9/24/09

During the 2004 campaign both President Bush and Senator Kerry agreed that the spread of nuclear weapons represented the gravest threat to the United States. Five years later, in an action-packed week, President Obama has put nonproliferation policy at the center of his vision of American security – and made significant advances to reduce the threat from nuclear weapons. Yesterday at the UN General Assembly, Obama not only pledged American leadership in the effort to strengthen international nonproliferation treaties, but gained Russian and Chinese support as well. Today, a meeting of the UN Security Council convened and chaired by Obama agreed to take significant steps to tackle the threat. These efforts directly relate to preventing rogue states like Iran and North Korea from developing nuclear weapons. And on this front, President Obama was able to gain Russian support for a unified international response if talks fail with Iran.

Strengthening nonproliferation efforts should have unanimous bipartisan support in the United States – and indeed today’s results were welcomed by bipartisan leaders George Shultz, Henry Kissinger, William Perry and Sam Nunn. Yet many conservatives in Congress view Obama's efforts to stop the spread of nuclear weapons the same way they do health care and energy legislation: because it s a priority for the president, it must be stopped. This isn't a policy-based argument, it is crass politics at its core and it imperils our national security. Neoconservatives’ ideological approach failed over the last eight years, and nuclear proliferation increased. Now, the U.S. has embraced a path that meets the nuclear threat with tough negotiations, strong safeguards, and an approach that builds on the strengths of other nations, rather than excluding them.

At the UN General Assembly meeting, President Obama advances nonproliferation agenda. Beginning with the elimination of the failed missile defense plans in Europe, and extending into yesterday’s opening of the UN General Assembly meeting in New York, the Obama administration has reaffirmed its commitment to ending the threat posed by nuclear weapons, taking concrete steps that advance the nonproliferation agenda.  

• Re-committed the U.S. to supporting and strengthening the nonproliferation regime. In his speech before the General Assembly yesterday, President Obama renewed his pledge to reduce the threat posed by nuclear weapons:  “We will pursue a new agreement with Russia to substantially reduce our strategic warheads and launchers. We will move forward with ratification of the Test Ban Treaty, and work with others to bring the Treaty into force so that nuclear testing is permanently prohibited. We will complete a Nuclear Posture Review that opens the door to deeper cuts, and reduces the role of nuclear weapons. And we will call upon countries to begin negotiations in January on a treaty to end the production of fissile material for weapons.” [President Obama, 9/23/09]
• Gained international support for resolution meant to strengthen the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty. The New York Times reported that the Administration gained the support of the Russians and the Chinese for a resolution to “strengthen the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty in a Security Council session scheduled for Thursday.”  The treaty sets the core international standard that discourages countries from seeking nuclear weapons – a norm that has influenced Brazil, South Africa, Ukraine, Japan and other key nations to remain non-nuclear or even renounce existing weapons. [NY Times, 9/24/09]
• Increased pressure on Iran heading into talks on its nuclear program by gaining Russian verbal support for sanctions if diplomacy fails.  The New York Times reported that Russian President Dmitri Medvedev “signaled for the first time that Russia would be amenable to longstanding American requests to toughen sanctions against Iran significantly” if talks scheduled for next month head nowhere. “‘I told His Excellency Mr. President that we believe we need to help Iran to take a right decision,’ Mr. Medvedev said, adding that ‘sanctions rarely lead to productive results, but in some cases, sanctions are inevitable.’” [NY Times, 9/24/09]
• By ending the failed missile defense program last week, the Administration bolstered relations with Russia, a key partner for addressing nuclear proliferation. The Washington Post reported last week, “the abrupt reversal of U.S. defense policy immediately brought plaudits from Russian officials, who had viewed the prospect of an American missile shield system on their country's western border as an affront. The shift raised the possibility of greater cooperation between the two powers on containing the Iranian threat and in negotiating an extension of the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty, or START, which expires in early December.”  According to the New York Times, administration officials acknowledged “that missile defense might have had something to do with Moscow’s newfound verbal cooperation on the Iran sanctions issue.” [Washington Post, 9/18/09. NY Times, 9/24/09]

Obama sparks new international commitments by chairing a UN Security Council session, only the 5th of its kind, on nonproliferation.   “The summit will be the first time the 15-member council will be chaired by an American president, with Obama having set combating nuclear proliferation as a priority of his new administration. US officials have stressed the aim of the summit is to reinvigorate the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), which will be the subject of a key review conference next year,” reports AFP.

The Washington Post reports that the session will produce significant progress. “Diplomats have finished negotiating a Security Council resolution that affirms many of the steps Obama plans to pursue as part of his vision for an eventual ‘world without nuclear weapons.’ They include a new worldwide treaty halting production of weapons-grade uranium and plutonium and the strengthening of the global Non-Proliferation Treaty, which has controlled the spread of nuclear weapons for decades but now is in danger of fraying. The session of the Security Council…will strongly push for a worldwide ban on nuclear tests, officials said. For the first time in a decade, a U.S. delegation will attend the biennial U.N. session on the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, which has been ratified by 181 countries but lacks the support of nine critical governments, including several declared and undeclared nuclear powers. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, who is leading the delegation, is expected to commit the U.S. government to trying to ratify the treaty, which was defeated in the U.S. Senate in 1999.”

These initiatives are directly related to preventing rogue states like Iran and North Korea from developing nuclear weapons. By pushing the Security Council on nonproliferation, Obama is furthering the effort to create a strong unified international approach toward Iran and North Korea. As the president said yesterday, “if the governments of Iran and North Korea choose to ignore international standards; if they put the pursuit of nuclear weapons ahead of regional stability and the security and opportunity of their own people; if they are oblivious to the dangers of escalating nuclear arms races in both East Asia and the Middle East — then they must be held accountable.” As the Council on Foreign Relations task force noted, “The overarching strategy to prevent terrorists and more states from acquiring nuclear weapons involves strengthening the nonproliferation regime, stopping the production of fissile material for weapons purposes, controlling the spread of enrichment and reprocessing technologies, and securing and reducing, as much as possible, nuclear weapons and weapons-usable materials.” [AFP, 9/24/09. Washington Post, 9/24/09. Barack Obama, NY Times, 9/24/09. CFR, 5/09]

Meanwhile, conservatives – who under Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush pursued nonproliferation agreements – attack the president for continuing the tradition of American leadership in nonproliferation. Conservative critics, such as the never-confirmed Bush administration UN Ambassador, John Bolton, have been critical of President Obama’s agenda to constrain nuclear weapons through international engagement.  Yesterday Bolton told the National Review Online, that the address to the U.N. was "a post-American speech by our first post-American president. It was a speech high on the personality of Barack Obama and high on multilateralism, but very short in advocating American interests... it became yet another symbol of American weakness... It was all extremely naive. The president did everything he could to say: 'Can't we all just get along?'" One can only speculate what Bolton means by “post-American,” but the notion that working with other countries to control dangerous weapons is somehow “un-American” just exposes neoconservatives as reckless, paranoid, and out of touch.  

It was the conservative icon, Ronald Reagan who kicked off the landmark Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START), and George H.W. Bush who signed it. Today Obama quoted Ronald Reagan, who said in 1984, “A nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought. And no matter how great the obstacles may seem, we must never stop our efforts to reduce the weapons of war. We must never stop at all until we see the day when nuclear arms have been banished from the face of this Earth.”

Neoconservatives aside, nonproliferation is a bipartisan priority. Senator Sam Nunn and Secretaries George Schultz, Henry Kissinger, and William Perry issued a statement today urging action: “The Summit in the UN Security Council brings much-needed global focus to the risks posed by the spread of nuclear weapons, nuclear know-how and nuclear material…The four of us have come together in a nonpartisan effort, deeply committed to building support for a global effort to reduce reliance on nuclear weapons, to prevent their spread into potentially dangerous hands, and ultimately to end them as a threat to the world.  We remain committed to working toward this vision and advancing the steps essential to achieve this goal.  We welcome the leadership of the U.S. administration in this effort. Furthermore, a recent bipartisan Council on Foreign Relations task force, chaired by William Perry and Brent Scowcroft, disagrees with Bolton and advocates exactly the type of engagement and global leadership that President Obama is providing: “The start of a new administration presents a fresh opportunity to reenergize international dialogue and cooperation on best security practices that would reduce the risk of loss of control of nuclear weapons or materials. Strategic discussions with other nuclear-armed states would also provide the United States with the necessary insight and foresight to determine how best to shape U.S. nuclear policy.” [John Bolton, NRO, 9/23/09. Ronald Reagan, TIME, 5/17/82. Jon Kyl and Richard Perle, WS Journal, 6/30/09. ABC, 9/24/09. CFR, May 2009]

What We’re Reading

General McChrystal’s formal request for more troops and resources for Afghanistan will be sent to the Pentagon at the end of the week. He denies that there is any disagreement with President Obama on war strategy. Meanwhile, military officials continued to be surprised by the Taliban’s tactical effectiveness.

Iraq is suffering from a severe drought, further depleting once fertile marshland that had been deliberately destroyed during Saddam Hussein’s regime.

The terror probe reported in New York last week may have uncovered the first active Al-Qaeda terrorist cell since 9-11. A NYPD police official has been removed because a suspect may have been inadvertently alerted to the investigation. Al Qaeda’s #2, Ayman al-Zawahri, has released a new video belatedly marking the anniversary of 9-11.

Libyan leader Moammar Kadafi rambled for 90 minutes during his first speech at the UN General Assembly, ranting about an Israeli connection to the JFK assassination, ripping up the UN charter and asking President Obama to be president for life.

Director General-Elect of UNESCO, Irina Bokova, pledged to heal division over her acrimonious election surrounding controversial Egyptian Cultural Minsiter Farouk Hosni. The Eygptian media blame bias for Mr. Hosni’s loss.

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown agreed to reduce the number of nuclear submarines Britain will construct in the upcoming years, in solidarity with President Obama’s nuclear reduction agenda.

The Vietnamese government predicts widespread migration and severely reduced food supplies if climate change causes sea levels to rise three feet in the coming decades. Also, 19 North Koreans sought to defect by entering a European embassy in Vietnam with the help of smugglers.

The United States seeks a new combination of sanctions and engagements towards Burma.

A European Union report cataloguing the causes of the Russian-Georgian War last year may reignite tensions in the region.

Israeli and Palestinian negotiators struggle to find common ground as efforts to restart formal peace talks continue.

Commentary of the Day

The New York Times approved of President Obama’s tone during his UN General Assembly speech, but they noted the absence of any plan for Afghanistan.

The Washington Post endorses President Obama’s plan to address trade imbalances at the G-20. Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva adds why the G-20 presents an opportunity to continue the reforms and international commitments made at previous G-20 meetings.

Roger Cohen explains why no one is paying much attention to the German elections this weekend.