Although the United States still has the largest number of nuclear power plants in the world, it does not dominate global nuclear power. While the United States was the leading nuclear power supplying nation more than thirty years ago—at least for states outside of the Soviet sphere of influence—the reality today is clearly that the U.S. nuclear industry is only one of several major suppliers. The United States can no longer build a large nuclear power plant on its own. Foreign nuclear companies own major U.S. nuclear power companies.

In addition, the United States no longer supplies the majority of the world’s enriched uranium for nuclear fuel; instead, the United States Enrichment Corporation has shut down its enrichment plants based on gaseous diffusion and has been struggling to commercialize the American Centrifuge Project partly due to reduced global demand for enriched uranium and also due to competition from established enrichment companies.

Nonetheless, the United States continues to have great influence on the nuclear market because many of the major supplying nations have built their nuclear power programs on the basis of U.S. technology. In a new issue brief, FAS President Dr. Charles Ferguson takes a look at options for the United States to gain back leadership via a cooperative approach. The brief analyzes what nations could be effective partners for the United States in furthering nonproliferation while providing for the continued use of peaceful nuclear energy. The nuclear industry is increasingly globalized and the United States needs to partner with allies and other nations to advance nonproliferation objectives.

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Editor’s Note: The following text was prepared by Dr. Norris for a presentation at the Woodrow Wilson Center’s 2013 Summer Institute on the International History of Nuclear Weapons (SHARF) in Washington, DC. 

The primary goal of my presentation today is to reconstruct the nuclear order of battle of the Cold War, to see how nuclear weapons were integrated into military forces, to assess what influence they had, and finally with all of that as a backdrop, revisit some crucial events and decisions that may make more sense when viewed with this additional information and perspective.

Growth and Evolution of the U.S. Nuclear Stockpile

By my estimation, the United States has produced approximately 66,500 nuclear weapons from 1945 to mid-2013, of approximately 100 types.[ref]Robert S. Norris and Hans M. Kristensen, “Nuclear Notebook: U.S. Nuclear Warheads, 1945- 2009,” Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, July 2009, vol. 65, no 4, pp. 72-81. “[/ref] New production of U.S. nuclear weapons ceased in 1990, twenty-three years ago, though modifications and life-extension programs continue. The historic high of the U.S. stockpile was reached in 1967 with 31,255 nuclear warheads. This stockpile, beginning in the mid-1950s, has been characterized by great dynamism and turnover.  We now have official figures for the number of nuclear warheads in the stockpile from 1946 to 2009:  In 1993, Secretary of Energy Hazel O’Leary released figures for the years 1946-1961, and on May 3, 2010 the Pentagon released a fact sheet with stockpile numbers for years 1962-2009.

All U.S. warheads were developed at one of two nuclear design laboratories, Los Alamos or Lawrence Livermore, both supported by Sandia National Laboratories to weaponize the warheads. Los Alamos has designed 77 types and Livermore 23. All four military services have had nuclear weapons: the Air Force adopted 52 warhead types, the Navy 35 types, the Army 26 and the Marines 15.

Many of the cancelled programs make interesting stories by themselves in capturing the thinking of the day.  Some warhead types have had wide applicability, used in one configuration as a bomb and in another as a warhead for one or perhaps several kinds of missiles, an early example of this is the Mark 7. The profusion is even more extensive when modifications and yield options are added:  the B-61 bomb has come in eleven modifications (soon to be twelve) and a variety of yields.

If we break down the stockpile by delivery system the Air Force has made use of 42 types of nuclear weapons, the Navy and Marine Corps 34 types, and the Army 21 types. As technological advances were made in reducing warhead weight and volume the military services adopted nuclear weapons for almost every conceivable military mission.

The first delivery system was an airplane dropping a bomb: specifically the B-29 carrying a single Little Boy or Fat Man type bomb. Soon after the war, a great profusion of new types of aircraft appeared offering greater range and capable of carrying many bombs. There have been more than 40 different types of aircraft that the U.S. military has used to carry nuclear weapons: 11 varieties of Air Force bombers, a dozen types of Air Force fighters, 13 types of Navy/Marine corps fighters, three types of helicopters, and three maritime patrol aircraft.  There are also several types of allied non-American aircraft that were certified to carry U.S. nuclear weapons including the Canadian Argus, German and Italian Tornados, the British Shackleton and Nimrod and the Italian Atlantiques.

An almost equal technological marvel to the atomic bomb is the development of the missile, specifically the ballistic missile.  It did not take a great leap of imagination to see that missiles might eventually be mated to an atomic bomb and flown (either in the atmosphere or out of it) great distances to a target.  Eventually missiles would come in every conceivable size, shape, and range for every mission: air-to-surface missiles like the Hound Dog, SRAM, Walleye and Bullpup, and air-to-air missiles like the Genie and the Falcon. One cancelled program, Skybolt, was to have been an air-launched ballistic missile, quite a concept when you think of it.  Complementing ballistic missiles were cruise missiles of every sort: the Matador (and later the Mace), and sea-based Regulus. For intercontinental distances there was for a very short time the notorious Snark. After improvements in ballistic missiles by the late 1950s and early 1960s, the United States had a wide variety of ICBMs, SLBMs, IRBMs, and short-range ballistic missiles. These included Corporal, Sergeant, Lacrosse, Redstone, Little John, Honest John, Thor, Jupiter, Atlas, Titan, and Polaris. Later they would be replaced by Minuteman and MX, Poseidon, Trident, Pershing and by air-sea and ground launched cruise missiles.  Anti-ballistic missile missiles like the Sprint and Spartan were developed and deployed as well.

Not to be outdone, the army proposed a full range of weapons for the nuclear battlefield. This included several calibers of artillery, short range missiles, air defense missiles like the Nike Hercules, and atomic land mines.  A particular favorite in this category was the Davy Crockett, a jeep- or tripod-mounted bazooka-type weapon able to deliver a very low-yield W54 nuclear warhead (20 tons yield) to a range of between 600-4000 meters.  It is said that the probability of kill lethal radius for the Davy Crockett exceeded its range, which is not a good thing.

The Navy had many non-strategic types for the anti-submarine mission (ASW), including the Betty, Lulu, and B57 depth charges; the ASTOR torpedo; and ASROC and SUBROC missiles.  For the anti-air warfare mission the TALOS and Terrier missiles were deployed on a host of ships to defend the carrier battle group.

Each one of these systems is deserving of its own history.  The historical record will only be complete when we know and understand why they were proposed in the first place, how much was spent on them, how many were produced, where were they deployed, and when they were retired. These stories constitute the reality of the nuclear arms race: the research and development, the procuring, the transporting, deploying, training and maintaining and retiring of all of this weaponry. Even weapons that were not deployed merit at least a footnote as they give expression to the mentality of the day.

After almost seventy years, we now estimate that the United States built 66,500 nuclear warheads, but we should recognize that along the way there were other expectations and possibilities. For example, here are two contrary views: Bill Moyers made a TV program on the 40th anniversary of Los Alamos; in one scene he is riding in a car with I.I. Rabi (an adviser to Robert Oppenheimer during the Manhattan Project), and as they drive through Los Alamos Rabi looks out the window at the laboratories and building after building and says that, from the vantage point of the Manhattan Project (at least in his mind), we never intended this: meaning this gigantic ongoing complex that ended up mass producing nuclear weapons by the tens of thousands.

At the other extreme we have certain military figures such as Army Lt. General James M. Gavin, Deputy Chief of Staff for R&D under Maxwell Taylor, who said in hearings to the Joint Committee on Atomic Energy in 1956 and 1957 that the Army’s total requirement would be 151,000 nuclear weapons, 106,000 for tactical battlefield use, 25,000 for air defense, and 20,000 for support of our allies.  He estimated that a typical field army might use a total of 423 atomic warheads in one day of intense combat, not including surface to air weapons. Some Navy officers in early 1958 spoke of a Polaris fleet of 100 SSBNs. This goal later dropped to between 40 and 50 and 41 were originally bought, with eighteen more Ohio-class submarines since purchased.

The Air Force never proposed an exact goal for the size of its ICBM arsenal, but there were statements in the late-1950s of several hundred to many thousands. At the high end was General Thomas S. Power, CINCSAC from 1957-1964, who spoke of a requirement of 10,000 Minuteman ICBMs and is known to have personally suggested that figure to President Kennedy. Many Air Force officers were not very enthusiastic about missiles, a diversion and drain on resources for what really mattered — that is, manned bombers. The Air Force has never been shy about asking for new planes, and in large numbers.  Since 1945 they have purchased close to 5,000 bombers of 11 types whose primary mission was nuclear weapon delivery (385 B-36s, 142 B-45s, 370 B-50s, 2,041 B-47s, 403 B-57s, 116 B-58s, 744 B-52s, 294 B-66s). The original goal would have been higher than what was finally purchased, given finite budgets. This is true with the two recent bombers – the original program for the B-1 was 244 (the air force bought 100), and 132 B-2s (only 21 purchased).

Even with the Air Force’s lukewarm attitude towards ICBMs they still managed to purchase a total of 3,234 ICBMS: Atlas (381), Titan (286), Minuteman (2,433), and MX (134). The Navy bought 2,783 SLBMs:  Polaris (1,092), Poseidon (640), and Trident (595 and 456) their SSBN fleet. In total over 6,000 strategic ballistic missiles were purchased.

One concluding point needs to be made about all of these numbers. Whatever they were–large, medium or small — I contend they were arbitrary.  It is often made to seem, especially in Secretary of Defense Annual Reports or Congressional testimony, that civilian officials and military brass knew exactly what the number of bombers or missiles was that would deter the Soviets.  In 1979 and 1980 it was said that 200 MX missiles, to be shuttled around and hidden amidst 4,600 shelters in a 40,000 square mile area of the Great Basin in eastern Nevada and western Utah, was absolutely essential to the security of the United States. Anything less just would not do. The effort and money that went into trying to come up with a survivable basing scheme to solve the problem of the so-called “window of vulnerability” is astonishing.

Stimulants to Growth and Diversity

There are three factors that sustained the nuclear arms race and led to its growth and diversity:

1) The inter-service rivalry that existed (and exists) between the branches of U.S. armed forces. These clashes over roles and missions are not aberrations; they are only the more visible skirmishes of an ongoing and eternal war. Its daily manifestations need to be tracked better than they have been.  This competition was a main driver in the proliferation of missiles. At the time, nuclear weapons were the things to have. All sectors of the military became enraptured with them and tried their very best to integrate them into the various combat commands. They developed elaborate war plans, had extensive military exercises, and some may have even believed that one could actually fight wars with them. The love affair eventually ended, disillusionment set in, the bloom was off the rose, and nuclear mission after nuclear mission was terminated.

Because of their inordinate destructive power these weapons prevented good soldiering rather than advancing it. Many general and admirals felt that in the end, the weapons weren’t usable. They took away from other things that commanders would rather have had.  Nuclear weapons require inordinate amounts of security and many special procedures and were not worth all of the care and feeding they required. Twenty years ago, the Army got out of the nuclear business and the non-strategic navy abandoned the nuclear anti-submarine warfare mission. In a similar development, the Navy and Marine Corps abandoned the carrier strike mission with nuclear bombs, a mission that began in the late 1940s. For a time the non-strategic Navy retained only the nuclear Tomahawk cruise missile (stored ashore in weapons depots), but that too has now recently been retired. Many or most of the missions we once had have been abandoned, and we are in the process of trying to figure out how many and what to do with the ones we have left. The answers are still not in: Can we continue to afford three legs of the triad or will two be enough?

2) A second factor which sustained and perpetuated the arms race was the belief that our nation could attain security through technical superiority in nuclear weaponry, in 1950 Chester Barnard termed this, “a most deadly illusion” – but it was one we continued to pursue year after year. Technological imperative drove the United States forward; this edge would make the difference, we could gain the upper hand, we must have this new missile or that new plane. Each of these milestones- whether it was ’boosting’, the hydrogen bomb, improved yield-to-weight  ratios, miniaturization, longer range missiles and planes, or greater accuracy – these were all eventually matched by the Soviet Union and the vaunted superiority could never be sustained or taken advantage of. Each of the accomplishments by our adversary then drove the United States forward to try and find a fix for the new dilemma it put us in.

3) The third factor is what I call a hyperactive definition of deterrence. This definition equated the prevention of a Soviet attack with just achieving very high degrees of readiness on the American side.  The Soviets were portrayed as ready to pounce the moment the United States let down its guard: the Red Army was ever ready to surge through the Fulda Gap. The Bolsheviks were global in their march and thus we had to be everywhere to deter them. Because warning times had shrunk so much in the missile age we needed to put bombers on 24 hour airborne alert, carrying nuclear weapons and patrolling the borders of the Soviet Union. Very high patrol rates were established for U.S. ballistic missile submarines – a practice that still continues today, by the way. After airborne alert was stopped in 1968 due to two serious accidents in Spain and Greenland, strategic bombers were put on 15-minute ground alert.  Until the early 1990s about one-third of U.S. strategic bombers were configured in this way, with their crews in ready-rooms waiting for the klaxon to sound.  If and when it did they would be airborne before the first nuclear detonations destroyed the base.

The image of a coiled spring is an appropriate metaphor to describe the way the United States deployed and postured its forces. It is very fortunate that the Soviets did not follow the United States in this regard, as two coiled springs would have been extremely dangerous.  When crises did develop we saw both springs get tighter and tighter, there is a literature on how those coupled systems could have cascaded us into nuclear war. We can count ourselves lucky that something like the Cuban Missile Crisis did not happen later on when both sides, rather than just the United States had mature nuclear forces.

At the time, but even more so now, we can see that this coiled spring was very dangerous, costly, arbitrary, and basically unnecessary for the purposes for which it was said to be needed. The concept of deterrence was a perfect one for the arms race as it could be used for any purpose; it was elastic enough to cover everything, the perfect rationale for anything anyone wanted. The mantra of deterrence was invoked thousands of times; it was the automatic litany that prefaced Pentagon officials’ presentations before Congress at budget time.  In one of its more recent incarnations, during the Reagan years, we were told that to adequately deter the Soviet Union we needed to be able to fight and win a nuclear war since our opponent, it was claimed, believed that they could do so. This is just one of many examples showing that it was quite easy to get lost in a `wilderness of mirrors’.

Basic knowledge of the growth and evolution of the U.S. nuclear stockpile is essential for undertaking research in the nuclear security field. However, there is still much to be learned regarding the history of the stockpiles of the eight other countries which possess nuclear weapons: the Soviet Union/Russia, Britain, France, China, Israel, India and Pakistan.

Dr. Robert S. Norris is the Senior Fellow for Nuclear Policy at the Federation of American Scientists. Dr. Norris was a senior research associate with the Natural Resources Defense Council in Washington, DC.  His principal areas of expertise include writing and research on all aspects of the nuclear weapons programs of the United States, Soviet Union/Russia, Britain, France, and China, as well as India, Pakistan, and Israel. He has written articles for Arms Control Today and Security Dialogue, and has written a column for the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists since 1987.

The U.S.-Japan Nuclear Working Group, co-chaired by FAS President Dr. Charles Ferguson, has released a new report recommending priorities for the Japanese government following the March 11, 2011 nuclear accident at Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant.

The U.S.-Japan Nuclear Working Group is composed of bi-national experts who have come together to examine the broader strategic implications of the Fukushima accident. The mission of the group is to understand, articulate and advocate for shared strategic interests between the United States and Japan which could be impacted through changes to Japan’s energy program. In the past twelve months, the group has conducted meetings with industry leaders and policymakers in Japan, the United States and the nuclear governance community in Vienna to examine the implications of Japan’s future energy policy. As a result of these meetings, the group released a report of its findings and recommendations, “Statement on Shared Strategic Priorities in the Aftermath of the Fukushima Nuclear Accident”.

The report discusses specific issues that must be addressed regardless of Japan’s energy policy decisions, including:  strategy for reducing Japan’s plutonium stockpile, new standards for radiation safety and environmental cleanup and treatment of spent nuclear fuel.

The report also examines broader concerns to Japan’s energy policy including:  climate change concerns, emerging nuclear safety regulations and global nuclear nonproliferation leadership (as Japan is a non-nuclear weapons state with advanced nuclear energy capabilities). The group offers strategic recommendations for Japanese and U.S. industries  and governments regarding the direction of Japan’s energy policy, and how both countries can work together for joint energy security.

Read the report here (PDF).

For more information on the U.S.-Japan Nuclear Working Group, click here.

Iran’s quest for the development of nuclear program has been marked by enormous financial costs and risks. It is estimated that the program’s cost is well over $100 billion, with the construction of the Bushehr reactor costing over $11 billion, making it one of the most expensive reactors in the world.

The Federation of American Scientists and the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace have released a new report, “Iran’s Nuclear Odyssey: Costs and Risks” which analyzes the economic effects of Iran’s nuclear program, and policy implications of sanctions and other actions by the United States and other allies. Co-authored by Ali Vaez and Karim Sadjadpour, the report details the history of the program, beginning with its inception under the Shah in 1957, and how the Iranian government has continue to grow their nuclear capabilities under a shroud of secrecy. Coupled with Iran’s limited supply of uranium and insecure stockpiles of nuclear materials, along with Iran’s desire to invest in nuclear energy to revitalize their energy sector (which is struggling due to international sanctions), the authors examine how these huge costs have led to few benefits.

The report analyzes the policy implications of Iran’s nuclear program for the United States and its allies, concluding that economic sanctions nor military force cannot end this prideful program; it is imperative that a diplomatic solution is reached to ensure that Iran’s nuclear program remains peaceful. Finally, efforts need to be made to the Iranians from Washington which clearly state that America and its allies prefer a prosperous and peaceful Iran versus an isolated and weakened Iran. Public diplomacy and nuclear diplomacy must go hand in hand.

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A country with few natural resources, first Japan began to develop nuclear power technologies in 1954. Nuclear energy assisted with Japanese economic development and reconstruction post World War II. However, with the fear of lethal ash and radioactive fallout and the lingering effects from the 2011 accident at Fukushima-Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant, there are many concerns related to Japanese nonproliferation, security and nuclear policy.

In a FAS issue brief, Ms. Kazuko Goto, Research Fellow of the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science, and Technology of the Government of Japan, writes of Japan’s advancement of nuclear technologies which simultaneously benefits international nonproliferation policies.

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The escalating confrontation between the United States and Iran over the latter’s nuclear program has triggered much debate about what actions should be taken to ensure that Iran does not develop a nuclear weapon. How might certain actions against Iran affect the global economy? FAS released the results of a study, “Sanctions, Military Strokes, and Other Potential Actions Against Iran”  which assesses the global economic impact on a variety of conflict scenarios, sanctions and other alternative actions against Iran. FAS conducted an expert elicitation with nine subject matter experts involving six hypothetical scenarios in regards to U.S. led actions against Iran, and anticipated three month cost to the global economy. These scenarios ranged from increasing sanctions (estimated cost of U.S. $64 billion) to full-scale invasion of Iran (estimated cost of U.S. $1.7 trillion).

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In the wake of the devastating meltdown at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant in Japan, many Americans are now reevaluating the costs and benefits of nuclear energy. If anything, the accident underscores that constant vigilance is needed to ensure nuclear safety.

Policymakers and the public need more guidance about where nuclear power in the United States appears to be headed in light of the economic hurdles confronting construction of nuclear power plants, aging reactors, and a graying workforce, according to a report (PDF) by the Federation of American Scientists (FAS) and Washington and Lee University.

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On 13 January, Ivanka Barzashka and I gave a briefing at the AAAS on our work regarding Iran’s uranium enrichment capacity.  Joshua Pollack also gave a briefing, which he has described.  Joshua’s analysis is thorough and interesting but I think I would use a different distinction than the “actual” and “nominal” values that he defines.

Pollack shows how the estimates of the capability of Iran’s centrifuge, the IR-1, have declined over time.  That is intriguing but I worry that it makes the calculations that Ivanka and I and others have performed using data reported from International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) on-site inspections seem like the next step in a series of similar estimates.  They are not.  There are two very different types of approaches being taken here.  Here I present an analogy that I think might make the differences clear. (more…)

By Ivanka Barzashka

FAS has posted a report on “Enrichment Supply and Technology Outside the United States” by S. A. Levin and S. Blumkin from the Enrichment Department of the Oak Ridge Gaseous Diffusion Plant, operated at the time by Union Carbide. The document, prepared for the U.S. Energy Research and Development Administration, reviews international uranium enrichment capacity and isotope separation technology as of 1977.

Apart from being of historical interest, the report explicitly states that Eurodif, a French-organized multinational enrichment consortium, was in part owned by Iran.

“The membership and apportionment of shares in Eurodif has been changeable. Presently, it is constituted by Belgium and Spain 11% each. Italy 25%, France 28% and Sofidif 25%, which is 40% owned by Iran and 60% by France.”

“In 1975, another consortium called Coredif with the same multinational membership as Eurodif but a different distribution of shares (Eurodif 51%, France 29% and Iran 20%) was organized to assess future nuclear demand and build a second Eurodif-type plant if the study results justified it.”

This is consistent with Iran’s claims that it owned shares of the enrichment company prior to the Islamic Revolution in 1979. This claim has been confirmed by the French government, but Iran has never received enriched uranium from the company.

The document has a disclaimer that “[i]t should not be presumed that the inclusion in this presentation of any reported information necessarily attests to its validity.”

On 14 November, Peter Orszag, Director of the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), testified before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee about the relative costs of plutonium reprocessing and direct disposal of used nuclear fuel. The oral testimony was quite brief and, unless otherwise noted, my comments are based primarily on the longer and presumably more carefully prepared written testimony. The testimony contained many errors, not all of them trivial, but one gigantic omission discussed at the end of this essay is inexcusable and calls into question the credibility of the entire CBO report.
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This afternoon, a committee of the National Research Council, a research arm of the National Academy of Science, issued a report that is extremely critical of the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership, or GNEP, an administration plan to restart separating plutonium from used commercial nuclear reactor fuel, something the United States has not done for three decades. I have argued that the goals of GNEP, while scientifically possible and perhaps someday economically justifiable, are decades premature. I am relieved to discover that the committee report comes to essentially the same conclusion.
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