Project on European Nuclear Non-Proliferation (PENN)
PENN Newsletter No. 15 / November 2001

Newsletter

c/o BITS ·  Rykestr. 13  · D-10405 Berlin ·   Germany  ·  Phone: +49-30-446858-0   ·    Fax: +49-30-4410221

Dear Friends,

much has changed since the last PENN-Newsletter has been produced. The terrorist attacks of September 11 and the war in Afghanistan are the most visible signals. Their impact was so strong that even the Russian – American announcements to mutually reduce their active strategic nuclear postures to between 1.700 and 2.200 in-service warheads over the decade to come went nearly as unnoticed as the departure from traditional arms control agreements represented by these reductions. While Presidents Bush and Putin agreed to join forces to fight international terrorism, they did not solve their differences on the future of missile defense and the ABM Treaty. The basic ideas for the future new “strategic framework” suggested by Bush administration officials remain nebulous. In Europe the terrorist attacks led many governments to compete for their roles in supporting the U.S. led fight against terrorism, and it remains to be seen whether this newly developing focus will weaken or strengthen the development of the Common European Security and Defense Policy.

• Analysis

Shaping the ‘new strategic framework’

On November 12th, President Putin arrived in Washington on his first official visit to the United States. The series of meetings Putin had with President Bush produced mixed results. While the two countries pledged to push ahead with deep unilateral reductions in their respective nuclear arsenals and continued to show a united front regarding the ongoing military campaign in Afghanistan, on the issue of U.S. missile defense and the future of the ABM Treaty, no clear agreement was reached. President Putin continued to resist U.S. pressure to abandon the agreement. Overall, however, the meeting represented a significant step in Washington’s attempt to develop what it has termed the ‘new security framework’ between the United States and Russia.

The core elements of the ‘new strategic framework’ were clear even before George W. Bush came to power. On May 23rd 2000, then Governor Bush gave a speech that emphasized the need to deploy an extensive National Missile Defense (NMD) system, raised the possibility of deep cuts in the U.S. nuclear arsenal, and spelled out the need to release the U.S. from strict arms control agreements. Bush stated, “it should be possible to reduce the number of American nuclear weapons significantly further than has already been agreed under START II without compromising our security in any way.” He went on to argue that, “these changes to our forces should not require years and years of detailed arms control negotiations.”

In the short term, therefore, the Bush administration is seeking an agreement with Russia concerning the development of NMD, the ABM Treaty, and the future of arms control. Failure to gain Moscow’s consent on these issues will leave the Bush administration open to fresh accusations of unilateralism at a time when it needs as much global goodwill as it can muster. However, these three initial aims are in turn being driven by a larger, more ambitious agenda that seeks to radically alter U.S. nuclear policy in ways that could negatively impact global security. Central components of this agenda are: a reduced emphasis on deterrence; the creation of a smaller, more flexible arsenal, unhindered by the constraints of arms control; and an expanded role for nuclear weapons in U.S. military planning.

Amongst the most influential contributions to this agenda have been the National Defense University’s U.S. Nuclear Policy in the 21^st Century, Paul Robinson’s A White Paper: Pursuing a New Nuclear Weapons Policy for the 21^st Century, and the National Institute for Public Policy’s two volume Rationale and Requirements for U.S. Nuclear Forces and Arms Control. The NIPP report is believed to be particularly influential on current planning, with several of its authors gaining key positions within the Bush administration: Stephen J. Hadley, the deputy national security adviser; Stephen Cambone, a special assistant to Donald Rumsfeld; Robert Joseph, a National Security aide overseeing counterproliferation; and William Schneider Jr., who informally advised Donald Rumsfeld during the transition. All signed the main proposals of the report.

The current security crisis appears to have done little to alter the enthusiasm of this pro-nuclear lobby for their proposed changes. However, the extent to which their thinking has influenced the Bush administration will only become apparent with the release of the Nuclear Posture Review in December, which was charged in February with the job of clarifying nuclear policy for the next five to 10 years. This article sets out to examine the arguments of this pro-nuclear lobby in more detail. It addresses each of the three central components – NMD and deterrence; smaller and more flexible forces; and the expanding role of nuclear weapons in nuclear planning – before drawing a number of conclusions as to the likely consequences for global security.

De-emphasizing deterrence

A large part of the rationale driving the pro-nuclear agenda is an attempt to move away from the traditional concept of deterrence, as based on the theory of Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD). More specifically, those driving the debate are keen to move away from the second principle of deterrence – mutually assured vulnerability - which implicitly accepts that continued security is based on the ability of another country to destroy the United States.  This unease regarding the vulnerability implicit in deterrence is apparent in much of the literature currently driving the debate. The National Defense University (NDU) report from 1998, for example, asserts that “the United States must be prepared to adjust to the way it structures deterrence, relying less on the threat of retaliation and more on denial and dissuasion.”

The development of an NMD system is largely driven by a desire to escape from the vulnerability inherent in deterrence. While the United States has had to learn to live with the fact that Moscow will continue to retain the ability to destroy the United States for the foreseeable future, there is a clear objection to the possibly ill-founded fear that North Korea should be able to, and an unwillingness to accept that China can. NMD is largely an attempt to escape from this vulnerability and free Washington’s hand to intervene militarily in the world.

NMD is also by far the most visible and therefore the most controversial aspect of the ‘new strategic framework’ and the area where the Bush administration most needs to achieve the agreement of Moscow. However, the shift to a smaller, more flexible arsenal with an increased role for nuclear weapons is given much greater emphasis in the work of the NDU and NIPP.

Smaller, more flexible arsenal

One of the central themes of the pro-nuclear lobby is the need to free the United States from international arms control constraints. Current commitments made under the START process and the existing test ban moratorium place potential restrictions on Washington’s ability to adjust its nuclear force levels in the future. Freeing the United States from the restrictions of the START agreements will allow Washington to alter the size and composition of its nuclear arsenal without prior consultation with Moscow. It also fits within the broader agenda of the Bush administration, which is deeply suspicious of any attempt to make Washington answerable to any international treaty. According to Richard Butler, former head of UNSCOM, the “administration seems to believe that international agreements will increasingly pressure the United States to sacrifice its sovereignty and become subject to direction by international institutions.”

In the meantime, there is a clear case for radically reducing the size of the U.S. arsenal. The 1990s witnessed the collapse of the once mighty Russian nuclear arsenal, to the extent that Moscow would probably be hard pushed to maintain an arsenal of more than 2.500 warheads by 2010 even if it wanted to. There is clearly ample scope for the United States to cut the size of its arsenal and still maintain the ability to deter a nuclear attack. Arguments in favor of deep cuts in the U.S. arsenal are common to the various reports shaping the current agenda. The NIPP report, for instance, states the United States could unilaterally reduce its arsenal to below proposed START III levels.

In May this year, President Bush stated that he is committed to “achieving a credible deterrent with the lowest-possible number of nuclear weapons consistent with our national security needs.” In June, Richard Perle stated that the United States could reduce its arsenal to “well below 1.000” nuclear weapons. Meanwhile, in July, Washington Post columnist, Bill Arkin, wrote that the administration was looking seriously at a three-stage process that would lead to a reduction to 1.000-1.500. At the Crawford summit, Bush announced a unilateral, two-third reduction in the U.S. nuclear arsenal, reducing the number of warheads from over 6.000 under START I to between 1.700 and 2.200 in the next ten years. In response, President Vladimir Putin has said that Russia will take efforts to follow suit. While the proposed cuts are less dramatic than those previously mooted, they still go beyond the level of 2.500 provisionally set for START III.

However, along with a desire to cut away the dead weight of the U.S. nuclear arsenal, one of the primary aims of these cuts is to increase the level of flexibility in U.S. nuclear force planning. By announcing unilateral cuts beyond the levels provisionally agreed in START III, Washington can successfully free itself from binding and irreversible arms control agreements. The NIPP report acknowledges this stating that deep unilateral cuts in the U.S. arsenal would be “both prudent and practical to the extent that it permits the United States to meet its requirements and to maintain the de jure and de facto capability to adjust its future strategic force structure, offensive and defensive, in response to a highly dynamic strategic environment.”

Achieving a smaller more flexible arsenal would fit with the third, and perhaps most controversial aspect of the agenda being pursued: the attempt to ‘re-center’ nuclear weapons back at the heart of U.S. military planning, with a more active role in attacking hardened targets and deterring chemical and biological weapons.

New-nukes, new roles

During the 1990s, the rapid advance of the so-called ‘revolution in military affairs’ led many to question the role of nuclear weapons in U.S. military planning. The extent to which the United States led the world in the development of precision-guided munitions, computer network attack, and electronic power distribution munitions led many to feel that the tasks previously reserved for nuclear weapons could now be fulfilled with conventional weapons. Indeed, U.S. conventional superiority was borne out by the experience of the 1991 Gulf War, the 1994 North Korean crisis and the attacks on Yugoslavia in 1999. In all three cases the use of nuclear weapons was either discarded after the briefest of assessments, or not considered at all. In contrast, precision-guided munitions played a decisive role in the Gulf War, while in Yugoslavia conflict computer network attack and electronic power distribution munitions were also used.

Armed services chiefs, particularly those from the Air Force, have long argued that nuclear weapons divert resources away from employable conventional weaponry, and are increasingly supportive of cuts in the U.S. nuclear arsenal. A recent Air Force Academy research paper even suggested scrapping the entire ICBM force, calling the missiles “aging relics of the Cold War.”

In 1999, Paul H. Nitze, former special advisor to President Reagan, argued that the United States should contemplate complete, unilateral nuclear disarmament due to its unrivalled superiority in the field of conventional weapons. Similarly, a congressionally appointed defense panel in 1997 argued: “Advancing military technologies that merge the capabilities of information systems with precision-guided weaponry and real time targeting and other new weapons systems may provide a supplement or alternative to the nuclear arsenals of the Cold-War.”

However, contrary to the weight of this evidence and opinion, the NDU and NIPP reports and the Paul Robinson paper argue for an increased role for nuclear weapons in U.S. military planning. Robinson’s paper argues, for example, that the U.S. should build special low-yield warheads for use against hardened underground targets. In a recent interview Robinson backed up his argument, asserting that conventional weapons have proved deficient in handling hardened targets in recent conflicts. “We’ve seen examples as recently as the [1999] air war with Serbia, when we attacked underground targets with conventional weapons with very little effect. It just takes too many aircraft sorties and conventional weapons to give you any confidence that you can take out underground bunkers. By putting a nuclear warhead on one of those weapons instead of high explosives, you would multiply the explosive power by more than a million.”

According to the pro-nuclear lobby, Washington’s policy of deliberate ambiguity over the question of whether it would retaliate with nuclear weapons to a chemical or biological weapons attack must also be discarded. Instead, they argue, that the United States must declare openly that it would respond to biological and chemical weapons attack with nuclear weapons. The NIPP Report, for example, advocates the use of nuclear weapons to “deter regional powers or an emerging global power from WMD or massive conventional aggression against the United States or its allies.”

While there is little desire to maintain the current nuclear arsenal at its present level, administration officials are keen to reverse the trend, apparent through much of the 1990s, of de-emphasizing the role of nuclear weapons in U.S. military planning. Advances in precision guided munitions and other aspects of the RMA give the United States a clear advantage over many of its adversaries, but combined with low-yield nuclear weapons these advantages could be extended still further. It is this thinking that seems likely to push the NPR towards recommending an expanded role for nuclear weapons when it reports in December.

Conclusions

The underlying issue that cuts through many of the pro-nuclear recommendations is the fear that the U.S. nuclear deterrent is no longer ’credible’. The United States has become far too hampered by ‘self deterrence’ to convince anyone that it would use nuclear weapons in anything but a last resort situation. As a recent report from the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Affairs (CSBA) argues, “the will of U.S. policy officials to escalate to nuclear use for an enemy provocation short of nuclear attack is very much in doubt.” The development of NMD, a smaller, more robust arsenal, and the development of smaller, more usable warheads, will counteract this trend, eliminating many of the factors that currently inhibit U.S. nuclear use.

The events of September 11 and the ongoing military campaign in Afghanistan seem to have done little to temper the Bush administration’s enthusiasm for the proposed changes. President Bush has made it clear that he is still determined to pursue his pre-election agenda, arguing that “the case is more strong today than it was on September 10th that the ABM is outmoded, outdated, reflects a different time”. Most worrying perhaps are the indications that the events of September 11 have further invigorated those advocating a more aggressive nuclear policy. David Smith, a defense consultant and one of the author’s of the NIPP report, said: “September 11 really underscores the need to look at a full range of flexible options … What we were trying to get at there [in the NIPP report] is we don’t believe the current arsenal of the United States is persuasively deterrent to all comers.”

September 11 has also made it a lot harder for other countries to speak out in opposition to the direction being taken by the Bush administration. As it seeks to redefine its relationship with Russia to enable a more flexible and possibly aggressive nuclear policy, both allies and opponents will find it much harder to voice concerns in the current climate. As John Chipman, Director of the International Institute for Strategic Studies, put it: “If European leaders stand up and argue that the ABM Treaty is a cornerstone of strategic stability, the present U.S. administration will wonder if they were on a different planet on Sept. 11 when strategic stability in the proper sense of the term was shattered.”

On the other hand, it is a truism of government that idealistic plans put together while outside of office can often be severely tempered by the realities of government. For example, prior to his election, President Nixon pledged to build a 12-site NMD. In the end, however, he negotiated the ABM Treaty that allowed for only one site. Similarly, Ronald Reagan began his time in office pursuing an ambitious modernization of the nuclear arsenal but ended up agreeing to the elimination of theatre nuclear forces in Europe and to substantial reductions in strategic forces. There are already indications that the NPR may suffer a similar fate to the Quadrennial Defense Review released in September, which was short on substance and left a great deal to be cleared up by subsequent, more specialized review processes.

While there is clearly a great need to radically overhaul existing U.S. nuclear policy, the current strategic framework being promoted by the Bush administration is largely based on a set of principles that aim to undermine existing arms control agreements and increase the role of nuclear weapons in U.S. military planning. This agenda can only serve to decrease global security and increase instability.       MB

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The Diffusion of U.S. Arms Control Policies

Washington's policy toward unilateralism and international commitments has not changed much since the September 11 terrorist attacks. The ultimate goal remains to acquire maximum flexibility to adjust and reconstitute the U.S. military posture as circumstances require ¾ without the legal and financial obligations imposed by international agreements. So far, the U.S. considers most of the major arms control accords as "too restrictive":

Antiballistic Missile Treaty (ABMT): In recent months, Russia has indicated that the Antiballistic Missile Treaty (ABMT) allows both Russia and the United States enough flexibility to redefine their strategic relationship and to accommodate each side's interests. Moscow quite possibly would concede certain treaty modifications to accommodate limited testing, given that the U.S. provides more concrete information on what kind of missile defense it wants to develop. But at the Crawford summit November 13-15, no deal emerged that would allow the U.S. to undertake extensive testing of sophisticated missile defense technologies without breaking the ABMT. Without an arrangement reached by the end of this year, concerns are increasing that the U.S. will announce to withdraw unilaterally from the ABMT. Such a move would lead to the emergence of some kind of action-reaction dynamics, because Russia still views the ABMT as a "cornerstone of stability".

Strategic Arms Reductions Treaty (START): At the Crawford summit, Bush and Putin also discussed goals for reducing strategic nuclear warhead levels to between 1.700 and 2.200 on each side. Before deciding on specific numbers, Bush will wait until the December 2001 Nuclear Posture Review is completed. The NPR will determine U.S. strategic needs and the nuclear posture for the coming decades. Rather than a mutually binding treaty framework with strictly scheduled reductions, the administration wants the future arrangement to take the form of reciprocal unilateral reductions in deployed warheads. But under present law, President Bush cannot do this. In August, the House Armed Services Committee rejected to repeal a 1997 provision prohibiting unilateral reductions until START II entered into force. If this legislation had been adopted, unilateral reductions in deployed warheads would be permitted without START II going into force. A vital opportunity would be missed to eliminate multiple independently targetable re-entry vehicles under START II, which is also a key security issue closely linked to the relationship between offensive weapons and missile defenses.

Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT): There is little chance that the CTBT will enter into force during Bush's presidency. While pledging to continue with the 1992 unilateral testing moratorium, Bush has resolved to let the CTBT languish in the Senate, where its supporters do not have the votes to revive it. Most recently, on November 11, the United States sidestepped a UN conference on CTBT ratification, causing annoyance among the other delegations about U.S. diplomatic behavior at a time when it seeks to maintain a coalition to fight terrorism. The official U.S. motivation is to keep the option for future testing to ensure the safety and reliability of the U.S. nuclear stockpile. Another relevant aspect is the intention to keep the option to develop a new low-yield nuclear weapon for use against underground command bunkers and biological weapons facilities.

Biological and Toxic Weapons Convention (BWC): On December 8, the Geneva held BWC review was disbanded after the American delegation had sought to cut off discussions about a draft BWC protocol on compliance and enforcement mechanism which would be conducted by a newly created international body. This move came only one month after President Bush for the first time had admitted the need to reinforce the BWC. However, his proposal focussed on actions by individual countries increasing the control of bioweapons-related material and activities, rather than relying on a legally binding agreement under international law, which the U.S. rejects as "ineffective".

Outer Space Treaty: On May 8, Defense Secretary Rumsfeld announced several changes to the way the U.S. operates its space programs. When asked whether the U.S. intended to pursue space-based weapons, he quoted from a report saying that the U.S. "will develop, operate and maintain space control capabilities to ensure freedom of action in space and, if directed, deny such freedom of action to adversaries." So far, the United States has ignored the insistence by some members of the Conference on Disarmament to begin negotiations on a new and more appropriate Outer Space Treaty.

Landmine Ban Treaty: The U.S. remains on the outside of a treaty joined by more than two thirds of the world's nations. Under the Bush administration, the Pentagon has recommended to abandon the U.S. commitment policy to join the Mine Ban Treaty as soon as possible, rejecting the existing target date for joining in 2006. Washington argues that it requires the use of anti-personnel landmines in and around the demilitarized zone between North and South Korea.

Small arms and light weapons: In July, the U.S. weakened the outcome of the UN Conference on Illicit Trade in Small Arms and Light Weapons in New York. The U.S. delegation controversially refused to discuss firearms and non-military rifles, which was not that surprising given the known close ties bet-ween the American gun lobby and the Bush administration. It also refused to accept language that could lead to changes in U.S. policy or law, even though the action program is only voluntary and non-legally binding. Restrictions on small arms sales to nongovernmental actors, a pledge to hold a mandatory review conference, and the promotion of international advocacy by nongovernmental and international organizations were rejected.

The Bush administration's policy to diffuse the exist­ing network of formal arrangements into more elusive structures has been called " à la carte multilateralism": On one hand, the preeminent international position of the United States enables it to oppose and weaken existing international agreements, justified only on the basis of American national interests. On the other hand, the U.S. takes an active leadership role on those few multilateral arrangements it wants to remain in­tact, because they maintain vital American high-tech oligopolies, like the MTCR or the NPT. The contra­diction is that "the country with the greatest interests in seeing the rule of law develop internationally is the one that most refuses to contribute to it", as Phillip Jordan put it. This policy leads not only toward fewer and fewer constraints and more flexibility, but also toward less predictability and decreasing security – not at least for the United States itself. MN

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Space Weaponry and Deterrence

As the United States deploys its formidable military power against Afghanistan, it is worth recalling that military assets in space are integral to Operation Enduring Freedom, and that consequently the debate over weaponizing space has been suspended but not ended. Like missile defense, plans to put weapons into space have ebbed and flowed in strategic policy debates in the U.S., but have resurfaced under the Bush administration. Like missile defense again, weapons in space are likely to have far-reaching and possibly grave consequences for deterrence as we have come to think of it.

Background

It is important to distinguish between militarizing space and weaponizing space. Space has been militarized for many years: ‘passive’ systems, such as reconnaissance, communications, early warning, surveillance, are examples of the use of space for purely military purposes. The Gulf War against Iraq in 1990-1991 demonstrated that space-based systems were integral to the warfighting capability of industrialized major powers: intra-theatre communications, weather information, multispectral imagery, target acquisition, and the Global Positioning System (GPS), were vital components in the way the war was waged.

Afterwards, William Perry noted the importance of such systems, and warned that it was “unlikely” that they could be used again without some attempt at countermeasures by the enemy. This supposed vulnerability was later highlighted by Stephen Lambakis, who described space as the Achilles’ heel of the U.S., and went on to argue that “in the future, space control will be as important as sea control or command of the air are today”. Both these points resurfaced in the report of the Commission to Assess United States National Security Space Management and Organization, led by Donald Rumsfeld and published in January 2001.  It echoed the allegation of an Achilles’ heel in space by alleging vulnerability to a “space Pearl Harbor” which would seriously incapacitate the warfighting capabilities of the U.S. The emphasis on control of space was similarly put by the report, and by a U.S. Space Command which argued that “the medium of space is the fourth medium of warfare along with land, sea and air”. The upshot, Rumsfeld argued, was that U.S. policy should now work “to ensure that the President will have the option to deploy weapons in space”. We therefore seem to be approaching a new phase. The current system, in which militarized space is accepted, but weaponized space is tacitly or explicitly forbidden, may be under threat.

Rumsfeld's Recommendations and Their Implications

The Rumsfeld report begins from the premise that, in economic and military terms, the United States is heavily dependent on space assets. This is certainly beyond dispute. What is required, the report urges, is “a deterrence strategy for space, which in turn must be supported by a broader range of space capabilities”. Many of the proposed capabilities, such as improved command, control and communications (C³) and earth surveillance from space, are an extension of the militarization of space. But the deterrence/defense strategy also involves defense in space, and “power projection in, from and through space”, and therefore ineluctably means weaponizing space as well as militarizing it. Thus, the report goes beyond recommending a deterrent strategy to augment terrestrial deterrent posture. It also proposes a deterrent posture in and for space itself.

Upgraded C³ will be the first deployment, but weaponization will not be far behind. In the short-to-medium run, anti-satellite operations (ASAT) and ballistic missile defense are the most probable first deployments. The technology required is currently some way from realization, but the most likely forms are directed energy weapons such as lasers, and kinetic energy weapons. However, it is very possible that more exotic weapons and more ambitious functions are envisaged: the phrase “power projection in, from and through space” suggests far-reaching hopes. As for operational targets, the revealing phrase “a space Pearl Harbor” points to a key theme in U.S. defense policy since the mid-1990s: asymmetry. This is officially defined in the U.S. as “countering an adversary’s strengths by focusing on its weaknesses”, and has become a recurrent buzzword in strategic policy. In this context, it refers to a possible strike at U.S. space capabilities in order to negate the formidable military power of U.S. terrestrial forces.

The report is careful to couch its recommendations in terms of deterrence and defense. That is to say, it seeks to present them as non-aggressive and unthreatening. However, this is a highly problematic interpretation. The most stable form of deterrence relies on secure retaliatory capability, and the U.S. claims to be simply acting to safeguard its own retaliatory offensive capabilities, including C³. However, U.S. deterrent capabilities are of a different nature to those of other states. As the only superpower, and being geographically isolated, U.S. deterrent strategy is invariably driven by overseas commitments rather than actual threats to its homeland. To put it another way, the U.S. does not have to practice central deterrence in the way that, say, Iran does. There are no border disputes or ethnic conflicts with neighbors to threaten the U.S. homeland. Such threats and attacks will be related to policies and events far away from the continental United States.

This is where the problems start, and where the U.S. is in a unique position. For the U.S., defense is predominantly about defending its global presence. Deterrence is thus unavoidably about deterring challenges to that global presence, and therefore about protecting the ability to intervene in regional conflicts. This is not a solely U.S. characteristic, but because the U.S. is the only state able to assert itself militarily on a global scale, it is more true of the U.S. than any other state. It means that the U.S. can be peculiarly threatening when it takes steps to enhance its interventionary capabilities, and that claims to be only interested in deterrence often ring hollow with other states, for whom U.S. deterrence is about Washington’s ability to decisively influence their security environment.

However, it must be recognized that the U.S. is in an unusually difficult position if it does become vulnerable to other states, or when its deterrent capabilities are eroded by new technology in other states. The benefits of maintaining global presence may be quickly outweighed by the costs of a large-scale attack on the U.S. homeland. As China’s General Xiong Guangkai told an American envoy, “in the end, you care more about Los Angeles than you do about Taipei”. Thus the U.S. may be peculiarly susceptible to asymmetric attack and/or limited technological advances by small states. It is therefore not surprising if Washington sometimes seems more fretful about its deterrent capabilities than other states – it has more reason than most to want defenses to back up its deterrent policy.

But for those states with difficult or hostile relationships with the U.S., the line between deterrence and compellance in Washington’s military policy is slim. It is therefore highly unlikely that increased U.S. space capabilities would not be countered in some way. Few states, if any, can match the U.S. in terms of technology, but proponents and opponents of space weaponization concur that ASAT technology is not the prohibitively high-tech response it once was. Further weaponization of space is almost certain to prompt countermeasures and counter-weaponization. In this way, pursuit of the near-term aim of using space weapons to bolster terrestrial deterrence may in itself create the necessity for the longer-term aim of a deterrent strategy for space itself. In other words, the Rumsfeld strategy may generate the very conditions it seeks to prevent.

There is, however, an alternative way forward. There is no question that space is already militarized, nor that capabilities for attacking militarized and commercial space assets are likely to emerge in the foreseeable future, nor that attacks on those assets will severely damage the credibility of the U.S. deterrent posture. The issue, therefore, is whether the U.S. will confront fewer problems by weaponizing space or by pursuing alternatives. The principal alternative is to pursue a dual strategy of constructing an international regime for the non-weaponization of space, backed by upgraded passive defenses for space assets. Passive defenses, such as those outlined by Bruce Deblois, avoid weaponizing space, and also exploit the key advantage of the U.S. – technological know-how and financial resources. The aim, after all, should not be to weaponize space per se, but rather to make space assets less vulnerable than they currently are. Out-maneuvering attacks, rather than temporarily outgunning them, may in the longer term be a more effective way to plug the asymmetry gap. MS

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The CESDP’s countdown to Laeken

Progress made by the European Union in the construction of its Common European Security and Defense Policy (CESDP) can be best described as mixed. According to the Union’s schedule, the intention is to finalize the arrangements during the present Belgian Presidency with a view to making it operational by the end of the year. Most of the arrangements required for declaring CESDP operational are ready; however, an agreement with NATO on the use of its assets for EU-led missions is still to be accounted for.

The most significant achievement of the Gothenburg European Council last June was to bolster the development of the civilian elements of crisis management. To this end, it has formulated “Headline Goals” in the fields of Rule of Law and Civil Protection, following the pattern initially set in Helsinki for the establishment of the Rapid Reaction Force. In each Headline Goal, Member States commit to pool a certain number of experts to be deployed at short notice for a determined period of time. A total of 200 legal experts should be ready for deployment within 30 days’ notice, their missions consisting of assistance in the build up of legal entities to be subsequently transferred to local authorities in order to be implemented. In the field of civil protection, intervention teams of up to 2,000 specialized personnel should be deployable by 2003.

Prior to the Gothenburg Summit, the European Council’s almost exclusive focus on the military aspects of the future crisis management capability had given rise to concerns within the NGO community that the civilian aspects were being given a rather marginal role. The Gothenburg decisions have dissipated these reasonable doubts by putting the strengthening of civilian elements firmly on the CESDP agenda.

Another remarkable development has been the approval of a “Programme for the Prevention of Violent Conflicts”. This document constitutes the Council’s response to the Communication on Conflict Prevention tabled by the Commission last April, which singled out a number of instruments that the Council could use for conflict prevention purposes. While overall the program remains vague in its provisions, it foresees the formulation of preventitive strategies by the EU, including preliminary work such as periodic reviews of potential conflict areas and yearly orientation debates within the Council.

Regarding the military domain, the EU approved an Exercise Policy and is planning to conduct its first exercise in the coming year. Different categories of exercises are foreseen, depending upon which instances of the institutions they involve. However, these exercises remain limited to the domain of the command post, and shall only take place from the Force Headquarters level upwards. For exercises below that level, i.e., troops exercises, it is explicitly mentioned that they can be conducted within the framework of NATO’s command structure or the structure of Partnership for Peace. Also, joint exercises between the EU and NATO are envisaged, which will not only require close co-ordination between the two bodies, but will also result in a need for the EU to adapt to NATO standards. All this seems to confirm what was first made apparent at the Feira European Council of June 2000: that every detail of the CESDP will be closely co-ordinationed with NATO.

After the Swedish Presidency had carried forward a great amount of work, one could have the impression that the mandate concerning CESDP will be easy for the Belgians to accomplish. The Belgian Presidency has to elaborate principles for the financing of operations, to finalize arrangements for co-operation with other international organisations and to eventually declare the EU operational. The mandate specifies that operational readiness should be declared “no later than at the European Council at Laeken”, which will take place in December. However, it should be remembered that the EU needs NATO assets for the conduct of its operations, and that agreement with the Alliance on this question is still lacking. This critical accord is long overdue: arrangements were supposed to have been made ready as early as December 2000, but Turkey’s reluctance to grant the EU a general access to NATO assets has hindered the conclusion of an agreement. While the Union has firmly refused to cede to Ankara’s demands for greater participation in future EU missions, the tone in which the Council Conclusions call for the finalization of an arrangement sounds irritated almost. With no clear understanding in sight, the Laeken European Council will be confronted with a hard choice: to declare operational readiness while lacking the capabilities necessary to back it up, or to postpone the decision until an accord is reached.  CP                                                                        

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Transcending MTCR: The EU’s Common

Following up on a Declaration issued at the Gothenburg European Council last June, the EU adopted a ‘Common Position on the fight against Ballistic Missile Proliferation’ on 23 July. The Common Position primarily calls for the adoption and universalization of a ‘Code of Conduct against Ballistic Missile Proliferation’; in essence, a document setting out principles and confidence building measures. It invites any potentially subscribing state to participate in negotiations leading to its adoption, which should ideally result in a UN Conference to be convened next year.

At first sight, this initiative seems somewhat complicated because it involves different forums: the EU, the UN and the Missile Technology Control Regime (MTCR), an informal export control regime. The EU is suggesting to transfer the planned Code to the UN framework. So far, efforts to curb ballistic missile proliferation have been confined to the existence of the MTCR arrangement, within which the Code was initiated. This regime imposes restrictions upon the transfer of missile-related technologies by its 33 members, a group that includes the world’s most advanced suppliers of this kind of technology. However, the regime suffered from two important deficits. First, its membership was limited and could only be expanded upon invitation. Second, it was merely a supply-side control. As a result, it could only be effective as long as the key technical means remained solely in the hands of MTCR members. Since this is no longer the case, new ideas to improve the effectiveness of the regime are long overdue. It was in this context that the MTCR group agreed upon a draft Code of Conduct at its Helsinki Summit in October of last year. EU member states, all of whom take part in this forum, have now decided to lobby for the finalization of the document and its adoption at a future UN Conference.

As far as this initiative is intended to improve the effectiveness of a regime that is not working well, it should be welcome. The draft Code addresses the main shortfalls of the imperfect MTCR. It tries to engage as many participants as possible, and it includes measures for demand-side restraint. Transferring the matter to the UN context is undoubtedly a good step - not only because it is in accordance with the intention of universalizing the Code, but also because India and China have made it clear that without doing so they would not consider adherence. In its present form, the Code emphasizes transparency and confidence building measures. The weakest section of the document is clearly that which concerns the provision of incentives to states that choose to abstain from pursuing ballistic missile programs or to eliminate existing ones. While it is stated that those incentives will be deliberated, no concrete options have been suggested. Until the UN Conference is scheduled, states concerned could begin to independently circulate ideas on what these incentives could look like.

However, a glance at the wider context of ballistic missile proliferation reveals that the EU has been too slow to get a (rather timid) missile proliferation agenda. It looks as if the EU is endeavoring to promote the idea that proliferation threats can be addressed with diplomatic instead of military means. If this is the intention behind the initiative, actions to this end should have already been carried out more vigorously than they have been. Now that the U.S. administration is determined to pursue NMD plans, it is unlikely that anybody will be persuaded that diplomacy can work. CP

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The European Union’s anti-terrorist response

The European Union has responded to the terrorist attacks on 11 September in the U.S. with a double strategy. First, it is in the process of developing a series of legal measures to protect the Union from terrorism. Secondly, it has set in train a diplomatic initiative to contribute to dealing with the crisis provoked by the attacks.

The terrorist attacks have changed the way Europeans think about security by making apparent that the line separating internal from external security is vanishing. This is visible in the Action Plan approved by the Extraordinary European Council of 21 September, which provides for comprehensive legislation to combat terrorism. These include enhancing air transport safety, tightening up laws against money laundering and creating a group of Nuclear, Biological and Chemical experts to assist any country that requests help. The most significant innovations have been decided in the field of Justice and Home affairs, the so-called “third pillar”. These include the agreement to a common definition of terrorism, the introduction of a common arrest warrant for all member states and a substantial upgrading of information exchange between intelligence services.

What is taking place in the third pillar is a watershed. Co-operation in police and criminal justice matters between Western European countries has always proceeded with great difficulty and extreme slowness. Normally, proposed legislation remains in the pipeline for as long as member states are uncapable of resolving their differences over questions that they perceive to be at the core of national sovereignty. Under these circumstances, no one realistically expected the ambitious agenda set at the Tampere European Council two years ago to be implemented smoothly. However, in the wake of the attacks, it looks like the planned European arrest warrant, which will be a substitute for the contentious regular extradition procedures, will be swiflty approved. It is paradoxical to think that the stimulus to boost police and criminal justice co-operation has come from outside the Union. After France and Belgium have been refusing to extradite separatist terrorists to Spain for years, events largely unrelated to Europe seem to have convinced these member states that they should change their policy. In future, the Union can be expected to further emphasise internal security – i.e., co-peration between its member states-, gradually showing how its changing threat perception translates into a new approach to security.

The Council also agreed that it must make its European Security and Defense Policy (ESDP) fully operational in order to be more effective in the fight against terrorism. However, it has not been specified in what way the existence of a European crisis management capability could contribute to combating terrorism. The linkage remains unclear, since the Rapid Reaction Force does not include the kind of Special Forces trained to conduct anti-terrorist operations.

With regard to the military campaign in Afghanistan, the EU has taken up its traditional role as a provider of humanitarian help pledging aid for the post-conflict reconstruction of the country shortly after the war began (!). But not content with being a mere donor, the EU has shown at the same time an interest in enhancing its diplomatic presence. In late September a EU-Troika visited a number of Muslim countries, and after the commencement of the war, it convened a European Conference to consult with Eastern European countries including Russia. Seen in conjunction to the gradual upgrading of its role in the Middle East conflict, this can be regarded as forming part of an initiative to enhance the overall international role of the Union. CP

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American-Russian Nonproliferation Cooperation: Funding needs to be increased

On November 18, national security adviser Condoleezza Rice assured in a television interview that President Bush has always been "very supportive" of American-Russian threat reductions initiatives.  "The funding was not cut", Mrs. Rice said, referring to a wide variety of bilateral programs aimed at securing, protecting and monitoring excess warheads and fissile materials and providing assistance to displaced workers and scientists from the nuclear complexes in Russia and other countries of the Former Soviet Union. "All the way back in the campaign, the president talked about perhaps even increasing funding for programs of this kind." But here Mrs. Rice was incorrect, because the funding was cut earlier this year, when the Bush administration's budget request for FY02 recommended a decrease of nearly $46 million, or 32% for the arms control and nonproliferation programs run by the Energy Department. Congress did not follow the administration's request, but allocated an increase of  nearly $37 million for these programs. But even after adding this $37 million, the overall nonproliferation funding was reduced by $11 million, or 7,4%, compared to FY01 budget levels.

Dollars in Million. Source: Report of the  Senate Armed Services Committee to accompany the National Defense Authorization Act, FY 2002, September 12, 2001    

At their November 13-15 summit, U.S. President Bush and Russian President Putin have agreed that "urgent attention must continue to be given to improving the physical protection and accounting of nuclear materials of all possessor states, and preventing illicit nuclear trafficking." But this statement is apparently not  compatible with the U.S. administration's current nonproliferation policy. While threat reduction initiatives are facing serious funding, bureaucratic and implementation problems, the Bush administration is pressing to cut off resources for these vital nonproliferation measures that have achieved impressive results so far. There are various problems with the programs that cannot be addressed by increasing funds alone. But without providing substantial increases in funding, it will be hopeless to achieve much needed improvements in the security of the Russian nuclear sector. It will be impossible to adequately address the threat, which the January 2001 Baker-Cutler Task Force described as the "most urgent unmet national security threat to the United States today". The Task Force report proposed to increase budgets for these programs from the present level of less than one-quarter of 1% of the annual U.S. defense budget, to about 1% of the defense budget. A rather modest variation would be the proposal of the "Nuclear Threat Reduction Act of 2001" of July that called to increase nonproliferation funding to $2 billion next year, to strengthen the prevention of nuclear proliferation. But on the other hand, nothing of the $40 billion emergency supplemental funding package that was approved following the September 11 attacks has been allocated for expanded nonproliferation activities with Russia and other FSU countries.

Two of the most troubled nonproliferation programs are the Plutonium Disposition Program and the Nuclear Cities Initiative. The agreement between Russia and the United States on the disposing of 34 tons of excess weapons grade plutonium was signed in September 2000, but is essentially bankrupt. Russia remains strongly supportive about this project that would include the development of an industrial infrastructure in Russia to convert plutonium into reactor fuel; the converted nuclear fuel could be sold or leased and would bring financial benefits to Russia. The U.S. for its part views the project as too expensive and prefers to wait until cheaper disposal technologies can be developed. A $600 million share pledged by the G-7 organization would provide only two thirds of investment needed to create the initial conversion capacities in Russia.

The Nuclear Cities Initiative (NCI) has been handicapped by implementation problems from the beginning, mainly because the Russian nuclear administration's intention was to develop civilian jobs in Russia, while its counterpart spent two-thirds of the fund at the U.S. Energy Department's national laboratories. Within the U.S., the NCI program has often been criticized as overly broad and unfocussed. The Bush administration did not address these implementation and programmatic deficiencies, e.g. by practical steps or by reviewing the mandate of the program design. Instead, the "Energy and Water Appropriations Act" that President Bush signed on November 12 calls for a joint management of the NCI and the Initiative for Proliferation Prevention, practically merging both projects into a single program.

A conceptually more promising legislative initiative than this could be the "debt-for-security" approach. On November 14, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee approved legislation that would let Russia reduce its $3.5 billion debt to the United States by working to limit proliferation of nuclear and other weapons of mass destruction. Many threat reduction programs could be funded if only a small portion of the $48 billion Russia debts the Western countries of the Paris Club were placed into a nonproliferation fund. Portions of Russia’s debt to the United States and other Western countries could be forgiven in exchange for depositing Russian funds into a specified nonproliferation trust. Such a multilateral debt-for-security program with Russia might supplement and substantially relieve resources for the bilateral programs. MN

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Responding To the New Nuclear Terrorism Threat: Too expensive

In response to the 11 September terror acts in the U.S. and the need to consider the likelihood of similar strikes on nuclear power plants, the IAEA extended a recent week-long international safeguards symposium with one full day devoted to nuclear terrorism. While IAEA Director General Mohamed ElBaradei admitted that it is now “far more likely”¹ that terrorists target nuclear facilities, it is unlikely that the nuclear watchdog will pressure its 132 member states to upgrade its nuclear safety standards to adequately meet this newly acknowledged threat.

Post 11 September, the world nuclear community can no longer discard as “too unlikely to worry about” the possibility of a plane penetrating a nuclear reactor with potential Chernobyl-type consequences. That the head of the IAEA goes as far to say “there is no sanctuary any more, no safety zone” speaks volumes of the seriousness of the threat. While many nuclear critics have for decades questioned the preparedness of nuclear installations against plane crashes, a new dimension of the threat was shown by the 11 September attacks; namely the willingness of terrorists to sacrifice their lives to kill thousands of innocent people.

In the world-wide scramble for responding to the “new” threat, eyes immediately turned to the IAEA, mandated to set international nuclear safety standards. Coincidentally, the IAEA was about to hold its annual General Conference just one week after the attacks in the U.S. This provided the first opportunity for the agency to react and set the course of action. While the General Conference acknowledged the need to devote attention to the physical protection of nuclear facilities, it curiously requested the Director General ElBaradei to only review the agency’s work relevant to preventing acts of terrorism “involving nuclear materials and other radioactive materials”, thus leaving out reference to facilities.

Consistent with his new mandate, ElBaradei has effectively focused media attention on the Agency’s work relevant to preventing the (not so new) threat from terrorists putting together a crude nuclear weapon. Asked at the 2 November nuclear terrorism session of the IAEA safeguards symposium about what the agency will do about nuclear safety of installations, ElBaradei noted that his organization stands ready to assist any member state asking for help in upgrading their facilities.

ElBaradei’s comment reflects the limitations of the IAEA as a nuclear safety watchdog. While it can make recommendations, it is up to the individual member states to set the level of nuclear safety and security. Even recommendation setting is often a hard fought battle since all 132 member states must agree and, as ElBaradei so astutely noted, “security is as good as its weakest link”.

So far nuclear power states have only responded with emergency measures such as enforcing temporary no-fly zones for private planes or stationing fighter-jets and anti-aircraft artillery pieces around nuclear installations. Serious discussion on effective technical upgrades of the installations themselves are conspicuously absent. Germany briefly considered reinforcing the 1-meter thick concrete containment around its nuclear reactors, but initial calculations showed that such investments would be so expensive that continued electricity production would be economically impossible. TS             

                                

• Short Reports

A new superbomb?

The Bush administration is studying options for the development and production of a new kind of nuclear bomb. This small, low-yield nuclear weapon would burrow into ground and by that be capable of hitting deep fortified targets, such as Saddam Hussein’s underground bunkers.

In theory, the mini-nuke would be released by a plane and then it would point towards its target. Its rocket motors would drive it deep underground where, after a time delay, the nuclear charge would explode. The blast would be contained in the hole dug by the missile. But critics say that in fact no earth-burrowing weapon can penetrate deep enough into ground to contain an explosion of a nuclear yield even as small as one percent of the 15-kiloton Hiroshima weapon. The explosion would simply blow out a crater of radioactive dirt which would rain down on the region around.

Besides these technical obstacles, a main critic point to the development of this new bomb is that the new mini-nukes would increase the likelihood of the use of nuclear weapons. In this way a conventional war could easily turn into a nuclear war because the threshold for the use of (mini-) nuclear weapons would be significantly lowered.

Finally, the development of the new weapon would be challenging national and international law: George Bush Sr. singed a moratorium on nuclear testing in October 1992; a 1994 law prohibits the U.S. developing nuclear warheads of less than five kilotons; and it would be a step away from signing the 1996 comprehensive test ban treaty, too.  BS

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The case Sutyagin enters final stage: FSB put pressure on the court

Igor Sutyagin, an arms control researcher at the USA-Canada Institute of Strategic Studies has been accused of having transferred state secrets about Russian nuclear issues to foreign business groups. Mr. Sutyagin was arrested in October 1999 and has been in custody ever since. The Federal Security Service (FSB) considers that reports provided by Sutyagin as a consultant amounted to espionage. More than half a year after the trial was opened, it will soon enter its final stage on 29 October. After the court has finished with the hearings of evidence, the prosecutor asked for five weeks to prepare his arguments. The request of such a long period of time for the accusation demonstrates the weakness of the case. It seems that the FSB has no evidence of proof. Instead the FSB has built the case against Sutyagin on testimonies of experts from the FSB and the Ministry of Defense. These experts claim that the work of Sutyagin contained classified information in the sense of the Decree No. 55 of the Minister of Defense.

The secrecy of the decree itself and the lack of an explanation by the prosecution as to how Sutyagin could determine whether the information was classified, shows once more the mockery of justice. In the last days before the break, the FSB stepped up its efforts to put pressure on Sutyagin and the court. Prior to the formal opening of the trial, FSB guards did not let Sutyagin talk to his attorneys. The judge did not call the FSB to order. Furthermore, a report by Sutyagin written in 1999, which is central to the case, is apparently different to the one the FSB presented to court. The FSB has acted similarly in the past.

The proceedings can be regarded as a deterrent to the research community to refrain from critical inquiry – a warning not to explore nuclear issues too closely. Besides, the FSB is pursuing a number of espionage cases against academics, journalists and environmentalists who work on nuclear issues and other security related matters. VH

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Cohen promotes use of tactical warheads

Sam Cohen, the scientist who invented the neutron bomb in the 1950s,  has gone public with his plan to ‘do in’ bin Laden and the Taliban. Newsmax reported on September 24 that Cohen is spreading the idea among top officials in the Administration and on the Capitol Hill.

His idea is to use Minuteman missiles, with each of the three warheads ridded of the thermonuclear component, i.e. the secondary. The primary of the bomb alone would stay at the kiloton level and would cover an area of a square mile, which the scientist compared to the harm caused by the attack on the World Trade Center. He also claims that this warhead would only yield a limited fallout, especially compared to his famous invention, and that it would also be able to destroy property.

After the first Bush Administration significantly reduced the role and amount of tactical warheads, the idea of low yield weapons is recently re-gaining attention. The reason for this shift is the alleged need for deterrence means against Third World states and non-state actors. The high-precision delivery vehicles allow the use of these weapons against hardened targets while minimizing collateral damage. In the context of this discussion, the idea of deploying strategic missiles with a dummy secondary, making it a low yield weapon has been voiced before. Testing of delivery vehicle and warhead would be superfluous, because of the slight modifications to the already operational system.

However, critics of nuclear weapons argue that low yield nuclear devices would increase the likelihood of nuclear strikes in an armed intervention. On the other hand, Cohen, who has been an advocate of tactical warheads in the past, argues: “My offhand guess is that the majority of Americans couldn’t care less how we do in the Taliban and bin Laden [...]". His plan has also received positive reactions in some quarters of Washington.  JS

• PENN - Suggested Readings

On the occasion of the NATO special Council meeting in Brussels on June 13, 2001, Otfried Nassauer and Ulf Terlinden argued for an alternative approach toward the next round of NATO enlargement in their paper "Stability Enlargement: A Win-win Solution for Enlarging NATO and the EU," BITS Policy Note, 01.4. They propose a strategy driven decision-making in the next round of NATO enlargement that considers how to most effectively share work with the European Union. The report argues that both organizations can contribute to a cooperative European Security Architecture by following asymmetric enlargement strategies. A win-win solution could be achieved if NATO would be enlarged only to the Southeastern direction, while the EU would be enlarged only to the Northeastern direction. The paper is available at: http://www.bits.de/public/policynote/pn01-4.htm

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Forthcoming is a German-language paper prepared by Joost Sproedt: "Klar zum Gefecht!? Die Europäische Sicherheits- und Verteidigungspolitik vor Laeken", BITS Briefing Note 01.5. The paper gives an overview over the latest developments and problems of the European security and defense policy at the end of the Belgian presidency. It will be available at
http://www.bits.de/public/briefingnote/bn01-5.htm

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BITS has relaunched its NATO-Russia Archive. The completely revised and updated version includes additional sections on Russia and the CFE Treaty, NATO-Ukraine relations, NATO enlargement, European Security, UN Peacekeeping, U.S.-Russia relations, Missile Defense and the ABM Treaty, START, Central Asia and the Caucasus. Please visit us at: http://www.bits.de/NRANEU/index.htm

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The report "Uncovered Nukes - Arms Control and the Challenge of Tactical Nuclear Weapons" (Forth Freedom Forum Policy Brief, November 30, 2001) by Alistair Millar and Brian Alexander addresses currently deployed and stored arsenals of tactical nuclear weapons (TNWs), and the problems related to the potential for future development of low-yield, bunker buster, earth penetration tactical nuclear weapons. The report finds that the START framework can be a basis to ensure control with adequate verification and monitoring and that START III and current discussions should address TNWs. There is also a need to go beyond unilateral and bilateral approaches in relation to TNW to ensure stability and third-party participation of other nations. To address longstanding Russian security concerns, TNWs should be withdrawn from Europe, in exchange for sharing data on the status and location of the Russian TNW arsenal. The paper is available in pdf. http://www.fourthfreedom.org/pdf/uncoveredrpt.pdf

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On June 29, 2001, the Dutch sections of IPPNW, the Atlantic Association and PENN Netherlands organized a conference on missile defense in the Netherlands parliament. This seminar brought together diplomats, government officials and members of non-governmental organizations. The edited report of the seminar, "

NMD: The end of deterrence? American and European perspectives on missile defense," offers insights into various issues surrounding the missile defense debate, ranging from technical arguments through arms control issues to geopolitical positions. To order a printed copy, please visit the Netherlands Atlantic Association's website at 
 http://www.atlcom.nl/Engels/enhome.htm

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A new BASIC report examines the close links between the British and the American nuclear policies, highlighting the nuclear weapons policy issues to be addressed during the second term of the Labour government. The "Secrecy and Dependence: The UK Trident System in the 21st Century" by Nicola Butler and Mark Bromley (BASIC Research Report 2001.3,  November 2001) argues that although the UK nuclear weapons posture is closely linked to that of the United States, the British government should introduce and encourage wider multilateral disarmament negotiation among the nuclear weapons states, strengthening international commitment to arms control and nuclear nonproliferation. The paper is available at BASIC's website: http://www.basicint.org

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In his new paper, "Options for Increased U.S.-Russian Nuclear Nonproliferation Cooperation and Projected Costs", Kenneth N. Luongo of RANSAC analyzes where cooperative efforts in the bilateral Russian-American programs could be increased and calls for an increase of approximately $330 million to $1.6 billion per year above current levels for key programs. He also identifies several new ideas for implementation. The text is available at: http://www.ransac.org/new-web-site/whatsnew/options_paper_101101.html

• Diary

BITS would like to thank the W. Alton Jones Foundation for its generous support for the PENN program for the fifth year.