Jamaica Joins U.S. Nonproliferation Efforts

Jamaica yesterday joined two efforts designed to prevent the smuggling of nuclear or radioactive material into the United States, the U.S. National Nuclear Security Administration announced yesterday (see GSN, May 30).

Under the Megaports Initiative, the agency places radiation detectors at foreign ports in an effort to prevent nuclear smuggling. The nonproliferation program is already operating in six countries and is at various stages of development and negotiation with 30 other nations.

The Container Security Initiative places teams of U.S. personnel at foreign ports to work with officials there to prepare security measures designed to identify and secure “high-risk containers,” according to an NNSA press release. The program now operates in 44 ports in Asia, Africa, Europe, the Middle East, and North, South, and Central America. Roughly 75 percent of containers bound for the United States originate in or are shipped through those ports, the NNSA release said.

“To expedite the inspection process, host customs administration must provide nonintrusive technology to quickly inspect identified high-risk containers before they are shipped to U.S ports. The capabilities provided under the Megaports Initiative offer an additional targeting tool for customs officials supporting CSI,” the NNSA release said (U.S. National Nuclear Security Administration release, June 20).

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South Korea Tightens WMD Export Controls

South Korea yesterday moved to tighten export controls on WMD-related technologies, The Korea Herald reported (see GSN, Dec. 20, 2005).

A new law requires official confirmation of whether products to be shipped outside the country are “strategic goods.” The government would have to approve shipments of such material.

The revision also bans shipment of foreign-made strategic goods to third countries.

Prison terms of up to five years and fines of three times the value of the goods could be imposed in case of violation, the Herald reported.

Although Seoul has operated an export management system governing strategic goods since 1989, lack of public awareness has inhibited its effectiveness, according to the Herald (Jin Dae-woong, The Korea Herald, June 21).

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U.S.-Indian Deal Would Violate NPT, Critics Say

By David Ruppe
Global Security Newswire

WASHINGTON — The Bush administration’s proposed U.S.-Indian nuclear cooperation agreement would violate the 1970 Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, 10 bipartisan U.S. nonproliferation experts and former senior government officials wrote in a letter to Congress released yesterday (see GSN, June 15).

The deal, still under negotiation, would have the United States pursue exceptions for India to U.S. export control laws and multinational Nuclear Suppliers Group export restrictions. In exchange India would open some nuclear facilities to international safeguards to ensure they are not used for military purposes. Congress must sign off on the agreement.

The proposed agreement, the critics wrote, would benefit India’s nuclear weapons program by “free[ing] up India’s limited domestic nuclear fuel making capacity to produce highly enriched uranium and plutonium for weapons.”

“By the Indian government’s own admission, its military and civil nuclear programs are ‘inextricably’ linked, so if we assist one we assist the other,” the letter’s bipartisan authors wrote. 

They include former U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission member Victor Gilinsky, former U.S. Arms Control and Disarmament Agency Director and Undersecretary of State John Holum, former Defense Department Deputy for Nonproliferation Policy Henry Sokolski and former Assistant Defense Secretary Henry Rowen.

The letter responded to a State Department assertion that the proposed deal would not violate the treaty’s core Article 1 requirement that members not “in any way … assist, encourage, or induce any non-nuclear weapon state to manufacture or otherwise acquire nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices.”

India has not signed the treaty, and is not recognized in the pact as a legitimate nuclear weapons state.

The State Department in a June 5 letter to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee said the agreement would not violate Article 1 even if foreign fuel supplies “could allow India to devote its domestic uranium substantially or even exclusively to its weapons program.”

It conceded foreign uranium supplies could “arguably relieve India of its reliance on domestic uranium for energy production,” but asserted: “Nothing in the NPT, its negotiating history, or the practice of the parties supports the notion that fuel supply to safeguarded reactors for peaceful purposes could be construed as ‘assisting in the manufacture of nuclear weapons’ for purposes of Article 1.”

Sokolski and Natural Resources Defense Council senior analyst Christopher Paine, in an appendix accompanying the letter, wrote that after India tested a nuclear device in 1974, “hundreds of members of Congress, of both parties, were opposed to continuing the supply of U.S. fuel to [India’s] Tarapur reactors precisely because they believed full-scope safeguards in nonweapons states are required to faithfully carry out the U.S. NPT obligation under Article 1.” 

They wrote that the proposed deal could enable India to channel all of its current and future uranium enrichment into the nuclear weapons program, “thereby clearly aiding India in the manufacture of higher-yield-to-volume (or yield-to-weight) thermonuclear weapons suitable for long-range missile delivery, and violating the U.S. obligation under Article 1 of the NPT.”

The critics’ letter says that the State Department “construes the meaning of the NPT so narrowly as to render it meaningless,” and that “partial safeguards in a state with a secret nuclear weapons program are more symbol than substance.”

It says: “India may not have to comply with the NPT, but the United States, as a signatory to the NPT, has a solemn responsibility not only to discourage proliferation by others, but to refrain from assisting other states’ nuclear weapons program in any way. The current proposal would breach this central provision of the treaty.”

Reuters reported today that U.S. lawmakers are preparing deal-enabling legislation that is expected to be voted on by the House International Relations Committee and the Senate Foreign Relations Committee next week. It said at least one of the pieces of legislation would authorize Bush to exempt India from U.S. export control restrictions even before the two countries agree upon the terms of the deal. Congress later would vote, once terms are agreed upon, whether to approve the deal.

Citing unidentified diplomats, Reuters reported yesterday the United States is hoping Group of Eight member countries meeting in July will issue a statement supporting the proposed deal. Four of the members are believed opposed or neutral, it reported.

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Khan Network Could Erode U.S. Deterrence, Expert Says

By Jon Fox
Global Security Newswire

WASHINGTON — The spread of nuclear technology on the black market could weaken U.S. efforts to block the transfer of fissile material by rogue nations to terrorist groups, a nonproliferation expert said Friday (see GSN, June 12).

Speaking before a group of congressional staffers, former Assistant Secretary of State Robert Gallucci questioned the U.S. capability to determine the origin of fissile material following a nuclear blast.

That ability — what experts call nuclear attribution — is “not certain,” said Gallucci, now dean of the Edmund Walsh School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University.

“One of the reasons is that of course A.Q. Khan has played Johnny Appleseed, and the same kind of centrifuge has been spread all over the place,” he said.

Gallucci was referring to Abdul Qadeer Khan, the former director of Pakistan’s nuclear weapons program. In 2004, Khan admitted to coordinating the transfer of nuclear technology to Iran, Libya and North Korea (see GSN, Feb. 2, 2004).

With the U.S. ability to link fissile material to a particular country in doubt, nations such as Iran or North Korea might feel more confident supplying highly enriched uranium to a nonstate group, Gallucci said.

Citing North Korea’s track record of transferring weapon technology, he questioned whether the leadership in Pyongyang would be any more scrupulous about uranium.

“That’s what they do — they sell this stuff,” Gallucci said. “So what are they going to do, all of a sudden get religion and not sell highly enriched uranium?”

Iran is the primary supplier of conventional arms to terrorist groups, Gallucci said, arguing that it is not inconceivable that it would move up to transfers of nuclear material.

For Gallucci, the prospect of so-called rogue nations accumulating fissile material should be considered a priority security risk to the United States.

“I don’t know what’s in second place, but it’s way back there,” he said. “I’m worried about five nuclear weapons going off in five American cities, and the United States of America not existing anymore.”

Gallucci said the danger posed by a nation such as Iran holding banks of fissile material is so great that “pre-emptive war” should remain an option.

“I become interested in some pretty horrible options,” he said. “The implications are horrible for American interests. … It’s just dreadful, but not as bad as losing an American city or two.”

Deterring a nation from transferring fissile material to a terrorist group on the sly relies largely on a U.S. ability to determine the material’s origin after a blast. That is an uncertain skill, Gallucci said.

If officials are banking on intercepting a nuclear device on its way into the United States, it is already too late given porous U.S. borders, Gallucci argued. Counting on the intelligence community to deter a rogue regime from transferring fissile material is also a gamble.

The objects in question could be small, he said, suggesting a golf-ball size lump of plutonium or a baseball-sized amount of uranium would be sufficient to create devastating nuclear devices.

Even an assembled bomb would fit inside a podium, Gallucci added.

“You’re going to have to have the confidence that the North Korean regime and the Iranian regime believe they couldn’t get a box out of their country to some place in Africa or central Asia or wherever it is al-Qaeda would set up a garage or a machine shop to make the weapon,” Gallucci said.

However, if a nation believes the United States could sift through the smoldering ruin of a U.S. city and pinpoint where the fissile material in a bomb came from, that country might be less likely to hand that material over to a terrorist group.

Striking a nonstate actor could be difficult, but the country that supplied the terrorists could be targeted.

“They should believe that we would regard that as an attack on the U.S. made by them and respond as if it were an attack,” Graham Allison, director of the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at Harvard University, said in an interview.

That assumes a distinct nuclear fingerprint could found and linked to a source, which experts say is an enormous challenge.

Jay Davis, a former national security fellow at the Center for Global Security Research at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, called it “the attribution problem” in a 2003 paper.

“I keep a standing mental list of the five hardest technical problems of which I am aware,” he wrote. Nuclear forensics is on that list.

“There is no assurance” that in the wake of a nuclear blast that the United States would be able “to uniquely determine a perpetrator,” wrote Davis, former director of the Defense Threat Reduction Agency.

Determining that plutonium came from a reactor in North Korea could be possible. “It has virtually a fingerprint,” Allison said.

The U.S. agencies that would be involved in such an effort have not released details of their capabilities.

In 2002, the United States was still several years away from having the capability to detect the country of origin of a nuclear weapon, according to a report released by National Academy of Sciences (see GSN, June 26, 2002)

The state of attribution technology has advanced since then, but it remains a “huge challenge,” said former U.S. Energy Department energy research chief William Happer, chairman of the academy panel that produced the nuclear and radiological threat section of the report. “If anything, I’m slightly …  surprised we have been able to do a little better than I thought we could.”

Still, determining the provenance of highly enriched uranium following a blast might remain beyond U.S. capabilities, Happer told Global Security Newswire.

“If we got our hands on a terrorist bomb before it went off and it was uranium, we would have a very good chance of determining where it came from,” he said. “After the detonation it’s much harder.”

Attribution is just one piece of the puzzle, said Michael Levi, an arms control expert at the Council on Foreign Relations.

“The purpose of technical attribution measures is not to tell you where the material came from but to reduce the number of possible sources you might detect,” he said. “Just because the technical intelligence doesn’t deliver a slam dunk doesn’t mean it’s not useful.”

Information gleaned from attribution technology would work in concert with human intelligence and other data, Levi said. If a blast were to occur on U.S. soil, there would be a crowd of nations rushing to clear themselves in the aftermath, he added.

When it comes to deterrence, the perception other nations have of U.S. capabilities is important. Levi suggests that the question is not whether U.S. officials could pinpoint the origin of the fissile material but if other nations think they can.

If a nation thinks the United States has the necessary capabilities, that could be good enough to keep it from spreading nuclear material around.

“It’s like poker where they’re going to lose everything they have if they bet wrong,” Levi said.

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EU Encourages Iran to Accept Nuclear Offer

The European Union yesterday expressed hope that Iran would not “make a mistake” by rejecting an incentives package offered by world powers to persuade Tehran to curb controversial nuclear work, the Associated Press reported (see GSN, June 20).

EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana called for Tehran to quickly make its decision.

“We expect a response in the coming days,” Solana told AP.

Solana said Iranian officials are “no doubt ... aware of the responsibility they have” in resolving the issue diplomatically.

He urged Tehran to “think very carefully what decision to take. I hope that they will not make a mistake” (Robert Wielaard, Associated Press, June 21).

U.S. President George W. Bush was expected today in Vienna to urge European leaders not to ease pressure on Iran, Reuters reported (William Schomberg, Reuters, June 21).

Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said yesterday that Tehran was still mulling the offer, Agence France-Presse reported.

“It is not decided yet,” he said.

“I can’t say for the time being when the answer will be finalized. There can be some questions and doubts which should be clarified,” Mottaki said.

“When this package was offered no deadline was given for our answer,” he said.

Mottaki called Bush’s call for “progressively stronger political and economic sanctions” against Iran if it rejects the deal a “threat.”

“It’s as though some have forgotten that the time of threats is over. Threats are unacceptable in today’s world,” he said (Agence France-Presse I/Yahoo!News, June 20).

A top Iranian lawmaker today reaffirmed his country’s rejection of demands that it suspend uranium enrichment, AFP reported.

“In order to remove ambiguities and create transparency, Iran volunteered to suspend enrichment of uranium for two and half years,” said Alaeddin Borujerdi, who leads parliament’s Foreign Policy and National Security Commission.

“A repeat of this suspension is not logically acceptable,” he said.

He said Iran was “welcoming negotiations without preconditions” but added, “We still do not trust America, because even today it does not refrain from attempts to pressure the Islamic Republic” (Agence France-Presse II/Yahoo!News, June 21).

The Organization of the Islamic Conference also called for negotiations “without any preconditions,” AFP reported today.

“We express our conviction that the only way to resolve Iran's nuclear issue is to resume negotiations without any preconditions,” the organization’s 57 member states said in a document called the Baku Declaration.

Members also expressed concern over “pressure being mounted on Iran and its potential consequences for peace and security in and outside the region.”

“We reaffirm the basic and inalienable right of all member states to develop research, production and the use of atomic energy for peaceful purposes in conformity with their respective legal obligations,” the declaration says (Agence France-Presse III/Yahoo!News, June 21).

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Man Indicted for Illegal Export of Graphite

A U.S. federal grand jury yesterday indicted a Pennsylvania man who helped illegally export to the United Arab Emirates material that could be used in a nuclear program, the Associated Press reported (see GSN, Nov. 2005).

Manoj Bhayana, 39, is accused of conspiring with another person and multiple companies to falsify documents related to the graphite exports. U.S. law bars export of that form of graphite because it “had potential nuclear and military applications,” said U.S. Attorney Mary Beth Buchanan (Associated Press/phillyBurbs.com, June 21).

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Iraqi CW Attacks on Kurds Could Be Tough to Prove

Proving that the Hussein regime in Iraq used chemical weapons against Kurds in that country could be difficult nearly 20 years after the alleged genocide campaign, the International Herald Tribune reported yesterday (see GSN, Oct. 21, 2005).

Former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein and six former regime officials were charged in April with the 1988 Anfal campaign that is believed to have resulted in 50,000 or more Kurdish deaths. A chemical attack on the town of Halabja alone is thought to have killed 5,000 Kurds.

However, records that could shed light on the deaths have disappeared or been destroyed. There was minimal testing available in the isolated locations where the attacks occurred, and direct evidence of chemical weapons use is 15 or more years old, the Tribune reported.

Forensic experts working on behalf of the Iraqi court spent weeks investigating a mass grave of Anfal victims, near the northern city of Mosul, but the deaths were found to be caused by gunfire rather than chemical weapons. 

“Unfortunately we’ll never know how many people were killed or exposed,” said Joanne al-Talabani, who studies the long-term health problems of Kurdish children exposed to chemical agents. “There are no medical records from that time, none. Most people can’t remember, they were delirious, running, in shock.”

Physicians and laboratory researchers can find indicators of exposure, but are less able to determine legal evidence. Chemical agents do not remain long in the environment or the body, making it hard to know what to look for 18 years after the Anfal deaths.

Hussein is being tried now for the 1982 deaths of 148 people in the town of Dujail. The Anfal trial, which includes the chemical weapons charges, “will be the most important public reckoning, but in court you can’t just say, ‘I know it happened,’” said Alastair Hay, a chemical pathology professor at the University of Leeds in England.

“You need solid, irrefutable scientific evidence. But it’s very difficult to establish something like nerve gas exposure at this stage,” Hay added. “I can’t tell you how frustrating this is, since nothing concrete has ever appeared.”

The Iraqi military is believed to have used mustard gas and tabun and sarin nerve agents against the Kurds. The death count from such weapons is estimated at anywhere from thousands to hundreds of thousands.

Dr. Jan Willems saw Kurds who arrived in Europe following the 1988 attacks. Many suffered burns that indicated exposure to mustard gas.

“Twenty years later it is difficult to prove on the basis of physical evidence, but the total picture in my eyes doesn’t leave any doubt that it occurred,” said Willems, a retired Belgian professor of occupational medicine.

Kurdish fears of seeking treatment at nearby Iraqi hospitals, whose doctors had been ordered not to treat them, restricted the amount of evidence of the attacks, Talabani said. Those able to enter Iran for medical treatment destroyed medical records confirming chemical exposure for fear of reprisals, Talabani said. 

The only physical evidence of chemical weapons use was found in 1992 in samples collected from two bomb craters near the Kurdish village of Birjinni.

Testing in England revealed two samples contained materials related to mustard gas and sarin. Other attempts to analyze soil, however, proved fruitless.

It is difficult to directly connect the health problems of Kurds who lived near sites of suspected chemical agent use to those weapons, the Tribune reported. Conditions such as pain or chronic bronchitis are vague and could have other causes. 

Many former Iranian soldiers and a smaller number of Kurds who say they were exposed to chemical weapons suffered a wide range of health problems. Blood tests did not prove chemical exposure, but Hay and other doctors believe such “tracks” could be discovered with research.

“Diagnosis was based on clinical history and signs and symptoms,” Willems said (Elizabeth Rosenthal, International Herald Tribune, June 20).

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Kentucky Chemical Weapons Depot Passes Inspection

The Blue Grass Army Depot in Kentucky received strong marks from a recent five-day Army inspection of its chemical weapons storage facility, the Richmond Register reported yesterday (see GSN, May 22).

A 12-person team from the Army Department Inspector General’s Office conducted the biennial inspection. The officials spent 10-hour days to carry out the comprehensive inspection.

“It was very tough, but it was supposed to be,” said Lt. Col. George Shuplinkov, commander of Blue Grass Chemical Activity. “The team is detail-oriented and looks at everything we do, makes sure we’re following regulations along with safety and security guidelines. This inspection was the toughest challenge during my command and failure was not an option.”

The team evaluated worker and community safety and examined storage, monitoring and handling of chemical weapons. It evaluated physical protection of the chemical stockpile and other security matters.

Preparation for inspection was minimal, Shuplinkov said.

“We don’t get ready for an inspection at the Blue Grass Chemical Activity because we’re ready every day of the year,” he said.

Evaluators found some areas in need of improvement, said Thom Bilyeu, director of Mission Operations.

“It’s good to have another set of eyes looking at what you do to help you keep from making mistakes,” Bilyeu said. “Everything the inspector general team found that needed fixing was fixed on the spot. We’ll work better and safer with this kind of oversight.”

This is only one of several inspections to which Blue Grass Chemical Activity is subject, said Sgt. First Class Michael Blow, senior enlisted adviser for Blue Grass Chemical Activity.

“Although it’s the most comprehensive, there are areas that the inspector general doesn’t look at,” Blow said. “For those areas, we have other inspections, such as international treaty inventory or the Chemical Stockpile Emergency Preparedness Program. We stay on our toes every day” (Ronica Shannon, Richmond Register, June 20).

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Small Rocket Fire Reported at Umatilla

A small fire ignited yesterday at the Umatilla Chemical Agent Disposal Facility in Oregon during disposal of a M55 rocket that had been drained of sarin nerve agent (see GSN, May 16).

There was no danger to workers, the surrounding community or the environment, officials said.

The fire occurred while the rocket was being cut into pieces.

“As with most previous small rocket fires at the plant, the fire was sparked during the fifth of seven shears. It occurred in the portion of the rocket containing rocket propellant,” according to a depot release.

The processing operation was under engineering controls and the fire was restricted to Explosive Containment Room A. The flame was visible only momentarily before the fire was extinguished.

The rocket was from a lot that contained propellant produced in 1962. Officials said those rockets are more susceptible to fires during processing than other rockets. 

Operators processed 131 rockets yesterday before the fire occurred. The facility as of yesterday morning had eliminated more than 75,000 rockets.

Workers planned to evaluate the impact to the containment room yesterday and make repairs if necessary before continuing with weapons disposal. Processing was expected to resume yesterday in Explosive Containment Room A or B (U.S. Army Chemical Materials Agency release, June 20).

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North Korea Offers Talks on Missile Test

North Korea today offered to talk directly with the United States regarding the controversy over Pyongyang’s missile launch plans, Agence France-Presse reported (see GSN, June 20).

“The United States says it is concerned about our missile test launch,” Han Song Ryol, deputy head of North Korea’s U.N. mission, told the Yonhap News Agency. “Our position is, ‘Okay then, let’s talk about it’” (Agence France-Presse I/Yahoo!News, June 21).

“As a sovereign state, North Korea has the right to not only develop, deploy and test-fire but also export a missile. It is not right that others tell us what to do about our sovereign rights,” Han told Yonhap.

The Bush administration has claimed that North Korea effectively renewed a 1999 missile-testing moratorium in September during six-party nuclear talks.

Han, however, said that commitment applied only during periods of active dialogue with the United States, the Los Angeles Times reported.

“Some say our missile test launch is a violation of the moratorium, but this is not true,” he said.

A South Korean intelligence analyst said Han’s rhetoric could be interpreted as a sign that “they are trying to find a way to have a diplomatic overture.”

“I think the story is on the way to change, if you look at the words of North Korea,” the analyst said.

Meanwhile, former South Korean President Kim Dae-jung today canceled a visit to Pyongyang scheduled for next week.

“It is practically impossible for him to visit in late June because of the unexpected circumstances,” said Jeong Se-hyun, an aide to Kim.

South Korean officials yesterday disputed reports that North Korea had completed fueling the Taepodong 2 missile. The South Korean National Intelligence Service told the National Assembly that the 40 fuel canisters seen near the launch site were not enough to fuel the missile (Barbara Demick, Los Angeles Times I, June 21).

U.S. Ambassador to Japan Thomas Schieffer said today that the United States is keeping “all options on the table” to stop the launch, AFP reported.

“We have greater technical means of tracking than in the past and we have options that we have not had in the past, and all those options are on the table,” he said (Agence France-Presse II, June 21).

U.S. and Japanese officials have discussed imposing sanctions on Pyongyang if it goes through with a launch, The Australian reported today.

A top U.S. official said Washington has prepared “a well planned and very detailed response.”  The official indicated the sanctions would be an extension of the financial regulatory actions already in place through the U.S. Treasury Department (Peter Alford, The Australian, June 21).

The Bush administration does not have a wide range of options for dealing with the potential missile test, the Times reported today.

While North Korean missile deployments could be tempt the United States to attack pre-emptively, such a move is unlikely given U.S. commitments in Iraq and objections from China, the Times reported. Both Beijing and Moscow, meanwhile, would be expected to block any tough action at the U.N. Security Council. South Korea has also indicated it would not participate in economic efforts against the North.

“Kim Jong Il is calling the Bush administration’s bluff,” said Daniel Pinkston, a North Korea specialist with the Center for Nonproliferation Studies. “The U.S. is already doing everything it can do in terms of economic pressure.”

“If there ever was a case in which pre-emption would be logical, it would be this moment — but this is not where the political priorities are of the Bush administration right now,” said a U.S.-based North Korea analyst.

“If there is a missile test, the South Koreans will carry on business as usual,” said Kim Tae-woo, a South Korean analyst at the Korea Institute for Defense Analyses. “They will not participate in any international effort to isolate North Korea.”

North Korea scholar Andrei Lankov said the missile test moratorium has expired and recommended the Bush administration “ignore the North Koreans.”

“Too much of a fuss will only make things worse,” Lankov said (Barbara Demick, Los Angeles Times II, June 21).

Some analysts said North Korea would not benefit from a missile test, AFP reported yesterday.

“If North Korea fires the missile, it would risk simply too much, especially in the form of more U.S.-led financial sanctions,” said Kim Tae-woo.

“Pyongyang is already feeling the pinch from the U.S. financial sanction,” he said. “It would also lose many of its friends in South Korea.”

However, Jun Bong-geun, of Seoul’s Institute for Foreign Affairs and International Security, said South Korea is unlikely to reverse its engagement policy even if Pyongyang launches a missile, while Beijing is also unlikely to retaliate.

“There is the view that North Korea has done the math and thinks that on balance, a missile launch might help,” he said (Park Chan-kyong, Agence France-Presse III/Antara News, June 20).

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U.S. Refuses Comment on Missile Defense Status

The U.S. Defense Department yesterday declined to comment on reports that its antiballistic missile system has been placed on operational status, Agence France-Presse reported (see GSN, June 20).

“We don’t discuss any kind of alert status,” said Pentagon spokesman Eric Ruff.

“We have a limited missile defense system. It’s in the development phase.  But that’s about all we really discuss,” he said (Agence France-Presse/Yahoo!News, June 20).

“It’s not like we can press a button and go on alert,” said Defense Department spokesman Lt. Col. Brian Maka (Matt Kelley, USA Today, June 21).

The United States and its allies are monitoring preparations in North Korea for a long-range missile test. U.S. experts warned against attempting to shoot down that missile if it is launched, the Associated Press reported today.

A U.S. intercept would produce “very strong international reaction” against the United States, according to Robert Einhorn, a senior adviser at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. Einhorn added that it was unlikely that the United States would attempt such a move.

David Wright, a senior scientist at the private Union of Concerned Scientists, questioned the U.S. capability to bring down a ballistic missile.

“I consider it to be rhetorical posturing,” Wright said. “It currently has no demonstrated capability” (Robert Burns, Associated Press/Yahoo!News, June 21).

“Suppose North Korea launches a missile and the MDA tried to shoot it down, and like in some of the recent tests, it failed,” Philip Coyle, former Pentagon weapons testing chief and a critic of the program, told USA Today. “It would be totally embarrassing. It would cause a huge uproar in Congress.”

House Armed Services Committee Chairman Duncan Hunter (R-Calif.) said a limited missile defense capability is better than nothing.

“We’re going to have to be able to stop an incoming ballistic missile,” Hunter said. “That’s a truth that liberals are going to have to accept.”

 “We want something that works,” countered Representative Ellen Tauscher (D-Calif.), a member of the panel (Kelley, USA Today, June 21).

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