Foreign Policy In Focus

"In crisis lies opportunity" is more than just a cliché (and we're not just talking about Naomi Klein's Shock Doctrine.)  For instance, what could be a better time than the recess-depression in which we're mired to rethink the whole concept of a growth economy, which has become unsustainable in the face of climate change and dwindling resources? At the very least, it's a chance to trim our defense budget. In fact, it might not be foremost in the minds of most Americans, or even of much consolation, but cuts to our nuclear-weapons program constitute a silver lining to our economic crisis.

If you'll recall, earlier this year, the New START treaty was held hostage by Senate Republicans under the direction of Sen. Jon Kyl (R-AZ). By way of ransoming it, the Obama administration forked over a proposal to spend $88 billion during the next decade on nuclear-weapon modernization. (As if to show the futility of that approach, while it was ultimately passed, Kyl still didn't vote in favor of New START.) That figure represents a 20 percent increase above funding levels proposed during the Bush administration.

Equally as sad, as Hans Kristensen wrote at the Federation of American Scientists' Strategic Security Blog:

… 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 [thanks, in part, to a] new counting rule that attributes one weapon to each bomber rather than the actual number of weapons assigned to them. [Even stranger, 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.

Indeed, the New START Treaty is not so much a nuclear reductions treaty as it is a verification and confidence building treaty.

Confidence building is nice and all. But it's been 62 years since both the United States and the former Soviet Union (and then Russia) have possessed nuclear weapons,  25 years since the pivotal Reykjavík nuclear summit, and 20 years since the end of the Cold War. We're still just trying to build confidence?

Meanwhile, what does disarmament look like when it's not just pecking at the inside of its egg struggling to emerge? Regular readers of Focal Points know that we track the progress of the Los Alamos Study Group, a disarmament organization that monitors the Los Alamos Nuclear Laboratory (the heart of the Manhattan Project during World War II) and is today managed by a Bechtel-led consortium for the National Nuclear Security Administration.

In recent years, the mission of the Los Alamos Study Group (LASG) has been to halt the progress of a Soviet-era-sounding project called the Chemistry and Metallurgy Research Replacement Facility (CMRR), intended, in the words of the Los Alamos National Laboratory itself, to perform "analytical chemistry, materials characterization, and metallurgy research and development," for the production of nuclear pits.

Upon first hearing the phrase, a nuclear pit might sound like a dump for nuclear waste and old warheads. But, as in the pit of a fruit, it's an origin of life -- where the chain reaction occurs in a nuclear warhead. You can be forgiven if you're surprised that, in light of President Obama's renowned Prague disarmament speech and New START, however watered down, we're still creating these obscure objects of destruction. Especially considering that 14,000 pits have been recovered from warheads that have been retired.

Physicist and nuclear policy authority Frank von Hippel recently testified in a lawsuit that the LASG filed against the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA).

The need for large-scale pit production has vanished. In 2003, the [NNSA] was arguing that the [United States] needed the capability to produce 125 to 450 pits per year by 2020 to replace the pits in the US weapon stockpile that would be 30 to 40 years old by then. . . . But, in 2006, we learned that US pits were so well made that, according to a Congressionally-mandated review of … pit aging, "Most primary types have credible minimum lifetimes in excess of 100 years."

Of course, that's as much bad news -- these infernal engines will be around for another century unless they're dismantled -- as good news. Meanwhile, the CMRR project is now expected to cost between $4 and $6 billion. In order to halt or at least stall it, the LASG filed a case against the NNSA seeking a new Environmental Impact Statement (as mandated by the National Environmental Policy Act) to address, among other things, seismic concerns about the project. While that case was dismissed, the LASG is not only appealing it, but filing a second lawsuit toward the same end. In the latest LASG newsletter, Executive Director Greg Mello writes (emphasis added):

On December 15, House and Senate conferees issued their "megabus" appropriations bill for fiscal year (FY) 2012. [Passed in the Senate and House, though 86 Republicans defied Republican leadership and voted against it. -- RW] … the bill appropriates only 63% of the requested funds for the [CMRR], slashing $100 million (M) from the $270 M proposed spending level in the project. … CMRR and [a project in proximity to it] were the only NNSA Weapons Activities construction projects cut. … The proposed CMRR cut is 90% of the total proposed cut in new NNSA construction. NNSA's other proposed massive project, the Uranium Processing Facility (UPF), slated to be built at the Y-12 Nuclear Security Site in Tennessee, was not cut at all.   

We have no wish to slight the forces arrayed against the Oak Ridge, Tennessee project. But we can't help but conclude that, along with current economic climate, the Los Alamos Study Group made the difference in slowing progress of the CMRR.

As Mello writes, the funding cut "can be fairly described as one of the few concrete policy accomplishments of the entire arms control and disarmament community in the United States over the past couple of years." Never mind your garden-party treaties that are guaranteed not to offend -- when the construction of a facility designated for the manufacture of nuclear-weapons components is blocked, that's disarmament you can taste and feel.

[The National Nuclear Security Administration] has advanced a "new paradigm" of nuclear weapons management. … which is really just the old Cold War revived. [The] CMRR-NF is a required gateway to that bleak and hopeless world. 
-- Greg Mello, Los Alamos Study Group

A nuclear "pit," as regular readers of Focal Points know, is the heart of a nuclear weapon where the chain reaction occurs. The fight to halt the construction of a facility that's instrumental in their manufacture is finally experiencing some success and the media, including mainstream, has been noticing. By way of background, an excerpt from a recent post of ours about the Chemistry Metallurgy Research Replacement Facility (CMRR-NF ) follows.

To Focal Points' surprise, the New York Times addressed the facility in an editorial on October 29 titled The Bloated Nuclear Budget, which began:

Twenty years after the end of the cold war, the United States still has about 2,500 nuclear weapons deployed and 2,600 more as backup. The Obama administration, in an attempt to mollify Congressional Republicans, has also committed to modernizing an already hugely expensive complex of nuclear labs and production facilities. [But the] country does not need to maintain this large an arsenal. … President Obama [should speed up] already negotiated reductions in deployed weapons and committing to further cuts, unilaterally if necessary.

Including

Halt construction of the new plutonium storage facility at Los Alamos National Laboratory. Costs have increased tenfold, and there are serious safety questions about the location — along a fault line and near an active volcano. Savings: $2.9 billion.

Greg Mello is the executive director of the Los Alamos Study Group, which is leading the charge to block the CMRR-NF, via the courts. The LASG is both appealing the dismissal of its case which sought a new Environmental Impact Statement (under the National Environmental Policy Act) to address those seismic concerns and is filing a second lawsuit to the same end.

Not long after singling out the CMRR-NF for condemnation, the Times provided Mello with space for an op-ed of his own. He points out that the present plutonium facility at Los Alamos

… which has about twice the space inside as the proposed one, already has a high-capacity manufacturing line that takes up just a third of the building. Why does the nuclear administration need to produce more pits, let alone at a faster rate? Scientists agree that the existing stock of pits will last a century or so without replacement.

Then the American Conservative ran a story about the CMRR-NF. Kelley Beaucar Vlahos reports.

It hasn’t been built yet—in fact, the designs aren’t even finished after 10 years. But the Chemistry and Metallurgy Research Replacement Nuclear Facility (CMRR-NF) has been soaking up taxpayer money all the same as the scope of the project has metastasized.

“The country doesn’t have money to pour into an unnecessary, giant boondoggle that has grown beyond all original expectations,” charges Greg Mello, executive director of the Los Alamos Study Group. … There is no doubt that the budget-cutting imperative is clashing with the old way of doing business on Capitol Hill, as pet projects and earmarks come under more scrutiny than ever. … That includes CMRR-NF, which has never been the subject of a public congressional hearing or passionate floor speech—much less a heated debate on cable TV or talk radio—but has been controversial nonetheless.

Finally, some good news, as relayed in the latest LASG newsletter.

Today the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Judicial District ruled … in favor of the Los Alamos Study Group on a motion by the Department of Justice (DOJ) requesting dismissal of the Study Group's appeal of a May 2011 decision by a New Mexico federal district court which allowed the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) and the Department of Energy (DOE) to continue working toward building [the CMRR-NF].

The Study Group had claimed, and still claims in this appeal and in a second lawsuit filed in New Mexico federal court, that NNSA and DOE have never written an applicable environmental impact statement (EIS) for the facility … that the agencies involved are violating the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), and that the project is proceeding illegally and must be halted while an applicable EIS is written. … In a separate positive ruling yesterday for Study Group in their second NEPA case in New Mexico federal court, the court denied DOJ's attempt to transfer the new case to the Honorable Judith Herrera, who had ruled against the Study Group in the first case, the case now under appeal.  

Then, on Monday, December 5, the Associated Press addressed the CMRR-NF in an article titled Debate over $6B Los Alamos nuke lab.

Questions continue to swirl about exactly what kind of nuclear and plutonium research will be done there, whether the lab is really necessary, and — perhaps most important — will it be safe, or could it become New Mexico's equivalent of Japan's Fukushima?

As federal officials prepare the final design plans for the controversial and very expensive lab, increased scrutiny is being placed on what in recent years has been discovered to be a greater potential for a major earthquake along the fault lines that have carved out the stunning gorges, canyons and valleys that surround the premier U.S. nuclear weapons facility in northern New Mexico. 

It's beginning to look as if the nuclear weapons-industrial complex has overreached with the CMRR-NF. We'll give Mello the last word.

NNSA has advanced a “new paradigm” of nuclear weapons management, so far without White House endorsement, which aims at repeated upgrades and replacements to nuclear weapons on an accelerated schedule. If accepted, this “new paradigm” … – which is really just the old Cold War revived – could serve as a potent narrative supporting a new arms race with Russia, a possibility which is never far away. CMRR-NF is a required gateway to that bleak and hopeless world. 

As those who read Focal Points regularly know, a facility intended to provide technical support for the production of the plutonium pits for nuclear warheads is under construction at Los Alamos National Laboratory. The pit -- which, one ventures to guess, makes the warhead the fruit of our nuclear-weapons program -- is where the chain reaction occurs. To Focal Points' surprise, the New York Times addressed the facility in an editorial on October 29 titled The Bloated Nuclear Budget, which began:

Twenty years after the end of the cold war, the United States still has about 2,500 nuclear weapons deployed and 2,600 more as backup. The Obama administration, in an attempt to mollify Congressional Republicans, has also committed to modernizing an already hugely expensive complex of nuclear labs and production facilities. Altogether, these and other nuclear-related programs could cost $600 billion or more over the next decade. The country does not need to maintain this large an arsenal. … especially when Congress is considering deep cuts in vital domestic programs. … President Obama [should speed up] already negotiated reductions in deployed weapons and committing to further cuts, unilaterally if necessary.

Including

Halt construction of the new plutonium storage facility at Los Alamos National Laboratory. Costs have increased tenfold, and there are serious safety questions about the location — along a fault line and near an active volcano. Savings: $2.9 billion.

Greg Mello is the executive director of the Los Alamos Study Group, which is leading the charge to block the facility, known as the Chemistry and Metallurgy Research Replacement Facility (CMRR-NF), via the courts. The LASG is both appealing the dismissal of its case which sought a new Environmental Impact Statement (under the National Environmental Policy Act) to address those seismic concerns and is filing a second lawsuit to the same end. In the comments section of the op-ed, Mello points out that the Times underestimated the cost of the CMRR-NF.

The CMRR project is now expected to cost between $4 and $6 billion, not $3 billion. NNSA and the Bechtel-led consortium that runs Los Alamos want to start construction a year or more before design is completed; currently the Senate would allow and fund that but the House would not. A year from now when design is 90% complete the cost may be higher; experience shows further large cost increases can be expected between now and the planned completion date in 2023. 

Continuing to look at the CMRR-NF in purely economic terms, at the New Mexican, Roger Snodgrass writes:

Some small-business owners in Santa Fe are opposing the proposed plutonium facility at Los Alamos National Laboratory. … Although the group has been gathering support for several weeks, the announcement of its formation in a newspaper ad coincided with the release of a formal record of decision, a day earlier, that approved the plan to build a nuclear facility at LANL. … "We hope New Mexicans will take more interest now, and if they want to keep some value in the real estate and attract visitors from all over the world, they better think twice about their relation with Los Alamos," said Willem Malten, the organizer of the businesses. 
Also, in 2008
 
… 326 New Mexico businesses … signed a "Call to Disarmament" developed by the Los Alamos Study Group. The petition called for a stop to the "design and manufacture of all nuclear weapons, including plutonium bomb cores ['pits'] at Los Alamos and elsewhere." 

Mello, too, speaks about the effect (or lack thereof) of nuclear-weapons projects such as the CMRR-NF on the local economy in an interview with Mary-Charlotte Domandi on KSFR, Santa Fe Public Radio:

Unlike a solar or wind-energy project, which could potentially bring in hundreds of millions of dollars in capital investment and create thousands of jobs (as opposed to just 660), the CMRR, in Mello's opinion, benefits primarily the companies who already own LANL (Bechtel, the University of California, BMW), while hardly generating any long term value. "It doesn't train people to do anything in the economy," observed Mello. "It doesn't provide any infrastructure, in that it functions in the real economy (there are no goods or services provided, since no one buys or sells nuclear pits). And it attracts no private capital."

Or as Andrew Lichterman, also a member of the LASG, as well as the Western States Legal Foundation and Reaching Critical Will, writes: Even though the CMRR-NF is

… by far the largest government  construction project in New Mexico history aside from the interstate highway system [much] of this money will flow to contractors based elsewhere, as Los Alamos is now managed by a consortium including such huge multinational nuclear industry players as Bechtel and B&W. Complex high tech military construction projects create fewer jobs per dollar than most other types of public spending, and even fewer permanent positions. The end result for New Mexico, where Los Alamos County residents have a per capita income over 4 times that of the poorest county, will be further economic stratification. 

Nuclear-weapons projects are of so little benefit to the economy of the state that they don't even qualify as pork. Lichterman explains who they benefit and how. Take a moment to digest his thoughts: if you're like me, you haven't seen nuclear weapons viewed in exactly this light before.

The nuclear road provides elites in that sector with privileged access to their own country’s resources, a development context that can be shielded from foreign competition, and forms of trade and industry that can be portrayed as increasing in importance as fossil fuels diminish. The powerful tools of nationalism and “national security” secrecy both facilitate the extraction of wealth from the rest of society and prevent scrutiny of national nuclear enterprises that … have been rife with technical problems, corruption, and widespread, intractable environmental impacts. Nuclear technology, with its vision of near-magical, limitless power (an image its purveyors energetically promote), casts a positive aura over other big, centralized high-tech development programs that are profitable for elites, but have little or even negative value for much of the population in an ever more stratified world.

To conform to the requirements of the congressional supercommittee, the House of Representatives is debating whether to cut hundreds of billions from nuclear weapons programs over the next 10 years.

At the Atlantic, Joseph Cirincione of the Ploughshares Funds writes::

Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) sent a letter to the 12 members of the supercommittee …  signed by 65 lawmakers." Even though the Cold War ended, Markey wrote, "We continue to spend over $50 billion a year on the U.S. nuclear arsenal. … We are robbing the future to pay for the unneeded weapons of the past."

The House Appropriations Committee cut funding for nuclear warheads and weapons material production by almost 7 percent from the President's request, or $498 million. [Meanwhile, the] Senate subcommittee cut just a tad less -- $440 million -- from the same programs.  Members are increasingly troubled by rising costs, slipping schedules and questionable need for new weapons production plants. "The Committee is concerned about the escalating costs for two new nuclear facilities to handle plutonium and uranium," the Senate report noted.

One of these two new nuclear facilities is the proposed Chemistry and Metallurgy Research Replacement Nuclear Facility (CMRR-NF) at Los Alamos National Laboratory. On the grounds that a new Environmental Impact Statement (EIS), instead of just a supplemental EIS, was required because of, among other things, seismic issues (such as a 3.8 earthquake nearby on October 16) the Los Alamos Study Group sought to halt the project.

In his latest press release, LASG executive director Greg Mello writes that, on October 13, "the National Nuclear Security Administration … issued an 'amended' 'Record of Decision' to build the [CMRR-NF] expected to cost $4 to $6 billion. … as much as the total constant-dollar [adjusted for inflation] cost of all the buildings and programs in Los Alamos for the first decade and a half, from 1943 to 1957." During the Manhattan Project, that is.

The Record of Decision, Mello explains, "is the formal completion of the most recent environmental review of the project under the National Environmental Policy Act."

But, just as it looked like it was green-lighted, "We do not anticipate that this project will succeed, in the end,” writes Mello. "We are now in a kind of fiscal 'Indian Summer;' the real frosts of deficit reduction have not started to hit. … Many decision makers know there isn't enough money to build CMRR simultaneously with a more important project in Tennessee unless both are slowed and made much more expensive in the process." Ironic as that sounds.

He concludes that the United States can't "afford to maintain such a huge nuclear arsenal in the first place, since the delivery systems are wearing out and very expensive to replace." As usual, Mello not only looks at the costs, but the wider implications for the real-world economy. The CMRR-NF, like nuclear weapons in general for the most part, "also makes no economically useful infrastructure, attracts no private capital, trains nobody in anything useful for our economy, and produces no goods and services for sale (we hope). … At $1,000,000 per job created, it's an economic disaster in waiting."  

Remember the movies and Broadway play Little Shop of Horrors? Our nuclear-weapons program is like Audrey II, the carnivorous plant screaming "Feed me." Time to, in the words of conservatives, starve the beast.

Republicans never met a nuclear weapon they didn’t like, right? Generally, that’s true, but neither are they immune to infatuation with another program that happens to be at odds with nuclear weapons as the national-security policy of last defense. All of a sudden Republicans’ mania for cost-cutting might override the special place they hold in their hearts for “our nuclear deterrent,” as they euphemize nuclear weapons.

On June 15, at the Washington Post, Walter Pincus provided as good an introduction as any to what transpired.

. . . lawmakers are cutting into the funds that the Obama administration had pledged for [nuclear] upgrades and modernization. The House Appropriations subcommittee that approves funding of the weapons complex, run by the National Nuclear Security Agency (NNSA), just whacked almost $500 million from the weapons program. A slice of $100 million came out of a $200 million pot that is supposed to finance early steps in the coming year to build a new facility at Los Alamos National Laboratory.

What’s strange about the $100 million is that  

Sen. Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.) had pushed for funding for [the above-mentioned facility, known as] the Chemistry and Metallurgy Research Replacement facility [CMRR-NF] — expected to cost $5 billion or more — as one of his demands of the Obama administration.

As a condition, that is, of he and the Republican members of the Senate voting to ratify New START. Pincus again:

Problem is, members of the House weren’t involved in the discussions. [The] House Republican-led subcommittee that cut the funds says NNSA is not ready to support spending for early construction [of the CMRR-NF] because seismic issues are not resolved in the design. Plus, the subcommittee says, there is a need to revalidate what capabilities are to be needed in the plutonium area.

The function of the CMRR-NF, you may recall from earlier posts of mine, is to perform scientific work for the nearby construction of nuclear pits – the living, breathing hearts of a nuclear weapon where the chain reaction occurs. As for the need for new nuclear pits, Frank von Hippel, physicist and nuclear policy authority, recently testified

The need for large-scale pit production has vanished. In 2003, the [NNSA] was arguing that the [United States] needed the capability to produce 125 to 450 pits per year by 2020 to replace the pits in the US weapon stockpile that would be 30 to 40 years old by then. . . . But, in 2006, we learned that US pits were so well made that, according to a Congressionally-mandated review of Los Alamos and Livermore studies on pit aging, "Most primary types have credible minimum lifetimes in excess of 100 years as regards aging of plutonium."

Greg Mello of the Los Alamos Study Group, which has dedicated itself to halting construction of the CMRR-NF, said in a recent newsletter that at the Los Alamos “these proposed increases were to be unprecedented since the Manhattan Project.”

Regarding the CMRR-NF, the bill’s report reads “The Committee recommends $200,000,000, $100,000,000 below the budget request.” Although it “fully supports the Administration’s plans to modernize the infrastructure,” the Committee

. . . intends to closely review the funding requests for new investments to ensure those plans adhere to good project management practices. The latest funding profile provided to the Committee indicates that over half the funding requested for the Nuclear Facility would be used to start early construction activities. [But the] NNSA is not prepared to award that project milestone since [the project must, among other things] first resolve major seismic issues with its design.

In other words 

Modernization will take several years and the considerable number of variables still at play argues against an excessively aggressive funding curve. The construction of the new major facilities must not force out available modernization funding for the rest of the nuclear security enterprise.

More on the “excessively aggressive funding curve” from Mello (emphasis added):

This $100 million . . . cut is 90% of all the Committee’s proposed cuts in NNSA construction, meaning that the House Appropriations is almost uniquely targeting  CMRR-NF, among all proposed NNSA construction, for cuts. 

Meanwhile, at Arms Control Now, the blog of the Arms Control Association, Daryl Kimball writes (emphasis added):

Early news accounts have overlooked the fact that the House Energy and Water Appropriations bill would increase—not decrease—the NNSA weapons activities budget above the previous year's level, and has allocated more than enough money to keep programs on track but not so much as to be fiscally irresponsible in this fiscally-constrained time.

The . . .  appropriations committee would increase funding for . . . weapons activities by 3% to $7.13 billion for fiscal 2012 from $6.99 for fiscal 2011. The fiscal 2010 appropriation for NNSA weapons activities was $6.36 billion.

But, according to Mello:

Overall, the Committee would slash $498 M from the Obama request for NNSA nuclear Weapons Activities, adding only 3% [over last year], a 6.6% cut from Obama’s warhead request. Considering inflation, nuclear warhead spending would not rise. 

Still, there’s no denying, as Mello says, that, “Relatively speaking, the Committee protected the nuclear weapons establishment.” In fact, aside from the CMRR, most everything else was rubber-stamped. For example (emphasis added):

Project 10–D–501, Nuclear Facilities Risk Reduction, Y–12 National Security Complex, Oak Ridge, TN.—The Committee recommends $35,387,000 as requested.

Project 08–D–802, High Explosive Pressing Facility, Pantex Plant, Amarillo, TX.—The Committee recommends $66,960,000 as requested.

Project 06–D–141, Project Engineering & Design, Uranium Processing Facility, Y–12 National Security Complex, Oak Ridge, TN.—The Committee recommends $160,194,000 as requested.

Meanwhile, the response to these developments of a less-than-totally-informed observer such as myself might run something like this:

Slashing CMRR-NF funding is like Republicans are saying to the Obama administration: We got you to commit outrageous amounts of money to the CMRR-NF and other nuclear-weapons project by holding passage of New START hostage. But this time we weren’t in our default more-money-for-defense posture. Nor was it about pork. This time, inducing you to commit to these extravagant sums for the CMRR-NF and other nuclear projects was a ploy to make you look like you were playing fast and loose with taxpayers' money. This year's model of Republican is less about defense or pork than cutting spending (or looking like we are).

Who knew that you can actually be too cynical about Republicans? Turns out, I was informed, that, while Senator Kyl is an old-fashioned defense-first Republican, some Republicans in the House Appropriations Committee are respectful of that particular committee’s traditional view that nuclear weapons are over-funded. As well, of course, the Tea Party strain currently infecting the Republican party seems to be emphasizing deficits over defense at the moment.

We’ll allow Kimball to put it all in perspective:

The Obama administration’s $88 billion, 10-year plan to operate the nuclear complex represents a 20 percent increase above funding levels proposed during the Bush administration.