Doomsday Revisited

When the former Soviet Union and the United States declared their intention radically to reduce their nuclear weapons arsenals, the world breathed a collective sigh of relief. But the relief lasted not much longer than the sigh.

Less than six months ago, attention was riveted on horrifying tales of massive new threats to international security - the appearance of nuclear weapons' material on the black market in Germany. Without these products (bomb-useable uranium and plutonium) the attempts of would-be nuclear nations such as Iran, Iraq, and Libya could be at least forestalled by years, if not stymied. Terrorists, increasingly a threat to worldwide security, would have to make do with conventional explosives - already devastating in their impact, as so many of the often-suicidal missions in Israel, Egypt, Lebanon, or the bombings of the New York World Trade Center, and the Pan AM Lockerbie flight, have demonstrated in numbing detail. Nevertheless nuclear radiation holds the greatest terror.

The repercussions of the appearance of fissile materials were immediate and electrifying. The cover of Time magazine carried the picture of an eerily irradiated skull, with the banner headline 'Nuclear Terror for Sale: Once We Feared Thugs Like Carlos the Jackal. Now No One Knows Who Might Buy Smuggled Plutonium - and Hold The World Hostage'. The article warned that 'The first symptoms of the nuclear plague are spreading into Europe'. As quickly as the new threat appeared, it disappeared. Had all the culprits been apprehended? Had the threat receded? Had the Russians and other producers of plutonium in the former Soviet Union, the assumed source of the illicit materials, managed to batten the hatches at their nuclear installations? Or had the media simply turned its attention to today's, real or potential catastrophes?

Experts speaking at the February meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in Atlanta answered the questions - largely in discouraging words. Not only had nuclear smuggling not stopped; it was on the rise. Anthony Fainberg, a senior analyst with the US Congress's Office of Technology Assessment, reported that the nuclear material that has been appearing since the wave of panic six months ago is even more dangerous. Much of the earlier supply was not weapons-grade material, although it could be used by blackmailers and terrorists. Recent blackmarket nuclear samples, Fainberg said, included greater amounts of plutonium and highly enriched uranium and are more readily available.

Other panellists lengthened the list of potential threats. Nuclear weapons could be seized in the former Soviet Union, particularly Russia, by renegade military units. Civilian nuclear installations could be sabotaged: security is minimal at most of them. Or nuclear facilities could be targeted with conventional arms as the Chechens have threatened to do. And with so much weapons-grade material being transported to storage sites, the likelihood of accidents or threats occurring during transportation has mounted.

On a happier note, William C. Potter, the director of the Program for Nonproliferation at the Monterey Institute of International Studies outlined the accomplishments of Project Sapphire, recently carried out in secrecy by the United States Department of Defense. Some 1,100 pounds of enriched uranium were airlifted from Kazakhstan to Oak Ridge, Tennessee for safe storage. To give some idea of what this cache represents, the requirement for one nuclear weapon is only about 25lb or 10kg of enriched uranium; had it been plutonium-239, it would require only 9lbs (4.5kg). Not surprisingly, Iran, one of the countries most aggressively pursuing a nuclear capability had taken note of this motherlode of plutonium and at the time of the transfer was actively attempting to procure some of it. This particular cache may have been safely snatched from the ayatollahs' clutches, but like the material appearing on the black market, it is but a hint of what lies stored in the irradiated Pandora's Box.

Since the AAAS meeting, Russia has signed an agreement to sell two nuclear power plants to Iran. Even though the reactors will be used to produce electricity, they will bring Iran one giant step closer to being able to produce their own weapons-grade nuclear material. Russian technicians are already working there, and 150 Iranian engineers will be trained in nuclear engineering in Russia - another giant step in nuclear proliferation.

Speaking at a Harvard colloquium the previous week, John Holdren, a physicist at the University of California stated that the planned dismantling of existing nuclear weapons in the United States and Russia would produce 50 tonnes of surplus plutonium in both countries. What the US and Russia do with this surplus, he added, will determine the likelihood of whether the plutonium could be used by other countries to manufacture nuclear weapons. If the plutonium were not destroyed, the rest of the world would not believe that these two superpowers were serious about permanent nuclear disarmament. The perception that they are serious, he noted, will be crucial to convince other countries that they should not go nuclear.

Above all, continuous public attention is essential. A number of ameliorating possibilities exist. Three years ago, the US Congress passed the Nunn-Lugar legislation to aid in denuclearising much of the weapons stockpile in the former Soviet Union. The legislation stalled in the Russian Duma as a paranoid faction perceived it as an attempt to weaken Russia by stealing its secrets.

Only when Yeltsin shut down parliament in October 1993 was the agreement implemented. Its accomplishments to date are relatively small, but they are laying a solid base. Some Dollars 600 million of the authorised Dollars 1.6 billion has been spent on several projects - on the dismantling of strategic nuclear weapons and construction of storage sites for the plutonium that is released. Even contracts for building prefabricated housing for workers at the sites are included in the funding. Many of the efforts are collaborations between governments and federal laboratories, while others provide contracts for American private companies. On a smaller scale, other Western countries and Japan are entering into similar arrangements.

The recently-elected Republican Congress, determined to reduce such spending. This would deal a serious blow to national and international security. Worst of all the costs of reducing nuclear weapons are not nearly as great as those that will be faced when the dismantling of chemical weapons begins in earnest. The media, the experts, and the public must keep sustained pressure on their governments to continue to fight the dangers the world faces from nuclear proliferation. All the weapons in their combined armamentarium have to be employed - knowledge, expertise, technology, and international co-operation - and, regrettably, huge sums of money. The science fiction tales of doomsday are no longer quite so distant from reality.