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Politics > Politics-USA |
| User: |
"Jei" |
| Date: |
29 Dec 2003 08:23:29 PM |
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North Korea, Others to Build New Mini-Nukes as Well? |
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines03/1223-05.htm
Published on Tuesday, December 23, 2003 by the Los Angeles Times
Observers Fault U.S. for Pursuing Mini-Nukes
Critics Say American 'Double Standard' Will Undermine Efforts to Curb
Nuclear Arms
by Douglas Frantz
VIENNA - Research on a new generation of precision atomic weapons by the
Bush administration threatens to undermine international efforts to stop the
spread of nuclear arms and to tarnish recent successes, according to
diplomats and nonproliferation experts.
The criticism focuses on the administration's decision to lay the groundwork
for developing low-yield weapons - known as mini-nukes - while pursuing
President Bush's doctrine of preemptive strikes against rogue states.
The diplomats and independent experts said Washington's strategy weakens
support for more stringent controls at a time when the Nuclear
Nonproliferation Treaty faces serious challenges from North Korea and Iran
and amid widespread fears of terrorists acquiring atomic weapons. The U.S.
strategy, critics say, may cause other countries to pursue nuclear arms.
"The U.S. follows a double standard that allows it to develop and threaten
to use nuclear weapons while denying them to smaller countries," said
Hussein Haniff, Malaysia's ambassador to the International Atomic Energy
Agency in Vienna. "We do not know whether the nuclear nonproliferation
treaty can survive with these U.S. policies."
Haniff heads a group of 13 countries that constitute a nonaligned bloc on
the IAEA's 35-nation Board of Governors. The bloc is often at odds with the
United States and last month opposed U.S. efforts to declare Iran in
violation of the nonproliferation treaty.
The Bush administration argues that mini-nukes would provide flexibility to
respond to changing threats and small-scale conflicts that do not require
full-size nuclear armaments.
Nonetheless, some U.S. allies are alarmed. A senior Western diplomat called
the prospect of mini-nukes "politically stupid" and said it would complicate
U.S. security by weakening support for tougher nuclear controls.
Anger over the U.S. policy has risen steadily since the spring when the
administration requested funding for research on mini-nukes, in effect
seeking a reversal of a 1993 ban on research and development of low-yield
atomic weapons. After much wrangling, Congress approved the bill last month,
granting $7.5 million, half of what the administration had sought.
The weapons would be designed to penetrate underground bunkers presumed to
conceal weapons of mass destruction or command centers. Pentagon planners
say the low yield would limit nuclear fallout, a claim some scientists
dispute.
Administration officials have said the research into mini-nukes was
insignificant compared with its larger arms control effort, which would cut
the U.S. nuclear stockpile by two-thirds by 2012.
"If you look at reality, and not just a sound bite, we are not ramping up
our nuclear arsenal, we are ramping down," a senior administration official
in Washington said.
Officials said the administration's multi-pronged strategy helped persuade
Libya to give up its nuclear, chemical and biological programs.
"The administration's tough stance on Iraq, its national security strategy
and President Bush's firm speeches against terror all got Tripoli's
attention," a U.S. official said Monday.
Libya's surprise decision, which followed months of talks with the U.S. and
Britain, may have been motivated by outside factors, and did not necessarily
reflect a bow to American threats, foreign officials said.
"It's hard to tell what the reasons were just yet, but the Libyans told me
that the programs had become too expensive and that world conditions had
changed," said a Western diplomat in Vienna.
The Libyan decision did not put to rest questions about the U.S. strategy.
Some experts said the research on mini-nukes violated U.S. legal obligations
to disarm and blurred the line between conventional warfare and nuclear
conflict.
"Preemptive strikes linked to the development of new nuclear weapons sends a
threatening message to nonnuclear states," said Jean du Preez, a former
South African diplomat who is an analyst at the Center for Nonproliferation
Studies in Monterey, Calif. "Even some nuclear states, including India and
Pakistan, may decide, well, why not do the same."
The debate over the U.S. posture comes as anxiety over the spread of atomic
weapons is rising after the nuclear standoff with North Korea and the
disclosure of Iran's uranium-enrichment program and Libya's progress.
Iran has maintained that its nuclear program exists solely to generate
electricity.
"I would not be surprised if we see more countries acquire nuclear weapons,"
Mohamed ElBaradei, director-general of the IAEA, said recently at the
agency's headquarters in Vienna.
ElBaradei did not suggest which countries might try to do so, but diplomats
said Algeria, Sudan and Syria were on the list and the number would grow
sharply if North Korea or Iran obtained weapons.
Technology that was once the preserve of the five original nuclear weapons
states - the U.S., Russia, China, Britain and France - is now available
worldwide. Export controls have eroded and technical barriers have fallen.
At the same time, detecting the early phases of a weapons program remains
virtually impossible. U.S. officials who visited Libyan nuclear facilities
after Tripoli's decision said the weapons work was far more advanced than
they had suspected.
ElBaradei said on Monday that Libya had tried to use centrifuges to enrich
uranium for over a decade, but that it had not produced weapons-grade
material.
The Treaty on the Nonproliferation of Nuclear Weapons, was developed in 1968
and went into force in 1970. It was drafted to curb the spread of nuclear
weapons and bind the five existing nuclear powers to reducing their arsenals
to zero.
The International Atomic Energy Agency, set up under United Nations auspices
in 1957 to promote peaceful nuclear energy, was given responsibility for
monitoring compliance. So far, 183 countries have accepted the treaty.
Most nonproliferation experts applaud the treaty. President Kennedy's famous
1963 prediction that between 15 to 20 countries would be armed with nuclear
weapons in a decade did not come true; only eight countries are known to
have atomic arsenals. South Africa willingly gave up its weapons and other
countries abandoned weapons programs or surrendered inherited weapons.
On the negative side, three nations with nuclear weapons - India, Israel and
Pakistan - refuse to sign the nonproliferation treaty. Pakistan is suspected
of supporting weapons programs in Iran and North Korea. Intelligence experts
are divided on whether North Korea yet has atomic bombs.
Developments in Iran and North Korea in the last year highlighted other
major treaty shortcomings.
The biggest flaw is that the treaty grants countries the "inalienable right"
to acquire the technology to develop nuclear fuel. The provision was
essential to convince countries without nuclear arms to forgo any
aspirations in return for access to nuclear technology for peaceful
purposes.
The problem is that fuel, whether enriched uranium or plutonium, is the most
critical ingredient in nuclear weapons and the hardest to obtain. But the
same technologies used to manufacture fuel for reactors can, with minor
changes, be used for weapons. So countries with fuel cycles can move to
within a short step of weapons while appearing to comply with the treaty.
This is precisely what the U.S. has accused Iran of doing. Washington said
Tehran used the cover of a civilian program to develop the ability to enrich
uranium for weapons, an accusation that Iran denies.
Responding to international pressure, Iran disclosed details of its nuclear
program and opened its doors to tougher inspections last month. On Thursday,
it signed an agreement to permit more intrusive inspections by the IAEA.
The nuclear nonproliferation treaty allows inspectors to visit declared
nuclear sites. But an additional protocol permits them to examine other
suspicious locations after telling the country which installations they want
to inspect.
Diplomats said the protocol is an important step forward, but it is not a
panacea and acceptance has been slow. Iran was the 79th country to sign the
pact, but only 38 have ratified it. The U.S. signed it but has not ratified
it.
"The treaty and the protocol only buy time," said a diplomat in Vienna.
"They don't stop anyone determined to build a nuclear bomb."
To close the gap, ElBaradei recently proposed controls to restrict access to
the nuclear fuel cycle. The approach envisions multinational control over
the sensitive aspects of fuel development, coupled with guarantees to
countries that they could buy fuel for civilian uses.
The Bush administration has acknowledged the problem ElBaradei's proposal
aims to address.
"We must seriously limit enrichment and reprocessing capabilities while
allowing access to appropriate reactor fuels," Mitchell B. Reiss, director
of policy planning at the State Department, said in a speech this month.
But other countries, including Iran, expressed strong reservations about
giving up the right to indigenous fuel sources and diplomats said it was
unlikely to happen without a major diplomatic fight.
Another treaty shortcoming often pointed out is the absence of set penalties
for violating or withdrawing from the agreement while under suspicion of
developing a weapons program.
The agency's Board of Governors can refer violators to the U.N. Security
Council for possible sanctions, but both bodies are political arenas where
compromise often trumps punishment. The U.S. is angry that the IAEA failed
last month to refer Iran's concealment of nuclear activities to the council.
North Korea is considered a more pressing nuclear threat - and a more
glaring example of the treaty's lack of teeth.
Early this year, North Korea became the first nation to withdraw from the
treaty, a step that followed years of it being declared in noncompliance.
Still, the U.N. has not punished North Korea.
"It's always a case-by-case basis and the Security Council is helpless to
act," said a European diplomat who advocated that the U.N. adopt a set of
escalating sanctions for violators.
The debate over strengthening the nonproliferation regime will heat up in
preparation for a treaty review in the spring of 2005. The Bush
administration's push for new controls, however, may be stymied by the anger
generated by its policies.
While the administration takes credit for pressuring Libya to relinquish its
weapons programs, Tripoli's voluntary action probably will present an
obstacle in U.S. efforts in the coming months to persuade other countries to
support tighter nuclear controls.
Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak said over the weekend that Israel should
now give up its nuclear arsenal. On Monday, the IAEA's ElBaradei praised
Libya's decision and repeated his call for eliminating nuclear weapons in
the Middle East.
Washington has long refused to pressure Israel over its ample nuclear
stockpile, a position many countries regard as a double standard when it
comes to who can possess nuclear weapons - the same concerns diplomats said
have been reinforced by the mini-nukes prospect.
"Bush's posture makes the job of selling nonproliferation more difficult,"
said a senior Western diplomat in Vienna. "If nuclear weapons are necessary
for the sole surviving superpower, what hope does Iran or any number of
other countries have without them?"
World nuclear powers
.. The United States has more than 7,000 strategic nuclear warheads; with
about 1,670 tactical warheads and stocks, the arsenal numbers about
10,000-12,000.
.. Russia has roughly 6,000 deployed strategic nuclear warheads but the
arsenal jumps to about 20,000 when stored and tactical warheads are counted.
Like the U.S., it keeps about 2,000-2,500 weapons on high-alert status.
.. France maintains about 350 nuclear warheads on 60 Mirage 2000N bombers,
four nuclear-powered ballistic missile submarines, and on carrier-based
aircraft.
.. Britain's capability is thought to consist of approximately 200 strategic
and "sub-strategic" warheads on nuclear-powered ballistic missile
submarines.
.. China has an estimated 140-290 strategic and 120-150 nonstrategic nuclear
warheads.
.. Pakistan says its "minimum nuclear deterrent" includes ballistic missiles
that can hit deep inside India. Analysts put the Pakistani arsenal at
between 10 bombs at the time of its May 1998 nuclear tests and up to 48 now.
.. India is estimated to have between 55 and 110 bombs, according to
scientific and arms monitoring groups around the world. Most analysts
believe the figure is toward the lower end.
.. Israel has not signed the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty and has never
officially admitted to having the bomb. But nonproliferation analysts
estimate Israel has between 100 and 200 nuclear weapons.
.. North Korea expelled U.N. nuclear inspectors Dec. 31, 2002, and later
withdrew from the nonproliferation treaty. Some analysts suspect North Korea
of having at least one atom bomb, despite a 1994 accord that froze its
nuclear program. Last November, North Korea's ambassador to Britain said
Pyongyang had a "nuclear deterrent capability" that was ready to use.
Sources: Reuters; http://www.nti.org (Nuclear Threat Initiative)
Copyright 2003 Los Angeles Times
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