Author: Joby Warrick
Publication: The Washington Post
Date: December 24, 2002
URL: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A31490-2002Dec23.html
Both Achieved Progress That Went
Undetected
The recent disclosures of secret
nuclear facilities in Iran and North Korea -- combined with the North's
threat this week to resume plutonium production -- have presented the United
States with its most serious nuclear challenge since the early 1990s. The
episodes have not only forced a reassessment of when the two countries
could become nuclear powers but also exposed widening gaps in the international
fire walls built decades ago to halt the spread of nuclear materials and
technology, weapons experts say.
U.S. officials had long suspected
Iran and North Korea of quietly seeking uranium-based nuclear arms. But
what was most startling about the revelations of the past few weeks was
how much the two countries managed to achieve before anyone noticed, the
experts added.
For example, Iran's secret nuclear
program was disguised for two years as a water irrigation project in the
country's northern desert. Two weeks ago, satellite photos revealed construction
near the town of Natanz that U.S. officials say apparently is designed
not for pumping water but for enriching uranium.
North Korea agreed in a 1994 pact
with the Clinton administration to stop pursuit of a plutonium bomb. But
then it created a hidden uranium program and disguised it so well that
intelligence officials are still not sure of its location. Accounts by
defectors in a recent congressional report point to at least one underground
factory in tunnels in Mount Chonma, on the Chinese border. Production of
enriched uranium, which would be necessary to make a weapon, appears to
be underway, according to the defectors cited by the Congressional Research
Service.
The disclosures have spawned new
worries that other countries will be drawn into an accelerating arms race
just as the Bush administration prepares for a possible conflict with Iraq.
The United States has accused Iraq of trying to develop weapons of mass
destruction, which Iraq has denied. While the scope of any Iraqi nuclear
program is still not known, U.S. officials acknowledge that, if it exists,
it is probably far less advanced than those in Iran or North Korea.
"For everyone who hoped that nuclear
weapons were somehow receding from international politics, we're now seeing
them come back again, in part because of our own failed policies," said
Graham Allison, director of Harvard University's Belfer Center for Science
and International Affairs. "If North Korea becomes a nuclear state, you
can predict that in short order South Korea and Japan may become nuclear
states also. After that you've got a devil's brew."
"Just try to imagine," Allison added,
"what the Middle East will be like with another nuclear actor."
Even before the recent disclosures,
many weapons experts were alarmed by nuclear tests conducted by India and
Pakistan in May 1998. The experts have also expressed concern about recent
U.S. willingness to consider new uses for nuclear bombs, such as the destruction
of heavily fortified bunkers.
"The nuclear issue is back again
in a way it hasn't been around since the 1950s," said Andrei Kokoshin,
a Russian legislator and an adviser to former president Boris Yeltsin on
military and security issues. "There is a great probability that arsenals
will grow and new countries will acquire weapons. And we are simply not
prepared for it."
In the early 1960s, President John
F. Kennedy's advisers made fearful predictions of a world perpetually on
the brink, as nuclear weapons and know-how spread to dozens of nations
on every continent. But in the decades since, membership in the nuclear
club has been restrained, thanks to a combination of international monitoring,
superpower pressure and strict controls on the export of sensitive technology
and material.
Today, in addition to the original
five nuclear powers -- the United States, Russia, Britain, France and China
-- only India and Pakistan have declared arsenals of nuclear weapons. Israel
is widely assumed to have the bomb, and North Korea is believed to have
one or two nuclear devices, according to CIA analysts. South Africa built
a bomb in the 1970s but later renounced its nuclear program.
Other nations have sought nuclear
weapons, including Iran, Iraq and North Korea. But the technical difficulties
inherent in creating fissile material -- plutonium or enriched uranium
-- combined with restrictions on nuclear-related exports, helped put the
bomb out of their reach. Although clandestine development of nuclear weapons
was possible, as Iraq demonstrated in the early 1990s with its crash program
to build a bomb, Western intelligence agencies were proficient at spotting
the distinctive nuclear reactors and large reprocessing facilities required
for making plutonium-based weapons.
Strikingly, both North Korea and
Iran managed to fool Western spy satellites by apparently choosing uranium
as their fissile material. European technology for enriching uranium for
bombs has spread globally in recent years. The technology requires less
production space and thus is easier to conceal, weapons experts and intelligence
officials say.
"With plutonium you have big production
reactors and lots of signs and signals that give you away," said Rose Gottemoeller,
formerly deputy undersecretary for defense nuclear non-proliferation in
the Department of Energy and now a senior associate at the Carnegie Endowment
for International Peace. "It is possible to build a uranium plant without
giving off any signals to the outside world."
In addition, both countries appear
to be benefiting from relationships with other countries that possess nuclear
know-how and are increasingly willing to share it, weapons experts said.
"The spread of enrichment technology
was predicted 25 years ago, and now it seems to be happening," said Leonard
S. Spector, a deputy director of the Center for Nonproliferation Studies
at the Monterey Institute of International Studies. "There seems to be
networking among the bad guys -- the technology holders who are perceived
as proliferation threats. They're not just keeping it at home, they're
sharing it. We haven't seen that before."
U.S. intelligence officials believe
North Korea obtained uranium-enrichment technology and equipment from Pakistan
in exchange for missiles. The reclusive North Korean government, which
had halted its pursuit of a plutonium bomb under the agreement with the
Clinton administration, is believed to have begun secretly building a uranium
enrichment plant in the late 1990s using hundreds of fast-spinning devices
known as gas centrifuges. Pakistan has denied aiding North Korea's nuclear
efforts.
In late September, the North Koreans
acknowledged the existence of a secret uranium program after Assistant
Secretary of States James A. Kelly confronted them with evidence during
a meeting in Pyongyang. Tensions have risen in recent weeks, culminating
in North Korea's decision to rescind its agreement not to develop plutonium
bombs.
If North Korea begins full production
of nuclear weapons, it could develop up to five plutonium bombs from its
existing stocks of reactor fuel, and could begin production of uranium-based
weapons as early as 2004, according to a recent analysis by the Washington-based
Nonproliferation Policy Education Center.
Iran's suppliers are less well-known,
although U.S. intelligence officials suspect the Tehran government received
help from Russian and Ukrainian companies, and possibly from China. The
evidence of Iran's program came in the form of commercial satellite photos
depicting two suspicious construction projects. One of them -- the "desert
eradification" project near the town of Natanz -- has all the markings
of a uranium enrichment plant, including eight-foot concrete outer walls
to protect the facility against an attack, said David Albright, a former
nuclear inspector for the International Atomic Energy Agency, the U.N.-chartered
agency that monitors nuclear facilities in scores of nations. The Natanz
site and another facility near the town of Arak were first reported by
opponents of the Iranian government outside the country in August.
Albright said he believes that strengthened
international inspections requested by the IAEA in the 1990s could have
detected the facilities sooner, and might prevent others from being developed.
"There's nothing that Iran is doing
that would not be caught under [enhanced] inspections," said Albright,
whose nonprofit Institute for Science and International Security released
the satellite photos.
Other weapons experts say current
international controls on proliferation are inadequate to prevent the kinds
of violations committed by Iran and North Korea. Not only do the rules
allow cheating, but they offer few tools for dealing with problem states,
said Henry D. Sokolski, director of the Nonproliferation Policy Education
Center. For example, it is currently difficult to prevent such nations
as Iran from acquiring the capacity to develop nuclear weapons as long
as they do not cross the line into production, he said.
"There is no handbook, no clear
enforcement features in the treaties," Sokolski said. "Now that we have,
or are about to have, violations, we have to decide what to do. And what
we decide to do today will decide what, if anything, will be done with
future violators -- and indeed, the fate of the treaties being violated."
