To submit an international arms control agreement to the U.S. Senate for ratification has not always been the Bush Administration’s first instinct. But last month the White House asked the Senate to ratify a 2005 Amendment to the 1980 Convention on the Physical Protection of Nuclear Material.

“This Amendment is important in the campaign against international nuclear terrorism and nuclear proliferation,” President Bush wrote in his transmittal letter.

“It will require each State Party to the Amendment to establish, implement, and maintain an appropriate physical protection regime applicable to nuclear material and nuclear facilities used for peaceful purposes.”

The pending Amendment along with a State Department overview and related materials were recently printed for the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. See “Amendment to Convention on Physical Protection of Nuclear Material” (pdf), submitted by the President of the United States to the U.S. Senate, September 4, 2007.

International progress on ratifying the Amendment “remains slow,” lamented Mohamed El Baradei, director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, in a September 10 statement. Of the 128 States that are party to the 1980 Convention, only 11 have approved the 2005 Amendment, he said.

Notable new reports from the Congressional Research Service that have not been made widely available to the public include the following (all pdf).

“Covert Action: Legislative Background and Possible Policy Questions,” updated October 11, 2007.

“U.S.-China Counterterrorism Cooperation: Issues for U.S. Policy,” updated October 10, 2007.

“Mexico’s Drug Cartels,” October 16, 2007.

“Burma-U.S. Relations,” updated October 4, 2007.

“The Export Administration Act: Evolution, Provisions, and Debate,” updated September 28, 2007.

“Status of a Member of the House Who Has Been Indicted for or Convicted of a Felony,” updated October 5, 2007:

A new publication (pdf) from the Joint Chiefs of Staff defines military doctrine regarding “peace operations.”

Peace operations utilize “all instruments of national power with military missions to contain conflict, redress the peace, and shape the environment to support reconciliation and rebuilding and facilitate the transition to legitimate governance. Peace operations include peacekeeping, peace enforcement, peacemaking, peace building, and conflict prevention efforts.”

There are 15 fundamental elements of peace operations, according to the new doctrine, including: transparency, impartiality, credibility, freedom of movement, restraint and minimum force, and so on.

See “Peace Operations,” Joint Publication JP 3-07.3, October 17, 2007.

Much of what is publicly known regarding the abuse of detainees held in U.S. custody did not emerge from congressional investigations — there were no such investigations — or from other conventional means of oversight.

Instead, a large portion of the public record on interrogation policy was uncovered through an unusually effective Freedom of Information Act lawsuit brought by the American Civil Liberties Union.

A new documentary collection on detainee abuse edited by ACLU attorneys Jameel Jaffer and Amrit Singh has just been published by Columbia University Press under the title “Administration of Torture,” with a narrative introduction by the editors.

The U.S. Government was acquiescent in Pakistan’s acquisition of nuclear weapons technology over a period of decades, according to a new book on the subject.

The activities of individual members of Pakistan’s nuclear procurement network in the United States are examined in detail by investigative reporters David Armstrong and Joseph Trento in “America and the Islamic Bomb,” Steerforth Press, 2007.

Richard M. Barlow, a former CIA and Defense official who attempted to “blow the whistle” on Pakistan’s pursuit of nuclear technology in the 1980s, was effectively punished for his efforts.

“For his candor, and despite the backing of some top intelligence officials, Barlow was stripped of his Top Secret/Codeword clearances and hounded out of the Pentagon,” wrote Jeff Stein in “The Nuclear Bombshell That Never Went Off,” CQ Homeland Security, October 19.

Within a week, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence will formally disclose the size of the National Intelligence Program budget for fiscal year 2007, an ODNI spokeswoman said.

The anticipated disclosure marks the culmination of decades of advocacy, debate and litigation.

Last July Congress enacted an intelligence budget disclosure requirement over White House objections as part of a bill to implement the recommendations of the 9/11 Commission.

“The Administration strongly opposes the requirement in the bill to publicly disclose sensitive information about the intelligence budget,” according to a February 28 statement of administration policy (pdf).

But on August 3 President Bush nevertheless signed the final bill, which allows the (next) President to waive the disclosure requirement on national security grounds, if necessary, starting in 2009.

The disclosure requirement states (in section 601 of H.R. 1):

“Not later than 30 days after the end of each fiscal year beginning with fiscal year 2007, the Director of National Intelligence shall disclose to the public the aggregate amount of funds appropriated by Congress for the National Intelligence Program for such fiscal year.”

Since fiscal year 2007 ended on September 30, the legal deadline for budget disclosure is October 30.

Will the DNI comply?

“That’s what the law requires,” said Vanee Vines of the ODNI public affairs office today, “and we’re going to follow the law.”

The aggregate intelligence budget (a broad term which included “tactical” as well as “national” intelligence spending) was first officially disclosed ten years ago, in October 1997, in response to a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit filed by the Federation of American Scientists. At that time, the (FY 1997) budget figure was $26.6 billion. The last officially authorized disclosure was in March 1998, when the budget was $26.7 billion.

The treatment of injuries caused by chemical weapons and other chemical agents is addressed in a new military field manual (pdf). The manual, issued jointly by the Army, Navy, Marines and Air Force, characterizes the threat from chemical weapons, describes the diagnosis of chemical injuries and outlines preventive and remedial measures.

See “Multiservice Tactics, Techniques, and Procedures for Treatment of Chemical Agent Casualties and Conventional Military Chemical Injuries,” FM 4-02.285, September 2007.

Last week, President Bush issued Homeland Security Presidential Directive 21 on “Public Health and Medical Preparedness,” which is intended to advance “preparedness for all potential catastrophic health events.”

It’s an impossible job, and perhaps it was meant to be.

The Director of the Information Security Oversight Office (ISOO) has “responsibility for security classification, safeguarding and declassification policy and oversight throughout the Executive Branch of the United States Government.” Ability to leap tall buildings in a single bound is preferred but not required.

Except for the last part, that is the job description that was posted online yesterday as the search for a new ISOO Director commenced in earnest.

Bill Leonard, the highly regarded current Director, announced his retirement last month, to the surprise and dismay of many.

See the Job Announcement for the position of ISOO Director.

“It is an abuse of the classification process to withhold from Congress and the people of the United States broad assessments of the extent of corruption in the Iraqi Government.”

Remarkably, that complaint was endorsed Tuesday by a large majority of the House of Representatives, which voted 395-21 to condemn the Administration’s restrictions on disclosure of information about Iraqi corruption.

The resolution condemning the restrictions, sponsored by Rep. Henry Waxman, emerged from the conflict between his Oversight Committee and the State Department over access to and disclosure of government records on this topic. See the October 16 floor debate on House Resolution 734.

One of the assessments of Iraqi corruption that was retroactively classified after Rep. Waxman’s committee requested it has been made widely available (pdf) on the Federation of American Scientists web site.

State Department official David Satterfield disputed allegations that the Department had improperly withheld information in an October 16 conference call.

A resolution has been introduced in the House of Representatives to honor the participants in “Post Office Box 1142,” a military intelligence interrogation program from World War II.

“In advancing the Nation’s interests and uncovering vital secrets, the interrogators at P.O. Box 1142 never resorted to tactics such as sleep deprivation, electrical shock, or waterboarding. Their captives were never sexually abused, humiliated, or tortured. They never resorted to the methods that have recently branded our Nation so negatively,” said Rep. Jim Moran (D-VA).

See also “Fort Hunt’s Quiet Men Break Silence on WWII” by Petula Dvorak, Washington Post, October 6.

The late Chuck Hansen, a relentless and resourceful researcher, worked for decades to document the history, technology, design and development of nuclear weapons. His findings helped nurture a continuing wave of scholarship and historical reflection on nuclear policy and technology.

An extensive new collection of his most valuable and important acquisitions has recently been published on compact disk under the title Swords of Armageddon, Version 2. It is a veritable encyclopedia of nuclear weapons history.

More details about the collection and ordering information can be found here.

Earlier this year, the U.S. Army updated its Handbook on Weapon Systems. A copy of that illustrated and annotated catalog is now available online.

Along with basic system data, each entry includes information about program contractors and foreign military sales, and other useful reference material.

See “2007-2008 Army Weapon Systems.”