North Korea is kind of like that rebellious child whose behavior never seems to get any better, no matter how many times they apologize and promise that they won’t ever do it again. A few days later, and you’re wondering how you ever fell for that same trick again.

Just a few weeks ago, North Korea announced announced that it would implement a moratorium on long-range missile launches, nuclear tests and nuclear activities at Yongbyon, including uranium enrichment activities, in exchange for food aid from the United States.

Whether the apparent deal was the result of a new policy adopted  by Kim Jong-un after the death of Kim Jong Il, the leader who championed the North Korean nuclear program, or the negotiating prowess of Glyn Davies, the new U.S. envoy to North Korea, and others is unclear. And while this seemed like a promising development in the long history of negotiations with North Korea, experts warned us to be cautious.

The experts were correct. This time it’s because North Korea is threatening to launch  a satellite in honor of the 100th anniversary of the birth of its founder. Despite President Obama’s warning to refrain from “bad behavior,” North Korea has stated that it will proceed as planned.

Missile technology to launch a satellite could also be used to launch a nuclear weapon. Despite the Pyongyang’s effort to separate satellite launches from missile tests, neither Washington nor the UN Security Council sees a distinction. The North Koreans have reacted negatively to the West’s insistence that they cancel the test, with a spokesman from the Foreign Ministry saying this morning that, “We will never give up the launch of a satellite for peaceful purposes.”

President Obama made it clear that if North Korea proceeds with the test, they will be jeopardizing the food assistance they were promised by the United States earlier this month.

UPDATE 3/29: A few hours after publishing this post, the administration announced that it's "been forced to suspend our activities to provide nutritional assistance to North Korea."

For an examination how the deal fell apart, see Jeffrey Lewis’ take here. For an assessment of why the North Koreans thought they could get away with a satellite launch, see this article. And for an explanation of why the U.S. is no worse for trying to negotiate with the North Koreans, see Center Chairman Lt. Gen. Robert Gard’s piece here

Whatever the reasons for the likely collapse of the arrangement, it does not portend well for security and stability in the near-term, as additional North Korean missile and nuclear tests could be in the offing.

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north korea, Nukes on a Blog (all tags)

Below is the Fissile Materials Working Group’s response to the outcome of the 2012 Nuclear Security Summit in Seoul, including reaction from Center Deputy Director Duyeon Kim.

CONTACT: In South Korea Sean Harder (sharder@stanleyfoundation.org or 912-210-2862); in United States Jim Baird (jim@rethinkmedia.org or 202-510-7586)

Seoul Nuclear Security Summit Delivers Modest Results

Experts Call for Bolder Action to Prevent Nuclear Terrorism

The communiqué and commitments world leaders agreed to today at the 2012 Nuclear Security Summit mark a modest but important step forward in the effort to secure vulnerable nuclear materials around the globe. However, bolder action is needed to effectively counter the threat of nuclear terrorism, according to the Fissile Materials Working Group (FMWG), an international coalition of nuclear security experts.

"Several key steps should be taken prior to the next Nuclear Security Summit in the Netherlands in 2014. States should institutionalize binding, comprehensive standards for security that emphasize performance and accountability," said Ken Luongo, co-chair of the FMWG and president of the Partnership for Global Security.

"The current nuclear material security regime is a patchwork of unaccountable voluntary arrangements that are inconsistent across borders," Luongo said. "This system is not commensurate with either the risk or consequences of nuclear terrorism. Consistent standards, transparency to promote international confidence, and national accountability are additions to the regime that are urgently needed."

Outcomes of particular note from the Seoul Summit include setting a target date of 2014 for bringing the amendment of the Convention for the Physical Protection of Nuclear Materials (CPPNM) into force; the addition of several nations such as Italy pledging to eliminate their stocks of fissile material; and an agreement between the U.S., France, Belgium and the Netherlands to produce medical isotopes without the use of highly enriched uranium by 2015.

"These pledges represent the most concrete results from the summit and represent some useful steps forward," said Miles Pomper, senior research associate at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies and FMWG Steering Committee member. "If they are to be realized, however, the White House will have to be more active than it has been in winning congressional support for appropriate legislation and sufficient funding."

Duyeon Kim, deputy director of nuclear nonproliferation, at the Center for Arms Control and Nonproliferation, lauded the inclusion of the nuclear safety and security interface in the Communiqué in the aftermath of Fukushima that demonstrated that a Fukushima-like terrorist attack is plausible.

"Notable achievements [in the Communiqué] is a consensus on and vision for strengthening nuclear safety-security as well as raising the importance of radiological security since the 2010 Summit," Kim said. "Not only did world leaders acknowledge the overlap between nuclear safety and security, but they've agreed that the measures need to be incorporated in all stages including effective emergency preparedness. It's an extremely significant first step but the key is implementing and sustaining measures that strengthen the nuclear safety-security nexus beyond 2014 as long as we opt for nuclear power to meet our energy needs."

"Also, setting a target date to announce each country's plans on minimizing the civilian use of HEU by the end of 2013 is a positive step forward but so far it's an 'encouragement' to do so and the key is in the details, which are unclear."

By the end of the four-year effort, there will be major progress in reducing the risk of nuclear theft and terrorism, said Matthew Bunn, co-principal investigator of the Managing the Atom Project at Harvard's Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs and FMWG Steering Committee member.

"But we won't be done - keeping nuclear materials out of terrorist hands will require a culture of continual improvement sustained as long as nuclear weapons and the materials needed to make them continue to exist," Bunn said. "With at least two and probably three major terrorist groups having pursued nuclear weapons over the last 20 years, we cannot expect they will be the last," Bunn said. "Despite the death of Osama bin Laden, the world is likely to be confronting the danger of nuclear terrorism as long as nuclear weapons and the materials needed to make them continue to exist."

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Nuclear Security Summit (all tags)

Despite the fact that most experts, including U.S. military leaders, are clear that Iran has not yet made the decision to pursue nuclear weapons, there has of late been a great deal of speculation as to when (not if) there will be a military attack on Iran. The hysteria was only enhanced by President Obama’s recent meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu.

When considering this hype, however, one should examine the views of the Israeli public on military action. Shibley Telhami, a nonresident Senior Fellow in the Saban Center for Middle East Policy at the Brookings Institution, and a professor at the University of Maryland, has conducted a poll, in partnership with the Dahaf Institute in Israel on Israeli public opinion with regard to Iran.

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Iran Watch (all tags)

DNI Clapper

In his testimony in a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing last week entitled “Current and Projected National Security Threats to the United States,” Director of National Intelligence James R. Clapper Jr. updated Congress on the status of Iran’s nuclear program, and its relevance for U.S. national security.

While Clapper’s statement that it is possible that perceived threats from the United States could encourage Iranian terrorists to seek targets on American soil grabbed most of the headlines, his testimony is an important counter to the alarmist reaction about Iran’s capabilities and intentions that has been permeating the country over the last few weeks.

In his prepared statement, Clapper acknowledged that while “Iran is keeping open the option to develop nuclear weapons, […] we do not know […] if Iran will eventually decide to build nuclear weapons.”

Clapper did not disguise the fact that Iran appears to be developing the technical capability to produce nuclear weapons. He claims that “Iran’s technical advancement, particularly in uranium enrichment, strengthens our assessment that Iran has the scientific, technical, and industrial capacity to eventually produce nuclear weapons, making the central issue its political will to do so.”

This is a critical distinction. Clapper went on to add that an Iranian decision to pursue nuclear weapons is not inevitable.

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Iran Watch, Congress, Intelligence (all tags)

With the 2012 election looming, it is not surprising that the bulk of President Obama’s State of the Union address was focused on the U.S. economy and job creation. But the focus on domestic issues was underscored by a strong defense of the President’s record on foreign policy, in particular his decision to order the mission that led to the death of Osama bin Laden.

Apart from the killing of bin Laden, the only foreign policy issue that merited its own paragraph was Iran.

President Obama’s critics have accused him of being weak on Iran. During the Republican debate on Monday night, Rick Santorum even went so far as to say that, “Obama’s Iran policy has been a colossal failure.”

The President countered this criticism on Tuesday, saying, “Let there be no doubt: America is determined to prevent Iran from getting a nuclear weapon, and I will take no options off the table to achieve that goal.”

He then added a vitally important caveat, “But a peaceful resolution is still possible, and far better, and if Iran changes course and meets its obligations, it can rejoin the community of nations.”

Although Obama is not ruling out the possibility of a military strike, at least rhetorically, it is clear that he will not consider it until all other options have definitively failed. Indeed, many in Washington, both in and out of government, have highlighted the dangers of military action in Iran. In fact, several Iran experts argue that that a military strike in Iran will virtually guarantee that Iran continues to pursue, and eventually obtains, nuclear weapons.

And it is not only the civilians in Washington who believe that military action in Iran would be detrimental to regional and global security. In a speech at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Admiral Mike Mullen, former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, argued for greater engagement with Iran, saying, “We haven’t had a connection with Iran since 1979. Even in the darkest days…of the Cold War we had links to the Soviet Union. We are not talking to Iran so we don’t understand each other.”

For an excellent primer on how a diplomatic solution to the Iran nuclear challenge might be achieved, see Arms Control Association analyst Peter Crail’s important analysis here.

Currently, Obama’s Iran policy has been dominated by economic sanctions. The United States-led multilateral sanctions effort has been joined by many other key nations, including Russia and China. And on Monday, the European Union tightened its existing sanctions against Iran, just in time for the State of the Union.

Thanks in part to these sanctions, Iran has become increasingly isolated over the past year.  In the words of Colin Kahl, former deputy assistant secretary of defense for the Middle East:

One year after the Egyptian revolution began, Khamenei's hopes -- and Western analysts' fears -- have not materialized, and are not likely to. Although it has been fashionable to describe Iran's growing power in the Middle East, actual events suggest the opposite. Iran's economy is reeling under sanctions, and the regime's nuclear activities and saber-rattling increasingly mark it as a pariah state. And as the Arab Spring marches on, Iran will find itself falling further behind.

Whether this will still be the case a year from now remains to be seen. Sanctions alone are unlikely to force Iran to rethink its nuclear program. It’s up to the administration to ensure that economic pressure is paired with the aggressive pursuit of a diplomatic solution.  

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Iran Watch (all tags)