Remind me. Why Are We So Obsessed with Iran's Phantom Nuclear Weapons Programme?

Pretty much any country with a reasonable industrial base is capable of producing nuclear warheads.  It's not that hard once you figure out how to produce weapons-grade uranium or plutonium.

Contrary to the dark fantasies rattling around in Benjamin Netanyahu's mind, even the Mossad knows that Iran has no weapons-grade nuclear refining underway.

It makes you wonder why Netanyahu didn't spare some time in his recent address to the US Congress to mention a nation that presents a real nuclear threat to Israel, Pakistan.  Not only does Pakistan sport a dandy arsenal of nuclear warheads, it has the delivery systems capable of reaching out and touching Tel Aviv if and when it chooses.  Add to that intelligence suggesting that radical Islamist fundamentalists have a place high in Pakistan's military leadership and concerns that the country's arsenal is anything but secure from terrorists and you might think that Iran wouldn't be Israel's greatest worry.

Pakistan successfully launched the latest version of an indigenously developed nuclear-capable cruise missile on Monday, The Washington Post reports.

The Shaheen-III missile has a maximum range of up to 1,700 miles, according to members of the Pakistani military. Depending upon the missile's placement, Pakistan would be capable of carrying out a nuclear strike from Israel in the West to Kazakhstan in the north and Burma in the east.

Launched from Gwadar in Pakistan's southwest, the new cruise missile could just make it to Tel Aviv.  Pakistan, by the way, has no restriction on first use of nuclear weapons.

 

Does Your Bank Back the Bomb?

We're all familiar with the ongoing campaign to urge institutions such as universities and churches to divest their shareholdings in fossil fuel companies.

Well, if we believe that these institutions should be walking away from fossil fuels, how do we feel about their investments in the nuclear weapons industry?

A Dutch organization, Don't Bank on the Bomb, has compiled a list of what it calls nuclear weapons producers and the entities that invest in them.

When you look at the list of producers you'll find a lot of companies you would not be surprised to find on any mutual fund's books.  Familiar names like Raytheon, BAE Systems, Boeing, Lockheed, Bechtel, Airbus, Honeywell, Northrop Grumman, Rockwell Collins, Rolls Royce and ThyssenKrupp.  These companies may not produce actual nuclear warheads but they do manufacture missiles, rockets, cruise missiles, and submarines that get those devices onto their assigned targets.

The organization also lists institutions that invest in these companies on a country by country basis.  Here's Canada's.  The only Canadian lender listed as developing a nuclear weapons policy is the Royal Bank.

Investment opportunities seem plentiful, especially after US Defense Secretary, Chuck Hagel, announced a 30-year, trillion dollar programme to refurbish America's nuclear arsenal.  There's going to be a lot of money splashed around and a great deal of profit to be skimmed off some decidedly apocalyptic hardware.

Now that our leaders seem hell bent on getting us firmly stuck into Cold War II we should try to get a handle on this nuclear arms business and the role we all may inadvertently have in it.

Update -

While this is an obscure issue in Canada, it is generating controversy in Australia where the country's sovereign wealth fund, Future Fund, is investing millions in these nuclear weapons producers.

Then consider this item from Forbes that seems to be hyping America's nuclear rearmament by suggesting that Russia could defeat the US in a nuclear war.  It paints Russia as having the upper hand and a willingness to resort to tactical nuclear weapons in the belief the Americans have become too decadent, too weak to respond in kind.  This brings to mind an editorial that appeared in the leading German financial paper, Handelsblatt, in August that warned civilian populations in the West are undergoing "a kind of mental mobilization: war fever."

Arms Race Update - US to Spend a Trillion Dollars on Upgrading Nukes

US Defense Secretary, Chuck Hagel, put it bluntly.  "No other mission we have is more important."

The mission Hagel was referring to was a trillion-dollar, 30-year programme to upgrade America's nuclear weapon arsenal.  A trillion dollars.  Even today that's serious money.

According to the Associated Press, Hagel told the Pentagon on Friday that the decision to upgrade the US nuclear weapons arsenal came after a series of reviews. He said that the internal and external reviews revealed "a consistent lack of investment and support for our nuclear forces over far too many years has left us with too little margin to cope with mounting stresses".

The embarrassing state of the US arsenal was underlined by the review finding that some of the aircraft used by the US military date from 1969 and had seen action in the Vietnam War.

Hagel admitted: "The root cause has been a lack of sustained focus, attention, and resources, resulting in a pervasive sense that a career in the nuclear enterprise offers too few opportunities for growth and advancement."

The US annual spending on its nuclear forces is $16bn and it is expected to increase on average by 10% annually for the next five years.

The programme conflicts with Obama's previous campaign promise to create "a nuclear-free world".

However, with the rise in tensions between the White House and the Kremlin over Ukraine, and the longstanding threat of North Korea, Obama's nuclear upgrade will do little to help international relations.

Russia announced last week that it would be boycotting an international nuclear security summit, scheduled to be hosted by Obama in 2016.

And there it is, kids, we're back.  Cold War II is underway.  Russia and the US are building new warheads.  Russia is developing new intermediate- and intercontinental-range missiles.  Russia is developing new submarines.  Russia and the US are developing new strategic bombers.  And that's to say nothing about what's underway in Pakistan, India and China.  France won't cut its nuclear force and Britain is upgrading hers.

It takes enormous courage to end one of these things and just a cold wind on the back of the neck to start it up again.

Is There a Nuclear War in Your Future?

Maybe that's why Sideshow Steve went on the down low to get F-35s in RCAF hangars as soon as possible.

Could the planet be headed for the first (and last) nuclear world war?  Noam Chomsky thinks it's a real possibility.  (Hint: he's right).

“It’s come ominously close several times in the past, dramatically close,” he said. “It could happen again, but not planned, but just by the accidental interactions that take place — that has almost happened.”

“It’s worth remembering that just one century ago, the First World War broke out through a series of such accidental interchanges. The First World War was horrifying enough, but the current reenactment of it means the end of the human race.”

“There have been many cases,” Chomsky continued, “not that serious, but pretty close, where human intervention with a few-minutes choice has prevented a nuclear war. You can’t guarantee that’s going to continue. It may not be a high probability each time, but when you play a game like that, with low probability risks of disaster over and over again, you’re going to lose.”

“And now, especially in the crisis over Ukraine, and so-called missile-defense systems near the borders of Russia, it’s a threatening situation.”

We know that Russia's current rearmament programme is nuclear weapon oriented.  A new intercontinental range missile, a new intermediate range missile, a new (probably stealthy) strategic bomber, a new nuclear missile sub. America already deploys the nuclear capable, B-2 stealth bomber and the F-35 is or will be nuclear-weapon capable.  The US is also working on a new strategic bomber.

So, yes, we are upping the nuclear ante even as Cold War II continues to set in. Ain't life grand?  I'm sure a cupboard/broom closet full of nukes would have a powerful appeal to a smug prick megalomaniac like this:

Arms Race Update - India Warns Kashmiris to Prepare for Nuclear War

Indian officials are warning residents in their part of Kashmir to dig bomb shelters and gather a two week supply of food and water in preparation for a possible nuclear exchange.

The notice, published Monday by the Kashmir police in the Greater Kashmir newspaper, advised people to build toilet-equipped basements large enough to house the entire family for two weeks. If there is no basement, residents should construct bunkers in their front yards, the notice advised.

The shelters should be stocked with candles, battery-operated lights and radios and nonperishable food and water that is regularly replaced to ensure it is fresh, it said.

During an attack, it advises drivers to dive out of their cars toward the blast to save themselves from being crushed by their soon-to-be tumbling vehicles. It also warns residents to keep contaminated people out of their shelters.

“Expect some initial disorientation as the blast wave may blow down and carry away many prominent and familiar features,” it advises.

This is probably just sabre-rattling from the Indian side.  Let's hope so.  There's not much chance of world powers compelling India and Pakistan to eliminate their nuclear arsenals, not when those world powers are upgrading their own nuclear arsenals.


Asia, from the Kamchatka Peninsula to the Indian Ocean is becoming insanely bellicose today.    China, Japan, Taiwan, Vietnam, the Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia, India and Pakistan seem caught up, in various ways and degrees, in ultra-nationalistic belligerence.   The United States, meanwhile, has reacted like a moth to a candle and may inadvertently help destabilize the region.

Even the Harper government seems to want a piece of the Asian action.  It was just months ago that Peter MacKay, gushing after face-time with U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, proclaimed that it was essential that Canada establish a permanent and substantial military presence in the region.

Israel - Nukes - Apartheid South Africa

1975. Two defence ministers - one named Botha, the other Peres - meet to seal a pact. The South African asked for nuclear warheads. The Israeli, today's prime minister, responded, offering them in "three sizes."

Secret, apartheid-era documents reviewed by The Guardian, confirm that Israel has a substantial nuclear arsenal:

"...Secret South African documents reveal that Israel offered to sell nuclear warheads to the apartheid regime, providing the first official documentary evidence of the state's possession of nuclear weapons.

The "top secret" minutes of meetings between senior officials from the two countries in 1975 show that South Africa's defence minister, PW Botha, asked for the warheads and Shimon Peres, then Israel's defence minister and now its president, responded by offering them "in three sizes". The two men also signed a broad-ranging agreement governing military ties between the two countries that included a clause declaring that "the very existence of this agreement" was to remain secret.

The documents, uncovered by an American academic, Sasha Polakow-Suransky, in research for a book on the close relationship between the two countries, provide evidence that Israel has nuclear weapons despite its policy of "ambiguity" in neither confirming nor denying their existence.

The Israeli authorities tried to stop South Africa's post-apartheid government declassifying the documents at Polakow-Suransky's request and the revelations will be an embarrassment, particularly as this week's nuclear non-proliferation talks in New York focus on the Middle East.

They will also undermine Israel's attempts to suggest that, if it has nuclear weapons, it is a "responsible" power that would not misuse them, whereas countries such as Iran cannot be trusted.

South African documents show that the apartheid-era military wanted the missiles as a deterrent and for potential strikes against neighbouring states.

These revelations ought to spark an international furor but, chances are, they won't. It's not as though Israel's nuclear programme has really escaped anyone's attention and a degree of military cooperation between apartheid South Africa and Israel was also understood. These documents suggest, however, that Israel was willing to proliferate nuclear warheads into southern Africa by putting them into the hands of the apartheid white movement.

That's not something you just brush off. Israel was totally willing to assist a regime oppressing its own majority people, its blacks, even to the point of transferring to it nuclear warheads.

The sad part is that, it could happen, isn't really that surprising.

Will Brazil Bring Nuclear Weapons to South America?

Brazil is a full member of the BRIC countries (Brazil, Russia?, India and China) said to be the emerging economic superpowers of the 21st century.

There's now concern that Brazil is secretly working on its own nuclear weapon not because of any legitimate threat but to bolster its position on the world stage:

Why all this secrecy? What is there to hide in the development of small reactors to power submarines, systems that several countries have had for decades? The answer is as simple as it is unsettling: Brazil is probably also developing something else in the plants it has declared as production facilities for nuclear submarines: nuclear weapons. Vice President José Alencar offered a reason when he openly advocated Brazil's acquisition of nuclear weapons in September 2009. For a country with a 15,000-kilometer border and rich offshore oil reserves, Alencar says, these weapons would not only be an important tool of "deterrence," but would also give Brazil the means to increase its importance on the international stage. When it was pointed out that Brazil had signed the NPT, Alencar reacted calmly, saying it was "a matter that was open to negotiation."

How exactly could Brazil go about building nuclear weapons? The answer, unfortunately, is that it would be relatively easy. A precondition for the legal construction of small reactors for submarine engines is that nuclear material regulated by the IAEA is approved. But because Brazil designates its production facilities for nuclear submarine construction as restricted military areas, the IAEA inspectors are no longer given access. In other words, once the legally supplied enriched uranium has passed through the gate of the plant where nuclear submarines are being built, it can be used for any purpose, including the production of nuclear weapons. And because almost all nuclear submarines are operated with highly enriched uranium, which also happens to be weapons grade uranium, Brazil can easily justify producing highly enriched nuclear fuel.

Read more here.

And, as though Brazil's nuclear ambitions aren't bad enough, the American journal Foreign Policy warns Burma, Bangladesh, Kazakhstan, Venezuela and the United Arab Emirates could soon join the nuclear club.

UnDemonizing Iran

Doug Saunders has an excellent op-ed piece in today's G&M detailing how Bush rejected a comprehensive peace offer from Iran, undermined a moderate leader and left the way open for a rabid radical, Ahmadinejad.

Saunders points out that the path to peace with Iran begins when we stop demonizing it:

The pro-American demonstrations, by all reports genuine (and unpunished), took place over several days in 2003. In that spring, Mr. Khatami sent a Swiss official to Washington to make the peace offer. In exchange for recognizing Israel, cutting off Hamas and proving it had abolished any nuclear-weapons plans, Iran wanted an end to sanctions, normal diplomatic relations with the U.S. and recognition of its role in the region.

So what happened? Well, nothing. George W. Bush was president, the Iraq war was just approaching the "mission accomplished" phase, and nobody in the White House thought it would look good to make peace with Iran, a country that only the year before had been made a rhetorical component in Mr. Bush's "axis of evil."

As one State Department official directly involved with the Iranian offer told me, "It was like we missed the biggest Middle East peace opportunity of the decade, just so we could keep saying 'axis of evil.' "

So the offer was stuck in a drawer. That diplomatic snub was one of several humiliations, diplomatic and economic, that led to the defeat of Mr. Khatami's reformists in subsequent elections and the victory of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's neo-conservative zealots. Mission accomplished, indeed.

A friendly relationship with Iran would solve a number of problems: The Afghanistan war would be much, much easier; Iraq would be more manageable; and prospects for Middle East peace would be energized. As Ms. Albright said, there are useful alliances with far less democratic, far more Islamic countries that are far less capable of changing for the better - notably, Saudi Arabia.

Most of the objection to this scenario, of course, is based on our belief that Iran is developing a nuclear weapon. But that, too, is almost ready to vanish into vapour. Our most authoritative source of information about Iran's nuclear program is the 2007 U.S. National Intelligence Estimate, which stated categorically, based on voluminous sources, that Iran had abandoned its nuclear-weapons program in 2003. Intelligence officials acknowledge openly that the past two years have not added a single new piece of information to that assessment.

It was reported this week, based on a new IAEA report, that Iran has produced "enough low-enriched, reactor-grade uranium to make a bomb." This, as former Los Alamos National Laboratory scientist Cheryl Rofer has carefully documented, is scientific nonsense: Yes, that uranium contains enough U-235 to make a bomb. To get it out, you would need to kick all the inspectors out of the country, reconfigure thousands of closely watched centrifuges and engage in years of enrichment.

It was physicist Werner Heisenberg who found that the act of observing can affect the nature of the thing being observed. It is likely that simply by looking at Iran as a threat, we've made it one. Look again, and it might change.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/LAC.20090221.DOUG21/TPStory/Focus/
There are still forces in the United States and especially Israel that would bomb Iran in a heartbeat. You can spot them when they distort Iran's actual weapon-making capacity, spinning half truths and infusing fear. Fortunately there seems to be a new American administration that sees Iran as a possible opportunity, not an inevitable adversary.

Is Myanmar Going Nuke?

Asia Times Online reports that Southeast Asian leaders are getting nervous about a spate of recent top-level visits to North Korea by top Myanmar generals. The worst case scenario that has them in a tizzy is the prospect of the Burmese junta acquiring nuclear arms or nuclear weapon technology from the Koreans.

"The rapid-fire visits have gone beyond goodwill gestures and the normal diplomatic niceties of re-establishing ties. Rather, the personalities involved in the visits indicate that Myanmar is not only seeking weapons procurements, but also probable cooperation in establishing air defense weaponry, missiles, rockets or artillery production facilities.

Myanmar's stagnant nuclear program was revitalized shortly after Pakistan's first detonation of nuclear weapons in May 1998. Senior general and junta leader Than Shwe signed the Atomic Energy Law on June 8, 1998, and the timing of the legislation so soon after Pakistan's entry into the nuclear club did little to assuage international concerns about Myanmar's nuclear intentions. Some analysts believe the regime may eventually seek nuclear weapons for the dual purpose of international prestige and strategic deterrence.

...The famine in North Korea in the late 1990s and Myanmar's military expansion ambitions, including a drive for self-sufficiency in production, have fostered recent trade flows. While Myanmar has the agricultural surplus to ease North Korean hunger, Pyongyang possesses the weapons and technological know-how needed to boost Yangon's military might. There is also speculation Myanmar might provide uranium, mined in remote and difficult-to-monitor areas, to North Korea."

Pervez' Purported Perfidy

The father of the "Islamic Bomb" alleges that the Pakistani military, then under the command of Pervez Musharraf, supervised a flight of nuclear centrifuges to North Korea in 2000. From BBC News:

"Disgraced scientist AQ Khan has said that Pakistan transported nuclear material to North Korea with the full knowledge of the country's army.

At the time President Pervez Musharraf was head of the army.

Dr Khan said that uranium enrichment equipment was sent in a North Korean plane loaded under the supervision of Pakistani security officials.

The BBC's Barbara Plett, in Islamabad, says that Dr Khan's latest claims contradict a public confession he made in 2004 that he was solely responsible for exporting nuclear technology to Iran, North Korea and Libya.

Our correspondent says that the comments are the most controversial accusation made by Dr Khan since he recently began defending himself in statements to the media.

His comments are also at variance with the oft-stated line of the Pakistani government that neither it nor the army had any knowledge of the exports."