4. Divergent views on the targets of anti-terrorist WMD export controls. President Bush has indicated that the administration seeks to bring international terrorists to justice. Once past the Al Qaeda network and the Taliban, however, it remains uncertain that the United States can create international agreement on the individuals, entities, and governments appearing on its roster of SDTs, FTOs, and Terrorism List Governments. Disagreements about WMD export controls on trade with China, Iran, and India, for example, already plague the supplier groups. Even where they agree on which groups are international terrorists, it seems likely that countries will disagree on which terrorists constitute WMD threats. Given the imprecision and politicization involved in defining terrorism, much less on which entities pose a threat to use WMD, considerable disagreement will emerge outside of several clear-cut cases. 5. Divergent approaches to industry - govemment cooperation. Although the United States and several other governments have strong sets of outreach programs to inform industry about WMD export controls, evidence suggests that industry compliance remains haphazard in the United States, even among the biggest high-tech exporters. Several countries, such as Denmark and Japan, already rely more extensively on corporate compliance programs to implement export control policy than does the United States.8 7 See Richard T. Cupitt, "Survey on US Industry Compliance and Export Controls: Findings," available on line at http://www.uga.edu/cits/news/news_us_indi_full.htm. 8 See, for example, Center for Information on Strategic Technology Controls (CISTEC), Export Control System in Japan, Tokyo: CISTEC, February 2001; or Danish Agency for Trade and Industry, On the Way to a New Export Control System, Copenhagen: Ministry of Trade and Industry, September 2000, also available in Danish at www.efs.dk. Arguably, the most effective actions the United States might take in developing better WMD and anti-terrorism export controls would be to create and certify minimum standards for industry internal compliance programs and export control administrators (some companies already do the latter). These will be particularly important for those companies that operate most of the functions at the US national laboratories. Conclusion Unfortunately, the international nonproliferation export control community appears much better at reacting to catastrophic events than undertaking proactive reforms. The 1974 Indian nuclear test, the use of chemical weapons by Iraq in the 1980s, and the exposure of the extensive Iraqi WMD programs after the Gulf War, among other events, all prompted long-needed reforms in multilateral coordination of export control policies. The tragic events of the last two months appear to offer another opportunity to make the international system more effective. The fundamental weaknesses of the existing multilateral system, however, will hamper coordination on WMD anti-terrorism export controls if left untreated. Let me suggest a few immediate steps to address these concerns: Develop working groups in each supplier arrangement to address anti terrorism, but coordinate their work with a small international anti-terrorism export control working group. Identify anti-terrorism export control policies of other countries, especially those related to WMD, starting with the G-8 and other key members of the supplier groups. Develop a list of items to control that are of greatest concern related to WMD anti-terrorism as a basis for international negotiations on anti-terrorism export controls. • Develop a list of terrorists and terrorist organizations that pose the greatest WMD threat as a basis for international negotiations on anti-terrorism export controls. Be willing to provide funding, technical assistance, and critical information to help US partners implement and coordinate WMD anti-terrorist export control intelligence, licensing, and enforcement policies. Create new standards for industry compliance programs that make it more likely that companies, research institutions, and especially the national laboratories of greatest WMD concern do not inadvertently export items that enhance the treat of WMD terrorism. Export controls alone can not prevent WMD terrorism. Nonetheless, they will play an important role in the anti-terrorism campaign. Without appropriate export controls, those groups already willing to use WMD could more easily obtain WMD capability. As important, without improving existing export controls, sufficient weaknesses in the multilateral export control system may be exposed so that terrorists now dissuaded by the difficulties in obtaining WMD will recalculate the costs and benefits of using WMD that will lead to more terrorists seeking and acquiring WMD. Making it harder for terrorists to acquire WMD capabilities through export controls, without unnecessarily impeding legitimate commercial and scientific exchange, is an important preventative step in that direction. Current and Future Weapons of Mass Destruction Proliferation Threats Subcommittee on International Security, Proliferation and Federal Service Center for Strategic and International Studies November 7, 2001 Mr. Chairman, let me thank you and the other members of the Committee for the opportunity to testify on the effectiveness of export controls in curbing the proliferation of material and technology used for weapons of mass destruction. Through the 1980s and 1990s, the U.S. created an extensive export control architecture. Export controls became an important tool to slow the spread of sensitive technologies to states of concern. However, over the last decade, two major developments have changed the significance of export controls for national security. First, a far more complex security environment has replaced the tidy Cold War alignment of friends and foes. International security is now complex and unpredictable. Second, the global economy has evolved in ways we did not foresee when the U.S. established its export controls. The result is that export controls grow less effective every year. This is particularly true for dual-use export controls. The principle reason for this is the continuing economic development and integration of countries around the globe. Fewer obstacles and lower costs for international trade mean that industries and production are increasingly international. The volume of international trade has tripled in the last fifteen years. Improvements in communications technologies make it easy to transfer data and ideas around the world in a few seconds. Container ships and jumbo jets have made transportation cheap and easy, allowing millions of tons of cargo and millions of people to travel around the world every year. These changes have significant implications for U.S. security, particularly for counter-terrorism and for nonproliferation. Business and science have become more international and more collaborative. International research and development alliances among corporations has increased eightfold since the mid 1980s. Companies place plants or development centers in different countries or even different continents. They move their research and development ideas rapidly among these facilities to gain competitive advantage in a global market place. Scientific capabilities have also diffused around the world, as more countries build scientific and research institutions and as scientists find that they gain an advantage from research conducted by multinational teams of specialists in different countries. For nonproliferation, these changes make it harder to deny access to technology, especially as much of the technology needed for weapons of mass destruction does not need to be particularly advanced. Proliferators can use industrial equipment from the 1970s or even 1950s to build weapons of mass destruction. Determined nations, such as Iraq, Iran or North Korea will be able to continue their WMD programs despite export control efforts. Iraq exemplifies this best, for despite the most restrictive sanctions Multilateral Regimes and Nonproliferation While export controls have become less useful, the Missile Technology Control Regime, the Australia Group and the Nuclear Suppliers Group continue to make positive contributions to security. The characteristics that make the regimes more effective are: -- They have strong multilateral support, so a denial by one country will not be “undercut by another." -- There is broad consensus to prevent exports that contribute to WMD proliferation. -- They focus their efforts on specific chokepoint technologies. -- They have good mechanisms for information sharing and consensus building on projects of concern. These characteristics are a good test for measuring the effectiveness of national export controls. In an era of economic globalization, a single country's export controls will be ineffective unless it focuses on key technologies and other nations follow similar practices. Export controls can remain effective in an era of economic integration and globalization only if they focus on technologies that are not widely available in the world market and if they have a high degree of multilateral support. A fourth regime, the Wassenaar Arrangement, demonstrates the need for focus and cooperation. Unlike the three nonproliferation regimes, the Wassenaar Arrangement is ineffective. There is little consensus among Wassenaar members on its mission or on what technologies are crucial for control. As a result, we can no longer prevent countries from acquiring many items on the Wassenaar control list. However, Wassenaar has little to do with nonproliferation. It focuses on controlling conventional dual-use technologies. Many of these technologies are not key WMD technologies and not controlled by other countries for proliferation purposes. Items on the Wassenaar List that are useful for WMD are already controlled by the three nonproliferation regimes. This is because when the Wassenaar Arrangement was established, our allies insisted that any item or technology for weapons of mass destruction be moved from Wassenaar control lists to one of nonproliferation regimes. The result is that for WMD, Wassenaar controls are redundant. "Catch-All" Controls Wassenaar controls are also redundant for nonproliferation if a country has effective "catch-all" controls. "Catch-all” controls apply to any export when the intended recipient is a proliferation-related entity. The U.S. created its "catch-all" control, known as EPCI (Enhanced Proliferation Control Initiative), in response to Iraqi efforts in 1990 to acquire U.S. equipment for WMD production. EPCI allows the U.S. to stop shipments of any |