While many people were rightly upset over a  recent piece in The Cable by Josh Rogin entitled “‘New START” dead on arrival?” they may have overlooked some very important words by Arizona Senator John Kyl.

Kyl is the bête noire of those promoting a new nuclear reductions treaty and a Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty.

He has sent a series of missives along with many of his colleagues raising issues such as nuclear weapons modernization and missile defense. He has also delivered a number of speeches on the same topics.

As the British would say, he is constantly throwing a spanner into the works (i.e., monkey wrenches).  

But check out what Sen. Kyl said in the Rogin story:

If that is his gold standard, then he will get his wish — perhaps the gold, silver and bronze…

Defense Secretary Gates is one of the key architects of the Administration’s nuclear weapons policy as reflected in the recent Obama budget submission, the on-going Nuclear Posture Review and Vice President Biden’s recent Op-Ed in the Wall Street Journal.

Just last week, Secretary Gates introduced the Vice President at his National Defense University speech explaining the Administration’s nuclear weapons policy.  

Also there was State Department Under Secretary Ellen Tauscher, Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. James Cartwright, National Nuclear Security Agency Administrator Thomas D’Agostino and other officials.

The message was clear: The Obama nuclear policies are the Obama-Biden-Gates-Cartwright-Tauscher-D’Agostino nuclear policies.

If Senator Kyl will only support New START if Gates is happy with the nuclear modernization program, then we have, in the immortal words of George Tenet, a slam dunk.

Kyl did not stop with that quote.

He went on to express  his concerns about Russian statements about missile defense.

But again, let’s look at the tape.

On nuclear modernization, he suggested it would be “very difficult for the Senate to
support” the new treaty unless Gates concerns have been answered.

On Russian assertions, he used milder words such “very troubling” and “very damaging.”

In no event did Senator Kyl say he would oppose the new treaty — unless Gates is not a happy man.

Kyl clearly will continue throwing spanners into the works.

But pay close attention to his words. He continues to stop short of outright opposition to New START.

With President Ahmadinijad last week boasting of the production of Iran’s first batch of highly enriched uranium and its “capability to enrich at over 20 percent and at over 80 percent,” the need to accurately account for and safeguard Iran’s nuclear material is of ever-pressing importance.  

Most observers agree that any weapons program in Iran is more likely to follow a clandestine path, since Tehran is unlikely to risk diverting materials from IAEA monitored facilities.  Yet just how satisfied can we be that Iran can’t actually misuse the stocks of uranium currently safeguarded by the IAEA?

Given the scope of the IAEA’s worldwide responsibilities, it must rely on remote nuclear monitoring equipment to ensure that the nuclear fuel under its watch is not diverted for military use.  Many people fail to realize that this system is not fool proof.  However, the steps required to fill in these gaps and strengthen the IAEA require additional resources that the international community has to date been unwilling to provide…  

In 2008, the Non-Proliferation Education Center’s Henry Sokolski pointed out that of the IAEA’s 1,200 remote inspection cameras, nearly 800 have no “near-real-time” feedback, and virtually none of those with live streams can be found in “countries of concern.”   Recordings from the “offline” cameras are instead collected manually once every 90 days by IAEA staff.  As such, the IAEA has just four opportunities per year to find out if materials it claims to be safeguarding have been diverted for weapons use.  

Worse still, notes Sokolski, is that in a review of these recordings, it was shown that between 1999 and 2005 there were twelve occasions when camera “blackouts” lasted for more than thirty hours.   The proliferation risks associated with camera “blackouts” in countries of concern is magnified by the fact that the IAEA may not find out about them for weeks at a time.   When viewed in the context of the extremely short time it took Iran to announce the completion of its first batch of 20% HEU, the potential for an Iranian nuclear weapons “break-out” scenario under full IAEA supervision is not beyond the realm of possibility.

Given the shortcomings detailed so far, it is clear that the IAEA’s capacity to monitor the Iranian nuclear program needs to be increased.  The Additional Protocol, which once in force would give the IAEA much greater access to suspected nuclear information and sites, is seen by many as a key part of the solution.  

However, research conducted by Dr. Edwin Lyman of the Union of Concerned Scientists shows how difficult it can be to accurately account for nuclear materials even in countries that have ratified the Additional Protocol.  In 1994 for example, 69 kg of plutonium was unaccounted for at the Tokai-mura fuel fabrication plant in Japan, and was found only after a lengthy and costly investigation.  More recently, a 2005 leak at the UK’s BNFL Sellafield facility (which led to an accumulation of deposits containing 19 tons of uranium and 190 kg of plutonium) was not discovered until eight months after it began – this despite BNFL’s claim that the plant possessed one of the most advanced monitoring systems in the world.  

Whilst these examples illustrate some of the difficulties associated with safeguarding nuclear materials – even under the auspices of the Additional Protocol – it is important to understand that these difficulties can be greatly minimized through improved safeguards processes, increased scrutiny, and more staff.  Likewise, the IAEA’s regular monitoring capacity can be bolstered significantly by implementing real-time surveillance technologies throughout all declared facilities.  Naturally though, these fixes come with significant costs for the IAEA.

Whilst the IAEA has taken on more and more responsibility in recent years, its activities have remained underfunded.  Hence it should be no surprise that there have been problems in monitoring nuclear activities worldwide.  2003 finally saw the end of a decade of zero budget growth for the agency.  However, increases since 2003 have been minimal, prompting Mohamed ElBaradei to state in 2007 that the “dichotomy between increased high priority activities and inadequate funding, if continued, will lead to the failure of critical IAEA functions.”

Few countries seem to have taken any notice.  In August 2009, the IAEA’s Board of Governors did vote for a rare budget increase for 2010, but this marked only a 5.4 percent increase (2.7 per cent in real terms) compared to the 2009 budget, falling well short of the 11 per cent sought by Mohamed ElBaradei at the time.  Of this, only $40 million is currently dedicated to global nuclear safety and security, roughly what NBC bosses are paying to secure the departure of Conan O’Brien from ‘The Tonight Show’

As more and more countries develop civilian nuclear power programs, the burden on the IAEA will continue to increase.  Currently the funding system is based on a UN formula that links a country’s GDP to its expected level of contribution.  Consequently, a state with an extensive nuclear industry can, at the moment, end up paying less than a state with little or no nuclear industry.  Whilst this system is supplemented by additional donations (for example, the Obama administration’s FY 2011 budget request includes a voluntary contribution to the IAEA of $79.5 million, an increase of nearly $15 million over what was requested last year), the IAEA should not be forced to rely on voluntary contributions for additional funding.  

Given the threats posed by the diversion or theft of highly enriched uranium and/or weapons-grade plutonium, it is essential that the global community take heed of the IAEA’s budget more seriously.  That it is deemed as worthy an investment as getting rid of Conan O’Brien is not a laughing matter!

In the wake of the release of the Obama administration’s FY 2011 budget request, which includes a ten percent increase in funding to maintain our nuclear weapons stockpile and supporting infrastructure, Greg Mello took to the online pages of the Bullet…

…read Arms Control Association Senior Fellow Greg Thielmann’s most recent threat assessment brief.  It’s a comprehensive and outstanding take on the purpose of verification and how to think about it in the context of the (hopefully) soon to be signed New START agreement, especially the hand wringing over Votkinsk and telemetry.  I’ve been trying to make many of the same points here at NoH, but Greg seamlessly ties it all together in less than 8 pages.

The bottom line, as Greg notes, is that while New START will draw upon much of what was in START I, the new treaty will contain new rules and limits.  New rules and limits in turn require verification provisions that are actually pegged to those new rules and limits, not rules and limits from a treaty that was negotiated during the 1980s and early 1990s…  

These new rules and limits will be rooted in the fact(s) that:

(1) U.S. defense planning is no longer guided by many of the (oftentimes crazy) scenarios vis-à-vis Russia (e.g. think protracted nuclear war) that dominated our thinking during the Cold War,

(2) the U.S. is starting with a lot more information about Russia’s strategic forces now than it did in the late 1980s and early 1990s when START I was negotiated and signed, and

(3) our own national technical means of monitoring and verification have vastly improved.

Consequently, what we’re likely to get in New START is an updated and streamlined system of verification procedures that will allow the U.S. to effectively verify Russia’s compliance with the new treaty. Elaine Grossman wrote a good story last week on what New START’s provisions on telemetry might look like. Hint: they’re going to be simpler!  

Senator Lugar, who unlike some of his Republican colleagues has always taken verification seriously, recently expressed legitimate concerns that over time our information about Russia’s nuclear forces could diminish without the kind of intelligence we got from START I’s verification provisions.  

Of course, our intelligence community would probably prefer to retain all of START I’s provisions (e.g. on continuous monitoring at Russia’s mobile missile production facility at Votkinsk and telemetry). Yet as Greg points out, while cooperative verification measures supplement and confirm information gleaned from national technical means, “enhancing collection per se is not a legitimate rationale for including them [verification provisions] in a treaty.”

If the purposes for which the Votkinsk and telemetry provisions were crafted in START I are no longer going to exist in New START, then it’s tough to make the case, particularly to the Russians, that these same provisions (at least in their current form) are necessary to build confidence and verify compliance this time around.

The International Security Assistance Force – otherwise known as the American-led NATO force in Afghanistan – launched Operation Moshtarak in the Helmand province last week.  The largest military operation in Afghanistan since the initial invasion in 2001, Operation Moshtarak is the debut of ISAF’s new “civilian-friendly” attitude.

NATO announced that their new strategy was to center on protecting civilians and building up local support rather than focusing predominately on pursuing insurgent militants without explicit consideration for the largely non-combatant populations in which they take refuge.

However, the strategy has proven messier to implement than the military’s rhetoric suggested.  In Marjah, civilians have been used as human shields, while the economic and social infrastructure of the town has been riddled with bullets and laced with improvised explosive devices.  The Associated Press reported that:

Shops were riddled with bullet holes. Grocery stores and fruit stalls had been left standing open, hastily deserted by their owners. White metal fences marked off areas that had not yet been cleared of bombs.

Avoiding negative impacts on civilians during a massive urban operation is impossible, it seems.

However, while an explicit effort to minimize civilian casualties is to be lauded, General McCrystal’s strategy seems to have wholly neglected the displacement of civilians that his operation has caused.  For instance, General McCrystal rapidly apologized to President Karzai after a NATO airstrike today killed at least 27 civilians – most, if not all, of whom were women and children– but has been silent on the forced internal migration that the operation has caused.

The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) reports that the number of displaced due to Operation Moshtarak has doubled over the past four days, reaching close to 25,000 people who have fled the conflict.  Many are reported to have fled abruptly, without food or water.

The population of Marjah has halved — from 80,000 to 40,000 — according to OCHA.  Those who remained in the town are stuck due to mines and the threat of being caught in the crossfire, according to the Afghan Red Crescent Society.

The internally displaced persons newly created by the operation have no camp to go to, and the innocent men, women, and children who have been fled the conflict in fear are streaming into a void of humanitarian assistance.  

Add to this the uproar in the international humanitarian assistance community over General McCrystal’s “government in a box” theory, and suddenly the outlook for displaced civilians is grim.  

McCrystal is increasingly involving the military in state-building endeavors, from building schools and distributing food to assisting in the creation of a local government.  On the face of it, this strategy seems to be a good idea: the military is engaged in good works that could help win over the support of the local population.  However, as Oxfam elucidates, “in some cases, military involvement in development activities is, paradoxically, putting Afghan lives further at risk as these projects quickly become targeted by anti-government elements.”

As a result, the United Nations is refusing to deliver aid in conjunction with the Helmand operation for fear of tainting their objectivity and independence in the delivery of humanitarian aid to a distressed population.

This twin effect of massive displacement and militarization of aid has led to a high cost to pay for the civilian population of Marjah as a result of Operation Moshtarak.

The rebuilding of schools, provision of humanitarian aid, and emergency medical attention should be left in the expert hands of neutral humanitarian aid organizations like OCHA, Doctors Without Borders, UNICEF, and Oxfam.  

So when the new NATO intention to prioritize respect for the civilian population and minimize civilian deaths, one has to ask why so little attention is being paid to the massive civilian displacement that has been the result of Operation Moshtarak.  Refugees are civilian victims of war, and the loss of one’s home, livelihood, safety and sense of security due to war and displacement are a devastating cost to pay.  If General McCrystal and NATO really want to respect the civilians of Afghanistan, then they should consider the massive displacement that results from such large operations.

NATO should also leave humanitarian assistance to the purview of neutral international aid organizations that have the experience and technical capacity to serve the local population without further endangering their safety.  Aid should not be militarized; this only further endangers the safety and livelihoods of an already distressed population.