Posted by Deborah Bain
May 08, 2008; From NPR

Who can forget Senator John McCain singing "bomb bomb bomb, bomb bomb Iran," at a campaign appearance last year? Or Senator Hillary Clinton saying recently that the U.S. would "totally obliterate" Iran if it were to consider attacking Israel with a nuclear weapon.  Fortunately, reports NPR's Mike Shuster, all three candidates offer more nuanced and less bellicose language when asked detailed, substantive questions such as, "should Iran permanently or temporarily suspend its uranium enrichement activity and development of a plutonium processing capability?"  That's just one of the queries posed to Senators Clinton, McCain and Obama by the Ploughshares-funded Institute for Science and International Security as part of a project aimed at providing the public with greater clarity about the candidates' positions and about the issue itself.  ISIS' Jacqueline Shire, who helped develop the questionnaire, reports that "McCain gave a … direct answer, saying there's no circumstance under which the international community can be confident that uranium-enrichment activity in Iran is for peaceful purposes. "  Both Senators Clinton and Obama favor direct talks with Iran without insisting that Iran suspend uranium enrichment first.  She says that both Democratic candidates "hew closely to the approach that diplomacy is best — in Clinton's case, carrots and sticks; in Obama's case, thinking maybe a little more broadly about bringing the international community into the solution."  Listen to Shuster's report and read more about what the candidates said. 

May 02, 2008; From Scientific American

Ploughshares Fund Advisor Frank von Hippel argues in this month’s Scientific American against U.S. Department of Energy calls to revive nuclear fuel “reprocessing.”  In his feature article Nuclear Fuel Recycling: More Trouble Than It’s Worth, von Hippel lays out the debate:

• -- Spent nuclear fuel contains plutonium, which can be extracted and used in new fuel.
• -- To reduce the amount of long-lived radioactive waste, the U.S. Department of Energy has proposed reprocessing spent fuel in this way and then “burning” the plutonium in special reactors.

Posted by Paul Carroll
May 02, 2008; 

Last week we wrote about the highly charged atmosphere surrounding an administration intelligence briefing to Congress about details on the alleged Syrian nuclear reactor, a site that was bombed by Israel in September.  New revelations seem to indicate that the site was a nuclear reactor facility, and that there was some tangible North Korean association with it.  What exactly the facility was intended for, and what that “association” is still the subject of much speculation.  Some of the briefing evidence was released to the media, and the op-ed pages and blogosphere have been abuzz with speculation.  While the new evidence seems damning, as is often the case with intelligence information the drama last week has raised more questions than it answered.  Currently, there is a healthy debate about the timing and intention of the administration’s action.  Was it timed to help the case for continuing the Six Party process and agreement and garner congressional support?  (Congress is currently considering a waiver to allow U.S. funds to be spent on North Korea projects.)  Was it the result of a sub-set of administration players attempting to undermine the deal, those who have opposed it from the start?  Regardless of the answer, one thing seems clear:  for now, President Bush himself is supporting the process and, as difficult as it may be, is putting his political capital squarely behind Ambassador Chris Hill to move keep moving ahead.  At an address on April 30 to an audience of Asian-Pacific American, the president specifically identified Amb. Hill and offered support and endorsement of his efforts with North Korea.  Ploughshares continues to support independent analysts and expert interlocutors who work directly with North Korea as well as with the administration and Congress to sort out the facts, consider flexible options, and keep the focus on the constructive engagement with North Korea to eliminate its nuclear capacity. 

Posted by Deborah Bain
Apr 30, 2008; 

Calling ballistic missile defense “a placebo strategy that gives the troops and the nation the illusion of defense,” Ploughshares Fund president Joseph Cirincione testified again today before the House Subcommittee on National Security and Foreign Affairs, calling on Congress and the next administration to change the mission and restructure the missile defense program in a way that would “give the nation a better chance to field capable weapon systems against the near-term threats.”  He said that missile defense leaders have been engaged in a "Sisyphean task...they are rolling money up the hill, but the programs keep rolling back down." Despite the fact that “anti-missile program are now free from any treaty restraints, flush with cash, and exempt from the normal defense program checks and balances...instead of soaring performance, we have a record unblemished by success."  (Read Cirincione’s prepared testimony here.)  
Cirincione was joined at the witness table by Philip Coyle, senior advisor at the Ploughshares-funded Center for Defense Information, who provided a point-by-point technical critique of each element of the program, along with an analysis of the strategic costs of the 60-year pursuit of missile defenses.  "The U.S. proposal to site missile defenses in Poland and the Czech Republic has alienated Russia and upset the overall strategic balance to a degree not seen since the height of the Cold War,” he said.  Coyle’s testimony can be viewed here.

Posted by Deborah Bain
Apr 29, 2008; 

This Mother’s Day, Americans are expected to spend $15.8 billion on gifts for their moms, according to a new survey by the National Retail Federation.  That’s an average of $138 per person on jewelry, clothing, flowers, dinners out and trips to the spa.  
Don’t get me wrong – I love being remembered on my special day (are you listening, Andy and Hallie?) -- but with so much need in the world, maybe it’s time to rethink our priorities.  Ploughshares Fund’s Mother’s Day for Peace campaign invites sons and daughters everywhere to give something of lasting value -- the gift of peace.  A donation to the Mother’s Day Peace Fund, given in honor of someone special, will support initiatives to rid the world of nuclear weapons, rebuild war-torn regions, and restore a healthy environment, free from the damage caused by weapons of war. 
For those of you who still want to shower your mom with gifts, Ploughshares Fund will deliver a dozen roses to whomever you designate (with a donation of $250 or more),  and in time for Mother’s Day if you make your gift online by Wednesday, May 7.  “Mom has been saying for decades that it’s the thought that counts on Mother’s Day,” says the author of the National Retail Federation’s survey. 
Here’s a thought: Mother’s Day was meant originally as a holiday to encourage people to work for peace.  With so much conflict in the world, it’s about time we returned to those roots.  Happy Mother’s Day for Peace.

Posted by Paul Carroll
Apr 28, 2008; 

Faced with more than 87,000 public comments to date, demands for more time, and official requests from both New Mexico senators as well as Governor Bill Richardson, the Department of Energy (DOE) undertook a highly unusual step and extended the public comment period for its highly controversial “Complex Transformation” plans.The public now has until April 30 (that's this Wednesday) to submit comments under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA).
Complex Transformation is a plan that would shrink the “footprint” of today’s nuclear weapons research, design and manufacturing infrastructure and consolidate some operations and materials.  Sounds like a good idea, right?  The problem is that the plans, while seemingly aimed to economize operations and save money, obscure a more fundamental goal – that of continuing to design and build new nuclear warheads and even build new facilities to do so.  Rather than restructuring the weapons facilities to cease production and clean up past messes, the DOE is seeking a leaner, meaner “complex” with a fundamental mission of modernizing the arsenal. 
Ploughshares Fund is supporting groups that are working to keep the public educated and informed, like Concerned Citizens for Nuclear Safety and Nuclear Watch New Mexico  on front lines” near DOE weapons facilities as well as national groups like the Alliance for Nuclear Accountability  that are weighing in on the plans and seeking to cut funding for the DOE’s ill-advised plans. 

Apr 25, 2008; 

Seven months following an Israeli strike on a Syrian site believed to be a nuclear reactor, intelligence officials say they have evidence that it was, in fact, a reactor and that North Korea helped to construct it. Yesterday, officials briefed select Congressional committees using photos said to have been taken inside the facility. The White House released the following statement: “Until Sept. 6, 2007, the Syrian regime was building a covert nuclear reactor in its eastern desert capable of producing plutonium. We are convinced, based on a variety of information, that North Korea (DPRK) assisted Syria's covert nuclear activities. We have good reason to believe that reactor, which was damaged beyond repair on Sept. 6 of last year, was not intended for peaceful purposes.” The Syrian embassy in Washington denies the administration’s allegations.   

It is still unclear exactly what the evidence shows or does not show, and observers can only comment on what has been made public. Ploughshares Fund President Joe Cirincione said in an interview with the The Guardian, "We should learn first from the past and be very cautious about any intelligence from the U.S. about other country's weapons." Today in an interview with NPR’s Tom Gjelten on Morning Edition he said that while the photos made a compelling case for reactor construction, the facility could only be considered one piece of a nuclear program. There is no evidence that the reactor had the capabilities to make material for nuclear weapons. Cirincione and many other Ploughshares Fund grantees say that there is no information on how Syria would fuel the reactor and no evidence of Syrian plutonium separation facilities or nuclear weaponization facilities. 
The release comes at a time when the Administration has gained significant ground in the shut down of North Korea's existing nuclear weapons program and their existing plutonium production reactor.  With persistent negotiation among members of the Six-Party framework, Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill has come close to ending a major international security threat. U.S. technicians are in North Korea today disabling the reactor, negotiating its complete dismantlement, and in the process of verifying all plutonium stocks and arranging for their disposal.  News of possible North Korean proliferation activities with Syria could threaten support for the negotiations.  Ploughshares Fund grantee David Albright, president of the Institute for Science and International Security, has been investigating the issue since the bombing of the site in September, said in a new brief issued yesterday,  “This new information confirms the need to be concerned about Syrian and North Korean actions, including their nuclear cooperation which dates back many years. However, it should not be seen as a casus belli against Syria or a reason to scuttle the progress being made at the Six Party Talks in disabling and dismantling North Korea’s nuclear arsenal.” 

Albright is just one of a number of Ploughshares Fund grantees who have been working for years to ensure the success of the denuclearization of North Korea.  Dr. Siegfried Hecker,  former head of the Los Alamos National Laboratory and currently professor at Stanford’s Center for International Security and Cooperation, recently visited the Yongbyon nuclear complex in North Korea and filed this report.  

These events underscore just how vital it is to understand the extent of any proliferation activities by North Korea or any other nation, but that it is also critical to preserve the gains already made in the Six Party Agreement and use this new information to bolster that process rather than undermine it.  The evidence of North Korean participation places an imperative on the DPRK to fully explain its activities – something the Six Party Process is designed to do.  To stop that process now will leave these questions unanswered.

Posted by Naila Bolus
Apr 25, 2008; 

Ploughshares Fund grantee Gareth Evans wants to change "the idea that a state's sovereignty is a license to kill its own people."  In a story reported this week in BBC News, Evans is making the case for a "responsibility to protect", also known as R2P.  He co-chaired the commission that coined the phrase and has campaigned tirelessly for a new norm whereby individual states would bear the responsibility to protect their people from violence.  And if states "cannot meet that responsibility, through either ill-will or incapacity, it then falls on the wider international community to take appropriate action."
Evans, who was also the Foreign Minister of Australia and currently serves as President of the International Crisis Group, delivered his powerful message earlier this month to an audience of some five hundred philanthropists at the invitation-only Global Philanthropy Forum.
The conference focused this year on human security, human rights and the shared responsibility to protect.  Speakers, including Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Annie Lennox, Jeff Skoll, and many others delivered impassioned speeches addressing regional flashpoints, the impact of conflict on women and children, the role of civil society and Track II diplomacy, and innovative solutions and success stories.  (I was invited to speak on the topic of conflict and small arms flows.) 
Jane Wales, the founder of the Forum, implored philanthropists to "act together to address the root causes of the cycles of violence and poverty that perpetuate insecurity globally, and to prevent disastrous situations before they develop.  When it comes to protecting human rights, preventing deadly conflict, advancing public health and addressing resource scarcity, philanthropy not only supports the work of changemakers, but is itself a source of innovation."
Ploughshares Fund-supported projects such as the Failed States Index, the Alliance for Peacebuilding, the Public International Law and Policy Group, or the Nonviolent Peace Force are examples of innovative partnerships between philanthropsists and civil society that are contributing to conflict prevention and the rebuilding of societies after war.    

Apr 23, 2008; From New York Times

Check off the completion of a two key U.S. nonproliferation goals this month.  Last weekend, Russian news agencies announced the closure of a weapons-grade plutonium producing reactor in the Siberian town of Seversk. Officials shuttered the reactor only weeks after temporarily deactivating it. A second reactor in Seversk (also know as Tomsk-7 and part of the Soviet nuclear weapons complex) will close in June, and a third, located further east in Zheleznogorsk, is slated for closure in late 2009, early 2010. Zhelznogorsk is home to the Krasnoyarsk Mining and Chemical Combine and also to Ploughshares Fund grantee Vladimir Mikheev, who has been reporting on and monitoring developments at the site -- and advocating for its closure -- since 1998, much of that time with Ploughshares Fund support.

Two weeks ago, Senator Richard Lugar (R-IN) announced the completion of the elimination of all Soviet SS-24 "scalpel" intercontinental ballistic missiles, "another important milestone in our 16-year effort to secure and dismantle the weapons of mass destruction of the former Soviet Union." 
The announcement from Seversk came a week ahead of the 22nd anniversary of the Chernobyl accident and a day ahead of the second annual Russian Nuclear National Dialogue on Nuclear Energy, Society, and Security co-organized by Green Cross International, the Public Council of Rosatom, and the Russian Academy of Science. Ploughshares Fund grantee and Global Green USA Legacy Program Director Paul Walker plays a key organizing role. The Dialogue will take on issues of Russia’s energy future, nuclear legacies of the Cold War across Russia, and security and proliferation risks of nuclear weapons, fissile materials, and related systems, including threat reduction and Global Partnership demilitarization and disarmament efforts.

Posted by Joseph Cirincione
Apr 21, 2008; 

Apr 15, 2008; From Boston Globe

Theodore A. Postol, Ploughshares Fund grantee and professor of Science, Technology and National Security Policy at  Massachusetts Institute of Technology, questions the viability of U.S. missile defense in today’s Boston Globe.  Postol’s opinion piece comes a day ahead of a key hearing of the House Subcommittee on National Security and Foreign Affairs.  First, he asks whether the system is indeed capable of defense, namely, of distinguishing between decoys and real warheads. Second, has the government’s Missile Defense Administration (MDA) exercised proper oversight of its operations? He responds to both questions in the negative. Postol raises allegations that the MDA and organizations like MIT Lincoln Laboratory “that were created by Congress to provide the nation with accurate technical information on these matters” of tampering with scientific findings. “If Congress vigorously pursues these matters of alleged scientific fraud in the missile defense program, it may not only find that the promise of missile defense is a pipe dream, but that major institutions charged with protecting U.S. security have failed in their duties." Postol has long provided independent expert analysis on missile technology. Read more of his recent critiques of European missile defense proposals in the October 2007 issue of Arms Control Today (with George Lewis) and in the Congressional News Quarterly report “Missile Agency Under Fire” By Josh Rogin – March 24, 2008.
 

Related hearings:

April 1 - Strategic Forces Subcommittee of the Senate Armed Services Committee receives testimony on Ballistic Missile Defense programs and their future from Army Space and Missile Defense Command, Director of Acquisition and Sourcing Management at the Government Accountability Office, and Defense Undersecretary for Acquisition, Technology and Logistics. Committee members raise questions about MDA oversight.

March 5 - In his first day as president of Ploughshares Fund, Joseph Cirincione warned Congress of inflated threats, inflated capabilities and inflated budgets in the $12.3 billion administration request this year for anti-ballistic missile weapons. In testimony before the House Government Reform and Oversight Committee, Cirincione presented a detailed analysis showing that the record-breaking budget request comes at a time of steady decline in the threat posed by ballistic missiles.

Posted by Deborah Bain
Apr 14, 2008; From Times of London, Los Angeles Times

Over the past week, stories about Iran's growing offensive capability have been in the headlines.  But it takes the kind of nuanced understanding and analysis that Ploughshares Fund grantees provide -- often found in the third or fourth paragraph -- to make sense of these developments.  The Los Angeles Times reported that "ignoring international condemnation, Iran announced Tuesday that it has begun to dramatically increase its capacity to produce enriched uranium and is adding newly developed high-speed centrifuges, which can be used to produce atomic material either for electricity or a nuclear bomb."  While not minimizing the implications of the move, Ploughshares Fund grantee David Albright of the Institute for Science and International Security focuses on what's actually being increased -- the problem-prone "P-1" design that Iran's centrifuges have been based on. "The question is whether the P-1 they're building is better than the P-1 they've got already... It's pitiful how poorly it's performed."  Even Tehran's new, faster centrifuge, the IR-2, is based on an "antiquated" technology that experts say was surpassed long ago in the West.  Meanwhile, the Times of London reports that new satellite images reveal the location of "the secret site where Iran is suspected of developing long-range ballistic missiles," from which Iran launched a "research rocket" claiming that it was in connection with their space program.  Geoffrey Forden of the Ploughshares-funded Massachusetts Institute of Technology analyzed the photographs and identified a recently constructed building similar to a North Korean missile assembly facility. Forden said that the test launch did not demonstrate any significant advances in ballistic missile technology. “But it does reveal the likely future development of Iran's missile program,” he said.  The Iranians denied any plans to develop nuclear-armed ballistic missiles.   Ploughshares Fund believes that any attempt to engage with Iran and prevent the proliferation of nuclear weapons must be based on detailed, accurate assessments of technological developments, the kind that scientists like Albright and Forden are providing.

Posted by Deborah Bain
Apr 10, 2008; From Military.com

"You can have all sorts of rules and regulations, but they still won't do any good if the people don't follow them," said Hans Kristensen of the Ploughshares-funded Federation of American Scientists (FAS) in response to a new report by the Defense Science Board recapping the "lessons learned" of last summer's flight by an Air Force bomber, accidentally armed with nuclear bombs.  On Aug. 31, 2007, crews loaded six live nuclear warheads onto a B-52 bomber and flew from Minot Air Force Base in North Dakota to Barksdale Air Force Base in Louisiana. "The system of checks and balances has degraded to a point that six of the planet's most powerful weapons were missing for 36 hours -- and no one noticed until they had landed in Louisiana," writes Adam Pitluk in Military.com.  Kristensen notes in FAS's Strategic Security Blog that the incident he calls "one of the biggest nuclear weapons blunders in U.S. nuclear history" does not even appear on the Air Combat Command's list of "bent spear" incidents recently obtained from the Department of Defense. (Photo:US Air Force)

Posted by Alexandra Bell
Apr 10, 2008; 

Tuesday, April 8 was a busy day on the Hill, and competing with the long-awaited testimony of General David Petraus was not the most desirable option.  Nevertheless,"Breaking the U.S.-Iran Stalemate: Reassessing the Nuclear Strategy in the Wake of the Majles Elections," a conference sponsored by the Ploughshares-funded National Iranian American Council (NIAC), attracted a capacity audience and a full schedule of major heavy hitters from the foreign policy world, including Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) as the keynote speaker.  The room was filled to capacity and Congressman Kucinich (D-OH)even stopped by to listen for awhile.    

Initial discussion centered on the political landscape of Iran and the distant possibility of direct U.S.-Iran talks.  Despite soaring inflation and high unemployment conservatives blocked the reformist zeal.  Moderate voices in Iran made modest gains in the latest parliamentary elections, but the Supreme Leader seems to have supported a fundamental shift to the right in the Iranian political sphere.  Speakers Barbara Slavin, Scott Peterson and Ahmad Sadri all agreed that the current sanctions against Iran seemed to be helping this conservative drift.  The middle class is feeling the most of the pain and the centrifuges at Natanz continue to spin.

Hans Blix, Ambassador Thomas Pickering and David Albright, president of the Ploughshares-funded Institute for Science and International Security covered the major issues surrounding the technical capabilities of the Iranian nuclear program in detail.  Despite the many political reasons for the current stand-off, they agreed that talks without preconditions were an absolute necessity.  The Iranians are creating "nuclear facts on the ground" and the longer the world delays, the more likely it is that Iran will move toward a weapons capacity.

Senator Feinstein closed the conference with a speech laced with hope for progress.  While she acknowledged the need for Iran to accept Israel's right to exist and full IAEA compliance, she supported many of the policies proposed earlier in the day, including the need for diplomatic initiatives between the U.S. and Iran to take place without preconditions.  

Posted by Deborah Bain
Apr 07, 2008; 

For the first time in memory, all three major presidential candidates are on record calling for nuclear disarmament, notes Ploughshares Fund grantee William Hartung, writing in TPM Cafe.  Speaking in Los Angeles on March 26th, Senator John McCain said that "the United States should lead a global effort at nuclear disarmament consistent with our vital interests and the cause of peace," thus joining Democrats Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, who have called for the elimination of nuclear weapons.  But, Hartung asks, "What can the candidates do NOW to back up their rhetoric? A good start would be to speak out loudly and clearly -- at every opportunity -- against the Department of Energy's Complex Transformation initiative, which would spend $200 billion or more in the next two decades to build new nuclear weapons and new nuclear weapons factories." Speaking at a recent Department of Energy hearing, Hartung called the plan "provocative, premature, unnecessary and a massive waste of taxpayer dollars."  Premature, he says, because the decision about whether to proceed should be made by the next president, who is likely to revise the current U.S. nuclear posture.

Posted by Deborah Bain
Apr 06, 2008; From The New Republic

Concern about global warming may be the best thing that's ever happened to the nuclear power industry, writes J. Peter Scoblic in "Nuclear Spring," which appears in this month's issue of The New Republic.  By "aggressively rebranding itself as eco-friendly" and the solution to climate change, the industry is enjoying a "nuclear renaissance" worldwide, with multiple new reactors under development in the U.S. and country after country announcing itheir intention to develop nuclear power.  "While there's good reason to believe some countries intend to harness nuclear power toward green ends, there's also good reason to believe that other nations will use warming as a pretext for less virtuous purposes--namely, to acquire technology that would allow them to build nuclear weapons. And, even as nuclear power spreads to developing countries without such nefarious motives, the increased production of uranium and plutonium will provide new opportunities for would-be terrorists (or profiteers selling to terrorists). Nuclear power may be a necessary, if not sufficient, weapon against planetary apocalypse; but, in hyping its ameliorative properties, we could well open ourselves to a different sort of catastrophe."  Scoblic, executive editor of The New Republic and former editor of Arms Control Today, received a grant ifrom Ploughshares Fund in 2007 to support the writing of articles on nuclear non proliferation.  

Posted by Deborah Bain
Apr 04, 2008; From Washington Post/Newsweek blog

"Americans and Iraqis tell two different stories about the war in Iraq," writes Ploughshares Fund grantee Lisa Schirch in Post Global, the Washington Post/Newsweek global issues blog. "Most Iraqis say that the U.S.-led invasion and occupation have fueled violence. The dominant American story is that U.S. forces are curbing sectarian violence and making things better in Iraq."  She writes that "while some of us believe we should not have gone to war in the first place, many now believe the United States has some responsibility to prevent the sectarian violence which we believe threatens to pull the country apart...Within this narrative, many Americans see two choices: a long-term U.S. military presence, or a U.S. withdrawal leading to sectarian warfare. But there is a third option for responsible U.S. engagement in Iraq."  There is a third option, she says: Withdraw U.S. troops, support international peacekeeping forces, initiate robust regional diplomacy, and invest in reconstruction and humanitarian aid for the nearly five million displaced Iraqis.  
An expert in peacebuilding and multi-track diplomacy, Schirch directs the 3D Security Project at the Center for Justice and Peacebuilding at Eastern Mennonite University, where she promotes a more effective security posture for the U.S., one that balances defense with diplomacy and development.

Posted by Paul Carroll
Mar 28, 2008; 

For more than a year now, North Korea and the United States, along with South Korea, China, Japan and Russia have held together a delicate but essential negotiation.  The Six Parties have made progress in implementing the groundbreaking February 2007 deal under which the DPRK agreed to relinquish its nuclear program, including any bombs it has assembled, in return for substantial energy and economic assistance from the other five parties, and other diplomatic measures.  Recently, a sticking point has been the completeness and veracity of the North’s “declaration” of its entire nuclear enterprise, from a supposed uranium enrichment program to alleged assistance to Syria on nuclear projects.  This week it seems as though the wheels are coming off:  North Korea first expelled eleven South Korean officials from the joint economic cooperation facility at Kaesong, and today we learned that Pyongyang fired a volley of short-range missiles into the sea.  The first action was squarely aimed at South Korea’s recent statements about the North’s human rights performance and the South’s slow-down in delivering its share of the energy package.  The second is aimed at the U.S. and its persistence about the uranium and Syrian issues.  While these actions are certainly provocative, they are not showstoppers.  Rather than being a dealbreaker, they represent exactly the kind of attention-getting and nerve-rattling behavior the North has practiced for years to signal its distress over negotiating terms and issues.  In fact, the U.S. statement that calls the missile tests “not productive” is telling in its restraint.  Let’s not forget, in the summer of 2006 the North conducted a similar set of missile launches, and three months later actually conducted a nuclear test.  It was in the wake of these provocations that the February 2007 agreement was created.  The North’s recent action should be seen as strong signals, not as irrational folly.  Far from being “March Madness” the North is closer to acting crazy like a fox.  Ambassador Chris Hill, the U.S. lead negotiator, is working hard to find creative ways to resolve the issues without any one party losing too much “face.”  North Korea’s recent actions put the pressure on to do so quickly, as the North’s behavior will certainly amplify the voices of the more hawkish and hard-line elements in the U.S. and South Korea.  But we believe that despite these unfortunate developments, it is still vital to keep the process moving forward.  Ploughshares Fund has been supporting a number of people and organizations that have supported the official talks and work, as well as analytical projects and public education efforts to provide policymakers and the public with accurate, nuanced information.  Some of the groups we have supported include the Nautilus Institute, the National Committee on North Korea, Lee Sigal of the Social Sciences Research Council, and the Center for International Security and Cooperation (CISAC) at Stanford University. 

Posted by Deborah Bain
Mar 25, 2008; 

 Although the Department of Defense was quick to reassure the public today that triggering mechanisms for nuclear missiles shipped to Taiwan in error had been recovered and that they did not contain any nuclear material, Ploughshares-funded experts underlined the gravity of the incident.  The U.S. accidentally shipped crates containing four nuclear missile nose cone fuses to Taiwan in fall 2006 instead of the helicopter batteries the Taiwanese had ordered.  The error went undetected for nearly two years, and came to light only after Taiwan notified Washington -- repeatedly -- that it had received the wrong items.  Hans Kristensen, an analyst at the Federation of American Scientists, told Agence France-Presse that the fuses were "hugely important" nuclear weapons components.  "For a country like China, that is trying to develop more capable systems, that would be very important material to get. And (for) any country that is even lower on the nuclear threshold scale, having not quite gotten there, would be potentially even more important," he said.   Jeffrey Lewis writes in Arms Control Wonk that the biggest concern is what the incident says about the Air Force, which less than a year ago committed another embarrassing and potentially disastrous error involving nuclear weapons, described then by the Pentagon as an isolated incident. "These guys don’t get it," said Lewis, the director of the Nuclear Strategy and Nonproliferation Initiative at the New America Foundation.  "This is not an isolated incident. The organization has a problem. This is dangerous."   Added Ploughshares Fund President Joseph Cirincione in an interview with the Los Angeles Times, "this is really unbelievable.If the Russians had shipped triggers to Tehran we would be going nuts right now."
 

Posted by Deborah Bain
Mar 21, 2008; From Washington Post

"That's as uninformed as McCain's statement that Iran is training al-Qaeda," said Ploughshares Fund President Joseph Cirincione, responding to statements President Bush made Thursday that Iran has declared that it wants to be a nuclear power with a weapon to "destroy people."  Bush's accusation contradicts the conclusion contained in the National Intelligence Estimate that Iran had stopped its weapons program in 2003, a major reversal in the long-standing U.S. assessment.  "Iran has never said it wanted a nuclear weapon for any reason. It's just not true. It's a little troubling that the president and the leading Republican candidate are both so wrong about Iran," said Cirincione.  Other analysts warned that Bush's statement on Iran's nuclear intentions could escalate tensions when U.S. strategy for the first time in three decades is to persuade Iran to join international talks in exchange for suspending its uranium enrichment.

Posted by Deborah Bain
Mar 19, 2008; From Institute for War and Peace Reporting

While U.S. media giants from CNN to the New York Times feature special coverage from Baghdad on the five-year anniversary of the invasion of Iraq, the people of Halabja, a town in the Kurdish north, are observing another anniversary. Twenty years ago, on March 16, 1988, Saddam Hussein unleashed a massive chemical weapons attack on the town, killing an estimated 5,000 people and injuring 10,000 with internationally-banned chemical weapons including VX, sarin and mustard gas. Reporter Azeez Mahmood writes that the U.S. and Iraqi governments have promised millions of dollars in aid to help rebuild the town, but local residents remain skeptical. “We are totally discouraged because of all the broken promises of the past few years,” said one resident. 
 

Posted by Deborah Bain
Mar 18, 2008; From San Francisco Chronicle

"Complex transformation" means different things to different people, as David Perlman writes in today's San Francisco Chronicle.  To Thomas d'Agostino, director of the National Nuclear Security Administration, it means "harnessing the skills of its scientists and engineers for research into counterterrorism, intelligence and nuclear nonproliferation, while continuing to assure that the remaining weapons stockpile is 'safe and reliable,'" according to Perlman.  Ploughshares-funded groups are highly dubious. "The Department of Energy's 'Complex Transformation' plan, which we call the bombplex, is intended to design, test and build the euphemistically titled Reliable Replacement Warhead, and other new and modified nuclear bombs," said Tri-Valley CARES' president Marylia Kelley. "In fact, the plan's most salient feature is building whole new bomb plants to churn out new nuclear weapons for decades to come. We favor a curatorship approach to maintain the safety and reliability of the existing nuclear weapons stockpile as it awaits dismantlement under the provisions of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty," she said.

Kelley and other Bay Area groups are gearing up for hearings today and tomorrow in Livermore and Tracy, encouraging the public to attend and speak out against the modernization plan.  Hearings are taking place elsewhere around the country between now and April 10th, the deadline for public comments.  Visit the Alliance for Nuclear Accountability website for more information about Complex Transformation, the schedule of hearings and about how to voice your opinion (you don't have to show up -- a letter or an email will suffice) So far, over 35,000 people have commented.  

Too complex? Watch U.S. Nukes in 90 Seconds, created for Tri-Valley CAREs, for a crash course on U.S. nuclear weapons policy.   

Posted by Deborah Bain
Mar 17, 2008; 

Amid intensified work this week by U.S. diplomats to keep the North Korea nuclear agreement on track, controversy remained about the recent visit to Pyongyang by the New York Philharmonic.  In the lead-up to the concert – which constituted the largest U.S. group to visit North Korea since the end of the Korean War – some critics questioned the value the visit, calling it a "propaganda coup for Kim Jong Il," and disparaging the North Koreans’ level of artistic sophistication. (“North Korea… does not have anything remotely resembling a serious musical culture,” claimed one writer  in the Wall Street Journal.) Following the concert, several members of the orchestra reported that they had never before played for such a receptive crowd, nor felt such an emotional connection to an audience.  (Watch a scene from the concert here.) Karin Lee, executive director of the Ploughshares-funded National Committee on North Korea, writing in Japan Focus, welcomed all sides of the debate, saying that “the sheer volume of coverage the concert engendered may have contributed to a positive atmosphere that will help contribute to the momentum for the difficult negotiations in the months ahead. The concert itself did not resolve deeply held national security concerns on either side –nor should anyone expect a concert to have such an impact. What may have changed, incrementally, is that a few words have been added to a common cultural vocabulary. Now each country has an additional image of the other country, a new cultural point of reference to add to the customary images of nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles. Ultimately, exchanges such as these prepare the people in both countries to sustain the peace that we hope will be brokered by our respective governments.”  With Ploughshares Fund support, NCNK promotes engagement between the U.S. and North Korea , not on music and art, but around key political, economic and social issues that divide our countries.  NCNK’s members – seasoned and trusted experts who have traveled to North Korea or worked closely with North Koreans in other settings – provide nuanced information to Congress and decision makers in the administration in preparation for impending decisions about the future of the U.S.-DPRK relationship after the current impasse end. 

Posted by Deborah Bain
Mar 14, 2008; From Aviation Week

As the Bush Administration winds down, missile defense boosters are working hard to lock in budgets and agreements to build ballistic missile interceptors in Eastern Europe.  "But critics – if not outright opponents – are increasingly questioning the rate of expenditures and whether promised capabilities really have been delivered, or even should be further pursued," reports Aviation Week.  Chief among them is Ploughshares Fund President Joseph Cirincione who warned that "the administration will produce weapons independent of a concrete threat and deploy them irrespective of the weapons’ operational performance.”  He told Congress earlier this month that "such an approach, based on exaggerated threat estimates and optimistic expectations, wastes valuable defense resources needed for other pressing military needs.”  Cirincione testified during the same week that the Heritage Foundation sponsored a high-profile dinner honoring the 25th anniversary of President Reagan’s Strategic Defense Initiative, and the Boeing corporation and the American Foreign Policy Council hosted a breakfast in support of missile defense efforts.

Read Cirincione's complete testimony here, and listen to an audio clip from the session in which he answers a Congressman's question about whether the proposed expenditure for missile defense -- $12.3 billion this year -- is proportional to the threat.  "Absolutely not," he says.  He called the missile defense system "the longest running scam in the history of the Department of Defense."    (photo:Boeing)

Posted by Deborah Bain
Mar 10, 2008; From New York Times

"The fallout, if you will, would be tremendous," says Daryl Kimball, president of the Ploughshares-funded Arms Control Association.  The Week in Review article in yesterday's New York Times begins with the scenario of an attack on U.S. satellites in space: "An enemy — say, China in a confrontation over Taiwan, or Iran staring down America over the Iranian nuclear program — could knock out the American satellite system in a barrage of antisatellite weapons, instantly paralyzing American troops, planes and ships around the world.  Space itself could be polluted for decades to come, rendered unusable.  The global economic system would probably collapse, along with air travel and communications. Your cellphone wouldn’t work. Nor would your A.T.M. and that dashboard navigational gizmo you got for Christmas. And preventing an accidental nuclear exchange could become much more difficult."  Yet, as writer Steven Lee Myers notes, the U.S. opposes international efforts to ban weapons in space.  Indeed, the recent shoot-down of a disabled satellite was a demonstration of how committed U.S. war planners are to building up our country's space weaponry.  John E. Pike, director of GlobalSecurity.org, an organization that studies military and space issues, has noted a spike in recent years in secret “black budget” spending by the Missile Defense Agency.  Arms control advocates like Kimball and Michael Krepon of the Stimson Center, also supported by Ploughshares Fund, offer proposals for preventing the weaponization of space, in the belief that it "should remain a place for exploration and research, not humanity’s destructive side."

Posted by Deborah Bain
Mar 10, 2008; From Christian Science Monitor

"Interest is growing in a possible U.S.-Iran nuclear compromise that could enable sensitive atomic work on Iranian soil, lower the risks of proliferation, and ease Iran's isolation," reports the Christian Science Monitor from Tehran.   The compromise solution, which has been developed by a number of experts, was outlined last week in an article in the New York Review of Books by former Undersecretary of State Thomas Pickering, and Ploughshares Fund grantees William Luers and James Walsh.  All have been engaged in behind-the-scenes talks with Iranian policymakers aimed at finding a solution to the impasse over Iran's nuclear program.  Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki told the Monitor during a conference on nuclear issues that the proposal "could be considered."  Not everyone, however, is ready to concede that international pressure against Iran should be abandoned. David Albright, president of the Ploughshares-funded Institute for Science and International Security (ISIS) in Washington, says it is too soon to "give up and find a face-saving way" when questions are still outstanding about evidence of missile designs and explosive tests that the U.S. has put forward.  The Iranians claim that the evidence is fabricated, and refuse to address the question.  Carah Ong, the Iran analyst for the Ploughshares-funded Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation in Washington, speaking in Tehran, says that continued efforts to isolate Iran are pointless.  "The more openness you have, the more difficult it becomes for nefarious activities to occur."

Posted by Deborah Bain
Mar 09, 2008; From Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel

"We are in a period of dramatic political transition," writes Ploughshares Fund President Joseph Cirincione in today's Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel. "The U.S. presidential election is just one part of an unusual simultaneous change in global leadership. Combined with two other political developments, they could lead to sweeping change in policies governing the 26,000 nuclear weapons in the world today."  In just a few paragraphs, Cirincione lays out the argument that we are witnessing a "new moment," an unprecedented set of circumstances that are leading toward fundamental changes in U.S. and international nuclear weapons policy.  He identifies three factors: leadership transitions, the collapse of the current administration's nonproliferation polices, and the third, "the emergence of new policies...coming from an unlikely source: veteran cold warriors who helped build the vast U.S. nuclear weapons complex. With two prominent op-eds in The Wall Street Journal in the past 14 months, former Democratic defense secretary William Perry, former Democratic senator Sam Nunn, and former Republican secretaries of state George Schulz and Henry Kissinger have laid out a plan for 'a world free of nuclear weapons'  It is not just words..."  He concludes, "Nothing is guaranteed, and much work will be required of many. But with new leaders, a new vision and a new activism, this might be a moment when changes seem not just possible but probable."  Ploughshares Fund's job, with Joe at the helm, will be to make the most of this moment by helping to build a public and bipartisan consensus for a re-orientation of national policies toward the eventual elimination of nuclear weapons.

Posted by Deborah Bain
Mar 05, 2008; From Associated Press

Joe Cirincione is spending his first day today as president of Ploughshares Fund testifying before the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform about the declining threat posed by long-range ballistic missiles and the record levels of government spending on the systems to counter them.  He called the missile defense system "the longest running scam in the history of the Department of Defense."  Writing online in The Nation about the hearing and Cirincione's testimony, editor Katrina vanden Heuvel agrees. "The jig is up," she writes. "With the Administration requesting a record $12.3 billion for missile defense this year, pushing its European-based missile defense system on Czech and Polish citizens who want nothing to do with it, and fueling a new arms race with Russia, the need to put an end to this madness is clear." The Associated Press reported yesterday that Congress' scrutiny "comes as the United States is at a sensitive moment in negotiations with Poland and the Czech Republic to build part of its shield on their territory....[Chairman] Rep. John Tierney said he intends, during hearings beginning Wednesday, to raise the question of whether Congress should continue present funding levels for what congressional auditors call the most expensive U.S. defense program."  Cirincione's testimony, posted here in its entirety, is aimed at providing a comprehensive assessment of the current and projected ballistic missile threat confronting the U.S., an analysis that has been missing from recent budget requests for missile defenses.  Listen to a clip of Cirincione's testimony here.

 

Posted by Paul Carroll
Mar 05, 2008; 

"Britain is prepared to use our expertise to help determine the requirements for the verifiable elimination of nuclear warheads.  …we will be at the forefront of the international campaign to accelerate disarmament among possessor states…and to ultimately achieve a world that is free from nuclear weapons."

These words, and this remarkable theme, is not a historical notion uttered by Churchill or even an anomaly in Margaret Thatcher’s otherwise hawkish prime ministership.  This is a recent statement by Prime Minister Gordon Brown that he has repeated on more than one occasion, signaling his administration’s commitment to British leadership in nuclear reductions and eventual elimination.  The significance of one of the original nuclear weapons states (Britain first acquired nuclear arms in 1952) staking out this ground cannot be overstated.  In other speeches by high-level UK officials, that country has claimed its intention to act as a “laboratory” for arms control and disarmament.

Ploughshares Fund is seizing this momentum and opportunity to build UK leadership on nuclear disarmament.  We view this as a key element in the international context of making progress toward a nuclear weapon-free world.  Recently, the Global Security Institute had a private meeting with Prime Minister Brown at which the options for moving in practical ways toward a nuclear free world could be realized.  Ploughshares Fund supports GSI for its Middle Powers Initiative, which works to engage international diplomats to promote nuclear risk reduction. On the analytical front, we recently made a grant to the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS), a highly-regarded London-based think tank, to identify and articulate what political conditions would be necessary to take steps to nuclear reductions and elimination.  IISS is working closely with the UK government on this front, so that ideas and suggestions are grounded in the realities of geopolitics. The British-American Security Information Council (BASIC) is a uniquely positioned NGO that works on transatlantic issues and builds connections between U.S. and UK policymakers on the nuclear weapons issue.  BASIC has recently embarked on a “Getting to Zero” program that will build political and public support for real arms reductions and policies to promote them. 

With a recent high-level meeting in Oslo, Norway just ending, the brain trust behind the original Wall Street Journal op-eds joined with an array of experts and officials to map out next steps.  Britain’s declared leadership as part of a global effort is a welcome and significant enhancement to the “Oslo process.”  Ploughshares Fund is pleased to partner with and support the best efforts out there to realize Prime Minister Brown’s vision.  Hear hear!

Posted by Deborah Bain
Mar 03, 2008; From Philadelphia Inquirer

"Using the Bush administration's Iran Democracy Fund as a pretext, Iranian authorities have clamped down on Iran's civil society with thousands of arrests," writes Trita Parsi, president of the Ploughshares-funded National Iranian American Council (NIAC) in an op-ed in the Philadelphia Inquirer.  He adds that Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have documented a sharp increase in executions, including stonings, under President Ahmadinejad.  Parsi calls on the current and the next U.S. administrations to put human rights on the table alongside strategic issues.  "By tying improved relations to Iranian respect for human rights, Washington will develop a stake in Iran's future and ultimate stability, but not a stake in the survival of the Iranian theocracy."  (Ploughshares Fund's 2008 grant to NIAC supports outreach to Congress with independent policy analysis on Iran.)

Posted by Paul Carroll
Feb 29, 2008; 

On Tuesday, February 26 India test-fired a missile from an underwater platform to mimic the conditions of a submarine-launched ballistic missile.  Called the K-15, the missile is designed to have a range of about 700 kilometers (a little more than 430 miles for us Americans).  This test is significant – and troubling – since it signals India’s desires and progress toward developing a full-blown “triad” of nuclear forces.  A triad means having three different delivery systems for sending nuclear weapons toward a target: airplanes armed with bombs, ground-based ballistic missiles, and finally submarine launched ballistic missiles.  Of the three, the latter is the most sophisticated and has long been sought by India in order to round out its nuclear arsenal.

The test is troubling since it indicates that India is not slowing its drive toward modernizing and “improving” its nuclear arsenal.  Such plans have typically been called "vertical proliferation"’, describing the quest for keeping up with the nuclear Joneses like the United States, the U.K, France, China and Russia.  All have developed the three legs of the triad.  But in India’s case, it is unclear why it needs a submarine-based nuclear force.  Its adversaries, Pakistan and potentially China, border it and the ranges offered by its bombers and land missiles are sufficient for deterrence.  It seems that the submarine option is more about status among the nuclear club than any real security need.  In fact, the test risks reducing India’s security since Pakistan will likely respond in some way to counter Indian’s submarine aspirations, provoking a de-stabilizing arms race.  

In a way, the South Asian nuclear saga is like the U.S.-Soviet nuclear arms race of decades ago.  Arsenals beget arsenals, and each step to improve and make more deadly and “survivable” their respective weapons evokes a response in kind.  But at least two things make the South Asian case far more worrisome.  First is geography:  India and Pakistan are next door neighbors and so any miscalculation or false warning could easily lead to a mistaken counterattack.  In the good old U.S.-Soviet standoff, we enjoyed as much as 30 minutes of warning and assessment time.  The second is technical sophistication.  While India's nuclear offensive forces evolve, there has been little improvement in confidence-building measures, communications systems, or early warning equipment that could help the two nations avoid a catastrophic accidental nuclear war.  In its rush to keep up with the Joneses, India’s submarine aspirations could lead it to Davy Jones’ locker. 

Ploughshares is supporting efforts to limit India and Pakistan’s nuclear arsenals and to ease the tensions between the two nations so that they can eventually agree to begin rolling back their nuclear arsenals.  

Posted by Naila Bolus
Feb 27, 2008; From New York Review of Books

For the past four years, Ploughshares Fund has supported a unique, high-level Track Two dialogue between American and Iranian officials, the details of which were revealed publicly for the first time this week.  Convened by the United Nations Association, participants have included, among others, former Ambassadors Bill Luers and Tom Pickering, and a number of nuclear experts, including Ploughshares Fund grantee and MIT professor Jim Walsh. Some fourteen dialogue meetings have been held addressing issues of mutual interest to both sides -- terrorism, Iraq, Afghanistan, regional security in the Middle East, the domestic political environments in the U.S. and Iran, and, most importantly, the impasse over Iran's nuclear program.  
 
Up until this point, the policy recommendations evolving from these dialogues have remained confidential.  But  this week Luers, Pickering and Walsh made public for the first time a groundbreaking solution for the U.S.-Iran nuclear standoff, described in detail in today's New York Review of Books.  They propose that Iran's efforts to produce enriched uranium and other related nuclear activities be conducted on a multilateral basis, jointly managed and operated on Iranian soil by a consortium including Iran and other governments. 
 
The proposal has received traction in both Iran and the United States, including bipartisan support from two prominent Senators.  Senator Chuck Hagel responded to the publication saying, "This article presents a powerful case for a clear, strategic change in U.S. policy on Iran."  Senator Dianne Feinstein said, "I believe the steps set forth in this article are practical, doable and forward-thinking.  The authors  have presented a way forward that has little if any downside, and could present a solution." (photo:seier)

Posted by Deborah Bain
Feb 26, 2008; From Financial Times

Mohamed ElBaradei, director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, is succeeding in "achieving the goals that [his detractors] seemingly desire – the disarmament of the Islamic Republic," write Ploughshares Fund's soon-to-be-president Joseph Cirincione and Ray Takeyh (of the Ploughshares-funded Council on Foreign Relations) in today's Financial Times.  Far from "subverting the western strategy of restraining Iran’s nuclear programme," as some claim, "the IAEA investigations have produced enough circumstantial evidence to support the view that Iran probably conducted nuclear weapons research in the past. But the evidence to date also indicates, as the US National Intelligence Estimate on Iran concluded last November, that Iran stopped this direct weapons work. The path now is to recognise this success, deepen it, find a way for Iran to come clean safely on its past work and to prevent Iran from developing capabilities that could allow it to produce weapon material in the next decade."   The best way forward "is for the US and its European allies to offer Iran a chance for a resumed relationship. The prospect of diplomatic ties with America and integration into the global economy will motivate pragmatic elements of the theocracy. Iran will have an incentive to restrain its nuclear ambitions and confine its programme within the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty."

Posted by Deborah Bain
Feb 25, 2008; 

On Friday, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) released a report that the New York Times says "strongly suggests the country had experimented with technologies to manufacture a nuclear weapon." The Iranian government dismissed the report as "baseless and fabricated."  Ploughshares Fund grantees David Albright and Jacqueline Shire of the Institute for Science and International Security conclude, however, that the good news gleaned from the report is that Iran has made progress in resolving many of the issues that earlier cast suspicion on its nuclear program, for example, providing "plausible explanations" for uranium contamination found on equipment detected at a technical university.  They summarize a number of other issues that are still unresolved and are characterized by Iran's "continued stonewalling."  On Sunday, Ali Ashgar Soltanieh, Iran's representative to the IAEA, blamed the U.S. for his country's intransigence, claiming that the information he was asked to respond to "was not only fake but came too late for a proper review," according to a report from the Associated Press.  He also acknowledged that his country's uranium enrichment program was experiencing "ups and downs," confirming IAEA reports and observations in Albright's report that Iran's centrifuges were underperforming.  "It appeared to be the first time Iran has admitted its enrichment activities were running into some difficulties," said the AP.  Says David Albright about the IAEA report, "the issue now is whether this is symptomatic of a comprehensive nuclear weapons effort, or just individual projects. Is it part of a plan to design and develop a weapon that can fit on a nuclear missile? And if so, why are so many pieces missing?"   (photo: Hamed Saber )     

Posted by Deborah Bain
Feb 24, 2008; From Associated Press

After the high-fives had ended over the bulls-eye missile strike against a disabled satellite in space, journalists turned to the missile defense and space security experts Ploughshares Fund supports to help make sense of what had just occurred.  "In last week's space spectacular," wrote Charles Hanley of the Associated Press, "a U.S. missile did more than turn a dead satellite into bits of space scrap.  It also blew another hole in hopes that the world's nations could forge a treaty making out space a weapons-free realm."  Michael Krepon of the Stimson Center asserted that the U.S. action would make such a treaty even harder to achieve, and promoted the idea of a less formal "code of conduct," a halfway step by which governments pledge to avoid "harmful interference" with satellites, and not to test space weapons. The European Union and Canada are among those endorsing such a code.  "There's a growing consensus among nations, including space-faring and missile-possessing nations, that there should be some rules of the road, some standard for responsible behavior in space," agreed Daryl Kimball of the Arms Control Association.  "A key is going to be what the next U.S. administration decides to do." According to the Ploughshares-funded Council for a Livable World, Senator Barack Obamba backs a space code of conduct, while Senator Hillary Clinton said she would constrain space weaponization "as much as possible." (Republican candidates did not respond to the Council's survey. )  Jeffrey Lewis of the New America Foundation said that the worry that may finally unite the world for action is what Lhe calls "debris risk." If multiple countries compete in testing anti-satellite weapons, they'll litter near-space with millions of bits of debris endangering working satellites.  "You could really ruin portions of the space environment for everyone," Lewis said. "Getting everyone to understand that common interest will be the goal."

Posted by Deborah Bain
Feb 21, 2008; From Christian Science Monitor

The losses suffered by President Pervez Musharraf in the recent election are not the only changes taking place in Pakistan. Ploughshares Fund board member and CBS news analyst Reza Aslan reports that public opinion in what is often called "the most dangerous nation on earth" has turned dramatically against Al Qaeda and the Taliban.  Writing in the Christian Science Monitor, Aslan and Kenneth Ballen report on a survey showing that public approval of Osama bin Laden has dropped by half in just five months.   "In addition to the widespread support that has swept the moderates to power, the Pakistani public has just as powerfully rejected extremism in all its forms." 

"The fact is," they explain, "Pakistan includes a mostly young, sophisticated, and upwardly mobile population that aspires to the ideals of democracy and rule of law. If given the opportunity to choose their leaders, there can no longer be any question but they will overwhelmingly elect moderate parties, giving Pakistan a government that finally enjoys the popular legitimacy necessary to mount an effective military campaign against Al Qaeda and the Taliban – a legitimacy that Mr. Musharraf so clearly lacks." 

This perspective on Pakistani politics may be surprising to U.S. observers, and illustrates why a new U.S. approach and better understanding of Pakistan are increasingly urgent.  A recent Ploughshares Fund grant to Network 20/20 is aimed at building bridges between emerging leaders in both countries, beginning by sending a delegation of young policymakers and business leaders from the U.S. to meet with their counterparts in Pakistan.

Posted by Naila Bolus
Feb 19, 2008; 

Today, Ploughshares Fund embarks on an exciting new endeavor, designed to seize the unprecedented opportunity before us to make dramatic progress toward a nuclear weapon-free world.  In short, we have resolved to more than double our grantmaking capacity over the next several years and to develop a series of targeted projects to build and sustain the new momentum for nuclear disarmament.