Stimulating the Nuclear Weapons Complex?
Any time Congress spends hundreds of billions of dollars in a hurry we'd better read the fine print. So it is with today's Senate Appropriations Committee mark-up of the next installment -- over $365 billion -- of the economic stimulus package. Tucked away in the bill is $7.8 billionfor the Department of Energy's National Nuclear Security Administration -- the agency responsible for researching, developing and maintaining nuclear weapons. The funding is set aside for a variety of purposes, from construction of facilities to clean-up of weapons sites to "laboratory infrastructure," to "advanced computing development." Whatever the appropriations committee chooses to call it, it represents a bailout for an agency that should be reduced in size, not increased.
At a time when President Obama has committed himself to seeking a world without nuclear weapons -- backed up with specific pledges to seek a global test ban and a prohibition on the production of bomb-making materials -- Congress should not be throwing money at the nuclear weapons complex.
This blatant exercise in pork barrel spending comes at a time when the NNSA has been pushing a "modernization" and upgrade of the nuclear weapons complex under the antiseptic phrase "Complex Transformation." The plan includes the construction of at least three new nuclear weapons factories, and could cost up to $200 billion over the next two decades. It is incumbent upon the Obama administration to put the brakes on this ill-conceived initiative and send the agency back to the drawing boards to come up with a plan to put the weapons complex on a low-level, standby status appropriate to a time of deep reductions -- or ideally, total elimination -- of nuclear weapons.
But first things first -- Senate Appropriations Committee's attempt to slip $7.8 billion to the nuclear weapons complex must be rejected. Then we need to get on with the job of reducing the size and scope of the complex to reflect the reality that nuclear weapons can and should be eliminated once and for all.
Mr. Hartung, you should at least read and consider the following, vet it and factor it in:
http://www.nationalinterest.org/General.aspx?id=92&id2=19712
It's in the Sept./Oct. 2008 National Interest.
There's still a need for operational and updated nuclear weapons infrastructures for deterrence purposes.
January 27, 2009 7:31 PM | Reply | Permalink
While your at it, why not read the concurrent DoD and DoE policy paper here:
http://www.defenselink.mil/news/nuclearweaponspolicy.pdf
It speaks to the need for infrastructure renewal, treaty compliance and non-proliferation.
January 27, 2009 7:34 PM | Reply | Permalink
I know you distrust Russia, with some reason. There are good reasons to make sure what is currently deployed is reliable, but can we distinguish a credible deterrent from the insane numbers of existing weapons and any believable scenario involving their use?
A good history of strategic theory and planning is Fred Kaplan's "Wizards of Armageddon." The conclusion I came to is that we have no coherent theory that details how we can glean any benefit from actual use.
Russia also has no coherent theory of use, except as counter to US weapons. (Note the recent announcement of non longer planning to deploy missiles at Kaliningrad.)
I am not a reflexive disarming type, since I note the absence of outright war between nuclear states, including Pakistan and India. But the main impetus for the nuclear-weapons modernizing and improving schemes is simple budget and job protection.
January 28, 2009 5:41 AM | Reply | Permalink
Uuummmm as someone who lives rather close to the place where they found this: http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn16447-earliest-weaponsgrade-plutonium-found-in-us-dump.html
...I have to say this is a knee-jerk and ill informed protest.
If you bother to look a little closer, you'll find that one of the leaks is now within a hundred feet or so from the deeper water table that would contaminate the Columbia River.
And I know it's bad form to so heavily excerpt an article ... but this is important to some of us in the Northwest. Handford is in WA, and there is also a nasty site down south at the Idaho National Laboratory(but it isn't guaranteed to poison a major waterway, so I'm a little less freaked out by it).
There is a reason for a bipartisan push on this. I agree that we need to scale back our nuclear programs - across the board. But there is some deadly stuff out there. This money is needed.
Oh yeah ... the article I ripped off:
http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/80beats/2009/01/21/the-dirtiest-place-on-earth-still-has-a-lot-of-nuke-waste-to-clean-up/#comment-17692
January 27, 2009 9:20 PM | Reply | Permalink
Cleanup, environmental protection, and wise site choices are separate issues. With nuke facilities, independent, non-profit, public oversight and inspection should be the norm. Such inspectors would have to obtain security clearances in some cases.
It would be dangerous to scale back spending on updating the nuclear infrastructure and technologies because aging nuclear infrastructures are more apt to radioactive incidents such as Hanford and Rocky Flats. However, you can't have increased budgets for these things without accountability. Must have accountability.
I don't think you read the links before writing your comment.
January 27, 2009 10:24 PM | Reply | Permalink
The original authors links or my own? I read them both(and yours). I'm not sure you and I are on the same page here. The cleanup at Rocky Flats was declared complete in 2005 and certified by the EPA in 2007. It's a historical district and soon to be opened national wildlife preserve.
Also, "radioactive incidents" isn't really an apt description of Hanford's issues. Hanford has 53 million gallons of high-level waste (2/3 of the waste in America) in cracked underground tanks actively seeping into the ground atop a water system that runs right through Portland. If the money is there, the clearances are already granted - this cleanup is as shovel ready as they come. It needs $50bn not $7bn.
My link is of recent quotes by officials involved in the stimulus and nuclear related funding. They show the thinking behind the $7.8bn in the stimulus package - which I support and the author of this article seems to oppose. They indicate to me that a good chunk of these funds will be used for cleanup, at Hanford in specific. Even if some of the money will go to buying new computers for an "objectionable" agency, IMO an extra penny to secure this site would make it worth it.
The author's links are related to “Complex Transformation” which is a (ostensibly) $200bn proposal completely separate from the $7.8bn stimulus he is concerned about. I don't like it much either. I've been arguing against the plan with a some severely pro-nuke friends for the past couple of months(they do related research).
My concern, and unless I misread your comment it seems valid, is the author uses an unrelated, crappy plan to attack the funds included in the stimulus - by virtue of the fact that they are related to anything nuclear - even though they will be used to fund some critical cleanup. I think the issue deserves discussion.
I do agree with your points about a need to fund the infrastructure long-term with proper oversight and planning.
January 28, 2009 2:55 AM | Reply | Permalink
kgb, apologies..I'd thought your initial comment was a reply to the sources I'd posted. Case of the me-monster on my part.
January 28, 2009 3:11 AM | Reply | Permalink
Question is: Is the money for the ENNSA going to nuclear weapons or nuclear power clean up?
If the former, Hartung has a good point. If the latter, no point, as I see it. But I don't see anyone citing facts to prove the $7.8B will not go for nuke weapons development.
January 28, 2009 5:05 AM | Reply | Permalink
Several points made in the article "Stimulating the Nuclear Weapons Complex?" should be clarified.
First, Mr. Hartung's main point that "tucked away in the bill is $7.8 billion for the Department of Energy's National Nuclear Security Administration" is factually inaccurate. According to the Senate Appropriations mark, $1 billion would go to NNSA Weapons Activities, not $7.8 billion as claimed by Mr. Hartung. ("The Committee provides $1,000,000,000, of which $900,000,000 is to be applied to address maintenance and general plant project backlogs, other construction activities, and various energy projects throughout the weapons complex. The remaining $100,000,000 is for advanced computer research and development.") The $1 billion in funding is not going towards producing new nuclear weapons, it would be used to maintain aging facilities so that the country can maintain a deterrence capability while also consolidating and reducing the infrastructure of the weapons complex.
Second, the Senate markup does include an additional $6.4 billion for environmental cleanup of the former nuclear weapons complex (this funding is account is not an NSSA account as stated in Mr. Hartung's article; rather, it's funding for the DOE Office of Environmental Management). Cleanup of former energy research & weapons sites has nothing to do with expanding size and scope of nuclear weapons mission; it's actually the opposite. Through environmental cleanup of some of the most polluted sites in the western hemisphere, the federal government can close and reduce its footprint on the environment, and potentially beneficially reuse sites in the long-run for energy purposes. DOE is legally, and morally, required to cleanup these hazardous sites.
Regarding "economic stimulus", both the $6.4 B for DOE environmental cleanup and the $1 B for NNSA weapons activities, are legitimate appropriations for projects that are "boots on the ground" "ready to go" oftentimes with contracts already in place, all of which are key factors in the current debate on stimulative effect of current legislation.
January 31, 2009 3:54 PM | Reply | Permalink