Sleepwalking With the Bomb Read online

  Cold War–oriented curricula began to disappear from college offerings. Students looked elsewhere for fields of study—finance, law, and ecology. National security threats as a concept came to include climate change and economic growth. Nuclear nightmares receded.

  The terrorist atrocities of September 11, 2001 brought home militant Islam’s crusade against the West. Once again the Bomb threatened. This time the most feared threat was not warheads atop ballistic missiles hurtling through space at several miles per second, but Islamist terrorists chauffeuring a crude atomic device inside a truck or slipping a device inside a shipping container.

  Lost to a new generation that did not live through the Cold War’s “delicate balance of terror” was the real sense that nuclear catastrophe was more than a theoretical prospect. Al-Qaeda has been pushed back, with its efforts abroad increasingly feeble. Its founder perished ignominiously in his hideout, cowering before the avenging angels of SEAL Team 6.

  So while national security specialists continue to worry about growing nuclear threats, our citizenry is preoccupied with global economic crises. Though generally aware of present threats, many lack the grounding offered by the more than half century of tutelage that preceded 9/11. To them the prospect of an actual nuclear detonation must seem remote. It is a comforting, but perilous, assumption. Only history’s lessons can supply what living memory cannot.

  Nuclear strategy was once an avocation for what often was termed—rarely as a compliment—a “priesthood” of strategists, scholars, defense and foreign policy intellectuals, government officials, and a small coterie of interested onlookers from the outside. Much relevant knowledge was of necessity highly classified (some still is, most notably the precise formula for making an efficient, and hence readily deliverable, hydrogen bomb). Most discussions of what might or might not happen—even what could and could not happen—centered upon speculation. The great nuclear strategists of a half century ago exercised their keen imaginations, with only sparse data to answer central questions, among them how governments and individual leaders could acquire and use nuclear technology, and how nuclear war could best be avoided.

  There was little historical guidance. America’s Founding Fathers, by contrast, drew lessons extracted by painstaking study of historical examples dating back to ancient Greece, traced through imperial Rome, medieval England, and more. Over 2,000 years of history were encompassed in such narratives.

  Now, after two-thirds of a century, global nuclear history offers multiple clear examples that teach lessons on how to minimize the risk of nuclear catastrophe in the present and future. Yesterday’s history gives us concrete evidence of what has worked and what has failed. Now there are enough examples to illustrate—for the public and policy makers alike—how to most effectively address the nuclear issues we face. This book applies lessons of nuclear-age history to chart a less utopian, more prudent path.

  Support for nuclear disarmament—so-called nuclear zero—flies in the face of history’s lessons. Proponents of nuclear zero hold that the possibility of nuclear annihilation creates among all nations a common interest in mutual survival. They also hold that a world without nuclear weapons can be achieved by means of diplomacy. According to their view, the use of a single nuclear weapon will inevitably lead to an all-out nuclear war—that is, to mutual assured destruction; disarmament is therefore necessary to save the human race.

  Public policy prescription has always been, in the main, guesswork, but there are better and worse guesses. Guesses that rely on the belief that all countries and all leaders share our core civilizational values are likely to be wrong. The strategists, with their numbers and calculations, can err with catastrophic consequences—but equally so can those who slight sound strategic principles or disdain numbers and calculations, because they pursue disarmament as an end in itself in spite of what history has to teach.

  The first two chapters of the book offer some background. Chapter 1 explains why policies driving America’s arsenal towards nuclear zero would, far from making America, its allies, or the world safer, bring everyone closer to nuclear catastrophe. This is especially crucial to realize as the United States elects a president in 2012; the winner likely will face decisions of greater moment than any since at least the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis.

  Chapter 2 reviews nuclear-age history, highlighting key events from the three eras of nuclear arms evolution: 1945 to 1967, which saw an all-out arms race; 1968 to 1992, which was dominated by superpower efforts to restrain arms competition; and 1993 to the present, which has featured growing nuclear proliferation by hostile states.

  Each of the next eleven chapters offers a narrative of key faces, places, and cases with an eye towards the vital lessons nuclear-age history now offers—lessons that are being ignored at grave peril to world political, economic, and social stability.

  Chapter 3 looks at the former Soviet Union and today’s Russia to examine the relationship—in strategic parlance the question of “linkage”—between the nuclear arms policies and foreign policies of nuclear nations. It offers the FIRST LESSON: ARMS CONTROL CANNOT BE VIEWED IN ISOLATION, BUT RATHER MUST BE CONSIDERED ALONG WITH AN ADVERSARY’S CONDUCT.

  Chapter 4 examines the problem of trying to negotiate arms agreements with adversaries. The experience of the United States over several decades teaches the SECOND LESSON: ARMS AGREEMENTS MUST BE BASED UPON GENUINE, NOT PRESUMED, COMMONALITY OF STRATEGIC INTEREST.

  Chapter 5 examines the risk of a future global nuclear confrontation with Iran in light of new information about the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis. That event, properly understood, teaches the THIRD LESSON: REVOLUTIONARY POWERS CANNOT BE CONTAINED; THEY MUST BE DEFEATED.

  Chapter 6 looks at North Korea to consider the risk of a rogue nuclear state blackmailing adversaries with the threat of a sudden resort to nuclear weapons. It offers the FOURTH LESSON: NUCLEAR WEAPONS GIVE NATIONS A “DYING STING” CAPABILITY THAT VIRTUALLY PRECLUDES PREEMPTIVE ACTION AND CONFERS NEAR-TOTAL SURVIVAL INSURANCE.

  Chapter 7 looks at China and Chinese history to consider the risk of a regional power confrontation escalating to nuclear war. The Chinese experience teaches the FIFTH LESSON: THE NUCLEAR BALANCE MATTERS IF ANY PARTY TO A CONFLICT THINKS IT MATTERS, AND THUS ALTERS ITS BEHAVIOR.

  An “interlude” between chapters 7 and 8 examines how thin is the line between development of commercial nuclear power and the development of weapons. The discussion there serves as an important background to subsequent chapters.

  Chapter 8 looks at India and Pakistan to examine the risk of regional nuclear war. It also examines the risk posed by theft of nuclear weapons or an Islamist takeover of the country. These countries’ experiences teach the SIXTH LESSON: CIVILIAN NUCLEAR POWER INHERENTLY CONFERS MILITARY NUCLEAR CAPABILITY.

  Chapter 9 examines the problem of obtaining accurate intelligence on a country’s nuclear power program, looking specifically at Western experiences with Iraq and Iran. It offers the SEVENTH LESSON: INTELLIGENCE CANNOT RELIABLY PREDICT WHEN CLOSED SOCIETIES GO NUCLEAR.

  Chapter 10 examines why nations go nuclear and considers Russia, Britain, France, and Israel in turn. It offers the EIGHTH LESSON: ALLY PROLIFERATION CAN BE PREVENTED ONLY BY SUPERPOWER CONSTANCY.

  Chapter 11 looks at the implications of popular pressure to disarm, such as arose after the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, as well as pressure to ban atmospheric tests. It offers the NINTH LESSON: POPULAR PRESSURE FOR UNILATERAL DISARMAMENT CAN PREVAIL UNLESS WESTERN GOVERNMENTS EXPLAIN ITS HIDDEN, GRAVE DANGERS.

  Chapter 12 also looks at disarmament, though from a different angle: it explores why nations disarm (the examples are South Africa, Libya, Argentina, Brazil, and three former Russian republics) or are disarmed by force (Iraq and Syria). These examples teach the TENTH LESSON: DISARMING HOSTILE POWERS CANNOT BE DONE BY NEGOTIATIONS ALONE.

  Chapter 13 examines the special catastrophic threat posed by surprise “electromagnetic pulse” attacks, now within reach of smaller, e
merging nuclear powers such as nuclear-club-aspirant Iran. It offers the ELEVENTH LESSON: NEVER ALLOW SINGLE OR LOW-NUMBER POINTS OF CATASTROPHIC VULNERABILITY.

  Chapter 14, the last chapter, ties everything together: concepts, cases, and coping with future dangers. It suggests that, if learned, the vital lessons afforded by nuclear history can reduce the risk of nuclear catastrophe, and it offers a final, summative TWELFTH LESSON: NUCLEAR POLICY MUST BE FUNDAMENTALLY DEFENSIVE: ITS GOAL SHOULD BE TO AVOID THE APOCALYPTIC TRINITY OF SUICIDE, GENOCIDE, AND SURRENDER.

  Four appendices offer important context. Appendix 1 discusses how the imaginations of novelists and filmmakers swayed the public via scenarios starkly at odds with nuclear-age realities. Appendix 2 discusses the tightening of control over nuclear weapons since 1945. Appendix 3 discusses intelligence failures regarding strategic arms deployment. Appendix 4 discusses nuances of the complex relationships between missile defensive and offensive weaponry.

  This book assembles in one place an integrated picture of what lessons history and strategic thinking offer us to confront today’s nuclear threats. They are lessons we are well advised to absorb, and to apply to evolving events and threats today and in the future.

  1.

  THE RUSH TO NUCLEAR ZERO: COURTING CATASTROPHE

  So today, I state clearly and with conviction America’s commitment to seek the peace and security of a world without nuclear weapons. I’m not naive. This goal will not be reached quickly—perhaps not in my lifetime. It will take patience and persistence. But now we, too, must ignore the voices who tell us that the world cannot change. We have to insist, “Yes, we can.”

  PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA, HRADCANY SQUARE,

  PRAGUE, CZECH REPUBLIC, APRIL 5, 2009

  SINCE NEWS OF THE TWIN ATOMIC BOMBINGS THAT ENDED THE SECOND World War first hit front pages around the world, the cause of abolishing nuclear weapons has resonated with millions. A visit to the Los Alamos “Trinity” test site, where the first atomic bomb exploded, offers mute testament to the vast scale of man-made destruction unleashed two-thirds of a century ago: the three-foot-high remnant of the 100-foot tower that cradled the massive, ungainly device; the ground littered with tiny shards of “trinitite,” also called “Alamogordo glass.” The explosion instantly fused the sand around the tower base into a green-gray glass that sparkles in the sun—and that emits radioactive alpha and beta particles. One site visit will give visitors about half the radiation dosage they would get from a transcontinental plane flight. A brown rock obelisk, about twice the average height of an adult, marks the spot where the world was changed forever.

  Beginning with President Harry S. Truman, every American president has expressed a desire to see the world rid once and for all of nuclear weapons. All have stated that it is a goal unlikely to be achieved anytime soon. But on February 15, 2012—less than three years after President Obama joined his predecessors in cautioning that nuclear abolition is a faraway goal—“perhaps not in my lifetime”—anonymous senior administration officials leaked a “trial balloon.” The Obama administration was considering three levels of arms cuts beyond those already slated in the 2010 New START Accord, down to far lower nuclear force levels than 2009’s total stockpile of 5,133 warheads. The three target level ranges leaked were 1,000–1,100, 700–800, and 300–400.

  It is evident that President Obama desires to push America’s nuclear arsenal as low as possible, to levels near those he had originally said might be decades away. He gave the reasons in his April 5, 2009, Prague address:

  The existence of thousands of nuclear weapons is the most dangerous legacy of the Cold War. No nuclear war was fought between the United States and the Soviet Union, but generations lived with the knowledge that their world could be erased in a single flash of light.…

  [T]he threat of global nuclear war has gone down, but the risk of a nuclear attack has gone up. More nations have acquired these weapons. Testing has continued. Black market trade in nuclear secrets and nuclear materials abound. The technology to build a bomb has spread. Terrorists are determined to buy, build or steal one. Our efforts to contain these dangers are centered on a global non-proliferation regime, but as more people and nations break the rules, we could reach the point where the center cannot hold.…

  Some argue that the spread of these weapons cannot be stopped.… Such fatalism is a deadly adversary, for if we believe that the spread of nuclear weapons is inevitable, then in some way we are admitting to ourselves that the use of nuclear weapons is inevitable.

  … [W]e must stand together for the right of people everywhere to live free from fear in the 21st century. And … as the only nuclear power to have used a nuclear weapon, the United States has a moral responsibility to act. We cannot succeed in this endeavor alone, but we can lead it, we can start it.

  Obama views himself as a transformational president. And in national security what could be more transformational than ending the world’s post-1945 nuclear nightmare? The New START Treaty, ratified in December 2010, and the 2010 Nuclear Security Summit are cited as examples of success in the direction of nuclear zero. But New START was a unilateral U.S. strategic arms-reduction agreement, as the Russians were already below treaty limits. Under the treaties to which they are signatories, the Russians can actually build newer, more modern missiles and add to their arsenal; they are in fact doing so, testing several models. New START’s verification provisions are far more limited than those in the treaty it replaced (the Bush Moscow Treaty of 2002). As for the Nuclear Security Summit, its participants paid more attention to Israel for its arsenal than they did to North Korea for having exited the Nonproliferation Treaty and joined the nuclear club.

  Abolitionism cannot surmount several immense obstacles. First, hostile states will not only decline to follow our good example; they will be induced to increase their arsenals, which become more valuable as our arsenal shrinks—100 nukes in Pakistan matter much more in a world in which the U.S. has the same number than in a world in which the U.S. has a few thousand. This behavior runs counter to the psychology of civilized people who see nuclear weapons as being for deterrence only, but a nuclear Iran eager to destroy the Great Satan (U.S.) and Little Satan (Israel) will think differently.

  Consider what the Soviets did in the 11 months between the November 1985 Geneva Summit and the October 1986 Reykjavik Summit. In that short span they capped off their 25-year strategic buildup by adding over 5,000 warheads, topping out at some 45,000 warheads—this despite the U.S. having frozen the total number of its warheads in 1967 at 31,255, and reducing them constantly since. Gorbachev did soon come around, as Russia’s economy imploded. But it is unrealistic to expect Iran’s fanatical mullahs to do the same. Pakistan’s increasingly Islamist leadership plans to double its arsenal as rapidly as possible.

  A second obstacle to abolitionism is that verifying clandestine stockpiles of warheads and missiles is simply impossible at present and likely will remain so for a long time. We failed to find a dozen jet planes Saddam hid in the sands of Iraq, until after his overthrow. Concealing missiles and nuclear warheads deep underground would be, by comparison, child’s play.

  China has been developing—and possibly concealing—new nuclear weapons. It revealed in December 2011 that it has built 3,000 miles of deep underground tunnels—called “the Underground Great Wall”—that may conceal an arsenal far larger than the 200 to 400 weapons China is commonly thought to possess. China has never divulged anything compatible to the extensive nuclear data that we have collected from the Russians over the past 20 years, and thus we can only guess at the size of its arsenal. A former U.S. national security official, Professor Phillip Karber, had students working for three years to compile all available data on the subject. Karber offered no specific China arsenal estimate. The data, official film footage on China’s bomb and missile programs, show huge missiles shuttling inside the tunnels. Prominent skeptics argue that current estimates are correct, citing CIA estimates of arsenal size and estimates
of fissile material produced in China. But CIA nuclear intelligence estimates are often wrong. Given that Chinese leaders know they may someday face the United States in a western Pacific showdown, it defies strategic logic to assume that the massive across-the-board Chinese military buildup would exempt the most powerful class of weapons.

  Third, abolitionists have no basis for their confidence in the UN’s ability to stop a determined nuclear aspirant. The worst nations will simply ignore entreaties and evade inspections. What can work—the only remedy–is positive regime change. The Soviet Union evaded arms treaty obligations for years and concealed the full size of its massive strategic buildup. Only with the accession of Mikhail Gorbachev late in the Cold War did things change for the better. Until similar change comes to Pakistan, North Korea, and Iran, abolition is chimerical.

  To be sure, President Obama talked in Prague about the need to punish violators:

  Rules must be binding. Violations must be punished.… The world must stand together to prevent the spread of these weapons.… North Korea must know that the path to security and respect will never come through threats and illegal weapons. All nations must come together to build a stronger, global regime.… [W]e must stand shoulder to shoulder to pressure the North Koreans to change course.

  He went on to note the threats posed by Iran and by terrorists in possession of a nuclear weapon.

  But President Obama had spurned a rare opportunity for positive regime change in June 2009, when the Iranian opposition formed in fury at the stolen election that returned Islamist Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to the Iranian presidency. Instead of siding with the demonstrators and uniting a coalition to put maximum pressure on the mullahs, Obama stood aside and contented himself with feeble verbal sallies. Moreover, he pursued arms talks with a leadership that had never honored an agreement made and that was clearly determined to pursue its nuclear ambitions, in part by slow-rolling diplomatic negotiations whenever possible. He also allowed Russia and China to water down several rounds of Iran sanctions. Though since late 2011 sanctions against Iranian oil and financial interests began to bite, they have not stopped Iran’s nuclear program.