North and South Korea Exchange Artillery Fire

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

Stories we're following today, Tuesday, November 23, 2010:

North and South Korea Exchange Fire, Killing Two – Mark McDonald in The New York Times [link]

• North and South Korea exchanged artillery fire on Tuesday after dozens of shells fired from the North struck a South Korean island near the countries’ disputed maritime border, South Korean military officials said. Two South Korean soldiers were killed, 15 were wounded and three civilians were injured, said Kiyheon Kwon, an official at the Defense Ministry.
• The South Korean military went to “crisis status,” and fighter planes were put on alert but did not take off. South Korean artillery units returned fire after the North’s shells struck South Korea’s Yeonpyeong Island at 2:34 p.m., said Mr. Kwon, adding that the North also fired numerous rounds into the Yellow Sea.
• The South Korean deputy minister of defense, Lee Yong-geul, acknowledged that artillery units had been firing test shots on Tuesday afternoon close to the North Korean coast, from a battery on the South Korean island of Paeknyeongdo. But he denied Pyongyang’s charge that the shots had crossed the sea border.
• While skirmishes between the two countries have not been uncommon in recent years, the clash appeared to have been the most serious in decades and came amid heightened tensions over the North’s nuclear program.
• “We will not in any way tolerate this,” [President] Lee’s chief spokesman, Hong Sang-pyo, said after the meeting. “Any further provocation will get an immediate and strong response and the South Korean military will strongly retaliate if there is anything further.”
• The shelling also followed revelations of two new nuclear facilities in the North — a light water reactor under construction and a modern plant for enriching uranium that Pyongyang says is operational.

Gates Warns of Fallout if Russia Arms Treaty Fails - Anne Gearan of The Associated Press 

• U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates said Saturday that Russian cooperation on U.S. priorities from the Afghan war to the diplomatic squeeze on Iran is at risk if the Senate doesn't pass a new nuclear arms treaty.
• "The reality is, despite what anybody says, I as secretary of defense and the entire uniformed leadership of the American military, believe this treaty is in our national security interests."
• Gates also said lawmakers' failure to approve the pact would undermine the momentum for modernizing and overhauling the U.S. nuclear weapons program.
• The U.S. would lose the firsthand knowledge it now gets from onsite inspections in Russia, Gates said. The wider political fallout is hard to predict, he said, but could mean less Russian cooperation with overland supply routes for the war in Afghanistan.
• The Pentagon chief gave a forceful defense of the treaty against Republican complaints that it limits U.S. options for future missile defense plans. "Anything that we have in mind now or in the years to come that ... we have even thought about is not prohibited," Gates said with frustration.

Ratify the New START Treaty - Donald Kerrick for Sun-Sentinel [link]

• On Dec. 5, 2009, America lost the ability to inspect Russia's strategic nuclear arsenals. The verification regime that for 18 years shed an illuminating light on Russia's nuclear weapons program ended when the first START treaty expired.
• Now, after nearly a year in the dark, the Senate has the opportunity to turn the lights back on by ratifying the New START Treaty. The treaty must be promptly ratified for a very straightforward reason — it makes America safe. As a former director for operations for the Defense Intelligence Agency, I can say definitively that this treaty makes an enormous difference to our nation's security.
• New START is a good treaty, which is why it has overwhelming support from our nation's military. Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates and seven former STRATCOM commanders have urged the treaty be ratified.
• It takes 67 votes to ratify a treaty. Sens. George LeMieux and Bill Nelson have repeatedly shown leadership with regard to doing what's best for the security of our nation. Both senators should continue in that tradition, follow the advice of our Pentagon leadership, and ratify the New START Treaty.

Report: Nuclear Weapons Drivers Drank on the Job – Ed O’Keefe in The Washington Post [link]

• A report released Monday by the Energy Department's Office of Inspector General found 16 alcohol-related incidents between 2007 and 2009 involving personnel with the National Nuclear Security Administration's Office of Surface Transportation (OST).
• Two incidents involved extended overnight missions where OST agents parked convoy vehicles in safe harbor before checking in at nearby hotels, the report said. An agent was arrested in 2007 for public intoxication, and two agents were handcuffed and temporarily detained by police officers in 2009, according to the report.
• "Alcohol incidents such as these, as infrequent as they may be, indicate a potential vulnerability in OST's critical national security mission," the report said.
• The office requires its agents to undergo alcohol testing at least once every 12 months or when there is reasonable suspicion of alcohol use, according to the report. OST commanders ask agents during roll call whether they are fit for duty. Officers are required to tell commanders if they are not, the report said.

View From the Dark Side

The Nuclear Treaty Rush - The Wall Street Journal [link]

• Democrats lost the House and six Senate seats on November 2, but you wouldn't know it from their lame duck agenda. Majority Leader Harry Reid has told Republicans that in a mere three weeks he wants to pass a food safety bill, the immigration Dream Act, a repeal of "don't ask, don't tell" for gays in the military, a 9/11 rescue workers relief act, a spending bill for fiscal 2011, an extension of some Bush tax cuts and estate tax reform. Oh, and the New Start nuclear treaty with the Russians.
• Yet somehow Republican Jon Kyl is getting kicked around for saying he doubts there's time to ratify the arms treaty this year. Who's really playing the political games here?
• Recently, the White House has been more forthcoming, and in the last week it has promised $4.1 billion in new spending to update nuclear warheads. But that commitment needs to be signed, sealed and delivered before the treaty gets a vote. All the more so because the U.S. hasn't tested a weapon in 18 years. (The U.S. abides by the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty though the Senate hasn't ratified it.)
• The Administration also doesn't help its credibility by hinting that Senate Democrats will only cooperate on modernization if New Start is ratified.
• Missile defense is another obstacle, not least because the treaty preamble explicitly says either party can drop out if future missile defenses are developed.
• The Administration is playing the diplomatic scare card. It claims that if New Start isn't ratified in a month, Russia might retaliate and refuse to help us on Iran's nuclear program or it might block U.S. supply routes to Afghanistan.
• New Start is a relatively minor treaty that lacks the nuclear high drama of the Cold War era. Russia is no longer an adversary, its arsenal is going to shrink in any case from cost and decay, and the U.S. will have enough missiles to maintain its nuclear deterrent even under New Start. We would nonetheless probably oppose it on grounds that it furthers the illusion that arms control enhances U.S. security.

Note:  Please see "Twelve Reasons to Support New START" by the Arms Control Association, a Ploughshares Fund grantee.