Bad Combination: Drugs, Cheating and Nuclear Missiles

January 16, 2014 | Edited by Lauren Mladenka and Geoff Wilson

Officers suspended - “The Air Force said on Wednesday that 34 officers responsible for launching the nation’s nuclear missiles had been suspended, and their security clearances revoked, for cheating on monthly proficiency tests that assess their knowledge of how to operate the warheads,” reports Helene Cooper for The New York Times. “Although the Air Force has been plagued in recent years by scandals, the current revelations are particularly alarming because they involve America’s nuclear arsenal, where errors could be catastrophic.” Read the full story here. http://nyti.ms/1fBDCaX

Video - “Air Force Secretary: 37 Nuclear Launch Missile Officers Involved in Drug, Cheating Scandal,” available in the Huffington Post. http://huff.to/1m8QG58

UPF downsizing - “The National Nuclear Security Administration this evening confirmed that it will begin to develop ‘alternative mission delivery scenarios’ for getting out of the aged 9212 complex at the Y-12 nuclear weapons plant in Oak Ridge by 2025 and replacing the enriched uranium capabilities within the ‘original cost range,’” says Frank Munger for Knoxblogs. “This appears to be the first step in scaling down the size and scope of the Uranium Processing Facility and likely focusing first and foremost on a new facility that can do the uranium work done in 9212, parts of which date back to the World War II Manhattan Project.”

--“The NNSA statement on the “original cost range” apparently is referencing the $4.2 billion to $6.5 billion cost range for UPF that’s been in effect for the past couple of years, although there were earlier (and lower) cost ranges for the multibillion-dollar project to replace Y-12′s production capabilities. There have been various analyses over the past year that have suggested the UPF could end up costing $10 billion or more.” Read the full story here. http://bit.ly/1dx0tCP

Idiotic sanctions - Jon Stewart says that Congress is throwing away “a tremendous opportunity because of immaturity and a lack of self control.” Watch the clip here. http://huff.to/1ashMC5

Congressional sabotage - Chris Hayes discusses the negative effects that new Iran sanctions will have on the diplomatic process. Watch the video at MSNBC. http://on.msnbc.com/1j94Jue

Increased nuclear spending - “A new U.S. Congress omnibus spending bill would increase funding to the Energy Department's nuclear-weapons efforts by close to $1 billion for fiscal 2014,” reports Rachel Oswald for Global Security Newswire. “Legislation released on Monday jointly by the Senate and House appropriations committees would provide $7.8 billion for National Nuclear Security Administration work on the nuclear arsenal -- an $874 million increase over fiscal 2013 post-sequester enacted levels, according to a bill summary.”

--The increase in fiscal 2014 spending shows that the decrease in program funding last year was only temporary and that the, "NNSA weapons budget is back on the rise," according to Kingston Reif, an analyst for the Center for Arms Control and Nonproliferation. “At the same time, ‘Congress once again proved unwilling to fund NNSA weapons activities at the funding level projected for 2014 as part of the 2010 modernization plan worked out in conjunction with the New START treaty.’” Full report here. http://bit.ly/La7ddu

Obama says stop - “President Barack Obama implored Democratic senators Wednesday to put off new sanctions against Iran that he warned could derail delicate nuclear talks,” writes Josh Lederman for the AP. “An evening session in the East Room of the White House offered Obama an opportunity to deliver a message privately and in person that his administration has been making publicly for weeks: Give budding negotiations with Tehran time to play out before turning the screw further.”

--Senators who attended said that “Democrats present seemed receptive to Obama's appeal - even some hawkish Democrats who have vocally advocated for moving ahead with new sanctions. That sentiment reflected a growing sense on Capitol Hill that lawmakers will likely take a wait-and-see approach before putting new sanctions into effect.” Full story here. http://apne.ws/1dTCybo

Losing steam - “Harry Reid and Senate Dem leadership aides have been telling reporters that there are no plans for a vote on a new bill to impose sanctions on Iran — a vote the White House fears could derail diplomacy and make war more likely,” writes Greg Sargent . “Yet it may actually be even worse than this for proponents of the bill. Even Senators who support the measure are no longer pushing for any vote, and have no plans to do so for the foreseeable future, a Democratic Senator who favors the bill tells me.” Read the full piece in The Washington Post. http://wapo.st/K6oJyU

Makes no sense - Hawkish senators’ preferred policy of complete elimination of Iran’s nuclear fuel cycle program sets an unachievable goal, argues George Perkovich in Foreign Affairs “Yes, the world would be a safer place if Iran did not enrich uranium. But contrary to the arguments that hawks put forward, the United States is not in any position to prevent Iran from doing so.”

--“It is important to underscore what must be in the foreground of these negotiations,” says Perkovich, which is “not the cessation of Iran’s nuclear enrichment but its capacity to create a nuclear weapon quickly. In that way, international diplomacy and the threat of force go hand in hand: If Tehran rejected a diplomatic solution that allowed carefully limited enrichment in Iran, or if Iran agreed to such an arrangement and then violated it, military action would be legally and politically defensible. That is why the Obama administration’s strategy should not be impeded by Israel and ill-conceived congressional gambits. The Menendez-Kirk-Schumer bill may be politically expedient, but it is also entirely unnecessary and dangerous.” Read the full article here. http://fam.ag/19wWtRx

Lobbying increases - “Lobbying Picks Up Over Bill to Toughen Anti Nuclear Sanctions Against Iran” by Rick Gladstone in The New York Times. http://nyti.ms/1fBLuZP

IAEA meeting - “The 35-nation governing board of the [IAEA] will meet next week to discuss its role in verifying the implementation of a landmark nuclear agreement between Iran and six world powers,” Reuters reports. “Yukiya Amano, director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), said he had requested a board meeting to be held on January 24, four days after the six-month accord is due to start taking effect.” Get the full story here. http://reut.rs/1m7JF4w

Events:

--”Benefit or Burden? The Future of U.S. Tactical Nuclear Weapons.” Discussion with Rep. Jim Cooper, Gen. Norton Schwartz, and Amb. Richard Burt. Jan. 16th from 1:00-2:30 at 2456 Rayburn House Office Building. RSVP here. http://bit.ly/1eA5nez

--”What Will 2014 Bring for North Korea’s Nuclear Program?” Discussion with James Schoff, Toby Dalton, Go Myong-Hyun, Choi Kang, Park Jiyoung, and Shin Chang-Hoon. Jan. 21st from 9:00-12:00 at Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. RSVP here. http://ceip.org/1lIxXQo

--”Making Sense of Nuclear Negotiations with Iran: A Good Deal or a Bad Deal?” Discussion with Alireza Nader, Daryl Kimball and Paul Pillar. Jan. 22nd from 10:00-11:00am at 2168 Rayburn House Office Building. RSVP here. http://bit.ly/19Th8zR

--”Resolved: The United States Should Modernize Only One Leg of the Nuclear Triad.” Debate with Christopher Preble and Elbridge Colby. Jan. 27th from 6:00-8:00 at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. RSVP here. http://bit.ly/L7utt2

Dessert:

Five minutes ‘til midnight. Again. - “The Doomsday Clock is set at five minutes to apocalypse.” Thats right, “as of today, the group of experts brought together by the Bulletin decided that the world is at a figurative five minutes away from nuclear zero, meaning it has not improved over last year’s time.” According to The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, “the group ‘created the Doomsday Clock … using the imagery of apocalypse (midnight) and the contemporary idiom of nuclear explosion (countdown to zero) to convey threats to humanity and the planet, adding that the clock has become an indicator of just how vulnerable the world is to nuclear catastrophe, climate change and new, potentially dangerous, technologies.”

--“In the group’s annual letter -- this year sent to the United Nations due to its international implications -- they say the world's biggest threat is the “potentially civilization-ending” outsized nuclear stockpiles of the United States and Russia, along with the growing arsenals in India, Pakistan and China.” But wait there’s more, “beyond the nuclear threat, the group also notes that world leaders have hit a stalemate on efforts to limit carbon dioxide emissions that have made oceans more acidic, and even note that there are emerging dangers like cyber-weapons and ‘killer robots.’” Read the full report about the world’s continued countdown to zero, here. http://lat.ms/1kE8v0w