NPR Likely to Call for Elimination of Nuclear Tomahawk Missiles

We are happy to serve you a daily summary of the day's top nuclear policy stories each morning, with excerpts from the stories in bullet form.

Stories we're following today:

U.S. to Retire Nuclear Tomahawk Missiles - Kyodo News [link]

• The United States has informally told Japan it will retire its sea-based Tomahawk cruise missiles carrying nuclear warheads, in line with President Barack Obama's policy to pursue a world free of atomic weapons, government sources said Monday.
• Washington said the move would not affect the nuclear umbrella, addressing concerns in Tokyo about the step's effect on U.S. deterrence against potential attacks from China, North Korea or other countries, the sources said.
• The retirement will probably be stipulated in the Nuclear Posture Review, a new nuclear strategic guideline the Obama administration is slated to submit to Congress next month, they said.

Revisiting Biden's Nuclear Speech - Laura Rozen in Politico [link]

• It’s “very clear to me that the President and Vice President are establishing the framework that ... ‘Yes, we want to move towards elimination of nuclear weapons,’” [Ploughshares Fund President Joe] Cirincione interpreted. “’But as long as [we still] have [them], we should maintain them at highest possible levels of safety, security and effectiveness, and we are going to move to reduce [the number of nuclear warheads] through negotiations with the Russians, we are going to ratify CTBT," the nuclear test ban treaty, "and push for a series of other measures."
• With nuclear disarmament a signature issue for Obama, the administration is hashing out the tough issues ahead of the delayed release of its Nuclear Posture Review, now expected out in late March or April.
• Disarmament hands say the review draft originally headed by the Defense Department’s Brad Roberts was too status quo on the policy issues from the administration's perspective, and is being reworked at the senior inter-agency level by Principal Deputy Undersecretary of Defense for Policy Jim Miller, officials from the office of State’s Under Secretary of State for Arms Control Ellen Tauscher, and White House and OVP nonproliferation advisors before heading to the president’s desk.
• “On content, the President and Vice President want a more ambitious disarmament and non-proliferation agenda than many people they appointed,” Cirincione said. “And in this field, no question, the President is the transformer in chief. He is driving the agenda. It’s no secret that the president has been somewhat disappointed in the pace of change on this."

US Role Vital on Path to Nuclear Security - Beth Edmonds in the Bangor Daily News [link]

• Vice President Joe Biden recently spoke at the National Defense University in Washington about the importance of nuclear nonproliferation and our nation’s nuclear deterrent. His talk is very timely, considering the impending Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty follow-on agreement with Russia, the Nuclear Posture Review in March, a nuclear security summit in April and pursuing ratification and entry into force of the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, or CTBT.
• We in Maine are connected to the future of nuclear weapons nonproliferation by the absolute importance of the support and leadership of Sens. Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins on the votes for START and CTBT that require 67 senators to vote in favor for ratification.
• In light of the policies stated by Vice President Biden and the support for non-proliferation voiced by the major players above, I hope that Sens. Snowe and Collins are attentive to a bipartisan agenda for nuclear security and vote in favor to ratify both the START follow-on and CTBT treaties.

Clinton Urges NATO Security Cooperation with Russia - Reuters [link]

• NATO must boost security cooperation with Russia and streamline operations to face new challenges -- both military and civilian -- in coming years, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said on Monday.
• Clinton said new partnerships, including with Cold War foe Russia, will help NATO to take on growing transnational threats including nuclear proliferation, terrorism, piracy and cyber security.
• "We want a cooperative NATO-Russia relationship that produces concrete results," she said.

China Encourages US, North Korea to Meet - AFP [link]

• China on Tuesday urged the United States and North Korea to step up efforts to restart stalled nuclear disarmament talks, as diplomats criss-crossed the region to try to get Pyongyang back to the table.
• The US and South Korean envoys to the six-party talks, which began in 2003 and have been on hold since the North stormed out 10 months ago, were both due in Beijing this week for meetings with their Chinese counterparts.
• China, the host of the talks and the communist North's sole major diplomatic and economic ally, said efforts by Washington and Pyongyang would be the key to success.