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Cutting off our nose to spite our face on nuclear security cooperation with Russia

Russia’s illegal invasion of Crimea requires a strong and forceful US response to support  Ukraine and punish Moscow. But that fact that a meaningful response is required does not mean that we should deliberately score an own goal by taking actions that would be self-evidently counterproductive and detrimental to our security.

As former Secretary of State George Schultz and former Senator Sam Nunn wrote in a recent Washington Post op-ed, “A key to ending the Cold War was the Reagan administration’s rejection of the concept of linkage, which said that bad behavior by Moscow in one sphere had to lead to a freeze of cooperation in all spheres.” “Although current circumstances make it difficult,” they noted, “we should not lose sight of areas of common interest where cooperation remains crucial to the security of Russia, Europe and the United States. This includes securing nuclear materials…and preventing catastrophic terrorism, as well as destroying Syrian chemical stockpiles and preventing nuclear proliferation by Iran and others.”

This is wise advice. But wisdom is a commodity in short supply on the GOP-led House Armed Services Committee, especially when it comes to nuclear policy. It should not be surprising, then, that the Republican leadership of the Committee is sponsoring legislation in response to the Crimea crisis that would imperil our security by stopping nuclear security cooperation with Russia.

Among the many not so brilliant ideas included in the legislation, which is titled “Forging Peace through Strength in Ukraine and the Transatlantic Alliance” and co-sponsored by Reps. Michael Turner, Buck McKeon, and Mike Rogers, is a provision that “Prohibits the contact, cooperation or transfer of technology between the National Nuclear Security Administration and the Russian Federation until the Secretary of Energy certifies the Russian military is no longer illegally occupying Crimea, no longer violating the INF treaty, and in compliance with the CFE treaty.”

Unless there is some disclaimer in the actual bill text that I have yet to see, this would bring to a halt NNSA’s nuclear security work in Russia, most of which is conducted under the auspices of the International Nuclear Materials Protection (IMPC) program. Examples of activities that the IMPC program plans to pursue in and with Russia in FY 2015 include consolidating of all category I/II fissile material into a new high security zone at a nuclear material site in Russia; completing a perimeter upgrade around two guarded areas with 13 buildings that store and process weapons-usable nuclear material in a large bulk processing facility; providing upgrades at three additional buildings in a large bulk processing facility; and completing upgrades to closed city perimeter entry points at the two primary weapons design facilities and one bulk processing facility in Russia.

As our friend Nick Roth has written, “although Russia has made tremendous progress in securing its nuclear weapons and materials, because of the size and far-flung locations of Russia’s stockpile, Russia still presents one of the most significant challenges to reducing the global risk of nuclear terrorism. Russia has the most highly enriched uranium (HEU) and plutonium of any country and the most HEU research reactors in the world. There is also a significant risk of insiders stealing nuclear material from its nuclear facilities.”

It is true that in recent years Russia has become an increasingly difficult partner on nuclear security cooperation. Moscow’s refusal last year to renew the old Cooperative Threat Reduction (CTR) umbrella agreement has reduced the amount of work we can do in Russia (though much of NNSA’s work will continue). Funding for nuclear security work in Russia makes up a much smaller share of the Pentagon and NNSA’s nonproliferation budgets than it once did, as Moscow is appropriately footing more of the bill to secure materials and sustain improvements enabled by US assistance.

Meanwhile, NNSA has already decided to rescind its funding request for one nuclear security activity within the IMPC program and is apparently reviewing the merits of other programs as well.

Yet it’s important to remember that we don’t cooperate with Russia on nuclear security as a favor to Moscow. We do it because it is strongly in our national security interest. Our cooperation with Russia keeps Americans safe from the threat of nuclear terrorism and this cooperation should continue (and is continuing) despite the tensions in the larger US-Russia relationship. At a time of enhanced U.S.-Russia tensions now is hardly the time to reduce our on-site presence in the Russian nuclear sector. The cost for these programs is relatively low and the return on investment is extremely high. There is more work that remains to be done and it is critical that this work get done as quickly as possible.  

Fortunately, there appear to be GOP leaders in the House who understand this. At an Energy and Water appropriations subcommittee hearing last week, Chairman Mike Simpson (R-ID) highlighted the importance of nuclear security cooperation despite our concerns about Moscow’s behavior in other areas:

REP. SIMPSON: — why I ask this question. You’re probably going to see amendments on the floor to take out all funding for all of those things that have the word “Russian” anywhere in them. How much funding in your budget is a request for projects that are in Russia that probably will face amendments and stuff? And I have been and I think this committee has been supportive of the work that’s going on there. We want to be able to answer the questions that are going to come up.

MS. HARRINGTON: Thank you, sir. We view the work that we do in Russia, which focuses on the security of both the material and facilities and, in some cases, the actual weapons that were once a threat to this country, as vital to U.S. national interests. So we hope that both we and the Russians would be able to continue with that kind of work.

As you know, in past geopolitical times of conflict, there have either been carve-outs or accommodations made to allow nonproliferation and threat-reduction programs to move forward.

That said, as you might imagine, internally within the government right now, there is intense scrutiny of everything that’s being done with Russia, you know, and real concern about the path that it has chosen to take. So we are in that process of reevaluating.

In terms of the 2015 budget, there’s — out of the 1.55 billion (dollars) there’s something around $100 million for programs that work with Russia. Of that, about 25 percent goes to our own laboratories to support the technical expertise to bring into projects. So out of the total budget amount, it’s not a particularly large percentage, but we still view it as being a very important element of our ability to engage both with sensitive materials and at sensitive facilities.

REP. SIMPSON: So the short answer I would give to people is this is actually in our own interest, not just Russian interest and the world’s interest.

MS. HARRINGTON: Correct. Right, that is why we are there. [emphasis mine.]

Well said.

The Prague Agenda on its Fifth Anniversary

On April 5, 2009, President Obama articulated a vision of a nuclear-free world in a speech in Prague, marking the start of a committed pursuit of enhanced global nuclear security. He reiterated this commitment in a June 2013 speech in Berlin, but while significant progress has been made, many aspects of this agenda have stalled or failed to get off the ground. Five years after the speech in Prague, it is time to revitalize the cause of nuclear security and non-proliferation.

The “Prague Agenda” laid out in Obama’s 2009 speech focuses on several steps to reduce the threat of nuclear weapons—reduction of the number of nuclear weapons within states that already possess them; reduction of the role of nuclear weapons in national defense; prevention of nuclear proliferation by strengthening the global non-proliferation regime and punishing those states in violation of their obligations; securing vulnerable nuclear materials and enhancing international cooperation on nuclear security; and Senate approval of the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT).

Progress toward these goals has been made, albeit unevenly. A litany of factors, including political obstruction from domestic opposition and worsening ties with Russia, has prevented more extensive progress from being realized. Moreover, the White House has not always pursued these goals with the vigor required of such an ambitious agenda. To sustain progress on this front, Obama must advance the Prague Agenda more forcefully throughout the remainder of his second term.

The New START Treaty, which came into effect on February 5, 2011, supported the first item on the Prague Agenda—to reduce the world’s supply of nuclear weapons, starting with the United States and Russia. In his Berlin speech last year, Obama announced that the United States would pursue a reduction in the number of deployed strategic nuclear weapons by up to a third, bringing the total from the 1,550 allowed under New START closer to 1,000.

As part of an update to high-level nuclear weapons policy guidance, this proposed reduction and further changes to the US nuclear posture would reduce the role that nuclear weapons play in US defense policy. However, the administration is predicating further reductions in the number and role of nuclear weapons on a negotiation with Russia, which Russia refused. Cooperation is especially unlikely to deepen amid the crisis in Ukraine and allegations that Russia violated the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF).

With regards to the global non-proliferation regime, Obama has gone to great lengths to strengthen the regime, most obviously seen through his commitment to a negotiated settlement to the Iranian nuclear impasse. Yet despite recent progress on Iran, North Korea’s nuclear weapons program continues to expand. The 2010 Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) Review Conference yielded consensus on a final document, a notable achievement given the failure to arrive at such a conclusion in 2005. The document espoused specific action designed to strengthen the three pillars of the NPT, non-proliferation, disarmament, and peaceful use of nuclear energy. On non-proliferation, a variety of proposals were put forward, many of which have seen progress since 2010–for example, strengthening export controls and encouraging states to adopt the NPT Additional Protocol. On disarmament, the final document requires nuclear weapons states to report on their disarmament activities at the 2014 NPT Preparatory Committee meeting in late April and for the first time explicitly states that the goal of the NPT’s disarmament provision is a world free of nuclear weapons. Other action plan items, such as negotiations on a Fissile Material Cut-off Treaty and on a nuclear-weapons-free zone in the Middle East have stalled, and realistic steps toward nuclear disarmament post-New START have been few and far between.

The United States under President Obama deserves great praise for leading a global effort to secure vulnerable nuclear materials. Through the Nuclear Security Summit, Obama has ensured that this issue has remained at the forefront of the international community’s agenda, and a great deal of measurable progress has been made in reducing the amount of vulnerable nuclear material around the world. Beyond the planned 2016 Nuclear Security Summit, however, it is unclear how the United States will pursue global nuclear security. Furthermore, budget cuts have slowed the pace of nuclear security efforts, and many projects have been delayed or place on hold indefinitely.

Finally, the CTBT still has not been ratified despite Obama’s insistence in Prague that his administration would “immediately and aggressively pursue U.S. ratification of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty.”

Five years after Obama established an ambitious commitment to nuclear security and non-proliferation at Prague, his record on the subject remains mixed. While progress has been made in some areas, many initiatives have stalled. To make matters worse, the Russian incursion in Ukraine will be a major obstacle to political cooperation between the United States and Russia, but there are steps the administration can take that need not rest on immediate Russian reciprocity.

The fifth anniversary of the Prague speech provides the administration with a chance to intensify its efforts in support of nuclear security and non-proliferation.