these subjects and they feel more connected and attracted to the topic area. Traveling exhibits and permanent collections in cities with several universities could make a lasting impression on students.

Guest speakers with real world experience – nonproliferation and safeguards are extraordinarily complex topics and many key documents are dry and difficult to teach – the Additional Protocol is one example of critical document that is difficult to teach because it is obtuse and boring to read. Sharing lived experiences can contribute to deeper student engagement.

Multimedia – different people learn differently; unfortunately individual faculty have limited capacity to develop diverse teaching resources themselves. I recall when I was at the Department of Energy I had the opportunity to use a CD-ROM training program called Nuclear Material Control and Accounting 101. This particular resource might not be appropriate for general distribution, but something similar could be produced and even made available online and would provide a multi-media learning opportunity for my students that I could not produce on my own.

These have been just a few examples: encouraging multidisciplinary teaching by creating career incentives for faculty, seeding transformational programs and seeking a vision of emerging professions and creating a global network to engage real-world problems, widening campus conversations about the risks and benefits of nuclear technology, and making tailored multimedia resources, guest speakers with vivid real-world experience, and networking technology to drive more exciting simulations available to faculty teaching on nonproliferation and safeguards. I look forward to learning from you what other resources would be useful and how we might work together to assemble them. Thank you.

[1] Page 13.
[2] John W. McArthur and Jeffrey Sachs, “Needed: A New Generation of Problem Solvers,” The Chronicle of Higher Education, June 26, 2009.
[3] Page 13-4.

Everybody's Bomb: Urgency, Inclusion, and Hope in Response to Nuclear Weapons

noreply@blogger.com (Douglas B. Shaw) — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 12:45:00 +0000

Remarks as Prepared for Delivery byDouglas B. Shaw on March 16, 2010
At a Woodstock Theological Center Forum on "God and the Bomb: Deterrence, Disarmament and Human Security" at Georgetown University

In December, the fellows and leadership of the Woodstock Theological Center engaged in a discussion on the topic of “Nuclear Deterrence or Disarmament: A Global Human Choice.” With their help, I better understand that the weighty historical choices humanity faces today are not between deterrence and disarmament but between engagement and what Woodstock Senior Fellow Delores Leckey termed “a kind of great apathy that we are part of and complicit in.” In response to my greater awareness of my own complicity in this great apathy, I am grateful to Father Lo Biondo for organizing this forum and Archbishop Migliore, Father Langan, Professor Maryann Cusimano Love, and all of you for the opportunity tonight to offer my thoughts on urgency, inclusion, and hope in response to nuclear weapons. My hope is that everyone here tonight will leave carrying a little more responsibility for what I think of as everybody’s bomb.

I. Nuclear weapons require an urgent response

A little more than twenty years ago, the fall of the “iron curtain” revealed a “nuclear archipelago” of vulnerable fissile material – plutonium and highly enriched uranium that could be used by terrorists to make nuclear weapons – across the former Soviet Union. At the same time, glacially slow arms control negotiations between the United States and Russia finally began to result in actual agreements requiring on-site verification and implementation. The prospect of nuclear terrorism displaced the Cold War order; as President Barack Obama has observed, “[i]n a strange turn of history, the threat of global nuclear war has gone down, but the risk of a nuclear attack has gone up.”

In light of these developments, some of which are now two decades past, many people think that nuclear weapons are yesterday’s news; that the danger nuclear weapons pose went away with the end of the Cold War. The truth is that as long as nuclear weapons exist, they pose an extraordinary threat to human life and civilization and this danger requires urgent action.

Immediate danger

This danger is immediate and stems from a combination of factors: terrorists intent on using nuclear weapons, the potential availability of these weapons or materials that could be used to make nuclear weapons, and lapses of security. In the asymmetric struggle against terrorism, nuclear weapons are worse than useless – they are a liability: a potential source of incredible destructive power for terrorists, an obstacle to reductions in nuclear weapons and weapons-usable nuclear materials elsewhere, and used by some as evidence of the injustice and indiscriminate violence embedded in the contemporary world order.

Founding Dean of the John F. Kennedy School of Government and former Assistant Secretary of Defense Graham Allison predicted in his 2004 book, Nuclear Terrorism: The Ultimate Preventable Catastrophe, that “if the United States and other governments keep doing what they are doing today, a nuclear terrorist attack on America is more likely than not in the decade ahead.”[1] Such an attack could kill hundreds of thousands of Americans.

Preserving our agency

In addition to the lives lost, our agency to respond to the danger may not outlast the first act of nuclear terrorism. In 1996, Senator Richard Lugar ran a campaign ad dramatizing a conversation in which a child asks her mother about the future possibility of nuclear terrorism; the ad closes on the little girl asking: “Mommy, won’t the bomb wake everybody up?”[2]

Johns Hopkins University Professor Daniel Deudney offers an alarming answer to this innocent question: “that a 9/11 to the fourth or fifth power could lead to a Patriot Act to the fourth or fifth power and the end of constitutionalism” – the next nuclear attack could undermine the American way of life and the basis for our free society.

For Americans, I believe this argues strongly that anything we might want to do the day after a nuclear attack, we would be better off to do the day before. This requires citizen engagement. Just like health care, the federal deficit, and every other issue important to our future, the responsibility for nuclear weapons policy cannot belong to the Government bureaucracy alone.
The day after the next nuclear detonation in a major city, I believe that many Americans – including some in this room – might feel called to respond personally. Unfortunately, this calling will come in the context of a global political environment of fear unprecedented in human history. The bomb will wake everybody up, but our options afterward may be constrained by this fear. Many may wish then that they had acted now.

Shaping our future capacity to respond

This challenge is not new, but it may be accelerating. Throughout the nuclear age humanity has made choices that have shaped our capacity to respond to nuclear weapons dangers today. We have come to many forks in the road, made several wrong turns, and been enormously lucky many times. But we also have a number of important choices immediately ahead of us that will shape our future capacity to respond to the dangers posed by nuclear weapons. I’ve listed eight of these in a hand-out tonight. Each of these represents an important opportunity for citizen engagement.

II. Nuclear weapons require greater inclusion

We are witnessing today an irreversible widening of responsibility for the problems nuclear weapons pose to human security across dimensions of geography and sovereign authority, legal rules and diplomatic fora, scientific disciplines and technical skill sets, as well as society and culture. The effect of the problem is the same – a species-level danger to humanity in its physical and moral aspects – but we are increasingly aware that its causes and our capacities for response are more diverse, complex, and multifaceted than we previously understood.

Our deepening understanding of this global human danger shares important attributes with our deepening understanding of climate change. The difficulty of fully parsing expert disagreement about climate change has not prevented a widening sense of public responsibility for the problem and appropriate responses. People around the world are making economic and political choices that reflect this priority. They don’t know for sure that they will save a polar bear, but they’re collective attention and action changes the political context for policy making by elevating the issue, attracting more resources and critical focus to the effort to find solutions, and raising the political price of neglecting the problem.

A similar increase in public engagement could also improve the context for nuclear weapons policy making, by supporting governments exhibiting more political commitment; more scholarly research across more disciplines; better education and more technical experts; and more public awareness. We need to act out of a heightened awareness that the bomb is the problem, and that it is everybody’s problem – everybody’s bomb.

Global inclusion

Inequality is the crack that threatens to shatter the future of nuclear proliferation restraint. In explaining his country’s 1998 nuclear tests, Indian Foreign Minister Jaswant Singh used the term “nuclear apartheid” to describe the current international legal order in which most countries have forsworn nuclear weapons in exchange for the benefits of peaceful nuclear technology and a vague and largely unfulfilled pledge by the United States, Russia, the United Kingdom, France, and China to work toward the elimination of nuclear weapons. He’s wrong – the 1968 Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons – the NPT – did not create two classes of states but merely recognized that this destructive technology had already spread to five states and that it was in the common interest of all to stop this spread and for those who already had these weapons to work toward their elimination. The problem is that Minister Singh’s logic is seductive. Some on the “have not” side of history seek a greater role in world affairs through nuclear weapons. More productive means of inclusion must be found.

Inclusion means listening to those with whom we disagree to specify and work to reduce areas of disagreement. Not every disagreement can be resolved and not every partner is willing to earnestly undertake this work – the governments of both Iran and North Korea are both clearly engaged in behavior that threatens global efforts to reduce and control nuclear weapons as well as every other milestone in the field of international law and organization. But diplomacy is about talking to – and about – the “bad guys.” It is about maintaining agreement across a wider global community so that when Iran or North Korea breaks the rules, their behavior is aberrant and unacceptable. Clear solutions for lawbreaking may not always exist, but long-term peace and stability demand that we maintain international agreement about standards for responsible global citizenship.

This is properly the work of diplomacy. Archbishop Migliore has observed that multilateralism is an important and superior alternative to violence as a means to security. But it is also the work of social organization and scholarship, to find ways to overcome disagreements by establishing new standards of responsible global citizenship.

Social inclusion

A tradition of social activism for inclusion in nuclear solutions has contributed to our ability to live with our bomb. In the 1940s, the Federation of Atomic Scientists coined the term “education for survival” to characterize their work to educate the public about the danger they had brought into the world in response to wartime necessity.[3] In the 1960s, His Holiness Pope John XXIII responded to the extraordinary danger of the Cuban Missile Crisis through his encyclical Pacem en Terris. In the 1980s, Randall Forsberg sparked a Nuclear Freeze movement and the U.S. Catholic Bishops issued a pastoral letter on war and peace in the nuclear age. Perhaps closer to home for this community, in the pages of America Magazine just five years ago, the late Father Robert F. Drinan asked “[w]ould it be possible to educate and arouse America’s 64 million Catholics to become a church that is a strong political force aimed at persuading the Congress and the White House to renounce and defuse nuclear weapons?”

Epistemic inclusion

Some who study the role of nuclear weapons in world politics believe that the elimination of nuclear weapons is impossible and dangerously destabilizing to attempt. Some research traditions have rigorously constructed elaborate theoretical responses for managing the problems of the nuclear age that depend on nuclear weapons – and in some cases quite a few nuclear weapons – for stability. We cannot turn our back on these but must translate them forward to new generations and map them to new political facts and technical developments.
Some disciplines – including medicine, public health, and theology – are often excluded from some important discussions about nuclear weapons. This exclusion should be considered critically, because some of these disciplines have a history of pushing their way into the discussion with important positive effects. In the 1960s, for example, members of Physicians for Social Responsibility raised public awareness about the dangers of nuclear testing by demonstrating that Strontium-90, a by-product of nuclear fission, could be found in the baby teeth of American children.

Georgetown University’s President, Jack DeGioia, suggests that while scholarship demands impartial methods to reveal truth, sometimes the truth makes demands of us – that the creation of knowledge will sometimes demand action. If we agree, then everyone who holds legitimate knowledge about the danger nuclear weapons pose should be part of the conversation about their future.

III. Everyone is a source of hope for living with the bomb

In arguing for the development of the hydrogen bomb, its designer Edward Teller argued that “[i]f the development is possible, it is out of our powers to prevent it.”[4] But while this technological determinism may be logically seductive, history has not borne it out. There are still only two handfuls of nuclear armed states and there are reasons to hope to reduce that number toward zero. The momentum to move toward the goal of a world free of nuclear weapons has been renewed by President Obama and by four renowned leaders of the Cold War era: Sam Nunn, Bill Perry, Henry Kissinger, and George Shultz.

Nuclear weapons are a familiarizing and globalizing technology

During the conversation about nuclear weapons at Woodstock in December, Father Haughey recalled the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, emphasizing that “[t]he use of nuclear weapons awakened me to our vulnerability and our common humanity.” The images of the atomic bombings may be lost to the popular imagination, but they can be recalled. Even some who take a more coldly rational view of nuclear weapons allow that they build a certain sort of global community by placing the cost of war so high that no rational person would risk it. As Robert Oppenheimer, the father of the atomic bomb observed, “[t]he true security of this nation, as of any other, will be found, if at all, only in the collective efforts of all.”[5] However horrible, nuclear weapons can serve to emphasize the unity of global humanity.
Powerful interests are engaged

In fact, among major global dangers to human security including poverty, pandemic disease, and environmental degradation, nuclear weapons are unusual because they command the immediate attention of the most powerful people on earth.

Nuclear weapons are the one issue that literally follows the President of the United States everywhere he goes in the person of a military aide carrying the “football” that could enable the use of American nuclear weapons. Moreover, the United States spends tens of billions of dollars of each year and has spent more than $5 trillion total on nuclear weapons.[6] Unlike some causes for citizen engagement, nuclear weapons already command the attention of our leaders. It is the public that remains complacent.

We know what we ought to do; the real problem is how

I am calling for radical change tonight. I am not asking you to support the abolition of nuclear weapons – I do happen to believe it to be necessary and find myself in good company from Henry Kissinger to Richard Branson in doing so – but our discussion at Woodstock suggests to me that this is not the argument I need to win. Brilliant people disagree for the most careful and thoughtful reasons on this topic – I only need to convince you to be one of them.

The human family has not concluded that nuclear weapons are a moral evil, the way we have about slavery – although important institutions including the Catholic Church have come close. Even in the act of committing the United States to the abolition of nuclear weapons last Palm Sunday, President Barack Obama allowed that it would probably not happen in his lifetime. But for all the complexity of and disagreement about nuclear weapons, there are some things we know about them. We ought not to live comfortably behind the threat of killing millions of other human beings in an afternoon – because it is morally dubious at best and because it is an unreliable means to guarantee our security. If it is our lot to carry this burden today, we ought to try to relieve it for future generations. We – all of us here tonight in this room and throughout the human family – ought to engage this challenge deeply.

In response, and as a political scientist, I find an insight offered by Archbishop Migliore particularly illuminating: “Here the recognition of the values of morality would play an instrumental role in effecting political will.”[7] Religious and social institutions can call people to learn and embrace their share of nuclear dangers. My hypothesis is that leaving each of you with a greater sensitivity to your potential control over the bomb – your own imaginary “nuclear football” over your shoulder and always present in your conscience – will lead to more and better ideas more carefully and reliably acted upon for living with everybody’s bomb and reducing the danger that you will use yours carelessly.

[1] Ibid., page 203.
[2] Graham Allison, Nuclear Terrorism: The Ultimate Preventable Catastrophe (New York: Henry Holt and Company) 2004, page 209.
[3] Ibid. page 220.
[4] As quoted by Joseph Cirincione, Bomb Scare: The History and Future of Nuclear Weapons (New York: Columbia University Press) 2007, page 71.
[5] J.R. Oppenheimer, “The New Weapon: The Turn of the Screw,” Chapter 5 in Dexter Masters and Katharine Way, eds. One World or None: A Report to the Public on the Full Meaning of the Atomic Bomb, (New York: The New Press) 2007 reprint, page 68.
[6] Stephen I. Schwartz, Atomic Audit: The Costs and Consequences of U.S. Nuclear Weapons Since 1940 (Washington: Brookings) 1998 see press release at: http://www.brookings.edu/press/Books/1998/atomic.aspx
[7] Archbishop Celestino Migliore, “Nuclear Weapons Contravene Every Aspect of Humanitarian Law,” Official Documents of the Roman Catholic Church, January 29, 2009, pps. 2-3.

What Richard Perle and Andrew Marshall think you should know about nuclear weapons

noreply@blogger.com (Douglas B. Shaw) — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 17:13:00 +0000

Stuck at home in a blizzard, I'm catching up with my DVR and found the following gem of an exchange that took place at the Hudson Institute on February 23, 2009 and was aired on C-Span 2's Book TV at 1:30 am on March 16, 2009.

The event celebrated the Nonproliferation Policy Education Center’s publication of Nuclear Heuristics: Selected Writings of Albert and Roberta Wohlstetter edited by Henry Sokolski and Robert Zarate (Strategic Studies Institute, January 2009) featuring discussion from Richard Perle and Andrew Marshall.

Henry Sokolski: do you have any thoughts, either of you, about what we should be encouraging in the way of education of young people who are interested in foreign affairs and military affairs or what we should be asking or demanding of the studies that are funded by the United States Government that deal with these topics? How shall I put it, let's leave Albert and Roberta out of it.

Richard Perle: My immediate reaction to that is that what we should be teaching is not the conclusions they arrived at or, for that matter, the substance of their research, but the tools, the methodology. I can't imagine a better way to bring a young student along than to give him the famous Base Study and invite him to reflect on the mode of analysis that is reflected in it. It was the rigor and discipline they brought to every issue they examined. Now, as it happens, many of those issues are still with us and I think they have a great deal to contribute in the way we think about those issues, but far more important is respect for their approach to the analysis of issues and there is much too little of that today in universities and government funded research programs.

Andrew Marshall: Well, I would certainly second that, I think in addition other things I've written suggest reading a lot of history. Clearly, one of the things you want people to understand is the uncertainty of things; how you really need to look at a variety of alternative futures. Any notion that you know what's going to happen is not going to work.

Ambassador Max Kampelman on Nuclear Disarmament

noreply@blogger.com (Douglas B. Shaw) — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 13:22:00 +0000

Ambassador Max Kampelman, the Democrat who became President Ronald Reagan’s arms control negotiator and who is argued to have initiated the new political momentum behind nuclear disarmament, addressed faculty and students at the Elliott School of International Affairs on November 9, 2009. Ambassador Kampelman recommended research and policy engagement by institutions of higher education to respond to the dangers posed by nuclear weapons. Observing that “political scientists ought to know how to get things done,” he contended that academic research should include questions of how policy might shape political outcomes. He suggested additional research focused on how to build consensus domestically and globally around how the world “ought” to be and the steps necessary to move in that direction. He also suggested research into how the historic experience of arms control could inform policy to respond to today’s challenges. Noting an absence of institutional and coordinative mechanisms for resolving policy uncertainty related to nuclear nonproliferation and disarmament, Ambassador Kampelman emphasized the value convening and policy engagement to bridge different perspectives on the challenge of nuclear disarmament, as well as new research on how to advance toward this increasingly important policy objective. Watch the video of Ambassador Kampelman’s public remarks here.

T family values

noreply@blogger.com (Douglas B. Shaw) — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 22:17:00 +0000

Undersecretary of State for International Security and Arms Control Ellen O. Tauscher shared her perspectives on her current tasks and her career with students and faculty of the Elliott School of International Affairs on November 10 as part of the Elliott School's Distinguished Women in International Affairs event series.

Observing that organizational units in the State Department have "code" letters -- "we even have an M, although he's not a secret agent" -- and that her bureau is known as "T," Undersecretary Tauscher related that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has asked her to "resurrect the T family."

“T” could do with some resurrection. Under the leadership of John Bolton, famously hostile not only to arms control but also to the United Nations to which he later represented the United States, the bureau was "reorganized." These reorganizations appear to this outside observer to have significantly degraded the U.S. Government's capacity to lead and sustain international cooperation to prevent the spread or use of nuclear weapons.

Secretary Clinton's direction to Undersecretary Tauscher is thus much needed and reflective of the deep engagement and effective leadership both have shown over time on the challenge of nuclear weapons proliferation.

"Resurrection" is an important and complicated word in this context. Then Undersecretary Bolton's "reorganization" was structural -- it continues to constrain the function of the Bureau after his departure. So Undersecretary Tauscher's resurrection should be structural as well, creating new enduring capacity. A very welcome project to those who believe international law can be used to protect national and global security.

There is, however, an asterisk to this formulation in the mind of longtime observers of the organization of the U.S. Government for proliferation prevention. As the head of the "T family,” Undersecretary Tauscher is one of six undersecretaries. In contrast to the Undersecretary for Political Affairs, she has no foreign government “clients” – she represents only the U.S. Government’s commitment to promote international security through diplomacy.

Sometimes the requirements of effective global nonproliferation align with the requirements of strong bilateral relations with U.S. friends and allies. Sometimes this alignment is more difficult to achieve. In this latter class of cases, it is crucial that the requirements of preventing the spread of nuclear weapons have a strong champion, like Undersecretary Tauscher, to ensure that they are not drowned out by a host of bilateral diplomatic concerns, sometimes with significant economic implications.

This is a major challenge, worthy of the talents of a proven leader like Undersecretary Tauscher. But it used to be a little easier.

From 1961 until 1997, the U.S. Arms Control and Disarmament Agency (ACDA) was legislatively established as independent of the State Department. This meant that whenever conflicts arose among the various Undersecretaries of State, the requirements of prevention of proliferation or use of weapons of mass destruction could be raised by the ACDA director one-on-one with the Secretary and, if necessary, the President. The ACDA director had his (sadly, the ACDA directorship no longer exist for Ellen Tauscher to break the male monopoly) own seat on the National Security Council reflecting the extraordinary danger weapons of mass destruction pose to U.S. national security. In observing that these dangers persist, we should think carefully about the future structure of the U.S. Government to effectively face them.

The Contribution of the Global South to Nuclear Nonproliferation

noreply@blogger.com (Douglas B. Shaw) — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 21:24:00 +0000

A talk I gave at a FLACSO Conference on “The Nuclear Challenge” Santiago, Chile on September 4, 2008:

I would like to begin by thanking FLACSO and the organizers of this conference for the opportunity to address you here today; as I will discuss in some detail, I believe the inclusion of the global south and Latin America in particular is a vital step toward a more stable nuclear nonproliferation regime and the ultimate goal of the elimination of nuclear weapons. I am also grateful to Dr. Bonnie Jenkins and the Ford Foundation for her ongoing support of innovation and global inclusion in the field of nuclear nonproliferation. I would also like to thank my fellow panelists and conference participants for your effort in service of global human security. The views I express today are mine alone.

I am pleased to speak with you today about the contribution of the global south to nuclear nonproliferation. The history of this contribution is both long and characterized by innovation, but the recognition of this rich tradition is often undermined by the differences of context in which nuclear weapon states and non-nuclear weapon states consider security and stability as well as technological and commercial issues. Today I will briefly discuss the global south’s tradition of contribution, the challenge of today, and the future potential of a more inclusive global conversation on nuclear nonproliferation and disarmament.

A Tradition of Contribution

The global south has contributed significantly and innovatively to the cause of nuclear nonproliferation and disarmament. An international legal commitment to a nuclear weapon-free zone was first incorporated into the Antarctica Treaty in 1959 and the Treaty of Tlatelolco established the first nuclear weapon-free zone in a densely populated region in 1967. The states of Latin America and the Caribbean established a model for subsequent nuclear weapon-free zones in the South Pacific, Africa, Southeast Asia, and Central Asia; created a unique regional implementing body in the Organization for the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons in Latin America and the Caribbean; and in overcoming significant challenges to the full implementation of the Zone through the Quadripartite Agreement and unprecedented cooperation between potential nuclear rivals.

Four decades since its inception, the spirit of Tlatelolco has contributed significantly to global nuclear nonproliferation and disarmament. As United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki Mun acknowledged in Mexico City last month:

Today, the regional or territorial approach to disarmament covers most of our planet. Virtually the entire southern hemisphere is now nuclear-weapons free…[and]…two thirds of the world’s States are signatories to nuclear weapon-free zone treaties… [1]

The Secretary-General went on to observe contrast with the global north, where “the majority of the world’s population still lives in countries that possess nuclear weapons.” What challenges stand in the way of translating the positive nuclear nonproliferation experience of the global south into the northern hemisphere?

The Challenge of Today

Many of the arguments that may alienate states of the global south from more active participation in the nuclear nonproliferation regime are focused on Articles IV and VI of the NPT – understood by many to constitute “half” of a “bargain” between the non-nuclear weapons states and the nuclear weapons states parties to the NPT. The idea is simple – the NPT includes an obligation undertaken by non-nuclear weapons states not to acquire nuclear weapons which can be understood to be “balanced” by obligations undertaken by the nuclear weapons states to share the peaceful benefits of nuclear technology consistent with Article IV and to work toward the ultimate goal of the elimination of nuclear weapons under Article VI. This way of understanding the NPT as a “balance of obligations” or a “bargain” is simple, but not stable.

Each side can view the absence of shared understanding of what constitutes compliance as an obstacle to cooperation imposed by the other – the examples of this phenomenon I am most prepared to describe come from my country, the United States. One expert observer has referred to the perennial clash over the meaning of nuclear weapons state compliance in the NPT Review Process as a “dialogue of the deaf.” Another has lamented the futility of communicating the substantial efforts undertaken by the U.S. Government to establish and communicate a strong record of compliance to the non-nuclear weapons states who, in that expert’s opinion, cannot be satisfied. A third expert has suggested that there are “two NPTs,” one that functions to identify clandestine efforts to acquire nuclear weapons and rally international opposition to stop these clear and present threats to international peace and security, and another, second NPT, that functions as a periodic and ineffectual international debating society about marginal and ephemeral issues. While I am less familiar with the state of political discourse about the future of the nuclear nonproliferation regime in the global south, I suspect that that similar arguments may surface here. Without assigning blame or attempting to adjudicate the validity of accusations on either side, I would argue that the past performance of the NPT as a mechanism to promote shared meaning and a stable, shared appreciation of what constitutes compliance and “good” nuclear nonproliferation behavior is constrained by these mutually exclusive perspectives.

The NPT is unequal in its obligations, but it did not create two classes of states, it recognized that two classes of states existed in an effort to slow the translation of scores of nuclear weapons “have nots” into “haves.” While this international legal rule has helped maintain this disparity, the diffusion of technology and political challenges including the dissolution of a nuclear weapon state and the emergence of “proliferation rings” and “second-tier” suppliers of nuclear or dual-use materiel have eroded the context that gave rise to this difference. Others have very ably observed that it is increasingly difficult to prevent a determined nuclear proliferator.

At the same time, globalization has widened the group of nuclear weapons stakeholders. Those who feel threatened or who believe they have been adversely affected by nuclear weapons testing, development, and production and more able to communicate with each other. Independent studies suggest the potential for global climate effects of the use of multiple nuclear weapons. Ease of transportation and communication make the suffering of people anywhere difficult to ignore for people everywhere as greater awareness of global poverty and challenges to health and sanitation underscore.

In this context, it is easy to understand the traditional role some governments of the global south have adopted – as an advocate for those who, having no nuclear weapons themselves, are merely potential victims. From this perspective, consistent pressure for greater nuclear weapon state compliance with Articles IV and VI may seem sufficient. This criticism of the nuclear weapons states may be argued to have a legal basis and has been offered consistently in demands for a Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, a fissile material control regime, strong negative security assurances, a time-bound framework for nuclear disarmament, and greater cooperation in peaceful uses of nuclear technology.

While it may not be possible for the nuclear weapons states to meet any of these demands at a given moment in time, it is possible at any time for the nuclear weapons states to respond to each of the concerns that underlie these demands working toward a more inclusive global conversation on nuclear nonproliferation and disarmament. This was, to some degree, achieved during the 1995 NPT Review and Extension Conference. However, this possibility can be easily derailed and legitimate expressions of concern marginalized by strident rhetoric or reluctance to acknowledge progress and legitimate obstacles and constraints to earnest compliance efforts. The result can be measured not only in failure to achieve incremental progress toward the objectives identified by the non-nuclear weapons states but also in their greater alienation from the global nuclear nonproliferation regime. This is an unnecessary risk at a moment in which the nuclear nonproliferation regime faces grave challenges, not the least of which is the fact that the presumed “leverage” of the non-nuclear weapons states does not seem likely to generate compliance “concessions” from the nuclear weapons states. The “leverage” model is not working.

The Potential of the Future

While it is reasonable to ask what the non-nuclear weapons states parties to the NPT receive in exchange for giving up their sovereign “right” to nuclear weapons through the NPT “bargain,” it is also reasonable to recognize that international leadership is itself a significant benefit with significant attendant global prestige. Just as China benefits from hosting the Olympics and the World’s Fair, Japan benefits from Director General Koichiro Matsura’s leadership of the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization, and Canada derived prestige from its sponsorship of the “Ottawa Process” culminating in the ban on anti-personnel landmines, states in the global south aspiring to regional and international leadership can garner prestige by building on their tradition of introducing innovative and constructive ideas into global diplomatic discourse on nuclear nonproliferation and disarmament, by testing these ideas and the processes and technologies they will require regionally to demonstrate their feasibility, and exploring the constraints and obstacles the nuclear weapon states will face in the application of these new ideas in ways that foster cooperation and sidestep the difficulties inherent in arms reductions negotiations among the nuclear weapon states. This is a future worthy of the spirit of Tlatelolco.

I have referred to this approach elsewhere as a “fusion of obligations” in which all states parties consider themselves equal partners in the fulfillment of shared obligations to prevent nuclear proliferation, share in peaceful benefits, and move toward the ultimate elimination of nuclear weapons. This approach has a basis in the text of the NPT which clearly specifies that Articles IV and VI are not merely half a bargain but shared obligations among all states parties. Articles I, II, and III, while directed alternatively at nuclear weapon states parties and non-nuclear weapons states parties, are each increasingly relevant to the other type of states parties in ways hard to imagine in 1968 as the diffusion of technology makes the cooperation of non-nuclear weapons states more relevant in preventing the transfer of nuclear or dual-use materiel and as nuclear weapons states increasingly accept international safeguards over their non-weapons activities. In this way, the apparent structural flaw of inequality in the NPT can be mitigated, leveling this foundation document to allow for increasingly equal obligations to be built upon it. While the NPT is for all practical purposes formally unamendable, state practice can render it more equitable just as state practice has been understood to nullify the Article V endorsement of peaceful nuclear explosions.

What specific contributions could the global south make to leveling the NPT playing field in this way? From the other hemisphere, it is hard to imagine the specific potential of the experience of the global south to contribute to this “fusion of obligations.” It is easy, however, to imagine areas in which action by the global south would reinforce the compliance efforts of the nuclear weapon states and I will list a few of these as examples:

Taking careful note of what the nuclear weapons states are able to do and acknowledging when the nuclear weapons states change their behavior is crucial to promoting an effective and inclusive global dialogue about what constitutes compliance with the NPT. This need not mean being satisfied with less, but rather showing greater sensitivity to obstacles and helping to overcome them.

By identifying particularly difficult political obstacles that constrain cooperation among the nuclear weapon states, the governments of the global south could work to imagine the technologies and procedures that would be necessary to move forward once these obstacles are overcome. For example, while political circumstances have not yet allowed for warhead-level verification of nuclear arms reductions between the United States and Russia, this is likely to be an important step on any realistic path toward deeper reductions and the ultimate elimination of nuclear weapons. Cooperation among the governments of the global south and perhaps in separate, parallel tracks with the nuclear weapons states could make this path easier to follow when political circumstances allow. In truth, this approach could be seen simply as an attempt to extend the model of preferred behavior offered by the Tlatelolco parties into new areas.

The post-Soviet transition created unimagined opportunities for cooperation in nuclear threat reduction. The work led by the United States in this area has been impressive, but has also encountered significant challenges. It might be constructive for the governments of the global south to pay explicit attention to this work to imagine what a future global standard for cooperative efforts to prevent nuclear proliferation might require in terms of domestic laws and bureaucratic structure. The ABACC experience of Argentina and Brazil may prove valuable in this regard.

In the wake of revelations regarding the AQ Khan network, it seems possible that future nuclear nonproliferation success will increasingly depend on a combination of traditional diplomatic tools with law enforcement tools such as criminal prosecutions and alternative legal instruments, possibly including civil lawsuits. These challenges overlap with other challenges faced in the global south including trafficking in drugs, arms, and human beings. Creating responsive laws and modes of international cooperation is another area of potential leadership for the global south.

International networking of legislators, prosecutors and judges to prepare them for their role in addressing emerging nuclear proliferation challenges might be accomplished, for example, through OPANAL with efficiencies impossible in regions that do not have their own nuclear weapons-free zone implementing body.

These are just a few examples of areas where the global south might choose to innovate in support of universal compliance with the NPT. These may not be the right suggestions and no one expects that these proactive compliance measures by non-nuclear weapons states will reduce the obligation for compliance by the nuclear weapon states. But the global south’s tradition of nuclear nonproliferation leadership suggests that innovative ideas and exemplary behavior can strengthen the global nuclear nonproliferation regime.
[1] Ban Ki Mun, http://presszoom.com/story_145611.html

Global Zero World Summit -- student opportunities

noreply@blogger.com (Douglas B. Shaw) — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 20:20:00 +0000

The following is posted at the request of Claire Morelon from Global Zero. If you are a GW student, of course, I'm also interested in knowing if you're planning to apply.

Seeking Student Representatives at the Global Zero World Summit in Paris, February 2010Global Zero, a new international campaign to eliminate nuclear weapons, is looking for a handful of smart savvy, entrepreneurial university students to attend the Global Zero World Summit in Paris this coming February as representatives of a growing youth-led movement for the elimination of nuclear weapons worldwide.Applications are to be submitted online and are due by 11:59PM on Monday, 30 November 2009.

English-language application:
http://www.globalzero.org/en/world-summit-students

French-language application:
http://www.globalzero.org/fr/sommet-mondial-etudiants

Applications will not be considered complete until applicants submit a CV/resume and a short writing sample via email with the following subject line: "Paris Application - Writing Sample" to Claire Morelon (cmorelon@globalzero.org).

Global Zero is spearheaded by a group of over 200 world leaders – including President Jimmy Carter, Queen Noor, Sir Malcom Rifkind, Mikhail Gorbachev, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, among others, The campaign’s work includes a world summit in 2010, a comprehensive plan for zero authored by Global Zero Commissioners, a global online and grassroots campaign, and a major documentary from Academy-Award winning producers.Global Zero is looking for a handful of smart savvy, entrepreneurial university students to attend the Global Zero World Summit in Paris this coming February as representatives of a growing youth-led movement for the elimination of nuclear weapons worldwide. A small group of applicants who have demonstrated commitment to the mission of Global Zero as well as potential to be strategic movement organizers will be selected to attend the Global Zero World Summit in Paris in February 2010. At the Summit, these Global Zero Student Leaders will work alongside other students from around the world and Global Zero signatories to chart a course toward a world without nuclear weapons. Travel, room & board, and training will all be provided. Exact dates and a complete agenda are TBD - please check the website for updates.The application form can be found by clicking or pointing your web browser to the link below:http://www.globalzero.org/en/world-summit-students

There is also a french language application available here:http://www.globalzero.org/fr/sommet-mondial-etudiants

There is a growing consensus among world leaders that the only way to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons and end the threat of nuclear terrorism is to eliminate all nuclear weapons. Recent efforts by Presidents Obama and Medvedev, as well as a summit-level United Nations Security Council resolution endorsing the goal of a world free of nuclear weapons, give us an unprecedented window of opportunity to act.We are looking forward to meeting the next generation of leaders for zero! Interested individuals should complete and submit the application by Monday, 30 November

LT in the FT

noreply@blogger.com (Douglas B. Shaw) — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 15:47:00 +0000

Leonor is quoted in Wednesday’s Financial Times story “Split on the atom” by Ed Crooks and James Blitz:

"The world will be a much more dangerous place if more countries acquire enrichment and reprocessing facilities, because then we will have more potential nuclear weapons states."

This is a pedestrian post for such an important date of remembrance, but it is also true and reflective of a pressing problem for the Non-Proliferation Treaty regime.

Newsweek misrepresents nuclear weapons scholarship

noreply@blogger.com (Douglas B. Shaw) — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 13:39:00 +0000

Jonathan Tepperman’s thesis in his September 7th Newsweek article “Why Obama should Learn to Love the Bomb” that “a growing and compelling body of research suggests that nuclear weapons may not, in fact, make the world more dangerous” badly misrepresents the state of scholarship on this crucial topic.

First, Tepperman references a handful of scholars to make his argument while dismissing the majority who disagree with him. George P. Shultz, William J. Perry, Henry A. Kissinger, and Sam Nunn opposed this view in two op-eds in the Wall Street Journal and other leading scholars and practitioners participated in a 2007 conference at Stanford University, now memorialized as a 500-page volume, Reykjavik Revisited. Scores of experts are summarily excluded from Tepperman’s article.

Second, Tepperman suggests a robust understanding of how deterrence relates to today’s challenges where none exists. Nuclear deterrence scholar Sir Lawrence Freedman observed a “lost generation” of nuclear weapons specialists in remarks at the Elliott School of International Affairs this spring and Commander of the U.S. Strategic Command, General Kevin Chilton, observed this summer “we have allowed an entire generation to skip class, as it were, on the subject of strategic deterrence.” More scholarship is needed to translate “nuclear optimism” and other Cold War concepts into the Twenty-first Century.

Third, in over 2,700 words on deterrence, not one of them is “accident.” This is a catastrophic flaw in characterizing scholarly debate on nuclear weapons. Kenneth Waltz, cited by Tepperman as “the leading nuclear optimist” underlines this point by co-authoring a book titled The Spread of Nuclear Weapons: A Debate Renewed with Stanford University’s Scott Sagan who has done decades of careful scholarship to demonstrate the relevance of accidents to nuclear deterrence.

Tepperman’s “iron logic” of deterrence is undermined by a more unstable plutonium logic that can only be understood by the combined lights of physics, engineering, political science, economics, and at least more than a dozen other disciplines that James Doyle of Los Alamos National Laboratory argues constitute “nuclear security science.” The nuclear future ahead of us is long, imperfect, and badly in need of more research and more informed public debate.

Nuclear Umbrella: Pick 40

noreply@blogger.com (Douglas B. Shaw) — Tue, 18 Aug 2009 23:25:00 +0000

Defense News recently ran an editorial arguing that the United States should build new nuclear weapons or run the risk of losing the skills necessary to build these weapons, and:

“That's simply unacceptable for a nation whose nuclear protective umbrella covers some 40 nations.”

The number 40 captured my imagination. I thought immediately of the 28 members of NATO. Then it occurred to me that this includes the United States itself, which is a provider of the extended deterrent usually referred to as the “nuclear umbrella” and thus might not be counted toward the 40. And, of course, the United Kingdom and France have their own independent nuclear deterrents, so 25 in NATO properly under the U.S. “nuclear umbrella.” But then I decided that coming to agreement about this will require a more cooperative spirit, so 28.

Japan is an oft-cited (if increasingly complex) case, and South Korea leaps to mind, but I started running out of steam in my effort to count to 40.

Then it occurred to me I might have the whole thing the wrong way round. I began again: 192 members of the United Nations, now subtracting:

33 members of the Latin American Nuclear Weapon Free Zone,
13 parties to the South Pacific Nuclear Free Zone,
10 parties to the Southeast Asian Nuclear Weapon Free Zone,
53 signatories to the African Nuclear Weapon Free Zone, and
5 parties to the Central Asian Nuclear Weapon Free Zone
And, of course,
28 NATO members previously mentioned

This should leave 50 UN members not in NATO or an explicit nuclear weapon free zone agreement, right?

Of course, the devil is in the details, with Taiwan probably relevant and Niue party to Pelindaba and Brunei party to Bangkok all without seats in Turtle Bay – but building on the collaborative spirit referenced above, let’s say this is all part of a round 30, leaving 10 states to be named later under the U.S. “nuclear umbrella” from among (more or less) the follwing 53: Afghanistan, Andorra, Armenia, Australia, Austria, Azerbaijan, Bahrain, Bangladesh, Belarus, Bhutan, China, Cyprus, Egypt, Finland, Georgia, Iceland, Indonesia, Iran, Ireland, Israel, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Liechtenstein, Macedonia, Maldives, Malta, Marshall Islands, Micronesia, Monaco, Mongolia, Montenegro, Myanmar, Nepal, New Zealand, North Korea, Oman, Pakistan, Palau, Qatar, Moldova, Russia, San Marino, Saudi Arabia, Serbia, Sri Lanka, Sweden, Switzerland, Syria, Timor-Leste, Ukraine, United Arab Emirates, and Yemen. Plus, the Holy See.

This list certainly includes some of my favorites, but the point is that the who the United States has pledged to defend is potentially important at a moment when our negative security assurances (not to use nuclear weapons against non-nuclear weapon states parties to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty) will again be discussed critically at the 2010 Review Conference of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. The stakes may not seem what they once were in extending our deterrent largesse in this way, but exactly which states we have pledged to defend with nuclear weapons under what conditions remains a worthy topic of public debate because it has implications for the effectiveness of our nonproliferation policy.

Renew Article IV with Renewables

noreply@blogger.com (Douglas B. Shaw) — Fri, 07 Aug 2009 17:06:00 +0000

Forty-two years since the conclusion of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT), the world has changed substantially. Nuclear power generation has provided enormous quantities of electricity, fueling growth over decades and clarifying challenges that were dimly understood in the 1960s. Germany, for example, may be changing course away from indefinite reliance on nuclear power while even the United States may be as much as a generation away from a permanent solution for the disposal of high-level nuclear waste. In light of these changes, state practice in compliance with NPT Article IV commitments related to peaceful uses of nuclear energy has changed as well, and could change still further, potentially to the benefit of the NPT regime and international peace and security.

Clearly, the peaceful benefits -- and challenges -- of nuclear energy have become more diffuse and complex than they were in 1967. These peaceful benefits today include the advantage of historical perspective on varied international experiences with nuclear power generation and the more informed policy choices this perspective enables.

Nuclear power may not be suitable for every state, particularly in the context of increasing Non-Nuclear Weapon State sensitivity to each state’s own responsibility to comply with Article VI, as Professor Scott Sagan recently suggested at an event sponsored by the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies.

In this context, Non-Nuclear Weapon States should have the option to embrace assistance in the research, development, and deployment of renewable energy resources, distributed generation capacity, and energy efficiency as constitutive of Nuclear Weapon State compliance with Article IV. In some cases, these technologies may be more appropriate to the needs of Non-Nuclear Weapon States than nuclear power generation; assessment of this possibility should specifically include plans for future global growth in these technologies.

A view of Article IV compliance inclusive of non-power generation cooperation has a substantial history in the NPT regime. In the U.S. Arms Control and Disarmament Agency’s January 1995 publication NPT Article IV: The Human Dimension, non-power cooperation is emphasized specifically as constitutive of U.S. compliance with Article IV (p.2):

“U.S. support for the technical assistance programs administered by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has enabled many nations to make great strides in the application of nuclear techniques to a wide range of non-nuclear power disciplines. These techniques are used for such purposes as diagnosing and treating human and animal disease, optimizing soil fertility and crop production, reducing industrial pollution and improving the efficiency of industrial operations, to name just some. Many of the Agency’s programs are tailored to the needs of individual countries. Others are undertaken on a region-wide, or international basis. A closer look at some of them reveals the enormous benefits that many nations have realized in terms of an improved quality of life for their citizens.”

and (p. 18):

“The United States’ wide-ranging bilateral and multilateral technical assistance activities underscore its firm commitment to the goal enshrined in Article IV of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty of promoting ‘the fullest possible exchange of equipment, materials, and scientific and technological information for the peaceful uses of nuclear energy…with due consideration for the needs of the developing areas of the world.’”

The arguments – and this specific document – were an organic part of the global discussion leading up to the successful indefinite extension of the Treaty in 1995.

One danger of moves in this direction is that they could be seen by some Non-Nuclear Weapon States as an attempt to buy out an “inalienable right.” This is a legitimate concern as a key objective of the process of strengthening the NPT is increasing the perception of universal equity among its states parties. However, careful alignment of efforts at “renewable” Article IV compliance with “the needs of the developing areas of the world;” efforts to strengthen global compliance with other Articles – particularly I, II, and III; and the responsibility of aid recipient states to comply with Article VI could mitigate and balance these concerns. This is not a one-size-fits-all solution – but neither are the other proposed solutions, including internationalization of the fuel cycle or the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership. We may be years away from the right idea about the future of Article IV compliance, so we should definitely keep an open mind about the future of the benefits of peaceful uses of nuclear energy and potential linkages to renewable energy, distributed generation, and energy efficiency.

New video from the Two Futures Project

noreply@blogger.com (Douglas B. Shaw) — Fri, 24 Jul 2009 21:47:00 +0000

We recoomend the following 2 minnutes video with gratitude to Joe Cirincione for passing it along:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YgsL7L-2MKc&feature=channel

Imagining Iran

noreply@blogger.com (Douglas B. Shaw) — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 16:04:00 +0000

Like millions around the world, we are moved by the reports and images of Iranian citizens demanding effective democracy and resisting violent oppression. We are reminded of earlier instances when heroic leadership led to dramatic political change.

This vital national drama plays out against a backdrop of global significance. The Iranian Government’s refusal to fully align its nuclear behavior with its international legal commitments and the directives of the United Nations Security Council threatens international peace and security.

Today, Iran is a singular problem in terms of compliance with the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and its actions threaten the global norm against the spread of nuclear weapons. New prospects for progress toward a nuclear weapon-free world are precariously balanced on a prudent and coordinated response among many states, each with its own security and political equities to service. The Iranian Government ‘s rejection of the emerging multilateral effort to move toward the global abolition of nuclear weapons and contrary national development of sensitive nuclear fuel cycle technologies are disproportionately shaping our common human future much for the worse.

But what if they weren’t? Witnessing the courage of ordinary Iranians, we recall the challenges faced by leaders including Washington, Gandhi, and Mandela and the transformational changes their heroism made possible. Today, the hope for such leadership sparks interesting possibilities for international security and world peace, as well as for the people of Iran.

Next spring, the NPT will be reviewed by its states parties. Many expect Iran to play a cynical and destructive role in the proceedings, but there is a precedent for another alternative. When the NPT was made permanent at the 1995 Review and Extension Conference, the revolutionary leaders of South Africa’s new multi-racial democracy played an important role in rallying the world behind the then-hotly contested option of indefinite extension. They had the authentic claim to leadership of a state that had renounced and destroyed its nuclear arsenal under international verification as well as President Nelson Mandela’s extraordinary moral authority and they played an important and positive global leadership role.

What sort of leadership could a transformed Iranian diplomacy offer the world at the 2010 NPT Review Conference? Full compliance and openness to verification is obviously a first step, but South Africa did not stop there and there is no reason Iran could not go further. Aligning its longtime assertiveness on Article IV and “peaceful uses” more closely with international law and global expectations through acceptance of some type of internationalization of its nuclear fuel cycle could be a second important step. A third step might be to explore how global confidence could be maximized in the compliance of NPT states parties with their Article VI disarmament obligations, for instance through cooperative efforts to develop non-nuclear energy alternatives in cooperation with other states parties, new technologies and practices for detecting nuclear materials and processes, and nonproliferation and disarmament education practices to align national pride with global leadership for peace and security rather than the development of nuclear technology. We are indebted to Professor Scott Sagan for his recent observation (in an exchange with Ambassador Lewis Dunn at an event sponsored by The Nonproliferation Review of the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies) that non-nuclear weapon states parties to the NPT should all make explicit efforts to comply with the disarmament provisions of Article VI.

We realize that democratization alone will not solve the nuclear proliferation problem, as Ambassador Jack F. Matlock observes in his chapter “Regional Animosities and Nuclear Weapons Proliferation” in George P. Shultz, Steven P. Andreasen, Sidney D. Drell, and James E. Goodby’s pivotal Reykjavik Revisited: Steps Toward a World Free of Nuclear Weapons (Hoover/NTI, 2008):

“even a democratically elected government in Iran might well continue the Iranian program unless the external political environment is altered (p 406)…In Iranian eyes, since the other states seem to have accepted Pakistan’s nuclear status (even with its record of proliferation!), what valid motive could they have for denying Iran that capability other than a desire to make it vulnerable to military intervention, as the lack of nuclear weapons made both Serbia and Iraq vulnerable to military attacks even though they had not threatened the attackers? Such would be the rationale of the current Iranian leaders – and the likely rationale of any, more democratic, replacement regime faced with the same geopolitical configuration (p. 411).”

But heroic actions inspire us to imagine a future different than today, and a transformed Iran would have the capacity to exercise an important leadership role toward a world free of nuclear weapons.

Is the bomb boring you?

noreply@blogger.com (Douglas B. Shaw) — Wed, 15 Jul 2009 12:44:00 +0000

James MacPherson of the AP reported yesterday that:

"The Air Force discharged three North Dakota ballistic missile crew members who fell asleep while holding classified launch code devices, the military announced Tuesday. Officials said the codes were outdated and remained secure at all times."

This story reminded me of an observation made by Bruce Blair in his chapter “Alerting in Crisis and Nuclear War” in Ashton Carter, John Steinbruner, and Charles Zraket’s iconic 1987 tome Managing Nuclear Operations (p. 85):

“The normal peacetime level of alert permits crew members to sleep while on duty. Depending on the time of day, a DEFCON 3 message literally might awaken the Minuteman launch crews, an obvious precondition for the rapid firing of forces."

The editors of Managing Nuclear Operations remind us that (p. 3):

"In its forty years of existence the command system has had direct experience of only one operational state -- peacetime."

We should all be grateful that since that writing, this period has been extended more than half again. We should also be respectfully critical and vigilant about the challenges of the next sixty years of nuclear operations.

Nukes on a Blog would like to thank Joseph Grieboski for passing on the AP story.

Global Zero Seeks Young Leaders

noreply@blogger.com (Douglas B. Shaw) — Wed, 08 Jul 2009 22:48:00 +0000

Parsa Bastani at Global Zero forwards the following opportunity for undergrads:

On July 22, we're launching the Global Zero Student Summer - a 3-week program for students in Washington, DC to meet Global Zero commissioners and participate in organizing and media trainings with top practitioners in their fields.

We're looking for some smart, savvy, and entrepreneurial young people - current college students, incoming freshmen, or students on a gap year - who will embrace the once in a lifetime opportunity to sit down with Global Zero Commissioners Dr. Tony Lake, Ambassador Thomas Pickering, and Ambassador Richard Burt to hear why they believe we can achieve global zero. In the fall, participants in the Global Zero Student Summer will deploy back to their campuses to start local Global Zero chapters, leading our growing grassroots movement for global zero.
Apply Now http://www.globalzero.org/en/student-summer> for the Global Zero Student Summer (July 22-August 7, 2009 in Washington, DC)

Global Zero roles forward

noreply@blogger.com (Douglas B. Shaw) — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 21:39:00 +0000

The Global Zero Commission announced an “Action Plan,” a “step-by-step process to achieve total elimination of nuclear weapons,” today in press conference at the St. Regis Hotel in Washington, D.C. ahead of the scheduled Moscow Summit between President Barack Obama and Dmitry Medvedev.

The Commission is comprised of experts from seven states that maintain nuclear arsenals, as well as Japan and Germany.

Global Zero Commission member and former U.S. Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty negotiator Ambassador Richard Burt explained that the Global Zero Commission does not have all the answers or the only possible solution and looks to be collaborative with others engaged in the work of nuclear disarmament, but that today’s plan adds something different to this discussion because it is focused on the long-term development of a multilateral process for getting to zero nuclear weapons. Ambassador Burt and other Commission members emphasized that their effort was realistic, practical and pragmatic and that the:

“risks of nuclear weapons outweigh any stabilizing effect of nuclear weapons…We’re at a point where nuclear weapons will no longer be a weapon of the strong, they will increasingly be a weapon of the weak.”

Ambassador Burt carefully observed that testimony provided to the Commission suggests that governments and intelligence agencies have in every case been able to provide clear indication when and in what countries nuclear weapons development was underway. Former Ambassador of the United States to the United Nations, Russia, and India Thomas Pickering explained that the Global Zero Commission’s plan extends over fourteen years for the negotiation of the various constituent agreements and another seven years to complete dismantlement of existing nuclear arsenals.

Former Pakistani Foreign Secretary Ambassador Shahryar Khan affirmed that “Pakistan has absolutely no reservations” about going forward on the Global Zero path, and that with Pakistan’s leadership, most other Islamic countries would follow suit.

Former Permanent Representative of the People’s Republic of China to the United Nations, Ambassador Jianmin Wu, observed that:

“the threat is felt not only by developed countries, but also by developing countries."

The Commission will convene again in the fall (probably in Moscow) to more thoroughly flesh out the plan, while continuing to consult with governments and reach out the public. A “Global Zero Summit” is planned for January of next year in Paris.

We applaud this effort and agree that the prompt creation of an inclusive global dialogue about the future of nuclear weapons that engages governments not yet involved in the nuclear arms reduction process as well as international civil society and the global public is extremely important.