Report Outlines Steps For Nuclear Arsenal Reduction

By: Audrey Hoffer

WASHINGTON (ISNS) -- During a speech on Thursday in Washington, D.C., Vice President Joe Biden spoke of the administration’s desire to “seek a world without nuclear weapons”.

The Obama administration’s goal of nuclear disarmament was also addressed Thursday afternoon in San Diego, where a newly-released report from the nation’s largest physics society outlined a set of technical steps to be taken in the pursuit of nonproliferation.

View The Complete American Physical Society Report: Technical Steps to Support Nuclear Arsenal Downsizing

“The technologies are at hand to substantially reduce the size of nuclear arsenals; no great inventions are required,” said Jay Davis, chair of the report committee. Davis announced the report at a meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. “The good news is we can do it,” Davis said in an interview. “The bad news is it will take a long time.”

The report recommends that the United States declassify the number of nuclear weapons it possesses.

Currently, this number is not made public.

The physicists believe that the United States can lead the way in reducing the uncertainties involved in disarmament by revealing its own arsenal -- which could help to establish a baseline for international efforts to reduce nuclear weapons through treaties and inspection agreements.

“Getting countries to allow inspections will have to be agreed upon by treaty,” said Davis. “Every camera brought in, every piece of measurement equipment, the ability to touch and to observe will all have to be negotiated in advance.”

The report advocates the building of new tools for treaty verification. This verification process will have to be institutionalized and could take decades to accomplish.

The report asks the government to ensure the remaining arsenal is safe and secure; to sustain federal investments in programs to enhance the detection and safeguarding of unknown facilities; and to support nuclear archaeology as a means of developing an international system to determine the amount of nuclear material a country has produced.

“This report makes a valuable contribution to informing the national debate over whether to reduce further the size of our nuclear arsenal and, if so, to what level,” wrote Albert Carnesale, chancellor emeritus and professor at the University of California, Los Angeles in an email.

“Rather than advocating a particular outcome, the report clearly and objectively elucidates the technical issues associated with downsizing the nuclear stockpile and offers concrete recommendations on how to deal with those issues,” Carnesale added.

“Taking the number of nuclear weapons down is both possible and can be done safely from the standpoint of U.S. security,” said Davis. “But as the number becomes smaller the risk of unaccounted-for weapons and the potential threats from rogue nations increases.”

On Feb. 3, Department of Energy National Nuclear Security Administration administrator Thomas P. D’Agostino announced the establishment of an international center for verification research in a speech at the Institute of Nuclear Materials Management in Washington. The center will serve as the site for developing technologies and for building confidence between nuclear-armed countries.

“It’s very exciting that this recommendation was acted upon as the report was being released,” Davis said.