|
|||||
|
|||||
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|||||
 |
 |
    |
|
|
|||
 |
|
||
|
|||
|
|
|
|
||||||||
|
U.S.-Russia: Nunn Calls for Naming Threat Reduction Czars By Bryan Bender “The first step is to put our own houses in order — identifying, accounting for, and securing the weapons and materials in Russia and the United States,” Nunn said in a speech to a nonproliferation conference sponsored by the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. “Each president should appoint one high-level person, reporting directly to the president, to take full responsibility for this issue, and this issue alone.” He added, “Both presidents should pledge to complete this task at the fastest possible pace and urge other nations to do likewise.” Nunn, an original co-sponsor of the so-called Nunn-Lugar Cooperative Threat Reduction program, the decade-old U.S. effort to secure former Soviet weapons of mass destruction and related materials, said that despite dramatic progress in recent years, “I think we have been slow to perceive this danger and respond to this threat.” “The likeliest use of these weapons is in terrorists’ hands,” he said. In addition to naming a senior official in the U.S., Russian and other governments to coordinate cooperative threat reduction efforts, Nunn recommended that Moscow and Washington: * immediately begin outlining adequate safeguards for tactical nuclear weapons — a perfect terrorism weapon that is not covered by any arms control treaties; * devise operational changes in the alert status of U.S. and Russian nuclear forces to reduce the risk of accidental launch or miscalculation, while expanding the decision time for each president to decide whether to retaliate to a perceived nuclear attack; * combine their collective biological defense knowledge, beginning with a joint fight against infectious diseases in Russia; and * launch a global partnership against catastrophic terrorism, based on the premise that the greatest dangers of the 21st century are threats to all nations and must be solved by all nations. Moreover, there is no doubt that securing WMD materials at their source will be the most effective way to stave off the terrorist WMD threat, he added. “Acquiring weapons and materials is the hardest step for the terrorists to take, and the easiest step for us to stop. By contrast, every subsequent step in the process is easier for the terrorists to take, and harder for us to stop. Once they gain access to nuclear materials, they’ve completed the most difficult step — and our nightmare begins.” Quoting statistics provided by Wall Street investor Warren Buffet, who recently pledged $2.5 million to the Nuclear Threat Initiative, Nunn said even a small improvement in security can make a big difference over time. If the chance of a weapon of mass destruction being used in a given year is 10 percent, the chance of getting through a 50-year period without a disaster is only .51 percent, Nunn said. If the chance can be reduced to 1 percent each year, there is a 60.5 percent chance of making it through 50 years safely, according to Nunn. “We can make it 120 times less likely that we will suffer from a use of these weapons for the next 50 years. As Warren Buffet would say, that’s real leverage,” Nunn said. [EDITOR'S NOTE: Sam Nunn is co-chairman and chief executive officer of the Nuclear Threat Initiative, the sole sponsor of Global Security Newswire, which is published independently by National Journal Group.]
| ||||||||||
Back to top
