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How to Stop Nuclear Terror
Author(s): Graham Allison
Source: Foreign Affairs, Vol. 83, No. 1 (Jan. - Feb., 2004), pp. 64-74
Published by: Council on Foreign Relations
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20033829
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How to Stop
Nuclear Terror
Graham Allison
THE THREE NO'S
PRESIDENT GEORGE w. BUSH has singled out terrorist nuclear
attacks on the United States as the defining threat the nation will
face in the foreseeable future. In addressing this specter, he has asserted
that Americans' "highest priority is to keep terrorists from acquiring
weapons of mass destruction." So far, however, his words have not
been matched by deeds. The Bush administration has yet to develop
a coherent strategy for combating the threat of nuclear terror. Although it has made progress on some fronts, Washington has failed
to take scores of specific actions that would measurably reduce the
risk to the country. Unless it changes course-and fast-a nuclear
terrorist attack on the United States will be more likely than not in
the decade ahead.
The administration's inaction is hard to understand. Its behavior demonstrates a failure to grasp a fundamental insight: nuclear
terrorism is, in fact, preventable. It is a basic matter of physics:
without fissile material, you can't have a nuclear bomb. No nuclear
bomb, no nuclear terrorism. Moreover, fissile material can be kept
out of the wrong hands. The technology for doing so already exists:
Russia does not lose items from the Kremlin Armory, nor does the
United States from Fort Knox. Nascent nukes should be kept just
GRAHAM ALLISON is Douglas Dillon Professor of Government and
Director of the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at
Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government. From 1993 to
1994 he was Assistant Secretary of Defense for Policy and Plans.
as secure. If they are, terrorists could still attempt to create new
supplies, but doing so would require large facilities, which would
be visible and vulnerable to attack.
Denying terrorists access to nuclear weapons and weapons-grade
material is thus a challenge to nations' willpower and determination,
not to their technical capabilities. Keeping these items safe will be
a mammoth undertaking. But the strategy for doing so is clear. The
solution would be to apply a new doctrine of "Three No's": no loose
nukes, no new nascent nukes, and no new nuclear states.
GETTING A GRIP
A FEW NUMBERS starkly illustrate the scale of the problem the
United States now faces in trying to control the spread of nuclear
weapons materials. Just eight countries-China, France, India, Israel,
Pakistan, Russia, the United Kingdom, and the United States-are
known to have nuclear weapons. In addition, the CIA estimates that
North Korea has enough plutonium for one or two nuclear weapons.
And two dozen additional states possess research reactors with
enough highly enriched uranium (HEU) to build at least one nuclear
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Graham Allison
bomb on their own. According to best estimates, the global nuclear
inventory includes more than 30,000 nuclear weapons, and enough
HEU and plutonium for 240,000 more.
Hundreds of these weapons are currently stored in conditions that
leave them vulnerable to theft by determined criminals, who could
then sell them to terrorists. Even more "nascent nukes" (the HEU and
plutonium that are the only critical ingredients for making nuclear
bombs) are at risk. Almost every month, someone somewhere is apprehended trying to smuggle or steal nuclear materials or weapons. Last
August, for example, Alexander Tyulyakov-the deputy director of
Atomflot (the organization that carries out repair work for Russian
nuclear icebreakers and nuclear submarines)-was arrested in Murmansk for trying to do just that. The situation is so bad that three years
ago, Howard Baker, the current U.S. ambassador to Japan and the
former Republican leader ofthe Senate, testified, "It really boggles my
mind that there could be 40,000 nuclear weapons, or maybe 80,000 in
the former Soviet Union, poorly controlled and poorly stored, and
that the world is not in a near-state of hysteria about the danger."
In making his case against Saddam Hussein, President Bush argued,
"If the Iraqi regime is able to produce, buy, or steal an amount of uranium a little bigger than a softball, it could have a nuclear weapon in less
than a year." What the president failed to mention is that with the
same quantity of HEU, al Qgeda, Hezhollah, or Hamas could do the same.
Once built, nuclear weapons could be smuggled across U.S. borders
with little difficulty. Of the seven million cargo containers that will
arrive at U.S. ports this year, for example, only two percent will be
opened for inspection. And once on U.S. soil, those weapons would likely
be used. Prior to September 11, 2001, many experts argued that terrorists
were unlikely to k.illiarge numbers of people, because they sought not
to maximize victims but to win publicity and sympathy for their causes.
Mter the attacks on the Pentagon and the World Trade Center, however, few would disagree with President Bush's warning that ifal Qgeda
gets nuclear weapons, it will use them against the United States "in a
heartbeat." Indeed, Osama bin Laden's press spokesman, Sulaiman Abu
Ghaith, has announced that the group aspires "to k.ill4 million Americans, including 1 million children," in response to casualties supposedly
inflicted on Muslims by the United States and Israel.
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How to Stop Nuclear Terror
THE DAY AFTER
IF A TERRORIST nuclear attack did occur in the United States,
the first questions asked would be who did it, and where did they
get the bomb? Bin Laden would top the list of probable perpetrators.
But the supplier would be less certain; it could be Russia, Pakistan,
or North Korea, but it could also be Ukraine or Ghana. Russia would
probably top the list not because of hostile intent but because of the
enormity of its arsenal of nuclear material, much of it still vulnerable
to insider theft. Pakistan would likely rank second due to the ongoing
links between its security services and al Qeeda, and the uncertain
chain of command over its nuclear weaponry. North Korea, the most
promiscuous weapon proliferator on earth, has already sold missiles to
Iraq, Iran, Pakistan, and Saudi Arabia and so would merit suspicion.
As would Ukraine and Ghana, which operate Soviet-supplied research reactors with enough HEU for one or more nuclear weapons.
Interestingly, Saddam-era Iraq would not have even made the top ten.
To be fair, since September 11, the Bush administration has taken steps
to reduce the danger of a nuclear attack by terrorists. It has attacked al
Qeeda training bases in Mghanistan and around the globe and enlisted
more than 100 nations in a global effort to share intelligence, enforce
antiterrorism legislation, and curtail the flow of terrorists' mone~ Bush
has repeatedly declared that the spread ofweapons of mass destruction
(WMD) would be "intolerable," prompting similar declarations from key
allies. Recendy; he also proposed a UN Security Council resolution that
would criminalize WMD proliferation and promoted the Proliferation
Security Initiative, an n-nation group that, stretching existing legal
frameworks, will search vehicles suspected oftransporting WMD cargo on
the high seas. Mter initial skepticism, the administration has also embraced the Nunn-Lugar Cooperative Threat Reduction Program to
secure and eliminate former Soviet nuclearweapons and has enlisted other
members of the G-8 group of leading industrialized countries to match
Washington's $1 billion annual commitment to the program over the next
decade. And the United States has cooperated with Russia to extract
three potential nuclear weapons from Serbia and one from Romania.
But the list of actions not taken by the administration remains
lengthy and worrisome. Bush has not made nuclear terrorism a personal
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Graham Allison
priority for himself or those who report directly to him. And he has
resisted proposals by Senator Richard Lugar (R-Ind.), former Senator
Sam Nunn (D-Ga.), and others to assign responsibility for the issue
to a single individual, who could then be held accountable. As a result,
were the president today to ask his cabinet who is responsible for preventing nuclear terrorism, either a dozen people would raise their
hands, or no one would. Bush has also not communicated his sense
of urgency about nuclear terrorism to the presidents of Russia or
Pakistan. Nor has Bush increased the pace ofU.S. cooperation with Russia in securing former Soviet nuclear weapons and materials. As a result,
after a decade of effort, half of the Soviet arsenal remains inadequately
secured. More generally; the Bush administration has not acted to change
the prevailing practice that allows states to decide for themselves how
secure weapons and materials on their territories will be. More than
100 potential weapons, such as those extracted from Serbia, still sit in a
dozen countries in circumstances that leave them vulnerable to theft.
In this context, it is impossible to avoid mentioning Iraq. The Bush
administration used the danger that Saddam might supply WMD to
terrorists as its decisive argument for war. The subsequent failure to
find evidence ofthese weapons has compromised the administration's
credibility on the general subject of WMD, as well as the perceived
competence of the U.S. intelligence community. Moreover, during
the year and a half in which the United States sought to get other
countries to support its Iraq policy, North Korea and Iran were able to
accelerate their own programs. Mounting a serious campaign now
to prevent nuclear terrorism will thus be more challenging than it
would have been before the Iraq war.
NO,NO,NO
will require a comprehensive
strategy: one that denies access to weapons and materials at their
source, detects them at borders, defends every route by which a
weapon could be delivered, and addresses motives as well as means.
Aggressive offense to disrupt and destroy organizations and individuals
that could attack the United States must be matched by robust defenses
at home. Washington may still sometimes have to act unilaterally.
PREVENTING NUCLEAR TERRORISM
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How to Stop Nuclear Terror
But the United States will not be able to bully other nations into taking
all the necessary steps. Successful counterterrorism requires multinational intelligence and local police enforcement. For example, last
summer's capture of al ~eda's Southeast Asia mastermind resulted
from a tip from suspicious neighbors, who informed Thai authorities
who, in turn, called the CIA. If properly encouraged, foreign nationals
and governments can playa huge role in tracking down terrorists. Ifnot,
they become a sympathetic sea in which terrorists can swim and hide.
The centerpiece ofa serious campaign to prevent nuclear terrorisma strategy based on the three no's (no loose nukes, no new nascent
nukes, and no new nuclear weapons states)-should be denying
terrorists access to weapons and their components. Mter all, no nuclear
weapons or material means no nuclear
terrorism; it's that simple.
No nuclear weapons
The first part of the strategy-no loose
nukes-would require rapidly securing all or materials means
nuclear weapons or weapons-usable material no nuclear terrorism;
under a new "International Security Standard"
that would ensure that terrorists could not it's that simple.
acquire weapons or their components. The
United States and Russia should develop such a standard together
and act quickly to secure their own weapons and materials in a manner
sufficiently transparent to give each other assurance that their stockpiles could not be used by terrorists. Moscow and Washington should
then go quickly to other nuclear-weapons states and demand that
they too meet this new benchmark for nuclear security and be
certified by another member ofthe club as having done so. Ifnecessary,
technical assistance in meeting these standards should be offered.
But the United States and Russia should also make clear that this is
not a negotiable demand.
Simultaneously, a "Global Cleanout Campaign" should extract all
nascent nukes from all other countries within the next 12 months.
Since all research reactors in non-nuclear weapons states contain
fissile material that came from either the United States or Russia,
each has a sufficient legal claim to demand its return. Compensation
and wrangling may be required. But the United States and Russia
must not take no for an answer.
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Graham Allison
A "no new nascent nukes" approach will require ensuring that all
nuclear aspirants, especially Iran and North Korea, stop producing
HED and plutonium. This effort should begin under the auspices of
inspections mandated by the Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) and the
International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), including the NPT'S
Additional Protocol that allows more intrusive inspections ofsuspected
nuclear sites. But two other elements must also be added to the current
system: a prohibition on the production offissile material, and actual
enforcement mechanisms. Enforcement should begin with political
and economic sanctions for recalcitrant states but should also include
threats and the use of military force if necessary, whether covert or
overt. Enhanced export controls and greatly strengthened intelligence
capabilities (especially human agents) should focus on preventing the
work of nuclear aspirants and stopping sales from potential suppliers.
Ratification of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (which the Bush
administration has rejected, despite support from four former chairmen
of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, including Secretary of State Colin Powell)
and the negotiation of a cutoff in production of fissile material in
current nuclear-weapon states would reinforce this principle.
Iran will be a decisive test of this strand of the new strategy. The administration has declared that the United States "will not tolerate the
construction ofa nuclear weapon" by Iran and has elicited similar threats
from its allies. American assertiveness has galvanized the IAEA to demand
that Iran prove a :full account ofpast and present nuclear activity. Unless
Iran complies, the IAEA will refer the case to the UN Security Council.
Note the differences between the administration's current approach and the "no new nascent nukes" approach proposed. The
administration has named Iran a member of the "axis of evil" and
threatened it with regime change. It has tried to persuade Russia to
halt construction of Iran's Bushehr light-water nuclear power plant.
And it has accepted verbal declarations of support from Iran's trading
partners in Europe. The proposed strategy, in contrast, would focus
on one objective only: denying Iran material from which nuclear
weapons can be made. This would mean preventing Iranian enrichment ofuranium or reprocessing of spent fuel to produce plutonium.
With Russian President Vladimir Putin as his partner, Bush would
remind Iran that in signing the NPT, it forswore nuclear weapons,
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How to Stop Nuclear Terror
and he would demand that Iran verifiably dismantle any emerging
capability for enrichment or reprocessing.
To win Moscow's support, Washington should accept Russian
completion of the Bushehr reactor, confirm Russia's role as fuel supplier to the reactor, initiate joint Russian-American research on new
proliferation-resistant nuclear power plants, and agree that Russia become
the secure depository for international spent fuel. Fuel supplied at
favorable prices to Bushehr would be owned and managed by Russia and
withdrawn at the end ofthe fuel cycle. (Russia's minister of atomic energy has even expressed a readiness to form ajoint U.S.-Russian venture
to supply this fuel.) To force Iran's hand, the United States and Russia
would show Tehran that they are ready to do whatever is necessary to
prevent it from acquiring the ability to produce its own fissile material.
The "no new nuclear weapons states" part of the strategy would
draw a bright line under the current eight nuclear powers and say unambiguously, "no more." Four decades ago, PresidentJohn F. Kennedy
predicted that by the end ofthe 1970s, 25 countries would have nuclear
weapons. His pessimistic forecast reflected a presumption then generally accepted: that as states acquired the scientific and technical
ability to build nuclear weapons, they would do so. Thanks to far-sighted
international efforts, however, including treaties, security assurances,
and overt and covert threats, most nations have renounced nuclear
weapons instead. Through the NPT, first signed in 1968 and extended
indefinitely in 1995, 184 nations agreed to eschew such weapons, and
existing nuclear weapons states pledged, in effect, to sharply diminish
the role of nuclear weapons in international
politics. But as with the nascent nukes,
the problem has been enforcement.
During the Cold War, rival
superpowers served as the
enforcers, preventing nuclear
proliferation within their spheres
of control. Thus the United States
scotched South Korean and Taiwanese
aspirations, and the Soviet Union dissuaded North Korea. When the Soviet
Union disappeared in December 1991,
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Graham Allison
leaving weapons in Ukraine, Kazakhstan, and Belarus, intense U.S.Russian cooperation was able to eliminate these, too. Al14,000 nuclear
warheads were returned to Russia for dismantlement, and the newly
independent states were compensated with nuclear fuel for their civilian reactors. But the United States and Russia then failed to devise
a common strategy for dealing with nuclear weapons elsewhere. As a
result, Pakistan and India both tested nuclear weapons during the
1990S and declared themselves members ofthe nuclear-weapons club.
The test case for a "no new nuclear weapons states" policy will be
North Korea. That country remains, as former Secretary of Defense
William Perry called it, "the most dangerous
spot on earth." Ifit follows its current course,
Already, the challenge
North Korea will soon be able to produce
from Pyongyang has
dozens of such weapons annually. Should it
become more dangerous achieve this, South Korea and Japan will
likely also go nuclear before the end of the
than it was when Bush decade. Taiwan could follow suit, risking
war with China. And Pyongyang, already the
took office.
world's leading supplier of missiles, could become a sort of Nukes"R"Us, supplying weapons to whoever could
pay-including terrorists. Should that happen, future historians will
justifiably condemn today's leaders for their negligence.
Already, the challenge from Pyongyang has become less manageable and much more dangerous than it was when President Bush took
office. Indeed, some members of his administration have reportedly
concluded that the problem is beyond the point ofno return and have
started focusing on how to accommodate North Korea and avoid blame.
The proposed strategy, by contrast, would begin with an unambiguous
stance on this question: no nuclear North Korea. It would focus solely
on this objective and subordinate all others, especially regime change.
However despicable North Korea's regime, the United States has higher
priorities than getting rid of it. The administration should start to
recognize the urgency ofthis threat. Its mantra of"no crisis," evidently
chosen to avoid distraction from Iraq, has served U.S. interests
poorly. Bush must also get Putin and President Hu Jintao of China
to contemplate the consequences ofa nuclear North Korea for their own
countries. Active cooperation in stopping Pyongyang should be a major
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FOR E I G N A F FA IRS . Volume 8] NO.1
How to Stop Nuclear Terror
test oftheir security relationships with Washington. That said, the administration should drop its objections and immediately accept North
Korea's proposal for bilateral negotiations. North Korea is correct when
it claims that only the United States can address its security concerns.
Direct talks will allow Washington to test its presumption that,
above all else, Kim Jong II is committed to his own survival. The
United States should offer him a deal: survival in exchange for nuclear
disarmament. This deal would offer big carrots and threaten a big
stick. IfNorth Korea is prepared to visibly and verifiably forgo nuclear
weapons and dismantle its nuclear weapons production facilities, the
United States should publicly pledge to abandon any attempt to change
North Korea's regime by force. It should also arrange for generous
economic assistance from South Korea and Japan, which they stand
ready to provide if North Korea forgoes its nukes. It: however, North
Korea refuses to verifiably relinquish nuclear weapons and persists in
its current efforts, the United States should threaten to use all means,
including military force, to stop it. Horrific as the consequences of a
preemptive attack on North Korean nuclear facilities would be, the
prospect of a nuclear North Korea willing to sell its weapons to al
~eda and other terrorists would be worse.
A GRAND ALLIANCE
As THE PRECEDING DISCUSSION suggests, the United States
cannot undertake or sustain its war on nuclear terrorism unilaterally.
Fortunately, it need not try. All of today's great powers share an
interest in the proposed campaign. Each has sufficient reasons to fear
nuclear weapons in terrorists' hands, whether they are al ~eda,
Chechens, or Chinese separatists. All great powers can therefore be
mobilized in a new global alliance against nuclear terrorism, aimed
at minimizing this risk by taking every action that is physically, technically' and diplomatically possible to prevent nuclear weapons or
materials from being acquired by terrorists.
Construction of this alliance should begin with Russia, where the
close personal relationship between Presidents Bush and Putin will
be a major asset. Russia will be flattered by the prospect of standing
shoulder to shoulder with the United States-especially on the one
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Graham Allison
issue on which it can still claim to be a superpower. Americans and
Russians should also recognize that they have a special obligation to
address this problem, since they created it-and since they still own
95 percent of all nuclear weapons and material. If they demonstrate a
new seriousness about reducing this threat, the United States and
Russia will also be able to credibly demand that China likewise secure
its weapons and materials. China could sign up Pakistan. And the rest
of the nuclear club would quickly follow.
Objections will surely be raised about the unfairness of a world in
which some states are allowed to possess nuclear weapons while others
are not. But that distinction is already embedded in the NPT, to which
all non-nuclear weapons states except North Korea are signatories.
Although the treaty also nominally commits nuclear weapons states to
eventually eliminate their own weapons, it never set a timetable, and no
one realistically expects that to happen in the foreseeable future.
The United States and its allies already have the power to define and
enforce new global constraints on nuclear weapons. To make this order
acceptable, however, they should undertake a concerted effort to eliminate nuclear weapons and nuclear threats from international affairs. The
United States and Russia should accelerate current programs to reduce
their arsenals. Moreover, the Bush administration should drop its current
plans to conduct research for the production of new "mini-nukes."
Is the course of action outlined above conceivable? For perspective,
consider the leap beyond the conventional box that the American
president took in enunciating the "Bush Doctrine." With that strategy,
the administration unilaterally revoked the sovereignty of states that
provide sanctuary to terrQrists. Declaring that "those who harbor terrorists are as guilty as the terrorists themselves," the president ordered
American military forces to topple the Taliban regime in Mghanistan.
Ofcourse, this new principle has yet to be enshrined in international
law. It has, nonetheless, already become a de facto rule of international relations. Any government that knowingly hosts al ~eda
or its equivalent knows that it is inviting attack. True, the move
beyond the current war on terrorism to a serious war on nuclear
terrorism based on the three no's would be ambitious. But the leap
involved would be no greater than the distance already traveled
since September 11.e
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