U.S. Expected to Maintain CTR Funding, Officials Say

The White House is expected to maintain the Defense Department’s budget for the Cooperative Threat Reduction program, overruling the Pentagon’s proposed cuts to the nonproliferation effort, the Boston Globe reported today (see GSN, Jan. 6).

In the wake of spending increases related to the Iraq war, the Pentagon last month recommended cutting $46 million for fiscal 2005 from the program to secure unconventional weaponry from the former Soviet Union, according to the Globe.

Officials said yesterday, however, that the White House Office of Management and Budget has said that the roughly $400 million spending plan will not be reduced.

“It has been rejected by the White House,” said a senior government official. “We have been assured by a number of people that it is not going to happen.”

White House officials yesterday declined to comment.

Some analysts said the proposed cut emphasizes some Defense Department officials’ doubts about international arms-control programs.

“There is a general skepticism among the neoconservatives of the value of these programs,” said William Hoehn of the Russian American Nuclear Security Advisory Council. “Their emphasis is much more on killing terrorists than keeping weapons from the hands of terrorists.” 

Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and Deputy Secretary Paul Wolfowitz also believe Russia should bear more responsibility for securing the materials, according to the Globe.

Russian President Vladimir Putin’s growing grip on power at the potential expense of democracy appears to be feeding Pentagon skepticism of the CTR program, said Jon Wolfsthal of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. Top U.S. defense officials worry that the program may be helping “a potential enemy,” he said (Bryan Bender, Boston Globe, Jan. 7).

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