An important new treaty reduces the limit for deployed strategic warheads but not the number.

By Hans M. Kristensen

The White House has announced that it has reached agreement with Russia on the New START Treaty. Although some of the documents still have to be finished, a White House fact sheet describes that the treaty limits the number of warheads on deployed ballistic missiles and long-range bombers on both sides to 1,550 and the number of missiles and bombers capable of launching those warheads to no more than 700.

The long-awaited treaty is a vital symbol of progress in U.S.-Russian relations and an important additional step in the process of reducing and eventually perhaps even achieving the elimination nuclear weapons. It represents a significant arms control milestone that both countries should ratify as soon as possible so they can negotiate deeper cuts.

Yet while the treaty reduces the legal limit for deployed strategic warheads, it doesn’t actually reduce the number of warheads.  Indeed, the treaty does not require destruction of a single nuclear warhead and actually permits the United States and Russia to deploy almost the same number of strategic warheads that were permitted by the 2002 Moscow Treaty.

The major provisions of the New START Treaty are:

• 1,550 deployed strategic warheads: Warheads on deployed ICBMs and deployed SLBMs count toward this limit and each deployed heavy bomber equipped for nuclear armaments counts as one warhead toward this limit.
• A limit of 700 deployed ICBMs, deployed SLBMs, and deployed heavy bombers equipped for nuclear armaments.
• A limit of 100 non-deployed ICBM launchers (silos), SLBM launchers (tubes), and heavy bombers equipped for nuclear armaments.

These limits don’t have to be met until 2017, and will remain in effect for three years until the treaty expires in 2020 (assuming ratification occurs this year). Once it is ratified, the 2002 Moscow Treaty (SORT) falls away.

Verification Extended

The most important part of the new treaty is that it extends a verification regime at least a decade into the future. The inspections and other verification procedures in this Treaty will be simpler and less costly to implement than the old START treaty, according to the White House.

This includes on-site inspections. Each side gets a total of 18 per year, ten of which are actual warhead counts of deployed missiles and the remaining eight being “Type 2” inspections of storage and dismantlement facilities.

Exchange of missile test telemetry data has been limited partly because it is not as necessary for verification as previously; there are other means for collecting this information. Even so, the treaty includes exchange of telemetry data for five test flights each year.

The Fine Print: Limits Versus Reductions

The White House fact sheet states that the new limit of 1,550 deployed strategic warheads is 74% lower than the 6,000 warhead limit of the 1991 START Treaty, and 30% lower than the 2,200 deployed strategic warhead limit of the 2002 Moscow Treaty.

That is correct, but the limit allowed by the treaty is not the actual number of warheads that can be deployed. The reason for this paradox is a new counting rule that attributes one weapon to each bomber rather than the actual number of weapons assigned to them. This “fake” counting rule frees up a large pool of warhead spaces under the treaty limit that enable each country to deploy many more warheads than would otherwise be the case. And because there are no sub-limits for how warheads can be distributed on each of the three legs in the Triad, the “saved warheads” from the “fake” bomber count can be used to deploy more warheads on fast ballistic missiles than otherwise.

Under the New START Treaty That’s One Nuclear Bomb!

The New START Treaty counts each nuclear bomber as one nuclear weapon even though U.S. and Russian bombers are equipped to carry up to 6-20 weapons each. This display at Barksdale Air Base shows a B-52 with six Air Launched Cruise Missiles, four B-61-7 bombs, two B83 bombs, six Advanced Cruise Missiles (now retired), and eight Air Launched Cruise Missiles. Russian bombers can carry up to 16 nuclear weapons.

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The Moscow Treaty attributed real weapons numbers to bombers. The United States defined that weapons were counted as “operationally deployed” if they were “loaded on heavy bombers or stored in weapons storage areas of heavy bomber bases.” As a result, large numbers of bombs and cruise missile have been removed from U.S. bomber bases to central storage sites over the past five years, leaving only those bomber weapons that should be counted against the 2,200-warhead Moscow Treaty limit.

Since the new treaty attributes only one warhead to each bomber, it no longer matters if the weapons are on the bomber bases or not; it’s the bomber that counts not the weapons. As a result, a base with 22 nuclear tasked B-52 bombers will only count as 22 weapons even though there may be hundreds of weapons on the base.

According to U.S. officials, the United States wanted the New START Treaty to count real warhead numbers for the bombers but Russia refused to prevent on-site inspections of weapons storage bunkers at bomber bases. As a result, the 36 bombers at the Engels base near Saratov will count as only 36 weapons even though there may be hundreds of weapons at the base.

If the New START Treaty counting rule is used on today’s postures, then the United States currently only deploys some 1,650 strategic warheads, not the actual 2,100 warheads; Russia would be counted as deploying about 1,740 warheads instead of its actual 2,600 warheads. In other words, the counting rule would “hide” approximately 450 and 860 warheads, respectively, or 1,310 warheads. That’s more warheads that Britain, China, France, India, Israel, and Pakistan possess combined!

Dodging The Issue

Update March 30: Ellen Tauscher, the U.S. Under Secretary for Arms Control and International Security, was asked at a press briefing to explain the rationale behind the “fake” bomber warhead counting rule, but dodged the issue: “Well, I think what we want to do right now is talk about why this is an important treaty….” Increased transparency of bomber weapons would greatly improve the importance of the new treaty; the U.S. and Russia have more bomber warheads than the total nuclear weapon inventory of all other nuclear weapon states combined. If they have to use an arbitrary bomber warhead number because it’s too hard to verify, why chose 1? Why not 10 (as START I did) or 12, the medium loading capacity of U.S. and Russian bombers?

The paradox is that with the “fake” bomber counting rule the United States and Russia could, if they chose to do so, deploy more strategic warheads under the New START Treaty by 2017 than would have been allowed by the Moscow Treaty by 2012.

Force Structure Changes

How the new treaty and the “fake” counting rule will affect U.S. and Russian nuclear force structures depends on decisions that will be made in the near future. In the negotiations both Russia and the United States resisted significant changes to their nuclear forces structures.

Russia resisted restrictions on warheads numbers to keep some degree of parity with the United States. It achieved this by the “fake” bomber weapon count and the delivery platform limit that is higher than what Russia deploys today. Under the New START Treaty, Russia can deploy more strategic warheads on its ballistic missiles than it would have been able to under the Moscow Treaty, although it probably won’t do so due to retirement of older systems. It can continue all its current and planned force structure modernizations.

The United States resisted restrictions on its upload capability, which it achieved by the high limit on delivery platforms. The “fake” bomber count enables more weapons to be deployed on ballistic missiles and more weapons to be retained at bomber bases than would have been possible under the Moscow Treaty. The SLBM-heavy (in terms of warheads) U.S. posture “eats up” a large portion of the 1,550 warhead limit, so the U.S. Nuclear Posture Review soon to be completed will probably reduce the warhead loading on each SLBM, and possible cut about 100 missiles from the ICBM force. The incentive to limit bomber weapons further is gone with the new treaty, although it could happen for other reasons. All current and planned modernizations can continue.

Although Russia has thousands of extra weapons in storage, all its deployed missiles are thought to be loaded to near capacity. As a result, under the New START Treaty, Russia will have little upload capacity. The United States, on the other hand, has only a portion of its available warheads deployed and lots of empty spaces on its missiles. The large pool of reserve warheads available for potential upload creates a significant disparity in the two postures so it is likely that the Nuclear Posture Review will reduce the size of the reserve.

Estimated U.S. and Russian Strategic Warheads, 2017

Although the New START Treaty reduces the limit for deployed strategic warheads, a “fake” bomber weapon counting rule enables both countries to continue to deploy as many weapons as under the Moscow Treaty. A high limit for delivery vehicles protects a significant U.S. upload capacity, whereas Russia will have essentially none. Future force structure decisions might affect the exact numbers but this graph illustrates the paradox.

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Conclusions and Recommendations

The New START Treaty is an important achievement in restarting relations with Russia after the abysmal decline during the Bush administration. And extending and updating the important verification regime creates a foundation for transparency and confidence building.

The treaty will also, if ratified quickly and followed up by additional reductions, assist in strengthening the international nonproliferation regime and efforts to prevent other countries from developing nuclear weapons.

The United States and Russia must be careful not to “oversell” the treaty as creating significant reductions in nuclear arsenals and strategic delivery systems. Although the treaty reduces the limit, the achievement is undercut by a new counting rule that enables both countries to deploy as many strategic warheads as under the Moscow Treaty.

Indeed, the New START Treaty is not so much a nuclear reductions treaty as it is a verification and confidence building treaty.  It is a ballistic missile focused treaty that essentially removes strategic bombers from arms control.

The good news is that a modest treaty will hopefully be easier to ratify.

Because the treaty protects current force structures rather than reducing them, it will inevitably draw increased attention to the large inventories of non-deployed weapons that both countries retain and can continue to retain under the new treaty. Whereas the United States force structure is large enough to permit uploading of significant numbers of reserve warheads, the Russian force is too small to provide a substantial upload capacity. Even with a significant production of new missiles, it is likely that Russia’s entire Triad will drop to around 400 delivery vehicles by 2017 – fewer than the United States has today in its ICBM leg alone. That growing disparity makes it imperative that the forthcoming U.S. Nuclear Posture Review reduces the number of delivery vehicles and reserve warheads.

To that end it is amazing to hear some people complaining that the U.S. deterrent is dilapidating and that the United States doesn’t gain anything from the New START Treaty. In the words of one senior White House official, the United States came away as a “clean winner.”

Because the treaty does not force significantly deeper reductions in the number of nuclear weapons compared with the Moscow Treaty, it is important that presidents Obama and Medvedev at the signing ceremony in Prague on 8 April commit to seeking rapid ratification and achieving additional and more drastic nuclear reductions.

See also Ivan Oelrich’s blog.

This publication was made possible by a grant from Carnegie Corporation of New York and Ploughshares Fund. The statements made and views expressed are solely the responsibility of the author.

By: Alicia Godsberg

On Friday, February 5 the EastWest Institute (EWI) held a seminar at their office in New York to discuss its recently released report on the CTBT, entitled, “The Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty: New Technology, New Prospects?” Speaking at the event for the pro-CTBT ratification camp was Ambassador Robert T. Grey, Jr. (Director, Bipartisan Security Group and U.S. Representative to the Conference on Disarmament from 1998-2001) and against was Stephen Rademaker (Senior Council, BGR Government Affairs and Assistant Secretary of State from 2002-2006). The seminar also hosted many representatives of the NGO disarmament community as well as several diplomats from UN missions, including from Iran, Egypt, and South Korea.

Mr. Rademaker articulated familiar reasons for opposing U.S. ratification of the CTBT: it won’t ensure entry into force of the Treaty; the Treaty is unverifiable; the U.S. may need to test in the event the nuclear weapon stockpile becomes unreliable; there is no agreed definition of a “zero yield” nuclear test; and Russia (and possibly China) does not conform to the U.S. definition of absolutely zero yield, enabling them to benefit from such tests while the U.S. adheres to a stricter standard and (presumably) falls behind in knowledge. The fact that each of these assertions has been proven untrue does not stop these talking points from surfacing at every turn.   (more…)

Release of the Nuclear Posture Review (NPR) is delayed once again.  Originally due late last year, in part so it could inform the on-going negotiations on the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty Follow-on (START-FO), after a couple of delays it was supposed to be released today, 1 March, but last week word got out that it will be coming out yet another 2-4 weeks later.  Some reports are that the delay reflects deep divisions within the administration over the direction of the NPR.  That means that there is really only one person left whose opinion matters and that is the president.

We can only hope that President Obama makes clear that he meant what he said in Prague and elsewhere.  This NPR is crucial.  If it is incremental, if it relegates a world free of nuclear weapons to an inspiring aspiration, then we are stuck with our current nuclear standoff for another generation.  This is the time to decisively shift direction.  But we should not be paralyzed by thinking that the only movement available is a giant leap into the unknown.  We need to move decisively in the right direction, sure, but we can do that in steps. (more…)

Missile Watch
A publication of the FAS Arms Sales Monitoring Project
Vol. 3, Issue 1
February 2010
Editor: Matt Schroeder
Contributing Author: Matt Buongiorno
Graphics: Alexis Paige

Contents:

Global Overview

Afghanistan: No recent discoveries of shoulder-fired, surface-to-air missiles in insurgent arms caches
Eritrea: UN slaps arms embargo on major missile proliferator
Iraq: Fewer public reports of seized shoulder-fired missiles in Iraq, but MANPADS still a threat
Ireland: Alleged plot to shoot down a police helicopter may have involved surface-to-air missile
Myanmar: 300 shoulder-fired missiles in insurgent arsenal, claims Thai Colonel
North Korea: North Korean arms shipment included MANPADS, Thai report confirms
Peru: Igla missiles stolen from Peruvian military arsenals, claims alleged trafficker
Spain: Failed assassination attempts underscore the risks for terrorists of relying on black market missiles
United States: Congress to receive DHS report on anti-missile systems for commercial airliners in February
United States: Documents from trial of the “Prince of Marbella” reveal little about his access to shoulder-fired missiles
United States: No new international MANPADS sales since 1999
Venezuela: U.S. receives “assurances” from Russia regarding controls on shoulder-fired missiles sold to Venezuela, but questions remain

Additional News & Resources

About Missile Watch

About the Authors

 

Global Overview

 

This issue of Missile Watch features big news out of Thailand. A North Korean arms shipment seized by Thai officials in December contained “five crates of MANPADS SAM[s]”, according to an official Thai government report. The report, which was obtained by Bloomberg News in late January, appears to confirm North Korea as an illicit source of shoulder-fired, surface-to-air missiles. Depending on the origins and model of the missiles, this case could have profound implications for international efforts to curb missile trafficking. Also notable are reports of a Peruvian trafficking ring that stole at least seven Strela and Igla missiles from government arsenals and sold them to Colombian rebels, and of insurgent arsenals in Myanmar that contain 300 missiles – a stockpile comparable in size to the holdings of many small states. These reports illustrate the continued availability of illicit missiles to armed groups despite a decade-long international campaign to strengthen export controls and secure government stockpiles.

The news isn’t all bad, however. Recent reports suggest that most armed groups continue to rely – often clumsily – on older first-generation infra-red seeking missiles, which are difficult to use effectively and often malfunction, as evidenced by the Basque terrorist group ETA’s failed attempts to shoot down the Spanish Prime Minister’s plane in 2001. This is not the first failed terrorist missile attack, and it will not be the last. In 2002, for example, an al-Qaeda affiliated group in Kenya armed with two SA-7b missiles missed an Israeli airliner as it was leaving Mombasa. The more of these spectacular failures that come to light, the less demand there will be amongst armed groups for first and second generation missiles. Or at least that is the hope. In those comparatively rare cases when terrorists are able to acquire and effectively use newer missiles, modern anti-missile technology may provide an effective last line of defense, as illustrated by the recent “multiple IR engagement” thwarted by the missile defense system on a Chinook helicopter reportedly operating in Iraq.[1] Whether this last line of defense will be extended to commercial airliners will be determined, in part, by Congress’ reaction to Department of Homeland Security’s long-awaited report on its Counter-MANPADS program, which will be delivered to key congressional committees this month.

Also encouraging are recent actions taken against missile trafficking and the governments that facilitate it. The same month that the Thai government moved against missile trafficking in their country, the UN Security Council imposed an arms embargo on Eritrea, the supplier of thousands of weapons, including surface-to-air missiles, to the militant Somali group al Shebab. The embargo comes none too soon. A spokesman for the group recently threatened to come to the aid of their “Muslim brothers” in Yemen,[2] an apparent reference to the al Qaeda affiliate responsible for the failed attack on the US-bound airliner in December. Extensive involvement in Yemen’s civil war by al Shebab would be very bad for the Yemeni government and its western allies, especially if the militants bring their missiles. It remains to be seen if the embargo will motivate Eritrea to stop arming Somali militants, or at least stop arming them with sophisticated light weapons.

Country Reports

Afghanistan: No Recent Discoveries of Shoulder-fired Antiaircraft Missiles in Insurgent Arms Caches, Confirms ISAF Spokesperson

No MANPADS were found in seized insurgent arms caches in late 2009, according to the US military. A spokesperson from the International Security Assistance Force Joint Command (IJC) told the Federation of American Scientists that “[t]he ISAF Joint Command intelligence section is not aware of any man-portable surface-to-air missile finds by ISAF units since the IJC’s inception in October 2009.”[3] To date, the ISAF has largely been spared the problems associated with the widespread proliferation of surface-to-air missiles that has plagued Coalition forces operating in Iraq (see Missile Watch #3: Black Market Missiles Still Common in Iraq).

While the reasons for the difference in illicit missile activity in Iraq and Afghanistan are not entirely clear, one likely factor is availability. Shortly after the US invasion, hundreds of missiles were looted from unsecured arms depots scattered across Iraq. Much of the looting, notes Government Accountability Office in a 2007 report, “…was conducted by organized elements that were likely aided or spearheaded by Iraqi military personnel,”[4] – future members of insurgent groups. There is no comparable domestic source of missiles for the Taliban. The absence of a convenient domestic source would not preclude acquisition of shoulder-fired missiles on the international black market, however, and there is strong evidence that the Taliban has acquired missiles – namely Chinese HN-5s – from sources abroad, but their numbers appear to be limited. The extent to which these missiles have been used against ISAF aircraft is unknown. Publicly available information on insurgent activity suggests, however, that few if any of the missiles have been used successfully.

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Eritrea: UN Slaps Arms Embargoes on Major Missile Proliferator

After years of supplying weapons to Somali militants in violation of UN Security Council resolutions, the UN has slapped an arms embargo on the government of Eritrea. Resolution 1907, which was approved by a 13-1 vote in the Security Council in December,[5] imposes a ban on the international transfer of arms to and from Eritrea. It also authorized UN member states to inspect cargo crossing their territory if a violation is suspected, and to seize and dispose of any illicit weapons that are discovered.

Eritrea ranks high on the list of MANPADS proliferators. In recent years, UN investigators have documented shipments containing dozens of MANPADS from Eritrea to Somalia in violation of a long-standing UN arms embargo. In 2007, an SA-18 missile “delivered by Eritrea,” according to UN investigators,[6] was used by Somali militants to shoot down a Belarusian cargo aircraft departing from Mogadishu. The Eritrean government has denied the accusations, but additional evidence collected by investigators in recent years appears to support the earlier claims. An SA-18 Igla missile “found in Somalia” by UN investigators, for example, was later traced back to a shipment of Russian weaponry delivered to Eritrea in 1995.[7]

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Iraq: Fewer public reports of seized shoulder-fired missiles in Iraq, but MANPADS still a threat

Publicly available reports of shoulder-fired, surface-to-air missiles discovered in insurgent arms caches in Iraq dropped off precipitously in 2009, but the reason for this decline is unclear. A survey of English-language media and US military sources yielded information on only a handful of illicit MANPADS recovered from arms caches in 2009, as opposed to dozens in previous years (See Missile Watch #3: Black Market Missiles Still Common in Iraq). Given the rigor of US and Iraqi efforts to recover illicit weapons and dismantle arms trafficking networks, it is possible that terrorists and insurgents did indeed have access to fewer missiles in 2009. It is also possible, however, that seized MANPADS simply are not being reported as frequently, possibly for security reasons. When queried about the apparent decrease, a representative from Multi-National Forces-Iraq declined to comment, saying only that “[f]or operational security, we are unable to provide such details…”[8]

Regardless of the reason for the decline in reported seizures, MANPADS remain a threat in Iraq, as evidenced by a recent incident in which a Chinook military helicopter was engaged by “multiple IR MANPADS.” The attack, which was first reported by Aviation Week’s David Fulghum, was reportedly thwarted by the helicopter’s anti-missile system.[9]

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Ireland: Alleged plot to shoot down a police helicopter may have involved surface-to-air missiles

In December, the Belfast Telegraph reported that “[d]issident republicans” had obtained an unspecified surface-to-air missile and were “…planning to use it to shoot down a helicopter full of police officers…” The article provides no additional details on the missile or the alleged plot, although an unidentified “police source” suggests that the “missile” may instead be a rocket-propelled grenade: “They [the dissidents] have access to rocket-propelled grenades or other surface-to-air missile [sic] and one of their priorities is to take out a helicopter.”[10] The Irish government and the Independent Monitoring Commission declined to comment on the story, and an email to the author of the Telegraph article went unanswered.

Too little information is available to assess the accuracy of the Telegraph’s claims. Yet even if Irish dissidents have access to a missile, a successful attack is far from guaranteed. Like many terrorist and insurgents worldwide, armed groups in Ireland have a long, largely unsuccessful history of illicit activity involving shoulder-fired missiles. Repeated attempts by the IRA to acquire Stinger missiles in the United States ended in jail time for many of the would-be missile traffickers,[11] and even when the group succeeded in procuring missiles with help of the Libyan government,[12] the IRA never effectively incorporated the missiles into its campaign against the British.[13] In the late 1990s, the group reportedly supplied some of its missiles to the Basque group ETA, who also failed to use them effectively (See below: “Spain: Alleged ETA member reveals details of failed attempts to assassinate Spanish prime minister”).

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Myanmar: 300 shoulder-fired missiles in insurgent arsenal, claims Thai Colonel

A Thai military official interviewed by the International Herald Tribune in November claimed that the United Wa State Army, a Burmese insurgent group, possesses 300 “shoulder-fired anti-aircraft missiles”[14] – a stockpile that is comparable in size to those of many small states. No additional details on the missiles were provided.

According to Jane’s Information Group, the Wa’s missile holdings consist of older SA-7s acquired in the early 1990s from “Cambodian black market sources,” and more sophisticated HN-5Ns from China.[15] These reports appear to be a decade old, however, so it is possible that the composition of the Wa’s current missile stockpile is very different.

If Colonel Peeranate’s estimate is accurate and the missiles are operational, the Wa’s missile stockpile is one of the largest non-state arsenals in the world. Little is known about the security of the Wa’s weapons, but the general lack of accountability and formal controls on insurgent arms caches and the size of the stockpile raises concerns about theft, loss and diversion, and the possibility that some of the missiles will end up on the black market.

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North Korea: North Korean arms shipment included man-portable air defense systems, Thai report confirms

The Federation of American Scientists has learned that a cargo plane loaded with weapons from North Korea that was grounded in Bangkok in December contained man-portable air defense systems. According to a Thai report to the UN Security Council obtained by Bloomberg in January, the cargo contained “five crates of MANPADS SAM[s]”. The manufacturer, model and year of the MANPADS are not identified.[16] This information is required to fully assess the implications of the seizure, and to craft strategies for preventing similar shipments.

It is possible that the missiles were manufactured in North Korea, which has produced the Chinese HN-5 and the Soviet SA-14 and SA-16 under license,[17] and the Soviet SA-7 and US Stinger missile, which it reverse-engineered from missile technology acquired from Egypt in the 1970s and from the Afghan Mujahideen in the 1980s, respectively.[18] Another possibility is that the missiles were foreign-made and were transiting through, or were re-exported from, North Korea. This scenario could also have profound implications, depending on the origin and age of the missiles. Newly manufactured foreign missiles would suggest a recent government-to-government sale to North Korea – an egregious violation of the spirit if not the letter of international agreements on controlling MANPADS – or diversion from government stockpiles, which would likely be indicative of serious shortcomings in stockpile security policies and practices.

North Korea as a source of illicit MANPADS poses a significant challenge for policymakers since few if any of the diplomatic carrots and sticks used to secure MANPADS elsewhere would be effective vis-a-vis the Hermit Kingdom. Interdiction efforts associated with UN Security Council Resolution 1874 will likely make it more difficult to traffic in weaponry from North Korea, but shoulder-fired missiles are easy to smuggle, and adequately screening the contents of every plane and ship departing from North Korea would be impossible. The best that can reasonably be hoped for is that vigilance by North Korea’s neighbors and robust patrolling of international waters will limit North Korea’s arms smuggling in the near term, and that prioritization of the MANPADS proliferation threat by the six-party nations in negotiations with North Korean officials will yield a longer term solution.

The Thai report identifies Mahrabad Airport in Iran as the aircraft’s destination, although Thai officials have subsequently stated that Sri Lanka and the United Arab Emirates were also listed as stops in the flight documentation.[19] The Iranians have denied any involvement in the transfer, pointing out that they have no need for the shipment since Iran’s defense industry produces its own “modern weapons”.[20] But it is possible that the Iranians had ordered the weapons not for their own use but for their proxies in Lebanon or elsewhere. Foreign missiles would allow the Iranians to provide like-minded armed groups with much-needed air defense systems while maintaining plausible deniability regarding their role in the transfer. A similar strategy was pursued by the United States during the clandestine campaign to arm and train the Afghan Mujahideen during the Soviet occupation.[21] If the North Korean weapons were bound for Iran, they may have been intended for a similar purpose.

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Peru: Igla missiles stolen from Peruvian Military, claims alleged trafficker

A self-proclaimed “logistics specialist” for Colombian rebels reportedly obtained seven Stela and Igla surface-to-air missiles from the arsenals of the Peruvian military according to the Miami Herald and the Lima-based La Republica newspaper. Ecuadorian national Freddy Torres allegedly acquired the missiles, along with other weapons, from a trafficking ring comprised of members of the Peruvian air force, army and police.[22] Four of the missiles were purchased between May and October 2008 and the remaining three were purchased in 2009, according to Juan Tamayo of the Miami Herald. Each of the missiles was reportedly purchased for “the sum of 45,000 US dollars.”[23]

Assuming man-portable Strela and Igla missiles were indeed stolen from Peruvian arsenals and sold to Colombian rebels, this case could have significant implications. The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) has tried unsuccessfully for years to acquire missiles capable of countering the Colombian armed forces growing fleet of fixed and rotary-wing aircraft, which are critical to its counter-insurgency operations.  While a handful of Strela and Iglas will not turn the tide of the war in the FARC’s favor, the missiles could be very disruptive to Colombian air operations, at least in the short term.

Of greater consequence is the potential terrorist threat from the missiles.  In the hands of a trained operator, a well-maintained missile poses a significant threat to civilian planes, including airliners; at least 45 civilian aircraft have been shot down by man-portable air defense systems worldwide since 1975.[24] The missiles are of significant value to the FARC’s war against the Colombian government and therefore the rebels are unlikely to use the missiles against commercial airliners.  However, they could be used against high-value civilian targets such top government or military officials.  The missiles could also be stolen or sold on the black market, where they would they could be acquired by terrorists with designs on an airliner.

The missile theft is also a critical test of the region’s commitment to combating the shoulder-fired missile threat.  In 2005, the 35 members of the Organization of American States (OAS) adopted AG/RES.2145, a set of guidelines that urges member states to, inter alia, “…adopt and maintain strict national controls and security measures on Man-Portable Air Defense Systems and their essential equipment.”  These guidelines include specific, rigorous stockpile security measures, such as separate storage of missiles and launchers, 24-hour surveillance, and strict controls on access to missiles.[25] The diversion of multiple missiles over a period of months raises serious questions about the Peruvian government’s implementation of these guidelines and the security of the rest of its missile stockpile, which numbers in the hundreds, according to Jane’s Information Group.[26] A robust response to this incident would show the region and the world that the OAS and its member states take the illicit trade in terrorist technology seriously and are willing to match rhetoric with action.

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Spain: Failed assassination attempts underscore the risks for terrorists of relying on black market missiles

Intelligence obtained from an alleged member of the Basque terrorist group ETA revealed three failed attempts to shoot down the Spanish prime minister’s plane with a shoulder-fired, surface-to-air missile acquired from the Irish Republican Army in 1999. According to the Telegraph, the plots came to light after the arrest of the suspected ETA member, who reportedly told Spanish investigators that the group had tried three times in April and May 2001 to shoot down the plane but that the missile had malfunctioned each time. A letter addressed to the IRA discovered in the suspect’s home reportedly complains about defective missiles allegedly sold to ETA by IRA members based in Germany.[27] The missiles were seized from an ETA arms cache by French authorities in 2004.[28]

Media reports do not indicate whether authorities believe that the missiles used in the botched attack was indeed faulty or was used incorrectly. Contrary to popular belief, shoulder-fired missiles aren’t simply point-and-shoot weapons; they require training to use effectively, and it is not clear what training, if any, ETA members received in the operation of the missiles. Regardless of the reason for the failed attacks, this case underscores the risks for terrorists of relying on black market missiles, especially when the missiles are first generation technology that is nearing the end (or is past) its estimated shelf life and may have been tampered with or stored improperly. It is hoped that ETA’s bumbling – along with other spectacular failures like the unsuccessful missile attack on an Israeli airliner in Kenya in 2002 – will reduce black market demand for the most widely available (i.e. first generation) shoulder-fired missiles as terrorists recognize the folly of planning high-profile attacks around weapon systems that they do not fully understand and that may not function properly.

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United States: Congress to receive DHS report on anti-missile systems for commercial airliners in February

The Federation of American Scientists has learned that a long-awaited report on the feasibility of installing anti-missile systems on commercial airliners is nearly finished, and will be delivered to Congress in February. “The report is nearing the end of review; we are still expecting a February delivery to Hill staff,” a DHS spokesperson confirmed in a correspondence with the Federation of American Scientists. The report, which will be sent to the House and Senate Appropriations Committees, summarizes the results of a program launched in 2003 to assess the “…viability, economic costs and effectiveness of adapting existing technology from military to commercial aviation use.” As noted in the last issue of Missile Watch, the response from Congress to the report will be a critical indicator of whether its early enthusiasm for outfitting commercial airliners with anti-missile systems – a multi-billion dollar undertaking – has survived DHS’ lengthy evaluation process and a constant barrage of competing agenda items.

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United States: Documents from trial of the “Prince of Marbella” contain additional information on shoulder-fired missiles

Court documents recently obtained by the Federation of American Scientists provide some additional insight into the historic case of famed arms trafficker Monzer Al Kassar, but many important questions remain unanswered. In 2007, Kassar was arrested after allegedly agreeing to sell thousands of weapons, including shoulder-fired, surface-to-air missiles, to undercover informants posing as members of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC). A year later, Kassar was extradited to the United States and tried in New York, where he was convicted of, inter alia, conspiring to “acquire and export anti-aircraft missiles.”[29] The surprising arrest and conviction of Kassar brought an abrupt end to the career of one of the most prolific traffickers in recent history. According to the US government, clients of Kassar’s have included armed groups in Bosnia, Brazil, Croatia, Cyprus, Iraq, Iran, and Somalia, among others.[30]

Hundreds of court documents obtained by the Federation of American Scientists provide additional insight into the case, including Kassar’s offer to sell MANPADS to Colombian rebels. Summaries of phone conversations between Kassar and the DEA informants indicate that Kassar “…spoke about various types of surface-to-air missile systems– including SAM-7s, SAM-16s, and SAM-18s – and the systems’ respective abilities to destroy U.S. helicopters.” Previously released documents only reference the SA-7, a first generation Soviet-era missile that is easier to acquire and less capable than the SA-16 and SA-18. However, none of the documents reveal whether Kassar actually had access to the missiles, or – if he did – how many he had or where he acquired them. The Federation of American Scientists will continue to research these questions and report any additional findings in future issues of Missile Watch.

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United States: No New International MANPADS Sales since 1999, says Raytheon

A spokesperson for the US defense firm Raytheon recently told the Federation of American Scientists that the U.S. government has not entered into new deals for Stinger MANPADS with foreign clients since 1999. In an email correspondence, Raytheon official Ty Blanchard told said that “[s]ince 1999, the U.S. government has denied requests from non-NATO countries asking for Stinger MANPADS. We have not had any requests from NATO countries in the last ten years.”[31]

This record of restraint illustrates the disparity in the policies of the major arms exporting states. Even as the US has curtailed international sales of man-portable Stingers, other countries have sold advanced systems to governments with dubious stockpile security and end-use controls.[32] Failure to align the policies of exporting countries could erode nascent global standards for MANPADS exports and undo much of the progress toward eliminating the terrorist missile threat achieved to date.

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Venezuela: U.S. receives “assurances” from Russia regarding controls on shoulder-fired missiles sold to Venezuela, but key questions remain

The Federation of American Scientists has learned that US officials have received “assurances” from the Russian government regarding end-use controls on SA-24 MANPADS sold to Venezuela, but detailed information on the nature and implementation of these controls remain scant. This information is critical to determining whether the SA-24s and the “thousands” of additional missiles[33] that Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez claims to be importing are in danger of being diverted to armed groups in the region or elsewhere.

In response to a query about the sale, a State Department spokeswoman told the Federation of American Scientists that U.S. officials “…have expressed our concerns to the Russian government on the control and security of arms transferred to Venezuela” and that they have “…received assurances from the Russian government that the deal conforms with end-use controls that meet international standards.”[34] The official did not indicate whether Russia has provided the US government with a list of specific controls, or the extent to which these controls have been implemented. The Russian and Venezuelan governments have yet to respond to requests from the Federation of American Scientists for additional information.

The most prominent set of ‘international standards’ on MANPADS controls are the Elements for Export Controls of MANPADS. Under the Elements, Russia has agreed to “…satisfy itself of the recipient government’s willingness and ability to implement effective measures for secure storage, handling, transportation, use of MANPADS material, and disposal or destruction of excess stocks to prevent unauthorised access and use.”[35] A more detailed set of procedures is laid out in an annex to the OSCE’s Best Practice Guide on National Procedures for Stockpile Management and Security of MANPADS, which the Russian government helped to draft. Minimally, the Russian government should ensure that Venezuela’s stockpile security and end-use policies and practices conform to the Wassenaar Arrangement’s Elements and the OSCE’s Best Practice Guide, and the Organization of American States’ Guidelines for Control and Security of MANPADS. Given the history of diversion from Venezuela’s arsenals,[36] regular on-site inventories and inspections by Russian officials are also merited. Failure to take these steps would raise serious questions about the Russian government’s commitment to implementing key international agreements and guidelines, including guidelines it helped to draft.

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Additional News & Resources (11/ 2009- 1/2010)

• “Sarachandran jailed for 26 years for trying to aid Tamil Tigers,” National Post, 23 January 2010.
• “Helo-Protecting Advanced Sensors Hurried,” Aviation Week, 21 January 2010.
• “More Advanced SAMs Emerging in Combat Zones,” Aviation Week, 13 January 2010.
• “Missile defense: post DHS,” Avionics Intelligence, 7 January 2010.
• “R.O. CONGO: 750,000 dangerous items demolished in two years,” Mines Advisory Group, 11 December 2009.
• “Albanian Press Review – December 1,” Balkan Insight, 1 December 2009.  The article includes a brief reference to an article in the Albanian newspaper Gazeta Tema about alleged transfers of MANPADS from Albania to Hezbollah. The full article is available on Gazeta Tema’s website, but it is in Albanian.
• “Cyprus Confronts Its MANPADS Menace,” OSCE Magazine,December 2009.
• “Powder Keg – Unfettered arms flows reflect Sudan’s instability,” Jane’s Intelligence Review, December 20009.  The article includes a brief reference to the recent acquisition of SA-16 missiles by the SPLA.
• “Somali pirates seize Maran Centaurus oil tanker sailing from Saudi Arabia,” Times Online, 30 November 2009.  The article includes a brief reference to reports of pirates using shoulder-fired, surface-to-air missiles.  The report is probably in the Korea Times that the pirates had acquired Stinger missiles from al Qaeda.  Missile Watch has been unable to substantiate these claims.
• “Arrests Made in Case Involving Conspiracy to Procure Weapons, Including Anti-Aircraft Missiles,” US Department of Justice, 23 November 2009.
• “Protecting Civil Aviation from MANPADS,” Bureau of Political-Military Affairs, 23 November 2009.
• “CSTO member nations coordinate positions on SALW and MANPADS”, Asia Plus, 20 November 2009.

About the Authors

Matt Schroeder is the Manager of the Arms Sales Monitoring Project at the Federation of American Scientists. Since joining FAS in February 2002, he has written more than 80 books, articles and other publications on US arms transfers, arms export policies, and the illicit arms trade. He is a co-author of the book The Small Arms Trade (Oxford: Oneworld Publications, 2007), and a consultant for the Geneva-based Small Arms Survey.

Matt Buongiorno is currently serving as a Scoville Fellow at the Federation of American Scientists where he is working on small arms issues, U.S. nuclear policy issues, and Iranian nuclear issues. In addition to his work with FAS, Matt is staffing the 2010 National Model United Nations, a conference in New York that draws over 4,000 students and aspiring diplomats. He earned a B.A. in economics and political science from Texas Christian University in 2009.

About Missile Watch

Missile Watch is a quarterly publication by the Arms Sales Monitoring Project at the Federation of American Scientists that tracks the illicit proliferation and use of man-portable air defense systems (MANPADS), and international efforts to combat the terrorist threat from shoulder-fired missiles.

To sign up for Missile Watch, go to /press/subscribe.html.

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[1]David Fulghum, “Laser Saves Helo in Multi-SAM Ambush,” Aviationweek.com, 7 January 2010.

[2]“Yemen slams Shebab pledge to send fighters,” AFP, 2 January 2010.

[3]Correspondence with Major Steve Cole, spokesman for the IJC, 5 January 2010.

[4]DOD Should Apply Lessons Learned Concerning the Need for Security over Conventional Munitions Storage Sites to Future Operations Planning, Government Accountability Office, March 2007, p. 7.

[5]Colum Lynch, “U.N. Security Council orders arms embargo on Eritrea,” The Washington Post, 24 December 2009.

[6]Report of the Monitoring Group on Somalia, S/2007/436, 18 July 2007, p. 15.

[7]Report of the Monitoring Group on Somalia, S/2008/274, 24 April 2008, p. 24-25.

[8]Correspondence with MNF-Iraq, 19 November 2009. FOIA requests for similar information have also been denied. In January, US Central Command denied the release of six documents responsive to a Freedom of Information Act request filed by the FAS for information on “man-portable air defense systems collected or seized by Iraqi Security Forces or Coalition forces from 1 January 2007 to 1 June 2008.”

[9]David Fulghum, “Laser Saves Helo in Multi-SAM Ambush,” Aviationweek.com, 7 January 2010. While US Army officials did not identify the location of the attack, “…other military sources indicate it was in Iraq,” according to Fulghum.

[10]Deborah McAleese, “New Dissident Target…a Police Helicopter; Plan to Blast Lightly-armoured PSNI Chopper out of the Sky,” Belfast Telegraph, 2 December 2009.

[11]See Schroeder, Stohl and Smith, The Small Arms Trade (Oneworld Publications, 2007), p. 98-103.

[12]Smuggling efforts involving Libya were more fruitful. In the 1970s and 80s, the group acquired several MANPADS as part of a series of weapons shipments allegedly arranged by the Libyan government. But even these shipments were vulnerable to interdiction. The Eskund, for example, which reportedly contained 150 tons of weaponry, including 20 SA-7 missiles, was seized by French authorities in 1987.

[13]See Ian Bruce, “Why They’re Never Short of a Gun,” The Herald (Glasgow), 26 January 1998.

[14]“A Rebel Stronghold in Myanmar on Alert,” International Herald Tribune, 6 November 2009.

[15]“United Wa State Army (UWSA),” Jane’s World Insurgency and Terrorism, updated 11 November 2009 and Anthony Davis, “Myanmar heat turned up with SAMS from China,” Jane’s Defense Weekly, 28 March 2001.

[16]Some media reports identified the missiles as Chinese HN-5s, but these claims have not been corroborated.

[17]O’Halloran and Foss, Jane’s Land-based Air Defense 2008-2009 (Cambridge University Press, 2008), p. 22.

[18]O’Halloran and Foss, p. 22 and Schroeder, Stohl, Smith, The Small Arms Trade, p. 88.

[19]Daniel Ten Kate, “Thailand Urges UN Action on N. Korean Arms Cache as Cost Rises,” Bloomberg, 3 February 2010.

[20]“Seized Weapons Plane in Thailand not Heading for Iran: Official,” Tehran Times, 3 February 2010.

[21]The Central Intelligence Agency purchased weapons, including MANPADS, from Eastern European countries and China, refraining from sending more effective US Stinger missile until the final years of the campaign.

[22]Juan Tamayo, “Farc Rebels’ Missile Purchase Raises Concerns,” Miami Herald, 16 February 2010 and “Stolen Peruvian Arms Sold to Colombian Rebels,” EFE, 13 January 2010.

[23]Tamayo, “FARC Rebels’ Missile Purchase Raises Concerns”

[24]US Government data provided to the Federation of American Scientists, January 2010.

[25]Denying MANPADS to Terrorists: Control and Security of MAN-Portable Air Defense Systems, Adopted 7 June 2005, available at /asmp/campaigns/MANPADS/2005/OASmanpads.pdf.

[26]See “Peru,” Jane’s World Armies, posted 8 January 2010.

[27]Fiona Govan, “Spanish PM saved from assassination by faulty IRA missile,” Telegraph, 18 January 2010.

[28]“French police find anti-aircraft missiles in ETA cache,” Associated Press Worldstream, 5 October 2004.

[29]“International Arms Trafficker Monzer al Kassar and Associate Sentenced on Terrorism Charges,” US Attorney’s Office, Southern District of New York, 24 February 2009.

[30]United States of America –v. – Mozer Al Kassar, a/k/a “Abu Munawar,” a/k/a “El Taous,” Tareq Mousa al Gahzi, and Luis Felipe Moreno Godoy, June 2007, p. 1.

[31]Correspondence with Ty Blanchard, Raytheon’s business development manager for army advanced programmes, 2 February 2010.

[32]See, for example, Andrei Chang, “China ships more advanced weapons to Sudan,” UPI Asia, 28 March 2008.

[33]“Chavez: Venezuela acquires thousands of missiles,” Associated Press, 7 December 2009. According to the Associated Press, Chavez claimed in early December 2009 that “[t]housands of missiles…”and rocket launchers, reportedly Russian-made, “…are arriving” in Venezuela, although he did not identify the type of missiles and rockets.

[34]Correspondence with State Department officials, 12 January 2010. The full response from the State Department reads as follows: “Russia is a major supplier of arms to Venezuela. We have expressed our concerns to the Russian government on the control and security of arms transferred to Venezuela. We have received assurances from the Government of Russia that the deal conforms with end-use controls that meet international standards. Particularly given reports of Venezuelan-origin [weapons] surfacing in neighboring countries, we urge the Government of Venezuela to implement strict controls to prevent the diversion of arms and ammunition.”

[35]These measures include monthly physical inventories of all imported missiles and launchers, storage of missiles and launchers in separate locations, continuous (24-hour) surveillance, and limiting storage site access to two people with proper security clearances, among others.

[36]For a partial list of recent reports, see footnote 5 in “Securing Venezuela’s Arsenals,” FAS Strategic Security Blog, 24 August 2009.

Transparency is essential for effective congressional and public oversight of arms exports. Without complete and accurate data on the quantity, type and recipients of exported defense articles and services, it is impossible to assess the extent to which arms transfers further national security and foreign policy.

Download Full Brief

The government’s much anticipated Nuclear Posture Review, originally scheduled for release in the late fall, then last month, then early February is now due out the first of March.  The report is, no doubt, coalescing into final form and a few recent newspaper articles, in particular articles in Boston Globe and Los Angeles Times, have hinted at what it will contain.

Before discussing the possible content of the review, does yet another release date delay mean anything?  I take the delay of the release as the only good sign that I have seen coming out of the process.  Reading the news, going to meetings where government officials involved in the process give periodic updates, and knowing something of the main players who are actually writing the review, what jumps out most vividly to me is that no one seems to share President Obama’s vision.  And I mean the word vision to have all the implied definition it can carry.  The people in charge may say some of the right words, but I have not yet discerned any sense of the emotional investment that should be part of a vision for transforming the world’s nuclear security environment, of how to make the world different, of how to escape old thinking.  As I understand the president, his vision is truly transformative.  That is why he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.  His appointees who are developing the Nuclear Posture Review, at least the ones I know anything about, are incredibly smart and knowledgeable, but they are also careful, cautious, and, I suspect, incrementalists who might understand intellectually what the president is saying but don’t feel it (and, in many cases, fundamentally don’t really agree with it).  A transformative vision not driven by passion will die.  As far as I can see (and, I admit, I am not the least bit connected so perhaps I simply cannot see very far) the only person in the administration working on the review who really feels the president’s vision is the president.  Much of what I hear from appointees in the administration has, to me at least, the feel of “what the president really means is…”   If the cause of the delay is that yet more time is needed to find compromise among centers of power, reform is in trouble because we will see a nuclear posture statement that is what it is today neatened up around the edges.  But if the delay is because the president is not getting the visionary document he demands, delay might be the only hopeful sign we are getting.

Now, onto the possible content of the review:  The main question to be addressed by the review is what the nuclear doctrine and policy of the United States ought to be.  This has sparked a secondary debate about just how specific any declaration of policy should be and the value of declaratory policy at all.

Some hints coming out of the administration suggest that the new review may explicitly state that the sole purpose of nuclear weapons be specifically limited to countering enemy nuclear weapons, what we and others have called a “minimal deterrence” doctrine.  Currently, the United States claims that chemical and biological weapons may merit nuclear attack and that could go away with the current review.

Most reports leaking out from the review participants hint that the NPR almost certainly will not include a declaration that the United States will not be the first to use nuclear weapons.  The current U.S. policy is to intentionally maintain ambiguity about how and when we might use nuclear weapons, to keep the bad guys guessing.  The new review could keep that basic idea and still be a little less ambiguous around the edges.

Some question the value of having a declaratory policy at all.  For example, if a no-first-use policy can be reversed by a phone call from the president, what does it actually mean?   As Jeffrey Lewis argues, if having a declared policy causes an intense drilling down into what-ifs, it can increase suspicion and do actual harm.  (Although the example Lewis offers raises questions about whether China should have a no-first-use policy and is not particularly relevant to whether the U.S. should.)

A bigger problem with any declaratory policy is figuring out what it actually means.  Do we agree on what “no first use” means?  I think it means that we will not be the first to explode a nuclear weapon.  But, for example, in a recent article in Foreign Affairs, Lieber and Press argue that the United States could be justified in using nuclear weapons if an adversary first “introduced” nuclear weapons into a conflict, where “introduce” might be to explode one, but might also include putting them on higher alert, moving them, or simply implying their relevance to the contest.  So a nuclear war-planner and I could agree on a no-first-use policy and have differing, almost opposite, views of what that meant.

But if statements of doctrine don’t mean anything, then why the big deal?  Why would the nuclear establishment invest any political capital fighting for or against them?  While it is true that doctrinal statements are always taken with a huge grain of salt by other nations (just as the United States applies a steep discount to statements coming from others), they do make a difference in the domestic debate.  In the previous administration, the Department of Energy went to the Congress with a request to build a new facility to build the plutonium cores or “pits” for 250 new nuclear warheads every year.  This made no sense whatsoever;  it was completely out of synch with our own plans for future nuclear forces and Congress voted it down because the DOE was not remotely able to justify its request.  The DOE proposal went down to 125, then 80, and some current variations on the basic proposal are for a dozen or so, which actually makes some sense.

So doctrine and declaratory policy are important in very concrete ways when they can affect force structure decisions, including the numbers and types of weapons we have, their capabilities, and how they are deployed.  Moreover, these are the sorts of changes that other nations will see and pay attention to.

The uncertainty of the link between words and weapons is what causes wariness on every side of the debate.   Foreign governments might not believe our declarations but such declarations might form the basis for changes in the U.S. nuclear force structure, with all the implications for budgets and personnel, weapons, bases, and jobs back home.  That is why the nuclear establishment is resisting.  On the other hand, those who desire fundamental and profound change could be completely hoodwinked by nice sounding words that allow the status quo to coast ahead on its own momentum.

The danger I see is that, if discussion is so tightly focused on what we say, then too little attention will be given to what we do.  If we take our declarations seriously, they should have profound effects on the nuclear posture but I can imagine big changes in the review with little real physical change actually resulting.  For example, if we take seriously a no-first-use policy, our deployment of forces could be radically different.  Reentry vehicles could be stored separated from their missiles, missiles in silos could be made visibly unable to launch quickly, for example, by piling boulders over the silo doors.  Much of the ambiguity in any verbal statement of doctrine is squeezed out when we discuss the concrete questions of what the forces look like.  The nuclear war-planner and I might have effectively opposite definitions of “no first use” but we would agree entirely on what it means to piles boulders on our ICBM silo doors.

What I would hope to see come out of the NPR is not simply a statement of no first use but a plan for, for example, taking our nuclear weapons off alert.  We will certainly hear that nuclear weapons are for deterrence, perhaps that they are only for deterrence.  But that has become utterly meaningless because the definition of deterrence has been warped to the point that it can now be defined as whatever it is that nuclear weapons do.  Indeed, nuclear weapons are often simply called our “deterrent.”  Michele Flournoy, the current Undersecretary of Defense in charge of the NPR process, wrote a report while at CSIS describing how U.S. nuclear weapons should be able, among other things, to execute a disarming first strike against central Soviet nuclear forces, the better to “deter.”  When a word has that much flexibility, I don’t care whether it gets included in the posture statement or not but I do care whether we mount our nuclear weapons on fast flying ballistic missiles or on slow, air-breathing cruise missiles.

If we take seriously some of the statements that might come out of the review, then we can start to imagine radically different force structures.  For example, if the requirement for nuclear preemption is removed and the number of nuclear targets is substantially reduced, then new ways to base nuclear weapons become feasible.  We could, for example, store missiles in tunnels dug deep inside a mountain where the missiles would be both invulnerable and impossible to launch quickly.  We could invite a Russian to live in a Winebago on top of the mountain to confirm to his own nuclear commanders that we were not preparing our missiles for launch.

These are things the world can see.  Indeed, if we have no interest in a first strike capability, we have every incentive to invite the world to come in and see for themselves.  These are the types of changes that need to occur in the U.S. nuclear force structure and, if they do, debate about the words in the review is less important.

Transparency is essential for effective congressional and public oversight of the arms trade, and the US government is widely (and rightly) praised for its reporting on arms exports. Yet there is also significant room for improvement. Reporting on US arms exports and international arms transfers funded or authorized by the US government is often incomplete, unclear and hampered by overly aggregated data. The Obama Administration is clearly committed to improving transparency in government. Whether this commitment will translate into meaningful improvements in data on the arms trade remains to be seen. The latest FAS issue brief provides eight recommendations for improving transparency in US arms transfers. Implementing these recommendations would correct many of the problems with current reporting practices.

Click here to download the issue brief.

by: Alicia Godsberg

The First Committee of this year’s 64^th United Nations General Assembly (GA) just wrapped up a month of meetings.  The GA breaks up its work into six main committees, and the First Committee deals with disarmament and international security issues.  During the month-long meetings, member states give general statements, debate on such issues as nuclear and conventional weapons, and submit draft resolutions that are then voted on at the end of the session.  Comparing the statements and positions of the U.S. on certain votes from one year to the next can help gauge how an administration relates to the broader international community and multilateralism in general.  Similarly, comparing how other member states talk about the U.S. and its policies can give insight into how likely states may be to support a given administration’s international priorities.

The Obama administration will certainly be looking in the near future for support on some of its new international priorities – the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) Review Conference is happening in May, 2010 and the U.S. delegation will likely seek to promote certain non-proliferation measures, such as universal acceptance of the Additional Protocol and the creation of a nuclear fuel bank.[i] However, many states see these and other proposed non-proliferation measures as further restrictions on their NPT rights while the U.S. and the other NPT nuclear weapon states parties (NWS) continue to avoid adequate progress in implementing their nuclear disarmament obligation.  At the same time, other states with nuclear weapons continue to develop them (and the fissile material needed for them) with no regulation at all.  The United Nations (UN) is the court of world public opinion, a place where all member states have a voice.  If President Obama expects to win support for his non-proliferation agenda next May, he needs to win the GA’s support by showing that the U.S. is ready to engage multilaterally again and take seriously its past commitments and the concerns of other states.

While the U.S. continued to vote “no” on certain nuclear disarmament resolutions[ii], there were some noteworthy changes in the position of the new U.S. administration during this year’s voting.  One major shift away from the Bush administration’s voting through last year was a change to a “yes” vote on a resolution entitled, “Renewed determination towards the total elimination of nuclear weapons.”  In fact, the U.S. also became a co-sponsor of this resolution.  The change in the U.S. position on the CTBT was likely an important factor in this reversal, as the resolution “urges” states to ratify the Treaty, something Bush opposed but the Obama administration strongly supports.  Similarly, the U.S. voted “yes” on the resolution entitled, “Comprehensive Nuclear Test-Ban Treaty,” and for the first time all five permanent members of the Security Council joined this resolution as co-sponsors.

The change in the U.S. position on the CTBT was welcomed by many delegations on the floor.  Indonesia stated it would move to ratify the Treaty once the U.S. ratifies, and China has hinted at a similar position.  Non-nuclear weapon states have found the past U.S. position – that no new states should have nuclear weapons programs while the U.S. continues its own without any legal restrictions on the right to test nuclear weapons – to be hypocritical.  Add to this that the U.S. and other NWS have promised to work for the entry into force of the CTBT in the final documents of the 1995 and 2000 NPT Review Conferences, even using this promise as a way to get the indefinite extension of the NPT in 1995, and it may be that the CTBT is the sine qua non for the future of the NPT regime.

The U.S. delegation gave some strong signals that the Obama administration may be planning on decreasing the operational readiness of U.S. nuclear weapons (so-called “de-alerting”) in the upcoming Nuclear Posture Review (NPR).  This speculation comes from remarks on the floor, when the sponsors of a resolution that had been tabled for the past two years entitled, “Decreasing the operational readiness of nuclear weapon systems” stated they would not be tabling the resolution this year.[iii] The sponsors stated  that they would not be tabling the resolution because nuclear posture reviews were underway in a few countries and they hoped leaving the issue of operational readiness off the floor would, “facilitate inclusion of disarmament-compatible provisions in these upcoming reviews and help maintain a positive atmosphere for the NPT Review Conference.”  Apparently the U.S. delegation pushed to leave this resolution off the floor, not wanting to vote against it again while the NPR was underway.   Many took these political dealings as a sign that the Obama administration was pushing at home for a review of the operational readiness of the U.S. nuclear arsenal.  Decreasing the operational readiness of U.S. nuclear forces would be a welcome change in the U.S. nuclear posture, adding time for decision-making and deliberation during a potential nuclear crisis.  Such a change would also send an unambiguous signal to the international community that the U.S. was taking its nuclear disarmament obligation seriously, the perception of which is necessary for cooperation on non-proliferation goals in 2010 and beyond.

Another long-standing U.S. position apparently under review by the Obama administration relates to outer space activities.  The Bush administration spoke of achieving “total space dominance” and the U.S. has been against the multilateral development of a legal regime on outer space security for 30 years.  U.S. Ambassador to the CD Garold N. Larson spoke during the First Committee’s thematic debate on space issues, saying that the administration is now in the process of assessing U.S. space policy, programs, and options for international cooperation in space as part of a comprehensive review of space policy.  The U.S. delegation changed its vote on the resolution, “Prevention of an arms race in outer space” from a “no” last year to an abstention this year, and did not participate in a vote on a resolution entitled, “Transparency and confidence-building measures in outer space” due to the current review of space policy.  The U.S. message on outer space issues seemed to be that here too the new administration was looking to engage multilaterally instead of pursuing a unilateral agenda.

Under Secretary of State Ellen Tauscher mentioned another change in U.S. policy in her remarks to the First Committee – the support for the negotiation of an effectively verifiable fissile material cutoff treaty (FMCT)[iv].  Previously, the Bush administration had removed U.S. support for negotiating an FMCT with verification protocols, stating that such a Treaty would be impossible to verify.  Without verification measures, which were part of the original Shannon Mandate[v] for the negotiation of an FMCT, many non-nuclear weapon states saw little value in negotiating the Treaty.  Further, because verification was part of the original package for negotiation, the Bush administration’s change was seen as dismissive of the multilateral process and a further example of U.S. unilateral action without regard for the concerns of other countries or the value of multilateral processes.  With the U.S. delegation stating that it supported negotiating an effectively verifiable FMCT as called for under the original mandate, the Obama administration again showed a marked change from its predecessor and a willingness to engage in multilateralism.

What does all this mean?  President Obama stood before the world in Prague and pledged that the U.S. would work toward achieving a world free of nuclear weapons and has brought the issue of nuclear disarmament back to the forefront of international politics.  President Obama recognizes that the U.S. cannot work toward this vision alone – we have security commitments to allies that need to be addressed as the U.S. makes changes to its strategic posture and policy, there are other nuclear armed countries that need to have the same goal and work toward it in a safe and verifiable manner, and there is the danger of nuclear terrorism and unsecured fissile material that needs to be addressed by the entire global community.  In other words, the new administration recognizes the value in collective action to solve global problems, and at the 64^th annual meeting of the UN General Assembly this year, the U.S. began putting some specific meaning behind President Obama’s general statements.  With a pledge to work toward ratifying the CTBT at home and to work for other ratifications necessary for the Treaty’s entry into force, a renewed commitment to negotiating an effectively verifiable FMCT, and changes in long standing positions on outer space security and likely also on operational readiness of nuclear weapons, the Obama administration has shown the U.S. is back as a willing partner to the institutions of multilateral diplomacy.  More than anything, this change – if it turns out to be genuine – will help advance President Obama’s non-proliferation goals at the upcoming NPT Review Conference.  Of course the U.S. has internal battles to overcome, such as Senate ratification of the CTBT, but if promise and policy reviews are met with actions that can easily be interpreted by the rest of the world as genuine nuclear disarmament measures, President Obama has a greater chance to achieve an atmosphere of cooperation on U.S. non-proliferation goals at the upcoming NPT Review Conference in May, 2010.

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[i] President Obama’s non-proliferation agenda was presented on May 5, 2009 to the United Nations by Rose Gottemoeller (Assistant Secretary, Bureau of Verification, Compliance, and Implementation) at the Third Session of the Preparatory Committee for the 2010 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty Review Conference. http://www.state.gov/t/vci/rls/122672.htm

[ii] A few of the nuclear disarmament-related resolutions the US voted “no” on were: Towards a nuclear weapon free world: accelerating the implementation of nuclear disarmament commitments; Nuclear disarmament; and Follow-up to nuclear disarmament obligations agreed to at the 1995 and 200 Review Conferences of the Parties to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons.

[iii] The US had voted “no” on this resolution the past two years, joined only by France and the UK.

[iv] Ellen Tauscher mentioned that the US “looks forward to the start of negotiations on a Fissile Material Cutoff Treaty” without further elaboration.  President Obama, unlike President Bush, has made clear that his administration supports an effectively verifiable FMCT.  For examples of this new policy direction, see: http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/us-eu-joint-declaration-and-annexes; http://geneva.usmission.gov/2009/06/04/gottemoeller/; and http://www.state.gov/t/vci/rls/127958.htm

[v] Historical background on FMCT negotiations: http://www.reachingcriticalwill.org/legal/fmct.html

by Matt Schroeder

Photos of firearms seized from criminals in Colombia are poignant reminders of the importance of strong controls on government arsenals.

The photos, which were provided to the FAS’ Arms Sales Monitoring Project by the Colombian National Police, are of firearms reportedly seized in the department of Narino from a paramilitary group called the Organizacion Nueva Generacion (New Generation Organization). The weapons include an H&K G3 assault rifle apparently diverted from the “Guardia Republicana de Peru” (Republican Guard of Peru), an Argentine-manufactured FN rifle, an Israeli Military Industries (IMI) Galil rifle bearing the initials “P.N.C” (Policia National de Colombia) and an FN FAL rifle stamped “Fuerzas Navales de Venezuela.” The only weapon that does not bear markings of a government agency is an old Interdynamic KG-99 sub-machine gun.

The document from which the photos were taken provides no additional information the source of firearms or how and when they entered the black market. Most of the weapons appear to be quite old and in poor condition. Nonetheless, they do underscore the risk of diversion from government arsenals and the need for robust stockpile security.

Photos:
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Missile Watch

A publication of the FAS Arms Sales Monitoring Project

Vol. 2, Issue 2

October 2009

Written by Matt Schroeder and Scoville Fellow Matt Buongiorno

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By Matt Schroeder

Documents provided to the Federation of American Scientists by the US Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York provide additional details about the case against alleged arms trafficker Viktor Bout, but many important questions remain (publicly) unanswered. Below is a brief summary of these documents and their significance.

Background

Viktor Bout and an alleged associate, Andrew Smulian, were arrested in Thailand in March 2008 after an elaborate international sting operation organized by the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA).   Bout and Smulian have been accused of, among other offenses, conspiring to sell thousands of weapons to three “confidential sources” (CS) working with the DEA who were posing as representatives of the FARC, a Colombian terrorist group.  Since his arrest, Bout has been the subject of an international legal tug-of-war between Washington, which is seeking his extradition to the US, and Moscow, which is demanding that he be returned to Russia.  In August, Thai courts denied US extradition requests. Prosecutors appealed the ruling and are currently awaiting a decision on the appeal.

The Documents

The documents obtained by the FAS include copies of several pieces of evidence in the case, some of which were reportedly seized from Bout at the time of his arrest.  These documents include:

(1)   A print-out of an email that Bout allegedly sent to one of the DEA’s confidential sources. This email is mentioned prominently in other court documents made public shortly after Bout was arrested.  Oddly, the email was reportedly sent from an address linked to an account set up by a “Victor But.”   Use of an alias so close to his own name when setting up an email account intended for negotiating arms transfers seems uncharacteristically careless for Bout.

(2)   Excerpts from pamphlets on Soviet-era cargo planes that Bout allegedly recommended for delivering weapons to the FARC. According to investigators, the weapons were to be air-dropped from these planes.  The same delivery method was used by the orchestrators of a 1999 plot to divert to the FARC 50,000 Jordanian assault rifles intended for the Peruvian military.  The traffickers managed to drop 10,000 of the rifles into FARC-controlled areas of Colombia before the government of Jordan learned of the scheme and canceled the deal. In their book, Merchant of Death, Doug Farah and Stephen Braun suggest that Bout was linked to the diversion.  They claim that the plane used to deliver the rifles “…belong[ed] to one of Bout’s front companies…”

(3)  One of several articles on the FARC that describes their criminal activities.

(4) A map of South America that Bout reportedly used in discussions about the locations of American radar stations.

 

(5) Handwritten notes that Bout reportedly took during the meeting in Thailand. The notes include short-hand references to various weapons, including “AA” or anti-aircraft (believed to be a reference to Igla missiles), “AK-47,” “UAV” (unmanned aerial vehicle), 10,000,000 “7,62 x 54” (ammunition used in Russian Dragunov sniper rifles and PKM machine guns), RPG-7 and RPG-22 rocket launchers, and “AG-17” – presumably a reference to the AGS-17 30 mm automatic grenade launcher.  Some of the notes are more cryptic, including references to 500 “60 mm”, 200 “82 mm” and 40 “120 mm.”  Presumably, these are references to mortars since 60mm, 82mm and 120mm are all common calibers for mortar bombs.

(6) Technical documents on anti-tank missiles that Bout allegedly offered to sell to the FARC. The documents were reportedly taken from a memory stick provided to the DEA during the sting.  It appears that missile on offer was the AT-4 Spigot, a wire-guided Russian missile system that has a maximum range of 2000-2500 meters and can penetrate up to 400-460 mm of armor, depending on the type of missile used.

Other documents received by the FAS include affidavits from key players, the complaint and the indictment, most of which have been thoroughly dissected by the media.

Absent from the documents is a description of the 100 Igla missiles that Andrew Smulian reportedly claimed were immediately available to Bout.  Exhibit 6 of the Rebuttal Affidavit Concerning Request for Extradition reportedly contains “…photographs and specifications for anti-aircraft missiles…” but this material was not provided to the FAS.  The material on the anti-aircraft missiles would be useful in determining which of the three Russian missiles typically referred to as “Iglas” were allegedly accessible to Bout:  the SA-16, SA-18 or SA-24.  The first two models date back to the early 1980s and, while dangerous in the wrong hands, appear to be are less capable than the newer SA-24.  The SA-24 is also less widely available, meaning that it would presumably be easier to identify the point of diversion and the origin of black market SA-24s than SA-16s or SA-18s, both of which have proliferated widely.

While the documents contain some important details and add texture to the unfolding drama in Bangkok, they shed little additional light on several key questions, including whether Bout and Smulian actually had access to the weapons that they allegedly promised to deliver to the FARC.  This question is particularly important in regards to the 100 shoulder-fired, surface-to-air missiles, which, as explained in an earlier posting on the Strategic Security Blog, have been the focus of an international control campaign for nearly seven years because of the threat they pose to military and commercial aircraft.  Confirmation that Bout had access to the missiles would suggest the need for renewed vigor in the global fight against shoulder-fired missile proliferation.  Also unaddressed is the veracity of Smulian’s alleged claims that the weapons were located in Bulgaria, which was also reportedly identified by arms dealer Monzer al Kassar as his source of weapons during a similar sting in 2007.  According to Kassar’s indictment, he invited a DEA informant to “travel to Bulgaria and Romania where the weapons [on offer] were being manufactured”.  Investigating these claims is important because, if entities in Bulgaria are indeed offering to sell Igla missiles and the other weapons to arms traffickers, immediate action should be taken to identify them and shut down their operations.

Below is a list of some of the documents obtained by the FAS:

(1) Bout Complaint

(2) Bout Indictment

(3) Bout Rebuttal Affidavit in Support of Extradition 02.17.2009 – EX 1 (email allegedly from Bout)

(4) Bout Rebuttal Affidavit in Support of Extradition 02.17.2009 – EX 2 (plane Brochures)

(5) Bout Rebuttal Affidavit in Support of Extradition 02.17.2009 – EX 3 (article on FARC)

(6) Bout Rebuttal Affidavit in Support of Extradition 02.17.2009 – EX 4 (map of South America)

(7) Bout Rebuttal Affidavit in Support of Extradition 02.17.2009 – EX 5 (hand-written notes)

(8) Bout Rebuttal Affidavit in Support of Extradition 02.17.2009 – EX 6 (AT-4 Spigot description)

(9) Bout Affidavit in Support of Extradition 04.28.2008 – EX 1 (indictment)

(10) Bout Affidavit in Support of Extradition 04.28.2008 – EX A (photo of Bout)

by: Alicia Godsberg

This past Thursday and Friday marked the 6^th bi-annual Article XIV Conference, the Conference on Facilitating the Entry Into Force of the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty (CTBT).  This year’s conference was held at the United Nations in New York and was met with a measure of cautious optimism – most states voiced their appreciation of President Obama’s pledge to work toward US ratification of the CTBT, while many states recognized the challenges of obtaining all the necessary ratifications for entry into force of the Treaty and mentioned the challenges to the nonproliferation regime stemming from the lack of the Treaty’s entry into force (despite former commitments to do so) and from the DPRK’s 2006 and 2009 nuclear tests.

Entry into force of the CTBT has been on the international agenda for thirteen years. Because the US, China, UK, France, and Russian Federation have all imposed a voluntary moratorium on national nuclear testing, many question the need for entry into force of the CTBT.  Although the Treaty would bring few new tangible benefits, the political impact of entry into force would be tremendous.  As explained below, the vast majority of sates see entry into force of the CTBT as somewhat of a litmus test for the future viability of the nonproliferation regime.

The CTBT was opened up for signature in 1996 and since then the Treaty has obtained 181 signatories and 150 ratifications.  In order for the Treaty to enter into force, 44 states mentioned in annex II of the Treaty must ratify.  As of today, only 35 of these states have ratified the Treaty, leaving the full implementation of the Treaty in the hands of the remaining nine states.[i] The Treaty has an extensive verification system that is continuing to be built and includes 321 monitoring stations and 16 laboratories in 89 countries that make up an International Monitoring System (IMS).  This system is now approximately 85% operational and since 2000 has been transmitting data to an International Data Center (IDC) to be interpreted and shared with all signatories to the Treaty.  The IMS provides valuable data for civilian applications, such as advance tsunami warnings, but the main focus of the IMS is detection and attribution of nuclear test explosions.  The system was proven effective even without the CTBT entering into force after collecting and interpreting data from both of the recent DPRK nuclear tests.  However, the option of imposing intrusive on-site inspections is necessary for an extra layer of investigation into the attribution of nuclear explosions.  According to the terms of the CTBT this option cannot be exercised before the Treaty enters into force, and is one main reason for the need to obtain the remaining nine “annex II” state ratifications.

Entry into force of the CTBT is also important, as many states reiterated at this latest conference, because the early entry into force of the CTBT was one of the conditions under which the non-nuclear weapon states parties (NNWS) to the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) agreed to indefinitely extend the NPT in 1995.  Similarly, at the 2000 NPT Review Conference, early entry into force of the CTBT was the first of 13 Practical Steps toward nuclear disarmament that was adopted by consensus by all states parties to the NPT that year.  Nuclear weapon states parties to the NPT (NWS) have all signed the CTBT, but China and the US have not ratified the Treaty.  President Obama has pledged to work toward US ratification, but it seems he is going to have to fight to get the 67 votes he needs in the Senate to do so.  Indonesia, also an annex II state, recently publicly stated that once the US ratifies the CTBT they will follow with ratification, and it is likely that China will follow US ratification as well.  Ratification of the CTBT by the last two NWS before the NPT Review Conference in May 2010 would be an important first step toward fulfilling NWS’s political commitments and legal obligations to NNWS.  US and China’s ratifications of the CTBT could set the tone for cooperation on President Obama’s nonproliferation agenda and perhaps even on the sensitive topic of the control of the nuclear fuel cycle at the upcoming NPT Review Conference in May.

If you go here and read a random selection of statements from the Article XIV Conference, you will find that most states are looking to the US to fulfill its past promises and to take up the leadership position on nuclear nonproliferation and disarmament, about which President Obama speaks so eloquently.  Yet, with all the positive reasons for states to ratify the CTBT, there still remain some important international and domestic stumbling blocks.  Because countries like the DPRK and Iran are on the list of annex II states, many in the US and around the world believe that the Treaty will never enter into force.  These voices in the US use such countries as one excuse not to support US ratification of the Treaty.  While US ratification is not sufficient for the Treaty to enter into force it is necessary, and US ratification is likely to be followed by the ratification of at least some other annex II states as well.  In addition, the international community would certainly see US ratification of the CTBT as a positive step toward a world free of nuclear weapons and toward fulfilling the nuclear disarmament obligation under Article VI of the NPT.

Policy makers in Washington don’t seem to make the connection between keeping political commitments/upholding international treaty obligations and getting support from the global community for US nonproliferation objectives.  This point is never lost at the UN on the vast majority of states (meaning all but the five permanent members of the Security Council).  In speech after speech, in forum after forum, NNWS – along with India, Pakistan, and Israel – call upon NWS to fulfill their obligations from the indefinite extension of the NPT in 1995 and from the 13 Practical Steps of the 2000 NPT Review Conference.  President Obama recognizes the need for the international community to work together to manage our common security (see his speech to the GA here and to the Security Council here) and last week began reasserting US leadership at the UN in matters of nuclear disarmament and nonproliferation.  To show the high-level of engagement that the US intends to have on the subject, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton led the US delegation to the Article XIV Conference (the first US delegation at an Article XIV Conference in ten years) and President Obama addressed the 64^th General Assembly the day before the conference started and chaired the first ever Security Council Summit on nuclear disarmament and nonproliferation in a separate meeting on the conference’s first day.  All this high-level attention from the US for the CTBT, nuclear disarmament, and nonproliferation was noted and welcomed by most of the states in attendance at the conference.

One thing that was not mentioned by any states in their official statements to the conference was the possibility of the provisional entry into force of the Treaty prior to obtaining all remaining annex II ratifications.  Provisional entry into force of the CTBT could allow states parties to the Treaty to agree to on-site inspections when necessary, an important added layer to detect potential cheating.  Provisional entry into force might also put pressure on those annex II states that have not yet ratified the Treaty to do so by being yet another indicator of the importance the vast majority of the international community places on the CTBT.  Recognizing that international law helps solidify norms of state behavior and brings predictability and stability to international relations, many states at the conference spoke about the importance of codifying the voluntary nuclear testing moratoria the NWS have made into the CTBT, a legally binding treaty.  Provisional entry into force of the Treaty before all annex II states have ratified could be an important step in the cementing of the norm against nuclear testing, thus providing another motivation for more annex II states to work toward ratification of the Treaty.

One other interesting note from the conference is that the actual measures to promote early entry into force of the CTBT – the main stated purpose of the conference – were not mentioned by many countries.  Japan was one of only a few countries to discuss such measures in their speech, measures that included sending high-level envoys to annex II states to encourage their ratification of the Treaty at an early date.  And while 103 states were represented at the conference, attendance during the bulk of state speeches was relatively low.  This could be due to the fact that the General Assembly was simultaneously in session, and it should be noted that the large number of participants is indicative of the importance the international community places on the early entry into force of the CTBT.

The conference ended with the adoption of a final document but without much celebration.  NNWS want serious progress to be made toward nuclear disarmament before NWS further restrict nuclear technology for peaceful purposes; the ratification of the CTBT by the two hold-out NWS is a promise that needs to be fulfilled for the vast majority of the world to recognize such serious progress.  Despite the positive developments many states mentioned since the last Article XIV Conference in 2007, the CTBT is still not in force.  US ratification of the CTBT might become the strongest signal of the revitalization of the nonproliferation regime, which will be tested for its durability at the upcoming NPT Review Conference in May 2010.

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[i] The following is the list of annex II states that need to ratify the CTBT before it can enter into force: China; DPRK; Egypt; Indonesia; India; Islamic Republic of Iran; Israel; Pakistan; and the United States of America.  Of these nine countries, three have not yet signed the Treaty (DPRK, India, and Pakistan).