Want to know how to prevent a nuclear attack by terrorists? It's simple. Don't let terrorists beg, borrow or steal a nuke, or the few hundred pounds of highly enriched uranium they need to make one of their own.
The United States, the United Kingdom, France, Russia and China are all signatories to the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty and all have nuclear stockpiles. If the reports of the International Atomic Energy Agency can be believed, North Korea, Iran, Iraq and more than a hundred other signatories to the treaty do not have nuclear stockpiles. Contrary to what you may have heard, Iran allows the IAEA's inspectors complete access to any and all "declared" or "suspected" nuclear facilities. Iraq allowed agency inspectors such access a year ago, and inspectors are in North Korea right now. While Pakistan, India and Israel do have nuclear stockpiles, they are not signatories to the nonproliferation treaty.
In addition to the eight countries that do have nuclear weapons, other signatories, such as Germany, are able to produce the highly enriched uranium needed to make a nuke. However, according to the IAEA, North Korea, Iran and Iraq do not have the capability to produce large quantities of the necessary uranium.
But Pakistan does have that capability, and it is not fully subject either to the agency or the nonproliferation treaty. So, if you're an Islamic terrorist and you desperately want to nuke America, where do you go to beg, borrow or steal a nuke, or a few hundred pounds of uranium? Well, for starters, how about Pakistan?
And if you're President Bush and you want to keep a terrorist from acquiring a nuke, what do you do? It's worth noting that soon after Sept. 11, U.S. experts on the safeguarding and physical security of nuclear weapons and related materials were sent to Pakistan. The Pakistanis were urged to accept and immediately install safeguards, security equipment and procedures provided by the U.S.
U.S. Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham was sent to the IAEA headquarters in Vienna with some money, a promise of much more money and a message. He briefed the agency's board of directors on the results of an intensive review of all U.S. nuclear proliferation prevention programs, and on his recent series of meetings in Moscow with Minatom Director Alexander Rumyantsev.
Presidents Putin and Bush had already declared that "urgent attention must be given to improving the physical protection and accounting of nuclear materials of all possessor States, and preventing illicit trafficking." Abraham told the agency board that agreement had been reached to not only accelerate and expand U.S.-Russian cooperation in protecting nuclear material, but also to coordinate joint efforts with other countries and with the IAEA to improve the protection of nuclear materials
During the Cold War, the U.S. and the Soviet Union provided most of the IAEA's funding and technical support. Russia has not since been able to sustain that level of support, and the agency has had to get by on a zero-growth budget. As a result, the agency estimates it needs an increase of about $40 million per year just to cover its existing responsibilities. And after completing a study on how to make its technical cooperation program with nonproliferation treaty signatories more effective in an era of terrorist threats, the agency estimates an additional need of $30 million to $50 million annually.
"In addition to the resources required for urgent international assistance," IAEA Director General Mohamed El Baradei said, "the necessary global upgrades to meet the full range of possible threats would be in the range of hundreds of millions of dollars and would have to be carried out by individual States and through bilateral and multilateral assistance."
The extra funding would simply allow the agency to play a coordinating role in delivering this assistance. Of course, when it comes to Pakistan, India and Israel – who are not now subject to the IAEA regime – it will be largely up to us and Russia to deliver this assistance. And it will be up to President Bush to make the case to Congress that all of the agency's programs be fully funded, as well as all of our cooperative programs with Russia.
Is there anything we should not do if we want to prevent terrorists from getting a nuke? Well, for one thing, we and the Russians effectively are the IAEA, so we shouldn't trash the agency. Nor should we threaten to carpet bomb Iran, Iraq and North Korea because we "suspect" that they may have "secret" undetected underground nuke development programs. The bombers will have to find some other excuse.