Nuclear Issues

Obama’s sparring with Putin is hampering the push to prevent nuclear terrorism — and even raising the risk of an accidental nuclear confrontation.

Through several programmatic evolutions, U.S. efforts to convert HEU research reactors and to repatriate fresh and spent fuel, have significantly advanced efforts to prevent nuclear proliferation and terrorism.  Unavoidable technical and political factors have slowed this progress.  To maintain the program’s momentum, fresh thinking will be necessary and deserves support from the executive and legislative branches of government.

For two days in October, Russian and American experts met at the Belfer Center to discuss the state of U.S.-Russia relations and look for glimmers of hope.

Unfortunately, few were seen. The conflict in Eastern Ukraine is only the most urgent manifestation of a deeply troubled relationship between Russia and the West—in particular the United States. As one Russian participant stated, “We should deal first with the problems that existed even before Ukraine.”

It is indisputable that the Ukraine crisis has dealt a serious blow to Russia's relations with core members of NATO. It would take many years for Moscow, Washington and Brussels to fully mend the fences even if the conflict in Ukraine were resolved tomorrow.

But as Russia's new military doctrine indicates, the Rubicon in NATO-Russian relations has not been crossed — at least not yet. While naming Russia's allies, the doctrine, which was published on Dec. 26, avoids designating either NATO as a whole or any of its specific members as adversaries.

The Non-proliferation Treaty (NPT) has been remarkably successful in restraining the nuclear ambitions of most states, writes William Tobey. If it is to succeed in the future, he says, the ‘best’ must uphold their convictions while the ‘worst’ must recognize that proliferation is ultimately a dead end.

"So Snowden has left the building. The NSA leaker’s departure from Moscow’s Sheremetyevo airport, for an undisclosed location in Russia, on Thursday is turning into a real blessing for the US-Russian relationship," writes Simon Saradzhyan. "It may sound perverse, but both Barack Obama, and, to a lesser extent, Vladimir Putin, have good cause to thank the man whom the US government has fruitlessly asked Russia to extradite and whom the Russian government has just granted temporary asylum."

"Fall 1991 saw U.S. and Soviet leaders display goodwill by pledging to unilaterally consolidate and reduce their nations' arsenals of tactical nuclear weapons in what became the last milestone in the history of U.S.-Soviet arms control....Twenty years after, however, the two countries still have thousands of tactical nuclear weapons outside any of the existing international arms control regimes," writes Simon Saradzhyan

Researchers from the United States and Russia issued in June a joint assessment of the global threat of nuclear terrorism, warning of a persistent danger that terrorists could obtain or make a nuclear device and use it with catastrophic consequences.

Russia is still a player whose choices affect our vital interests in nuclear security and energy writes Graham Allison and Robert D. Blackwill