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"I find hope in the work of long-established groups such as the Arms Control Association...[and] I find hope in younger anti-nuclear activists and the movement around the world to formally ban the bomb."

– Vincent Intondi
Author, "African Americans Against the Bomb: Nuclear Weapons, Colonialism, and the Black Freedom Movement"
July 1, 2020
July/August 2009
Edition Date: 
Thursday, July 2, 2009
Cover Image: 

The National Missile Defense Act of 1999

Greg Thielmann

The National Missile Defense Act of 1999 was described by its chief sponsor, Sen. Thad Cochran (R-Miss.), as "the necessary first step to protecting the United States from long-range ballistic missile attack."[1] Indeed, the act constituted an important milestone on the road to U.S. withdrawal from the Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty in 2002, a step that the sponsors of the act advocated. Although the act itself neither authorized any programs nor appropriated any funds, it was misrepresented then and has been misrepresented since as proof of strong congressional support for the urgent and unqualified pursuit of strategic missile defenses.

The National Missile Defense Act gave the United States a clearly stated policy goal: to "deploy as soon as is technologically possible an effective National Missile Defense system capable of defending the territory of the United States against limited ballistic missile attack (whether accidental, unauthorized, or deliberate)...." These simple words essentially became executive branch policy following the election of 2000. They were adopted as a charter for the Missile Defense Agency, appearing prominently today on the home page of the agency's Web site. Although the meaning of "effective" has been subject to debate and the elections of 2006 and 2008 have affected the implementation of that policy, the act represents an enduring symbol of the potent backing strategic missile defense has received from Congress during the last 10 years.

Ironically, the threat assessments on which the act was based have proven unrealistic with regard to Iran, Iraq, and North Korea. None of these countries and no other proliferant states have deployed long-range ballistic missiles in the decade following the act.

The sponsors of the act also identified growing Chinese missile deployments as a source of concern, "perhaps [the] most troubling"[2] in the words of Sen. Jesse Helms (R-N.C.), the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Yet, the U.S. strategic ballistic missile defenses deployed after passage of the act were never intended to defend against a deliberate Chinese attack.

Those missile defense deployments were also not directed at a deliberate Russian attack, although the act prepared the way for the U.S. decision in 2001 to withdraw from the ABM Treaty, which had been a keystone in the management of the U.S.-Russian strategic relationship. The Russians abandoned START II on the day after U.S. withdrawal from the ABM Treaty. In ratifying START II, the Russian Duma had conditioned its approval on continuing U.S. adherence to the ABM Treaty.

The Russian abandonment of START II, which the United States had never ratified, removed any chance of reducing Russian strategic offensive forces under the stabilizing terms of that treaty. Although Russian missile and warhead numbers continued to decline even without START II, the Russians were able to retain "heavy ICBMs" and other land-based ballistic missiles with multiple, independently targetable re-entry vehicles.

In short, China and Russia have increased the quality and, in the case of China, the quantity, of their strategic ballistic missile forces in response to U.S. missile defense programs. However, there is no evidence that the U.S. programs have dissuaded the states of proliferation concern from developing or deploying ballistic missiles.

Cold War Origins

The United States and the Soviet Union deployed limited numbers of strategic missile defense interceptors and radars in the middle years of the Cold War. These defenses were designed to cope with the intercontinental-range (greater than 5,500 kilometers) and intermediate-range (3,000-5,500 kilometers) ballistic missiles, with which the two sides could threaten each other's homeland. The U.S.S.R. went first, deploying nearly 100 nuclear-armed ABM interceptors around Moscow in the 1960s. The United States began deploying a comparable number of nuclear-armed ABM interceptors at Grand Forks, North Dakota, in 1974. The 1972 ABM Treaty had banned the United States and U.S.S.R. from developing nationwide defenses as well as systems or components for sea-based, air-based, space-based, or mobile land-based ABM deployments. The treaty permitted each side to build ABM systems at two fixed locations for defense of each national capital area and a land-based missile base, with up to 100 interceptors at each site. A 1974 protocol to the treaty reduced that allowance, limiting each side to only one site. The Soviets opted to maintain their system around Moscow while the United States elected to protect a missile field in North Dakota, until Congress cut off funding in 1975. A 1997 agreement on confidence-building measures, negotiated in the ABM Treaty's Special Consultative Commission, precisely demarcated strategic missile defense interceptors from those that were designed to intercept tactical and theater ballistic missiles. The latter systems were deemed incapable of overcoming the technical challenge of coping with the much faster re-entry of ICBM and sea-launched ballistic missile warheads.

Although the Soviets sought to be able to defend their capital and national leadership against the new U.S. missile threat that emerged in the 1960s, they never succeeded. U.S. warheads and the options for countermeasures were too numerous and the radars on which the Moscow system relied too vulnerable. Yet, bureaucratic inertia, vested interests, and the psychological desire to have some defense, however inadequate, have allowed vestiges of the Soviet/Russian system to survive even to the present day.

The United States was susceptible to the no-less-potent illusion that it could use technology to replace the defensive shield two oceans had historically provided for keeping enemies at bay. Nurtured by an almost unlimited faith in technological solutions and feeling the same natural reluctance as the Soviets to accept vulnerability, Washington plowed ahead until the inevitable logic of cost effectiveness caught up with strategic defenses in the mid-1970s when the Safeguard ABM system was canceled and dismantled. Although a new vision of a defensive umbrella that would render nuclear weapons "impotent and obsolete" was articulated by President Ronald Reagan in 1983, the Strategic Defense Initiative he launched two years later eventually fell victim to the "cost effectiveness at the margin" criterion advocated by his own special adviser, Paul Nitze. Strategic missile defense planning changed direction successively under Presidents George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton, but research and development funding remained robust throughout both presidencies, and neither administration made any decision to deploy strategic defenses.

Three events were key in creating the political environment for passage of the National Missile Defense Act. First was the 1994 U.S. congressional elections, which gave the Republicans a majority in the House and Senate. The new speaker of the House, Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.), included "a renewed commitment to a National Missile Defense" in his "Contract With America."[3] Republicans in both houses consistently and relentlessly pursued this goal as part of the GOP's political agenda, culminating in passage of the 1999 act.

Report Spurs Action

The second and most important substantive development was the July 1998 release of the Report of the Commission to Assess the Ballistic Missile Threat to the United States, chaired by Donald Rumsfeld, who had been President Gerald Ford's secretary of defense. The report's executive summary warned that North Korea and Iran would be able to inflict major destruction on the United States within about five years of a decision to acquire such a capability and that both placed "a high priority on threatening U.S. territory" and were even then "pursuing advanced ballistic missile capabilities to pose a direct threat to U.S. territory."[4] The report claimed that any other nation with a well-developed, Scud-based ballistic missile infrastructure could be within five years of an ICBM capability. Finally, the report warned that the United States "might have little or no warning before operational deployment" of these systems.[5]

The dire warnings of the Rumsfeld Commission were subject to considerable criticism and controversy among experts. Senate Democrats were still confident going into the August recess that year that they could sustain efforts by the Clinton administration to avoid congressional passage of an unqualified endorsement of strategic missile defense in reaction to the report. The public, however, which had already been spooked by Rumsfeld's depiction of a potential near-term threat from "rogue state" ballistic missiles, was about to receive a further jolt. North Korea surprised the world with its August 31, 1998, attempt to place a satellite in space using a three-stage Taepo Dong-1 rocket. Although the attempt was unsuccessful, no missile re-entry vehicle was tested, and the system's throw weight was inadequate to deliver a nuclear-sized payload to the United States, the political impact of the event was enormous. Proponents of strategic missile defenses skillfully used the North Korean launch as vindication of the Rumsfeld Commission's warnings and accompanying allegations that previous U.S. intelligence assessments had been overly sanguine.

Most Democratic senators became unwilling to stand behind White House threats to veto the strategic missile defense resolution being pushed by the Republican majority. The alternative strategy the Democrats chose was to make the issue go away by adding language to make the bill uncontroversial. Amendments to the policy bill provided reminders that any national missile defense program funding would have to be subject to annual authorization and appropriation measures and that it was still U.S. policy to seek negotiated reductions in Russian strategic forces. Clinton stressed that the amendments made clear that no deployment decision had been made, but the simple language of the bill implied strongly that Congress recognized U.S. technological obstacles as the only acceptable justification for delay. The Senate bill passed 97-3 on March 17, 1999. The House bill passed the next day, 317-105.

Clinton announced in 2000 that strategic missile defenses, then under the rubric of the National Missile Defense program, were sufficiently promising and affordable to justify continued development and testing but that there was not sufficient information about the technical and operational effectiveness of the entire system to move forward with deployment. He noted that critical elements, such as the booster rocket for the interceptor, had not been tested and that there were questions about the system's ability to deal with countermeasures.[6]

At the outset of the Bush administration in 2001, the programmatic course of strategic ballistic missile defense and the future of the ABM Treaty were still up in the air. That summer, a bipartisan majority of the Senate Armed Services Committee even voted to reduce missile defense funding.

The September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon created an entirely different atmosphere for continuing the debate. In the fearful wake of those attacks, President George W. Bush was successful in supercharging strategic missile defense procurement and deployment. In spite of virtually unanimous international opposition, he announced U.S. withdrawal from the ABM Treaty in late 2001 and a commitment to deploy strategic defense interceptors by 2004. The U.S.-based deployments and their "operational" designation were accomplished only after Rumsfeld, whom Bush had appointed secretary of defense, suspended traditional acquisition rules and operational testing criteria, introducing an unconventional and controversial "spiral" development process. By the end of two terms, the Bush administration was able to deploy a set of 20 ground-based missile defense (GMD) interceptors at sites in Alaska and California and to plan for deploying another 24 there and 10 more in Poland.

The ABM Treaty constituted a tacit acknowledgment by both sides that unlimited strategic defenses constituted a threat to the stability of the balance in offensive forces. Each side further demonstrated by its subsequent actions, albeit at different times, that offenses and defenses were inextricably connected. In 1988 the United States demanded that the Soviet Union dismantle the large phased-array radar Moscow was constructing at Krasnoyarsk before Washington would agree to any new offensive arms control limits.[7]

In response to U.S. withdrawal from the ABM Treaty on June 13, 2002, Russia announced one day later that it would no longer consider itself bound by START II, consistent with the Duma's ratification terms in 2000, which were contingent on continuation of the ABM Treaty. Thus, not for the first or last time, U.S. determination to escape from strategic missile defense strictures led to the loss of an opportunity to secure lower limits and stabilizing measures in strategic offensive forces.

In 2004 the Bush administration began talks with eastern European states to explore the potential use of their territory for deployment of U.S. GMD interceptors and a sophisticated midcourse X-band radar. By the end of his administration, Bush had secured agreements with the Czech Republic for hosting the radar and Poland for hosting the missile interceptors, but the agreements remain to be ratified by the host governments. Meanwhile, on the U.S. side, the pendulum again seems to be swinging away from the urgent priority assigned to strategic missile defense by the Bush administration. President Barack Obama said in his April 5, 2009, Prague speech that he would only go forward with a missile defense system in Europe that was "cost effective and proven." His revised request for the Missile Defense Agency in the fiscal year 2010 budget was $7.8 billion, a $1.2 billion funding cut in missile defense.[8]

Conclusion

In this tenth anniversary year of the National Missile Defense Act, it is worth noting that the North Korean ICBM seen as imminent when the act was passed has still not been successfully flight-tested. Deployment is down the road, "probably another three to five years minimum," according to Gen. James Cartwright, vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. [9] Helms worried during the 1999 debate over the act that "Iran may very well be able to deploy an ICBM before America has a missile defense to counter it, even if the United States breaks ground on construction tomorrow morning."[10] In fact, neither Iran nor any of the other emerging ballistic missile states the Rumsfeld Commission said could have ICBMs by 2003 has them today.

The sponsors of the National Missile Defense Act were correct in predicting that the pursuit of strategic missile defenses outside the ABM Treaty would not necessarily forestall additional reductions in the number of Russian strategic missiles given the state of Russia's economy after the dissolution of the Soviet Union. That pursuit did, however, derail START II, the next step of negotiated reductions in U.S. and Russian strategic forces. In order to satisfy the requirements of START II, Moscow would have had to deploy only single-warhead ICBMs, leading to a force structure with greater crisis stability and possibly with fewer overall warheads than it currently has. U.S. strategic missile defense deployments also provided additional incentives for the modernization of Chinese strategic forces that so troubled Helms at the time the act was debated. Using formulas familiar to U.S. and Russian strategic planners countering strategic defenses in the past, the Chinese have increased the mobility and number of their deterrent forces while improving the survivability of their re-entry vehicles.

Actual threat history aside, the National Missile Defense Act became an important argument in the continuing policy debate over the direction and pace of the strategic missile defense program. After 1999, whenever skeptics of missile defense raised programmatic issues, the act was cited as proof that an overwhelming and bipartisan majority in Congress had already established a policy of rapid deployment, relegating other issues to a subordinate position. The act prodded the executive branch to move forward with little consideration of the full repercussions. Following the superficial logic of the act, the United States discarded the ABM Treaty even though most of the U.S. missile defense activities that have taken place between then and now could have been accommodated under the broad conceptual framework of the treaty. Moreover, the United States rushed to deploy defenses against the rogue-state ICBM missile threat before that threat materialized and before U.S. defensive systems had been adequately tested. These actions cost the United States dearly in terms of treasure spent and opportunities lost to reduce the threat from its potential adversaries with the most lethal capabilities, against which U.S. strategic forces are still principally directed.


Greg Thielmann is a senior fellow at the Arms Control Association, where he directs the Realistic Threat Assessments and Responses Project. He previously served as a senior professional staffer on the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence and was a U.S. Foreign Service Officer for 25 years.


ENDNOTES

1. "Senate Backs Missile Defense System," CNN.com, March 17, 1999, www.cnn.com/ALLPOLITICS/stories/1999/03/17/missile.defense/.

2. Congressional Record, March 15, 1999, p. S2632.

3. Republican Contract with America, http://www.house.gov/house/Contract/CONTRACT.html.

4. Greg Thielmann, "Rumsfeld Reprise? The Missile Report That Foretold the Iraq Intelligence Controversy," Arms Control Today, July/August 2003, p. 3.

5. Ibid.

6. Office of the Press Secretary, The White House, "White House Fact Sheet on National Missile Defense," September 1, 2000.

7. Paul Lewis, "U.S. Ties Arms Deal to a Soviet Radar," New York Times, September 1, 1988, http://www.nytimes.com/1988/09/01/world/us-ties-arms-deal-to-a-soviet-radar.html.

8."David Morgan, "Pentagon Seeks $1.2 Billion Cut for Missile Defense," Reuters, May 7, 2009, http://www.reuters.com/article/politicsNews/idUSTRE5465CJ20090507.

9. Gen. James Cartwright, Testimony before the Senate Armed Services Committee, June 16, 2009.

10. Congressional Record, March 15, 1999, p. S2632.

 

The National Missile Defense Act of 1999 was described by its chief sponsor, Sen. Thad Cochran (R-Miss.), as "the necessary first step to protecting the United States from long-range ballistic missile attack."[1] Indeed, the act constituted an important milestone on the road to U.S. withdrawal from the Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty in 2002, a step that the sponsors of the act advocated. Although the act itself neither authorized any programs nor appropriated any funds, it was misrepresented then and has been misrepresented since as proof of strong congressional support for the urgent and unqualified pursuit of strategic missile defenses. (Continue)

Ending North Korea’s Nuclear Ambitions: The Need for Stronger Chinese Action

Hui Zhang

North Korea has recently taken a series of provocative steps to challenge the international community. These steps include test-launching a long-range rocket, walking away from the six-party talks and all disarmament agreements, kicking out international inspectors from its nuclear facilities, conducting an underground nuclear test May 25-a more powerful blast than the one conducted in 2006-testing a half-dozen short-range missiles, and announcing it had resumed plutonium production and started a program to enrich uranium. Pyongyang reportedly also is preparing a long-range missile test and a third nuclear test. If unchecked, North Korea will surely increase the quantity and quality of its arsenal. Even worse, once Pyongyang has more than enough weapons for its deterrent, it might be tempted to sell the surplus. The longer the crisis lasts, the more nuclear capable North Korea will become and the more difficult it will be to roll back Pyongyang's nuclear ambitions.

China, North Korea's most important ally and trade partner, has joined the rest of the international community in responding to the North Korean actions. Beijing has indicated, however, that it wants a balanced approach and does not want to push Pyongyang much harder. Nevertheless, China can and should do more to press its neighbor. North Korea's recent series of actions threatens China's national interests as well as those of the United States and countries in Northeast Asia.

It is important to have realistic expectations for changes in China's approach. Beijing can be expected to support modest UN sanctions against North Korea, as it did in response to the first nuclear test, but it probably will respond less strongly than the United States, Japan, and South Korea would hope. Beijing probably will maintain that any harsh measures should be directed toward facilitating talks over denuclearization but should not destabilize the North Korean regime.

On the other hand, Beijing must recognize that its modest approach, as the past several years have demonstrated, has not successfully constrained Pyongyang's nuclear development. Pyongyang proceeded with its two nuclear tests and has again boycotted the six-party talks. The May test has exacerbated the tense situation on the Korean peninsula and has destroyed regional stability. These results do not serve Beijing's major interest: a nuclear-free and stable Korean peninsula. If Beijing continues to allow Pyongyang's nuclear ambitions to go unchecked, Pyongyang will put Beijing in an embarrassing position, open it to more international pressure, and ultimately pose great risks to China's national interests.

China's Interests

Hours after North Korea's most recent nuclear test, the Chinese Foreign Ministry issued a statement strongly denouncing it:

On 25 May 2009, the DPRK [Democratic People's Republic of Korea] conducted another nuclear test in disregard for the common opposition of the international community. The Chinese Government is firmly opposed to this act.... To bring about denuclearization of the Korean peninsula, oppose nuclear proliferation and safeguard peace and stability in Northeast Asia is the firm and consistent stand of the Chinese Government. China strongly urges the DPRK to honor its commitment to denuclearization, stop relevant moves that may further worsen the situation and return to the Six-Party Talks.[1]

Beijing issued a similar statement in response to Pyongyang's first nuclear test in 2006, condemning the blast as brazen. China's response this time was even stronger. According to media reports, Beijing was informed by Pyongyang less than half an hour in advance of the explosion and was greatly angered and offended by the test because it blatantly disregarded China's calls for denuclearization. Even cautious high-level Chinese officials, including Vice President Xi Jinping and Minister of National Defense Liang Guanglie, have made harsh statements in opposition to Pyongyang's nuclear test. Moreover, Beijing has reportedly canceled some previously scheduled high-level visits to Pyongyang.

China's strategic plan through 2020 is focused on economic development and "building a well-off society in an all-round way,"[2] which requires a stable international environment, particularly among neighboring countries. A nuclear North Korea would stimulate a regional nuclear arms race and undermine regional stability. North Korea's nuclear and missile development provides a pretext for Japan to accelerate deployment of a joint U.S.-Japanese missile defense shield, which could mitigate China's nuclear deterrent. Moreover, a worsening crisis would generate a massive flow of North Korean refugees headed for China.

To bolster its image as a responsible stakeholder in the international community, China should show its willingness to contribute to international nonproliferation efforts. Accepting a nuclear North Korea would set a bad precedent both for the nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) regime-from which North Korea has withdrawn-and other countries with nuclear ambitions.

North Korea has long been a thorn in China's side. Pyongyang played a game of brinkmanship between Beijing and Moscow for several decades during the Cold War. Further nuclear and missile development would add a dangerous new element, allowing North Korea's strategic nuclear-strike capability to cover all of China. Thus, China, in the long term if not the near term, faces huge risks from a nuclear North Korea.

Beijing's Leverage

Among the interested players in the North Korean nuclear issue, China has the most significant economic and political leverage over the North Korean regime. China has been a close ally of North Korea over the past 50 years, with a friendship cemented in blood during the Korean War. Also, China is North Korea's largest trading partner, reportedly supplying North Korea with up to 90 percent of its oil imports and about 45 percent of its subsistence-level food supplies. Moreover, cross-border trade in 2008 was reportedly about $2.7 billion, an increase of about 40 percent from 2007.[3]

Since April 2003, China has hosted one trilateral negotiation and six rounds of the six-party talks. During these negotiations, China has acted not only as a host, but also as a mediator and constructive participant. China's major role in negotiations, as former Vice Foreign Minister Wang Yi, the head of the Chinese delegation to the first three rounds of the six-party talks, emphasized, "is contributing to peace and talks" (quan he cu tan).[4] China, according to official statements, hopes the parties to the talks will take actions to build trust, reduce suspicions, enhance consensus, and promote cooperation in order to create a win-win situation.[5]

In particular, China's role became even more proactive in the fourth round of the talks, leading to the breakthrough agreement on a joint statement of principles. During the fourth round, China not only tabled five drafts of the joint statement but also took a "reject/accept" approach to push the United States to accept the joint statement. Beijing also reportedly has lured Pyongyang to each round of the six-party talks with tens of millions of dollars in incentives. U.S. officials have praised China's active role in the talks, saying it has helped U.S.-Chinese relations.

Although Beijing is shifting from its traditional low-profile role in the affairs of the Korean peninsula toward a more active and constructive role in defusing the nuclear crisis, Beijing's leverage on Pyongyang is constrained by two main factors. First, Beijing believes the nuclear crisis is mainly the business of Washington and Pyongyang and, as such, is dependent on the political will of those two players. Second, to maintain regional stability, Beijing's bottom line is that war on the Korean peninsula and an abrupt collapse of the Kim Jong Il regime must be avoided at all costs. Beijing has called on "all parties concerned to respond in a cool-headed and appropriate manner and persist in seeking a peaceful solution through consultation and dialogue."[6]

Yet, Beijing's relatively passive, noninterventionist diplomacy has not helped with its top priority: regional stability, to which the continuing North Korean nuclear crisis poses a huge threat.

More Pressure Needed

Because Beijing has the most leverage on Pyongyang, Beijing is facing great pressure from the international community, particularly Washington and Tokyo. Some Western officials and scholars complain that Beijing's cautious approach to Pyongyang has not constrained North Korea's nuclear development. North Korea has proceeded with its nuclear tests and, since April 14, has boycotted the six-party talks hosted by Beijing since 2003. These actions have called into question Chinese leadership in the region.

Beijing is also facing great pressure on the domestic front. The nuclear test has prompted a strong reaction from the Chinese public. More and more Chinese citizens are angered by North Korea's repeated escalation of the crisis and its imperviousness to Beijing's demands for denuclearization. They believe that North Korea is doing great damage to the peace of Northeast Asia, and many worry that Beijing could be dragged into another Korean war by Pyongyang's rash actions.

According to some recent surveys in China, more than two-thirds of respondents believe Beijing should take stronger actions to constrain Pyongyang's nuclear ambitions, including cutting economic aid and applying UN sanctions. They consider North Korea a liability that, if unchecked, will create trouble for China's economic and security interests. Many Chinese believe that the concepts of North Korea as a buffer zone and the "lips to China's teeth" are no longer relevant or salient. Beyond concerns about a nuclear North Korea's impact on the stability of China's security environment, they also worry that a nuclear North Korea would pose a huge environmental threat to China's northeastern provinces. Much of the Chinese public fears that an accident from a nuclear test or weapon would cause heavy radioactive contamination in that region.

Recently, the Chinese media have begun to criticize Pyongyang openly for its nuclear program. For instance, Global Times, published by the government-run People's Daily newspaper, ran a June 3 editorial entitled "North Korea Should Not Offend the Chinese People." The editorial said, "The Chinese people's impression of North Korea is at the lowest level in history.... North Korea should understand that offending the Chinese people is shaking and destroying the foundation of the bilateral relationship. The changing attitude of the Chinese people toward North Korea will surely affect the government's policy toward North Korea."[7]

A majority of the public and many experts in China have called on Beijing to adjust its policy on North Korea. Although it may be difficult for Beijing to disregard this appeal, it can be expected that Beijing's position toward Pyongyang will not change significantly in the near future. If Beijing were to make any changes, it would take cautious and gradual steps. Beijing may wish to retain close ties to Pyongyang in order to gain more leverage over it. Also, although Beijing would be willing to strengthen its relationship with other parties in negotiations over the nuclear issue, it is not willing to take sides between Pyongyang and Washington.

China supports new, tightened UN sanctions on North Korea for its nuclear test, but it has had to figure out its own appropriate response to Pyongyang. Whether it acts through the United Nations or on its own, Beijing has to strike a balance between being tough enough to teach Pyongyang a lesson and not pushing Pyongyang toward an extreme reaction or even regime collapse. At the same time, Beijing must also meet the demands of Washington, Tokyo, and Seoul in pushing toward a denuclearized and stable peninsula. This overall effort would be a big challenge to China's diplomatic acuity and wisdom.

South Korea and Japan have affirmed that they would not tolerate a nuclear North Korea. Thus, a similar affirmation by China would push North Korea to think twice before continuing its nuclear program. China should deliver a clear message to Pyongyang: nuclear weapons are not in North Korea's long-term national security interest. Nuclear weapons will generate increasing international pressure and economic sanctions that will further devastate the already poor North Korean economy.

Beijing's control of energy aid to Pyongyang could be crucial in pushing Pyongyang to denuclearize. Recent history suggests that such an approach could be effective. China reportedly shut off an oil pipeline to North Korea for three days in March 2003 due to "technical difficulties." China's move was widely interpreted as an exercise of its economic leverage to pressure Pyongyang to attend a trilateral meeting held in Beijing in April 2003.

As it pushes Pyongyang, Beijing should maintain its bottom line, which is to avoid war on the Korean peninsula and an abrupt collapse of the Kim regime. One concern is that a U.S. military strike on North Korea could spark a full-scale war that would inevitably harm China's economic development. A U.S. strike could also force Beijing into an embarrassing position because the 1961 Sino-Korean Treaty on Friendship, Cooperation and Mutual Assistance obliges China to provide military aid to North Korea in the event of war. Furthermore, the fall of the Kim government could lead to sudden Korean unification and an uncertain geopolitical realignment, including the prospect of U.S. troops at China's border.

Beijing should be able to adjust its pressure on Pyongyang with a wide range of approaches, broadening its current "pure carrot" approach to include curbs on oil supplies and other exports. It is in Beijing's interests, however, to ensure that the pressure it applies on North Korea is just a means toward denuclearization and not regime change or collapse.

U.S.-Chinese Coordination

Given that Washington holds what Pyongyang covets most-diplomatic normalization and security guarantees-Beijing should privately persuade Washington to engage in bilateral dialogue with Pyongyang under the auspices of the six-party talks and put on the bargaining table a reasonable offer in exchange for Pyongyang's denuclearization. Such an offer should include robust security guarantees, normalization of relations, and economic aid. Any resolution of the nuclear impasse has to address the reasonable security concerns of North Korea. Pyongyang has often said that its nuclear ambitions are driven solely by the U.S. military threat. Thus, Pyongyang would most likely give up its nuclear program if it could get reliable security assurances in addition to economic and political benefits. Without Washington's cooperation, Pyongyang will undoubtedly continue to escalate the crisis, and Beijing's influence on Pyongyang could be expected to produce only limited success. Eventually, regardless of Pyongyang's intentions, if Beijing and Washington cannot tolerate a nuclear-armed North Korea, Washington must make a serious offer to the North Koreans. Then, Beijing can press Pyongyang to accept such an offer by maximizing its leverage. This would be the most feasible way toward denuclearization of the Korean peninsula.

It should be not difficult for Washington to satisfy Pyongyang's needs. Washington should recognize the importance of regime survival and the need for economic reform in North Korea. Given the long history of mutual mistrust, Washington may not be sure about Pyongyang's real strategic intentions, but the United States should take a chance by starting serious talks with North Korea. Washington's offer should include normalization and economic aid, including energy, following a principle of quid pro quo.

In practice, what North Korea could potentially offer in a negotiation are pledges that, once implemented, are difficult to reverse because they involve physical hardware or infrastructure. Such steps include dismantling known facilities for plutonium production and other processes relevant to a nuclear weapons program, surrendering all plutonium produced in the past, and ending its uranium-enrichment and long-range missile programs. Offers the United States could make, including normalization and pledges of nonaggression and nonintervention, would be easier to reverse if North Korea did not follow its commitment to nuclear disarmament. Thus, any breakthroughs in the negotiations over North Korea's nuclear program would likely have to start with Washington taking the first step.

It is possible that, as Pyongyang has recently said, it will not accept any deal that requires it to give up its nuclear program. If so, Beijing's control of aid to Pyongyang could be crucial in pushing Pyongyang to make its final decision on denuclearization. Because North Korea has very limited energy resources, long-term sustainable economic advancement depends on Pyongyang opening its doors to the international community, especially to foreign investment, trade, and aid from China, South Korea, and Japan. South Korea and Japan have affirmed that they would not tolerate a nuclear North Korea. Thus, an affirmation that Beijing would give no support to a nuclear North Korea would force Pyongyang to think seriously about its nuclear ambitions.

Finally, Beijing may show a greater willingness to press Pyongyang if Washington also addresses China's concerns, including U.S. missile defense and space weapons programs,[8] U.S.-Japanese missile defense cooperation, U.S. missile defense sales to Taiwan, and the deployment of U.S. military forces in the Korean peninsula if the North Korean regime collapses. Ultimately, if Washington can clearly demonstrate to Beijing that its long-term strategic intentions in the region would not constrain China, it could receive greater support from Beijing in negotiating with Pyongyang. Some in China are concerned that once the North Korean nuclear issue is resolved, Washington will focus its efforts on containing China. In addition, some suspect that Washington really has no desire for North Korean denuclearization and merely cares about the issue of nuclear transfer from North Korea. They think a nuclear North Korea could provide a pretext for Washington to strengthen its military ties with allies in the region, thereby constraining China.

A Denuclearization Road Map

Given the long history of mistrust and animosity between Washington and Pyongyang, North Korean denuclearization will not be achieved in one step. A road map is needed that links North Korean denuclearization with the gradual delivery of concrete benefits, including security assurances, diplomatic normalization, economic reform, and Northeast Asian security cooperation. In practice, the joint statement of September 19, 2005, already provided the foundation for a "verifiable denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula in a peaceful manner,"[9] in which North Korea committed to denuclearization in return for a set of security and economic benefits. The six parties agreed to take coordinated steps to implement the statement in a phased manner, "commitment for commitment, action for action."[10] The United States and North Korea have had very different timelines, however, and the sequencing of actions for the denuclearization process has not been well coordinated. North Korea and the United States are wary of giving the other side something valuable at an early stage in the process.

To address that obstacle, China should act as a mediator and play a more proactive and constructive role by offering its own road map for North Korean denuclearization. That detailed road map should include a timetable and delineate the reciprocal actions each side should carry out at certain stages. For each stage, the road map should clearly establish what North Korea should pledge to do, what inspection and verification provisions should be taken, and what benefits North Korea would receive regarding security assurances and economic aid. To promote North Korean denuclearization, China could play a number of active roles. For example, China, alone or together with Russia, could provide North Korea with some kind of security guarantee to reduce its security concerns. China could also help settle some of the disputes between Pyongyang and Washington during the verification stages. In addition, China could monitor and press both parties to implement faithfully their pledges at each stage.

The following is a road map describing three stages toward North Korean denuclearization: the first stage would focus on refreezing and disabling plutonium production; the second stage would involve dismantlement and decommissioning of all plutonium programs; and the third stage would entail the dismantlement of the highly enriched uranium (HEU) program. Each stage should be completed with adequate transparency and verification measures. At the outset, the six parties would agree to a joint statement of specific commitments under the road map. For example, North Korea would commit to abandon all of its nuclear programs (plutonium and HEU programs) and return to the NPT and to International Atomic Energy Agency safeguards. North Korea would also pledge not to transfer any nuclear weapons, fissile material, or knowledge during the implementation of the three stages. The United States and others would pledge to respect Pyongyang's sovereignty, normalize their diplomatic relations with North Korea, negotiate a peace treaty on the Korean peninsula, and pursue a mechanism for Northeast Asian security cooperation. The United States and other countries should also commit to provide North Korea with economic cooperation and energy assistance, adding specific pledges to the general principles articulated in the 2005 joint statement.

First Stage: As a first step to revive the six-party talks quickly, the United States should commit to having direct bilateral talks with North Korea for diplomatic normalization at an early stage under the six-party talks. Meanwhile, China should press North Korea to return to the six-party talks. All parties should reaffirm their commitment to the 2005 joint statement and the 2007 agreement on disablement. While North Korea is disabling its plutonium-production facilities and freezing its HEU program, the United States and other parties should take reciprocal actions, including security assurances and energy aid. The United States should affirm its commitment of security assurances to North Korea by respecting Pyongyang's sovereignty, not seeking a regime change, and formally stating it had no intention to attack or invade. North Korea, South Korea, and the United States should negotiate a trilateral peace treaty. The need for such a treaty is now particularly urgent because North Korea has withdrawn from the 1953 armistice treaty that ended the Korean War.

At that point in the road map, the United States would begin to take steps to lift economic sanctions, establish a liaison office, and assure economic cooperation between North and South Korea, as well as between North Korea and Japan. All relevant parties would resume energy aid to North Korea at the earliest possible time. To jump-start a new round of the six-party talks, Washington would send a prominent figure-a former president or other high-level official-to visit Pyongyang to help break the ice.

Second Stage: The second stage would include two phases to dismantle North Korea's plutonium program. In the first phase, North Korea would dismantle all of its plutonium-production facilities as a step toward a long-term decommissioning program. To reciprocate Pyongyang's cooperation in this phase, the United States and others would provide further security and economic benefits, including the replacement of U.S. liaison offices with an embassy and the establishment of full diplomatic relations. Meanwhile, Japan would normalize its relations with North Korea after resolving the remaining abductee issues.[11] Finally, in order to get to full normalization with Washington, Pyongyang would agree to a treaty ending its development of long-range missiles and halting all exports of missiles and missile technology.

After Pyongyang and Washington established normalized relations, Pyongyang would move quickly to the second phase: dismantling its plutonium weapons and all facilities associated with the weaponization program, as well as surrendering all of its plutonium.

It should be noted that the key to denuclearizing North Korea is the timing of normalization. Although Washington made an offer of normalization in the 2005 joint statement, it made the offer subject to the two countries' "respective bilateral policies." According to Washington, there will be a long road to normalizing relations with Pyongyang. That road will include not only denuclearization, but also discussions on human rights, biological and chemical weapons, ballistic missile programs, conventional weapons proliferation, and terrorism and other illicit activities. Pyongyang, however, wants normalization at a much earlier stage, before dismantling its nuclear program.

North Korea will not dismantle its nuclear program before receiving tangible security assurances, in particular, normalized relations with Washington. The only leverage that Kim Jong Il possesses is his threat to go nuclear. Therefore, Pyongyang fears that once it dismantles its nuclear weapons, there will be no deterrent against a U.S. military strike. Washington, however, as the world's pre-eminent military superpower, would have considerable strategic flexibility. If the United States provided North Korea with security assurances in return for denuclearization and North Korea then reneged on its commitment, the United States would not have lost much. Such a scenario could be frustrating and embarrassing for the United States, but that country's security would not be at risk. In contrast, if North Korea gave up its nuclear program and the United States later reneged on its security assurances, perhaps even by supporting or participating in an invasion, North Korea's very existence could be seen as being put at risk.

Third Stage: In the last stage, North Korea would complete dismantlement of its HEU program. The level of verification required for the HEU program depends on the status of the program, such as whether or not it has produced HEU. Its status could be somewhere between the research and development level and pursuit of the capability to construct a pilot experimental facility. If Pyongyang is only at the beginning of a uranium-enrichment program, as it indicated June 13, North Korea could be years away from producing enough HEU for one bomb.

Beyond denuclearization, North Korea would also sign and implement the Chemical Weapons Convention and the Biological Weapons Convention. Furthermore, the United States, China, and other relevant parties would negotiate a permanent peace regime in Northeast Asia. Such an agreement would play a major role in liberating the Korean peninsula from its Cold War quagmire and going to the root of the North Korean nuclear issue.

Pyongyang would need to cut its conventional forces gradually to achieve parity with South Korean and U.S. forces. That step would facilitate North Korean economic reform by significantly reducing the economic burden on the country of maintaining such a large military. Particularly valuable encouragement for North Korean force reductions would come from the removal of U.S. troops from the South. Furthermore, all other interested and involved parties would help the two Koreas pursue gradual integration toward unification. During this third stage, other countries would continue to aid North Korea's economic reform, help North Korea improve human rights, and provide funds and technologies for the modernization of its economic infrastructure.

Conclusion

A nuclear North Korea would put China's national interests at great risk. Beijing can increase pressure on Pyongyang, using positive inducements and punitive measures. The chances are low, however, that Beijing will radically adjust its North Korea policy, at least for the near future. Beijing will continue to maintain its bottom-line approach, avoiding war on the Korean peninsula and an abrupt collapse of the Kim regime. From China's perspective, these scenarios must be avoided at all costs because they are contrary to China's primary interest in a stable environment.

Given that Washington holds what Pyongyang desires most (security guarantees), Beijing should persuade Washington to engage in bilateral dialogue with Pyongyang. China should push the United States to put reasonable offers on the bargaining table, including robust security guarantees, normalization of relations, and economic aid. At that point, China could maximize its leverage and press North Korea to accept the terms offered. This strategy may be the only way to roll back Pyongyang's nuclear ambitions.

This strategy may not work. Pyongyang may decide not to give up its nuclear program for any sort of deal. Yet, if all of North Korea's neighbors, including China and the United States, make it clear that they will never tolerate a nuclear-armed North Korea and that international isolation therefore will inexorably continue, Pyongyang may decide to give up its nuclear ambitions. Pyongyang will not yield to a purely "stick" approach, however, and eventually a desperate and nuclear North Korea may take actions that are in no one's interests.

To achieve a stable and denuclearized Korean peninsula, all parties concerned must come back to the negotiating table. In particular, Beijing must press Pyongyang to return to the six-party talks as soon as possible. Given that Washington and Pyongyang deeply mistrust each other and neither side wants to go first, China, as a mediator, should play a more proactive and constructive role by offering its own road map for North Korean denuclearization. The six-party talks espoused a general principle of "commitment for commitment, action for action" as a means to denuclearization, but there were no specific timelines or sequencing of actions in the denuclearization process.

The three-stage road map detailed above should fill this gap and satisfy the principal goals of all the parties involved. Pressing for a road map is a step that holds few risks for China and could contribute greatly to resolving the long-standing international stalemate with North Korea. That success, in turn, would help China achieve its chief priority: a stable and a denuclearized Korean peninsula.


Hui Zhang is leading a research initiative on China's nuclear policies for Harvard University's Project on Managing the Atom in the John F. Kennedy School of Government. He is a physicist and a specialist in nuclear arms control and Chinese nuclear policy issues.


ENDNOTES

1. Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, "Statement of Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs," May 25, 2009, www.fmprc.gov.cn/chn/pds/ziliao/1179/t564332.htm (in Chinese). The other participants in the six-party talks are Japan, Russia, South Korea, and the United States.

2. "Full Text of Jiang Zemin's Report at 16th Party Congress," November 17, 2002, www.china.org.cn/english/features/49007.htm.

3. See, for example, AFP, "China, NKorea Trade Boom Despite Rocket Tensions," channelnewsasia.com, April 6, 2009, http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/afp_asiapacific_business/view/420413/1/.html.

4. Wang Yi, statement at a press conference on the first round of the six-party talks in Beijing, August 29, 2003 (in Chinese).

5. See, for example, the declaration by Vice Foreign Minister Wu Dawei, who served as chairman of the fourth round of the talks and head of the Chinese delegation, on the adoption of the joint statement at the fourth round six-party talks, held in Beijing on September 19, 2005.

6. Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, "Statement of Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs."

7. "North Korea Should Not Offend the Chinese People," Global Times, June 3, 2008. See http://blog.huanqiu.com/?uid-94539-action-viewspace-itemid-204519 (in Chinese).

8. Hui Zhang, "Action/Reaction: U.S. Space Weaponization and China," Arms Control Today, December 2005, pp. 7-9.

9. U.S Department of State, "Joint Statement of the Fourth Round of the Six-Party Talks," September 19, 2005, http://merln.ndu.edu/archivepdf/northkorea/state/53490.pdf.

10. Ibid.

11. Just before the second nuclear crisis in October 2002, Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi visited Pyongyang in September 2002 in an effort to speed up Japanese-North Korean diplomatic normalization. Kim Jong Il made a surprise admission during this trip that North Korea had abducted Japanese citizens in the 1970s and 1980s. Since then, the abductee issue has been a key obstacle to normalized relations between the two countries.

 

North Korea has recently taken a series of provocative steps to challenge the international community. These steps include test-launching a long-range rocket, walking away from the six-party talks and all disarmament agreements, kicking out international inspectors from its nuclear facilities, conducting an underground nuclear test May 25-a more powerful blast than the one conducted in 2006-testing a half-dozen short-range missiles, and announcing it had resumed plutonium production and started a program to enrich uranium. Pyongyang reportedly also is preparing a long-range missile test and a third nuclear test. If unchecked, North Korea will surely increase the quantity and quality of its arsenal. Even worse, once Pyongyang has more than enough weapons for its deterrent, it might be tempted to sell the surplus. The longer the crisis lasts, the more nuclear capable North Korea will become and the more difficult it will be to roll back Pyongyang's nuclear ambitions. (Continue)

Nuclear Security in Pakistan: Separating Myth From Reality

Feroz Hassan Khan

Pakistan is passing through an extremely delicate phase in its history. Recent instability in Pakistan, including the Taliban's advance into settled areas, prompted the Pakistani military to undertake large-scale military operations in the Swat Valley. As military and Taliban forces fight in the rugged tribal terrain, several Western analysts have raised concerns about the future of nuclear Pakistan.[1]

The nightmare specter of nuclear weapons, nuclear material, or a whole country falling into al Qaeda or Taliban hands is invoked, creating fear and mistrust between critical allies in the war against terrorism. The risk of a dangerous policy outcome in the United States, based on flawed assumptions, is now far greater than the probability either of nuclear weapons falling into the hands of Taliban and other extremists or of the disintegration of Pakistan itself. Any misstep against a nervous nuclear-armed country would be a greater mistake than any made in Iraq. Fortunately, the current top leadership in the United States can distinguish reality from myth.[2] Nevertheless, misperceptions about weapons of mass destruction have influenced U.S. decisions too recently to be ignored in a discussion of the current situation in Pakistan.

Western fears about Pakistani nuclear security range from valid to bizarre. The more valid concerns involve theft of material, sabotage, unauthorized use of nuclear weapons, and insider-outsider collaboration. The potential for terrorist infiltration into the program is a concern for Western analysts and the Pakistani nuclear establishment. The bizarre fear involves the allegation that Pakistani armed forces and intelligence agencies, who are the custodians and guardians of the nuclear arsenal, could be accomplices to such an act as Taliban sympathizers.[3] An alternate scenario posits that the inability of the armed forces to defeat the Taliban extremists would result in abdication of the Pakistani state to the Taliban.[4] Gen. Tariq Majid, chairman of Pakistan's Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee, called such scenarios "plain mischievous" and said they "need to be contemptuously dismissed."[5]

President Franklin D. Roosevelt famously said, "The only thing we have to fear is fear itself."[6] His words aptly describe the prevalent fears in regard to the situation in Pakistan today. Two main dangers emanate from the hype on nuclear insecurity in Pakistan. The first danger is that the grossly exaggerated threat perception in the West may prompt the United States into policy choices it would later regret.[7] The second danger is that continuing media focus on this issue stokes Pakistani paranoia about U.S. intentions. These fears and suspicions about U.S. intervention inside Pakistan could provoke that country to take defensive actions against foreign intervention rather than focusing on the possibility of reducing internal threats to nuclear security and could further fan anti-U.S. public sentiment. It is true that stability in Pakistan is shaky, its fledgling democracy is in transition, and it is facing internal threats from extremists. Until recently, decision-makers in Pakistan were in a state of denial and reacted only when the Taliban threat exploded in their faces. Therefore, it is justified to worry and ask questions about the security of a nuclear-armed country undergoing such a traumatic experience. It would be equally correct to weigh the seriousness of the threat against the ability of the state's security apparatus and its nuclear security measures to prevent the worst from happening.

This article examines the nuclear security of Pakistan in light of recent developments: the increasing threat of the Taliban and reports of Pakistan's expanding nuclear arsenal. The article will explore the backdrop of Pakistan's nuclear development in relation to U.S. policy. It will then examine the perceptions of insecurity and explain how Pakistan's threat priorities differ from U.S. concerns. Next, it will explain Pakistani efforts to establish a nuclear management system and the development of nuclear security culture. The article will conclude by examining the U.S. role in the evolving Pakistani nuclear security regime.

Backdrop: Regional Security

The nuclear dimension of regional security in South Asia is essentially a deterrence construct between India and Pakistan.[8] Although little has changed between India and Pakistan in the decade following their 1998 nuclear tests, the regional security landscape has been completely altered. [9] The region now faces new forms of asymmetric threat, the likes of which have never been experienced.

The war in Afghanistan, now in its eighth year, has metastasized into a classic insurgency and expanded into Pakistan. The impact of the Afghan war against the Soviets in the 1980s, insurgency in Indian-administered Kashmir, and domestic changes brought about during the Zia ul-Haq era have had a deleterious impact on the social fabric of Pakistan. New forms of religious-based militancy and an ethos of jihad were introduced in Pakistan at a time when the country was politically abandoned by its Western allies and slapped with nuclear sanctions.[10] Thus began a bitter history of distrust between Pakistan and the United States.[11]

Under these challenging and often unhealthy circumstances, Pakistan's covert nuclear program incubated and matured into an operational deterrent. The United States and Pakistan never saw eye to eye with regard to the latter's nuclear ambitions. Since the mid-1970s, every effort the United States undertook to block, stymie, and dissuade Pakistan eventually failed to stop Pakistan in its quest to acquire a nuclear deterrent.[12] The story of Pakistan's clandestine means of acquisition is widely known,[13] but less is known about the context, which involves domestic national politics, regional security, and intense geopolitical engagement with the United States.[14] By the turn of the century, the U.S. policy of rolling back Pakistan's nuclear capability had become an unrealistic objective. The United States instead sought to restrict Pakistan's nuclear capability to a minimum deterrence posture and dampen the security competition with India.

During the 1980s and 1990s, while Pakistan was building its nuclear program, issues of nuclear security and command and control were not the prime concern. That changed after Afghanistan-based terrorists attacked the United States on September 11, 2001, and news spread about a meeting in the summer of 2001 of two retired Pakistani scientists, Sultan Bashiruddin Mahmood and Abdul Majeed, with Osama bin Laden. Until then, concerns about "loose nukes" and nuclear material smuggling were focused on the former Soviet Union. Three years later, the shocking revelations about Abdul Qadeer Khan's nuclear smuggling network made Pakistan's nuclear program even more controversial.

Perceptions of Insecurity

States managing a nuclear weapons program typically have three main types of nuclear security concerns. First, every nuclear-capable state worries about the external threat of a preventive strike by hostile powers against its nuclear facilities. Second, such states worry about physical invasion of the state by a hostile neighbor. The third and probably the most dangerous concern is insider-outsider collaboration. Pakistan has lived with all three categories of threats since the inception of its nuclear program. Like every state, Pakistan's program places great emphasis on secrecy and compartmentalization. In the past, no single office, organization, or authority held ultimate responsibility for supervision. For the past decade, there has been a National Command Authority (NCA) with a dedicated secretariat (the Strategic Plans Division, or SPD), which is responsible for all nuclear-related activities.[15] Since these institutions were established, events, controversies, and deterioration of the regional and domestic environment have forced Pakistan to tighten its oversight and control.

The Taliban threat within Pakistan is a new phenomenon. The militant group led by Baitullah Mehsud belonging to the tribal belt in Waziristan calls itself the Tehrik-e-Taliban (TTP). The TTP is an extremist fringe whose activities have now expanded from the tribal areas into the settled areas of Pakistan. This provoked military operations that continue today and have resulted in the displacement of millions of people. The exact size of the Taliban in Pakistan is not known, but estimates range from 5,000 to 15,000. Grisly practices such as the public flogging of a young woman in April, against a backdrop of kidnapping, bombings of schools and mosques, and general killing of innocent civilians, turned the Pakistani public against any accommodation with the TTP or any other religious extremist organization. The tipping point arrived when the TTP exploited the "peace deal" and advanced further inland. The Pakistani public was shocked at the actions of an elected government that abdicated to such a force by negotiating a deal.[16]

Pakistan's armed forces are a half-million strong, and the country has a moderate Muslim populace with a history of repeatedly rejecting religious political parties.[17] The country has reacted forcefully against the Taliban, so the fear that Pakistani nuclear weapons could fall into the hands of the Taliban is totally misplaced.[18] As explained by Naeem Salik in a recent op-ed, there is "no causal relationship between the military operations against the Taliban and the security of Pakistan's nuclear arsenal."[19]

Nuclear security is a function of nuclear management, which covers both the nuclear arsenal and peaceful nuclear energy. The force goals and the size of the nuclear arsenal are determined by a comprehensive examination of national threats and responses to them. Meanwhile, nuclear energy requirements are based on long-term national development planning. Mixing the two together as a general expansion of nuclear capacity confuses the issue. Further, the terms "proliferation" and "nuclear security" are often used interchangeably. For example, Pakistani purchase of light-water power reactors under International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) safeguards should not be a proliferation concern.[20] The security of this expanding nuclear infrastructure requires an examination of the state's nuclear security regime, explained below.

External and Internal Threats

Pakistan does not have an enviable geography. It is surrounded by giant nuclear-armed neighbors Russia, China, and India. Its elongated shape lacks depth, making lines of communication vulnerable to India. Pakistan's western provinces consist of territories that are volatile because of border disputes (the Durand Line with Afghanistan) or internal tribal unrest, leaving the security managers of the state with extremely difficult choices. Pakistan's strategic planners are acutely aware of these structural vulnerabilities and account for them when selecting sites for sensitive nuclear and strategic organizations. They balance external threats, internal volatility, technical requirements, resource availability, and the secrecy requirements of every sensitive site. Therefore, generalized statements about nuclear weapons falling into the hands of the Taliban are disconnected from the reality on the ground.

Since the late 1970s, Pakistan's perceptions of threats to its nuclear program were externally oriented. Preventive strikes or sabotage of the program were hypothetical considerations until Israel successfully struck Iraq's Osirak reactor in 1981. Pakistan quickly assessed that India would mimic Israel. The proximity of Pakistan's centrifuge uranium-enrichment plant at Kahuta to the Indian border forced Pakistan to secure it and other strategic sites with air and ground defenses.[21] In the mid-1980s, Indian plans for a preventive strike were leaked to the press, confirming Pakistani fears. India later shelved the plan, but the notion never died in the minds of the Indian military. In the winter of 1986-1987, the Indian military planned Brass Tacks, a provocative military exercise designed to give India an excuse to strike at Kahuta.[22] By then, the new mysterious site tucked in the foothills of Islamabad had become a source of curiosity to spies and diplomats. Layers of security were added to protect the program not only from external attacks but also from spies and news reporters. Around this period, the Afghan jihad against the Soviets expanded, as did Pakistani nuclear infrastructure.

The nuclear security culture was originally designed to protect the autonomy of the scientists so that their work could continue unhindered. Because of the significance of the cause, managers of the program had no authority to question the motives and practices of the scientists. This enabled Khan to take advantage of the lack of proper accountability. Another reason that Pakistan wanted to avoid publicizing the program was the risk of losing U.S. aid by triggering various U.S. laws designed to stop Pakistani efforts.[23]

Physical Invasion of the Country

Pakistan has existed under the threat of invasion throughout its existence. Several wars were fought with India, one of which resulted in Pakistani national dismemberment. Even during the British Raj, the Indian subcontinent lived under the threat of physical invasion, especially from armies using historical routes such as the Khyber and Bolan Passes. New doctrines of wars to defeat and destroy Pakistan continue to be contemplated, practiced, and exercised in India.[24] Since the mid-1980s, six major military crises of varying degrees of intensity have forced Pakistan to consider physical invasion from India an existential threat in perpetuity. This perception cannot be wished away unless India and Pakistan undertake a structured and sustained program of conflict resolution, in conjunction with conventional and nuclear arms control measures. The Pakistani armed forces must balance three dimensions: India, Afghanistan's threat to the western border, and internal extremist threats.[25] When selecting strategic sites, Pakistan carefully takes these threats into account. Material storage, missile silos, and movement of sensitive material and personnel are being carefully and professionally watched, and best practices are being developed to prevent security breaches.[26] Details of such procedures cannot be publicly shared for obvious security reasons. No state with nuclear weapons is likely to discuss its operational management; it is always shrouded in secrecy.[27]

Insider-Outsider Collusion

Insiders in the program could have one of several motives. Some could be driven by economic incentives. Others may see an opportunity for political gain. Some may be driven by revenge, grudges, jealousies, psychiatric disorders, and so on. Also, moles or spies could reveal nuclear secrets to outside powers, help sabotage or destroy the program from within, or disclose a site's location to facilitate outside attacks. U.S. media reports and publications from authors widely known to base their writings on U.S. government leaks have reinforced perceptions in Pakistan that its nuclear infrastructure must be protected as much from allies as from hostile groups.[28]

Finally, there is the danger from religious fanatics. In the case of Pakistan, it is not just the proximity of terrorist groups but also trends in some segments of society that are under the influence of religious cults.[29] These factors have made the managers of nuclear security more alert than ever as details in the next section explain.

Institutional Changes

After the nuclear tests in 1998, the Pakistani nuclear program faced three major needs: to review national security policies, institutionalize the management of the nuclear program, and develop a prudent strategy for a robust strategic force.[30] The first challenge required Pakistan to have a national security apparatus capable of comprehensively analyzing national security policy in changing times. This challenge is being tackled nationally at the political level. The remaining two challenges involve the NCA, which comprises the top civilian, military, and scientific decision-makers in the country. The SPD, formed in 1999, provides institutional oversight on nuclear decision-making.

Pakistan's strategic force goals are designed to redress the vulnerabilities described above and to restore strategic balance. Matching warhead to warhead or accumulating fissile stocks for military purposes is not the goal. The objective is to ensure deterrence stability by calculating a minimum deterrence posture that is related to the increasing capabilities of its adversary, namely India.

Next, nuclear technology is for civilian use as well. Pakistan's 25-year plan calls for an installed capacity of 8,800 megawatts of nuclear energy.[31] Nuclear force goals and nuclear energy will thus remain essential national priorities.

As the nuclear program expands, Pakistan's nuclear security regime must meet a higher qualitative and quantitative standard. The armed forces, widely acknowledged to be Pakistan's most stable institution, are responsible for the custody and development of Pakistan's nuclear safety regime. In fact, Pakistan's nuclear management, including nuclear security and safety, has been more widely discussed and scrutinized than that of any other power. The professional and technical ability of Pakistan ought to be encouraged rather than disparaged.

Evolution of Security Culture

Nuclear security culture evolved in Pakistan after the September 11 attacks.[32] Pakistan improved its supervisory procedure for military and scientific manpower. The security division of the SPD established a reporting system for monitoring the movements of all officials. Two identical programs for employment security were created: the Personnel Reliability Program (PRP) and the Human Reliability Program (HRP), for military and civilian personnel, respectively. A security clearance system of annual, semiannual, and quarterly review was created. Counter Intelligence Teams were created to act as the daily eyes and ears of the SPD. Weekly, monthly, and quarterly reports for the security of all organizations are maintained by the SPD to prevent theft, loss, or accident.

Next, a system of sensitive material control and accounting was introduced. The system was derived from modern training, possibly modeled on U.S. national laboratory procedures. The system involved regular and surprise inspections to tally material production and waste in order to maintain transparency and accountability. Under a careful, secret plan instituted by the SPD, professional guards at static sites and escorts with tight security procedures are involved during transportation. Special theft- and tamper-proof vehicles and containers are used.[33] In peacetime, nuclear weapons are not mated with their delivery systems and are not operationally deployed. Operational secrecy precludes specific discussion of management of nuclear arsenals, but a two-man rule and, in some cases, a three-man rule is followed, with physical safety and firewalls built into the weapon system to prevent any unauthorized launch.[34]

The inception of the Nuclear Security Action Plan (NSAP), organized by the Pakistan Nuclear Regulatory Authority (PNRA), was a very important development in Pakistan's nuclear security management. The PNRA is an independent body responsible for civilian programs, but it coordinates closely with the SPD. The two organizations complement each other by sharing best practices.

The main task of the NSAP is to manage all nuclear activities and radioactive sources that are under regulatory control and to develop a sustainable national system. Nuclear security emergency centers and procedures to secure orphan radioactive sources and to secure borders against any illicit trafficking have been put in place. Rigorous inspections are one key element of the PNRA's activities to strengthen controls. Another is the training of a wide variety of personnel from all major organizations. The training involves nuclear security, physical protection, emergency preparedness, detection equipment, recovery operations, and border monitoring. The organizations involved in training are the Coast Guard, Frontier Corps, Pakistan Rangers, Customs, Emergency & Rescue Services, National Disaster Management Cell, intelligence services, law enforcement agencies, and all strategic organizations including offices from the SPD.[35]

A Nuclear Security Emergency Coordination Center has been established in Islamabad, which is the focal point of coordination, by all the government agencies mentioned above. In addition, regional offices in all major cities have been established, creating a network of six emergency-response mobile laboratories. The primary job of this network, which was completed in December 2008, is to track and respond to any threat of illicit nuclear material, a radioactive source, or a radiological dispersion device ("dirty bomb"). Finally, the NSAP has established border controls at major crossing points with state-of-the-art screening procedures with the help of the IAEA and the U.S. Department of Energy.[36]

The U.S. Role

The recent hype and, at times, irresponsible writing by U.S. academics with serious credentials has created a sense of cynicism in Islamabad, reinforcing beliefs that the recent chatter is a prelude to aggressive counterproliferation measures by the United States.[37]

Many claims, such as those in a recent Boston Globe article[38] alleging the existence of a secret joint Pakistani-U.S. strategy for U.S. access to Pakistan, are baseless.[39] Pakistan is very careful in seeking assistance on nuclear technology from the United States, especially if the assistance is perceived to be of an intrusive nature. Like other nuclear-capable states, Pakistan jealously guards its locations and nuclear best practices from any outside influence or knowledge.[40] However, it is always keen to learn of other countries' nuclear security measures and to acquire detection equipment at seaports, airports, and other border crossings.

In 2001, U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell offered nuclear security assistance to Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf. The SPD carefully examined the offer and accepted training but declined technology transfers, which they perceived as intrusive or likely to compromise program secrecy. Since then, Pakistan has benefited from advanced-level training from U.S. national laboratories and has improved its best practices in accordance with its own security culture.[41] There has been no further acceptance by Pakistan of any assistance from the United States, especially permissive action links (PALs), the coded mechanical or electrical locks designed to prevent unauthorized arming or detonation of a nuclear weapon.

There are two issues regarding cooperation on PALs. First, the U.S. export control laws restrict sharing PAL technology with other countries, especially with countries that are not parties to the nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT).[42] Second, transferring PALs not only helps prevent unauthorized use, but also can encourage the recipient state to deploy and disperse the weapons, thus facilitating nuclear use. There are objections from the proposed recipient as well. The recipient state would have to share details of its nuclear weapons design for the technology transfer to work.[43] No country shares such secrets.

In fact, alarmist stories in the U.S. media actually undermine any possibility of positive U.S. assistance.[44] U.S. speculation about contingency plans and pre-emptive weapons seizure leads to greater Pakistani distrust of the United States. Referring to conjecture on U.S. plans to seize nuclear sites, Michael Krepon accurately summed up Pakistani anxieties: "I think these plans-if they exist and I'm not sure that they do-[are] unlikely to be successfully executed and would result in multiple mushroom clouds. So I think this is a bad idea, and it's a bad idea even to talk about it."[45]

What the United States can do is explain to Pakistan its own experience with nuclear security management. The United States cannot boast of a perfect security record itself.[46] Nevertheless, as the most experienced nuclear power, the United States can share its nuclear security practices, performances of the system, and the likelihood of mishaps.

Pakistan has three decades of experience in producing, transferring, and storing fissile stocks and weapons. Pakistani security managers have also learned to put in place detection equipment and security barriers, as well as set up checkpoints and customs posts. Such types of performance are easily measurable and can be improved with little assistance required.

The effectiveness of the nuclear security culture is difficult to measure, which is true for all nuclear powers, including the United States. It involves institutionalization of standing operating procedures and practices beyond individuals. No matter how good a system is, it will require constant improvement. Other countries cannot measure the effectiveness of Pakistan's system, but generic training and the sharing of experience will help improve it. The efficacy of any system is tested only when a mishap or near-miss occurs. It is important for any organization to learn the ways by which a clever and determined criminal might overcome security. Only then can the physical and technical limitations of the system be evaluated. For example, managers may have confidence in existing detection sensors, but a clever criminal can manipulate them by rigging the system or discerning the alarm threshold and stealing quantities below that threshold.

The United States has produced sensitive sensors and software that can detect radiation at an extremely low level. Pakistan is unlikely to accept foreign-made sensors in any of its sensitive sites, but it can use these devices at major geographical chokepoints. By utilizing its elaborate network of river systems and canals, which restrict movement, Pakistan can make broader security improvements. The United States can help Pakistan modernize its NSAP by installing modern sensors and radiation monitors for portal monitoring at locations acceptable to Pakistan. This would help prevent terrorist transport of conventional explosives as well as illicit radiological material. Modern sensors at key bridges on Indus River systems, for example, will help nuclear security and internal security against suicide bombers.

The most difficult aspect of measuring effectiveness comes from the unpredictability of human motivations. Motivated individuals can always elude effective barriers. Therefore, Pakistan must constantly maintain a very close watch over the system, in addition to upgrading and improving the PRP and HRP. Simply adding more guards and security personnel will not suffice; Pakistan must constantly evaluate its system to detect potential failures. The security divisions of the SPD and intelligence services have layers of security and counterintelligence mechanisms for all sensitive sites. They are highly active and alert in updating, monitoring, and keeping a vigilant watch to detect and respond to any undesirable proclivities within the system. Western countries can share their experience with Pakistan to help improve the screening and certification procedures of its PRP and HRP. The implementation of UN Security Council Resolution 1540, which establishes a requirement for countries to take measures to prevent proliferation of nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons and their delivery systems, is extremely important, and Pakistan is believed to have taken serious steps to enforce international standards. National security considerations, however, prevent the SPD from publishing its results. Notably, Pakistani safeguards have always been in good standing with the IAEA, and Pakistan is a member of almost all international safety and security conventions.

Conclusion

Pakistan lives in a security-intensive environment, with internal and external threats. Nuclear weapons form an essential ingredient of its national security. Pakistan's pursuit of a nuclear capability is fraught with a history of friction with the United States. Pakistan has refused to be coerced on the nuclear question and views U.S. concern over nuclear security as "deliberate misinformation" and a "vicious campaign unleashed to malign and discredit" its achievement.[47]

Despite widely known limitations, Pakistan has done remarkably well in establishing a nuclear security regime and an evolving nuclear security culture that requires encouragement and support. It has been quite liberal in briefing U.S. officials, academics, and even journalists about its nuclear management. Over several years, Pakistan has sent officials, technicians, and administrators to receive training on modern technical solutions and management under the aegis of mutually acceptable arrangements that cater to each side's sensitivities.

Veiled threats and unsubstantiated criticism of its efforts can push an important nuclear-armed country in distress into directions highly undesirable for Pakistan and the United States. As critical allies in the war against violent extremism, the two countries have more pressing issues to tackle. Majid sums up the Pakistani perceptions of external or internal threats and the country's likely response: "Let it be known that Pakistan is confident but not complacent. Our security apparatus prepares and practices contingencies to meet all such eventualities and would not be deterred from taking any action whatsoever in ensuring that our strategic assets are jealously safeguarded. Any attempt to undermine our core capability will be strongly resisted and defeated."[48]


Retired Brig. Gen. Feroz Hassan Khan is a former director of arms control and disarmament affairs in the Strategic Plans Division of the Joint Services Headquarters of Pakistan. He is currently on the faculty of the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, California. The author is grateful to Paul Faris for his research and editing assistance.


ENDNOTES

1. See Bruce Riedel, "Pakistan and the Bomb," The Wall Street Journal, May 30, 2009; Bryan Bender, "Pakistan, US in Talks on Nuclear Security," Boston Globe, May 5, 2009, www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2009/05/05/pakistan_us_in_talks_on_nuclear_security/; Andrea Shalal-Esa, "U.S. Lawmaker Worried by Sag in Support for Defense," Reuters, June 24, 2009 (quoting Representative John Murtha [D-Pa.] about U.S. airstrikes against Pakistani nuclear targets).

2. Statements from President Barack Obama and senior U.S. political and military leaders have provided assurances on the security of the Pakistani nuclear program, even though they have recognized the internal instability and weak governance. See http://edition.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/04/29/obama.transcript/ (Obama's statement on the occasion of 100 days in office).

3. See Leonard Spector, "Pakistan, Taliban and Global Security - Part I," YaleGlobal, May 8, 2009; Riedel, "Pakistan and the Bomb"; David Albright, Paul Brannan, and Robert Kelley, "Pakistan Expanding Dera Ghazi Khan Nuclear Site: Time for U.S. to Call for Limits," ISIS Imagery Brief, May 19, 2009, p. 4.

4. Bender, "Pakistan, US in Talks on Nuclear Security."

5. See "No Compromise on Nukes: Pakistan," Indo-Asian News Service, June 18, 2009, http://in.news.yahoo.com/43/20090618/876/twl-no-compromise-on-nukes-pakistan.html.

6. Franklin D. Roosevelt, first inaugural address, Washington, D.C., March 4, 1933, http://bartelby.org/124/pres49.html.

7. See Simon Tisdall, "Pakistan Nuclear Projects Raise US Fears," The Guardian, May 3, 2009 (quoting Pakistani Ambassador to the United States Husain Haqqani).

8. For details, see Feroz Hassan Khan, "The Independence/Dependence Paradox: Stability Dilemmas in South Asia," Arms Control Today, October 2003, pp. 15-19.

9. India and Pakistan have failed to resolve their conflict, and the United States continues to intervene to defuse crises but shies away from mediation because of Indian sensitivity.

10. For Zia ul-Haq's policy, see Robert G. Wirsing, Pakistan's Security Under Zia, 1977-1988 (London: MacMillan, 1991). For the ethos of jihad, see Zahid Hussain, Frontline Pakistan: The Struggle With Militant Islam (New York: Columbia University Press, 2007), pp. 12-32.

11. See Steve Coll, Ghost Wars (New York: Penguin, 2004).

12. Feroz Hassan Khan, "Nuclear Proliferation Motivations: Lessons From Pakistan," in Nuclear Weapons Proliferation in the Next Decade, ed. Peter Lavoy (New York: Routledge, 2008), pp. 69-85.

13. See Mark Fitzpatrick, ed., "Nuclear Black Markets: Pakistan, A.Q. Khan and the Rise of Proliferation Networks," IISS Strategic Dossier, May 2007.

14. See Peter Lavoy, "Nuclear Proliferation Over the Next Decade: Causes, Warning Signs, and Policy Responses," The Nonproliferation Review (November 2006), pp. 441-442; Feroz Hassan Khan, "Nuclear Proliferation Motivations: Lessons From Pakistan," The Nonproliferation Review (November 2006), pp. 501-517.

15. Lt. Gen. Khalid Kidwai, lecture at the Naval Postgraduate School, Monterey, California, October 27, 2006 (hereinafter Kidwai lecture). See Fitzpatrick, "Nuclear Black Markets."

16. The term "abdication" to the terrorists was used by U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, whose view was echoed by Obama in the April 29, 2009, speech marking his 100th day in office. For the transcript, see http://edition.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/04/29/obama.transcript/.

17. The only exception was in the 2002 elections, when a coalition of religious parties won a plurality in the North West Frontier Province to form a provincial government. The coalition was routed in the 2008 elections.

18. See Tisdall, "Pakistan Nuclear Projects Raise US Fears."

19. Naeem Salik,"Comment: Riedel and the Pakistani Bomb," Daily Times, June 18, 2009, www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2009%5C06%5C18%5Cstory_18-6-2009_pg3_2.

20. Ibid.

21. Feroz Hassan Khan and Peter Lavoy, "Pakistan: The Dilemma of Nuclear Deterrence," in The Long Shadow: Nuclear Weapons and Security in 21st Century Asia, ed. Muthiah Alagappa (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2008), pp. 220-221.

22. Scott D. Sagan and Kenneth Waltz, The Spread of Nuclear Weapons: A Debate Renewed (New York: W.W. Norton, 2003), pp. 93-95. See Scott D. Sagan, "The Perils of Proliferation," in South Asia in 2020: Future Strategic Balances and Alliances, ed. Michael R. Chambers (Carlisle, Pa.: Strategic Studies War College, 2002), pp. 198-199.

23. See the 1977 Glenn and Symington Amendments and the 1985 Pakistan-specific Pressler Amendment to the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961.

24. See, for example, Walter Carl Ladwig III, "A Cold Start for Hot Wars? The Indian Army's New Limited War Doctrine," International Security, Winter 2007/08, pp. 158-190.

25. Ladwig, "A Cold Start for Hot Wars?" pp. 158-190; S. Paul Kapur, "India and Pakistan's Unstable Peace: Why Nuclear South Asia Is Not Like Cold War Europe," International Security, Fall 2005, pp. 138-139.

26. See Zafar Ali, "Pakistan's Nuclear Assets and Threats of Terrorism: How Grave Is the Danger?" Henry L. Stimson Center, July 2007, www.stimson.org/southasia/pdf/PakistanNuclearAssets-070607-ZafarAli-FINAL.pdf; Abdul Mannan, "Preventing Nuclear Terrorism in Pakistan: Sabotage of a Spent Fuel Cask or a Commercial Irradiation Source in Transport," Henry L. Stimson Center, April 2007, www.stimson.org/southasia/pdf/VFMannan.pdf.

27. See Ashton B. Carter, John D. Steinbruner, and Charles A Zraket, Managing Nuclear Operations (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution, 1987), p. 1.

28. Seymour Hersh, "Watching the Warheads: The Risk to Pakistan's Nuclear Arsenal," The New Yorker Magazine, November 5, 2001, pp. 48-54. Hersh alleges that "an elite Pentagon undercover unit [has been] trained to slip into foreign countries and find suspected nuclear weapons, and disarm them if necessary.... [The unit] has explored plans for an operation in Pakistan." See David Albright, "Securing Pakistan's Nuclear Weapons Complex" (paper for the 42nd Strategy for Peace Conference, Warrenton, Virginia, October 25-27, 2001), www.isis-online.org/publications/terrorism/stanleypaper.html; Nigel Hawkes, "The Nuclear Threat: Pakistan Could Lose Control of Its Arsenal," Times Online, September 20, 2001.

29. See Hasan-Askari Rizvi "Re-socialising Pakistan," Daily Times, June 7, 2009, www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2009%5C06%5C07%5Cstory_7-6-2009_pg3_2.

30. Kidwai lecture.

31. Pakistan's energy requirement for the next 25 years is about 163,000 megawatts. Nuclear energy's share will be 8,800 megawatts, necessitating a twenty-fold increase in its current civilian nuclear capacity. For a description of Pakistan's Vision 2030 project, see Zafar Bhutta, "Nuclear Power Plants of 1280MW: Pakistan to Seek Financing From China," Daily Times, September 4, 2008, www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2008\04\09\story_9-4-2008_pg5_1.

32. Pakistan's definition of nuclear security is "[t]he prevention and detection of, and response to, theft, sabotage, unauthorized access, illegal transfer or other malicious acts involving nuclear material, other radioactive substances or their associated facilities." Jamshed Hashmi, presentation at a workshop by the Partnership for Global Security, Washington, D.C., February 21-22, 2008 (hereinafter Hashmi presentation).

33. Kidwai lecture; Mannan, "Preventing Nuclear Terrorism in Pakistan," pp. 30-31.

34. For further details, see Kenneth N. Luongo and Naeem Salik, "Building Confidence in Pakistan's Nuclear Security," Arms Control Today, December 2007, www.armscontrol.org/act/2007_12/Luongo.

35. Hashmi presentation.

36. Luongo and Salik, "Building Confidence in Pakistan's Nuclear Security."

37. For example, assertions in The Wall Street Journal by former CIA official Bruce Riedel, who is also one of the senior advisers on Obama's "AfPak" policy, are not viewed in Pakistan as academic but rather quasi-official U.S. views. See Salik, "Comment"; S.M. Hali, "Why Bruce Riedel Has Lost My Respect," The Nation (Pakistan), June 3, 2009.

38. Bender, "Pakistan, US in Talks on Nuclear Security."

39. Air Cmdr. Khalid Banuri, communication with author, June 5, 2009 and June 29, 2009. The Pakistani Ministry of Foreign Affairs held a media briefing on May 7, 2009, and said there was no truth to the Boston Globe assertions.

40. Kidwai lecture; Lt. Gen. Khalid Kidwai, interview with author, Rawalpindi, Pakistan, April 19, 2009.

41. Strategic Plans Division, briefing to Naval Postgraduate School team, Islamabad, February 25, 2007. The briefing was part of the U.S.-Pakistan Track II Strategic Dialogue for Long-Term Partnership.

42. U.S. laws make an exception for sharing such technology only with NPT nuclear-weapon states. Pakistan is not a party to the NPT.

43. Garima Singh, "Interview With Brig Feroz Hassan Khan," Strategic Insights, Vol. 4, No. 7 (July 2005), www.ccc.nps.navy.mil/si/2005/Jul/khanJul05.asp.

44. For a perfect example of reinforcing Islamabad's concerns, see Riedel, "Pakistan and the Bomb." His selective historical account and characterization of the security of nuclear arsenals is shaky and a sad example of deliberate alarmism.

45. Elaine M. Grossman, "Talk of U.S. Plans to Secure Pakistani Nuclear Weapons Called 'Wildly Hypothetical,'" Global Security Newswire, June 10, 2009.

46. In October 2006, classified documents were stolen from Los Alamos National Laboratory and found in a trailer park. This led to the resignation of National Nuclear Security Administration head Linton Brooks. See Adam Zagorin, "A Breach in Nuclear Security," TIME, April 19, 2007. In August 2007, a U.S. Air Force B-52 mistakenly carried nuclear warheads across the country.

47. "No Compromise on Nukes: Pakistan."

48. Ibid.

 

Pakistan is passing through an extremely delicate phase in its history. Recent instability in Pakistan, including the Taliban's advance into settled areas, prompted the Pakistani military to undertake large-scale military operations in the Swat Valley. As military and Taliban forces fight in the rugged tribal terrain, several Western analysts have raised concerns about the future of nuclear Pakistan. (Continue)

Nuclear Security in Pakistan: Reducing the Risks of Nuclear Terrorism

Rolf Mowatt-Larssen

Today's frightening instability in Pakistan comes in a world in which global terrorists are actively seeking nuclear weapons and the materials and expertise needed to make them, a quest that has been underway for more than a decade. Rapid action is needed to keep the Taliban's advances in Pakistan from creating new opportunities for these deadly adversaries.

Yet, assessing nuclear security in Pakistan should not be viewed in isolation. The challenges faced by Pakistani authorities must be seen in their broader context to be properly understood and effectively countered. All countries in possession of nuclear weapons are concerned about the possibility of losing control over a bomb or weapons-related material. Consequently, states must pay utmost attention to securing these means of mass destruction. Recent years have seen increased international cooperation on nuclear security, improvements in international material protection control and accounting procedures, and increased funding for nuclear security-related initiatives. Despite increases in the scope and sophistication of security measures, much work remains to be done in order to lock down all nuclear materials to a Fort Knox standard. The fact remains that missing weapons-usable material turns up regularly on the nuclear black market.[1] The most worrisome aspect of these recurring incidents is that facilities from which the materials originated did not report them missing. In addition, there have been some notable lapses in warhead security, even in the United States.[2]

Despite such troubling developments, global security efforts until now have been good enough to avert a nuclear catastrophe. The bad news is that nuclear threats are growing.

According to former CIA analyst Bruce Riedel, "Pakistan is the most dangerous country in today's world."[3]

Daunting Security Task

Ensuring complete control over nuclear equipment, material, and technology is more difficult now than at any time in the past. There is a burgeoning global interest in all things nuclear. More states are seeking nuclear technologies, power, and weapons. Production, transportation, and storage of nuclear materials will expand throughout the 21st century. The presence of more material in more places increases the odds of a security breach leading to the loss of a bomb or the theft of materials to make a bomb. The anticipated global renaissance in nuclear energy will pose new challenges in this regard unless the associated proliferation risks are fully taken into account in decisions on materials processing, transportation, and storage. In this light, it is essential to secure not only weapons-grade plutonium and uranium from military programs, but also plutonium, highly enriched uranium, and other materials from civilian programs. Materials that would not meet the standards required for a nuclear weapon developed by a state might be usable in a terrorist's yield-producing bomb.[4]

Thus, a zero tolerance standard must be adopted for the loss of any nuclear weapon or of materials that may be fashioned into a bomb. Terrorists know that they can exploit any vulnerability to their advantage. In December 1998, Osama bin Laden expressed al Qaeda's intent when he stated in an interview, "Acquiring weapons [of mass destruction] for the defense of Muslims is a religious duty."[5] In November 2001, he added, "I wish to declare that if America used chemical or nuclear weapons against us, then we may retort with chemical or nuclear weapons. We have the weapons as deterrent."[6]

In its efforts to achieve the stature of a state, a terrorist group is most interested in producing a nuclear yield-a mushroom cloud. Consequently, a terrorist group would improvise a nuclear device or essentially build a crude nuclear bomb, one that has a low yield and may be unpredictable, inefficient, and unsafe in comparison with the complicated weapons systems in a national nuclear arsenal. To counter this qualitatively new threshold of nuclear-related threats, states must ensure that terrorists do not acquire any nuclear materials. This risk increases the demands that must be placed on security measures for materials at all stages of their use, i.e., production, processing, transportation, and storage, in research reactors as well as weapons facilities. The bottom line is that it is not enough to preclude terrorists from getting their hands on a bomb. States must eliminate any possibility that terrorists will acquire sufficient materials to build a bomb or successfully attack or take over a facility containing weapons or materials.

After the September 11 attacks, for example, the United States raised the level of the security for nuclear weapons and nuclear materials. As a centerpiece of this effort, President George W. Bush signed a National Security Directive in August 2006 establishing the U.S. government's Nuclear Materials Information Program. This program directed the consolidation of all U.S. information pertaining to all nuclear materials worldwide, in all forms and at all levels of enrichment. It included radioactive sources that could be fashioned into a dirty bomb. Every country was considered as a potential source of a crude terrorist weapon, including the United States. The directive prescribed a systematic approach to assessing the security status of all nuclear materials in facilities and in transit. It required the construction of a forensics database containing all U.S. holdings.[7]

In addition, substantial new investments were made in upgrading security throughout the U.S. nuclear establishment. To that end, security planners in the Department of Energy and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission made assumptions about the likelihood that malicious insiders at nuclear sites would work with outsiders to allow access to facilities and materials. The Energy Department and the FBI dramatically increased intelligence and counterintelligence efforts to mitigate threats posed by malicious insiders. Defense in depth-multiple, reinforcing layers of security-was strengthened to catch any leakage of materials or information that could enable an outside group in its pursuit of a bomb.

In spite of such upgrades, serious security lapses have occurred in the U.S. nuclear establishment over the past several years.[8] Others will surely happen in the future because no security is perfect. Thus, constant vigilance is required; it is important to strive continuously toward the elimination of nuclear threats, knowing that it may never be possible to achieve this ideal standard. The surest way to fail is to become complacent, to believe it cannot happen here.

That is certainly true in Pakistan. Nevertheless, all signs indicate that the professional and disciplined Pakistani military establishment that maintains control over the nuclear arsenal understands the dangers of a breakdown in nuclear security. Senior Pakistani military officers have consistently expressed a high degree of confidence that they are prepared to counter a range of plausible threats in this regard.

These officers have a lot to worry about, notwithstanding high-level reassurances from Pakistani authorities that everything is under control. Three worrisome trends are exerting mounting pressure on the Pakistani military's ability to secure its nuclear assets and prevent a nuclear catastrophe. First, growing extremism in Pakistan increases the odds of insiders in the nuclear establishment collaborating with outsiders to access weapons, materials, or facilities. Second, the rapid expansion of Pakistan's nuclear weapons program will introduce new vulnerabilities into the security system. Finally, growing instability within the country could lead to unanticipated challenges to nuclear command and control procedures, resulting in a "loose nuke" scenario, a takeover of a facility by outsiders, or, in the worst case, a coup leading to Taliban control over the nuclear arsenal.

Collaboration Scenarios

The greatest threat of a loose nuke scenario stems from insiders in the nuclear establishment working with outsiders, people seeking a bomb or material to make a bomb. Nowhere in the world is this threat greater than in Pakistan. Pakistani authorities have a dismal track record in thwarting insider threats. For example, the network run by the father of the Pakistani bomb, Abdul Qadeer Khan, channeled sensitive nuclear technologies to Iran, Libya, and North Korea for years under the noses of the establishment before it was taken down in 2003, to the best of our knowledge.[9] The Umma-Tameer-e-Nau (UTN), founded by Pakistani nuclear scientists with close ties to al Qaeda and the Taliban, was headed by Sultan Bashiruddin Mahmood, who had been in charge of Pakistan's Khushab reactor.[10] He discussed al Qaeda's nuclear aspirations with bin Laden. According to Mahmood, bin Laden asked him how he could construct a bomb if the group already had the material.[11] It is stunning to consider that two of the founding fathers of Pakistan's weapons program embarked independently on clandestine efforts to organize networks to sell their country's most precious secrets for profit.

Although the UTN network apparently was neutralized before it had a chance to fulfill al Qaeda's long-held aspirations to obtain what bin Laden has called a "Hiroshima bomb," this was the first known case in which a "WMD for hire" network had been created specifically to provide weapons of mass destruction to terrorist and extremist groups. In this context, members of the UTN group represented the broad set of scientific- and engineering-related capabilities necessary to construct an improvised nuclear device. They had an international reach. Most importantly, some prominent members of the group had once held positions in the Pakistani establishment and had connections to people on the inside with access to nuclear materials. It is not certain that this group had the wherewithal to have succeeded in its desire to enable al Qaeda's quest for a bomb, but it is encouraging that resolute Pakistani and U.S. follow-up action apparently nipped in the bud a potentially serious threat.[12]

There are troubling indications that these insider threats are not anomalies. In the Khan and UTN cases, the rogue senior officers and their cohorts in the nuclear establishment were not caught by Pakistan's security establishment. It would be foolhardy to assume that such lapses could not happen again. The Pakistani military, intelligence, and nuclear establishments are not immune to rising levels of extremism in the country. There is a lethal proximity between terrorists, extremists, and nuclear weapons insiders. Insiders have facilitated terrorist attacks.[13] Suicide bombings have occurred at air force bases that reportedly serve as nuclear weapons storage sites.[14] It is difficult to ignore such trends. Purely in actuarial terms, there is a strong possibility that bad apples in the nuclear establishment are willing to cooperate with outsiders for personal gain or out of sympathy for their cause.

Relying on Secrecy

Pakistani authorities certainly recognize the gravity of this problem. One of the ways they are coping is to emphasize secrecy and clandestinity over the more visible manifestations of nuclear security. The U.S. and Russian model of nuclear security relies on redundant layers of high walls, gates, and guards at sites in order to produce a highly visible image of impenetrability that will deter those seeking to gain access to them. Essentially, Pakistan has sacrificed some of the advantages of the traditional approach to security in favor of reducing unique vulnerabilities and threats arising from the circumstances in which it finds itself.

The thrust of the Pakistani military's strategy is to reduce its vulnerability to a nuclear security incident by systematically denying outsiders opportunities to gain illicit access to nuclear weapons. Consequently, the nuclear establishment is distributed geographically: Materials processing and weapons production facilities are consolidated in sites near Islamabad in areas under tight government control. Special nuclear material is reportedly stored apart from the weapons themselves. Warheads are reportedly stored separately from delivery systems.[15]

Another precaution taken by the Pakistani military is to maintain strict secrecy over the location of storage sites and to transport and deploy weapons clandestinely rather than in convoys that have a stronger, highly visible security profile. These security precautions produce fewer visible signs of movements, thereby lowering the risks associated with possible theft of or attack on weapons at their most vulnerable point, in transit.[16]

Paradoxically, this dependence on secrecy over physical security could backfire in the event a malicious insider gained access to locations of weapons storage sites, transportation routes, and similar insider information, especially because more moving parts are involved in assembling weapons when they are being deployed. In such a case, there would be fewer barriers between an outside group and the bomb.

The emphasis on maintaining clandestinity and secrecy in nuclear activity may hold other unintended consequences. For instance, Pakistan's development of indigenous weapons-use controls-permissive action links (PALs)-for partially disassembled weapons systems is more challenging than for PALs built into a fully integrated weapons system.[17] Moreover, although unpredictability in nuclear-related movements and activity is good from the standpoint of frustrating would-be attackers, it could conceivably increase the chances of a dangerous miscalculation of Pakistan's actions by India, especially in a crisis in which Pakistan's archrival interpreted a nuclear terrorist incident as a threat against its security.

Another trend that militates against achieving perfect nuclear security is the rapid expansion of the Pakistani nuclear program. Pakistan's nuclear arsenal roughly doubled from 1998 to today's total of a hundred weapons, in round numbers.[18] In the coming years, as new plutonium-production capacity at the Khushab site comes online, the total number of nuclear weapons could increase dramatically.[19] Using plutonium as the nuclear-explosive material also would allow Pakistan to build smaller nuclear weapons.

The expansion of the nuclear weapons program will mean more material, more construction of facilities for processing material and manufacturing weapons and delivery systems, and more demands for waste storage and transportation. More of everything means more vulnerabilities, more places for something to go wrong.

Finally, Pakistan's expanding nuclear program and the insider threat that accompanies it is taking place in the context of the broader trend of increasing instability in the country. In terms of assigning probabilities to a potential nuclear meltdown, the most likely scenario that Pakistan may confront is not a loss of control over one of its nuclear weapons, although that risk certainly must be addressed. Rather, threats are more likely to emerge from the increasing number of potential pathways to a bomb, specifically, the increasing threats posed by a slow hemorrhaging over time of technology, design, and construction knowledge and materials that might ultimately cross the threshold and produce a terrorist bomb. This phenomenon is more complicated and subtle and more difficult to counter than the scary, well-hyped scenarios involving loose nukes stolen by terrorists from a storage site or in transit.

Rising Risks

Unfortunately, there is growing rationale and shared motivation for insiders and outsiders to cooperate out of shared hatred toward the United States. This kind of externally directed hostility may not be readily recognized in its formative stages by those guarding the nuclear weapons arsenal, because these threats are not being directed against the Pakistani government. Countering such insidious trends will require not only a strengthening of defenses, but also a weakening of the threats, the sources of anti-U.S. antipathy that contributes to the possibility that al Qaeda will be able to convince an insider to help its cause. In terms of assessing any spike in these risks, the overall direction of pro-Taliban and anti-Taliban sentiment in the country should be closely watched.

The National Command Authority (NCA) that controls the use of nuclear weapons remains under the tight reins of the Pakistani military, not the civilian leadership. It is not obvious how effectively the military might respond to unprecedented challenges to its nuclear command and control procedures. The bifurcation of civilian and military roles seems to have been left deliberately ambiguous under the NCA; certain responsibilities that nominally have been given to the civilian leadership may be carried out by the military. The potential discrepancy between constitutional authorities and actual execution of those authorities raises the risks of uncertainty and confusion in a crisis. For example, the Pakistan civilian leadership, especially if a more extreme government assumed power, might issue orders or make statements concerning the status and control of nuclear forces contradicting those made by the Pakistani military commander-in-chief.[20]

Confusing and chaotic conditions would likely accompany a deterioration of the general security situation in Pakistan. One can only imagine how difficult it might be for the military to respond effectively to an unanticipated challenge to command and control communications that results from a surging Taliban offensive. Worse yet would be the potential uncertainties caused by an extremist bid to seize power. In such cases, some elements of the military's loyalties might be divided, even in the event that overall control over nuclear forces continues to be assured. By way of example, if a colonel in charge of hundreds of troops decided to take over a nuclear weapons site, would the military be able to resolve such a situation in a way that did not lead to catastrophe?

It is not likely that the Pakistani military and nuclear security establishment can fully consider all such challenges to its authority in advance or, even if it can, that such scenarios would unfold precisely as anticipated. For example, how would the military be able to respond to a breakdown of security involving a loose nuke, an ambushed convoy, or a takeover of a nuclear facility? Even if the military managed to resolve any threats on the ground immediately, there are questions concerning the military and civilian roles in the NCA that are not well understood outside Pakistan or perhaps even within the country. It is possible that, in extreme circumstances, the Pakistani government would be hard-pressed to reassure the outside world, especially India, that all its nuclear assets are under the full and authoritative control of the military.

Fortunately, it appears that the odds of such a security breakdown are very low, at least from an assessment based on the current realities of the security situation in Pakistan. The authorities appear to be serious about countering Taliban advances in the country. That is vital because ensuring continued stability and law and order is the most important factor in averting the possibility of a nuclear catastrophe. As Pakistan moves forward to face an uncertain future, the government faces an ongoing challenge to its authority and myriad threats against which it must defend. With the passage of time, the odds steadily increase that Pakistan will face a serious test of its nuclear security.

For its part, the United States must be fully prepared to respond to this eventuality. The United States should continue to do all it can to assist Pakistan in upgrading its nuclear security. U.S. government assistance to Pakistan has been a wise investment, even without full transparency into the expenditure of funds. The United States should be satisfied that anything that helps upgrade Pakistan's nuclear security is an investment in its own security. No country, including Pakistan, can be expected to risk exposing the details of its nuclear security posture and readiness to another country. Most importantly, U.S. assistance has improved bilateral nuclear ties between Washington and Islamabad, engendered trust, established more reliable lines of communication, and enhanced the possibility of more effective consultation and coordination in a crisis.[21]

Pakistan and the United States should be prepared to take cooperation one level higher. Both countries should consider unprecedented ways to address the more extreme contingencies on a cooperative basis to the extent that such action is feasible and realistic. In the interest of bridging gaps in nuclear security planning, senior-level officials should use existing channels of communication to discuss, behind closed doors, their specific concerns, including various security vulnerabilities that may emerge. Having such a dialogue early on, before an incident occurs, might help lower the risks of either side making a serious misstep based on miscalculations arising from inadequate information, misplaced assumptions, or the sensitivities that inevitably accompany nuclear-related decision-making. In addition, Pakistan should receive high-level reassurances concerning U.S. nonintervention in a crisis, possible means of assistance, and so on. Moreover, senior officials in both countries should agree to pursue specific joint actions and special communications mechanisms to be activated during a crisis, such as responses to a stolen or missing nuclear weapon or takeover of a nuclear facility.

Finally, increasing the level of transparency and predictability between India and Pakistan is absolutely vital. Neither party can afford to make a miscalculation in the heat of the moment that might escalate into a nuclear confrontation.


Rolf Mowatt-Larssen is a senior fellow at Harvard University's Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs. Until January 2009, he headed the U.S. Department of Energy's intelligence and counterintelligence office and before that served as a CIA officer for 23 years in various domestic and international posts.


ENDNOTES

1. Council on Foreign Relations, "Loose Nukes," Backgrounder, January 2006, www.cfr.org/publication/9549/#3.

2. Zachary Hosford, "Congress, Pentagon Probe Nuke Overflight," Arms Control Today, October 2007, p. 48.

3. John Barry, "How to Fight Al-Qaeda Now: An Ex-CIA Analyst Talks About the Terrorists' Power and Their Vulnerabilities," Newsweek, October 27, 2008, www.newsweek.com/id/165952.

4. Michael Levi, Testimony before the Senate Subcommittee on Terrorism, Technology, and Homeland Security, July 27, 2006, www.cfr.org/publication/1116.

5. Rahimullah Yusufzai, "Conversations With Terror," TIME, January 11, 1999, www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,174550,00.html.

6. Hamid Mir, "Osama Claims He Has Nukes: If US Uses N-arms It Will Get Same Response," Dawn, November 10, 2001, www.dawn.com/2001/11/10/top1.htm.

7. Steven Aoki, "Testimony on H.R. 2631, the Nuclear Forensics and Attribution Act," Washington, D.C., October 10, 2007 (testimony before the House Committee on Homeland Security).

8. "Tennessee: Plea Deal in Nuclear Case," Associated Press, January 27, 2009.

9. John Lancaster and Kamran Khan, "Musharraf Named in Nuclear Probe; Senior Pakistani Army Officers Were Aware of Technology Transfers, Scientist Says," The Washington Post, February 3, 2004, p. A13.

10. Dennis Overbye and James Glanz, "Pakistani Atomic Expert, Arrested Last Week, Had Strong Pro-Taliban Views," The New York Times, November 2, 2001, www.nytimes.com/2001/11/02/world/nation-challenged-nuclear-fears-pakistani-atomic-expert-arrested-last-week-had.html?pagewanted=all.

11. George Tenet, At the Center of the Storm: My Years at the CIA (New York: Harper Collins, 2007), pp. 264, 268.

12. Steve Coll, "What Bin Laden Sees in Hiroshima," The Washington Post, February 6, 2005, p. B1.

13. Omar Waraich, "Cricket Attack: Suspicions Grow That Ambush Was an 'Inside Job,'" The Huffington Post, March 5, 2009, www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/03/05/cricket-attack-suspicions_n_172281.html.

14. Bill Roggio, "Suicide Attack at Pakistani Nuclear Weapons Complex," The Long War Journal, December 10, 2007, www.longwarjournal.org/archives/2007/12/suicide_attack_at_pa.php.

15. Steven Mufson, "U.S. Worries About Pakistan Nuclear Arms," The Washington Post, November 4, 2001, p. A27.

16. Chaim Braun, Pakistan's Nuclear Future: Worries Beyond War, ed. Henry D. Sokolski (Carlisle Barracks, PA : Strategic Studies Institute, U.S. Army War College, 2008), pp. 261-262.

17. Gordon Correra, "How Secure Is Pakistan's Bomb?" BBC News, February 4, 2008, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/7225175.stm.

18. Heather Maher, "Expert Says Pakistan Improving Quality of Nuclear Arsenal," Radio Free Liberty Radio Europe, www.rferl.org/content/Expert_Says_Pakistan_Improving_Quality_Of_Nuclear_Arsenal/1736019.html.

19. Ibid.

20. Mark Thompson, "Does Pakistan's Taliban Surge Raise a Nuclear Threat?" TIME, April 24, 2009, www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1893685,00.html.

21. Bryan Bender, "Pakistan, U.S. in Talks on Nuclear Security," The Boston Globe, May 5, 2009, www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2009/05/05/pakistan_us_in_talks_on_nuclear_security.

 

Today's frightening instability in Pakistan comes in a world in which global terrorists are actively seeking nuclear weapons and the materials and expertise needed to make them, a quest that has been underway for more than a decade. Rapid action is needed to keep the Taliban's advances in Pakistan from creating new opportunities for these deadly adversaries. (Continue)

Editor's Note

Elisabeth Erickson and Daniel Horner

The security of Pakistan's nuclear weapons and infrastructure has been the subject of much coverage and debate in recent months as Pakistani government forces have stepped up their fight against insurgents. In this month's issue, two leading experts offer detailed analyses of the risks and possible policy responses.

According to Rolf Mowatt-Larssen, growing extremism, an expanding nuclear portfolio, and continuing instability challenge Pakistan's ability to protect its nuclear arsenal. He warns in particular against the slow leak of nuclear expertise and materials to nonstate actors.

Feroz Hassan Khan also sees "insider-outsider collusion" as a valid concern, but he emphasizes institutional changes that Pakistan has made to respond to that threat. A potentially much greater threat comes from flawed assumptions and rhetorical excesses, which could lead both Pakistan and the United States down the wrong path, he says.

Neither of the two authors saw the piece the other was writing, but they respond to each other on numerous points, disagreeing in some cases and agreeing in others. The two articles offer a valuable guide to analysts and policymakers navigating a delicate topic that has enormous implications for regional and global security.

Elsewhere in the issue, Hui Zhang addresses another thorny question in Asia as he looks at North Korea's nuclear weapons program and calls for more vigorous efforts by China to end it. He lays out a detailed road map for North Korea and other countries to follow. He argues that China could and should work with North Korea and the United States to pursue such a strategy.

In his "Looking Back" article, Greg Thielmann reflects on the National Missile Defense Act of 1999. He examines the circumstances leading up to it and the impact the legislation has had since its passage. As Eben Lindsey's news article on the Missile Defense Agency's recent testing of the Airborne Laser system indicates, the debates Thielmann describes resonate today.

 

The security of Pakistan's nuclear weapons and infrastructure has been the subject of much coverage and debate in recent months as Pakistani government forces have stepped up their fight against insurgents. In this month's issue, two leading experts offer detailed analyses of the risks and possible policy responses. (Continue)

Toward a Nuclear Freeze in South Asia

Daryl G. Kimball

Ten years ago this month, tens of thousands of Indian and Pakistani soldiers faced off in a confrontation over the disputed Kashmir region. If not for intensive U.S.-led crisis diplomacy, that standoff and another in 2002 could have led to war between the two nuclear-armed rivals.

Since then, Indian and Pakistani nuclear and missile stockpiles have grown even larger, and the underlying conditions for conflict still persist. Indian military planners foolishly believe they can engage in and win a limited conventional conflict without triggering a nuclear exchange even though the Pakistani army's strategy relies on nuclear weapons to offset India's overwhelming conventional superiority.

Unfortunately, U.S. policymakers downplayed regional nonproliferation and risk-reduction priorities in the pursuit of other objectives. Beginning with Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton's visit to India this month, the United States should help to re-establish nuclear restraint and arms control as a top priority for the region.

Despite its struggle against extremists inside its own borders, the Pakistani army sees India as its main adversary. Pakistan is expanding its uranium-enrichment capabilities and building two new plutonium-production reactors for weapons purposes even though it already possesses enough fissile material for 60-80 bombs.

One excuse for Pakistan's ongoing buildup is the U.S.-Indian nuclear cooperation initiative. Approved last year, the deal exempts New Delhi from long-standing restrictions on civil nuclear trade in exchange for India's promise to refrain from nuclear testing and support a global ban on fissile material production for weapons, among other nonproliferation commitments. The deal gives India access to global nuclear fuel markets, freeing up its limited domestic uranium supplies for use exclusively in weapons production. India has enough fissile material for well more than 100 bombs.

India and Pakistan each claim to want only a "minimal credible deterrent," but the end of their nuclear and missile buildup is not in sight. Indian and Pakistani support for negotiations on a global fissile material cutoff treaty (FMCT) is weak at best.

Ambassador Nirupama Rao said May 29 that New Delhi would allow multilateral talks to begin but would "not accept obligations" that hinder India's "strategic program" or research and development or those that "place an undue burden on our military nonproscribed activities." That, of course, is the very purpose of an FMCT.

Nor have the two states moved closer to a legally binding test ban since Washington persuaded them to declare testing moratoria in 1999. In recent months, Pakistani and Indian officials have said they have no plans to join the United States and China as signatories to the 1996 Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT).

Given the billions of dollars of U.S. military aid flowing into Pakistan and India's commitments made in the context of the nuclear cooperation deal, the Obama administration can and should use its leverage to put the brakes on their nuclear arms race. As Clinton suggested in a June 20 speech, the nuclear deal "can and should also serve as the foundation of a productive partnership on nonproliferation."

For his part, Indian Foreign Secretary Shivshankar Menon said June 3 that India would "welcome real action toward nuclear disarmament" and "will work with our partners internationally towards that objective." Now that President Barack Obama has jump-started global disarmament efforts and pledged to engage other states in the effort, India and Pakistan must do their part by embracing rather than rejecting commonsense nuclear arms control strategies.

A good starting point would be for India to invite Pakistan and China to halt fissile production for weapons pending the conclusion of a global FMCT. India, which has more than enough separated fissile material to maintain a large nuclear deterrent force, would win wide international acclaim for the proposal and remove the rationale for Pakistan's fissile buildup.

The Obama administration can nudge New Delhi along by strictly adhering to a key provision of the implementing legislation for the nuclear cooperation deal. That provision requires a report to Congress by the end of this year and each year thereafter that assesses whether India has or has not increased unsafeguarded fissile material production.

Clinton should not hesitate to put the CTBT back on the U.S.-Indian bilateral agenda. She should urge her Indian counterparts to reiterate Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee's 1998 commitment that India would not be among the last states standing in the way of the treaty's entry into force.

New Delhi is clearly not yet ready to sign the CTBT, but it is not in its strategic interests to resume nuclear testing. As then-Sen. Obama (D-Ill.) said on the floor of the Senate on November 16, 2006, "[I]n the event of a future nuclear test by the Government of India, nuclear power reactor fuel and equipment sales, and nuclear technology cooperation would terminate."

It may be difficult for the Obama team to nudge India and Pakistan toward greater nuclear restraint, but failure to bring about change risks the most severe nuclear proliferation consequences in the years ahead.

 

Ten years ago this month, tens of thousands of Indian and Pakistani soldiers faced off in a confrontation over the disputed Kashmir region. If not for intensive U.S.-led crisis diplomacy, that standoff and another in 2002 could have led to war between the two nuclear-armed rivals.

Since then, Indian and Pakistani nuclear and missile stockpiles have grown even larger, and the underlying conditions for conflict still persist. Indian military planners foolishly believe they can engage in and win a limited conventional conflict without triggering a nuclear exchange even though the Pakistani army's strategy relies on nuclear weapons to offset India's overwhelming conventional superiority. (Continue)

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