November 2024
By Kelsey Davenport

Israel’s retaliatory strikes against Iran did not target the country’s nuclear program, despite calls from top Israeli officials to strike those assets. Prior to the retaliatory attack, U.S. President Joe Biden said that the United States would not support Israeli strikes against Iran’s nuclear facilities.

Israel targeted Iranian air defenses and missile production facilities in its Oct. 26 attack. Israeli aircraft also struck Parchin, a military site where Iran conducted illicit nuclear activities as part of its pre-2003 weapons program. Iranian media outlets reported that four soldiers were killed in the strikes.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that the attack “severely damaged” Iran’s missile production capabilities.

In a telephone call with journalists shortly afterwards, a senior Biden administration official said that the United States did not participate in the attack but had encouraged Israel to conduct a “targeted and proportional” response with “low risk of civilian harm.”

The U.S. official said that the Israeli strike “should be the end of this direct exchange of fire between Israel and Iran.”

Iranian officials appeared to downplay the impact of the strikes. The country’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, called for “actions that serve the interests of this nation and country,” but said that it would be up to the government to “convey the power and will” of Iran. Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said that Iran will respond appropriately but reiterated that it does “not seek war.”

The Israeli strike was a response to Tehran targeting three Israeli military bases with nearly 200 ballistic missiles on Oct. 1. Unlike Iran’s missile attack in April, Tehran did not provide much advance warning for the October strike, which was retaliation for Israel’s attacks against Hezbollah in Lebanon that resulted in the deaths of Hezbollah commander Hassan Nasrallah and Islamic Revolutionary Guard Deputy Commander Abbas Nilforoushan.

Israel, with the support of the United States and others, shot down most of the incoming missiles.

In an Oct. 1 statement posted on the social platform X, the Iranian Mission to the United Nations suggested that Iran’s missile strike was intended to deter future attacks by Israel. The statement said that if Israel retaliated for the Iranian strike or committed “further acts of malevolence,” it would face a “subsequent and crushing response.”

Netanyahu will likely continue to face pressure to attack Iran’s nuclear program even if Tehran does not retaliate for the Oct. 26 attack.

In an Oct. 1 statement, former Prime Minister Naftali Bennett said that Israel must “act now to destroy Iran’s nuclear program.” Israel has the tools and the justification and should not “settle for Iranian military bases,” Bennett said.

Although Israel could strike Iranian nuclear facilities without U.S. support, it would be challenging for Israel to destroy deeply buried sites, such as the Fordow uranium-enrichment facility, without the GBU-57 Massive Ordnance Penetrator, the largest conventional weapon in the U.S. arsenal.

A strike against the nuclear infrastructure could also backfire in the long run. Iranian officials have threatened to develop nuclear weapons or withdraw from the nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty if the country’s nuclear facilities are attacked. (See ACT, June 2024.)

Biden, like his predecessors, has stated that he would use military force to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon. Although the country’s nuclear program is advancing, the U.S. intelligence community continues to assess that Iran is not pursuing nuclear weapons development. Following the Oct. 1 attack, CIA Director William Burns said that there is no evidence that Iran’s leadership has made the decision to develop nuclear weapons. Speaking at a conference on Oct. 7, Burns said the United States is “reasonably confident” that it would detect weaponization efforts early on.

November 2024
By Kelsey Davenport

North Korea suggested that the U.S. presidential election will not influence its approach to engagement with the United States and continued to blame Washington for escalating tensions on the Korean peninsula.

Speaking at the United Nations on Sept. 30, Song Kim, North Korea’s representative to the world body, said that “whoever takes office,” North Korea will deal only with “the state entity called the [United States].” He suggested that “the mere administration” does not affect the hostile U.S. policy toward North Korea and Pyongyang’s policy toward Washington.

Kim noted that North Korea can “choose either dialogue or confrontation” but should “go further” in preparing for conflict because of Washington’s aggression in the region.

Despite Kim’s suggestion that dialogue is an option, North Korea’s growing military ties with Russia, its focus on expanding aspects of its nuclear weapons program, and its rejection of unification with South Korea indicate that Pyongyang may not be interested in negotiating with the United States at this time.

Kim said the security situation on the Korean peninsula will be “intricately complicated through to the next generation” unless the United States and its unspecified “followers” change their “confrontation and aggressive nature.”

As North Korea continues to expand its nuclear weapons program, South Korea also is investing in new military systems.

At a parade commemorating Armed Forces Day on Oct. 1, South Korea displayed a new ballistic missile, the Hyunmoo-5, which is the most powerful ballistic missile in the country’s arsenal. It is designed to strike hardened targets with a large conventional warhead. South Korea has tested the system, but has not provided any details on the range and payload.

In addition to displaying the new missile system, President Yoon Suk Yeol heralded the establishment of South Korea’s new Strategic Command. In his Oct. 1 speech, Yoon described the creation of this command as “a key national task” and said it will protect South Korea from “North Korea's nuclear and weapons of mass destruction threats.”

South Korea began developing the new command in 2022 to centralize the country’s responses to North Korea’s nuclear weapons program. It will oversee South Korea’s three-axis defense system, which includes preemptive strikes to thwart North Korean nuclear or missile attacks, known as Kill Chain; multilayered missile and air defenses to intercept North Korean launches; and a counteroffensive strategy known as Korea Massive Punishment and Retaliation.

Yoon said the establishment of its Strategic Command “integrates our military’s advanced conventional capabilities” with U.S. extended deterrence.

The U.S. Strategic Command will coordinate with South Korea’s Strategic Command as part of Yoon’s April 2023 agreement with U.S. President Joe Biden to strengthen South Korea’s role in U.S. extended deterrence.

A U.S. B1-B bomber participated in the Oct. 1 parade, prompting criticism from North Korea.

In a statement ahead of the parade, the state-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) accused the United States of “chronic nuclear phobia” and trying to “permanently deploy strategic assets” on the Korean peninsula to put pressure on North Korea.

The B1-B bomber is no longer a nuclear-capable system, but a U.S. Ohio-class submarine, which carries nuclear-armed ballistic missiles, made a port call in South Korea in 2023. In July 2024, South Korea and the United States announced new deterrence guidelines, which Yoon’s government described as specifically assigning U.S. nuclear weapons missions on the Korean peninsula.

In the Oct. 1 speech, Yoon reiterated that if North Korea uses nuclear weapons, it will face a “resolute and overwhelming response from our military and the [South Korean]-U.S. alliance” that will be the “demise” of the regime in Pyongyang.

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un responded by saying that South Korea has “deliberately worsened” the regional security situation with the parade.

Kim, speaking at the country’s National Defense University on Oct. 8, said that North Korea has “no intention” of attacking South Korea and reiterated that North Korea is no longer interested in unification with South Korea.

The following week, North Korea destroyed sections of road and rail lines near the border with South Korea. KCNA described the decision as an “inevitable and legitimate measure” because South Korea is a “hostile state.” KCNA said that North Korea plans further actions to fortify the border with South Korea.

November 2024
By Shizuka Kuramitsu

Japan’s new prime minister, stirring controversy at the start of his tenure, proposed an Asian version of NATO that could include introducing nuclear weapons into the region to deter China, North Korea, and Russia.

Shortly before taking office on Oct. 1, Shigeru Ishiba wrote a commentary for the Washington-based Hudson Institute that took note of “the absence of a collective self-defense system like NATO in Asia” and suggested that the region is thus prone to war.

“The creation of an Asian version of NATO is essential to deter China by its Western allies,” Ishiba wrote. The issue was raised during the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) leadership race in September when several party leader candidates, including Ishiba, called for a debate on nuclear sharing and a review of Japan’s traditional three non-nuclear principles policy.

These principles are not to possess, manufacture, or allow the introduction of nuclear weapons onto Japanese soil. They were announced by Prime Minister Eisaku Sato in 1967 and have been government policy since then although they have not been enacted into law.

In his written commentary, Ishiba expressed concern that threats from China, North Korea, and Russia will make “the U.S. extended deterrence in the region […] no longer function.”

He said that an Asian version of NATO will supplement and “ensure deterrence against the nuclear alliance of China, Russia, and North Korea” and suggested that the “Asian version of NATO must also specifically consider America’s sharing of nuclear weapons or the introduction of nuclear weapons into the region.”

Ishiba’s proposals faced domestic and international skepticism including from national security experts and government officials. Speaking at a press conference on Oct. 15, Wu Qian, spokesperson for the Chinese Defense Ministry said, “we urge the Japanese side to stop forming exclusive military alliances and cliques, be very cautious with its words and deeds regarding military security, and do more for regional peace and stability.”

In Washington, Daniel Krintenbrink, U.S. assistant secretary of state for East Asia and the Pacific, dismissed the Asian NATO idea. “It’s too early to talk about collective security in that context, and [the creation of] more formal institutions,” he said on Sept. 17, according to Radio Free Asia.

Indian Foreign Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar, speaking in Washington on Oct. 1, also rejected Ishiba’s vision for an Asian NATO. Noting that Japan and the United States are allies, he said that “we don’t have that kind of strategic architecture in mind … as we have different ways of approaching to the world.”

Japan’s new foreign minister, Takeshi Iwaya, was cautious. “It is difficult to immediately establish such organization in Asia that would assume mutual defense obligations,” he said at a press conference on Oct. 2. “We should consider this as part of our vision for the future over the medium to long term. For the time being, we would like to carefully strengthen the various multilateral security cooperation programs that we have now.” 

Iwaya added that “the most ideal form of security cooperation in the future is the one that would not exclude any country in the region or Asia as a whole.”

Further, Tomiko Ichikawa, Japanese ambassador to the Conference on Disarmament, reaffirmed Oct. 21 at the UN General Assembly First Committee discussion that “Japan adheres to the three no nuclear principles” and “has no intention of revising the principles.”

On Oct. 7, Ishiba acknowledged that an Asian NATO would not happen overnight and said he has instructed his ruling party to set up a new committee to discuss it. This is expected to occur after the house of representatives election on Oct. 27. Ishiba’s LDP did not mention the Asian NATO proposal explicitly in its campaign pledge.

Meanwhile, Nihon Hidankyo, the Japanese atomic bomb survivors organization that won the Nobel Peace Prize on Oct. 11, spoke by telephone the next day with Ishiba. Terumi Tanaka, the group’s co-chair, later was asked at a press conference about Ishiba’s reference to nuclear sharing. Tanaka told reporters that “this is out of the question” and the fact that a political leader  says that a debate on the nuclear sharing issue is necessary “is an outrage itself.”

The following day, Ishiba signaled that his government will “seriously consider” participating as an observer at the next  meeting of states-parties to the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, which Japan has never attended.

November 2024
By Shizuka Kuramitsu

China conducted a rare test launch of an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) over the Pacific Ocean on Sept. 25, the country’s first launch in international waters since 1980.

In a statement, the Chinese Defense Ministry announced that its rocket force conducted the test “carrying a dummy warhead to the high seas in the Pacific Ocean.” It described the “launch as a routine arrangement in our annual training plan…in line with international law and international practice.”

Despite claims about a “routine” training exercise, the test was unusual. It was conducted publicly, with the Chinese military distributing photos via the state-run Xinhua News Agency, and was the first test in international waters in 44 years. Since 1980, China’s ICBM tests have taken place within Chinese territory, including roughly 135 ballistic missile tests in 2021, according to the U.S. Defense Department 2022 China Military Power report.

The Sept. 25 missile was launched from Hainan Island, and the reentry vehicle landed near French Polynesia’s exclusive economic zone, north of Tahiti, after traveling approximately 11,500 kilometers.

Several analysts said that the missile likely was a Dong Feng-31AG, one of China’s newest and most advanced ICBMs. The delivery range is expected to be 7,000 kilometers to 11,700 kilometers, with the ability to reach most of the continental United States, according to the Center for Strategic and International Studies Missile Defense Project.

Xinhua reported on Sept. 25 that “China notified the relevant countries in advance” of the launch. Pentagon spokesperson Sabrina Singh confirmed at a press briefing that same day that the United States “were given some advance notice.”

“We certainly welcome” this advance notice to the United States as it “is a good thing and that is moving in the right direction in terms of…getting that advanced notification and that further reduces the risks of any misperception and miscalculation,” Singh said.

In addition to the United States, China also gave advance notice to Australia, France, and New Zealand, according to various news reports on Sept. 25.

The United States has been pressing China to be more transparent about its nuclear program. (See ACT, June 2024.)

Hans Kristensen of the Federation of American Scientists posted on social media that to track the Chinese test, the United States “deployed an RC-135 Cobra Ball aircraft to collect optical and electronic data of the missile and warhead.”

Meanwhile, countries in the Pacific region including Australia, Fiji, and New Zealand voiced concerns about the launch. Moetai Brotherson, the president of French Polynesia, “expressed his…disappointment that Polynesia was not informed the missile was directed towards its waters,” Outremers 360 reported on Sept. 26. Kiribati made clear that it "does not welcome China's recent ICBM test," Reuters reported on Oct. 8.

Hui Zhang of the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at the Harvard Kennedy School, writing on the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists website on Oct. 16, speculated that the test may have been aimed at dissuading the United States from using nuclear weapons in a potential conflict across the Taiwan Strait.

He also suggested that the test showed that Beijing is increasingly confident of its capabilities and this may offer an opening for risk reduction talks with Washington.

Meanwhile, Reuters reported on Oct. 9 that six security analysts and four diplomats evaluating the launch said that “although the rare test carried political messaging amid China’s nuclear weapons buildup, it also met a long-overdue need for the [Chinese] Rocket Force to ensure its nuclear deterrent worked as advertised.”

Kristensen, in that report, said that the test “enabled the Chinese to carry out a test with a full attack profile. In operational terms, this is inevitably an important step.... [T]he test represents the operational validation of the entire system.”

Meanwhile, Timothy Wright, a missile researcher at the International Institute for Strategic Studies, told Reuters that the test gave the Chinese military a “great opportunity” to evaluate how well it could track long missile flights.

"China's network of satellites, ground stations and tracking ships is still evolving, and there are question marks over just how effective its space-based [intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance] capabilities are," Wright said.

This ICBM test was followed by a report in The Wall Street Journal on Sept. 26 that a new Chinese nuclear-powered submarine sank at a shipyard in Wuhan. Beijing has not issued an official statement regarding the submarine report.

November 2024
By Doniyor Mutalov

A Russian RS-28 Sarmat heavy intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) exploded in September at its test launch site, marking another setback for a missile that Russian authorities claim is already on active combat duty.

Unlike a previous test failure in February 2023, which was confirmed by U.S. officials, the latest mishap was visible to open-source analysts. Satellite images, taken Sept. 21 by Planet Labs and shared by analysts on social media and later corroborated by images published by Reuters from Maxar Technologies, demonstrated that a Sarmat test silo at the Plesetsk Cosmodrome was destroyed completely either during the missile test or after the test’s cancellation.

Military analysts quoted by Reuters said that it was not possible to identify the mode of failure.

This marked, at the very least, the second confirmed test failure for the Sarmat, and it cast doubt on the reliability of a critical component of Russia’s nuclear modernization program.

The Russian Defense Ministry did not acknowledge the incident and has made no announcements about Sarmat tests since April 2022, when the first and only successful test was conducted.

President Vladimir Putin unveiled the Sarmat ICBM as one of three next-generation missiles in his 2018 speech to the Russian Federal Assembly. Despite its poor testing record, Sarmat has been fast-tracked into the Russian strategic forces. Yuriy Borisov, the head of the state space corporation Roscosmos, told RIA Novosti on Sept. 1, 2023, that the Sarmat had been deployed for “combat duty.” A month later, Putin said at the Valdai International Discussion Club that only “administrative and bureaucratic procedures” needed to be completed before the missile moved to mass production.

In his February 2024 comments before the Federal Assembly, Putin said that the first “serially produced” Sarmat ICBMs had been delivered and promised to “show them to you on their combat alert duty in the areas of their deployment.”

The last heavy ICBM produced by the Soviet Union, the Voevoda R-36M2, was tested successfully 20 times before deployment, according to the website of the Russian Defense Ministry.

Heavy ICBMs were defined by the second round of U.S.-Soviet Strategic Arms Limitation Talks as ICBMs with a greater throw-weight or launch-weight than any light ICBM then in service. The 1979 agreement from those talks, which never entered into force, explicitly identified earlier versions of the R-36M missile as heavy ICBMs. The Sarmat could be armed with up to 10 multiple independently targetable reentry vehicles, according to the Federation of American Scientists.

Russian nuclear policy expert Nikolai Sokov told Reuters on Sept. 24 that Moscow will persist with the Sarmat program because the Russian military would like to preserve competition between the two rival Russian ICBM design plants.

November 2024
By Xiaodon Liang and Doniyor Mutalov

Russia likely will adopt a nuclear declaratory policy that reserves the right to use nuclear weapons “when the enemy, using conventional weapons, creates a critical threat to our sovereignty,” President Vladimir Putin announced.

In comments before the Russian Security Council on Sept. 25, Putin previewed changes to Russia’s Basic Principles of State Policy on Nuclear Deterrence. The changes are recommendations derived from a yearlong analysis by a cross-ministerial group of specialists, he said.

The new “critical threat” threshold is a departure from the policy adopted in June 2020 in the last revision of Russia’s public nuclear doctrine. The earlier version reserved the right to use nuclear weapons in response to weapons of mass destruction, including nuclear attack, or when a conventional attack means “the very existence of the state is in jeopardy.” (See ACT, July/August 2020.)

In comparison, the Biden administration’s 2022 Nuclear Posture Review adopted the declaratory policy that nuclear use would be reserved for “extreme circumstances to defend the vital interests of the United States or its allies and partners.”

In comments published on Oct. 29 by the Kremlin at the start of annual strategic nuclear forces exercises, Putin emphasized that “the use of nuclear weapons is an extreme, exceptional measure for ensuring state security.” Despite a modernization effort that seeks to “enhance all [strategic forces] components,” Russia does “not intend to be drawn in a new arms race,” he said.

The policy changes previewed on Sept. 25 include an expansion of the conditions under which Russia would transition to the use of nuclear weapons. The June 2020 version of Russia’s nuclear doctrine stated that one of the “conditions specifying” the possible use of nuclear weapons is the “arrival of reliable data on a launch of ballistic missiles.”

Putin announced that, in the future, this condition also would be met by indications of “a massive launch of air and space attack weapons and their crossing our state border,” whether these weapons are “strategic and tactical aircraft, cruise missiles, [unmanned aerial vehicles], [or] hypersonic [or] other aircraft.”

Putin’s Sept. 25 statement added that “aggression against Russia from any non-nuclear state but involving or supported by any nuclear state [would be treated] as their joint attack.” This closely mirrors the exception to Russia’s 1995 general negative security assurance issued to non-nuclear-weapon states.

That exception says that Russia will not use nuclear weapons against non-nuclear-weapon states-parties to the nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, except in the case of “invasion or any other attack carried out or sustained by such a non-nuclear-weapon state in association or alliance with a nuclear-weapon state.”

The “joint attack” language comes as the United States continues to weigh Ukraine’s request for permission to use U.S.-origin long-range missiles against Russian targets. (See ACT, October 2024.)

Additionally, Putin said in his statement that, “We reserve the right to use nuclear weapons in the event of aggression against Russia and Belarus as a member of the Union State.” In contrast, the 2020 doctrine makes references in several places to allies of Russia, but does not specify Belarus by name.

On Oct. 1, NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte described Putin’s announcement as “reckless and irresponsible,” but cautioned against overreaction to the rhetoric. “He wants us also to discuss his nuclear arsenal, and I think we shouldn't,” Rutte said at a press conference.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken referred to Putin’s announced changes to Russia’s doctrine as “totally irresponsible” in a Sept. 26 interview with MSNBC. He predicted that the doctrinal change would “play very badly around the world.”

Thirteen countries self-identified as members of the Global South issued a Sept. 27 joint communique calling for states to refrain “from the use or the threat of weapons of mass destruction, particularly nuclear weapons and chemical and biological weapons.”

The communique, which was supported by China, also called for a settlement of the war in Ukraine.

November 2024
By Shizuka Kuramitsu

Twelve countries launched a cross-regional group called Friends of a Fissile Material Cut-off Treaty on Sept. 23 with the aim of expanding support for negotiating a treaty banning the production of fissile materials for nuclear weapons.

The group, also known as FMCT Friends, consists of Australia, Brazil, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, Nigeria, the Philippines, the United Kingdom, and the United States. It kicked off the initiative with a high-level meeting on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly in New York.

In a joint statement, members committed to “work closely together to realize the common objectives of the group, which are to maintain and enhance political attention to [a fissile material cutoff treaty] FMCT as a priority action to forestall a recurrence of a nuclear arms race, and to contribute to expanding the support for the immediate commencement of negotiations…amid the heightened risk of destabilization.”

Further, the group underscored its expectation that the Conference on Disarmament (CD) in Geneva should consider negotiations on the proposed treaty “as a matter of priority in its work,” the statement said.

During the launch event, former Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida expressed concern that “we are on the brink of a possible reversal of the downward trend in the number of nuclear weapons since the Cold War” and emphasized the importance of an FMCT as a framework to maintain the downward trend “by limiting the quantitative increase in nuclear weapons.”

Kishida said that “[n]ow is the time for strong political will to begin negotiations that materialize” the expert-level discussions that have been underway since U.S. President Bill Clinton proposed the FMCT concept 30 years ago.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said that the proposed treaty “is the next step on the path to nuclear disarmament.” Although such a treaty “cannot address every nuclear risk…it would limit the unconstrained expansion of nuclear arsenals as well as reduce the nuclear risks they’re bringing,” he said.

The Japanese Foreign Ministry said that the FMCT Friends initiative would involve the participation of nuclear- and non-nuclear-weapon states. “There was a unanimous support among the participating countries on the commencement of FMCT negotiations and [the] importance of transparency measures and a fissile materials production moratorium” until a treaty enters formally into force, said a Japanese Foreign Ministry official to Arms Control Today.

“We hope to boost political momentum in those areas at the [CD] and are willing to gain a wider support to our initiative,” the official said.

By raising an issue that existing stockpiles of fissile materials should not be constrained under a treaty, Pakistan has blocked the start of FMCT negotiations in the CD, a 65-member body that operates by consensus, since May 2009. (See ACT, April 2010.)

Plans to establish the FMCT Friends group was announced by Japanese Foreign Minister Yoko Kamikawa when Tokyo chaired a high-level UN Security Council meeting on nuclear disarmament and nonproliferation in March. (See ACT, April 2024.)

November 2024
By Xiaodon Liang

A U.S. District Court judge ruled on Sept. 30 that the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) violated the National Environmental Policy Act by failing to conduct a proper analysis of alternatives that takes into consideration environmental impacts after significantly modifying plans for plutonium pit production in 2018.

The civil suit against the NNSA was brought in South Carolina by nuclear safety advocates in cooperation with a group representing the Gullah-Geechee slave-descendant community of the coasts of the Carolinas, Georgia, and Florida. Following the decision, the court has instructed the two sides to consult and jointly recommend an appropriate remedy.

U.S. District Judge Mary Geiger Lewis dismissed four of the plaintiffs’ claims for lack of standing. But, in assessing the remaining claim, Lewis agreed with the plaintiffs that the NNSA “failed to conduct a proper study on the combined effects of their two-site strategy,” according to her written opinion.

In May 2018, the NNSA announced that it would adopt a plan to produce 30 plutonium pits per year at Los Alamos National Laboratory and 50 pits per year at a new facility at Savannah River, South Carolina, now known as the Savannah River Plutonium Processing Facility.

The plaintiffs criticized the NNSA’s decision to continue relying on a 2008 comprehensive study of environmental impacts at the Los Alamos site, prepared at a time when the NNSA was considering alternatives for consolidating pit production at one location.

The defendants, named in the suit as the NNSA, Administrator Jill Hruby, and Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm, argued that two separate supplemental environmental impact studies for pit production at Savannah River and Los Alamos finalized in 2020 brought the agency in compliance with the environmental act.

But Lewis found this approach insufficient for studying combined environmental effects. As the plaintiffs pointed out in their initial claim, the 2020 studies only examined alternative production options at each site without comparing siting alternatives.

In a statement to Arms Control Today, an NNSA spokesperson said that the agency has “reviewed the Court’s ruling and [is] supporting the Department of Justice as it prepares to meet and confer with the plaintiffs, as ordered. At this point in the judicial process, work on the program continues.”

Jay Coghlan, the executive director of Nuclear Watch New Mexico, a plaintiff in the suit, said in an email to Arms Control Today that nuclear safety organizations first wrote to the NNSA expressing concerns about compliance with the environmental act in October 2018.

The NNSA “never deigned to respond to us. They have had more than ample time since then to comply with the law,” Coghlan added.

The other plaintiffs in the suit are Savannah River Site Watch, Tri-Valley Communities Against a Radioactive Environment, the Gullah/Geechee Sea Island Coalition, and Tom Clements.

The four claims dismissed for lack of standing noted some of the particular environmental concerns that the plaintiffs believe remain unaddressed in the absence of a comprehensive environmental study of the two-site plan. These concerns are the ability of the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico to accommodate radioactive pit-production by-products and the health risks posed by storage of radioactive waste at pit production sites raised in a 2020 Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board report.

According to the NNSA fiscal 2025 budget request, the total cost of construction at the Savannah River facility may now be $18-25 billion. In the September 2024 edition of the NNSA Stockpile Stewardship and Management Plan, the agency said the facility is likely to begin operations at some point between fiscal years 2033 and 2035.

The September report also indicated that the NNSA foresees spending around $735 billion on nuclear weapons activities over the next 25 years, counted in future-year dollars. This is an increase from a projection of roughly $655 billion last year.

Some of the increase is attributable to the inclusion in the 25-year projection of a notional future weapons program, the Submarine Launched Warhead, which the agency believes will cost between $52.4 billion and $65 billion and enter production in the 2040s. This warhead would succeed the W76-1 and W76-2 warheads, which currently are deployed on U.S. submarine-launched ballistic missiles (SLBMs).

The other deployed SLBM warhead, the W88, already has a successor, known as the Future Strategic Sea-Based Warhead, which is projected for entry into service in the 2040s. These two notional warheads would supplement the W93 warhead, which is now in the requirements-setting and design phase, for deployment on ballistic missile submarines.

In an Oct. 1 statement, the NNSA announced that Los Alamos has produced the first plutonium pit for the W87-1 intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) warhead program. It will replace the W78 ICBM warhead and be deployed on the Air Force’s costly new Sentinel ICBM, initially alongside the older W87-0. (See ACT, September 2024.)

The statement said that the pit was the first to be “diamond-stamped,” indicating compliance with production standards, but the laboratory also produced nine “developmental” pits in fiscal 2023, according to the September stewardship report, and six the year prior.

The W87-1 warhead modification program is expected to cost $15.9 billion

November 2024

International monitors have determined that Iran experienced two earthquakes on Oct. 5 and did not test a nuclear weapon.

Online suspicions about possible testing were sparked when one of the earthquakes struck a region centered in Aradan, about 100 kilometers from Tehran, and emanated from a depth of 10 kilometers.

Amid heightened tensions between Iran and Israel, there already had been speculation that Israel might strike Iranian nuclear facilities in response to an Iranian missile attack against Israel on Oct. 1. A nuclear test could be an additional provocation for Israel to attack Iran.

On Oct. 7, the Preparatory Commission for the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization (CTBTO), which monitors nuclear tests and other activity internationally through hydroacoustic, radionuclide, seismic, and infrasound detection technology, released data and analysis confirming that recorded waveforms from the earthquakes are consistent with previous earthquakes in the northern region of Iran. Tehran also dismissed the nuclear testing rumor.

“Data gathered by more than 25 stations in our global monitoring network, known as the International Monitoring System…was analyzed by our team in Vienna. The analysis indicated that the two events were consistent with previous earthquakes in this area in Iran,” said CTBTO Executive Secretary Robert Floyd, according to the organization’s website.

When completed, the CTBTO monitoring system will consist of 321 monitoring stations and 16 laboratories hosted by 89 countries around the globe. About 90 percent of these facilities are already operational, providing a steady flow of real-time data. The work of the CTBTO highlights the stabilizing role that can be played by scientific and technical experts in times of high political tensions.—SHIZUKA KURAMITSU 

November 2024

A battery of U.S. ground-launched missiles first deployed in the Philippines in April to participate in a military exercise will remain there indefinitely, U.S. and Philippine officials said.

The commander of U.S. Army Pacific, Gen. Charles Flynn, said in an interview with Defense News on Oct. 14 that the battery will remain in the Philippines “for the time being.” Flynn’s remark confirms prior statements made Sept. 25 by anonymous Philippine officials to the Associated Press that the battery may remain until next April, when the United States and the Philippines are scheduled to conduct annual joint military exercises.

The medium-range missile battery is equipped to launch Tomahawk land-attack cruise missiles, with an estimated range of more than 1,600 kilometers, and the multipurpose Standard Missile-6. The ground-launched variant of the Tomahawk would have violated the now-defunct 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty. (See ACT, May 2024.)

In the interview, Flynn said the Philippines had requested the continued presence of the missile battery. The state-run Philippine News Agency reported on Sept. 26 that Gen. Romeo Brawner Jr., chief of staff of the Armed Forces of the Philippines, wanted the missile battery to stay “forever” and that the military is interested in purchasing its own medium-range missile battery and other similar missile systems. The Philippine military took delivery of the Indian BrahMos ground-launched anti-ship cruise missile in April. That missile has an estimated range of up to 900 kilometers.

The decision comes after a summer of tense confrontations between Philippine and Chinese naval forces in the South China Sea, where the two countries have overlapping maritime and territorial claims. A Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson said on Oct. 11 that China “firmly opposes” the deployment of the missile system in the Asia-Pacific region.—XIAODON LIANG