NPT and is seeking a resolution condemning it. It has protested little or not at all, however, about Pyongyang's actual withdrawal from the treaty. Is the supposition here that the U.S. recognizes North Korea's right to nuclear weapons and its right to keep all the nuclear technology it illicitly gained while a member of the NPT? Then, there is the argument U.S. officials make that if North Korea does not disarm, Japan might acquire nuclear weapons as well. This is something China should fear, U.S. officials have explained, but is it also something Washington welcomes or expects? Perhaps U.S. could "live" with such a good nation acquiring nuclear weapons so long as Japan acquires them to assure mutual deterrence of North Korea. Is the U.S. ready to make the best of such proliferation? Is it prepared to let other friends South Korea, Taiwan, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Turkey-follow in suit? Again, if the U.S. is truly to move away from MAD, it must eschew even indirectly endorsing the notion that nuclear weapons can assure a nation protection from attack or that, as such, others' acquisition of them is simply the exercise of their right to self-defense. Certainly, if nations perceive that the U.S. is willing to look the other way or to endorse some nuclear proliferation as good, inevitable, or manageable, further proliferation will only be more likely. Third, the U.S. and its allies would actually have to enforce the current set of nuclear nonproliferation rules and make them less generous with regard to what is safe and dangerous. As noted before, the MAD or finite deterrence-inspired notion that states have a right to nuclear weapons and that they should be compensated with free access to all types of nuclear technology for not exercising this right has more than run its course in the case of Iraq, Iran, and North Korea. The NPT, after all, makes it clear in Article IV that nations' inalienable right to develop nuclear energy for peaceful purposes must nonetheless be exercised "in conformity with Articles I and II" which prohibits states from assisting non-weapons states "in any way” to acquire nuclear explosives or control over such weapons. This Article I and II prohibition, it should be noted, was originally inspired not by the finite deterrence or MAD thinking of the late 1960s, but by the original Irish UN Resolutions of 1958 and 1959, which were the first to call for an international nuclear nonproliferation treaty. In requesting that the UN to establish a committee to study the dangers inherent in the further spread of nuclear weapons, the Irish representative to the UN held no brief for nations having any "right" to acquire atomic explosives, much less for them being compensated with unrestricted access to nuclear technology for "peaceful" purposes. Nor did he argue that the key nuclear threat was the pace of Superpower nuclear weapons innovation or growth. Instead, Ireland's original call for a nuclear nonproliferation treaty was premised on the fear that the further spread of nuclear weapons to additional states would make nuclear disarmament and reductions less likely and accidental or catalytic wars-ones instigated by smaller powers to draw the superpowers to their defensemore probable. Against, this threat, the Irish representative urged adoption of the most basic restraint: States that had weapons should agree not to share or spread them and states that lacked them should agree not to acquire them. As for the sharing nuclear technology for civilian purposes, the Irish recognized that the further spread of such civilian capabilities would actually make the spread of nuclear weapons more likely and that, therefore, the proliferation of such technology had to be controlled. Finally, the Irish downplayed the idea that the Superpowers had to disarm themselves before any progress could be made to reduce the spread of nuclear weapons to other states.6 Clearly, this original Irish Resolution view of the NPT is the one we need to return to if we are to keep the NPT as an agreement that will reduce rather than fan further nuclear proliferation. In the first instance this will require that the U.S. and other nuclear technology exporting states recognize that too much of what they are willing to share is too close to bomb making to be safeguarded against quick diversion to military ends. Certainly, the export of light water reactors to Iran will bring it dangerously close to having a large arsenal of near weapons-grade plutonium only after 15 months of operation. The same is true of North Korea if either of the two light water reactors the U.S., Japan, and South Korea are helping to build are completed. It's even clearer that Russia's, Pakistan's, and China's sharing of fuel fabrication, plutonium separation, and uranium enrichment technology and hardware with Iran and North Korea is simply too close to bomb making ever to allow for any monitoring being able to afford timely warning of a possible military diversion. 6 For documentation of these points, see Henry Sokolski, Best of Intentions: America's Campaign Against Strategic Weapons Proliferation (Westport CT: Praeger Publishers, 2001), pp. 3956. 87-494 D-2 Unfortunately, America is still pushing international cooperation on advanced fuel cycles and reactors that includes cooperation on "proliferation resistant" breeder reactors and reprocessing (because of the addition of several steps that could just as easily be subtracted as not). This cooperation is being proposed for Brazil. South Africa, South Korea, and Argentina-states that only recently gave up nuclear weapons programs of their own. Finally, there is seems to be growing U.S. and allied indifference to further civilian use of weapons usable plutonium. Here the U.S. is proposing to reconsider President Ford's policy of deferring the commercial use of such nuclear fuels. As an unannounced lead in this effort, Washington is plowing ahead with its efforts to convert 34 tons of weapons grade plutonium into mixed oxide (MOX) civilian fuels over the next 20 years and to help pay Russia to do the same. The U.S. Department of Energy claims that this effort has nothing to do with reversing the Ford policies but, in fact, this project will result in over $6 billion in MOX fuel fabrication facilities being built both here and in Russia and the movement of over 17,000 nuclear weapons worth of plutonium into civilian commerce.7 Such risky civilian efforts, which are consistent with a MAD-inspired reading of the NPT and the need for the freest exchange of nuclear technology for civilian purposes are themselves bad enough. What's worse is their encouragement of lax enforcement of existing nonproliferation rules. Japan recently announced that it had lost between 59 and 206 kilograms (10 to 51 crude bombs' worth) of nuclear weapons usable material over the last 15 years of its civilian breeder and MOX operations. Yet, the U.S. made no complaint and the IAEA conducted no serious investigation. In fact, the IAEA still only makes public its discovery of special nuclear materials it believes is unaccounted for. It keeps no public account of the nearly 200 tons (25 to 50 thousand crude weapons worth) of weapons usable civilian plutonium that specific member states have on hand.9 Such a cavalier attitude regarding the sharing, accounting, generation, and safekeeping of civilian nuclear weapons usable materials and related technologies might have made sense in the MAD world of the NPT in 1968 but after the events of September 11 and Al Qeada's announced interest in nuclear explosives, it is woefully unwise. Towards A Saner Set of Policies Making the changes noted above will not be easy. However, it would be a mistake not to try. Currently, there are only five declared nuclear states all of whose arsenals (except China's) that are becoming smaller. India, Pakistan, and Israel also have nuclear weapons as does North Korea. The question is how much worse can it get. The answer is plenty. If nothing is done to shore up U.S. and allied security relations with the Gulf Coordination Council states and with Iraq, Turkey and Egypt; Iran's acquisition of even a nuclear weapons breakout capability could prompt one or more of these states to try to acquire a nuclear weapons option of their own. Similarly, if the U.S. fails to hold Pyongyang accountable for its violation of the NPT or lets Pyongyang hold on to one or more nuclear weapons while appearing to reward its violation with a new deal—one that heeds North Korea's demand for a nonagression pact and continued construction of the two light water reactors-South Korea and Japan (and later, perhaps Taiwan) will have powerful cause to question Washington's security commitment to them and their own pledges to stay nonnuclear. In such a world, Washington's worries would not be limited to gauging the military capabilities of a growing number of hostile, nuclear or near nuclear-armed nations. In addition, it would have to gauge the reliability of a growing number of nuclear or near-nuclear friends. Washington might still be able to assemble coalitions, but with more nations like France, with nuclear options of their own, it would much, much more iffy. The amount of international intrigue such a world would generate would also easily exceed what our diplomats and leaders could manage or track. Rather than worry about using force for fear of producing another Vietnam, Washington and its very closest allies are more likely to grow weary of working 7 For a full discussion of this effort, see Daniel Horner, "Full G8 Funding For Construction of Russian MOX Plant Seen By Year's End," NuclearFuel, April 28, 2003, p. 3. 8 See Bayan Rahman, "Japan 'Loses' 206 kg of Plutonium," Financial Times, January 28, 2003 9 Each year the IAEA and every second year EURATOM announce the total amounts of plutonium and highly enriched uranium they believe they are safeguarding. Both, however, are barred by rules of confidentiality from specifying what amounts they believe each country they are safeguarding is holding. On this point, see David Albright, Frans Berkhout and William Walker, Plutonium and Highly Enriched Uranium 1996 World Inventories, Capabilities and Policies (London: Oxford University Press, 1997), p. 407 and Albert Wohlstetter et al. Swords From Plowshares (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1977), pp. 65–67. closely with others and view military options through the rosy lens of their relatively quick victories in Desert Storm, Kosovo, Operation Iraqi Freedom, and Just Cause. This would be a world disturbingly similar to that of 1914 but with one big difference: It would be spring loaded to go nuclear. To move away from such a future, then, is worth some effort. But what step should be taken first? Cleary, it would be helpful if the U.S. and its allies backed country-neutral rules that would close some of the worst loopholes in the NPT. These gaps principally consist of the NPT's non-application to weapons states outside the treaty, the NPT's lack of any serious enforcement measures, its generous inattention to risky "peaceful" nuclear cooperation, and its allowance of nuclear weapons transfers between states so long as the weapon transferred remains under the control of the exporting nation (e.g., U.S. nuclear weapons deployed in Germany). To begin to fill these loopholes and to get back to an Irish Resolution view of the NPT generally, one might start by trying to establish an international common usage against any state helping others acquire weapons of mass destruction (nuclear, chemical, or biological weapons) like that that already exists against piracy and the trading in slaves. Piracy and slave trading are currently activities that can only be conducted outside of the protection of international law. Any nation that encounters someone engaged in these activities is free to act against them, to arrest them, seize their cargo, or force their vessels or vehicles to return to their point of origin. One approach to help establish such a rule against weapons of mass destruction, might be to establish that nations henceforth ought not to deploy chemical, biological, or nuclear weapons to any other nation in peacetime whether they be under their control or not. Beyond this, the U.S. and like-minded nations should propose that nations no longer ship any special nuclear materials (as defined by the IAEA Statute) or any item on Schedule One of the Australia Group's list of biological and chemical weapons items or items on the Nuclear Suppliers' list without giving prior international notification. In fact, shippers' export declarations laws in the U.S. and Australia already require exporters in these states to make prior notification of their export shipments. Other nations should do likewise. These postings could be made on an internationally available website almost immediately. At the same time, the U.S. or other like-minded nations could propose that the UN Security Council adopt a resolution that would remove the protection of international law from any nation's attempt to re-deploy nuclear, chemical, or biological warheads. This proposed resolution would also make it clear that if they were not properly pre-announced (on the recently established website or some facsimile), any shipments of Schedule One Australia Group or Nuclear Suppliers Group items or of special nuclear materials as defined by the IAEA Statute would also lack such protection. If the UN Security Council acted quickly to adopt such a measure, all the better. If it failed to act, however, those who discover a violation of the proposed rules might chose to act on their own. In either case, an international common usage against weapons of mass destruction trade could be established that's needed and currently lacking. What might its benefits be? It should cover several cases, all of which are worrisome. Pakistan, for one, could no longer contemplate transferring nuclear warheads legally under its control to a Saudi Arabia (as its generals have privately suggested they might). Nor could Pyongyang act on its threat to transfer its nuclear weapons to another state without risking having the shipment legally blocked or seized. Beyond this, any strategic weapons related assistance a Pakistan (or a North Korea, China, Iran or Russia) might want to give to other states would now have to be announced before it was actually shipped or hazard being interdicted. This, at the very least, in turn, would help prevent a repeat of another Iran-i.e., of another nation covertly acquiring all it needs to breakout quickly with a large arsenal of weapons without quite breaking the rules. This international common usage also would allow the world's Indias, Israels, and Pakistans, who cannot be made weapons state members to the NPT, a formal way to uphold international nonproliferation norms. In addition, it would allow other nations that have bad proliferation reputations (e.g., China and Russia) to work with the U.S. and others to restore their good names. Finally, by establishing an international rule against warhead transfers and dangerous covert trade, it would afford supporters of nonproliferation a legal basis for acting against violators even if they failed to catch them in the act. If the U.S. wanted to build additional support for this effort, it might offer to remove its prior deployment of nuclear arms in Western Europe. These weapons are almost certain to be removed with the planned reduction of American forces in Germany. Also, most of these weapons are quite old if not obsolete. Such an offer (to do what the US will likely do in time anyway), would still have to be implemented carefully so as not to undermine NATO alliance relations. It could not be done suddenly or appear to be the response to anti-nuclear protests. Assuming this could be done, though, such an offer might help persuade Russia and others to support establishing an international usage against WMD proliferation both before and at the time of any UN vote. In conjunction with the proposed ban on unannounced dangerous trade, a ban on redeploying weapons of mass destruction could set into motion a much more serious review of MAD-inspired nonproliferation policies more generally. What should the IAEA and the worlds' leading nuclear suppliers consider to be safe and dangerous? Should nations like Iran be able to get all they need to breakout with a large arsenal virtually overnight? What truly constitutes timely warning of a diversion of civilian technology to military purposes? Is something more than inspecting to find special materials unaccounted for? Does it make sense to spread nuclear bulk handling facilities—reprocessing, enrichment, fuel fabrication plants—where scores of bombs worth of nuclear weapons material will be present? What of increased civilian commerce in nuclear weapons materials? Is this trade worth the risks or should it be put on hold? What of missile technologies? Should controls be tightened to prevent proliferation or relaxed to promote missile defense cooperation? In either case, how should this be done? A debate over all these questions and more is likely assuming the U.S. and other chose to get serious about moving away from MAD toward world with fewer nuclear weapons in fewer hands. On the other hand, without such a move, the bold steps Washington have already taken away from MAD's opposition to missile defenses will hardly get it where the U.S. and world should want it to go-toward a safer, saner world whose security is based less on nuclear offenses than on defenses, selfrestraint, and, in time, on the kind of peace that can only come with a world full of Canadas. The Honorable Pete Domenici, Chairman, U.S. Senate, Washington, DC. DEAR MR. CHAIRMAN: We are writing to ask you to reject a dangerous provision in the House version of the pending energy bill that would relax export controls on nuclear-weapon grade, highly enriched uranium (HEU) by repealing part of the Schumer Amendment to the Energy Policy Act of 1992. Senator Bond of Missouri has inserted similar language in separate legislation approved by the Committee on Environment and Public Works, and is likely to offer this provision as an amendment to the Senate energy bill. We urge you to oppose this amendment. Senator Bond's amendment and the corresponding House version, sponsored by Rep. Richard Burr, are ostensibly intended to ensure the continued supply of medical radioisotopes to the United States. In fact, they are special-interest provisions aimed mainly at benefiting a single foreign isotope producer, MDS Nordion of Canada, by weakening the modest HEU export license conditions in the current law. We support the use of medical isotopes, but this legislation is not necessary to ensure their supply. The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission has never denied an HEU export license to Nordion under the current law. Thus, the Burr and Bond Amendments would needlessly increase the risk of nuclear terrorism in the name of ensuring the supply of medical isotopes, which is not threatened in the first place. The Schumer Amendment was intended to phase out HEU exports in order to reduce the risk of this material being stolen by terrorists or diverted by proliferating states for nuclear weapons production. The law bars export of HEU for use as reactor fuel or as targets to produce medical isotopes, except on an interim basis to facilities that are actively pursuing conversion to low-enriched uranium (LEU), a material that unlike HEU cannot be used to make a Hiroshima-type bomb. Because the United States has been the primary world supplier of HEU, the law provides a strong incentive for reactor operators and isotope producers to convert their operations from HEU to LEU. The law does not impose an unreasonable burden on isotope producers and indeed exempts them if conversion would result in “a large percentage increase in the total cost of operating the reactor." The Burr and Bond Amendments would eliminate this legal restriction on supply of HEU to the main producers of medical isotopes and thereby dramatically reduce their incentives to convert from HEU to LEU. (While the United States as a matter of policy could still choose to limit HEU exports, recent history demonstrates that it was the teeth added by the statutory restrictions of the Schumer Amendment that dramatically reduced HEU exports over the past decade.) The likely result of the Burr Amendment would be perpetual use of HEU by these isotope producers instead of the phase-out foreseen by current law. Worldwide, such isotope production now annually requires some 50-100 kg of fresh HEU, sufficient for at least one nuclear weapon of a simple design, or several of a more sophisticated design. (Each of the world's major isotope production facilities already requires annually about 20 kg of fresh HEU.) If the Burr amendment is adopted and derails conversion to LEU, the annual amount of HEU needed for isotope production is likely to grow in step with the rising demand for isotopes. Moreover, after the HEU targets are used and processed, the uranium waste remains highly enriched (exceeding 90 percent), and cools quickly, so that within a year the remaining HEU is no longer "self-protecting" against terrorist theft. Thus, substantial amounts of weapon-usable HEU waste accumulate at isotope production sites, presenting yet another vulnerable and attractive target for terrorists. Contrary to its stated intent, the Burr Amendment would do nothing to ensure the supply of medical isotopes to the United States because that supply is not currently endangered by the Schumer Amendment's restrictions on exports of HEU. The United States now gets most of its medical isotopes from the Canadian supplier Nordion, which still produces such isotopes at its aging NRU reactor and associated processing plant. The Schumer Amendment does not block continued export of HEU for isotope production at this facility prior to its impending shutdown. In addition, Nordion has stockpiled four years' worth of HEU targets specially designed for its new isotope production facility, which is scheduled to commence commercial operation soon. Even in the unexpected circumstance that Nordion's isotope production were to cease, the United States could turn to alternate suppliers in the Netherlands, Belgium, and South Africa that currently enjoy excess production capacity. We wish to underscore that the existing law does not discriminate against Canada or any other foreign producer. Indeed, in 1986, the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission ordered all domestic, licensed nuclear research reactors to convert from HEU to LEU fuel as soon as suitable low-enriched fuel for their use became available. The NRC recognized that prevention of theft and diversion of HEU from civilian facilities cannot be assured by physical protection and safeguards alone, but rather requires a phase-out of HEU commerce. The Schumer Amendment applied the same standard to foreign operators. Supporters of the Burr Amendment, such as the American College of Nuclear Physicians, have argued erroneously that the Schumer Amendment "was not drafted with medical uses of HEU in mind." In fact, the approximately 500-word Schumer Amendment uses the word "target" nine times. Targets, in distinction to "fuel," are used exclusively for the production of medical isotopes. Thus, it is readily apparent that the current law was drafted explicitly to include the HEU targets that are used in medical isotope production. We also wish to underscore that conversion of isotope production from HEU to LEU is technically and economically feasible. Australia has produced medical isotopes using LEU for years. According to Argonne National Laboratory, the main consequence of Nordion converting from HEU to LEU would be to increase its waste volume by about ten percent. That is a small price to pay to eliminate the risk that this material could be stolen by terrorists and used to build nuclear weapons. The main obstacle to Nordion converting its production process from ĤEU to LEU has been the company's refusal to pursue such conversion in good faith, as required by the Schumer amendment as a condition for interim exports of HEU. In 1990, Atomic Energy Canada, Ltd. (from which Nordion was spun off) pledged to develop an LEU target by 1998 and to "phase out HEU use by 2000." Nordion and AECL failed to meet this target. During the last few years, to qualify for additional HEU exports, Nordion repeatedly has pledged to cooperate with the United States on conversion. However, Nordion stopped engaging in such cooperation more than a year ago. The Schumer Amendment will never lead to an interruption in Nordion's ability to produce isotopes unless Nordion aggressively refuses to cooperate with U.S. policies designed to prevent terrorists from acquiring the essential ingredients of nuclear weapons. No company has a perpetual entitlement to U.S. bomb-grade uranium, and any such exports should be reserved for recipients who cooperate with U.S. law intended to prevent nuclear proliferation and nuclear terrorism. Passage of the Burr and Bond Amendments would reward Nordion for its lack of cooperation. During the past 25 years, an international effort led by the U.S. has succeeded at sharply reducing civilian HEU commerce. In 1978, the U.S. created the Reduced Enrichment for Research and Test Reactors (RERTR) program at Argonne National Laboratory. In 1980, the UN endorsed the conversion of existing reactors in its International Nuclear Fuel Cycle Evaluation (INFCE). In 1986, the U.S. NRC or |