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Securing Nuclear Warheads and Materials
Nuclear Warhead Security Upgrades
Status
![[ click here for larger photo ]](../../../images/cnwmphoto_warhead1_sm.jpg) U.S.-funded warhead security fencing. |
Both the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) and the U.S. Department of Defense (DOD) are cooperating with Russia to improve security and accounting for nuclear warheads.[1] The DOD cooperation began first, in the very earliest days of the CTR program .[2] The DOD effort works with the 12th Main Directorate of the Russian Ministry of Defense (MOD), known by its Russian acronym as the 12th GUMO, which is in charge of managing and securing Russia's nuclear weapons. Initially, the program focused on warhead transportation, providing security upgrade kits for railcars, armored blankets, "supercontainers" for warhead transport and storage, and the like. That cooperation continues, and indeed, the program is now paying the actual transport costs for secure train shipments of warheads to dismantlement sites or storage sites where they are being consolidated.[3] |
DOD has also been providing a variety of types of assistance to upgrade security at warhead storage bunkers controlled by the 12th GUMO. This includes equipment for a real-time computerized warhead accounting system (replacing the paper accounting systems of the past),[4] equipment and training for screening personnel (such as alcohol and drug testing equipment and lie detectors),[5] and improved security equipment for actual warhead sites. Equipment and training courses for the guard forces are also being provided. A "model" facility has been established at Sergeyev Posad to demonstrate and test modern security equipment, which the United States can then supply at Russian request for installation at actual warhead storage sites. (The United States has also supplied computer software tools for assessing security vulnerabilities at such sites and designing improvements to correct them.) The Sergeyev Posad facility will also serve as a training center for warhead security forces and a maintenance facility for security equipment, once that equipment is installed at warhead sites. [6] As discussed below, however, disagreements over access to the actual warhead sites have until recently prevented many security upgrades for these sites from being installed, a problem that has been ongoing for years, but now appears to have been resolved.
The DOE program developed from the DOE Material Protection, Control, and Accounting (MPC&A) program's work with the Russian Navy upgrading security and accounting measures for the Navy's HEU fuel. Based on the success of that effort, the Russian Navy requested assistance in upgrading security for Navy warhead locations (both storage bunkers and temporary sites such as locations for loading and unloading warheads from submarines). This effort has moved rapidly from its inception in 1999, and thousands of Russian warheads are already demonstrably more secure. Because of the difficulties the DOD counterpart effort has been facing, the MPC&A program has recently expanded from naval warhead sites to some Strategic Rocket Forces warhead sites as well.[7]
How many warheads at how many sites? There has been considerable confusion in public statements and documents regarding how many nuclear warheads there are in Russia, at how many sites. Precise numbers have been difficult to acquire, because in Russia, information concerning the size of the warhead stockpile and the locations of storage sites for nuclear weapons is considered a state secret. Most publicly available estimates of Russia's total nuclear warhead stockpile (counting both strategic and tactical warheads, and warheads that are operational, in reserve, and awaiting dismantlement) currently center around 20,000, down from over 30,000 a decade earlier.[8]
These warheads are stored at a combination of large national-level storage sites (all controlled by the 12th GUMO) and regional and front-line storage areas (some controlled by the 12th GUMO, some by the armed services).[9] In addition, of course, there are nuclear warheads at operational missile silos and on operational strategic missile submarines. Currently, based on discussions over several years with the 12th GUMO, DOD is planning security upgrades for 123 storage bunkers (50 at national storage sites, 48 at Air Force and Navy bases, and 25 at Strategic Rocket Forces bases) controlled by the 12th GUMO.[10] These bunkers are located at 48 sites,[11] 13-15 of which are large national-level storage sites.[12] These DOD figures, however, explicitly do not include sites for ready-for-use tactical nuclear warheads at operational bases of the military services (as opposed to those tactical weapons awaiting dismantlement, which the 12th GUMO has indicated are all stored at the national-level sites).[13] All told, there are estimated to be 65-75 warhead storage sites remaining in Russia, down from several hundred in Soviet times.[14] These figures, however, do not include temporary warhead storage sites such as maintenance facilities, railheads, mating and de-mating areas, and the like. There may be as many as 100 of these additional locations.[15] For example, of the 42 naval warhead locations where the DOE MPC&A program is working, only 5 are bunkers for permanent storage (and are therefore within the set of 123 that are also covered in DOD's effort), while 38 are for warheads that are present at these sites only temporarily (such as facilities where warheads are loaded and unloaded from submarines).[16] Since warheads in transit are particularly vulnerable to theft, upgrades for these temporary sites are important as well.
Progress on warhead transport security. Both U.S. and Russian participants agree that security for transport of Russian warheads has been improved substantially, reducing the risk of theft during this most vulnerable point in the warhead's life-cycle. The DOD warhead security program has:
- upgraded security for 100 warhead-carrying railcars and 15 guard railcars;
- provided 150 "supercontainers" for secure warhead transport and storage;
- supplied armored blankets to protect warheads from small-arms fire;
- provided improved communication and tracking systems to allow the Ministry of Defense to respond rapidly to any accident or attack on a warhead transport; and
- financed 131 (as of September 2002, with approximately
six per month anticipated following that date) secure
warhead shipments, carrying some 2,000-3,000 warheads
to dismantlement facilities or consolidated storage sites. [17]
Progress on naval warhead storage security. DOE's MPC&A program, in its work with the Russian Navy on securing HEU naval fuel, worked out effective procedures for cooperation, and in particular for arranging sufficient access to these sensitive sites to assure that U.S. taxpayer dollars were being spent appropriately. As a result, the warhead security program has moved very rapidly. Rapid security upgrades were completed on sites holding 99% of the estimated 4,000 Russian naval warheads by the end of fiscal year (FY) 2002 (with comprehensive upgrades on sites holding 40% of these warheads), and comprehensive upgrades are expected – as of early 2003 – to be completed on sites holding 90% of these warheads by the end of FY 2004, with the final 10% completed in FY 2006.[18]
Rapid upgrades for warhead sites include such items as upgraded fencing and bulletproof positions for guards. Comprehensive upgrades include a wide range of improvements both inside and outside the bunkers where the warheads are stored, including security cameras, electronic access control systems (which will not let anyone in without an authorized password and can be programmed to require two people to enter their passwords at the same time, enforcing the "two man rule"), microwave and acoustic intrusion detectors, and more.[19]
Slow progress on security for other warhead storage sites . As noted above, the DOD warhead storage site security effort has put in place initial national-level infrastructure, including the Sergeyev Posad testing site and steps toward a national computerized accounting system for warheads. But actual upgrades of Russian nuclear warhead storage sites have been nearly stymied by disputes over U.S. access to these sensitive sites.
The 12th GUMO has been unable or unwilling to provide the resources to install the security equipment provided by DOD itself, and the two sides have until recently been unable to reach agreement on access arrangements demanded by DOD to insure that installations were done appropriately if U.S. taxpayer funds were to be used to pay for them. Security upgrades in the DOD-12th GUMO cooperative program are planned to take place in two phases -- installation of "quick fix" security fencing that would be the same for each site, followed by a far more extensive "comprehensive" suite of security upgrades, from which designers would choose the best elements to address the vulnerabilities at each particular facility. The "quick fix" packages include three layers of security fencing, equipped with sensors to detect intruders. The "comprehensive" suite, agreed on in late 2001 by U.S. and Russian experts who had been testing equipment at the Sergeyev Posad facility, would include a wide range of equipment, including electronic access control systems, security cameras, and more, as discussed above in the discussion of DOE's approach to comprehensive upgrades.[20]
DOD supplied 50 sets of "quick fix" security fencing in late 1997 (for storage bunkers the 12th GUMO controlled at that time) and 73 more in mid-2000 (for the additional Navy, Air Force, and Strategic Rocket Forces sites the 12th GUMO began taking responsibility for in 1998). The idea was that the 12th GUMO would install this equipment with its own resources. But the 12th GUMO found it did not have the money to install these quick fix upgrade kits at a rapid pace, and DOD concluded it could not finance the installations because of Russia's refusal to let U.S. personnel visit the sites. Under DOD's interpretation of U.S. contracting laws, if the U.S. government is to finance installation of security upgrades, U.S. personnel need to be able to have enough access and information to independently estimate the true cost of installing upgrades (so as to avoid being overcharged), as well as some means, after upgrades are complete, of confirming that they were done to the standards agreed in the contracts. Under Russian regulations, however, the very locations of these storage facilities remain state secrets, and access by foreigners is forbidden. (There have been a small number of exceptions made to this Russian prohibition on access to warhead facilities, including visits by Gen. Eugene Habiger, when he was commander of the U.S. Strategic Command, and by Senator Richard Lugar, sponsor of the Nunn-Lugar program — and, as mentioned above, DOE has managed to work out a regular program of access to Russian Navy storage facilities.) With the 12th GUMO doing only the installations it could afford, only 47 sets had been installed and become operational as of April 2002, and only about half of those had the full 3-layer suite of quick-fix fencing installed.[21]
In other words, some of the original equipment has been sitting uninstalled in warehouses for five years, while this access dispute has been allowed to drag on unresolved -- period during which Russia underwent the severe nuclear security crisis of 1998, when large numbers of guards were going unpaid for months at a time.[22] Yet the fact that DOE's MPC&A program had been successfully upgrading naval warhead storage sites for much of this time suggests that both the 12th GUMO's insistence that Russian law made it impossible to offer any access to warhead storage sites and DOD's insistence that only the intrusive access measures it was proposing could comply with U.S. contracting laws were incorrect -- flexibility on both sides has been shown to be possible, and to work.[23] Similarly, although joint testing and evaluation at the Sergeyev Posad site has led to agreement on what equipment should be included in the comprehensive upgrades, none of these upgrades has yet been done.
Breakthrough on access to warhead sites. As of mid-2002, however, DOD achieved a significant breakthrough on the access issue. Following the September 11 attacks, DOD and the 12th GUMO reached agreement on what kinds of access would be provided, using what procedures, to allow DOD to finance the installation of quick fix and comprehensive upgrades at warhead storage sites, and in early 2002, the Russian Minister of Defense formally submitted a request that the required access be approved to the Russian cabinet. This request apparently applied to eight initial sites where work would begin, identified in a letter from the Chief of the General Staff, General Kvashnin, to DOD in late 2001.[24] This understanding was based in part on lessons from a pilot project where U.S. personnel were granted access at a Strategic Rocket Forces warhead site at Aleysk. Because of that access, CTR paid for the installation of the quick fix fencing at that site. The Russian Prime Minister approved the 12th GUMO's request to allow the access to go forward.
DOD experts were about to fly to Russia to make final arrangements to begin installation of security upgrades at these sites when the Bush administration decided not to certify Russia's compliance with congressional standards for release of Nunn-Lugar funds, blocking any new contracts or funding obligations and thereby throwing another obstacle in the path of getting these warheads secured.[25] In August 2002, President Bush signed a temporary waiver (through September 2002) of these certification requirements that had been approved by Congress, followed by another temporary waiver in January 2003, allowing work to move forward. DOD and the Russian MOD concluded an access agreement for these sites in early 2003, which should allow this work to go forward.[26] Moreover, while DOD officials hope that access arrangements at additional sites can be arranged easily once the principle is established at the first eight, this is not yet certain -- particularly as the first eight are service-level sites, not the national-level storage sites, holding more warheads, that the 12th GUMO has treated as more sensitive. If, in fact, the access issue is removed as a constraint on the pace of program implementation, it is still expected to take a substantial period to implement upgrades at the remaining bunkers. The plan is to use U.S. integrating contractors with Russian subcontractors, but the number of qualified Russian subcontracting firms with appropriate clearances, and the actual capabilities of each of those firms, remains uncertain.[27] Under current plans, implementation of the comprehensive upgrades is expected to take until 2012.[28]
Budget
See
budget table
Through FY 2002, DOD had allocated $347 million for warhead storage security efforts, and $83 million for warhead transport security, of which only $118 million and $43 million, respectively, had actually been disbursed as of early 2002.[29] This low disbursement rate was mainly caused by the problems moving forward on installation of storage site security upgrades. DOD requested and received from Congress $40 million more for warhead storage site security in FY 2003 (a 29% cut from the FY2002 funding level of $56 million, because of the unspent funds), and $19.7 million more for warhead transport security (more than double the $9.5 million FY 2002 funding level).[30] For FY 2004, DOD has proposed a budget of $46 million for warhead storage site security ($6 million above the FY 2003 amount), and $23.2 million ($3.5 million above FY 2002).[31] DOD expects that the total cost of the storage site security program will be over half a billion dollars (though that figure does not include provision for upgrading temporary warhead storage facilities). Remaining costs for DOD's warhead transport security program depend in part on how much consolidation and dismantlement of Russian warheads takes place in the coming years: each additional warhead dismantled incurs roughly another $6000 in transport costs.[32]
DOE has not always produced estimates that separated the amount of funding being allocated for nuclear weapons security from its larger Material Protection, Control & Accounting (MPC&A) program. Through FY 2000, the General Accounting Office reported that DOE had actually spent $31.1 million on the effort.[33] DOE itself reports that it budgeted $43.2 million in FY 2000 alone,[34] and $63.9 million in FY 2001.[35] (Differences between the budget allocated in a given year and the amount actually spent in that year, such as shown here for FY 2000, are typical because money for activities must be budgeted up front, but it usually takes additional time to actually complete the contracts and spend the money.) Following supplemental funding provided by Congress beyond what the administration initially requested, DOE budgeted a total of $87.8 million in FY 2002 for work on securing the entire Russian Navy complex (specific breakouts of that amount are not available, but originally DOE estimated that 95% of spending on the Russian Navy complex in FY 2002 would go to securing warheads). [36] For FY 2003, DOE received $47.3 million in new funding to secure Russian naval warhead sites, and for FY 2004, DOE is requesting new funding of $38 million for security at Russian naval sites, the vast majority of which is expected to go to providing additional comprehensive upgrades to nuclear facility sites.[37] Estimated remaining costs to complete the DOE security upgrades for Russian Navy warheads are not publicly available.
In addition, DOE is proposing a budget of $24 million for FY 2004 to extend security cooperation to Russia's Strategic Rocket Forces, at an estimated 10 sites.[38]
Key Issues and Recommendations
Access. The most critical issue facing these efforts, clearly, is the need to finally resolve the access issue for the DOD-12th GUMO cooperation, so that security upgrades for those sites can be implemented. The recent Russian decision to permit access to an initial 8 sites represents major progress, and both sides should move as quickly and flexibly as possible to ensure that these arrangements will allow both quick fix and comprehensive upgrades at all of Russia's warhead storage facilities.
- Recommendation: Given the new Russian flexibility, the United States should be prepared to be flexible as well. Access disputes should never again be allowed to delay progress in securing nuclear warheads for years at a time.
Schedule. The faster these warheads can be secured, the better for U.S. and world security.
- Recommendation: We recommend that the two sides set a target of completing all comprehensive upgrades by the end of 2006 (the fastest that seems practicable), and work out a joint strategic plan to achieve that objective.[39 ] Intensive efforts to expand the base of Russian firms capable of carrying out the implementation work should be made.
Tactical warheads. Currently, the DOD CTR program does not cover sites for operational tactical warheads, leaving a clear gap in the coverage of the program. This is part of an explicit policy of not supporting Russia's nuclear force operations. But Russian tactical nuclear warheads are perhaps the greatest prize for terrorist use, in that they are more often man-portable than are strategic warheads, and some are believed not to be equipped with modern electronic locks to prevent unauthorized use.
- Recommendation: The DOD policy should be changed to include security upgrades for Russian operational tactical nuclear warheads. The basic policy should be that the United States will provide assistance to secure any and all nuclear warheads whose theft could pose a threat to the United States.
Temporary sites. Temporary sites represent another key issue. DOD is prepared to provide assistance in upgrading security at sites where warheads are handled or stored temporarily, and MOD has requested such assistance, but given the difficulty of getting started on the permanent sites, such assistance has not yet begun. Temporary sites are critical, as warheads in transit -- especially when stored for days at a time in a known location that does not have the high-security arrangements of a permanent site -- may be particularly vulnerable to theft.
- Recommendation: Similarly, DOD should pursue upgrades for temporary warhead storage sites, while working closely with the 12th GUMO to reduce the number of these to a minimum.
Consolidation. Higher security could be achieved at lower cost if the number of sites where warheads are stored were substantially reduced. There seems little prospect that Russia will be able to sustain high levels of security at the very large number of sites where warheads are now located (particularly when temporary sites are also considered).
- Recommendation: Both DOD and DOE should work with their Russian counterparts to attempt to consolidate nuclear weapons storage in fewer locations. One potentially promising concept, given that Russia reports its existing storage facilities are already over-filled, would be to re-open one of the large closed national-level storage facilities, and consolidate warheads from several smaller regional facilities there.[40]
Sustainability. Perhaps because of the difficulties in moving forward to install security systems, there appears to have been much less focus on how to sustain security after equipment has been installed in DOD's warhead security program than there has been in DOE's MPC&A program (though sustainability remains a huge challenge there as well). The suite of equipment chosen for comprehensive upgrades in the DOD program is complex and expensive. Given the 12th GUMO's glacial pace in the relatively cheap and low-tech job of installing the "quick fix" fencing with its own resources, there is reason to question whether it will be able to operate and maintain these suites effectively for the long haul without new arrangements being put in place to make that possible.
- Recommendation: Additional attention should be given to sustainability, even as the upgrades are being implemented. This should include (a) additional emphasis on simple, low-cost, "inherently sustainable" upgrades;[41] (b) putting in place training programs to provide adequate trained personnel to use and maintain the equipment (a step already underway, at least in its early stages); (c) putting in place an adequate infrastructure for equipment maintenance and repair, including warranties, access to spare parts, and the like; (d) a push for a high-level Russian commitment that adequate Russian resources will be provided to maintain and operate all the equipment installed over time; and (e) efforts to ensure that the key Russian entities have strong incentives to allocate appropriate resources to security (including strengthening the internal MOD warhead security regulations, and the MOD team charged with enforcing them). In general, there should be substantially increased sharing of ideas and lessons learned on sustainability between DOE's MPC&A program for nuclear materials and the DOE and DOD warhead security programs, as the issues are similar (see discussion in MPC&A page).
Overlap and coordination.At least some of the sites where DOE has already performed rapid upgrades, and is completing comprehensive upgrades, are also sites for which DOD has purchased "quick fix" fencing. Now that DOE is working at Strategic Rocket Forces sites as well as Navy sites, the potential for overlap increases. An interagency working group has been established to coordinate these efforts and attempt to avoid duplication of effort.[42]
- Recommendation: DOE and DOD should use the existing interagency working group on warhead security upgrades to work out an explicit division of labor to ensure against overlap. This interagency forum also provides an opportunity to discuss regularly their differing approaches to, and problems in implementing, warhead security upgrades.
Links
| Key Resources | |
 |
Defense Threat Reduction Agency, "Site Security Enhancements," December 30, 2002, " Site Security Enhancements: Quick Fix," January 6, 2003; and " Security Assessment, Training and Logistics (Security Assessment & Training Center)," December 30, 2003 |
| These DTRA pages provide updates on various DOD efforts relating to nuclear weapons storage security. | |
|
Defense Threat Reduction Agency, "Nuclear Weapons Transportation", December 30, 2002 |
| This DTRA page describes U.S. support for secure transport of warheads to dismantlement and storage sites. | |
|
William Moon,
"CTR Russian Weapons of Mass Destruction Security
Program," (paper presented to the NDIA Security
Division Symposium and Exhibition, Reston, Virginia,
June 27, 2002). Download 2.8M PDF |
| This June 2002 presentation by William Moon, the manager of the Department of Defense's cooperation with Russia to upgrade security for Russian warheads, provides a good overview of what that effort has accomplished. | |
|
Department
of Energy, National Nuclear Security Administration,
Materials Protection, Control and Accounting Program,
MPC&A Program Strategic Plan, (Washington, D.C.:
DOE, July 2001). Download 5.9M PDF |
| This 2001 report describes the entire MPC&A program, including the status of and plans for its work securing Russian naval warheads. | |
|
Charles Digges, "Fences for Nuclear Security Seem Insurmountable," Bellona, June 10, 2002. |
| This article provides a well-informed brief account of how the access obstacles have blocked installation of warhead storage security upgrades in the DOD program. | |
|
John W.R.
Lepingwell and Nikolai Sokov, "Strategic Offensive
Arms Elimination and Weapons Protection, Control,
and Accounting," Nonproliferation Review 7, no. 1 (Spring 2000). Download 92K PDF |
| This article looks at the status (as of late 1999) of programs for strategic offensive arms elimination and nuclear weapons protection, control, and accounting. It examines whether these programs are progressing satisfactorily in addressing key threats, and what might be done to them more effective. | |
|
Center for Nonproliferation Studies, summary of Weapons Protection, Control, and Accounting |
| This page in NTI's Research Library provides a brief overview of warhead security projects. See also the page on Russian warhead security developments. | |
|
Matthew Bunn, "Nuclear
Warhead Security," in The
Next Wave: Urgently Needed New Steps to Control Warheads
and Fissile Material (Washington,
D.C.: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and
Harvard Project on Managing the Atom, April 2000),
pp. 37-38. Download 421K PDF |
| Excerpt from 2000 report updating the actions at the time that were being carried out for warhead security in the former Soviet Union. | |
|
"General Habiger Press Briefing On Trip to Russia," June 24, 1998. |
| In this briefing, Gen. Eugene Habiger, then commander of the U.S. Strategic Command, describes his visit to several Russian nuclear warhead storage sites (he was at that time the only American who had ever been allowed to visit sites with operational nuclear warheads in them), and his impressions of their security. Full text of Habiger's briefing on his earlier 1997 visit, on which he visited only one site, is also available. | |
| FOOTNOTES | |
| [1] | For discussions of these efforts, see William Moon, "CTR Russian Weapons of Mass Destruction Security Program," (paper presented to the NDIA Security Division Symposium and Exhibition, Reston, Virginia, June 27, 2002); Charles L. Thornton, "The Nunn-Lugar Weapons Protection, Control, and Accounting Program: Securing Russia's Nuclear Warheads," in Proceedings of the 43rd Annual Meeting of the Institute for Nuclear Materials Management, Orlando, Florida, June 23-27, 2002 (Northbrook, IL: INMM, 2002); Joshua M. Handler, "U.S.-Russian Efforts to Improve WPC&A: Shutting the Barn Door Before the Horse Has Left?" (paper presented to Institute for Nuclear Materials Management/Carnegie Endowment for International Peace Special Seminar, Washington, D.C., April 26, 2000); Charles Digges, "Fences for Nuclear Security Seem Insurmountable," Bellona, June 10, 2002; Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA), "Nuclear Weapons Storage Security Programs," no date; and DTRA, "Nuclear Weapons Transportation Security Programs," no date. Earlier accounts can be found in Matthew Bunn, The Next Wave: Urgently Needed New Steps to Control Warheads and Fissile Material (Washington, D.C.: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and Managing the Atom Project, Harvard University, April 2000, pp. 37-38; and John Leppingwell and Nikolai Sokov, "Assessment of Delivery Vehicle Elimination and Weapons Protection, Control, and Accounting," Nonproliferation Review 7, no. 1 (Spring 2000), pp. 59-75, available at . Descriptions from a Russian perspective can be found in Col-Gen. Igor Valynkin (commander, 12th GUMO), press conference, February 3, 1999, Official Kremlin International News Broadcast, Federal Information Systems Corporation; Gen. Evgeniy Maslin (former commander, 12th GUMO), "The CTR Program and Russia's National Security Interests," Yaderny Kontrol Digest 5, no. 1 (Winter 2000); Dmitry Litovkin, "Cooperation Between the 12th GUMO and the U.S. DOD Within the CTR Framework," in Ivan Safranchuk, Cooperative Threat Reduction Program: How Efficient? (Moscow: PIR Center, 2000); and Gen. Evgeniy Maslin, "Russian-U.S. Cooperation on Nuclear Weapons Safety," in John M. Shields and William C. Potter, eds., Dismantling the Cold War: U.S. and NIS Perspectives on the Nunn-Lugar Cooperative Threat Reduction Program, Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, CSIA Studies in International Security, 1997. |
| [2] | Unfortunately, however, the first U.S. assistance, nylon ballistic blankets for protecting nuclear weapons from small-arms fire during transport, did not arrive until after the initial mission of moving all the tactical nuclear weapons out of the non-Russian republics had been completed. See, for example, Handler, "U.S.-Russian Efforts to Improve WPC&A," op. cit. |
| [3] | See DTRA, "Nuclear Weapons Transportation," |
| [4] | Some of the U.S.-funded computers are in the field and being used, but it will be some time before a full national accounting system is actually operational, owing both to difficulties related to certifying U.S.-supplied hardware as suitable for carrying Russian top-secret information and to disputes over U.S. access to sensitive facilities where the equipment would be installed and used. Interviews with DTRA personnel, March and April, 2002. |
| [5] | The 12th GUMO has apparently used the personnel screening equipment extensively, screening out some candidates for nuclear weapon guard duties, and even some currently serving personnel, because of factors such as testing positive for drugs or alcohol. Interviews with DTRA personnel, March and April, 2002. |
| [6] | Thornton, "The Nunn-Lugar Weapons Protection, Control, and Accounting Program," op. cit; DTRA, "Nuclear Weapons Storage Security Programs," op. cit.; also interviews with Defense Threat Reduction Agency officials, March 2002. |
| [7] | See Jack Caravelli, Kenneth Sheely, and Brian Waud, "MPC&A Program Overview: Initiatives for Acceleration and Expansion," in Proceedings of the 43rd Annual Meeting of the Institute for Nuclear Materials Management, Orlando, Florida, June 23-27, 2002 (Northbrook, IL: INMM, 2002). |
| [8] | See for example, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Nonproliferation Project, "Nuclear Numbers," . For more detail, see William M. Arkin, Robert S. Norris, and Joshua M. Handler, Taking Stock: Worldwide Nuclear Deployments 1998 (Washington, D.C.: Natural Resources Defense Council, 1998. A recent official statement is from U.S. Department of Defense, Proliferation: Threat and Response (Washington, D.C.: January 2001, which estimated that as of the end of 2000, the total number of Russian nuclear warheads was "well under 25,000 a reduction of over 11,000 warheads since 1992." (p. 56) |
| [9] | For useful discussions of Russian nuclear warhead storage facilities, see Joshua M. Handler, "Lifting the Lid on Russia's Nuclear Weapons Storage," Jane's Intelligence Review, August 1999. |
| [10] | Thornton, "The Nunn-Lugar Weapons Protection, Control, and Accounting Program," op. cit. |
| [11] | Interviews with DTRA personnel, April, 2002. |
| [12] | Thornton, "The Nunn-Lugar Weapons Protection, Control, and Accounting Program," op. cit. |
| [13] | Thornton, "The Nunn-Lugar Weapons Protection, Control, and Accounting Program," op. cit. |
| [14] | Handler, "Lifting the Lid on Russia's Nuclear Weapons Storage," op. cit. |
| [15] | Thornton, "The Nunn-Lugar Weapons Protection, Control, and Accounting Program," op. cit. |
| [16] | Interview with DOE official, April 2002. For a map showing where these warhead bunkers are located, see U.S. Department of Energy, National Nuclear Security Administration, Material Protection, Control, and Accounting Program, MPC&A Program Strategic Plan (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department of Energy, July 2001, available at ), pp. 19-20. |
| [17] | See DTRA, "Nuclear Weapons Transportation Security Programs," op. cit. |
| [18] | See Jack Caravelli, Kenneth Sheely, and Brian Waud, "MPC&A Program Overview: Initiatives for Acceleration and Expansion," in Proceedings of the 43rd Annual Meeting of the Institute for Nuclear Materials Management, Orlando, Florida, June 23-27, 2002 (Northbrook, IL: INMM, 2002). |
| [19] | Interviews with DOE personnel, April 2002. |
| [20] | Interviews with DTRA personnel, March and April, 2002. |
| [21] | This was the figure for quick fix systems installed and operation provided to the Department of Defense by the Russian Ministry of Defense in April 2002. See Defense Threat Reduction Agency, “Site Security Enhancements (Quick Fix),” January 6, 2003. Also, interviews with DTRA personnel, March 2002. Forty-two was the number described as installed as of December 2000 in an earlier version of the DTRA website." |
| [22] | See Anecdotes of Nuclear Insecurity. |
| [23] | For an extended discussion of the access issue, see Oleg Bukharin, Matthew Bunn, and Ken Luongo, Renewing the Partnership: Recommendations for Accelerated Action to Secure Nuclear Material in the Former Soviet Union (Washington, D.C.: Russian-American Nuclear Security Advisory Council, August 2000; for a recent discussion of the lessons learned from the MPC&A cooperation with the Russian Navy, see Morten Bremer Maerli, "U.S.-Russian Naval Security Upgrades: Lessons Learned and Future Steps," Yaderny Kontrol Digest 7, no. 4 (Fall 2002). |
| [24] | In keeping with the restriction that the locations of these sites are state secrets, the locations of the eight sites were not identified in the letter. |
| [25] | Interviews with DTRA officials, March and April, 2002. |
| [26] | Testimony of J.D. Crouch III, Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Policy, House Armed Services Committee, March 4, 2003. |
| [27] | Interviews with DTRA officials, March and April, 2002. |
| [28] | See DTRA, “Site Security Enhancements (Quick Fix),” op. cit. |
| [29] | Thornton, "The Nunn-Lugar Weapons Protection, Control, and Accounting Program," op. cit. |
| [30] | Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA), Fiscal Year (FY) 2003 Budget Estimates: Former Soviet Union Threat Reduction Appropriation (Arlington, Va.: DTRA, February 2002). |
| [31] | William Hoehn, "Observations on the President's Fiscal Year 2004 Budget Request for Nonproliferation Programs in Russia and the Former Soviet Union," Russian American Nuclear Security Advisory Council, February 11, 2003. |
| [32] | Interviews with DTRA officials, April 2002. |
| [33] | U.S. General Accounting Office, Nuclear Nonproliferation: Security of Russia's Nuclear Material Improving; Further Enhancements Needed, GAO-01-312 (Washington, D.C.: U.S. General Accounting Office, February 2001). |
| [34] | Department of Energy (DOE), FY 2002 Detailed Budget Justifications—Defense Nuclear Nonproliferation (Washington, D.C.: DOE, March 2001), p. 145. |
| [35] | DOE, FY 2003 Detailed Budget Justifications—Defense Nuclear Nonproliferation (Washington, D.C.: DOE, March 2002). |
| [36] | See U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), FY 2004 Detailed Budget Justifications—Defense Nuclear Nonproliferation (Washington, D.C.: DOE, February 2003), p. 634. Also, see Hoehn, "Observations on the President's Fiscal Year 2004 Budget Request ," op. cit. |
| [37] | DOE, FY 2004 Detailed Budget Justifications—Defense Nuclear Nonproliferation, op. cit., p. 634. Also, Hoehn, "Observations on the President's Fiscal Year 2004 Budget Request," op. cit. |
| [38] | DOE, FY 2004 Detailed Budget Justifications—Defense Nuclear Nonproliferation, op. cit., pp. 637-638. |
| [39] | For discussion, see Matthew Bunn, John P. Holdren, and Anthony Wier, Securing Nuclear Weapons and Materials: Seven Steps for Immediate Action. (Washington, D.C.: Project on Managing the Atom, Harvard University, and Nuclear Threat Initiative, May 2002). |
| [40] | Thornton, "The Nunn-Lugar Weapons Protection, Control, and Accounting Program," op. cit. |
| [41] | The security for the warhead bunkers at the U.S. Pantex warhead assembly and disassembly facility provide a good example of a low-tech, easily sustained, but highly effective measure. Each bunker has a huge multi-ton concrete block in front of its thick steel door. The machine to lift the blocks away is kept outside the security fence except when needed, and only lifts a block away when a heavily armed guard force is in place to monitor the operation. Inside the block, the steel door has two huge locks Ë one whose key is held by the site operations personnel, the other whose key is held by the site security force. (Author's observations from a visit to Pantex, 1994.) |
| [42] | Interviews with DOE, DOD, and laboratory officials, March 2002. |
Written by Matthew Bunn. Last updated by Matthew Bunn on August 24, 2002.
The Securing the Bomb section of the NTI website is produced by the Project on Managing the Atom (MTA) for NTI, and does not necessarily reflect the opinions of and has not been independently verified by NTI or its directors, officers, employees, agents. MTA welcomes comments and suggestions at atom@harvard.edu. Copyright 2007 by the President and Fellows of Harvard College.