Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation

Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation

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Dueling Quote(s) of the Day: Missile Defense Edition

“It is not credible to promise better relations with Europe—and then stun Poland and the Czech Republic by abruptly abandoning plans to build missile defense bases there.”

Bret Stephens, Wall Street Journal Op-Ed, June 21, 2011

“And let’s be blunt: The third site in Europe was not going to happen, because the Czech government wouldn’t approve the radar….And so if it was going to happen at all, it would’ve taken years longer [than the Phased Adaptive Approach] and we still hadn’t negotiated the required agreements with the Poles in terms of the interceptors.”

Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, Hearing of the Defense Subcommittee of the Senate Appropriations Committee, June 15, 2011.

Also of note from the hearing was outgoing Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Mike Mullen’s comments on the prospects for giving the SM3 Block IIB a boost phase capability:

I’ve been around missile defense for the last 15 years. And the whole issue of boost-phase intercept is an extraordinarily difficult technical challenge. And at least if someone’s broken through on that, I haven’t seen that. It doesn’t mean we shouldn’t seek it, but I’ve seen an awful lot of efforts go after that and I was very supportive of the program adjustments that we made — particularly with respect to that, because I thought — my view was I thought we were throwing good money after bad.

Defense Appropriations Bill approved by House Appropriations Committee

Yesterday, the House Appropriations Committee approved its version of the Fiscal Year (FY) 2012 Defense Appropriations Bill. The bill contains $530 billion in funding for non-war programs and accounts, an increase of $17 billion over FY 2011 and a decrease of approximately $9 billion from the President’s request.

In addition to $530 billion in base spending, the bill contains $118.7 billion in spending for the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, $842 million above the President’s request and $39 billion less than FY 2011, a decrease due to the drawdown of U.S. forces in Iraq. This total includes $12.8 billion for the training and equipping of Afghan Security forces, and $1.1 billion for the Pakistan Counterinsurgency Capability Fund (PCCF), which has moved from the subcommittee on State/Foreign Operations to the subcommittee on defense.

The total in the bill is $648.7 billion. Other portions of defense spending are contained in the Military Construction and Energy and Water Appropriations Bills.

The bill is expected to be considered by the full House of Representatives the week of June 20. It is expected that germane amendments will be permitted.

Check out the full analysis here.

What Could Possibly Be Wrong with Ratifying Nuclear Weapons Free Zones? Sen. Kyl?

The Obama administration’s recent submission to the Senate for ratification of two Nuclear Weapons Free Zones has prompted a backlash from Sen. Jon Kyl (R-AZ).  The basis for the good Senator’s opposition is about as compelling as the reasons for his opposition to New START.  In other words, not compelling at all.

Nuclear Weapons Free Zones are declared zones in which the presence, production, acquisition and use of nuclear weapons are banned by the signatory states. On May 2, President Obama submitted two requests to ratify the protocols of nuclear free-zone treaties- Pelindaba in Africa and Rarotonga in the South Pacific.   The U.S. has signed the treaties, but has not yet ratified the protocols which commit us not to test or use nuclear weapons within the zones.  The U.S. did sign and ratify, however, the Treaty of Tlatelolco (with Reagan’s support for ratification), the Latin American and Caribbean nuclear weapons free zone treaty, so ratification of Pelindaba and Rarotonga would not be a grand departure from policy.

As the Arms Control Association’s Peter Crail has laid out, the arguments for Senate approval of the protocols are strong.

The treaties can prevent the spread of nuclear weapons and nuclear weapons usable technologies by requiring even stricter requirements than those in the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty.  Pelindaba, for instance, obligates members to follow the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) recommended standards of physical protection over nuclear facilities and material.  Both Pelindaba and Rarotonga require that member states only engage in nuclear commerce with countries that have applied IAEA safeguards over all of their nuclear activities.  This is significant because the two treaties’ members include some of the world’s key suppliers of uranium, including Australia, Namibia and Niger.  The treaties, therefore, contribute to non-proliferation beyond the core prohibition on acquiring nuclear weapons.

Nonetheless, a terse press release from Sen. Kyl immediately followed the submission, condemning ratifying the treaties because:

1)    signing would support the President’s “flawed nuclear policy” as outlined in the 2010 Nuclear Posture Review, which limits the circumstances under which the U.S. would use nuclear weapons, and
2)    the treaties do not address the proliferation threats posed by Iran, Syria and North Korea

Sen. Kyl’s first argument is moot because President Clinton already signed Pelindaba and  Rarotonga in 1996, giving our assurance not to test or bomb treaty members.  Is Sen. Kyl suggesting that there are circumstances under which the U.S. should renounce its political commitment and threaten to use nuclear weapons against one of the members?  If so, he should be asked to name them.  

Any future threat posed by members of these zones is addressed in the Nuclear Posture Review, which states that any country using chemical or biological weapons against the U.S. or its allies would still face a devastating conventional military response, and the leaders of the accountable countries would be held personally responsible.  This is a far more credible threat – especially as no country has used nuclear weapons since the end of World War II – and thus, a more effective deterrent than Sen. Kyl’s preferred theoretical U.S. nuclear strike.

Also, contrary to Sen. Kyl’s second argument, the fact that Pelindaba and Rarotonga are not directly tasked with curtailing the Iranian and North Korean nuclear programs is not an argument against the zones.  Senate approval of the protocols of these treaties would actually strengthen the U.S. ability to reign in rogue states because members of the treaties have demonstrated active commitments to arrest proliferation.  For instance, Nigeria and South Africa have halted shipments of Iranian arms and ammunition bound for Gambia and North Korean tank parts bound for the Republic of Congo.  Australia has employed stronger sanctions against Iran than the U.N. recommended.

“U.S. failure to ratify the [Nuclear Weapons Free Zones] protocols has not prevented such cooperation from occurring, but doing so would be a cost-free way to bolster the case made by the United States that more countries should cooperate in such nonproliferation efforts in the future,” Crail argues.

For fifteen years we have supported these treaties and now, we can only benefit from ratifying them. Ratify-away, Senate.

Experts Say Likelihood of Attack on Iran is Small, Should Stay That Way

It doesn’t really matter who you ask, the answer always seems to be the same: an attack on Iran would be messy, to say the least.

Yesterday, I attended the last of four in the Arms Control Association’s series of briefings on Iran, Solving the Iranian Nuclear Puzzle.  The briefing covered “The Military Option” and featured Ambassador Thomas Pickering, Jeffrey White with the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, and Alireza Nader from RAND.  While all three spoke frankly, none painted a particularly sunny picture of a potential war with Iran.

White noted, as we’ve heard before, that since it is not possible to destroy knowledge or basic technology, any setback would likely be measured in years.  The idea of complete destruction of any program is just “not a fair argument to make.”

Further, White noted that, “The attack itself is a complicated thing.  It’s not something you can easily gloss over the complexity of.”  If we assume an air campaign of days-weeks (which White says would be necessary) then operations would need to be phased, allowing the Iranians to react and the US to respond in kind.  The US and its allies would need air defense for ships, intelligence, a plan to counter Iranian missiles – altogether a lot of assets and phases would be required, all with their own complications.

On top of all this, Pickering offered his view that any attack has the very real potential to reinforce Tehran’s drive toward building a nuclear weapon.

Thankfully, Pickering also noted that, right now, the possibility of a US attack on Iran “seems to be as close to zero as one can get it, for which I’m deeply happy.”  

Across town, Admiral William Fallon, former US CENTCOM Commander, also said that there is probably “little chance” of a US or Israeli strike on Iran, adding “we ought to be working pretty hard to focus on other things that would have us in a different place.”

“Improvement in relations, in my opinion, will likely occur with the realization that the interests of both people are better addressed with engagement and cooperation rather than antagonism and hostility,” said Fallon.  

A Little Bill to Support Israel against Iran Poses a Serious Risk

A small number of House Republicans are threatening to undermine U.S. strategy in Iran by encouraging military strikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities.

On May 23, 2011, Representative Louie Gohmert (R-TX)) introduced House Resolution 271, a bill expressing support for “the State of Israel’s right to defend Israeli sovereignty…[and the use] all means necessary to confront and eliminate nuclear threats posed by the Islamic Republic of Iran, including the use of military force if no other peaceful solution can be found within reasonable time to protect against such an immediate and existential threat to the State of Israel.”   To date 44 Republicans have co-sponsored the bill.  It has been referred to the House Foreign Affairs Committee.

This is not the first time the U.S. House and Senate have expressed such support for Israeli military strikes.   In 2007, the House put forth a similar bill expressing support for Israeli strikes on nuclear facilities in Syria occurring in 2007 and in Iraq in 1981, but that bill expressed support after Israel’s strikes, not before.  

Rep. Gohmert’s 2011 bill is vague and dangerous.  The bill states that “if no other peaceful solutions can be found within a reasonable time” strikes are acceptable, but “reasonable time” is not defined.  Libya pursued a nuclear weapons program for 25 years before finally abandoning it in 2004.  Since no solution has yet been found to the Iranian nuclear impasse, does that mean military action is viable now?  

Despite the threat Iran poses, the argument for using military force against Iran has never been compelling, as our own Lt. Gen. Robert Gard and Laicie Olson documented last year. Military and foreign policy experts have warned that strikes on nuclear facilities can be counter-productive for non-proliferation efforts.   According to the Deulfer Report by the Iraq Study Group and reports by some Iraqi nuclear scientists, the Israeli strike on Iraq’s Osirak nuclear reactor in 1981 encouraged Saddam to ramp up its nuclear weapons program and work more secretively.  

In Iran, “[i]t’s possible [a strike] could be used to play to nationalist tendencies,” General Petraeus told reporters early last year.  Iran’s rulers are divided over whether to build nuclear weapons, especially because they do not know if the public will accept the costs – sanctions and international isolation.  Were Israel to strike Iran’s facilities, it could unify the leadership and rally the public in support of an Iranian bomb.  

Pursuit of this bill is also a challenge to regional U.S. foreign policy.  Polls conducted by the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press in March and April 2011 showed a significant decline in U.S.  popularity among most Arab publics, a reversal of the increase that followed President Obama’s election.  As the Arab Spring removes American allies, such as in Egypt and Yemen, there is concern that the U.S. will lose support and influence in the Middle East.

Internationally, the Obama administration’s dual track approach of diplomatic engagement and pressure has strengthened the U.S. hand against Iran and led to international support for the toughest ever sanctions against Tehran.   Rep. Gohmert’s bill undermines diligent Pentagon efforts to dissuade Israel from a military attack and the growing international support for tougher non-military measures against Iran.

Additionally, a simulation of an Israeli strike on Iran conducted by the Brookings Institution demonstrated that military strike, even if conducted by Israel, would have direct consequences for the U.S.  Such an attack would likely create a conflict that engulfs the region and draws in the U.S.  Admiral Mike Mullen, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, warned that a military attack on Iran would be as destabilizing as Iran becoming a nuclear state.   Moreover, the Brookings simulation found that the strike would merely set the Iranian nuclear program back, not destroy it.  

Considering the costs of such strikes, Gohmert’s bill is a brash and shortsighted proposal.  If the intent is to show public support for Israel, it is possible to do so without offering U.S. support for a potentially illegal and certainly a disastrous military attack on Iran.  Gohmert’s bill even lacks the support of the American Israeli Public Affairs Committee, the pro-Israeli lobby in the U.S.  Hopefully, Israel will show restraint and this bill will go the way of its 2010 predecessor, quietly disappearing at the door of the House Foreign Affairs Committee.