U.S. Looking for Ways to Reduce the Nuclear Arsenal

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

Stories we're following today - Wednesday, March 23, 2011:

Obama Administration Reviewing Ways to Shrink Nuclear Arsenal, Drawing Republican Ire - The Associated Press [link]

• The Obama administration has begun examining whether it can make cuts to its nuclear weapons stockpiles that go beyond those outlined in a recent treaty with Russia.
• Arms control advocates say the United States is mired in Cold War-era thinking about nuclear deterrence and are pressing the administration to use the review to rethink U.S. nuclear requirements. They say the decisions will be a test of President Barack Obama’s commitment nearly two years ago to put the world on a path toward eliminating nuclear weapons.
• The review will look at issues such as what targets the U.S. would have to hit with nuclear weapons in a worst-case scenario and what kind of weapons it would need to hit them. Rethinking the requirements could open the way to cuts.
• In the letter to Obama, Republicans warned against any big reductions from those outlined in the New START treaty, ratified by the Senate and the Russian Duma in recent months.
• There is no indication that the Obama administration is considering drastic cuts as a result of the review. But the study could shape talks it has proposed with Russia on weapons not covered by the New START treaty. The administration wants to focus on stored nuclear weapons and those intended for short-range delivery, known as tactical nuclear weapons. But negotiations with Russia also could lead to further reductions in deployed long-range nuclear weapons.
• Disarmament advocates who follow administration thinking on nuclear issues say the document is unlikely to lead quickly to sharp cuts. “For better or worse, it’s not in the cards,” says Daryl Kimball, head of the Arms Control Association, which advocates nuclear disarmament.
• “We shouldn’t have to dump 60 hydrogen bombs on Odessa to ensure U.S. nuclear security,” says Joseph Cirincione, president of the Ploughshares Fund, which advocates the elimination of nuclear weapons. “This review will determine whether the president is serious about moving toward deep reductions and the elimination of nuclear weapons or if he is giving up on that vision.”

Tokyo Issues Tap Water Warning for Infants - David Jolly and Kevin Drew in The New York Times [link]

• Radioactive iodine detected in the capital’s water supply spurred a warning for infants on Wednesday as the government issued a stark new estimate about the costs of rebuilding from the earthquake and tsunami that slammed into the northeast of Japan this month.
• Ei Yoshida, head of water purification for the Tokyo water department, said at a televised news conference that infants in Tokyo and surrounding areas should not drink tap water.
• He said iodine-131 had been detected in water samples at a level of 210 becquerels per liter, about a quart. The recommended limit for infants is 100 becquerels per liter. For adults, the recommended limit is 300 becquerels.
• “It’s unfortunate, but the radiation is clearly being carried on the air from the Fukushima plant,” said Yukio Edano, the chief cabinet secretary. “Because it’s raining, it’s possible that a lot of places will be affected. Even if people consume the water a few times, there should be no long-term ill effects.”
• The government found radioactive materials at levels exceeding legal limits in 11 vegetables in Fukushima Prefecture, the Kyodo news agency reported. Shipments of the affected vegetables from Fukushima Prefecture ended on Monday.
• Officials said earlier Wednesday that they hoped to have the cooling pumps at the No. 3 and No. 4 units operating by as early as Thursday. They had been planning to test Reactor No. 3’s cooling system later Wednesday. That reactor is considered one of the most dangerous because of its fuel — mixed oxides, or mox, which contains a mixture of uranium and plutonium and can produce a more dangerous radioactive plume if scattered by fire or explosions.
• Rebuilding after the 9.0-magnitude quake and tsunami, which ravaged the northeastern coast of the main Japanese island of Honshu, will cost up to $309 billion, Mr. Kan’s office said on Wednesday.
• The broadcaster NHK reported on Wednesday that the official death toll from the disaster had been raised to more than 9,400 with more than 14,700 people missing, although officials said there could be overlap between the figures.
  

Nuke Details Swapped Under U.S.-Russian Pact - Global Security Newswire [link]

• Russia and the United States in recent days started swapping data on their strategic nuclear arsenal assets in compliance with a bilateral arms control treaty that took effect last month.
• "With entry into force of [New START], we have begun implementing an extensive regime of mutual monitoring and information exchange," U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Rose Gottemoeller said.
• "Our Nuclear Risk Reduction Center transmitted the U.S. database to Russia over this past weekend. Such information includes data on the parties' missiles, launchers, heavy bombers, and warheads subject to the treaty," Gottemoeller said.
• The pact also allows both sides to conduct a number of audits of the other nation's nuclear weapons facilities each year. Such visits could begin as soon as April 6, 60 days after the pact took effect on February 5, Gottemoeller said.
• "Moving missile defense from a negative to a positive factor in our relationship could facilitate cooperation in other areas as well, including talks on further reductions in strategic, nonstrategic and nondeployed nuclear weapons (see related GSN story, today). But reaching any agreement will not be easy and it will take time," [Undersecretary of State Ellen] Tauscher said.

New START Data Exchange: Will it Increase or Decrease International Nuclear Transparency? - Kans Kristensen for The Federation of American Scientists’ “Strategic Security” blog [link]

• The first data exchange of the New START treaty between the United States and Russia has taken place, according to a report by RIA Novosti.
• But while the exchanges will increase U.S-Russia nuclear transparency, the rest of the world may be facing a future with less information about U.S. and Russian strategic nuclear forces than in the past.
• “All exchanges are classified and will not be subject to release,” a U.S. official told me. “There may be some information on very general numbers under the Treaty that could be made public, but that is still to be determined, and will not occur for a least six months if it occurs at all.”
• The New START treaty is widely seen as a first step in a process that seeks to involve other nuclear weapon states in future nuclear arms control negotiations. As such, it is important that the United States and Russia continue to make detailed information on the status of their nuclear forces available to the international community.
• At the very least, this should include the aggregate numbers – including breakdown by individual nuclear weapon systems. But it should also continue the practice of releasing the full unclassified MOUs to increase international transparency and predictability in nuclear forces. Doing anything else would be a step back that could create mistrust and undercut a broadening of the nuclear arms control progress to other nuclear weapon states.

Nuclear Power Loses Support in New Poll - Michael Cooper in The New York Times[link]

• What had been growing acceptance of nuclear power in the United States has eroded sharply in the wake of the nuclear crisis in Japan, with support for building nuclear power plants dropping slightly lower than it was immediately after the accident at the Three Mile Island plant in 1979, according to a CBS News poll released on Tuesday evening.
• Only 43 percent of those polled after the failure of the Fukushima Daiichi plant in Japan said they would approve building such new facilities in the United States to generate electricity. That is a steep decline from the 57 percent who said in 2008 that they approved of new plants.
• The new poll found that nearly 7 in 10 Americans think that nuclear power plants in the United States are generally safe. But nearly two-thirds of those polled said they were concerned that a major nuclear accident might occur in this country — including 3 in 10 who said they were “very concerned” by such a possibility. Fifty-eight percent of those polled said they did not think the federal government was adequately prepared to deal with a major nuclear accident.
• Finding places to build new plants could also prove difficult: more than 6 in 10 of those polled said they would not approve of a nuclear plant in their community.
• There was also a gender divide: while a majority of men said they approved of new nuclear plants, most women disapproved.

UN Committee Encouraged that More Countries Reporting Possible Arms Export Violations by Iran - Anita Snow for The Associated Press [link]

• Members of the U.N. Security Council committee that monitors sanctions aimed at preventing Iran from developing nuclear weapons said Tuesday they're pleased that more countries are reporting possible Iranian arms export violations.
• Colombian Ambassador Nestor Osorio, who heads the committee, said in the group's quarterly report that such readiness to report possible violations in their territories "is positive and should be encouraged."
• U.S. Deputy Ambassador Rosemary DiCarlo told the group that recent reports of other potential violations, including Iran's possible export of weapons seized by Israel last week, "underline the continuing need for a high level of vigilance on the part of all member states."
• srael believes Iran was trying to send the weapons to Palestinian militants in Gaza the weapons. The shipment included sophisticated Chinese-made land-to-sea missiles that Israeli officials said could change the balance of power in the area.
• DiCarlo also mentioned Nigeria's "excellent example of enforcing these measures" in recently seizing an Iranian shipment of arms and related materiel in the African country.