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"I want to tell you that your fact sheet on the [Missile Technology Control Regime] is very well done and useful for me when I have to speak on MTCR issues."

– Amb. Thomas Hajnoczi
Chair, MTCR
May 19, 2021
United States

Outgoing Nuclear Chief Counsels Caution on Strategic Reductions

Philipp C. Bleek

As the Bush administration prepares to make significant changes to U.S. nuclear forces, the country’s most senior military official in charge of those forces counseled caution in implementing deep reductions and criticized de-alerting proposals.

In July 11 testimony to the Senate Armed Services strategic subcommittee, Admiral Richard Mies, outgoing commander-in-chief of the U.S. Strategic Command, supported moves to reduce deployed strategic weapons but cautioned that strategic reductions must be viewed as “means to an end—national security—not as an end in itself.” The admiral highlighted a “naive and mistaken belief that the ‘nuclear danger’ is directly proportional to the number of nuclear weapons and accordingly, lower is inevitably better.”

Quoting an unnamed former national security adviser, Mies suggested that, “given present circumstances in Russia,” the United States should focus on “strengthening the safety and security of Russian weapons” and improving Moscow’s command and control rather than “spending our energies on radical cuts.” At lower levels, issues such as transparency, irreversibility, production capacity, aggregate warhead inventories, and verifiability become more important than numbers of deployed forces or numerical parity, Mies said.

Both during the campaign and from the White House, President George W. Bush has repeatedly said he would seek to reduce U.S. strategic forces to “the lowest possible number consistent with our national security.” More specifically, Bush said during the campaign that “it should be possible to reduce…significantly [below] START II,” under which the United States and Russia would be required to deploy 3,500 or fewer strategic warheads. Bush also said that “the United States should remove as many weapons as possible from high-alert, hair-trigger status” and that “keeping so many weapons on high alert may create unacceptable risks of accidental or unauthorized launch.” (See ACT, September 2000.)

The admiral sharply criticized reductions in the alert status of forces. Mies warned that de-alerting nuclear forces “can diminish their credibility and survivability” by “jeopardizing the existing stability we have against a pre-emptive strike because they increase our vulnerability.” Contesting the notion that U.S. forces are on “hair-trigger” alert, Mies emphasized that “multiple, stringent procedural and technical safeguards have been in place and will remain in place to guard against accidental or inadvertent launch.” Finally, he reiterated longstanding U.S. policy not to rely on so-called launch-on-warning. “Our trigger is built so we can always wait,” the nuclear chief said.

Mies also touched on U.S. plans to sustain its current strategic forces, noting that the issue will become increasingly critical as systems age. Mies stated that the B-52 bomber is scheduled to remain in service until 2044, giving it a total service life approaching a century. He also said the Trident submarine has had its service life extended from 30 years to 44 years. Mies further noted that, because some of the warheads currently deployed on Minuteman III missiles are due to reach the end of their service lives around 2009, it is important to transfer newer warheads to the Minuteman from the Peacekeeper missile, which the administration recently decided to retire with congressional support. He indicated the Defense Department is “committed” to moving the warheads.

The Defense Department announced July 25 that Bush had nominated Admiral James Ellis, currently commander of U.S. naval forces in Europe, to replace Mies. The position is subject to Senate confirmation; a confirmation hearing has not yet been scheduled.


Israel Plans to Buy U.S. F-16 Fighters

Amid displays of some of the most advanced weaponry available on the international arms market, Israeli government officials at the Paris Air Show notified U.S. aerospace manufacturer Lockheed Martin on June 19 that Israel would buy at least another 50 F-16I combat aircraft later this decade. Israel is exercising an option from a January 2000 contract, worth $2.5 billion for 50 F-16I fighters, that stipulated Israel could purchase up to an additional 60 fighters for an extra $2 billion.

The potential sale is unlikely to run into major hurdles even though the Israeli use of previously supplied U.S. F-16s to strike Palestinian targets May 18 upset some in the U.S. Congress. During a June 3 interview with CNN, Secretary of State Colin Powell indicated that Washington would prefer not to see U.S.-supplied weaponry used against the Palestinians.

At the request of Representative John Conyers (D-MI), the U.S. General Accounting Office is conducting a review of the terms and conditions of U.S. government arms sales to countries in the Middle East. Conyers is seeking to determine whether terms attached to earlier U.S. weapons sales to Israel would rule out their use against Palestinians, and whether Israel violated these terms in its May bombings.

For the option from the January 2000 deal to be exercised, the United States must negotiate a contract with Israel for the purchase of the additional 50 fighters. If a deal is reached, Israel will start taking delivery of the second batch of fighters in 2006 after the first 50 have been delivered, a process that will begin in 2003. Israel currently has approximately 250 F-16s and 100 F-15 combat aircraft supplied by the United States in service.

U.S. Finishes Packaging Kazakh Plutonium, Reviews Next Step

Philipp C. Bleek

In late June the United States and Kazakhstan completed a joint project to package spent fuel containing weapons-grade plutonium for permanent storage. Conclusion of the work represents a key milestone in a multi-year effort to inventory, secure, and permanently store material containing some three tons of plutonium in order to make it less susceptible to theft.

Presidents Bill Clinton and Nursultan Nazarbayev agreed in November 1997 to a three-part program to accurately inventory spent fuel produced by a Soviet-era BN-350 breeder reactor located in Aktau, Kazakhstan; seal the material in casks; and place it in permanent storage under International Atomic Energy Agency safeguards. Under a parallel agreement signed in December 1999, the United States is also helping to shut down the breeder reactor permanently.

The packaged fissile material is currently stored in cooling ponds at the breeder-reactor complex on the shores of the Caspian Sea. Technicians have been working on-site since December 1998 to place the reactor’s used fuel assemblies into an estimated 2,800 one-ton, 13-foot long, welded steel canisters. Radioactive waste was placed in the canisters before they were sealed, resulting in a “heavy, hot, and highly radioactive package that is far more difficult to steal,” according to the Energy Department’s Defense Nuclear Nonproliferation office.

The project’s next step involves construction of a longer-term storage facility for the material, since the fuel canisters in which the plutonium is currently stored are only designed to maintain their integrity for five years while submerged in the cooling ponds. Scientists from the U.S. Argonne National Laboratory have proposed constructing a dry-silo facility that would be engineered to contain the material for 50 years. (A U.S. official indicated that after 50 years Kazakhstan, which is currently pressed for funds, is expected to be able to finance the construction of a more permanent disposition facility.)

After evaluating 10 possible locations for the dry-silo facility, a team of Argonne scientists recommended two long-term sites, one at the former Soviet nuclear test site of Semipalatinsk in northeastern Kazakhstan, near the Russian border, and the other in Aktau, near the reactor complex. Aktau’s coastal location in the vicinity of several nuclear weapons aspirants, notably Iran, served as a prime motivator for the joint threat reduction effort. As a result, early discussions on the issue of permanent storage focused on moving the material far inland, and the Kazakh government has announced that it would like the material to go to Semipalatinsk, the more costly of the two possibilities. But U.S. government officials emphasized that both storage site options remain on the table.

No agreement has yet been reached on the issue, and according to a U.S. official, the whole issue of short- and longer-term storage options “is now being re-evaluated.” However, because the plutonium can only be kept dry in the cooling ponds for five years, terminating the cooperative U.S.-Kazakh effort at this stage would make any long-term storage effort considerably more difficult, the official said.

Even among Clinton administration officials, who initiated the project, there was some disagreement regarding the necessity of constructing a costly longer-term disposition site at Semipalatinsk. Although the fissile material’s quantity, quality, and location put it at risk of diversion or even forcible seizure, the fact that it remains in spent fuel elements and is now protected by additional highly radioactive waste significantly reduces those risks. With the administration seeking substantial nuclear threat reduction budget cuts, Energy Department officials may ultimately decide that other projects—some involving unprotected, separated fissile materials—pose a greater short-term proliferation threat. (See ACT, April 2001 and May 2001.)

Bush Meets Opposition to Missile Defense While in Europe

Wade Boese

Although President George W. Bush expressed satisfaction during a mid-June visit to Europe that Russian President Vladimir Putin and other European leaders had showed “receptivity” to his intention to develop a new strategic framework, including missile defenses, Putin and key NATO leaders reiterated their concerns with U.S. plans and warned the United States against pushing ahead alone.

On his first visit to Europe since winning the presidency, Bush traveled to five nations in five days, beginning with Spain on June 12 and capping the tour with his first meeting with Putin June 16 in Slovenia. In between these stops, Bush attended a NATO heads-of-state meeting and a summit with the 15-nation European Union.

At each stop, the president delivered the same message, urging his counterparts to “think differently” about preserving their security in the post-Cold War era, when Russia is no longer a NATO enemy, and rogue states, such as North Korea and Iran, are seeking long-range ballistic missiles and weapons of mass destruction.

The president further argued that this new world necessitates building ballistic missile defenses that would require Washington and Moscow to “set aside” the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty, which prohibits nationwide defenses against strategic ballistic missiles. However, Bush presented no specifics on his missile defense plans or the other elements of his nascent strategic framework, such as unilateral strategic reductions. “We are open as to what form [the new strategic framework] takes,” national security adviser Condoleezza Rice explained to reporters June 15.

Speaking at a joint press conference after their meeting, Putin welcomed Bush’s premise that Russia and the United States were no longer enemies in a changing world with new threats, but he said that those threats needed to be “defined” before it could be decided how to tackle them. He later implied they could be addressed through means other than strategic defenses, such as diplomacy and nonstrategic or theater missile defenses. Putin, who had warned earlier in his remarks that “any unilateral actions can only make more complicated various problems and issues,” concluded by saying, “I think we can work out a common approach.”

In an extensive interview with selected U.S. journalists in Moscow two days later, Putin called for further consultations with the United States and appeared to open the door slightly on amending the ABM Treaty. Putin twice stated that Washington and Moscow should look at what specific provisions in the ABM Treaty prevent the United States from countering perceived threats. He noted that the treaty can be amended and that it does not rule out all defenses, originally allowing the two countries to deploy two regional defenses. A 1974 amendment to the treaty trimmed this allowance to one regional defense per country.
The Russian president further said that the two sides should discuss what the United States sees as the threat, what can be done about it, and what the Bush administration means when it says the U.S. defense will be “limited.”

If the United States acts independently and opts to withdraw from the ABM Treaty, Putin declared that Russia would pull out of START I and START II, which limit the number of U.S. and Russian deployed strategic warheads. If that happened, he explained that Moscow would be free to keep multiple warheads on its land-based ICBMs, an action proscribed by START II, and that Russia and the United States would lose the ability to monitor each other’s nuclear reductions. Top Russian officials have recently stated that more than 30 strategic accords are tied to the ABM Treaty.

Secretary of State Colin Powell and Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld have both dismissed the specter of a new arms race with Moscow, asserting that Russia must cut its arsenal because it cannot afford to maintain its forces at current levels and that U.S. missile defenses will be limited, thus posing no threat to Russia’s deterrent and removing any reason for Moscow to build up or alter its strategic forces.

Testifying before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on June 20, Powell explained that Russia should not worry about a limited U.S. defense because the two countries will remain vulnerable to each other’s missiles. “You can’t entirely do away with what has been known as mutual assured destruction [MAD],” Powell said. Bush, however, has equated MAD with the ABM Treaty, calling them both bankrupt relics of the past that should be left behind.

Putin was not alone in expressing concerns about U.S. plans during Bush’s European tour. French President Jacques Chirac warned that missile defenses could prompt other countries to step up efforts to acquire ballistic missiles and weapons of mass destruction in order to overwhelm a U.S. defense, while Dutch Prime Minister Willem Kok counseled that a unilateral U.S. abrogation of the ABM Treaty “would not be the right approach.” Emphasizing the need for continued U.S. consultations on its missile defense plans, German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder said that there are a “host of issues that need to be clarified,” a message Berlin has voiced repeatedly in the past several months.

After his June 13 meeting with the NATO allies, Bush acknowledged that “there’s some nervousness” about U.S. plans. But Bush also said that he thought he had made progress in convincing other leaders to accept his approach, claiming that their worries are “beginning to be allayed when they hear the logic behind the rationale.”

Rice seconded the president in a post-trip June 17 interview on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” asserting, “We’re bringing people along with us.” U.S. officials have named Spain, Turkey, Britain, Italy, Poland, the Czech Republic, and Hungary as places where they say the Bush initiative received a positive reception.

Some of those countries, however, have cautioned that U.S. actions should not divide the alliance and that Washington needs to proceed cooperatively, not unilaterally. And some, particularly Britain, have said only that they understand why the United States is looking at missile defenses and that they are reserving judgment until they know program specifics. In the NBC interview, Rice said winning allied support would be needed to permit the United States “the full range of options in missile defense.”

Bush disputed accusations that the United States is acting alone, saying June 13, “Unilateralists don’t come around the table to listen to others.” Nevertheless, Bush officials have repeatedly declared that Washington will move forward with missile defenses.

The president vowed the United States would continue its foreign consultations, which have been universally welcomed, and he specifically charged Powell and Rumsfeld with carrying out “regular, detailed” discussions with their Russian counterparts. Putin noted that expert working groups would also be established to discuss specifics, such as identifying the threats. By the close of June, these proposals had not been given any shape yet, according to administration officials.

Although President George W. Bush expressed satisfaction during a mid-June visit to Europe that Russian President Vladimir Putin and other European leaders had showed “receptivity” to his intention to develop a new strategic framework, including missile defenses, Putin and key NATO leaders reiterated their concerns with U.S. plans and warned the United States against pushing ahead alone. (Continue)

U.S. Shifts Its South Asia Nuclear Policy

Moving away from the Clinton administration’s nuclear policy toward South Asia, the Bush administration has apparently decided not to try to persuade India and Pakistan to sign the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) or to give up their nuclear weapons programs.

In a June 18 meeting with Pakistani Prime Minister Abdul Sattar, Secretary of State Colin Powell did not raise the issue of CTBT signature, according to State Department spokesman Richard Boucher. When asked during a press briefing the next day whether Indian and Pakistani adherence to the CTBT is still a priority for the United States, Boucher responded, “The important thing to the United States is that nuclear developments not be carried any farther, and to that extent, the emphasis that we place on this in this administration has been that there not be any further testing.”

The Bush administration’s approach contrasts with that of the Clinton administration, which actively tried to convince India and Pakistan to go beyond their testing moratoria—declared by both states following their May 1998 nuclear tests—by signing the CTBT. To realize this objective and other nuclear-related goals in the region, the Clinton team conducted years of bilateral meetings with both states.

The Bush administration also seems to have shifted from the Clinton administration’s ultimate goal of persuading the two South Asian states to relinquish their nuclear weapons programs. At a June 9 press conference in Finland, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld said that the United States and “other interested countries” should encourage India and Pakistan to “learn that is it possible to live with nuclear weapons and not to use them.” Rumsfeld said he hoped that the two countries could “develop a stable situation” like that of the United States and Soviet Union during the Cold War. When asked if Rumsfeld’s remarks indicated a policy change, the Pentagon said it was not prepared to comment.

U.S. BWC Protocol Policy Still Unclear With Talks Short on Time

Seth Brugger

Three months after the release of a chairman’s draft of a protocol to the Biological Weapons Convention (BWC), the United States has yet to announce its position on the text. Although the administration has chosen to remain silent until it finishes conducting a protocol policy review, press reports and testimony by two senior administration officials suggest that Washington may reject the protocol.

BWC states-parties, including the United States, have met multiple times each year in Geneva since 1995 to negotiate a legally binding compliance protocol to the convention, which outlaws biological weapons but does not contain verification measures. In late March, the chairman of the negotiations, Ambassador Tibor Tóth, issued his version of the protocol, known as the “chairman’s text,” which contains compromises on long-outstanding issues.

Under the leadership of Ambassador Donald Mahley, the head of the U.S. delegation to the negotiations, the administration has been reviewing its protocol policy since February. It has not made any of the review’s details public yet, but The New York Times reported in May that an interagency review team had found 38 problems with the protocol and recommended that the White House reject the chairman’s text.

A House Government Reform subcommittee invited Mahley and Owen James Sheaks, assistant secretary of state for verification and compliance, to testify on the protocol June 5. The administration declined to send Mahley and Sheaks to testify in person, apparently seeking to maintain a low public profile on its protocol policy, but the two officials did submit written testimony.

In his comments, Mahley stressed that the United States “unreservedly” supports the BWC but that Washington has “serious substantive concerns” with the chairman’s text. He also said that the United States does not share the position of other countries that the fifth BWC review conference, scheduled to begin November 19, is a deadline for completing the protocol negotiations. Rather, Washington views the conference as a “target.”

But Mahley acknowledged that, if there is “no sense” during the conference that a protocol is “in sight, we can expect a very troublesome review conference, with some bitterly fought attempts to incorporate national views” into the conference’s final document. The United States is weighing the consequences of such an outcome in its review.

Although Sheaks recognized in his testimony that the Clinton administration’s goal during the negotiations had been to promote transparency, he said that he would not address “the level of transparency achieved” by the chairman’s text or “the potential value of that transparency.” Instead, Sheaks focused almost all of his testimony on how the protocol is not verifiable.

Sheaks said that, under the protocol, countries would only declare a “small fraction” of their facilities that could “potentially be used for offensive biological warfare purposes.” He added that states with offensive programs would not declare facilities with illicit activities or would “embed” these activities “beneath an effective cover of legitimate biological activity.” These loopholes, and the fact that “illicit work” could “easily be concealed or cleaned up” at visited facilities, would undercut the verifiability of the declaration-visit regime set out by the protocol. (See ACT, March 2000.)

Sheaks maintained that “challenge investigations could help to deter cheating” but added that they have “inherent limitations,” such as the time it takes to approve a request for an investigation and place an investigation team on-site. These delays “would likely permit more than enough time to clean up or otherwise conceal evidence of a BWC violation.” He further contended, “The dual-use nature of biological activities and equipment could readily be exploited by a violator to ‘explain away’ any concerns, with ‘managed access’ rights available as a last resort to deny access to any incriminating evidence.”

In an effort to sway the Bush administration’s apparent opposition to the protocol, Tóth met with senior State Department officials and National Security Council staff in Washington on May 22. According to State Department spokesman Philip Reeker, the administration shared some concerns it has and reaffirmed that, after completing its review, it would work with Tóth to “develop a strategy to move forward” during the next negotiating session.

The European Union and Russia also recently targeted U.S. protocol policy. The European Union parliament passed a resolution June 14 that noted “with concern” reports that the U.S. review had recommended rejecting the chairman’s text. It invited the European Union Council to discuss the protocol with President George W. Bush during a mid-June summit in Sweden.

According to a Swedish official, the protocol was not brought up with Bush because it has been raised using other avenues and because other items, such as missile defense and missile proliferation, filled the summit agenda. He added that the European Union has contacted Washington on this issue with increasing frequency over the past two months through senior embassy staff.

The Russian Foreign Ministry issued a statement June 26 that also expressed “concern” over reports that Washington might reject the protocol. It added that adopting the protocol “this year” is “realistic” and that the protocol “must become a major instrument strengthening the regime for the prohibition and nonproliferation of biological weapons.”

The Geneva Negotiations

Consistent with its low profile on the protocol, the U.S. delegation to the protocol negotiations in Geneva remained largely silent during the latest negotiating session, held April 23-May 11. The resulting lack of clarity on the U.S. position has taken its toll. According to one official in Geneva, “Without knowing what the U.S. is going to do, I think a number of countries—China, et cetera—are reluctant to say, ‘Yes, we will negotiate on the [chairman’s] text.’”

Whether the delegations would accept the chairman’s text as an official platform for the negotiations has been a question ever since Tóth released the text March 30. During the last session, many countries supported using the text as the basis for the negotiations. However, a few countries, such as China and Iran, while tacitly agreeing to discuss the text, have not been willing to endorse it as the basis for negotiations.

During meetings held the final week of the session, Tóth identified and discussed areas where the delegations have substantive differences. According to the Geneva official, the talks focused mainly on the long-controversial topics of declarations, visits, and investigations, but many delegations simply repeated their previous positions, resulting in a lack of compromise.

“Delegations were still dancing around each other. Nobody wanted to make the first move by saying, ‘I’ll give up my national position here if you do the same here,’” the official said.

The group will meet again from July 23 to August 17, its last session before the BWC review conference in November.

U.S. 2000 Data for the UN Conventional Arms Register















On May 31, the United States sent its annual submission to the UN Register of Conventional Arms, reporting on U.S. conventional arms exports and imports for 2000. For the third consecutive year, the U.S. export total, 1,637 weapons, marked a decrease from the previous year. (Washington reported 1,839 exports for 1999.) The total also stands as the lowest sum ever reported by the United States during the register’s history. For both 1992 and 1995, the United States reported more than 5,000 exports.

Established by the UN secretary-general in January 1992 with the goal of increasing transparency in the global arms market, the register calls on countries to voluntarily report their annual exports and imports in seven categories of conventional weapons: battle tanks, armored combat vehicles, large-caliber artillery, combat aircraft, attack helicopters, warships, and missiles and missile launchers. States may also elect to submit data on domestic military holdings and procurement through national production, as well as information on export policies.

Two dozen countries, including Taiwan, received U.S. weapons last year, according to the U.S. register submission. As in the previous two years, Europe ranked as the top regional destination with nine countries receiving 654 U.S. arms imports, nearly 80 percent of which were missiles and missile launchers. With the receipt of 394 U.S. weapons, including 303 large-caliber artillery systems, Egypt led all importers. Finland and Turkey ranked second and third.

Washington reported a total of 146 imports, all of which were missiles. The United States imported 142 Popeye air-to-surface precision strike missiles from Israel and four AGM-119 anti-ship missiles from Norway. —For more information, contact Wade Boese.

Region/Country
Battle Tanks
ACV's
Heavy Artillery
Combat Aircraft
Attack Helicopters
Warships
Missiles & Launchers
Total
Africa
             
430
Egypt
   
303
17
   
74
394
Morocco
 
36
         
36
Asia
             
284
Japan
           
102
102
Singapore
     
10
     
10
South Korea
 
17
       
100
117
Taiwan
27
     
11
2
15
55
Europe
             
654
Finland
     
3
   
209
212
Greece
 
68
18
     
66
152
Italy
           
60
60
Netherlands
       
7
 
2
9
Poland
           
17
17
Portugal
 
8
         
8
Spain
 
2
     
2
 
4
Turkey
 
27
     
1
147
175
United Kingdom
       
4
 
13
17
Middle East
             
174
Bahrain
 
38
 
10
     
48
Israel
           
21
21
Jordan
 
70
 
16
5
   
91
Lebanon
 
1
         
1
Saudi Arabia
 
5
         
5
United Arab Emirates
           
8
8
Other Regions
             
95
Argentina
 
82
         
82
Australia
   
1
       
1
Canada
           
12
12
TOTALS
27
354
322
56
27
5
846
1,637

 

U.S. Military Holdings and Procurement Through National Production
Other Regions
Military Holdings
2000 (1999)1
Procurement
2000 (1999)
I. Battle Tanks
8,104 (8,133)
0 (0)
II. Armored Combat Vehicles
19,983 (20,325)
0 (0)
III. Large-Caliber Artillery Systems
7,164 (8,780)
0 (0)
IV. Combat Aircraft
3,646 (2,970)
28 (28)
V. Attack Helicopters
2,484 (2,502)
-- (41)
VI. Warships
313 (315)
2 (93)
VII. Missiles and Missile Launchers
121,934 (118,528)
685 (1,115)
1Relative to last year’s submission (data for calendar year 2000) for U.S. military holdings, reductions in totals reflect continued downsizing actions. Increases in Category IV and VII reflect better accounting procedures.

Pentagon Prepares Modest Cutbacks in Nuclear Arsenal

Philipp C. Bleek

Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld is taking steps to reduce modestly all three arms of the nuclear triad in what appears to be the first stage of the unilateral nuclear cutbacks promised by the Bush administration. The secretary said he intends to retire the Peacekeeper ICBM, reduce the number of deployed B-1B Lancer bombers by a third, and study converting two Ohio-class ballistic missile submarines to play a conventional role.

Testifying before the House Armed Services Committee June 28, Rumsfeld said that both he and the Air Force had concluded that the Peacekeeper missile, also known as the MX, was “not needed.” The Air Force is seeking $4.9 million for 2002 to prepare for Peacekeeper dismantlement. The missiles are scheduled to be taken out of service between 2003 and 2005, with final dismantlement activities concluding in 2007.

The Peacekeeper is the United States’ newest ICBM, deployed under President Ronald Reagan in the early 1980s. Like the heavy, multiple-warhead Russian ICBMs, the Peacekeeper must be eliminated under the START II agreement, whose entry into force remains stalled. Currently, the United States has 50 Peacekeepers deployed.

The administration is prohibited from reducing U.S. nuclear forces below START I levels by language first included in the fiscal year 1998 National Defense Authorization Act. Intended to prevent then-President Bill Clinton from unilaterally reducing strategic forces, the language specifies that Pentagon funds may not be used to “retire or dismantle” strategic weapons below set levels, including “50 Peacekeeper intercontinental ballistic missiles.”

Pentagon Comptroller Dov Zakheim indicated at a June 27 press briefing that the administration was seeking “relief” from the restriction for all weapons systems, not just for the Peacekeeper missile.

That same day, Senator Mary Landrieu (D-LA) and Representatives John Spratt (D-SC) and Ellen Tauscher (D-CA) introduced the Nuclear Threat Reduction Act in both houses of Congress. The legislation would lift the restriction while also calling for reductions in the alert status of weapons and the acceleration of nuclear threat reduction efforts in Russia.

Rumsfeld also indicated in testimony to both houses of Congress that the Air Force had recommended reducing the fleet of B-1B Lancer bombers from 93 to 60 and reducing the number of B-1 bomber bases from five to two, a recommendation he indicated was already being implemented. The Lancer currently carries conventional weapons but is nuclear capable.

Lawmakers from states due to lose their bomber contingent expressed anger during the hearings. Senator Pat Roberts (R-KS), whose state is slated to lose its bombers, informed Rumsfeld that he was going to “make every effort” to block the decision until he is “confident” that it “fits into our national defense strategy.” Other lawmakers echoed his sentiments. Roberts was particularly upset by an Air Force memo he obtained that discussed the political necessity of maintaining bases in Texas and South Dakota, home to President George W. Bush and Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle, respectively.

The plan to study the conversion of two Ohio-class submarines to carry conventional cruise missiles appears to have generated little congressional interest. The United States currently deploys 18 of these nuclear-capable submarines, each of which carries 192 nuclear warheads, but four of those submarines are due for retirement by 2003.

The proposed reductions mesh with Bush’s plans to reduce the size of U.S. nuclear forces. During a May 1 speech at National Defense University, Bush said that he intends to develop a new framework that would “encourage” cuts in nuclear weapons and that he is “committed to achieving a credible deterrent with the lowest possible number of nuclear weapons consistent with our national security needs.” (See ACT, June 2001.)

Rules for U.S.-Swedish Arms Trade, Ventures Relaxed

Wade Boese

On June 14, the White House announced that Sweden, and therefore its arms companies, would be permitted to join a select group of countries that enjoy an expedited, relaxed, and simplified process for purchasing weapons from or participating in joint ventures with U.S. arms companies.

Last May, the Clinton administration unveiled 17 initiatives collectively referred to as the Defense Trade Security Initiative (DTSI) that, among other things, cut, consolidated, or sped up export licensing requirements for U.S. arms companies and their customers or partners in NATO, Japan, and Australia. (See ACT, June 2000.) Sweden will now be able to take advantage of the initiative, which was welcomed with open arms by U.S. arms manufacturers, who had argued that onerous U.S. export laws were costing them business.

The White House announcement, made while President George W. Bush was in Sweden for a summit meeting between the United States and the European Union, noted that Sweden is “one of six major European producers of aerospace and defense items.” During U.S. fiscal years 1996-1999, the U.S. government approved more than $1.3 billion in commercial licenses for exports of arms and military equipment to Sweden. (Countries can buy U.S. weaponry either through the Pentagon’s Foreign Military Sales program or directly from a U.S. company in a commercial deal. DTSI applies largely to commercial deals.)

Also under the rubric of DTSI, Washington resumed negotiations with Britain and Australia in mid-May to exempt selected companies in those countries from having to obtain licenses for unclassified U.S. weapons or services. The negotiations, which are not expected to be concluded anytime soon, had been put on hold when the Bush administration took office. At this time, only Britain and Australia have been singled out for this general license exemption (in addition to Canada, which was exempted before DTSI’s inception) because the United States believes their export control systems are closest to U.S. standards.

Rumsfeld Restructures Operation Of U.S. Space Programs

Wade Boese

Aiming to raise the profile of and accountability for U.S. defense and intelligence space-related activities, at the Pentagon on May 8 Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld announced several changes to the way the United States oversees and operates its space programs. Most of the recommendations mirrored those outlined in a January 11 report by a congressionally mandated commission tasked with reviewing U.S. space activities, which Rumsfeld chaired until he was nominated to head the Pentagon. (See ACT, March 2001.)

Describing how reliant the United States is on space assets for both military and civilian purposes—from gathering intelligence on foreign militaries to enabling global communication to providing early-warning of missile launches—Rumsfeld said the United States needs to match the management and organization of U.S. space-related security programs with the “importance of space to the nation today.”

Rumsfeld argued that the heightened U.S. dependency on space makes the United States “somewhat vulnerable to new challenges.” He said the question is how to “deter and dissuade” others from attacking or interfering with U.S. space assets in possible times of tension. Approximately half of the roughly 700 operational satellites in orbit are U.S. commercial, civilian, or military satellites, according to U.S. Space Command.

Topping the list of Rumsfeld’s changes is the creation of an interagency Policy Coordinating Committee for Space within the National Security Council. The new committee will be charged with developing, coordinating, and monitoring implementation of any presidential policy guidance on space.

Aiming to increase attention devoted to space by senior military officials, as well as accountability, the command of Air Force Space Command will now be independent and headed by a four-star officer. Previously, this command was part of the responsibility of the commander-in-chief of U.S. Space Command, who also serves as commander-in-chief of North American Aerospace Defense Command.
In addition, the Air Force will now be designated the executive agent for space within the Defense Department, putting the service in charge of planning, programming, and acquiring space systems. Rumsfeld also tasked the Air Force with being ready for “prompt and sustained offensive and defensive space operations.”

Although some members of Congress had lobbied for the creation of a separate Space Force, Rumsfeld said that the cost and complexity of such an initiative could detract from the effort to increase joint war-fighting capabilities among the existing services. Rumsfeld also elected not to request creation of a new undersecretary of defense for space, intelligence, and information, one of the few recommendations from the January report of the “Commission to Assess United States National Security Space Management and Organization” that he declined to follow.

When asked after his speech whether he intended to pursue space-based weapons, Rumsfeld dodged the question, saying his initiatives only focused on organizational issues. Pressed again, the secretary quoted from the 1996 U.S. National Space Policy, which says that the United States “will develop, operate and maintain space control capabilities to ensure freedom of action in space and, if directed, deny such freedom of action to adversaries.”

In its report, the members of the independent commission on space activities wrote that, although they appreciated that there is a controversy about weaponizing space, they believed the United States should “vigorously pursue the capabilities…to ensure that the President will have the option to deploy weapons in space.”

Then-Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle (D-SD) reacted to Rumsfeld’s May 8 speech by characterizing the possibility of space-based weapons as possibly “the single dumbest thing I’ve heard so far in this administration.” He warned that he believed Democrats, who became the majority party in the Senate following Vermont Senator Jim Jeffords departure in late May from the Republican Party, would be “universally opposed to doing something as foolish as that.”

Many countries, led by China and Russia, are already pressing the United States to negotiate an agreement at the UN Conference on Disarmament to prevent an arms race in outer space, something Washington has refused to do. (See CD Reconvenes, Stalemate Likely to Continue.)

The 1967 Outer Space Treaty bars states from stationing weapons of mass destruction in space and forbids military activities on celestial bodies, and the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty proscribes the development, testing, and deployment of space-based ABM components or systems.

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