Produced by the Monterey Institute's Center for Nonproliferation Studies

Updated March 2007

Halting Nuclear Weapons Programs

Nearly a dozen countries are known to have started nuclear weapon programs but then decided to halt them before obtaining nuclear arms. In addition, after the break-up of the Soviet Union in 1991, Soviet nuclear weapons remained on the territory of three successor states in addition to Russia: Belarus, Kazakhstan, and Ukraine. Each of these three voluntarily transferred these weapons to Russia by 1996, thus avoiding further proliferation of nuclear weapons.

Saddam Hussein and Iraq. Iraq pursued a clandestine nuclear weapons program during the 1980s, but it did not succeed in developing nuclear weapons by the time of the 1991 Gulf War. After Iraq's defeat in that war, UN inspectors exposed the program and destroyed all known equipment. Nevertheless, U.S. and British intelligence claimed that Iraq had begun to reconstruct its nuclear program, and used this assumption as a justification for the March 2003 invasion of Iraq and the subsequent overthrow of Saddam Hussein's regime. International inspectors (UNSCOM and UNMOVIC) had found no evidence to support this assertion before the war, however, and searches by the 1,700-member Iraq Survey Group after the war did not uncover a renewed Iraqi nuclear weapons program. A comprehensive report released in September 2004 by Charles Duelfer, the chief weapons inspector, concluded that Iraq had no nuclear weapons or the facilities to construct them, and that Iraq's nuclear program had ended in 1991 after the Gulf War.

Mu'ammar al-Qadhdhafi and Libya. In December 2003, Libya agreed to eliminate all of its weapons of mass destruction programs in return for the lifting of economic sanctions by the United States and Britain and other assurances. Despite being a party to the NPT, Libya under Colonel Mu'ammar al-Qadhdhafi sought nuclear technologies, fissile materials, and weapons designs and know-how from several countries including, China, Pakistan, the Soviet Union/Russia, Belgium, and Ukraine. Allegedly, Libya wanted a nuclear weapon to counter the covert Israeli nuclear program.  In 2003, Libya admitted to the IAEA that it had tried for more than a decade to develop a uranium enrichment capability and had acquired Chinese-origin nuclear weapon designs and fabrication documents. Under the 2003 deal, Libya agreed to transfer sensitive nuclear-related materials, and documents to the United States; conclude an Additional Protocol with the IAEA; and ratify the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty. In 2004, U.S. and British teams dismantled Libya's nuclear facilities with IAEA oversight. Documents and components of the nuclear and ballistic missile programs were airlifted to the United States, and highly enriched uranium from Libya's Tajura Nuclear Research Center was sent to Russia for reprocessing. In return, the United States lifted most of its trade restrictions on Libya.

Who Is Trying to Obtain Nuclear Weapons?

Today, many countries are concerned that North Korea and Iran may be pursuing clandestine nuclear weapon programs. In 1994, the United States signed an agreement with North Korea in which that country agreed to freeze sensitive parts of its nuclear program if the United States and others helped it meet its energy needs by providing two nuclear power plants and oil supplies until the two plants were built. However, North Korea's October 2002 admission that it had been conducting a secret uranium enrichment project violated the spirit and the terms of the 1994 agreement, and renewed tensions between North Korea and the international community. The situation deteriorated further in December 2002 when North Korea announced it would reactivate its Yongbyon facility, a site capable of supporting a plutonium-based nuclear program. Days later, Pyongyang insisted that the IAEA remove all monitoring equipment and seals from all nuclear facilities in North Korea. Subsequently, the DPRK disrupted most of the IAEA safeguards equipment at the Yongbyon facilities, expelled IAEA inspectors from the country, and announced its withdrawal from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). In the wake of this decision, the United States and the leaders of four other nations, South Korea, China, Japan and Russia, persuaded North Korea to sit at the negotiating table in late August 2003; this ongoing series of negotiations is known as the Six-Party Talks. In February 2005, the DPRK Foreign Ministry declared that North Korea possessed nuclear weapons and  the country would increase its nuclear arsenal to counter the hostile U.S. policy toward it. Nonetheless, the Six-Party Talks resumed after a year's recess in late July 2005.

On September 15, 2005, the six parties reached a tentative agreement, according to which the DPRK committed to abandoning all its nuclear weapons and existing nuclear programs, and to returning to the NPT and allowing IAEA inspections. But the parties almost immediately disagreed on the terms of the agreement, and the Six-Party Talks stalled. On July 4, 2006, North Korea test-fired approximately seven missiles, including a long-range Taepo-Dong missile that blew up seconds into the flight. The missile tests brought immediate condemnation and economic sanctions against Pyongyang through UN Resolution 1695 on July 15.

On October 9, 2006, the DPRK announced that it tested a nuclear device in defiance of repeated warnings from the international community. The test of a plutonium device was conducted in the North Hamgyong Province. Chinese officials said that North Korea warned them that the nuclear test would have a 4-kiloton yield, but seismic reading suggest a test of less than 1-kiloton, very small for a nuclear explosion. The UN Security Council condemned the test, and on October 14, adopted Resolution 1718 calling on all countries to bar the DPRK from receiving or supplying WMD-related or conventional weapons.

On February 13, 2007, North Korea agreed to begin closing it nuclear facilities and to allow international inspectors into the country in exchange for approximately $400 million in fuel, food and other aid from the United States, China, South Korea, and Russia. (Japan does not agree to the aid package as it still has outstanding bilateral issues with the DPRK.) In addition, the United States and Japan will discuss normalizing relations with North Korea and lifting trade and financial sanctions. The agreement gives North Korea 60 days to take the first steps toward halting its nuclear program but it leaves to a later negotiation the question of whether and how Pyongang will dispose of its nuclear weapons and the fissile material used to produce them. 

Iran, a member of the NPT, admitted that it had deceived IAEA inspectors for almost two decades about its nuclear-related activities, including uranium enrichment. In 2002, a group opposed to Iran's government revealed that Iran had two nuclear facilities it had never declared to the IAEA: an uranium facility at Natanz and a heavy water production facility at Arak. Iran then claimed that it was developing a nuclear power plan that would rely solely on domestic technology and supplies of uranium ore. The Western intelligence community feared that Iran was developing the capability to produce fissile material for nuclear weapons.

In February 2003, IAEA inspectors concluded that Iran had several sensitive nuclear technology facilities. Iran subsequently provided evidence of its technical NPT violations in the 1990s when it carried out uranium conversion experiments, using nuclear materials imported from China, and in the 1980s, when it produced heavy water in a laboratory. Following further IAEA inspections, which revealed highly enriched uranium at Natanz, the IAEA criticized Iran in November 2003 for not abiding by its IAEA Safeguards Agreement, for pursuing undeclared efforts to develop uranium centrifuge and laser enrichment programs, and for producing small amounts of low-enriched uranium and plutonium. The IAEA called on Iran to suspend enrichment activities and sign an Additional Protocol. Iran did sign the protocol, submit to further IAEA inspections, and provide additional information. In November 2004, the IAEA adopted a resolution acknowledging Iran's many breaches of its NPT obligations and subsequent corrective measures, and noting that Iran had finally agreed to temporarily suspend all enrichment-related and reprocessing activities. However, Iran said it would not abandon its nuclear program, and planned to achieve full mastery of the nuclear fuel cycle.

Given Iran's past deceptions and its insistence on mastering the production of nuclear fuel, the United States, Britain, France, and Germany argue that Iran is pursuing nuclear weapons. In August 2005, Iran rejected an European proposal to permanently abandon its nuclear activities in exchange for economic, technological, security and political incentives. On March 29, 2006, the UN Security Council demanded that Iran suspend all enrichment-related activities and resolve questions about its nuclear activities within 30 days. Iran rejected the call to freeze its uranium enrichment activities, announced that it had mastered a new stage of uranium enrichment, and planned to expand its enrichment activities to industrial scale at its Natanz facility. On July 31, 2006, the UN Security Council passed Resolution 1696, giving Iran a month to suspend uranium enrichment or face sanctions. Iran has not complied, and the UN Security Council members continue to discuss possible sanctions while trying to continue negotiations with Iran.

On February 22, 2007, the IAEA issued a report concluding that Iran, instead of halting its uranium enrichment program as required by UN Security Council Resolution 1737 (adopted December 23, 2006), has expanded its enrichment program. According to the report, Iran has set up hundreds of uranium-spinning centrifuges and gathered nearly 9 tons of gaseous feedstock to use as fuel. In addition, Iran is building a reactor that will use heavy water and a heavy water production facility; such a reactor produces plutonium that could be processed and used as fissile material in a nuclear weapon.

Attempts by non-state actors, such as Al-Qaeda, to obtain or produce nuclear weapons are another concern. Although the terrorist organization is not thought to possess either a nuclear weapon or the fissile material needed to produce a weapon, nuclear weapon designs and other documents found in Afghanistan indicate the organization's interest in obtaining WMD capabilities.