Excessive Spending on Last Century’s Strategy

On the radar: Time to trim nuclear spending; Mousavian on practical solutions to the Iran standoff; Sen. Kyl in WSJ; Pillar knocks down dominoes myth; Progress since 1999; IAEA and North Korea; and Small steps towards a deal with Iran.

April 3, 2012 | Edited by Benjamin Loehrke and Mary Kaszynski

Smarter spending - “Many tax dollars going into this enormous Pentagon budget are wasted on last century’s security strategy,” writes Susan Shaer in The Hill.

--“Expanding our production of nuclear weapons and their expensive delivery systems is at odds with our efforts to constrain nuclear weapons development elsewhere in the world. These weapons are simply irrelevant to support our troops on the battlefield or to address 21st century threats.” http://owl.li/a3f4j

Real solutions - Former Iranian diplomat Hossein Mousavian in The Boston Globe on practical steps for a deal with Iran: ”The P5+1 should offer a package that includes three major elements: 1) recognition of Iran’s inalienable rights for enrichment; 2) removal of the sanctions; and 3) normalization of Iran’s nuclear file.”

--“In return, Iran should provide full transparency to IAEA inspection as well as confidence-building measures and assurances that it will remain a non-nuclear weapon state.” http://owl.li/a3f2x

Welcome to Early Warning - Subscribe to our morning email or follow us on twitter.

--Have a tip? Email earlywarning@ploughshares.org. Want to support this work? Click here.

Event - Global Nuclear Security and Preventing Nuclear Terrorism, a panel featuring Robert Gallucci, Sharon Squassoni, Joseph Cirincione, and Alexander Glaser. Friday the 6th, 10am, at the National Press Club. RSVP here. http://owl.li/a3f1m

Breaking: Sen. Kyl does not favor reductions - In his latest op-ed in the WSJ, Sen. Jon Kyl (R-AZ) reiterated his opposition to nuclear reductions and support for missile defense spending. He concludes, “Supporting a robust nuclear deterrent and an effective missile defense is a moral obligation for all those who are entrusted with ensuring our nation's security.” http://owl.li/a3eZF

--EW editor’s note: For a different take on nuclear weapons and morality, see here: http://owl.li/a3eWH

Tweet - @nukes_of_hazard: “Sen Kyl says maintain current US arsenal of approx 5000 nukes no matter the strategic, financial or opportunity costs.”

The dominoes myth - In yesterday’s Foreign Policy Steven Cook offered one reason why an Iranian bomb wouldn’t trigger a wave of proliferation in the Middle East: none of the likely candidates has the necessary nuclear technology and infrastructure. Paul Pillar has another reason: “There simply are not a lot of useful things you can do with nukes.”

--”If we can get away from narrow, scared-chicken fixation on the supposed threat from any one possible bit of nuclear proliferation and instead let more sober calculations prevail,” Pillar adds, “the long-discussed concept of a Middle East nuclear-weapons-free zone would become feasible.” http://owl.li/a3eU4

Confidence without testing - As the Senate considered the CTBT in 1999, six former secretaries of defense wrote a letter opposing the treaty’s ratification, arguing that confidence in the U.S. nuclear stockpile would decline without testing or a mature Stockpile Stewardship program. Last week, the National Academies concluded that the U.S. is now better able to maintain its stockpile and does not need to test. David Hoffman reflects on how far we’ve come in a blog at Foreign Policy. http://owl.li/a3feB

Quote - “We are following up the invitation we received in a constructive spirit. You will appreciate that we can't simply jump on a plane and go, there are a number of technical aspects that require proper preparation,” said IAEA spokesman Greg Webb about the complexities of sending monitors to North Korea. Global Security Newswire has the story. http://owl.li/a3eSf

New talks, new chance for diplomacy - The upcoming Iran-P5+1 talks may not lead to a breakthrough, but even small steps - “something as basic as the full session breaking off for bilateral talks between Iran and the United States” - would be progress, writes Michael Adler in The Daily Beast.

--”Should we be optimistic or pessimistic at this critical point? Failed negotiations could set the clock ticking again towards hostilities. The bottom line, however, is that there is an opening that was not expected as war talk escalated just before the Netanyahu-Obama summit.” http://owl.li/a3eLa