Haha, amazing.

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Nukes on a Blog, New START (all tags)

Last week, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee approved New START on a bipartisan basis. Pause. Enjoy small victory. You good? Hope so, because it’s time to get back on the grind.

This morning, KReif and I have a new article in the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists. In it, we argue that sharing New START’s negotiating record – as treaty skeptics have called for (here, here, here) – is unwarranted. Doing so might delay the approval process and would confuse key issues, misinterpret ratification precedents from previous arms control treaties, and undermine future US diplomacy based on flimsy evidence.

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Nukes on a Blog, New START, Senate, Missile Defense (all tags)

Yes, Sen Corker, you were one of three Repubs to vote for New START!

Today, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee voted to approve the New START nuclear weapons reduction treaty.  Republicans Richard Lugar, Bob Corker, and Johnny Isakson joined the 11 Democrats on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee to vote in support.

In a political climate paralyzed by partisanship on other issues, this bipartisan vote of approval demonstrated an important commitment to reducing the dangers posed by nuclear weapons.

Indeed, New START encourages stability between the United States and Russia, two nations with nuclear stockpiles that could still destroy the world several times over.  That is why the treaty earned "the unanimous support of America's military leadership," according to Secretary of Defense Robert Gates. Seven former leaders of Strategic Command, which oversees U.S. nuclear weapons, endorsed the agreement. So did James Schlesinger, President Nixon’s former secretary of defense who recently led the conservative wing of the influential Strategic Posture Commission and who the Wall Street Journal dubbed Republicans’ nuclear “Yoda.”

Because of delays approving New START, the United States has not conducted an on-site inspection of Russia’s nuclear arsenal in over 285 days and counting. This lack of information threatens U.S. national security by undermining transparency and verifiability, the hallmarks of stable nuclear deterrence in the post-Cold War world.

New START now moves into procedural purgatory – the Senate calendar – where it will await Senate floor action and a final vote. Senators should debate, and approve, New START as soon as possible in order to mitigate the unnecessary danger posed by the current lack of verifiable information and restrictions on Russia’s still lethal nuclear arsenal.

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Nukes on a Blog, New START, Senate (all tags)

Nice one (h/t Gordon Lubold at Morning Defense):

When DoD is faced with a 20-year threat,
the government responds with a 15-year plan,
in a six-year defense program,
managed by three-year personnel,
attempting to develop a two-year budget,
which in reality is funded by a one-year appropriation,
which is typically four-to-six months late,
actually formulated over a three-day weekend,
and approved in a one-hour decision briefing!!!

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Security Matters, Defense Spending (all tags)

Following up on my post from last week, MDA put out a press statement Friday about the Airborne Laser Test Bed's (ALTB) failed September 1 test. According to the statement,

the experiment terminated early when corrupted beam control software steered the high energy laser slightly off center. While we continue analyzing the failure, preliminary indications are that a communication software error within the system that controls the laser beam caused misalignment of the beam. The ALTB safety system detected this shift and immediately shut down the high energy laser.

Good choice by MDA to disclose this information, although it should be done earlier next time.

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Security Matters, Missile Defense (all tags)

In a newly declassified letter snagged by the AP, top Pentagon officials conclude that Russia will not be able to achieve "militarily significant cheating" under the New START treaty. The U.S. nuclear arsenal, which under New START can be deployed in a flexible manner beneficial to American interests, will "help deter any future Russian leaders from cheating or breakout from the treaty, should they ever have such an inclination," states the assessment, which was endorsed by ADM Michael Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and Gen Kevin Chilton, commander of STRATCOM.

This assessment apparently means little to diehard New START skeptics like John Bolton. As he wrote yesterday in the Wall Street Journal, New START reflects military judgments “only marginally” and is instead “political, diplomatic and legal in nature” – as if military and political factors are separate considerations in strategy formulation (Clausewitz, dude). He also claimed that the military endorses and implements agreements such as New START because it knows “that thinking outside the treaty's four corners isn't career-enhancing” – as if military leaders were a bunch of empty vessels incapable or unwilling to speak truth to power.

The fact is that numerous military leaders have affirmed that the Obama administration’s nuclear weapons initiatives were developed through close cooperation between civilian and military officials. Nothing was imposed on anyone, as Bolton suggests. Military officials have endorsed New START because they were involved in its creation and believe in its substance. To assert otherwise is to question their integrity.

The Pentagon supports New START because Russia won’t be able to cheat significantly under it, among other reasons. The Senate should support the agreement, too.

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Nukes on a Blog, New START, Verification (all tags)

No flagellum required

The first Airborne Laser (ABL) test of 2010, which succeeded in February, merited a press release trumpeting that the ABL Test Bed “is a pathfinder for the nation’s directed energy program and its potential application for missile defense technology.”

The second test of 2010, which failed on September 1, merited neither a public announcement that the test was occurring nor a public disclosure of the test’s failure. We only know that the test failed because the enterprising Sharon Weinberger thought to ask (no one else had up until that point).

Here’s the problem: This spring, in part due to February’s successful test, the House Armed Services Committee added $50 million to ABL, which is now being used as a R&D technology demonstrator after Secretary Gates decided last year that, as an operational concept that might actually be used to shoot down ballistic missiles, the ABL-firing plane had "significant affordability and technology problems, and the program's proposed operational role is highly questionable."

If Congress and other defense policymakers react positively to ABL’s successes – as lawmakers did with the $50 million add – they should be given equal opportunity to react negatively to ABL’s failures. MDA should not soft pedal test failures, particularly when Congress has demonstrated that its funding decisions are influenced reflexively by test outcomes.

When MDA and defense contractors complain about funding instability in defense programs, they really have no one to blame but themselves in situations where they sporadically share information with Congress and the public in a manner seemingly intended to manipulate policy outcomes.

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Security Matters, Congress, Missile Defense (all tags)

Sayeth Saint Dick:

If it is brought up, "a large number of Republicans will be in favor of the [New START] treaty, but not all of them," he said.

[snip]

"I think a large majority of Republicans agree with me" on arms reduction, he said.

[snip]

“I think we will not deal with the treaty on the floor until after the election."

[snip]

"No I'm not predicting anything" when asked if it will pass by the end of this year, "beyond the fact that I think we will get to the floor and we'll have a chance to vote upon it, debate it in the lame-duck session."

Here’s hoping that Lugar’s optimistic estimate of his colleagues’ support is based on an actual nose count, not an assumption that they are as principled, knowledgeable, and reasonable as he is.

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Nukes on a Blog, New START, Senate, Congress (all tags)

You know how New START skeptics in the Senate have complained about the agreement’s verification provisions and definitions, Russian cheating, nuclear modernization, and the supposed lack of dissenting witnesses in hearings?

Yeah, well they didn’t give a hoot about any of that back in 2002 and 2003 when the Senate was considering the Moscow Treaty (aka SORT), according to Walter Pincus’s definitive account in today’s WaPo. Loyal NOH readers will recall our series of posts highlighting this hypocr…uh, open-mindedness! (Here – here – here – here)

But remember, their complaints are serious and have nothing to do with politics. Nothing at all. Not a thing.

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Nukes on a Blog, New START, Senate, Congress (all tags)

Snooki, do you think the U.S. Senate should approve New START?

Her response speaks volumes about how passionately people support this agreement.

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Nukes on a Blog, New START (all tags)