Make It or Break It

Abstract

The weapons labs built the Bomb. Now they're tasked with finding ways to get rid of it. Trouble is, old habits die hard.

In August 1945, nuclear weapon scientists became heroes. The U.S. atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki signaled the end to a long and bloody world war.

The scientific expertise that gave birth to the Bomb has also helped secure nuclear weapons and weapons-usable materials. During the Manhattan Project, the United States sent scientists throughout Europe to stop Nazi Germany from building the Bomb. This dual role continued throughout the Cold War, as the national weapons laboratories maintained the U.S. nuclear deterrent while simultaneously developing the means to verify the arms control treaties that imposed a degree of stability on the superpower arms race.

Following the collapse of the Soviet Union, the labs announced that they would place a renewed emphasis on ramping up nonproliferation programs. Certainly, events in subsequent years have validated the need for such efforts. Three additional nations (India, Pakistan, and North Korea) have joined the nuclear club, with potentially dozens of others–including terrorist organizations–waiting in the wings. Yet, recent developments raise concerns about the labs' commitment to this mission. The weapons designers are back on the job, tasked with developing a new generation of warheads that is said to be vital to sustaining the U.S. nuclear arsenal. The labs themselves see no conflict of interest, arguing that nonproliferation divisions benefit from the expertise of their weapons-making colleagues. But others worry that weapons work compromises the integrity of these efforts and diverts resources from halting the spread of nuclear weapons.

Wanting to probe this question further, last year we interviewed several senior scientists and analysts at three weapons laboratories: Los Alamos National Laboratory and Sandia National Laboratories in New Mexico, and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California. 1 In addition, we sought out the perspectives of watchdog groups: Western States Legal Foundation, the Los Alamos Study Group, and Tri-Valley Communities Against a Radioactive Environment (CAREs). Throughout our conversations, we wondered: Can the nonproliferation divisions at the labs fully serve the greater good if they remain steeped in a culture that creates weapons of mass destruction?

Serving the greater good

At the weapons labs, several hundred people work on nonproliferation and homeland security, operating under a budget that, in recent years, amounts to several hundred million dollars annually. The Energy Department's National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) remains the nonproliferation divisions' primary sponsor, although they also receive support from the State Department, the Defense Threat Reduction Agency, the Department of Homeland Security, and some foreign government agencies.

The labs have long been at the forefront of verifying compliance with arms control treaties by developing technologies that can detect the signatures of a nuclear detonation: X-rays, gamma rays, radio-frequency neutrons, charged-particle radiations, and seismic waves. In fact, Los Alamos's first major arms control initiative was the design of the Vela satellite, which monitored gamma ray bursts to detect atmospheric nuclear weapons tests following the ratification of the 1963 Limited Test Ban Treaty.

Since 9/11, Homeland Security support has allowed the labs to branch out from their traditional nuclear nonproliferation work. Los Alamos, for example, has developed a radiological emergency response project, which is improving decontamination technologies and is educating first responders about preparing for “dirty bomb” attacks. Complementing this project, Livermore makes its National Atmospheric Release Advisory Center available to first responders to model the dispersal of radioactive materials.

In addition, the labs continue to devote considerable resources to nuclear security activities, including the Material Protection, Control, and Accounting Program to protect nuclear materials in the former Soviet Union, and forensics analysis to help trace the origin of materials used in nuclear or radiological weapons. Nuclear safeguards training and analysis are the “heart and soul” of Los Alamos's nonproliferation work, according to one senior Los Alamos official. For example, the lab trains all International Atomic Energy Agency inspectors in nondestructive assay techniques and supports export control analysis at the Nuclear Suppliers Group. Sandia has used its cooperative monitoring centers to educate foreign officials about safeguards, as well as other security issues. Livermore has created a computer program that allows inspectors to understand how proliferators could try to spoof monitoring systems in a uranium enrichment or plutonium reprocessing plant.

Still, lab safeguards groups have faced funding shortfalls. One analyst said that his lab had developed a conceptual model of how to monitor the uranium enrichment level in individual centrifuge machines. But a lack of money has held back further development of this tool, which could in theory provide the means for cooperative continuous inspection of Iran's enrichment plant.

Axis of proliferation

These efforts serve U.S. interests by limiting “horizontal” proliferation–the spread of nuclear weapons to countries that do not already have them. Yet, there is also “vertical” proliferation, more commonly known as arms races, when nations build up their existing nuclear arsenals.

Each concept lies on a separate axis, but they inevitably intersect. The Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) encompasses a grand bargain whereby nations pledge to foreswear the development of nuclear weapons if the existing nuclear weapon states, including the United States, pursue complete nuclear disarmament.

From the perspective of the labs, there is no inherent conflict of interest between efforts to prevent nuclear proliferation abroad while pursuing a potentially multibillion-dollar effort to reduce the existing U.S. nuclear stockpile through new warhead designs.

The NPT does not specify when disarmament must be accomplished–a fact that was a key source of gridlock at the May 2005 NPT Review Conference. While many non-nuclear weapon states wanted to concentrate on this issue, the United States sought to deflect attention from the charge that it has made little or no progress on disarmament. Lab policy analysts pitched in by drafting a glossy brochure that argued the United States has been fulfilling its disarmament commitment.

Lab officials we spoke with pointed to the substantial reduction in the U.S. nuclear arsenal since the end of the Cold War as evidence of America's good intentions. Around 1990, the United States had about 20,000 warheads, and today, it has cut that number roughly in half. And the Bush administration has announced plans to further reduce the stockpile to approximately 6,000 warheads by 2012.

The labs also place tremendous faith in the Reliable Replacement Warhead (RRW) Program, which has spurred considerable controversy since Congress initiated it in late 2004. The program is billed as replacing existing weapons, and officials claim that it could allow for further reductions in the stockpile because the new weapons' high reliability would lessen the need to keep a large number of reserve warheads. The program would also add security features to the warheads to guard against terrorist tampering. Officials believe that the program would not need nuclear testing to ensure that the new warheads work. Moreover, they argue that RRW would strengthen deterrence by convincing adversaries that the United States has highly reliable warheads, theoretically making use of the weapons less likely.

Today, Energy is pushing toward an ambitious makeover of the labs. The plan, called Complex 2030, envisions completely replacing the current stockpile with an RRW stockpile by 2030. If all goes as expected, this would result in a smaller arsenal and a smaller number of sites holding weapons-usable nuclear material that could be vulnerable to theft. Although this transformation would require considerable up-front costs, Energy estimates that in the long term Complex 2030 would save more money.

A not-so-hidden stimulus for the RRW program was the perceived need to provide new work for weapons scientists. Commenting on the excitement of an RRW design competition between Los Alamos and Livermore, Joseph Martz, the leader of the Los Alamos design team, said, “I have had people working nights and weekends. I have to tell them to go home. I can't keep them out of the office.” 2

Although the nonproliferation lab experts we talked to seemed very dedicated to their work, they did not exhibit as much unbridled enthusiasm as their colleagues on the weapons design teams. Perhaps the primary difference is that the weaponeers, after a long dry spell, now have, to use J. Robert Oppenheimer's words, a “technically sweet” project to whet their appetites. There is a joy in having the opportunity to learn something new. As one of us who has worked at Los Alamos knows, there is another thrill at play: Weapons work bestows a great sense of power.

This situation will persist unless, as philosopher William James observed in his 1906 essay, “The Moral Equivalent of War,” anti-militarists endow their labors with the glories and disciplines associated with preparation for war. In U.S. society, the value placed on someone's labors often correlates with the money bestowed on their activities. The Natural Resources Defense Council estimates that the Bush administration is spending “more than 12 times as much on nuclear weapons research and production activities as it is on urgent global nonproliferation efforts to retrieve, secure, and dispose of weapons materials worldwide.” 3

The major hurdle for either a nation-state or a stateless terrorist group to make nuclear weapons is acquiring the necessary amounts of highly enriched uranium or plutonium. Understanding how to stop this acquisition does not depend on continued production of nuclear weapons.

Despite dining off the table scraps at the weapons complex banquet, senior lab nonproliferation officials emphatically told us that their programs have benefited from having access to weapons designers and nuclear materials near their offices. For instance, the nonproliferation lab groups supplied technical advisers to the six-party talks with North Korea and to the teams working to dismantle Libya's nuclear program. Having access to weapons designers also facilitated a detailed assessment of the nuclear bomb design Libya obtained from the A. Q. Khan network.

Bait and switch

From the perspective of the labs, there is no inherent conflict of interest between efforts to prevent nuclear proliferation abroad while pursuing a potentially multibillion-dollar effort to reduce the existing U.S. nuclear stockpile through new warhead designs.

But others see nonproliferation as inherently incompatible with what remains the core mission of the labs: developing weapons of mass destruction. The debate was thrown into sharp relief when, in 2000, chemist Andreas Toupadakis resigned from Livermore. He had joined the lab with promises of working on its environmental programs but soon became disenchanted when he was drawn into weapons work. In a public letter explaining his resignation, he wrote: “We, the scientists, have tried to justify our involvement in building and maintaining nuclear arsenals by claiming that we are doing it for peace. How can we have peace when, by our work on weapons, we are raising fear in the hearts of those who do not have the same technology for killing? … Those who work on environmental projects or nonproliferation projects at the nuclear labs have not realized that such a thing is an illusion.” 4 One year later, computer scientist Isaac Trotts also resigned from Livermore when he learned that a computer simulation project he was working on–ostensibly to help prevent nuclear warheads from accidentally detonating or polluting the environment with radioactive material–also supported efforts to enhance the nuclear-capable B61 warhead's ability to penetrate underground targets. 5

While opponents of continued weapons work recognize that this knowledge can potentially increase the effectiveness of programs to prevent proliferation or nuclear terrorism, they believe that such activity would provide only marginal insight as to how proliferators or terrorist groups would build nuclear weapons. The 60-plus years of weapons work at the labs is sufficient to understand those threats. We share that assessment because the major hurdle for either a nation-state or a stateless terrorist group to make nuclear weapons is acquiring the necessary amounts of highly enriched uranium or plutonium. Understanding how to stop this acquisition does not depend on continued production of nuclear weapons in the United States.

Of all the labs' work, the RRW Program and its associated claims of reducing the U.S. arsenal has especially outraged watchdog groups. Marylia Kelley, executive director of Tri-Valley CAREs, deems the RRW Program a “bait and switch” because, “It was advertised as making existing weapons more reliable but in fact new weapons are being designed.” She adds, “The second generation bait and switch will be the need for a final proof test.” Trying to counter government claims, Tri-Valley CAREs commissioned a report by Robert Civiak, a physicist who had worked as a U.S. government policy analyst. Their January 2006 report argues that the RRW Program might lower the threshold of nuclear weapon use because “it is impossible for this Congress to prevent future administrations from assigning those new warheads to new missions.” 6 Civiak further asserts that the current arsenal is already highly safe, secure, and reliable.

Watchdog groups are not won over by claims of spending reductions, particularly since the Secretary of Energy Advisory Board underscored the large uncertainties in the Complex 2030 cost estimate, which ranges between $155 billion and $175 billion. 7 That skepticism is also apparent in Congress, where Republican Cong. David Hobson of Ohio, who serves on the House Appropriations Committee, recently issued a stern warning over the spiraling costs of Complex 2030. “RRW is a deal with Congress, but the deal requires a serious effort by the department to modernize, consolidate, and downsize the weapons complex,” he wrote in a letter to Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman. “Absent that effort, there is no deal.” 8

In an attempt to rein in the labs, Tri-Valley CAREs partnered with Nuclear Watch New Mexico, another watchdog group, to submit in 2005 a proposal to become the new management team of Los Alamos. The coalition wanted to change the “overall direction of future missions” at the lab by downgrading the lab's nuclear weapons programs and subordinating them under a new associate directorship of nuclear nonproliferation. The goal was to ensure that commitments under the NPT are met. Jay Coghlan, executive director of Nuclear Watch New Mexico, and Tri-Valley CAREs' Kelley would have also discontinued work on new weapons designs. They would have shifted substantial resources toward non-nuclear programs at the lab and elevated to the highest priority work on “resolution of long-term national security needs such as energy independence, conservation, and global climate change.” 9 In late 2005, Energy rejected this management bid, and in January 2007, it disqualified a more recent proposal that Coghlan and Kelley submitted to run Lawrence Livermore because “their proposal did not meet the criteria for running the lab,” according to an NNSA spokesman. 10

Proponents of a robust U.S. nuclear arsenal would probably not give the watchdogs' proposal a second thought because they would view it as “anti-nuclear.” But a closer look may point to some common ground. While Kelley confirms that she is strongly in favor of irreversible nuclear dismantlement, she has accepted a need for maintaining a “custodial role” for nuclear weapons activities during the transition to a nuclear weapon-free world.

Mixed messages

Greg Mello, the director of the Los Alamos Study Group, a nuclear disarmament organization based in Albuquerque, New Mexico, recommends that the nonproliferation divisions “hire people who favor nuclear disarmament” to help the labs “break out of a mental straitjacket.” But watchdog groups also recognize that changing the culture of the labs ultimately depends upon broader changes in U.S. policies. While lab officials cite the post-Cold War decline in U.S. warheads as evidence of a U.S. commitment to reducing nuclear tensions, this tells only part of the story. A more critical indicator is the value that the U.S. government places on nuclear weapons. In this regard, the Bush administration's 2001 Nuclear Posture Review signaled a mixed message. On the one hand, it called for more capable conventional weapons systems to make the United States “less dependent” on nuclear weapons for its “offensive deterrent capability.” On the other hand, the review recommended reestablishing “advanced warhead concepts teams at each of the national laboratories.” While the review welcomed the goal of shifting down to between 1,700 and 2,200 deployed strategic nuclear warheads by 2012, it warned that “unexpected contingencies” demand that the United States maintain nuclear forces for the foreseeable future.

The task of cultivating a mindset that would devalue U.S. nuclear weapons is made difficult by a revolving door that allows lab employees to spend months or years at a time in Washington helping to write policy briefs. Mello noted that “few people in Congress have power over the labs” and added that “the lab directors are protected” because of their ties to U.S. Strategic Command (Stratcom), which has recently expanded its mission beyond nuclear deterrence to include combating unconventional weapons worldwide. The nonproliferation divisions, he says, have strayed from “true” nonproliferation work and supported Stratcom's new mission by doing targeting and nodal analysis of Iranian nuclear facilities.

Lab watchdogs believe that arms control analysis is best done at the State Department because that agency has the vested authority to ensure that the United States is meeting its treaty obligations. But the State Department's elimination of its arms control bureau during a recent reorganization has left a vacuum that it has filled by contracting out some of this analytic work to the labs. The critics, in general, would prefer a robust firewall erected between the labs and the policy shops in Washington.

The labs, however, bristle at the accusation of political manipulation. A senior lab official asserted that the nonproliferation divisions “support policy but do not make it.” He added, “Management of the lab was set up to buffer the division from political leaders.” A lab analyst added that the labs “have to remain independent to tell the customer [government] what is wrong.” Another scientist believes the desired relationship between the labs and government should be that “the government tells the labs what needs to happen and that each lab has its own mission space to accomplish the goals government has selected for it.”

Nonproliferation specialists are engaged in a heroic task–stopping the spread of nuclear weapons. But they see proliferation as the inherent problem, not the security dilemma spawned by continued possession of these weapons by the United States and others.

Still, some personnel see the current relationship as too personality driven and too riddled with micromanagement. For example, they pointed to the Material Protection, Control, and Accounting Program as having put the labs in an overly competitive environment. A senior lab scientist said that Energy “picked individuals from separate labs and threw them together in nonhomogeneous teams, creating a conflict of interest.” For decades, the labs have felt the push and pull of competition and cooperation. The government formed Livermore under the belief that competition with Los Alamos would produce creative tension and result in better work. (During the Cold War, a Livermore scientist posted a sign that declared: “Remember, the Soviets are the competition, Los Alamos is the enemy.”) There are indications that the competitiveness continues today.

We witnessed a contemporary clash in perspectives at Los Alamos and Sandia. Each views itself as doing the best in working with other nonproliferation divisions. As the oldest of the labs, Los Alamos “sees itself as a natural leader,” according to a senior scientist. A Sandia analyst believes her lab “is unique in looking at the interstitial space between policy and technology” and “does the best job at reaching out” to other labs.

However, a senior nonproliferation official told us that the competition is “mostly friendly.” While the nonproliferation divisions at the three weapons labs overlap in their capabilities, each has developed special strengths to tame competitive tensions. For instance, Livermore has a distinct advantage in regional analysis of current and potential emerging threats. Taking pride in its outreach capabilities, Sandia has brought together foreign scientists and analysts in its cooperative monitoring centers to help resolve common security problems. For example, two security experts from India and Pakistan recently wrote a Sandia-sponsored paper assessing how to prevent nuclear terrorism in South Asia.

But even if the labs maintain an atmosphere of creative tension, the larger question remains: What precisely are they creating? Nonproliferation specialists are engaged in a heroic task–stopping the spread of nuclear weapons. But they see proliferation as the inherent problem, not the security dilemma spawned by continued possession of these weapons by the United States and other nuclear-armed countries.

Lab nonproliferation experts are steeped in a culture that–more than six decades after Hiroshima and Nagasaki–still believes the path to national security lies in maintaining America's competitive nuclear edge. The ongoing paradox of their work is, in part, the product of a bureaucracy that seeks to sustain itself with new missions after the Cold War. But it is also a product of the larger paradox of U.S. policy, which simultaneously denounces the acquisition of nuclear weapons abroad while seeking to upgrade the nuclear deterrent at home.

Though the labs share a common national security mission, it is, ironically, this very mission that holds them back from objectively analyzing whether nuclear weapons will always be needed for U.S. security.