Lines Drawn, Leadership Needed on Nuclear Posture Review

More Nukes? - The Atlantic [link]

• Some administration officials say that a clash between the State Department and the Department of Defense is inevitable, and that presidential leadership will be needed to bridge the philosophical chasms that divide the two bureaucracies.
• Daryl Kimball, president of the Arms Control Association of Washington, urged the president and his Cabinet to step up -- and quickly. [Note: ACA is a Ploughshares Fund grantee.]
• On September 24, Obama will address the United Nations and chair a meeting of the Security Council on proliferation. Some in the arms control community hope that Obama will use the speech to declare that the United States would never use a nuclear weapon to attack a country that doesn't possess the capability. Doing so would immediately shift the tone and tenor of the NPR, which the administration officially must submit early next year.

North Korea Reports Advances in Enriching Uranium – The New York Times [link]

• North Korea declared Friday that it was in the “concluding stage” of tests to enrich uranium.
• No details were offered, and the use of the word “tests” suggests that the country may only be experimenting and has not yet undertaken the huge expense required to install the thousands of centrifuges necessary to produce enough uranium for a nuclear weapon.
• If the North Koreans have only recently conducted tests in uranium enrichment, as their letter stated, it may suggest that the program has been in abeyance and has been resumed for negotiating purposes. The North may also now see enrichment as a cheaper alternative to restarting decrepit nuclear reactors to produce plutonium.

Obama Keeps Head of Nuclear Weapons Program – ScienceInsider [link]

• The Obama Administration announced today that it will retain Thomas D'Agostino as head of the U.S. nuclear weapons complex.
• The decision was met with dismay by many in the arms control and non-proliferation community, who fear that it will be harder to implement the soaring vision for a nuclear-free future that President Obama has articulated while retaining key figures from a Bush Administration that supported expansion of the country's nuclear arsenal.
• Sources tell ScienceInsider that several prominent scientists and nuclear policy heavyweights rejected the Administration's overtures, and that other candidates were thought to carry too much political baggage to be confirmed by the Senate.

A View from the Dark Side

U.S. Rethinks Nuclear – Aviation Week [link]

• The Obama administration's Quadrennial Defense Review and a parallel review of U.S. nuclear posture could give the go-ahead to two long-debated programs: a next-generation missile-launching submarine (SSBN) and a new nuclear warhead.
• If so, it will be a relief to nuclear insiders who worry that the topic of deterrence has been ignored for too long in the U.S., while nations like France, the U.K., Russia and China outpace U.S. modernization plans.