Morning Joe: Gottemoeller on the Long Road From Prague

Stories we're following today:

The Long Road From Prague - Remarks by Assistant Secretary of State Rose Gottemoeller [link]

• We are under no illusions that we will be without challenge in aligning our nuclear posture for the 21st century in a way that simultaneously reinforces peace and security while reducing the salience of nuclear weapons worldwide. Achieving this end state requires creative transformational thinking, persistence, the assembly of a skilled workforce, and the marshalling of critical infrastructure.
• While we made enormous progress reducing the number of weapons, there remains much more we must do towards fulfilling the President’s increasingly broadly shared vision of “the peace and security of a world without nuclear weapons.”

Developing Story: Iran Envoy Disputes Iranian State TV Reports he Offered New Nuclear Dialogue - The Cable [link]

• Iranian state television first reported that Iran's ambassador to the UN nuclear watchdog agency in Vienna said that Iran is ready to talk with Western powers about its nuclear program without preconditions and based on mutual respect, before reporting that the ambassador said he was quoting from an Iranian letter to the United Nations, wire reports said Tuesday.

S. Korean Launch Raises Questions - Washington Post [link]

• A successful launch from an island off South Korea's southwestern coast will add that country to an elite club of nine nations that have demonstrated the capability to orbit a satellite and -- if they choose -- to conduct long-range missile strikes against an enemy. But it will probably not attract the same kind of international criticism heaped on North Korea when it recently attempted a similar launch.

Nuclear Power, Disarmament and Technological Restraint - Carnegie's James Acton in Survival [link]

• There is much that advanced nuclear states can do to steer others away from those technologies and pave the way for a ban. In particular, by desisting from the most sensitive technologies, trading in less sensitive technologies and facilitating the take back of spent nuclear fuel, even a small number of advanced nuclear states can shape the nuclear renaissance into a form that can help reconcile nuclear energy with nuclear disarmament.