Clinton Legacy Watch # 30: America the Proliferator
Israeli, As Well As U.S., Interests in Jeopardy
(Washington, D.C.): In recent days, the Clinton Administration has euchred Israel into
agreeing
to the establishment in Geneva of a panel to begin drafting yet another unverifiable, ineffective
and counterproductive arms control agreement. This one will purport to
prohibit the
production of all fissile materials; inevitably, the product of such negotiations will be
billed as a
great step forward toward the Administration’s stated goal of “denuclearization.” More likely, it
will prove to be just one more American contribution to the proliferation of technology
and
know-how that will enable rogue states and other would-be wielders of weapons of mass
destruction (WMD) to intensify the threat they pose to the long-term security interests of
the United States and/or its allies, like Israel.
Another Misbegotten Arms Control Scheme
The treaty now being launched in the Conference on Disarmament in Geneva has been a
gleam in
the eye of anti-nuclear activists for many years.(1) Like the
Comprehensive Test Ban (CTB)
signed in 1996, it is seen as a means of constraining and ultimately garroting the U.S. nuclear
program. If brought to fruition, such treaties may accomplish by a series of flanking
maneuvers
what could not be achieved with a frontal assault: the effective abolition of nuclear
weapons in
the relatively few nations like the United States that pay attention to their treaty
obligations.
The fissile material cut-off is even more seductive than the CTB since the United States
currently
has large stocks of such special nuclear materials (SNM) — plutonium and weapons-grade
uranium — and is not now producing additional quantities of SNM. A cut-off, therefore, appears
to be painless for the U.S.; to the extent that it would prevent these essential ingredients of fission
or fusion weapons from falling into unfriendly hands, it seems to
have no down-sides.
In fact, such an agreement will almost surely prove to be ineffective in achieving its
goal of
preventing fissile materials from falling into dangerous hands. Worse yet, like the Nuclear
Non-Proliferation Treaty and other agreements modeled upon it (notably, the Chemical
Weapons Convention(2)), this accord will probably turn into
an engine for the transfer of
WMD-related technical information and perhaps relevant equipment to the most
unfriendly of unfriendly states. It is predictable, for example, that the inspection
arrangements
required to give a fissile material cut-off the illusion of verifiability will require a degree of access
to U.S. (and other nuclear powers’) most sensitive nuclear facilities. It will also require the
training of personnel drawn from nations all over the world to conduct the associated inspections.
Past experience suggests that, far from curbing proliferation, these practices greatly
exacerbate it.
Israel’s Mistake
In capitulating to intense U.S. pressure not to prevent the consensus generally required by the
Conference on Disarmament to do its work,(3) the
government of Israel tried to make clear that its
objections to a fissile materials cut-off treaty remain. For example, on 11 August, Prime Minister
Netanyahu’s press spokesman said that Israel’s ambassador to the United Nations in Geneva,
Yosef Lamdan, was authorized to join the working group that will discuss the treaty and “the
problems of inspection that it raises.” And a statement issued by the premier’s office indicates
that Mr. Netanyahu told his Cabinet that joining the talks “does not imply adoption of a position
on the agreement or its contents” and that he had advised the United States that Israel has
“considerations of our own which are particular to our situation in the region.”
Of course, as with most UN negotiations, such Israeli “considerations” are going to be given
very
short shrift in the drafting sessions that will now commence. In due course, any U.S. assurances
to the contrary will — like so many other American promises to Israel — be breached whenever
they conflict with the lowest-common-denominator dictated by Arab and other governments
hostile to Israel, on the one hand, and by zealous arms control and other non-governmental
groups and American officials who share their radical anti-nuclear agenda, on the other.
For this reason, Israel is likely to find that its latest effort to secure some breathing space on
core
security issues with which it currently is at odds with the United States by acceding to some,
seemingly less consequential Clinton demand will turn out like the previous ones (e.g.,
relinquishing Hebron): a source of new frictions and intensified American pressure for additional,
and far more consequential concessions. At the very least, Israel will probably find itself facing a
dangerous Hobson’s choice: either preventing agreement in the CD on a negotiated
treaty —
something that is far more difficult to do politically than objecting to the negotiation of
one(4) — or exposing its national security apparatus to
international inspections with which
it literally cannot live.
A Bill of Particulars
Unfortunately, this is hardly the only example of the Clinton Administration pursuing
initiatives in
the name of arms control, good government or trade that are highly counterproductive with
respect to proliferation — and contrary to the long-term security interests of the United States and
its friends. Other cases in point include the following:
- Item: Reckless Declassification of Sensitive Nuclear Data
Acting on another of the Left’s longstanding agenda items,
1995 issued an executive order requiring the automatic declassification by 17 April 2000 of all
documents 25 years or older that contain historical information. While the order allows a few
exceptions in the name of protecting national security (notably, an injunction that “nothing in this
order shall supersede the [classification requirements of] the Atomic Energy Act of 1954″), the
practical effect of the order has been greatly to foreshorten the time and reduce the care with
which documents are being scrutinized prior to their release to the public. Indeed, the
Administration has taken to arguing that the costs associated with a careful page-by-page review
of materials being declassified are prohibitive.
Not surprisingly, a lot of babies are now being thrown out with the declassification bathwater.
According to the Washington Times of 31 July 1998, the Department of
Energy has
inadvertently declassified extremely sensitive information concerning: locations of
overseas
U.S. nuclear weapons storage facilities; data about U.S. nuclear weapons yields; Navy blueprints
showing the exact firing sequence of a nuclear weapon; a Navy document showing the design of
nuclear weapons fuel capsules; an Army paper detailing a gun-assembled nuclear weapon; data on
British yield-to-weight ratios for nuclear weapons; an Air Force document containing nuclear
weapon design information and another one concerning intelligence about Soviet nuclear
weapons.
According to a 28 July 1998 letter to National Security Advisor Samuel
Berger signed by
Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Richard Shelby (R-AL), Senate
Armed Services
Subcommittee on Strategic Forces Chairman Bob Smith (R-NH) and Senate
Judiciary
Subcommittee on Technology, Terrorism an Government Information Chairman Jon
Kyl (R-AZ):
- “We are…disturbed to learn that this problem is not unknown to the Department of
Energy or to members of your staff. Our information is that the Secretary of Energy
was made aware of the declassification problem in December 1995, and again in
January 1996. National Security Council staff was also briefed in January 1996. No
remedial action was taken as a result of these meetings. In our opinion, this lack
of action may be a very serious infraction of the Atomic Energy Act of 1954.
- “…It appears that, in a frenzied attempt to meet the deadline mandated by [the
executive order], officials are not taking proper care to ensure that Restricted
Data and Formerly Restricted Data that may be commingled with other
classified information is not being improperly released or scheduled for
automatic declassification.” (Emphasis added throughout.)
Concern about the potentially disastrous consequences that might arise from such
improper
release of nuclear-weapons related information prompted the Senate, at Sen. Kyl’s initiative, to
adopt on 23 June 1998 an amendment to the FY1999 Defense Department Authorization bill.
This amendment would require thorough review of to-be-declassified documents to prevent
further leaks. Incredibly, Secretary of Defense William Cohen has threatened withdraw
his
support of this legislation — possibly leading to a presidential veto — if members of the
House-Senate conference on the DoD authorization bill retain the Kyl amendment and
others the Secretary finds troublesome. It can only be hoped that the conferees will
understand
a reality the Clinton Administration seems determined to ignore: The costs of failing to
conduct
declassification of nuclear-related and other sensitive government materials could vastly
exceed those associated with a page-by-page pre-release examination of such materials.
- Item: Supercomputer Exports
A wholly-owned foreign subsidiary of IBM recently pleaded guilty
to charges that it
knowingly transferred 17 supercomputers to a Russian nuclear weapons design facility in 1996.
Unfortunately, this company’s astounding disregard for U.S. security interests can hardly have
come as a surprise to the Clinton Administration. After all, its arms control and trade policies
have actually encouraged just such transactions.
Specifically, in its single-minded pursuit of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, the
Administration clearly gave the Russians (and probably the Chinese) the impression that it
would be willing to share powerful supercomputer technology (and, according to some
accounts, even highly classified source codes derived from U.S. nuclear weapons testing)
in
exchange for support for a zero-yield CTB. The Clinton team’s theory evidently was
that since
such equipment and information was going to be good enough for U.S. nuclear weapons
laboratories to assure the continued safety, reliability and effectiveness of the American deterrent
— a highly debatable proposition, but one the lab directors were basically coerced to embrace
should be good enough for other nuclear weapon states, too. Completely lost in the
Administration’ obsession with advancing the CTB was a terrifying prospect: American
know-how would wind up helping Russian (and perhaps others’) scientists to develop new, more
powerful nuclear weapons with which to threaten this country.
This outrageous prospect has been made all the more likely by decisions the Clinton
Administration took in 1993 and 1995 to dismantle controls on the export of
supercomputing technologies. As a result, IBM is not the only company to provide high
performance machines to Russian, Chinese and Indian nuclear weapon and/or ballistic missile
design facilities. For example, in 1996, Digital Equipment Corporation shipped a supercomputer
to the Indian Institute of Science, one of India’s key missile research and development sites.
Silicon Graphics has also provided at least 47 supercomputers to Communist China — at least
some of which have found their way into the military-industrial complex, including its nuclear
design bureau.(7)
The cumulative and highly deleterious effect of such transactions prompted the
majority of the
Senate Government Affairs Subcommittee on International Security, Proliferation, and
Federal Services to conclude in an important report issued earlier this year: “The
Clinton
Administration’s non-proliferation efforts have been inadequate….[It] has not been willing to take
the tough actions necessary to back up the rhetoric in executive orders and other statements.
And, by relaxing dual-use export controls the Administration has allowed the United
States
to join the ranks of the proliferators.”(8)
- Item: Missile Technology Transfers
Another area in which the Clinton Administration’s relaxation of export controls has
contributed to proliferation involves technology transfers associated with U.S. support of foreign
space-launch services. To date, transactions involving the American companies Loral and Hughes
and Chinese manufacturers of both space-launchers and long-range ballistic missiles have received
the most critical attention. More recently, Boeing has reportedly been investigated by the State
Department and U.S. Customs Service over allegations that — as part of a cooperative program
with Russia and Ukraine to develop a sea-launched satellite delivery system — sensitive
information relating to the design and integration of rocket third-stages was transferred without
authorization.
Final determinations on the scope and strategic import of such transfers may have to await the
completion of executive and legislative branch investigations now underway. It seems safe to say
at this point, however, that successive decisions by the Clinton Administration — notably
the
President’s decision in 1995 to transfer jurisdiction for licensing of satellite exports to the
Commerce Department — gave rise to a climate in which trade, not national security,
considerations predominated. While not absolving American businesses of
responsibility for
technology transfers potentially inimical to the national security,
have clearly contributed to the creation of a climate conducive to U.S.-abetted proliferation.
The Bottom Line
Against this backdrop, it is fatuous to believe that the effect of the Clinton Administration’s
latest
initiative — the fissile materials cut-off treaty — will be actually to help reduce
proliferation. Even
if other nations faithfully observed its terms and stopped all future production (Russia will be
unable to do so anytime soon since many of its nuclear power plants, by design, produce as a
by-product of their operations weapons grade fissile materials), the vast quantities of
SNM that
already exist in Russian stockpiles alone under very uncertain control will be enough
to
supply nuclear wannabes with their needs for decades to come.
What is more, this treaty will almost certainly feature intrusive on-site inspection
arrangements
and other procedures that will pose serious security risks to the United States and Israel — and
presumably to other democracies like Britain and France, as well. The U.S. may or may
not be
able to tolerate the compromises of whatever remains of its most highly prized secrets;
Israel, which lives in a strategic environment affording precious little margin for error,
surely will not have that luxury.
Finally, it is the height of irresponsibility to be embarking — in the name of
non-proliferation — on so dubious a course at the same moment that other actions are being
taken
that can only aggravate the proliferation problem. If corrective action is not
promptly taken,
one of President Clinton’s most tragic legacies will be to have presided over the transformation of
the United States from a champion of relatively effective efforts to stem the spread of weapons of
mass destruction and their delivery systems into America the Proliferator.
– 30 –
1. One of the most tireless champions of the fissile material cut-off,
Dr. Frank Von Hippel, was
for much of the first Clinton term a senior official in the Office of Science and Technology Policy.
Although he was unable to consummate this treaty before he returned to his position at Princeton
University, Von Hippel did succeed in getting this presidency firmly committed to the pursuit of
such a cut-off as part of its non-proliferation agenda.
2. See the Center’s Decision Brief entitled
Truth or Consequences #12: The C.W.C.’s
Technology Transfer Provisions Will Exacerbate the Chemical Weapons Threat
(No. 97-D 56,
22 April 1997).
3. This practice — which has, in the past enabled the United States to
prevent myriad, pernicious
arms control agenda items from advancing in the CD — was violated when the Clinton
Administration ignored strenuous Indian objections to the Comprehensive Test Ban and got that
treaty approved by the Conference on a majority vote.
4. What is more, the U.S.-established precedent of overriding a single
country’s objection to the
CTB could very well mean that — even if Israel is able to withstand the pressure to permit a
cut-off treaty to be approved by the CD — its opposition will not be allowed to be a
showstopper.
5. Like the Von Hippel initiative, the declassification order is one of
the legacies of Dr. Morton
Halperin’s tenure in the Clinton Administration. During his decades as a radical opponent of U.S.
intelligence and the American military-industrial complex, Halperin tirelessly called for the
wholesale release of sensitive government information. After Senate concerns surrounding his
record prevented him from being confirmed as an Assistant Secretary of Defense (for more on this
controversial appointment see The Case Against the
Halperin Nomination: Selected Readings
From Morton Halperin’s Collected Works, 2 August 1993), then-National Security
Advisor
Anthony Lake hired his long-time colleague to work on the NSC staff — a vantage point that lent
itself to advancing Halperin’s declassification agenda.
6. For more on this bit of extortion, see the Center’s
Decision Brief entitled Warning to the
Nuclear Labs: Don’t Count on ‘Stockpile Stewardship’ to Maintain Either Overhead Or
Confidence (No. 97-D 183, 1 December
1997).
7. For more on the Clinton Administration’s dangerous policy on
supercomputers, see What’s
Good For Silicon Graphics Is Not Necessarily Good For America: Some Supercomputer Sales
Imperil U.S. Security (No. 97-D 102, 21
July 1997).
8. See The Proliferation Primer via the Subcommittee on Government Affair’s Web site (www.senate.gov/~gov_affairs). Please note that
if you “click” on this site, you will leave the Center’s World Wide Web site.
9. See in this connection, see Mirabile Dictu: Tom
Friedman Is Right on American Industry’s
Shortsightedness Concerning U.S. National Security (
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