Weapons, nuclear proliferation

Research by chemists and chemical engineers will be needed for the development of new analytical techniques to detect nuclear proliferation threats and treaty violations. This will require establishing the characteristic signatures of both production and testing of weapons. Detection of these signatures will depend on chemical spectroscopy techniques, and advances in remote sensing. 

Unlike both the NPT and the BWC, the CWC establishes an implementing secretariat. The international agency for monitoring nuclear weapons non-proliferation obligations is the IAEA. Its counterpart for chemical weapons is the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons. The OPCW is required ... 

Welcoming the international agreements and other positive measures of recent years in the field of nuclear disarmament, including reductions in arsenals of nuclear weapons, as well as in the field of the prevention of nuclear proliferation in all its aspects. 

Unlike nuclear proliferation, where the mere existence of an unsafeguarded nuclear facility in an NPT member state could be sufficient evidence of intent to produce weapons, many legitimate chemical facilities could have the ability to produce chemical agents. Intent cannot be inferred directly from capability. 

Keywords Nuclear security Non-proliferation Nuclear weapons Radiological weapons Nuclear terrorism fritemational oiganizations Dual-use Arms control law... 

The synergistic application of U.S. and Russian expertise and resources to maximize the safety of nuclear material processes will serve to ensure the successful disposition of excess weapons grade nuclear material in both countries. Collaborative efforts to date have established productive professional relationships between U.S. and Russian nuclear process safety specialists. Valuable experience has been gained that can be applied in the formulation of a successful program structure. A formal U.S.-Russia cooperative program will serve to ensure the safety and continuity of disposition processes and reduce the nuclear proliferation risks presented by this material. 

The perception of enviromnental radioactivity has evolved over the past century, starting with an extended period of scientific exploration until the detonation of the first atomic bomb. During much of the second half of the twentieth century, bomb fallout and the threat of nuclear weapon detonations have dominated discussions of radioactivity. Some countries are decreasing their weapons arsenal, but this still requires a safe method to dispose of the radioactive materials, especially to stop nuclear proliferation. In addition, other countries have been developing nuclear programs and the potential risk of detonations is still real. 

The proliferation of chemical and biological weapons involves a spread in the possession of weapons or of the capability to produce them. Like nuclear proliferation, this phenomenon can have a vertical as well as a horizontal dimension - that is, it can involve the development, refinement, or accretion of weapons by the great powers as well as the spread of capabilities to countries outside the orbits of NATO and the former Warsaw Pact. It can also imply qualitative as much as quantitative developments, since the use of new agents or combinations of agents or new delivery systems could affect the tactical utility of chemical weapons or their effectiveness as a deterrent. 

L.A. Dunn, Containing Nuclear Proliferation , A Papers 263 (Winter 1991), pp.6-12, 23, 25-7 McCain, Controlling Arms Sales to the Third World, pp.84-5 K.C. Bailey, Doomsday Weapons in the Hands of Many The Arms Control Challenge of the 90s (Urbana and Chicago University of Illinois Press, 1991), pp. 16-17, 32-4. 

The Nonproliferation Treaty and the international safeguards to support it failed, unfortunately, to stop new countries from getting possession of nuclear weapons. The effectiveness of political measures would be largely enhanced, if the processes of potential danger from the viewpoint of nuclear proliferation were phased out with development of the new nuclear technology. Such processes include the following ... 

U will only be possible through isotope separation techniques. The high Pu to Pu ratio and the production of gamma emitting Tl in the thorium cycle are hindrances to nuclear proliferation. Pu has a spontaneous fission that contributes to increased residual heat of spent fuel that will complicate the production of nuclear weapons. 

Nuclear proliferation indicates the spread of nuclear knowledge and technology that, though initially may be for the use of nuclear energy for peaceful purposes, can eventually enable many nations, even those of the Third World, to build their own nuclear weapons. The INFCE report dwelt mainly on this subject, but perhaps, in conclusion, the most sensitive points regarding the proliferation of the nuclear fuel cycle should be examined here. 

How to estimate the risk of nuclear proliferation (Weapons of mass destmction, possible extension to CBRN threats.)... 

These details are fundamental. They have a major bearing on the nature of the threat of nuclear proliferation and on the measures taken to prevent it. An efficient (ie, small) uranium bomb has, in practice, to contain around 93% U. Likewise, the plutonium weapons in the arsenals of the weapons states are over 90% Pu . The cleverest weapons designers employed at Los Alamos claim (controversially) that it is possible to create a weapon of some sort from any isotopic composition of plutonium and an inefficient bomb from uranium above around 20% enrichment. As they also admit, this would certainly be inferior to using virtually pure Pu, and advance calculation of its effects would be much more difficult the weapons states have, in practice, stuck to the latter. 

One disadvantage of actinide recycling is that recycled fuel costs approximately 10 to 20 percent more than fresh fuel. Another is that recycling technology could conceivably enable countries or groups to develop nuclear weapons— the proliferation issne. 

Other fuel besides that from U.S. commercial reactors may be disposed of in the ultimate repository. PossibiUties are spent fuel from defense reactors and fuel from research reactors outside of the United States. To reduce the proliferation of nuclear weapons, the United States has urged that research reactors reduce fuel enrichment in uranium-235 from around 90 to 20%. The latter fuel could not be used in a weapon. The United States has agreed to accept spent fuel from these reactors. 

The issue of nuclear weapons proliferation can be met, we believe, by strengthening the IntemationalAtomic Energy Agency both scientifically and by providing it with means of enforcement. 

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