Nuclear Proliferation and the Threat of WMDs

Worldwatch Live Online Discussion

Paul Walker: Director of the Legacy Program at Global Green USA

May 19, 2005 - 2:00pm EDT

Despite progress in nuclear arms control and disarmament, partly due to the 35-year-old†Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), there are still several grave dangers from the approximately 28,000 nuclear weapons that exist today.† Among them are the wide availability of highly enriched uranium and plutonium, the inadequate adherence of parties to NPT obligations, and rising doubts about the longer-term sustainability of the nonproliferation regime.

Steve Conklin, Worldwatch Institute: Welcome to Worldwatch Live! Today's guest is Dr. Paul Walker, Director of the Legacy Program at Global Green USA, and author of the Worldwatch Security brief "Weapons of Mass Destruction and Nonproliferation--The Need for Global Engagement and Threat Reduction." Welcome, Paul, could you tell us a little about yourself and your involvement at Global Green USA?

Paul Walker: Hi Steve. Glad to be here today and am looking forward to our on-line conversation. Global Green USA is the US affiliate of Mikhail Gorbachev's Green Cross, what some nickname "the environmental Red Cross." Green Cross was founded over a decade ago and is headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland, with national affiliates in over two dozen countries today. I joined Global Green USA (which is not called Green Cross in the US because of trademark restrictions) over nine years ago to help develop its "Legacy of the Cold War Program," an effort to advocate and facilitate the safe and environmentally sound destruction of Cold War weapons stockpiles. I had previously worked on the Armed Services Committee in the US House of Representatives. Global Green USA is headquartered in Santa Monica, CA with a Washington DC office where I work; you can find out more at www.globalgreen.org. Over the past decade, three GC affiliates -- Global Green USA, Green Cross Switzerland, and Green Cross Russia -- have cooperated closely in the Legacy Program to help secure and eliminate thousands of weapons of mass destruction (WMDs) in both the Former Soviet Union and the USA. We have focused a lot of our efforts in trying to get the US and Russia, along with the support of other nations, to abolish their stockpiles of chemical weapons -- some 31,500 tons in the US and over 40,000 tons in Russia. These deadly weapons all represent major threats in today's world, but fortunately both countries have agreed to destroy them.

Montreal, Canada: I would like to take the opportunity to commend Mr.Gorbachev's highly laudable but unrewarded efforts with Perestroika and congratulate him on winning one of the most significant Nobel Peace Prizes of the last 35 years (including Mr. Kinssinger's ). Questions: How is security of WMD coming along in Russia? Co-operation between the US and Russia on this matter? The symbolic ABM Treaty was scrapped in 2001 and from what I read the NPT is in tatters. What responsibility befalls the current US Administration for the inertia? Or the other Super-Middle Powers? John de Jesus

Paul Walker: Thank you for the kind remarks regarding President Gorbachev. I can tell you from personal experience that he is a wonderful and very dedicated individual and deserves credit from all of us for committing his post-Soviet career to making the world a better and safer place. I first met President Gorbachev in 1985 in Moscow and have enjoyed working with him ever since, particularly within the Green Cross organization. You may know that he visits North America two or more times every year on behalf of Green Cross/Global Green and the Gorbachev Foundation, of which he is also president, and I would urge people (including our leaders) to listen to him when possible. His primary message today is that we need a "global perestroika," a "value shift," in how we approach major problems. He has a very strong message in the foreword to the State of the World 2005 volume of Worldwatch which I'd commend to all.

WMD security in Russia still remains challenging. While Russia, with the help of the US Cooperative Threat Reduction Program and related nonproliferation efforts, has secured and/or destroyed thousands of nuclear warheads and other WMD materials, at least 50% of nuclear weapons and fissile materials remain vulnerable to theft and diversion. Russia has also secured, with US financial help, the two most dangerous chemical weapons stockpiles at Kizner in the Udmurt Republic and Shchuch'ye in the Kurgan Oblast (these two stockpiles hold over 10,000 tons of VX nerve agent in millions of artillery shells), but five additional CW stockpiles remain relatively insecure. What needs to be done is accelerated and expanded threat reduction efforts by Russia, the US, and other G-8 Global Partnership members. These countries are all very committed to this important task, but I remain deeply concerned that the efforts are too slow and bureaucratic.

Washington, DC: How can the United States convince non-nuclear countries to desist from pursuing nuclear weapons when the United States is considering researching new nuclear weapons?

Paul Walker: Very good question, particularly now when the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) is undergoing its five-year review at the United Nations in New York. The primary basis of the NPT, signed by most of the world over the last three decades, was a "grand bargain" in which the five acknowledged nuclear powers at the time -- US, USSR, France, UK, and China -- agreed to work towards abolition of their nuclear arsenals, and the non-nuclear nations (1) would agree to forego nuclear weapons development, and (2) would obtain technical help in developing and utilizing fissile materials for peaceful purposes, i.e. nuclear power. Unfortunately, the nuclear powers have not fully kept their side of the bargain and indeed, continued to expand and modernize their nuclear arsenals throughout the last few decades. A few of the non-nuclear powers have also not kept their side of the bargain -- witness the recent withdrawal of North Korea from the NPT and the exclusion of IAEA (International Atomic Energy Agency) inspectors from North Korean nuclear sites. And now the alleged nuclear ambitions of Iran, although Iran continues to deny that its nuclear development is weapons-related.

The proposals of the Bush Administration to expand studies of more sophisticated nuclear weapons ("bunker busters," etc.), and to begin readying the Nevada Test Site for possible new underground nuclear weapons tests, have also undermined, as you state, all credibility of the US in promoting nonproliferation of nuclear weapons. From the point of view of much of the non-nuclear world, why doesn't the US "walk its talk?"

I believe that in order to effectively inhibit the continued proliferation of nuclear weapons -- beyond the new nuclear powers of Pakistan, India, and Israel (not so new) -- the US and Russia, along with France, Britain, and China, must draw down their nuclear arsenals more quickly than now planned under the Moscow Treaty and publicly state that they're working towards complete and verified elimination; we also must continue to adhere to our nuclear testing moratoria, and must promote a global verification regime which will build confidence and trust in an enduring abolition regime. Only by making nuclear weapons truly taboo will we ultimately be successful in stopping other nations from repeating our historic mistakes.

Knoxville, TN: What is your estimate of probability of a WMD terrorist attack in USA in next 10 years?

Paul Walker: Given the insecurity of WMD and related materials abroad, especially in Russia today; the political credibility which the nuclear powers provide to nuclear weapons; and the more sophisticated nature of subnational terrorist groups, I think it's inevitable that some form of WMD will be used against the US over the coming decade. Hopefully this won't be a full-blown nuclear weapon, but I believe that a dirty (radioactive) bomb, a biological weapon, or a chemical weapon will be used in the foreseeable future. Remember, we've already seen chemical weapons used in Japan in the 1990s by the Aum Shinrikyo; fortunately, the Sarin agent they used in the 1995 Tokyo subway attack was not well planned technically, and the agent did not vaporize and disperse well. Nevertheless, over a dozen innocent Japanese citizens were killed, and over 5,000 injured. We also saw Saddam Hussein use chemical weapons against the Kurds in the late 1980s with gruesome results. And the anthrax attack in 2001 in Washington and elsewhere certainly portends future BW attacks.

We need to continue to improve "homeland security" to help protect against these possibilities, but not at the expense of basic civil liberties, and we need to secure and destroy WMDs and related materials (fissile material, chemical agents and precursors, and biological pathogens) at home and abroad before they become tools of the terrorists.

Oak Ridge, TN: Lots of volunteer organizations solicit my support, including faith-based, professional, civic, and public interest advocacy groups. I am quite open to asking them to take public positions regarding NPT and defusing threat of WMD, but they are likely not going to study the issues in much detail. Are there any "off-the-shelf" more-or-less generic statements of support for NPT that such organizations can adopt? What is more effective - my writing my Cogressional representatives about my support of NPT or my persuading a volunteer orgarization to which I belong to "go on record" in support of NPT?

Paul Walker: The former Speaker of the House, Tip O'Neill, always talked about the need to "think globally, act locally." In response to your good question, as well as to one from a questioner in Australia, I think there are many very positive and public statements on the need to universalize nonproliferation, that is, have all nations sign and ratify the NPT and, perhaps more importantly, follow through on their obligations to not develop and deploy nuclear weapons, and to abolish existing arsenals. The US State Department, which now includes the former US Arms Control and Disarmament Agency, has many good publications on its website which would be useful to excerpt. The NPT itself has excellent language. And many NGOs also have very good analyses available.

But perhaps more important than quoting government or international documents are local efforts to support the nonproliferation of WMD and the abolition of all WMD. I would certainly recommend that local groups, cities and towns, and professional organizations make their opinions publicly known. We also need to let our political representatives know that we do not believe that billions of dollars invested in nuclear weapons and related materials serve much purpose in national defense. This year's request, for example, by Defense Secretary Rumsfeld for several million dollars worth of research on "robust nuclear earth penetrators," i.e. "bunker busters," needs to be defeated on Capitol Hill. How can we convince Iran, North Korea, or other potential nuclear powers to forego the nuclear option when we continue to invest so heavily in them ourselves?

Hoboken, New Jersey: Mr. Walker - PLease tell me more about the WMD-related work of the Global Green USA Legacy program. What is the role of a not-for-profit in a field that involves national security, huge government programs, and international treaties?

Paul Walker: Green Cross and Global Green USA undertake a number of environmental programs in energy and resource efficiency, environmental education, reforestation, water, and other programs which overlap with many environmental organizations. However, the Legacy Program is fairly unique in that we play a very active role in helping facilitate weapons destruction, nonproliferation, and treaty implementation. And we do that with very limited resources.

You are correct in pointing out that WMD-related programs and national security are the purview of governments and multinational organizations. We've found, however, that there is an important role for more nimble, and perhaps less cautious, non-governmental organizations (NGOs) to play in first raising the issues to public attention (the advocacy role), and secondly helping to facilitate the process (what some would call "Track II" or "backchannel" diplomacy). You'd be surprised how difficult governments and agencies, at all levels, find it to communicate and cooperate with each other. We've been fortunate to be able to build a variety of forums to help, for example, the US and Russian governments communicate -- these can take the form of national dialogues, educational forums, training programs, local information and outreach offices, and other effective means of promoting constructive dialogue at international, national, regional, and local levels. Today, for example, we operate eleven local information offices at Russian chemical weapons stockpile sites; they are invaluable for helping the CW demilitarization process move forward and for making all stakeholders winners in the process.

Washington, DC: During last year's elections, both President Bush and Democratic candidate John Kerry said that the threat of WMD in the hands of terrorists was the biggest threat to our national secuirty. If there is such a consensus on the issue, how come we are not moving faster to secure dangerous materials around the world? What efforts are underway?

Paul Walker: The major efforts today to secure WMD materials globally come under the Cooperative Threat Reduction (CTR or "Nunn-Lugar") Program of the US Defense Department, the nuclear nonproliferation efforts in the US Energy Department, and the nonproliferation and demining efforts in the US State Department. The "Global Partnership," founded in Kananaskis, Canada almost three years ago, also has now involved over two dozen nations -- Canada, Britain, Germany, Italy, and many others. Together these programs are committing over $2 billion annually to securing and destroying WMD, primarily in the Former Soviet Union.

However, major obstacles continue to exist -- the slowness of federal bureaucracies, the lingering Cold War suspicions, and lack of transparency and access, and bureaucratic obstacles such as visa processing, especially in Russia and the US. These all need to be overcome. Most of these funds are also committed "inside the fence" at weapons and other nonproliferation sites, while essential "outside the fence" efforts to build political support for the work is lacking.

We need to more fully and quickly secure all WMD materials globally before it's too late.

: Following on the question about the US still investing in Nuclear Weapons, to what extent does the recent announcement for the US to sell bunker-busting technology to Israel jeopardize global disarmament even further, hardening not only Russia's resolve but other countries in the Middle East? What are the implications for that region?

Paul Walker: Wish we had more time to discuss this, but in short this is a very destabilizing step backwards. It needs to be stopped, along with the whole "bunker buster" program.

Steve Conklin, Worldwatch Institute: Thanks for joining us today, Paul, and thank you as well to all of our online discussion participants.

Paul Walker: Thanks to you too, Steve, and for all of our participants for the excellent questions.