Lugar Sees "Large Majority" of Republicans Backing New START

Today's top nuclear policy stories, with excerpts in bullet form.

Stories we're following today: Monday August 30, 2010

Lugar: 'Large majority' of Republicans Will End up Backing the START Treaty - The Hill [link]

• Sen. Richard Lugar, the ranking Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, predicted Friday that a "large majority" of members in his party will back a key nuclear arms reduction treaty with Russia and that it will be ratified.
• The Indiana Republican predicted that the treaty pass his committee in mid-September and will come up for a vote in the lame-duck session after the November elections.
• The veteran senator acknowledged that some in his party are using the ratification process to gain commitments from the Obama administration to modernize the country's existing nuclear facilities.
• "No I'm not predicting anything" said Lugar when asked if it will pass by the end of this year, "beyond the fact that I think we will get to the floor and we'll have a chance to vote upon it, debate it in the lame-duck session."

Let National Security, Not Politics, Guide Decision on START - John Castellaw, Dirk Jameson, & John Adams in the Nashua Telgraph [link]

• As those whose career has been dedicated to our nation’s defense...we take very seriously the idea that national security should be above political partisanship.
• Unfortunately, there has been an increasing push to make the treaty...into a political issue. Senators should resist that push, stick to the facts and ratify the treaty.
• The New START Treaty will make our country safer by implementing a new dedicated verification regime that will allow U.S. inspectors to monitor Russia’s nuclear arsenal, it will allow our own forces to plan and resource for the weapons we need for the 21st century, and it will allow us to move forward to deal with further proliferation issues and tactical nuclear weapons.
• We hope Sen. Judd Gregg, R-N.H., who has not yet indicated how he will vote, and Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, D-N.H., who has spoken out in favor of the treaty, will not be swayed by those who would attempt to put politics before national security and that they heed the advice of our nation’s military leadership and the collective wisdom of security experts from Republican and Democratic administrations.
• We hope they will vote in favor of the ratification of the New START Treaty.
• Lt. Gen. John Castellaw, Lt. Gen. Dirk Jameson and Brig. Gen. John Adams are members of the Consensus for American Security, a nonpartisan group of security experts committed to speak out on the most critical nuclear security threats facing Americans today and what we will face tomorrow.

New START Treaty Must Maintain Nuclear Capabilities - Sen. Bob Corker (R-TN) in the Knoxville News Sentinel [link]

• My focus through the ratification process for the New START treaty has been to ensure that if we reduce our strategic nuclear stockpiles over the next several years, the treaty does not inhibit our ability to maintain and continue to improve a robust missile defense system and that we ensure our country's remaining weapons are safe, secure and reliable.
• A recent column in the Knoxville News Sentinel mischaracterized my role in the Senate's consideration of the treaty, and I would like to set the record straight.
• Reduction of our country's nuclear arms must go hand-in-hand with ensuring the nuclear force we have is fully operational. Before a treaty can be ratified, we must ensure there are appropriate commitments to fully invest in the rehabilitation of the warheads and their components…Tennessee is playing a critical role in this process. Planning is already underway for the construction of the Uranium Processing Facility (UPF) at Y-12.
• It is my sincere hope to be able to support this treaty. To get there, we need to invest in modernization of the remaining arsenal, guarantee that there are no limits on our ability to engage in missile defense and make sure there is appropriate verification of Russia's commitments under the treaty.
• If these objectives are met, in conjunction with the prescribed reductions under this treaty, we will be more secure as a country.

At Our Peril - David Shribman in The Boston Globe [link]

• Richard Rhodes, a Pulitzer-winning historian, has made a career since 1979 of writing about how the bomb was built, refined, and delivered and how atomic war was conceived, conducted, and avoided.
• We can only hope that “The Twilight of the Bombs,’’ Rhodes’s survey of nuclear history, will be the last volume in his four-part series. Indeed, if the world listens, it might be.
• Eventually, Rhodes believes, terrorist threats — among other factors — will lead the nuclear nations to understand that strict control of plutonium and highly enriched uranium is essential, and that nuclear disarmament is logical. “The world," he says, “faces a stark choice: eliminate nuclear weapons and secure their fissile explosives or expect them to be used."
• In an unusual alchemy of physics and politics, Rhodes explains both the science and the culture of the nuclear age. He does so with the wisdom of the historian and the morality of the ages.

U.S. Considers Possibility of Engaging North Korea - New York Times [link]

• This week, Kim Jong-Il chose to go to China during a visit by former President Jimmy Carter to free another jailed American.
• Whatever the motivation for Mr. Kim’s snub, analysts said it underscored the deep freeze between North Korea and the United States.
• At a high-level meeting last week on North Korea, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton solicited ideas from outside experts and former officials about the next steps in policy toward the North. The consensus, even among the hawks, was that the United States needed to resume some form of contact with Mr. Kim, according to several people who took part.
• “The question is, what are we going to do now?” said Joel S. Wit, a former State Department negotiator with North Korea. “The answer is re-engagement. There aren’t any other tools in the toolbox.”