President and Congress Locked in Battle Over Nuclear Security Budget

May 21, 2014 | Edited by Lauren Mladenka and Geoff Wilson

Budget battle - “As annual defense authorization legislation nears the House floor, the Obama administration and House Republicans continue to clash over key nuclear weapons and nonproliferation issues,” writes Douglas P. Guarino for Global Security Newswire. “In a statement of administration policy released Monday evening, the White House says it ‘strongly objects’ to bill language that would prevent the Energy Department from continuing to conduct nuclear security work in Russia until the Ukraine crisis -- and concerns about potential Russian violations of various arms control treaties -- are resolved. The work includes efforts to secure buildings in Russia where sensitive nuclear materials are stored, among other projects.”

--“‘Cooperation with Russia remains an essential element to the global effort to address the threat posed by nuclear terrorism,’ the statement says, echoing sentiments of U.S. Undersecretary of State Rose Gottemoeller. The State Department official said earlier this month that stopping such collaboration would be tantamount to shooting ‘ourselves in the foot.’ … Similarly, the administration ‘strongly objects to the significant reduction of funds’ the House bill seeks to make to the Energy Department's Second Line of Defense program, which aims to prevent the smuggling of dangerous nuclear materials across borders.”

--“House Republicans, meanwhile, are looking to introduce additional provisions that would restrict key arms control efforts. Representative Doug Lamborn (R-Colo.) will seek to offer an amendment when the bill reaches the House floor this week that would prevent the United States from spending money on complying with the New START arms reduction agreement with Russia until the Ukraine crisis is resolved and other conditions are met… While House Republicans are looking to limit spending on nuclear-security and arms-control programs, they are simultaneously trying to accelerate controversial efforts to modernize the U.S. nuclear weapons arsenal with provisions that are also drawing the ire of the Obama administration… In addition to accelerating weapon modernization efforts, House Republicans also are looking for guarantees that all three legs of the so-called nuclear ‘triad’ will be maintained. The triad includes ground-launched missiles, submarine launched missiles, and gravity bombs dropped from airplanes.” Read the full report here. http://bit.ly/1oeT9y8

Uh-oh - “New Mexico's government said dozens of nuclear-waste drums may pose an ‘imminent’ and ‘substantial’ danger to residents,” Global Security Newswire reports. “New Mexico Environment Secretary Ryan Flynn gave Los Alamos National Laboratory until Wednesday to propose steps for locking down the 57 barrels, which it packed using materials tied to a burst container in an underground area of the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant near Carlsbad. The Energy Department has linked the breakage to a February radiation release that spread contaminants to 22 workers and forced personnel to vacate much of the repository.”

--“A significant number of the problematic drums may be outside, either at the nuclear-weapons laboratory or a short-term holding location in Andrews, Texas. A pair of the barrels were transferred into underground holding areas of the waste storage site prior to the February radiation leak, Flynn indicated in an order on Monday. He said data supplied to his agency suggests that ‘the current handling, storage, treatment and transportation of the hazardous nitrate salt-bearing waste containers at [Los Alamos] may present an imminent and substantial endangerment to health or the environment.’” Full report here. http://bit.ly/1j7qaXD

Tweet - @IranFactFile: New fact sheet on Iran's centrifuge program with a primer on enrichment up at http://IranFactFile.org #irandeal http://bit.ly/1gkNiHm

History repeating - “‘A relentless drumbeat of public doubt about Iranian compliance with arms control commitments could lead to missed opportunities at a time when Iran may be heading toward reform, greater openness, and a greater interest in building international confidence… American and Israeli rightists are quick to suggest the military option, and Iranians are painfully aware of how popular that option is among prominent Republicans and hardline opinion-mongers.’”

--“The words sound like they could have been written today about the latest talks in Vienna. But they actually appeared 16 years ago in [an article] by Eric Arnett, ‘Iran is not Iraq.’ Arnett, head of the Military Technology Project at the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, noted that for all its faults, Iran ‘has the best arms control and norm-building record in the Middle East. Iran is party to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and the Biological Weapons Convention (BWC). It has unilaterally signed and ratified the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC), unilaterally capped its ballistic missile program, participates in the UN Arms Register—revealing imports that previously had not been known to the public and were not reported by the supplier—and it has taken the initiative in promoting regional confidence-building measures.’”

--“What he wrote then is important to bear in mind now, when—in fits and starts, with many pauses and hiccups—Iran and the major powers seem to be moving closer to a deal that limits the Iranian nuclear program. And just as in the past, some in the US Congress are challenging any such approach, claiming that little short of bombing or invading Iran will ensure a weapons-free Middle East. But something significant has been happening in Vienna, where other countries hope to limit Iran's program so it does not produce material that is more than 5 percent uranium 235, an enrichment level that would allow Iran to make radioisotopes for research and, perhaps, fuel for its one commercial nuclear power plant, but not to build nuclear weapons. It seems, now, that such a deal is possible, perhaps because what Iran has been seeking all along is a national-pride-assuaging ‘Japan option’—that is, remaining one short technological step from weapons- grade uranium, unless the need to take that step arises.” Read the full piece by Dan Drollette Jr. for the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists here. http://bit.ly/1oS1p9K

Turn-over - “As Iran and international negotiators work towards a July deadline to complete an accord with Tehran on its nuclear program, a practical issue may be on their minds: the looming changeover of the European Union's foreign policy chief,” writes Justyna Pawlak in Reuters. “Catherine Ashton, the British baroness who has held the EU's top foreign policy post for the past five years, may not be the critical decision-maker in the talks, but she has been the prime coordinator of the negotiations since 2010.”

--“Her departure will create a gap, even if temporarily," said Ali Vaez of the International Crisis Group, a think-tank. "Personal relations matter too, in fact enormously." Read the full piece here. http://reut.rs/1h87sPP

Missile support - “A senior U.S. representative wants to see Ukraine cease its maintenance of Russian strategic ballistic missiles and has submitted a bill toward that end,” Global Security Newswire reports. “Representative Mike Rogers (R-Ala.), who heads the House Armed Services Strategic Forces Subcommittee, on Monday submitted an amendment to the panel's annual defense authorization legislation that would urge the Obama administration to initiate discussions with Kiev on ending the Ukrainian military industry's upkeep work on the Russian RS-20 intercontinental ballistic missile, also known as ‘Satan.’”

--The proposed language “would provide a ‘sense of the Congress that the United States government should promptly enter into discussions with the government of Ukraine to ensure a halt to the activities of the Yuzhnoye Design Bureau and any other Ukrainian industry that supports the military or military industrial base of the Russian Federation,’ so long as Moscow maintains its annexation of the Crimean Peninsula and foments unrest in other parts of Ukraine. The amendment would give the Pentagon and State Department 30 days to submit a report on how officials plan to achieve the objective of cutting off Ukraine-Russia ICBM cooperation and also outline ‘any recommendations ... for how the United States and its allies could benefit from the capability of the Yuzhnoye Design Bureau.’” Full piece here. http://bit.ly/1o5MrwQ

Getting closer - “A number of analysts now believe that North Korea is on the verge of achieving a nuclear missile capability,” Global Security Newswire reports. “Issue specialists believe the weapon the Kim Jong Un regime is most likely to first equip with a miniaturized nuclear warhead is the Rodong ballistic missile, which has a range of about 800 miles… Last spring, it was revealed that at least one U.S. intelligence agency believes Pyongyang has already acquired the ability to produce nuclear warheads small enough to mount on a missile. Responding to the furor that revelation caused, the head of the U.S. intelligence community quickly announced that the view was not shared by other intelligence branches.” Read the full article here. http://bit.ly/1tjJZm4

Quick-hits:

--“Satellite Shows ‘Rapid Pace’ of Work at North Korea Missile Site” by Rachel Oswald in Global Security Newswire. http://bit.ly/1j7oMEr

--“Iran and IAEA end nuclear talks, no early sign of breakthrough” by Fredrik Dahl for Reuters. http://reut.rs/1ncQjwG

Events:

--“Nuclear Weapons: How Safe is Safe?” Discussion with author Eric Schlosser. May 22 from 8:30-9:30am at the Rayburn House Office Building, Room 2212. RSVP to rsvp@ploughshares.org.

--“The Korean Peninsula Issues and U.S. National Security.” Discussion with Wallace Gregson, Gen. Seung Jo Jung, Joseph Bosco, David Maxwell, and Larry Niksch. May 23 from 1:15-4:30 at 345 Cannon House Office Building. RSVP here. http://bit.ly/1lBkqXQ

--“The United States and Global Missile Defense.” Discussion with 20 policy experts. May 28 at 8:30am at the Atlantic Council, 1030 15th St. NW, 12th floor, West Tower. RSVP here. http://bit.ly/1lFlA5Z

--“Chain Reaction 2014.” Ploughshares Fund Gala with Michael Douglas, Jeremy Ben-Ami and Trita Parsi. June 3 from 6:00 to 8:30 at The Open Square at Futures Without Violence, 100 Montgomery Street, The Presidio of San Francisco. Purchase tickets here. http://bit.ly/1nexkld

Dessert:

Or how they REALLY loved the bomb - “When you're a hammer, every problem looks like a nail. And if you have several thousand nuclear warheads just lying around, it seems a shame not to put them to good use,” writes Mark Strauss in a piece for io9. “Here are ten of the most bizarre proposals for nuclear bomb use over the decades.” Included are plans to nuke Canada for oil, demonstrate U.S. military power by blowing up the moon, use bombs to terraform or even rearrange the solar system, diffuse hurricanes, stop the Deepwater Horizon oil leak, and even create a lake in the middle of the Sahara Desert. Enjoy! http://bit.ly/TrFzxm