U.S. Response:  White House Requests Additional $27 Billion

The Bush administration yesterday requested an additional $27.1 billion in homeland security and other counterterrorism funds (see GSN, March 20).

While the request was expected, it is larger than the administration’s previous estimate of $15 billion, according to the Washington Post.  The request includes $14 billion for the U.S. Defense Department and $5.5 billion for homeland security measures.

The funding increases would “make sure Americans are more secure and more safe than ever,” said U.S. President George W. Bush.  “I know it’s a lot of money, my request.  But let me just tell you this — I want to remind you all, we fight for freedom.”

The request includes:

*         $6.7 billion for military operations;

*         $5.6 billion to New York for assistance in rebuilding after the Sept. 11 attacks;

*         $4.7 billion to the U.S. Transportation Department, with most going to the Transportation Security Administration;

*         $4.1 billion for National Guard and military reserve personnel on active duty;

*         $1.4 billion for intelligence and communications measures;

*         $1.2 billion to the U.S. International Assistance Program to help improve allies’ capabilities to fight terrorism;

*         $900 million for miscellaneous Pentagon efforts;

*         $500 million for unmanned aircraft;

*         $436 million to the U.S. State Department, with about half going toward improving embassy security;

*         $372.5 million for anti-terrorism efforts in the Middle East, Central Asia, Colombia and Ecuador;

*         $327 million for the Federal Emergency Management Agency to assist states in responding to terrorist attacks using weapons of mass destruction (see GSN, March 6);

*         $255 million to the U.S. Coast Guard (see GSN, March 21);

*         $87 million to the U.S. Postal Service for mail-screening measures (see GSN, Feb. 20) and

*         $19.3 million for “Cybercorps” scholarships to train experts to combat cyber-terrorism (see GSN, March 11).

Members of Congress said they expect the request to be easily approved, the Post reported.  Some congressional Democrats complained that Bush threatened to veto their requests to spend $7 billion on homeland defense, only to make his own request later.

“The question really is, ‘Where was this administration six months ago?’” said David Sirota, spokesman for Democrats on the House Appropriations Committee.

The Bush administration said it had wanted to give federal agencies time to decide the best ways to spend homeland defense funds.

“We were saying all along last year that there may be a need for more funding,” said Office of Management and Budget spokeswoman Amy Call.  “Now we have a better understanding” (Dana Milbank, Washington Post, March 22).

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Export Controls:  U.S. Resists Computer Pressure at Wassenaar

By David Ruppe
Global Security Newswire

VIENNA — Delegates are several months behind schedule for modifying arms export controls at the Wassenaar Arrangement forum in Vienna as the United States resists pressure to completely remove controls on two high technologies.

Normally, the Wassenar states announce changes each December to a list of dual-use technologies to which they agree to apply export controls (see GSN, March 6).  The terrorist attacks in the United States last year delayed progress, but disagreement over high-performance computers and machine tools also stalled negotiations, U.S. officials told Global Security Newswire.

Under Wassenaar rules, items can only be removed from the list by consensus of the 33 participant states.  Machine tools, however, are a special case and are scheduled to be removed unless the participants agree by consensus to retain them on the list.

Many of the Wassenaar states would like to see the computers — which can be used for military purposes including nuclear weapon simulation and design — completely removed from the list, said U.S. officials.

U.S. Seeks Relaxation, Not Elimination

In January, the Bush administration announced a large relaxation of restrictions on U.S. high-performance computer exports to countries it lists as proliferation concerns (see GSN, March 6).

U.S. companies favor complete elimination of licensing requirements for high-performance computers, and the administration has endorsed a bill passed by the Senate that would do away with the performance measurement — millions of theoretical operations per second (MTOPS) — which the government uses to restrict exports to countries of concern.  Such legislation would effectively decontrol the computers.

In congressional testimony last month, however, a Pentagon official said that while his department favors eliminating the MTOPS measurement for restricting computers, defense officials prefer that it be replaced with some other classification approach.

The Pentagon was expected to suggest an alternative standard called “adjusted GFLOPS” (more than 1 billion floating point operations per second), National Journal’s Technology Daily reported in November.  The idea was not expected to obtain the needed support, that report said.

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U.S.-Russia:  U.S. Wants Flexible Treaty Levels

By David Ruppe
Global Security Newswire

GENEVA — U.S. negotiators are seeking a provision to allow for the “flexibility” to change warhead levels in the event of changing geostrategic circumstances, a senior U.S. official said here today following two days of talks to codify U.S.-Russian strategic nuclear reductions (see GSN, March 18).

Russia has not agreed to the provision, said Undersecretary of State for Arms Control and International Security John Bolton at a press conference.

“We have had some fair discussions on that.  I think it would be fair to say we have not actually reached an agreement,” Bolton said.  “But I think the Russian side does not have that much of a different view of the importance of flexibility for both countries given the uncertainties we face looking into the future.”

The U.S. proposal would provide an option short of withdrawal from the treaty, said Bolton.

The United States, he said, has “proposed to the Russians that short of actual withdrawal there might be a mechanism where we might give notice if we felt that international geostrategic circumstances have changed to a point where the offensive nuclear weapons range could be adjusted so that we could adjust that without actually withdrawing from the treaty.”

The need for flexibility is less a concern about Russia than about other possibly emerging threats, Bolton said.

“Looking ten years down the road you’re looking into a very uncertain future.  And that while we’re interested in providing for stability between ourselves, it’s less a concern about us than about uncertainty in the world.”

Treaty Limits or Good Intentions?

An allowance for adjustments to a treaty would be rare, said Daryl Kimball, executive director of the Arms Control Association in Washington.

“There has been no U.S.-Russian strategic arms control agreement that has ever had this,” he said.  “The net effect of this combined with the United States responsive force capability would provide scant predictability and assurance for either side.  It makes the agreement little more than a statement of good intentions.”

Rose Gottemoeller, a senior associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and former Clinton administration official, said that “there are often clauses in agreements or treaties allowing for adjustments or changes that might be needed.”

It would be important to include language in the treaty indicating that any changes would be made by mutual agreement, she added.  Bolton did not say whether such assurances are part of the proposal.

Warhead Destruction

Several other issues are also unresolved in the proposed agreement, Bolton said.  In particular, U.S. and Russian negotiators remain at odds over another U.S. proposal in the name of flexibility.  The United States wants to retain thousands of warheads cut from the operational arsenal in a “responsive force,” where they could be retrieved for service if necessary.

Bolton today suggested negotiations on that issue are ongoing, as are discussions on counting warheads, keeping the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty in effect and facilitating transparency and verification.

Bolton said the subject of retaining warheads was a principal topic of conversation between Ivanov and U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld in their meetings last week (see GSN, March 13).

“While there is not complete congruence on this point yet, I think the parties have reached an understanding that in order to reach agreement by the summit in May, we have to focus on the subject that is of most concern to us, and that is the subject of the operationally deployed warheads,” Bolton said.

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United States:  Foster Panel Recommends U.S. Prepare for Nuclear Testing

By Greg Seigle
Global Security Newswire

WASHINGTON — To maintain confidence in its aging nuclear stockpile, the United States should improve its readiness to test nuclear weapons, the head of a congressionally mandated advisory panel testified yesterday (see GSN, Feb. 15).

By 2004, the United States should be able to test nuclear weapons within three months to a year after a presidential decision to do so, John Foster told the House Armed Services Special Oversight Panel on Department of Energy Reorganization.  Today it would take two to three years to conduct a nuclear test if the president ordered one, said Foster, a former director of Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory who has been involved in U.S. nuclear programs since World War II (see GSN, March 19).

“The more we reduce,” said Foster, referring to a U.S.-Russian agreement in principle to cut levels of each country’s deployed nuclear warheads to between 1,700 and 2,200, “the more confidence you need” in the warheads (see related GSN story, today).

Foster, who chairs a panel set to release its final report next week, also echoed the recently leaked Nuclear Posture Review (see GSN, March 14), saying the United States should also explore the option of building new, low-yield “clean” nuclear weapons intended to strike particular military targets while limiting civilian deaths or radioactive contamination.

“Test readiness needs to be addressed much more realistically,” Foster testified.  “This is not because a need to test is imminent but because prudence requires that every president have a realistic option to return to testing, should technical or political events make it necessary.”

Foster said the need to sustain confidence in U.S. deterrence capabilities is as important as it ever has been.

“Other major nations continue to maintain and adapt their nuclear arsenals, and there is continuing proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and their delivery methods,” he said.  “We recommend the administration and Congress support test readiness of three months to a year, depending on the type of test.”

Opponents Would “Go Ballistic”

Any move by the United States to simply begin preparing to test its nuclear warheads would surely garner a strong reaction from opponents, according to Representative Ellen Tauscher (Calif.), the ranking Democrat on the oversight panel.

“People will absolutely go ballistic if they think we are going to start testing,” Tauscher said.  “Just talking about it sends them into orbit.”

Daryl Kimball, executive director of the Arms Control Association, told the Associated Press that even shortening the time needed to prepare for a test “could easily lead to a dangerous action-reaction cycle involving China and Russia that could lead to the erosion of the test moratorium that [U.S. President] George W. Bush says he supports.”

Tauscher voiced concern about the age of U.S. nuclear weapons, some of which are about 50 years old.  According to Foster most of these warheads were built with an intended life span of about 12 years.

Tauscher also said that the United States must come up with a way to assess the safety and reliability of its nuclear arsenal, but she strongly opposes testing, arguing it would create a “domino effect” among allies and adversaries alike.  “How can we talk about nonproliferation and then go testing?” Tauscher asked.

Instead of live testing, U.S. scientists should focus on simulation testing, Tauscher said.  The first three-dimensional simulation of a nuclear explosion was conducted earlier this month on a new supercomputer link between the Livermore lab in her home district and the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico (see GSN, March 11).

Foster, however, said simulated nuclear tests alone would not suffice to maintain the safety and reliability of the U.S. stockpile — or to show U.S. enemies its stockpile is in working condition.  “Nobody knows” when the decay and corrosion of old warheads will reach the critical point, rendering them useless, he said.

If the ongoing decay and corrosion continues, “we might lose the warhead,” he added.

Testing Vital

Actual live tests of nuclear warheads and their components is crucial to enabling scientists to know just how a particular nuclear bomb will work, Foster testified.

Without testing there is no way for scientists at the national laboratories to know exactly how a particular warhead will perform — or even if it will perform, he said.

“That’s a risk,” he said.  “One cannot know whether [a bomb] will work or whether one will fail.  We cannot know that and we cannot prove that.”

If the country does not prepare to test, it would take two to three years after a presidential decision to begin testing — an unacceptable lag time considering today’s uncertain world, Foster said.

“That might not even be in [the president’s] term,” Foster said.  “Two to three years doesn’t do it.”

The costs of the tests would vary greatly, depending on the type of experiments needed, he said.  If scientists simply want to find out if a particular warhead works, it would be relatively inexpensive to conduct a test explosion, he said.  However, tests that study the physics and dynamics of a nuclear warhead and its components could be “frighteningly expensive,” he said.

Testing may be needed not only to gauge the capability, safety and reliability of a particular type of warhead but also to build new bombs to respond to an unforeseen crisis, Foster said.

 “It’s more likely a foreign country will test, and the president may want to take advantage of that” to start U.S. testing, he said.  “It’s not totally under our control.”

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North Korea:  IAEA Urges North Korea to Allow Inspections

During a board of governors meeting in Vienna Monday, the International Atomic Energy Agency urged North Korea to comply with the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty and allow full inspections (see GSN, Jan. 23).

“The IAEA continues to be unable to verify the correctness and completeness of the initial declaration by North Korea of nuclear material subject to safeguards in accordance with its NPT safeguards agreement with the IAEA,” said IAEA Director General Mohamed ElBaradei.

“The work required to verify that all nuclear materials subject to safeguards in North Korea have been declared and placed under safeguards will take three to four years, provided that IAEA receives full cooperation from Pyongyang,” he added.

The NPT, to which North Korea is a party, is legally binding, ElBaradei said.  He added, however, that North Korea links cooperation with IAEA inspections to progress in the construction of two light-water nuclear power reactors for the country — part of the Agreed Framework with the United States (see GSN, March 21).

ElBaradei said North Korea has taken some small cooperative steps, including allowing an IAEA team to visit its Isotope Production Laboratory in Yongbyon in January (Seoul Yonhap, March 19 in FBIS-EAS, March 20).

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CWC:  Future of Bustani’s Tenure Takes Center Stage

The future of the leadership of Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons is expected to be decided today in The Hague on the final day of a meeting of the group’s Executive Council, the Brazilian daily O Estado de Sao Paulo reported today (see GSN, March 21).

The latest U.S. attempt to bring a no-confidence motion to the floor against OPCW Executive Director Jose Mauricio Bustani failed to materialize yesterday, according to O Estado (Jamil Chade, O Estado de Sao Paulo, March 22, Global Security Newswire translation).  The OPCW is responsible for implementing the Chemical Weapons Convention.

Privately, U.S. officials want Bustani to resign because of his positions on Iraq and on inspections of U.S. chemical plants, O Estado reported earlier this week (Jamil Chade, O Estado de Sao Paulo, March 19, Global Security Newswire translation).  In public, the United States accused Bustani of poor financial management, demoralizing the OPCW’s staff and “denigrating” the convention’s fundamental priorities — the destruction and nonproliferation of chemical weapons (U.S. State Department release, March 19).

Bustani is concentrating his defense on the legal aspects of any attempt to remove him, noting that it is not clear whether the organization’s rules permit a no confidence vote.  The organization’s rules only allow for Bustani’s removal if the United States can persuade all of the OPCW’s 145 member states to vote against him, according to O Globo.

According to Bustani, the United States has already tried three times to get rid of him.

“Until now, however, they have not told me what I did” to cause “that call for my exit,” he said in yesterday’s council meeting.

Focusing on the public U.S. charges, Bustani said the charges of poor management are “serious” accusations, but said he is willing to submit to an audit by an independent body or by the United Nations.

“I am ready to evaluated,” he said.  “My professional life is open to scrutiny.”

Bustani also questioned U.S. efforts to pressure Brazil into agreeing with his removal, citing it as “interference” with the supposed “independence” of the OPCW director (Chade, O Estado de Sao Paulo).

Yesterday O Globo reported that the United States told Brazil it would support a Brazilian candidate for U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights in exchange for Bustani’s resignation (Berlinck/Fernandes, O Globo Online, March 21, Global Security Newswire translation).

The United States has said the motion has nothing to do with OPCW policies toward Iraq, the Associated Press reported.  U.S. State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said, however, that the United States currently has no candidate in mind to replace Bustani (Associated Press, March 21).

Meanwhile, Brazil, at least publicly is still supporting Bustani.  According to a Brazilian government source, Brazil is counting on a large number of abstentions during the no confidence vote to maintain Bustani at the OPCW helm, noting that an “abstention is not a vote” against Bustani.

O Globo reported that France is beginning to question the U.S. motion, considering it an excessive move (Oliveira/Bernlick, O Globo Online, March 22, Global Security Newswire translation).

According to Jornal do Brasil, Pakistan and Iran are also now defending Bustani, along with India, Cuba, China and Russia (Arthur Ituassu, Jornal do Brasil, March 22, Global Security Newswire translation).

“That phrase, ‘immediate removal,’” said the Russian council representative, referring to U.S. language calling for the end of Bustani’s tenure, “reminds me of a figure.  Do you know who?  [Former Soviet leader Josef] Stalin,” he said (Ituassu, Jornal do Brasil, March 21, Global Security Newswire translation).

U.S. Spying?

Meanwhile, O Estado reported yesterday that diplomatic sources in The Hague are saying that a recent U.S. staff member at OPCW who recently left the organization may have had connections with U.S. intelligence agencies (Reali Junior, O Estado de Sao Paulo, March 21, Global Security Newswire translation).

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United States:  VX Ten Times Stronger than Believed, EPA Study Says

A preliminary U.S. study has found that the VX nerve agents currently being stored at six U.S. Army chemical weapon depots is 10 times stronger than previously believed, officials said yesterday (see GSN, March 18).

“The dose rate at which we thought people would just begin to have some health effects is now one-tenth of what we had previously thought,” said Tom Johnson, administrator with the Oregon Office of Public Health.

The study, conducted by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, reviewed the toxicity rating of 400 hazardous chemicals.  Most of the chemicals reviewed saw no change to their rating.  The toxicity rating of VX, however, needs to be “substantially redone,” Johnson said (see GSN, Jan. 23).  The final VX toxicity ratings are expected by this summer, said Jon Yaquiant, spokesman for the U.S. Army Aberdeen Proving Ground in Maryland.

Impact on Neighbors

Federal emergency management officials are expected to visit the six chemical weapon depots throughout the country by November to review emergency plans, Yaquiant said.  Communities near the depots probably will have to change their emergency plans according to the new toxicity information, officials said.  Changes might include providing air filters to those who live near the depots, increasing the number of people who would be evacuated in the event of a release and examining how quickly an evacuation order should be given, according to the Associated Press.

The preliminary study will not change the U.S. Army’s plans to destroy its chemical weapon arsenal by 2008, the AP reported.  Currently, four out of the six depots storing VX plan to destroy chemical weapons through incineration, a controversial method (see GSN, March 15).

“Every study shows there’s more risk in storage than in incineration itself,” Yaquiant said.  “If anything, this knowledge would encourage you to dispose of the VX as quickly as possible” (Gillian Flaccus, Associated Press, March 22).

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Russia:  Gorny Disposal Plant to Begin Operations in July, Official Says

The Russian chemical weapons disposal plant in Gorny will begin operations in July, Russian Munitions Agency General Director Zinovy Pak said yesterday (see GSN, Jan. 10).

The Gorny disposal plant will destroy 400 tons of chemical weapons, 1 percent of Russia’s 40,000-ton chemical weapons arsenal, Pak said during a meeting of the executive committee of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, which oversees the Chemical Weapons Convention.

Russia wants more international assistance for its chemical weapons disposal project, said Valey Semin, chief adviser of the Russian Foreign Ministry.  Officials want $3 billion more to complete the disposal program, Semin said (ITAR-Tass, March 22.).

The United States has refused to fulfill its funding obligations for the Shchuchye chemical weapons disposal plant, even though Russia has agreed with the requirements made by the U.S. Congress, Pak said, adding that the delay could prevent Russia from destroying 20 percent of its chemical weapons by 2007 (see GSN, March 20).

The “financial aid promised by the U.S. has acquired a political slant,” Pak said.

He added that he hopes Russian President Vladimir Putin can convince U.S. President George W. Bush to release the funds during Bush’s expected visit to Moscow in May (Yury Golotyuk, Vremya Novostei/Defense and Security, March 22).

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China:  Country Has No Chemical Weapons, Foreign Ministry Says

China yesterday denied having an arsenal of chemical weapons, disputing U.S. claims made earlier this week (see GSN, March 19).

“China possesses no chemical weapons and strictly adheres to the Convention on Banning Chemical Weapons,” said Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Zhang Qiyue.

The statement came in response to claims made by Carl Ford, U.S. assistant secretary of state for intelligence and research.  Ford said Tuesday that the Chinese military has made chemical warfare plans and that China is still exporting chemical weapons-related technology and materials to Iran, China Daily reported (see GSN, Feb. 21).

China has created a set of laws to strictly control the export of chemical weapon materials and technology, Qiyue said (Jiang Zhuqing, China Daily, March 22).  It was irresponsible for the United States, which possesses a large chemical weapons arsenal, to slander China on the issue, she added (Xinhua/BBC Monitoring, March 21).

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U.S. Plans:  PAC-3 Missile Intercepts Target

A Patriot Advanced Capability-3 missile successfully intercepted a tactical ballistic missile during a U.S. Army test Thursday in the second operational test of the PAC-3 system (see GSN, Feb. 5), according to Lockheed Martin (PR Newswire, March 21).

The Army launched a Hera ballistic missile target from Fort Wingate yesterday morning and fired two PAC-3 missiles from the White Sands Missile Range, New Mexico, to intercept the Hera (Associated Press, March 21).

The Army simultaneously launched a PAC-2 missile against a drone aircraft in order to test the system’s ability to choose the correct missile for the correct target.  The PAC-3 missile uses a hit-to-kill warhead designed to destroy missile targets, and the PAC-2 missile uses a blast fragmentation warhead designed to destroy aircraft.

Both parts of the test were successful.  “The Hera target was engaged and destroyed by a PAC-3 missile, and a PAC-2 engaged and destroyed the subscale drone target,” the Army said (Agence France-Presse, March 21).

“The PAC-3 missile is proven, fielded technology,” said Mike Trotsky, vice president of Air Defense Programs for Lockheed Martin Missiles and Fire Control.  “There are no other fielded interceptors that have PAC-3’s power to negate ballistic missiles armed with weapons of mass destruction, as well as cruise missiles and other air threats” (PR Newswire).

Developers have planned two more tests, which are expected to conclude next month, as part of the initial operation test and evaluation for the PAC-3 system (Associated Press).

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