Ringing in Proliferation Montgomery How to Dismantle …cisac.fsi.stanford.edu/sites/default/files/Montgomery_IS.pdfRinging in Proliferation T he nuclear nonpro - liferation regime

Ringing in Proliferation

The nuclear nonpro-liferation regime has come under attack from a group of academics and policy-makers who argue that traditional tools such as export controls diplomaticpressure arms control agreements and threats of economic sanctions are nolonger sufordfcient to battle proliferation They point to North Korearsquos reinvigo-ration of its plutonium program Iranrsquos apparent progress in developing a nu-clear capability and the breadth of the Abdul Qadeer (AQ) Khan network asevidence that the regime is failing1 In addition they claim that proliferation isdriven by the inevitable spread of technology from a dense network of suppli-ers and that certain ldquoroguerdquo states possess an unordmagging determination to ac-quire nuclear weapons Consequently they argue that only extreme measuressuch as aggressively enforced containment or regime change can slow the ad-dition of several more countries to the nuclear club This ldquoproliferation deter-minismrdquo at least in rhetoric is shared by many prominent members ofPresident George W Bushrsquos administration and has become the main thrust ofUS counterproliferation policy2 Yet current proliferators are neither as ldquodead

Alexander H Montgomery is a postdoctoral fellow at the Center for International Security and Cooperationat Stanford University Please send comments to ahmstanfordalumniorg

The author is grateful for critiques of multiple versions of this article from Paul MacDonald and ToddSechser comments from an anonymous reviewer for International Security suggestions from ChaimBraun Christopher Chyba Lynn Eden Scott Sagan and Dean Wilkening and feedback from the partici-pants in the Research Seminar at the Center for International Security and Cooperation Stanford Institutefor International Studies Stanford University

1 On proliferation networks in general see Chaim Braun and Christopher Chyba ldquoProliferationRings New Challenges to the Nuclear Nonproliferation Regimerdquo International Security Vol 29No 2 (Fall 2004) pp 5ndash49 On North Korea see Jonathan D Pollack ldquoThe United States NorthKorea and the End of the Agreed Frameworkrdquo Naval War Review Vol 56 No 3 (Summer 2003)pp 11ndash49 On Iran see IAEA (International Atomic Energy Agency) Board of Governors ldquoImple-mentation of the NPT Safeguards Agreement in the Islamic Republic of Iranrdquo IAEA report GOV200483 (Vienna International Atomic Energy Agency November 15 2004) httpwwwiaeaorgPublicationsDocumentsBoard2004gov2004-83_derestrictpdf On the AQ Khannetwork see Gaurav Kampani ldquoProliferation Unbound Nuclear Tales from Pakistanrdquo (MontereyCalif Center for Nonproliferation Studies Monterey Institute of International Studies February23 2004) httpcnsmiisedupubsweek040223htm2 See for example Paul Wolfowitz ldquoDeputy Secretary Wolfowitz QampArdquo International Institutefor Strategic Studies Asia Security Conference Singapore May 31 2003 httpwwwdefenselinkmiltranscripts2003tr20030531-depsecdef0246html George W Bush ldquoPresidentAnnounces New Measure to Counter the Threat of Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) Re-marks by the President on Weapons of Mass Destruction Proliferationrdquo February 11 2004 httpwwwstategovtacrlsrm200429291htm Condoleezza Rice ldquoRemarks by National Security

International Security Vol 30 No 2 (Fall 2005) pp 153ndash187copy 2005 by the President and Fellows of Harvard College and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Ringing in Proliferation

Ringing in Proliferation Alexander HMontgomery

How to Dismantle anAtomic Bomb Network

153

setrdquo on proliferating nor as advanced in their nuclear capabilities asdeterminists claim3 To dismantle the network of existing proliferation pro-grams the administration should instead move toward a policy of ldquoprolifera-tion pragmatismrdquo This would entail abandoning extreme rhetoric using a fullrange of incentives and disincentives aimed at states seeking to acquire a nu-clear capability targeting the hubs of proliferation networks and engaging indirect talks with the Islamic Republic of Iran and the Democratic PeoplesrsquoRepublic of Korea (DPRK)

In practice the Bush administrationrsquos nonproliferation policies have beenmore varied and less aggressive than its rhetoric would suggest For exampleit has been willing to enter talks with North Korea and Libya despite describ-ing both as ldquoroguesrdquo Strong words can be used strategically to convinceproliferators that accepting a settlement offer would be better than continuingto hold out Yet the administrationrsquos unyielding rhetoric has placed the UnitedStates in a position from which it is difordfcult to back down4 combined with alack of positive incentives this stance has convinced proliferators that theUnited States will not agree to or uphold any settlement short of regimechange Moreover the administration has not formulated any coherentcounterproliferation policies other than regime change and an aggressive formof export control enforcement known as the Proliferation Security InitiativeWith respect to two of the key proliferators todaymdashIran and North KoreamdashtheBush administration has shown little interest in offering any signiordfcant incen-tives or establishing any clear red lines Instead it has relied almost exclu-sively on China to convince the DPRK to give up its nuclear program and hasdeclined to join the United Kingdom France and Germany in talks with Iran

Proliferation determinists present two arguments First dense networksamong second-tier proliferators such as Iran North Korea and Libya and pri-

International Security 302 154

Advisor Dr Condoleezza Rice to the Reagan Lecturerdquo February 26 2004 httpwwwwhitehousegovnewsreleases20040220040228-1html John R Bolton ldquoThe Bush Adminis-tration and Nonproliferation A New Strategy Emergesrdquo panel 1 of a hearing of the House Com-mittee on International Relations 108th Cong 2d sess March 30 2004 httpwwwstategovtusrm31010htm and Richard Cheney ldquoRemarks by the Vice President at Westminster CollegerdquoApril 26 2004 httpwwwwhitehousegovnewsreleases200404print20040426-8html3 John R Bolton ldquoPreventing Iran from Acquiring Nuclear Weaponsrdquo remarks to the Hudson In-stitute August 17 2004 httpwwwstategovtusrm35281htm4 As Vice President Dick Cheney has argued ldquoI have been charged by the president with makingsure that none of the tyrannies in the world are negotiated with We donrsquot negotiate with evil wedefeat itrdquo Quoted in Warren P Strobel ldquoAdministration Struggles to Find Right Approach to NKorea Talksrdquo Knight Ridder December 20 2003

vate agentsmdashincluding AQ Khan and two of his middlemen Buhary SeyedAbu (BSA) Tahir and Urs Tinnermdashhave rapidly accelerated proliferation andlowered technological barriers5 Because these networks are widespread anddecentralized global measures rather than strategies targeted at individualstates are necessary to slow these processes Second certain rogue states aredead set on proliferating and thus have no interest in bargaining These twoarguments deordfne two variablesmdashnetwork structure and state intentionsmdashencompassing four kinds of states that can be mapped to four differentnonproliferation strategies (see Figure 1) Proliferation determinists argue thata number of states (eg Iran North Korea and formerly Libya) belong in theupper-right quadrant of Figure 1 (regime change) because these regimes aredetermined to seek nuclear weapons and are connected by effective decentral-ized networks they must be changed

Both parts of the determinist argument are based on an interpretation of theprogress of new proliferators that is at odds with publicly available docu-

Ringing in Proliferation 155

5 Libya reinvigorated its nuclear program in 1995 then announced its termination in December2003 On the roles of Tahir and Tinner see Polis Diraja Malaysia ldquoPress Release by Inspector Gen-eral of Police in Relation to Investigation on the Alleged Production of Components for LibyarsquosUranium Enrichment Programmerdquo Royal Malaysia Police ofordfcial website February 20 2004httpwwwrmpgovmyrmp03040220scomi_enghtm

Figure 1 Network Structures and State Intentions Mapped to NonproliferationStrategies

ments The evidence that decentralized proliferation networks have allowedthese proliferators to make great strides is contestable the evidence that cer-tain types of regimes are dead set on nuclear proliferation and cannot be per-suaded to abandon their nuclear programs is even less compelling Althoughthe source of nuclear knowledge may have shifted from ordfrst-tier (advanced in-dustrialized) to second-tier (developing industrial) states there is no cause forproliferation panic

In this article I propose an alternative approachmdashproliferation pragma-tismmdashthat rests on two premises First nuclear proliferation networks arehighly centralized and are much less effective than determinists claim Secondgiven sufordfcient incentives proliferators can be persuaded to halt or roll backtheir programs Consequently most if not necessarily all states are in thelower-left quadrant of Figure 1 proliferation can be halted or slowed throughproper application of country-speciordfc incentives selected from a broad rangeof options The presence of second-tier networks is indeed a new problemMeasures to deal with them should be based on an analysis of their structureand the speed of technological development The hub-and-spoke structure ofnuclear weapons and ballistic missile networksmdashwhich I argue developed inpart because of the difordfculty of passing on the tacit knowledge required to suc-cessfully build and operate these weaponsmdashrequires a policy that targets thehubs rather than a policy of systemwide coerced change Past successes inslowing the spread of nuclear weapons through the use of targeted incentivesrather than demanding regime change indicate that even the most seeminglydetermined proliferants can be slowed without resorting to extreme measures

The two remaining quadrants in Figure 1 (global controls and isolation) dif-fer in their policy prescriptions from pragmatism and determinism If a prolif-eration network is decentralized but states that are part of it can be persuadedto halt their programs global methods (such as those discussed by ChaimBraun and Christopher Chyba) that enhance the bargain of the nonprolifera-tion treaty by providing more incentives and making transfers of nuclear tech-nology more difordfcult are most appropriate6 If the network is centralized butstates are determined to develop a nuclear capability then proliferation can be


6 Global methods advocated by Braun and Chyba include universalization of export controls ex-tension of the Proliferation Security Initative (PSI) an Energy Security Initative to complement thePSI a Fissile Material Cutoff Treaty and a policy of nuclear de-emphasis by the United StatesBraun and Chyba ldquoProliferation Ringsrdquo

stopped by threatening to isolate a few key states similar to the policy of dualcontainment of Iran and Iraq pursued by President Bill Clintonrsquos administra-tion7 Unlike regime change these prescriptions (especially global controls) arepotentially compatible with incentives targeted at speciordfc states althoughthey will most likely fail if used without incentives

In the next section I argue that nuclear proliferation networks have not sig-niordfcantly altered the length of the development cycle of nuclear weapons pro-grams and that regime type has little inordmuence on statesrsquo desires to seek suchweapons contrary to the claims of proliferation determinists I then examinethe structure of the proliferation networks and discuss the role of tacit knowl-edge in shaping those structures and hindering new proliferants In the thirdsection I review and critique steps taken to dismantle these networks I thenconclude with recommendations based on past successes

New Proliferators Are Neither Advanced Nor Determined

Proliferation determinists contend that the inevitable spread of nuclear tech-nology combined with regimes that are dead set on proliferating calls for apolicy of regime change Although countriesrsquo capabilities and intentions aredifordfcult to ascertain it is possible to compare particular claims made bydeterminists with publicly available data and reasonable calculations to dem-onstrate that the determinist case is far from certain a policy of regime changerequires much better evidence than advocates of determinism have presentedIn this section I focus primarily on the cases of North Korea Iran and LibyaBecause these countries were the primary recipients of nuclear technologyfrom the AQ Khan network and have been singled out as by the United Statesas ldquoroguerdquo states these should be easy cases for proliferation determinism Inaddition to examining the technological progress of these states I evaluate thedeterministsrsquo argument that particular regimes are dead set on proliferatingand ordfnd that the available evidence fails to support this assertion

nuclear networks leapfrogging or falling down

Determinists argue that proliferation networks are ubiquitous interlinkedand effective Some even group together proliferation networks and terrorist


7 Anthony Lake ldquoConfronting Backlash Statesrdquo Foreign Affairs Vol 73 No 2 (MarchApril1994) pp 45ndash55

networks for example President Bush argued in February 2004 that ldquowithdeadly technology and expertise going on the market therersquos the terrible pos-sibility that terrorists groups [sic] could obtain the ultimate weapons they de-sire mostrdquo8 The same month National Security Adviser Condoleezza Ricenoted ldquoWe now know however that there are actually two paths to weaponsof mass destructionmdashsecretive and dangerous states that pursue them andshadowy private networks and individuals who also trafordfc in these materialsmotivated by greed or fanaticism or perhaps bothrdquo9 Similarly Vice PresidentDick Cheney contended in April 2004 that ldquoour enemy no longer takes theform of a vast empire but rather a shadowy network of killers which joinedby outlaw regimes would seek to impose its will on free nations by terror andintimidationrdquo10 But how effective are these proliferation networks Undersec-retary of State John Bolton warned in May 2004 ldquoIt is clear that the recently re-vealed proliferation network of AQ Khan has done great damage to theglobal nonproliferation regime and poses a threat to the security of all statesgathered here todayrdquo11 Yet the difordfculties that the leadership in PyongyangIran and Libya have encountered in seeking to achieve nuclear capabilities in-dicate that there are still signiordfcant barriers to the development and transfer oftechnological knowledge

Although North Korea has received relatively little outside help with its plu-tonium program proliferation determinists cite its possession of ldquoup to eightbombsrdquo as a rationale for action arguing that the leadership in Pyongyangmay seek to sell plutonium to third parties12 Evidence suggests however thatNorth Korea may have much less plutonium than is commonly claimed InMay 1994 the DPRK heightened a crisis it started in 1993 by removing nearly8000 fuel rods from its Yongbyon nuclear reactor In exchange for diplomaticand economic beneordfts from the United States the North Koreans agreed toplace these rods in sealed canisters under International Atomic Energy Agency(IAEA) supervision standard calculations estimate that these rods (in additionto the rods that North Korea irradiated before 1989 and may have removed


8 Bush ldquoPresident Announces New Measure to Counter the Threat of Weapons of MassDestructionrdquo9 Rice ldquoRemarks by National Security Advisor Dr Condoleezza Rice to the Reagan Lecturerdquo10 Cheney ldquoRemarks by the Vice President at Westminster Collegerdquo11 John R Bolton ldquoNuclear Suppliers Group Plenaryrdquo statement to the 2004 Nuclear SuppliersGroup plenary meeting Goumlteborg Sweden May 27 2004 httpwwwstategovtusrm33121htm12 Bill Gertz ldquoNorth Korea Seen Readying Its First Nuclear Arms Testrdquo Washington Times April23 2005

and reprocessed) could contain as much as 415 kilograms (kg) of plutonium13

This calculation however assumes a high capacity factor of 80 percent for thereactor between 1989 and 199414 But the North Koreans also placed about 700broken fuel rods into dry storage making such a robust reliability unlikely15

Multiple shutdowns of North Korearsquos reactor between 1989 and 1994 possiblycaused by mechanical problems rather than regular maintenance have alsobeen reported16 Since the reactor was restarted in early 2003 it has been shuton and off multiple times indicating that the North Koreans are still experi-encing difordfculties operating it17 Many accounts assume that the North Kore-ans are understating the amount of plutonium that they have produced thisignores the signiordfcant incentives they have to overstate the amount they maypossess as a greater deterrent and for greater leverage

Since former Los Alamos National Laboratory Director Sigfried Heckerveriordfed in January 2004 that the 8000 fuel rods were no longer in theircannisters at the Yongbyon facility most analysts have assumed that they werereprocessed signiordfcantly increasing the potential nuclear material separatedby the North Koreans Yet whether the rods have been reprocessed is unclear18


13 According to David Albright Hans Berkhout and William Walker if between 1989 and 1994the plant was operated 80 percent of the timemdasha high estimatemdashit could have produced 33 kg ofplutonium in addition to the 95 kg still in the rods if only a few rods were extracted in 1989Albright Berkhout and Walker Plutonium and Highly Enriched Uranium 1996 World InventoriesCapabilities and Policies (Oxford Oxford University Press 1997) pp 298ndash29914 Capacity factor is equal to the actual energy produced divided by the energy that could havebeen produced if the reactor was run constantly for the entire time period at 100 percent power15 Robert Alvarez interview with author Washington DC November 8 2004 and RobertAlvarez ldquoNorth Korea No Bygones at Yongbyonrdquo Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists Vol 59 No 4(JulyAugust 2003) pp 38ndash45 Alvarez was a senior policy adviser in the US Department of En-ergy who oversaw the canning of the spent fuel rods Albright Berkhout and Walker note thepresence of 650 rods in dry storage in addition to the rods extracted from the reactor See AlbrightBerkhout and Walker Plutonium and Highly Enriched Uranium 1996 p 29416 Albright Berkhout and Walker Plutonium and Highly Enriched Uranium 1996 p 29817 See for example the images at the Institute for Science and International Security of the DPRKnuclear power plant Corey Hinderstein ldquoImagery Brief of Activities at the Yongbyon Siterdquo July 12003 httpwwwisis-onlineorgpublicationsdprkImagerypdf These photos indicate a shut-down sometime between March and June a second shutdown occurred later that fall DouglasJehl ldquoShutdown of Nuclear Complex Deepens North Korean Mysteryrdquo New York Times Septem-ber 13 200318 Hecker avoided arguing that all of the rods had been reprocessed simply by noting that theywere no longer in the cooling pond See Sigfried S Hecker ldquoVisit to the Yongbyon NuclearScientiordfc Research Center in North Koreardquo Senate Committee on Foreign Relations 108th Cong2d sess January 21 2004 httpforeignsenategovtestimony2004HeckerTestimony040121pdf Any of three remote-sensing technologies could have detected reprocessing First satellitephotos could have picked up visible emissions from the reprocessing plant See Richard R Pater-noster ldquoNuclear Weapon Proliferation Indicators and Observablesrdquo LA-12430-MS (Los AlamosNM Los Alamos National Laboratory December 1992) p 8 Second steam from the power plant

But reader problems and reprocessing inefordfciencies may have hindered theirability to produce enough plutonium for six to eight weapons For example ifthe reactor ran at a 40 percent capacity factor from 1989 to 1994 consistent withthe operating record before the 1989 shutdown and reprocessing losses were25 percent North Korea would have a total of about 20 kg of plutonium19 Al-though the standard ordfgure for calculating the amount of plutonium used perweapon is around 5 kg 6 kg is often used as a more conservative estimate20

further the ordfrst weapon built by a new proliferator can require up to 8 kg21

With the more conservative ordfgure North Korea would have enough pluto-nium for only three weapons not enough to sell or use in a test and still main-tain a sufordfcient deterrent There is also some question as to whether NorthKorea has produced nuclear weapons with this material22

Many US ofordfcials also raise concerns over North Korearsquos highly enriched


connected to the reprocessing plant could be observed this was seen brieordmy in January 2003 buthas not been observed since See David E Sanger ldquoUS Sees Quick Start of North Korea NuclearSiterdquo New York Times March 1 2003 Third detectors on the border could ordfnd Krypton-85 gasemissions such emissions were reported only once in July 2003 See Thom Shanker and David ESanger ldquoNorth Korea Hides New Nuclear Site Evidence Suggestsrdquo New York Times July 20 2003While the Central Intelligence Agency and the Defense Intelligence Agency had concluded thatNorth Korea had reprocessed the rods State Department intelligence was unconvinced as of mid-2004 David E Sanger and William J Broad ldquoEvidence Is Cited Linking Koreans to Libya Ura-niumrdquo New York Times May 23 2004 The reprocessing might have been done instead in an un-known underground facility which could potentially circumvent these detection methods19 Alvarez argues that with the large number of broken rods the capacity factor of the reactorcould have been 40 percent This ordfgure would also be more consistent with the operating record ofthe reactor before the 1989 shutdown With 95 kg already in the rods the additional amount ofplutonium in the rods would then be about 165 kg for a total of about 26 kg Alvarez also pointsout that without skilled knowledge of the PUREX process the amount of plutonium extractedcould be signiordfcantly less than assumed Alvarez interview with author The fraction by whichthis would decrease the amount of plutonium extracted is highly uncertain One possible indica-tion however is the amount of material North Korea itself claimed to have lost in its reprocess-ingmdashabout 30 percent See David Albright and Kevin OrsquoNeill Solving the North Korean NuclearPuzzle (Washington DC Institute for Science and International Security 2000) p 88 The amountof plutonium that North Korea could potentially extract from these rods is therefore probablycloser to 20 kg than 42 kg20 The Trinity atomic test on July 16 1945 and the bomb dropped on Nagasaki on August 91945 both used 6 kg or more of plutonium Richard L Garwin ldquoThe Future of Nuclear Weaponswithout Nuclear Testingrdquo Arms Control Today Vol 27 No 8 (NovemberDecember 1997) pp 3ndash1221 Albright Berkhout and Walker Plutonium and Highly Enriched Uranium 1996 p 30622 Although the CIArsquos assessment in 2003 that ldquoNorth Korea has produced one or two simpleordfssion-type nuclear weaponsrdquo is widely cited the next sentence of the assessment indicates thatthis conclusion may have been reached using only the vaguest of evidence ldquoPress reports indicateNorth Korea has been conducting nuclear weaponndashrelated high explosive tests since the 1980s inorder to validate its weapon design(s)rdquo Central Intelligence Agency ldquoSSCI Questions for the Re-cord Regarding 11 February 2003 DCI World Wide Threat Brieordfngrdquo SSCI 2003-3662 Central Intel-ligence Agency August 18 2003 httpwwwfasorgirpcongress2003_hr021103qfr-ciapdf

uranium (HEU) program In particular much has been made of Pyongyangrsquosattempts to acquire parts for its centrifuges in Europe The Central IntelligenceAgency reported in November 2003 that ldquoa shipment of aluminum tubingmdashenough for 4000 centrifuge tubesmdashwas halted by German authoritiesrdquo inApril 200323 The shipment in question however contained only 214 tubes IfNorth Korea had received this shipment these tubes could have been turnedinto the vacuum housings for 428 centrifugesmdashenough for only a pilot-sizedfacility24

The North Koreans seem to be seeking parts for the more advanced P-2 (akaG-2) centrifuge25 which operates at higher speeds and requires more sophisti-cated materials than the simpler P-1 centrifuge Consequently this increasesthe amount of time required to construct a uranium-enrichment facility capa-ble of producing sufordfcient quantities of nuclear weaponsndashgrade HEU As oneexpert has noted ldquoThe North Koreans assumed that their path to HEU wouldbe shortened if they procured the most advanced materials available Iraq alsolsquomade that mistakersquordquo26 Germanyrsquos 2003 seizure of the aluminum tubing re-veals that the DPRK did not have enough vacuum housings at that time foreven a small pilot plant In addition it seems unlikely that the North Koreanswould have already acquired difordfcult-to-manufacture maraging steel rotors orother sensitive parts if they could not manufacture the much simpler vacuumhousings Even with a simpler design they probably would not have pro-gressed to the point of being able to make HEU27


23 Central Intelligence Agency Nonproliferation Center ldquoUnclassiordfed Report to Congress on theAcquisition of Technology Relating to Weapons of Mass Destruction and Advanced ConventionalMunitionsrdquo January 1ndashJune 30 2003 httpwwwciagovciareports24 Joby Warrick ldquoN Korea Shops Stealthily for Nuclear Arms Gear Front Companies Step UpEfforts in European Marketrdquo Washington Post August 15 2003 Assuming 5 separative work units(SWU)yr P-2 centrifuges 428 centrifuges would take nearly two years to produce 20 kg of 93 per-cent enriched uranium (a standard assumption for a small-implosion nuclear weapon using HEU)But this assumes that no centrifuges break down which is highly unlikely given the record ofNorth Korearsquos plutonium program and the difordfculties faced by states unfamiliar with centrifugetechnology25 Mark Hibbs ldquoCustoms Intelligence Data Suggest DPRK Aimed at G-2 Type Centrifugerdquo Nu-clear Fuel May 26 200326 Quoted in Mark Hibbs ldquoCIA Assessment on DPRK Presumes Massive Outside Help on Cen-trifugesrdquo Nuclear Fuel November 25 2002 p 127 One ldquoWestern centrifuge expertrdquo doubted North Korearsquos progress arguing that the suggestionthat ldquothe North Koreans could make HEU on a consistent basis with (the CNORSNOR design)after say ordfve yearsrsquo time is pretty unlikely given all the challengesrdquo Quoted in Mark HibbsldquoDPRK Enrichment Not Far Along Some Intelligence Data Suggestrdquo Nucleonics Week October 242002 p 2 The CNORSNOR is a simpler aluminum-rotor design similar to the P-1 centrifugeused by Pakistan and distributed by the AQ Khan network

The Libyan nuclear program had been active much longer than the NorthKorean program suggesting that even with extensive help HEU productionremains difordfcult According to the IAEA Libyan authorities ldquomade a strategicdecision to reinvigorate its nuclear activitiesrdquo in July 1995 Despite massive as-sistance from the AQ Khan network including the sale of twenty preassem-bled P-1 centrifuges Libya had installed only one 9-machine cascade by April2002mdashand never fed any nuclear materials into it Libya also could not de-velop the uranium hexaordmuoride (UF6) production facilities required to feedthe centrifuges28 Given that it requires about 1600 P-1 centrifuges andaround 4500 kg of natural uranium to produce 20 kg of weapons-grade HEUin a year Libyarsquos program was far from completion29 Moreover the centri-fuges that Libya sent to the United States after it gave up its nuclear programlacked rotors30

Iranrsquos nuclear program has also been in existence longer than the North Ko-rean program Iranrsquos centrifuge enrichment program was established in themid-1980s After transient and somewhat dubious successes Iran has been un-able to separate isotopes using lasers since 1994 because of ldquocontinuous techni-cal problemsrdquo The laser-enrichment equipment Iran received from its foreignsuppliers between 1975 and 1998 was for the most part incomplete or neverproperly functioned the supposed success of its pre-1994 experiments wasmeasured by the same foreign suppliers who carried out the experimentslending some doubt as to the veracity of the results31 Similarly since its acqui-sition of parts for 500 centrifuges (split between two shipments in 1994 and1996) from the AQ Khan network Iran has made relatively little progress indeveloping its centrifuge technology Problems with the bellows required ad-ditional shipments in 199732 More than half of the rotors that Iran had assem-


28 IAEA Board of Governors ldquoImplementation of the NPT Safeguards Agreement of the SocialistPeoplersquos Libyan Arab Jamahiriyardquo IAEA report GOV200412 (Vienna International AtomicEnergy Agency February 20 2004) httpwwwfasorgnukeguidelibyaiaea0204pdf pp 4ndash529 Assuming a natural uranium feed and a 03 percent tails assay 4000 SWU are required to pro-duce 20 kg of 93 percent enriched HEU from 4500 kg of natural uranium enough for a ordfrst-gener-ation implosion device A P-1 centrifuge produces about 25 SWUyr so 1600 centrifuges wouldbe required See Albright Berkhout and Walker Plutonium and Highly Enriched Uranium 1996p 46930 David E Sanger and William J Broad ldquoAs Nuclear Secrets Emerge More Are Suspectedrdquo NewYork Times December 26 200431 IAEA Board of Governors GOV200483 pp 6 12ndash1332 Ibid p 8 Uranium centrifuges typically have one or more bellows (connectors) between indi-vidual stacked segments to prevent the centrifuges from self-destruction when passing throughresonance velocities

bled in the spring of 2004 were unusable33 Iran received P-2 designs in 1995from the AQ Khan network but reportedly did little work on the P-2 centri-fuges because of the extensive problems it was already having with the sim-pler P-1 centrifuge delaying work on the more advanced design until 2002The owner of the private company hired to work on the P-2 centrifuges statedthat Iran was not capable of manufacturing the P-2rsquos maraging steel rotorsand began work on adapting the design to use a shorter (probably single-rotor) composite carbon tube instead34 These time frames are quite close tomdashor even signiordfcantly exceedmdashthe ten to ordffteen years that other countries haveneeded to develop centrifuge programs35

the irrelevance of regime type

In addition to arguing that proliferation networks have signiordfcantly decreaseddevelopment times proliferation determinists contend that particular re-gimesmdashreferred to variously as ldquoroguerdquo states ldquooutlawrdquo regimes or membersof an ldquoaxis of evilrdquomdashare inherently prone to proliferation and cannot be de-terred or contained and so must be replaced In his State of the Union Addresson January 29 2002 President Bush singled out Iran Iraq and North Korea asan ldquoaxis of evilrdquo Two days later National Security Adviser Rice identiordfed thesame three states36 Secretary of State Colin Powell announced the Bush ad-ministrationrsquos policy of regime change in Iraq in testimony before Congress onFebruary 6 200237 Discussing Iraq just days before the US invasion onMarch 20 2003 Bush stated ldquoShould we have to go in our mission is veryclear disarmament And in order to disarm it would mean regime changerdquo38

Although the administration has sought to limit explicit calls for regimechange in countries other than Iraq since Powellrsquos testimony a secret memo bySecretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld leaked in April 2003 called explicitly


33 David Albright and Corey Hinderstein ldquoIran Countdown to Showdownrdquo Bulletin of theAtomic Scientists Vol 60 No 6 (NovemberDecember 2004) pp 67ndash7234 IAEA Board of Governors GOV200483 p 1135 Hibbs ldquoDPRK Enrichment Not Far Along Some Intelligence Data Suggestrdquo36 George W Bush ldquoState of the Union Addressrdquo January 29 2002 httpwwwwhitehousegovstateoftheunion2002 and Condoleezza Rice ldquoRemarks by the National Security AdvisorCondoleezza Rice to the Conservative Political Action Conferencerdquo Marriott Crystal GatewayArlington Virginia February 1 2002 httpwwwwhitehousegovnewsreleases20020220020201-6html37 Todd S Purdum ldquoUS Weighs Tackling Iraq On Its Own Powell Saysrdquo New York Times Febru-ary 7 200238 George W Bush ldquoPresident George Bush Discusses Iraq in National Press Conferencerdquo March6 2003 httpwwwwhitehousegovnewsreleases200303print20030306-8html

for such change in North Korea39 The following month Deputy Secretary ofDefense Paul Wolfowitz demanded ldquofundamental changerdquo in the DPRKrsquos re-gime40 The investigative journalist Seymour Hersh has reported that theDepartment of Defense is already conducting covert operations in Iran41 Evenwithout an explicit call for regime change the logic of proliferation determin-ismmdashthat new proliferants cannot be contained deterred or bribed into giv-ing up their nuclear weapon programsmdashleads to the inevitable conclusion thatregime change must occur

This position is untenable for three reasons First there is little or no system-atic evidence that regime type is linked to proliferation propensity Secondproliferation desires have historically varied even while regimes in North Ko-rea and Libya (and Iraq before the 2003 US invasion) remain the same whilein Iran the 1979 revolution temporarily halted its nuclear program Third thedirect evidence that contemporary proliferators are dead set on acquiring nu-clear weapons does not hold up to scrutiny

Although authoritarian regimes might be more prone to obtaining nuclearweapons and ballistic missiles than other kinds of states this is only one factoramong many Surveys of the proliferation literature emphasize security andprestige beneordfts or organizational pathologies as drivers of nuclear prolifera-tion rather than domestic political structures or particular leaders42 A fewstudies argue that economic liberalization not particular leaders may restrainregimes from developing nuclear weapons43 Ironically because economicgrowth is also linked to proliferation the net effect of economic liberalizationmay be to increase in the likelihood of proliferation Statistical studies of prolif-eration between 1945 and 2000 found either a positive correlation between de-


39 David Rennie ldquoPentagon Calls for Regime Change in North Koreardquo Daily Telegraph (London)April 22 200340 Wolfowitz ldquoDeputy Secretary Wolfowitz QampArdquo41 Seymour M Hersh ldquoThe Coming Warsrdquo New Yorker January 24ndash31 2005 httplexis-nexiscom42 See Scott D Sagan ldquoWhy Do States Build Nuclear Weapons Three Models in Search of aBombrdquo International Security Vol 21 No 3 (Winter 199697) pp 54ndash86 and Tanya Ogilvie-WhiteldquoIs There a Theory of Nuclear Proliferation An Analysis of the Contemporary DebaterdquoNonproliferation Review Vol 4 No 1 (Fall 1996) pp 43ndash6043 Etel Solingen ldquoThe Political Economy of Nuclear Restraintrdquo International Security Vol 19 No2 (Fall 1994) pp 126ndash169 and Etel Solingen ldquoThe Domestic Sources of Nuclear PosturesInordmuencing Fence-Sitters in the PostndashCold War Erardquo IGCC Policy Paper PP08 (Irvine Calif Insti-tute on Global Conordmict and Cooperation October 1 1994) httprepositoriescdliborgigccPPPP08

mocracy and proliferation or no relationship at all Factors such as diplomaticisolation economic growth interstate rivalries and security threats weremuch more inordmuential than how democratic or autocratic a regime was44 Fiveof the nine established or suspected nuclear weapons states (France IndiaIsrael the United Kingdom and the United States) are well-establisheddemocracies

Although a particular leader might still make a difference at the marginnone of the cases of contemporary ldquoroguerdquo state proliferators support the the-sis strongly Bolton has argued that ldquohistorically countries have given up theirnuclear weapons programs only at a time of regime changerdquo45 Yet this argu-ment does not seem to hold for the states singled out as ldquoroguerdquo regimes TheIraq Survey Group constituted by Australia Britain and the United States tosearch for evidence of nonconventional weapons programs after the 2003 Iraqwar and removal of Saddam Hussein from power found ldquono evidence to sug-gest concerted [Iraqi] efforts to restart the [nuclear] programrdquo after the 1991Persian Gulf War46 Libya gave up its nuclear chemical biological and long-range missile programs while maintaining the same leader North Korearsquos nu-clear ambitions have varied while its leaders have been relatively constant fac-tors other than regime type such as rapprochement with South Korea and USpromises to establish diplomatic and economic ties in exchange for a freeze onNorth Korearsquos program have inordmuenced its decisionmaking at various timesIran sought nuclear weapons even as a US ally under the shah the revolutionactually led to a cessation of Iranrsquos nuclear ambitions until at least 198547


44 See Sonali Singh and Christopher R Way ldquoThe Correlates of Nuclear Proliferation A Quanti-tative Testrdquo Journal of Conordmict Resolution Vol 48 No 6 (December 2004) pp 859ndash885 Dong-Joon Joand Erik Gartzke ldquoDeterminants of Nuclear Weapons Proliferationrdquo November 2003 httpwwwcolumbiaedu~eg589pdfnuke-proliferation-112003pdf and Karthika Sasikumar andChristopher R Way ldquoTesting Theories of Proliferation The Lessons from South Asiardquo paper pre-sented at the Center for International Security and CooperationndashArmy War College Conference onSouth Asia and the Nuclear Future Stanford California June 3ndash4 200445 John R Bolton ldquoArms Control and Nonproliferation Issuesrdquo press conference July 21 2004httpwwwstategovtusrm34676htm46 Charles Duelfer ldquoKey Findings of the Comprehensive Report of the Special Advisor to theDCI on Iraqrsquos WMDrdquo September 30 2004 httpwwwciagovciareportsiraq_wmd_2004Comp_Report_Key_Findingspdf47 On the shahrsquos program see Anne Hessing Cahn ldquoDeterminants of the Nuclear Option TheCase of Iranrdquo in Onkar S Marwah and Ann Schulz eds Nuclear Proliferation and the Near-NuclearCountries (Cambridge Mass Ballinger 1975) pp 185ndash204 After the revolution in 1979 Iran ordfrstconstituted its centrifuge program and began construction on the Isfahan nuclear complex in 1985IAEA Board of Governors GOV200483 pp 6 14

Much of the argument for regime change comes from a reading of thesecountriesrsquo intentions based on their progress This is especially true of IranSimilar to the North Korean case arguments regarding the rate of Iranrsquos nu-clear acquisition are based on worst-case estimates and incomplete informa-tion This is not to suggest that Iranrsquos pursuit of a nuclear capability is solelyfor civilian purposes as the Iranian government asserts rather advocates ofregime change have exaggerated the military capabilities of Iranrsquos nuclear fa-cilities Moreover the slow rate of growth of Iranrsquos nuclear program is incom-patible with the notion of a regime determined to acquire weapons at any cost

In an address to the Hudson Institute on August 17 2004 Bolton made re-marks typical of determinist claims regarding Iranian intentions48 He empha-sizes the potential size of the Iranian pilot facility (1000 centrifuges) and theplanned production facility (50000 centrifuges) Yet according to the IAEA theIranians installed only a 164-machine centrifuge cascade at the pilot plant asof August 2005 this pilot cascade has not been operated Uranium was fedinto a small test cascade of nineteen machines at the Kalaye Electric Companyonly in 2002 This represents a substantial lack of progress given the receipt ofparts for 500 centrifuges more than ten years earlier49 A regime determined toacquire nuclear weapons presumably would have attempted to move morequickly despite any signiordfcant technical difordfculties As noted earlier Iran hasbeen working on laser enrichment technology even longermdashsince 1975 Boltonclaims that Iran is developing enrichment facilities to produce weapons-gradeuranium (containing 90 percent uranium-235) But the samples acquired bythe IAEA from the laser enrichment facility were enriched to just 1 percentonly gram quantities were produced at this level Moreover Iran had shut thefacility down in response to a lack of progress and interest by May 200350

Bolton also claims that Iran has an impressive plutonium production pro-gram highlighting the capabilities of its planned 40 megawatt nuclear reactorldquoThe technical characteristics of this heavy water moderated research reactorare optimal for the production of weapons-grade plutoniumrdquo Initial estimateshowever projected that this reactor would not be online until 2014mdashhardly acrash nuclear weapons program51 especially given that Iran has been planning


48 Bolton ldquoPreventing Iran from Acquiring Nuclear Weaponsrdquo49 The centrifuge parts arrived in two shipments the ordfrst in March 1994 and the second in July1996 IAEA Board of Governors GOV200483 pp 6ndash850 Ibid pp 12ndash1451 Ibid pp 12ndash15

this reactor since the mid-1990s52 More recent reports claim that it could beordfnished more quickly perhaps by 2009 based on construction times of similarreactors in other countries53 An early completion date seems unlikely how-ever given Iranrsquos past difordfculties in attempting to ordfnish work on its Bushehrreactor a light-water nuclear power plant originally ordered in 1975 from Ger-many Iranrsquos inexperience with nuclear technologies has produced signiordfcantdelays despite assistance from Russia at one point Iranian contractors hadcompleted only ordfve months of work on Bushehr in twenty-ordfve months54

Moreover merely starting up the reactor would require 80ndash90 tons of heavywater as of November 2003 only one of the two heavy-water production lineshad been completed Production of 8 tons per year was supposed to havestarted in 200455 but as of February 2005 even the ordfrst production line had notyet started56 Consequently the reactor will not have a sufordfcient amount ofheavy water until at least 2010

Bolton also warns that Iran could use the Bushehr reactor to generate pluto-nium if it pulled out of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT)mdasha claimtrue for any of the seventy countries currently or previously in possession ofnuclear research or power reactors and consequently not a useful measure of aparticular regimersquos desire to proliferate57 Moreover Iran would have to mas-ter the necessary reprocessing technology so far however it has succeeded inreprocessing only milligram quantities of plutonium from irradiated targetsmdasha very different technical challenge than reprocessing reactor fuel rods58 TheIranians would also have to construct a large-scale reprocessing facility thatwould be relatively easy to detect It is also unclear how much knowledge Iran


52 IAEA Board of Governors ldquoImplementation of the NPT Safeguards Agreement in the IslamicRepublic of Iranrdquo IAEA report GOV200363 (Vienna International Atomic Energy AgencyAugust 26 2003) httpwwwiaeaorgPublicationsDocumentsBoard2003gov2003-63pdfp 953 Jack Boureston and Charles Mahaffey ldquoIran Pursues Plans for Heavy Water Reactorrdquo Janersquos In-telligence Review November 14 2003 httpjirjanescom54 Anthony H Cordesman ldquoIran and Nuclear Weapons A Working Draftrdquo (Washington DCCenter for Strategic and International Studies February 7 2000) httpwwwcsisorgmideastreportsirannuclear02072000PDF p 1355 IAEA Board of Governors GOV200375 p 1456 Institute for Science and International Security ldquoIran Constructing the 40 MW Heavy WaterReactor at Arak Despite Calls Not to Do So by the European Union and the IAEA Board of Gover-norsrdquo March 4 2005 httpisis-onlineorgpublicationsiranarakconstructionhtml57 Boltonrsquos presentation also includes technical inaccuracies such as confusing deuterium (D)with heavy water (D2O)58 IAEA Board of Governors GOV200483 p 17

can gain from its work on the Bushehr reactor Russian Minister of Atomic En-ergy Aleksandr Rumiantsev has claimed that Russian training of Iranian tech-nicians is limited to operation only without any transfer of knowledge ofldquoactual nuclear technologyrdquo59 Finally the highly publicized revelation in early2005 of Iranrsquos small stake in a uranium mine in Namibia was in the end oldnews Iran had acquired the stake in 1975 under the shah and its contract doesnot include rights to the uranium60

In sum Iran will need years to develop a nuclear weapons capability If theresuspension of centrifuge manufacturing that began in late November 2004holds the acquisition date will continue to be pushed back Boltonrsquos chargethat Iran is ldquodead set on building nuclear weaponsrdquo and is proceeding with anurgency ldquoquite consistent with a desire to produce a nuclear weapon as soonas possiblerdquo61 seems implausible in this light especially given that US intelli-gence on Iran has been called into doubt62 Even some in the Bush administra-tion estimate that Iran will not have a nuclear capability until sometime in thenext decade63 Bolton argues that the June 2003 introduction of uraniumhexaordmuoride gas into centrifuges at Iranrsquos pilot plant and the temporary re-sumption of centrifuge manufacture in July 2004 are inexplicable other than bydesire for rapid proliferation64 Yet the Iranian leadership has admitted takingthese actions primarily to secure a better bargaining position65 which seemsmore plausible given their difordfculties with the centrifuges and the consider-able length of time before their program reaches completion

Similar arguments hold for Libya and North Korea Libya had about thirtypeople working on its program far fewer than the thousands usually requiredfor nuclear weapons development Libyarsquos nuclear activities may have beenintended only as a bargaining chip rather than as part of a serious nuclear pro-gram components were collected haphazardly and development proceededslowly66 After signing the Agreed Framework in 1994 North Korea made adeal with Pakistan to purchase materials and plans for centrifuges in 1997 at


59 I thank Sonja Schmid for bringing this to my attention and providing a translation AleksandrRumiantsev ldquoInterview with the Minister of Atomic Energyrdquo Ekho Moskvy May 29 200360 Louis Charbonneau ldquoIran in Rio Tinto Linkrdquo Reuters January 31 200561 Bolton ldquoPreventing Iran from Acquiring Nuclear Weaponsrdquo62 ldquoUS Intelligence on Iran Seen LackingndashExpertsrdquo Reuters February 9 200563 Nicholas Kralev ldquoUS Doubts Tehran Nukes Are Imminentrdquo Washington Times April 14 200564 Bolton ldquoPreventing Iran from Acquiring Nuclear Weaponsrdquo65 Nazila Fathi ldquoIran Hints It Sped Up Enriching Uranium as a Ployrdquo New York Times December6 200466 David Crawford ldquoLibya Was Far From Building Nuclear Bomb Program Was Haphazard ButShows How Technology Was Bought Off-the-Shelfrdquo Wall Street Journal February 23 2004

the earliest67 it embarked on an effort to develop a uranium enrichment pro-gram only by late 200068 and started seeking the necessary materials in largequantities in late 200169 Although these dates are ultimately uncertain thebulk of public evidence does support them North Korearsquos multiple efforts toseek parts have all occurred after 2000 with only a single effort to procure fre-quency converters in 199970 As with Libya and Iran the North Korean pro-gram may be intended as a bargaining chip some observers argue thatPyongyangrsquos conordfrmation of its uranium program to US diplomats in Octo-ber 2002 may have been intended as an offer to put the nuclear issue on the ta-ble in exchange for a grand bargain with the United States71

Proliferation Networks Star Structures and Tacit Knowledge

To justify a policy of regime change proliferation determinists assume thatnuclear technology is spreading rapidly through decentralized networks Yetproliferation networks in general and nuclear proliferation networks in par-ticular resemble a star-shaped (aka hub-and-spoke) structure This structure isa function of the difordfculty of transferring tacit knowledge through these net-works thus restricting their growth This constraint makes these networks vul-nerable to a range of counterproliferation measures that target the hub statesdirectly

the structure of proliferation networks

In their study of ldquoproliferation ringsrdquo Braun and Chyba examine second-tierproliferation in which developing states aid each other in their ballistic missileand nuclear programs72 Although these proliferation networks have undercut


67 Joseph Bermudez Jr ldquoLifting the Lid on Kimrsquos Nuclear Workshoprdquo Janersquos Defense WeeklyNovember 27 2002 and Seymour M Hersh ldquoThe Cold Test What the Administration Knewabout Pakistan and the North Korean Nuclear Programrdquo New Yorker January 27 2003 httpjdwjanescom68 Central Intelligence Agency Nonproliferation Center ldquoUntitled CIA Estimate to CongressrdquoNovember 19 2002 httpwwwfasorgnukeguidedprknukecia111902html69 Central Intelligence Agency Nonproliferation Center ldquoUnclassiordfed Report to Congress on theAcquisition of Technology Relating to Weapons of Mass Destruction and Advanced ConventionalMunitionsrdquo July 1ndashDecember 31 2001 httpwwwciagovciareports70 North Korea unsuccessfully sought two frequency converters used for timing centrifuges in1999 then tried again in 2002 and 2003 Part of the 2003 shipment was delivered but the otherswere stopped Mark Hibbs ldquoProcurement by Iran DPRK Focuses Attention on lsquoCatch-Allrsquo Con-trolsrdquo Nucleonics Week May 29 200371 Hibbs ldquoDPRK Enrichment Not Far Along Some Intelligence Data Suggestrdquo72 Braun and Chyba ldquoProliferation Ringsrdquo

existing export control measures they have been less successful than prolifera-tion determinists contend The optimal strategy to halt the growth of these net-works depends on their structure which can take various forms includingrings or circles (where the connections between nodesmdashin this case statesmdashform a circle) stars (where every node is connected through a central hub) orcliques (where all of the nodes are directly connected) Simple examples ofthese three structures are diagrammed in Figure 2 If the structure is a ring or aclique then the shutdown of any single node would not unravel the entire net-work consequently global strategies that seek to eliminate all nodes or all con-nections between nodes might be more effective in dissolving the networkthan strategies that aim at key connections or nodes Densely connected de-centralized networks where no single node holds a crucial position in the net-work are easier in one sense to shut down connections to additional nodes inthe network are easier to discover although this is balanced by the number ofnodes and connections that need to be eliminated to dissolve the network Butif the structure is starlike then the network is highly centralized efforts arebest concentrated on eliminating the central node and preventing other nodesfrom becoming hubs73


73 These are ideal types and do not by any means exhaust potential network structures central-ization and density are only two possible network measures See Stanley Wasserman and Kather-ine Faust Social Network Analysis Methods and Applications (Cambridge Cambridge UniversityPress 1994)

Figure 2 Simple Network Structures

NOTE To isolate all nodes the center node in the star network can be removed but manymore nodes must be removed from a circle or clique structure

Existing ballistic missile and nuclear proliferation networks appear toclosely resemble stars in which North Korea and Pakistan are the hubs or cen-tral nodes for each network (see Figures 3a and 3b respectively) No nucleartransactions between the spokes in the nuclear network have been conordfrmedas of mid-200574 Interestingly the missile network seems to be closer to aclique than does the nuclear network however only Iran and North Koreaform hubs75 AQ Khan delivered plans or parts to Iran Libya and NorthKorea and offered assistance to other countries such as Iraq and possibly SyriaAlthough the extent of the Pakistani governmentrsquos knowledge about the nu-clear network remains unclear there is no doubt that AQ Khan enjoyedunprecedented operational autonomy shutting down the network requiresconvincing the Pakistani government to reestablish bureaucratic control overits program obtain relevant information from Khan and stop technologyleaks Consequently from a policy perspective Pakistan is the central hubrather than AQ Khan himself Similarly North Korea forms the center of amissile proliferation network delivering missile technology to Egypt IranIraq Libya Pakistan and Syria among others Iran forms a smaller hub formissile sales linking Libya North Korea and Syria

Braun and Chyba also cite other sources of missile technology (eg Chinaand Russia) but these nodes are less central and in any case less likely to takeon a central role if the existing hubs are shut down Since joining the MissileTechnology Control Regime (MTCR) in 1995 Russia has decreased its prolifer-ation of missile technology although it is still suspected of assisting North Ko-rea and Iran but at a lower level than before China agreed to abide by theMTCR and pledged not to assist in the development of nuclear-capable mis-siles in 2000 then passed related domestic regulations in 2002 Some Chinesecompanies were still assisting Pakistan and Iran as of 2002 but the Chinesegovernment has made progress in curbing missile technology exports sincethen although it has still not become a full member of the MTCR76


74 An uncorroborated report alleges that North Korea and Iran have assisted each other since thelate 1990s Louis Charbonneau ldquoN Korea Provides Nuclear Aid to IranndashIntel Reportsrdquo ReutersJuly 6 200575 Braun and Chyba also argue that China Russia Taiwan Macedonia and Belarus also assistedIran Braun and Chyba ldquoProliferation Ringsrdquo According to the Nuclear Threat Initiative Chinahas also given assistance to Iraq North Korea Pakistan Saudi Arabia and Syria Russia (or the So-viet Union previously) has also helped Egypt Iraq Libya North Korea and Syria See NuclearThreat Initiative Country Proordfles January 8 2005 httpwwwntiorge_researchproordfles76 On Chinarsquos missile exports and dates see Nuclear Threat Initiative Country Proordfles On its bid

The missile proliferation network shown in Figure 3a exhibits a more dy-namic structure than its nuclear counterpart North Korea received assistancefrom Egypt from 1974 to 1981 importing Scud missiles that were reverse-engi-neered by North Korean scientists In 1988 Iran gave the North Koreans thewreckage of al-Hussein missiles launched by Iraq in the war with Iran NorthKorea reciprocated by assisting both Egypt and Iran with their development ofballistic missiles then later Libya Syria gave North Korea information on itsSS-21 Scarab missiles from 1994 to 1996 and North Korea exported variants ofthe Scud and Nodong between 1991 and 2000 back to Syria North Korea alsoexported Nodong technology to Pakistan possibly in exchange for nucleartechnology while unconordfrmed reports identify exports to Iraq possibly as re-cently as 2001 Libya and Syria assisted Iran early in its program by supplying


to join the MTCR see Wade Boese ldquoMissile Regime Puts Off Chinardquo Arms Control Today Vol 34No 9 (November 2004)

Figure 3a The Network Structure of Second-Tier Ballistic Missile Proliferation1974ndash2002

SOURCES Missile proliferation data are from the Nuclear Threat Initiative Country Profilesand extend through 2002 Individual and minor incidents were discarded

NOTE Only the core second-tier proliferators appear in this figure other countries that re-ceived only limited assistance (eg Sudan and Yemen) are excluded Uncertain dates aremarked as lt (beginning of decade) or gt (end of decade) Minor nodes are excludednodes are placed for clarity

Scud-B missiles Iran later reciprocated by sharing Scud-C technology withSyria and development assistance with Libya Missile technology appears tobe more transferable than nuclear technology many of the relationships in Fig-ure 3a involve these reciprocal exchanges77 This may in part be a result of themany small technical challenges posed by ballistic missiles which allows formore decentralization and specialization than does nuclear weapons technol-ogy78 The density of ties among the participating nodes makes the total shut-down of such networks much more difordfcult but it also makes it easier to tracerelationships and discover additional nodes in the network

Evidence that the nuclear proliferation network continues to be centralizedwas provided in early 2005 In February the US government contended thatNorth Korea had sold uranium hexaordmuoride to Libya The ldquoalarming intelli-


77 For details on these trades see Nuclear Threat Initiative Country Proordfles78 I thank Dean Wilkening for pointing this out

Figure 3b The Network Structure of Second-Tier Nuclear Proliferation 1987ndash2002

SOURCES Nuclear proliferation data are from Gaurav Kampani ldquoProliferation Unbound Nu-clear Tales from Pakistanrdquo (Monterey Calif Center for Nonproliferation StudiesMonterey Institute of International Studies February 23 2004) httpcnsmiisedupubsweek040223htm

NOTE Declined offers of assistance are dotted uncertain dates are marked as ~ (mid-dec-ade) Minor nodes are excluded nodes are placed for clarity

gencerdquo that North Korea was ldquoactively exporting nuclear materialrdquo was de-duced ldquonot on a murky intelligence assessment but on hard datardquo79 Theevidence that led US ldquogovernment scientists to conclude with near cer-taintyrdquo80 that the uranium was from North Korea was either from uranium iso-topic ratios or from plutonium contaminating the three cylinders of uraniumhexaordmuoride that Libya had received in 2000 and 200181 This would indicatethat the network was becoming more decentralized as nuclear trading wastaking place between the separate nodes rather than through the hub One re-cently retired Pentagon ofordfcial described the trade as ldquohuge because itchanges the whole equation with the North It suggests we donrsquot have timeto sit around and wait for the outcome of negotiationsrdquo82 In March the USgovernment disclosed additional evidence regarding large ordfnancial transfersfrom Libya which the United States claimed implicated North Korea83

Contrary to US claims the plutonium uranium and ordfnancial evidence inthe Libyan case is far from conclusive The IAEA had performed similar analy-ses and found no plutonium traces on the cylinders84 The precision of themethod used to determine the potential source of uranium has also been calledinto question because the isotopic ratio measured (U-234 to U-238) can vary asmuch as 10 percent85 Yet the United Statesrsquo contention that the uranium mustbe from North Korea ldquowith a certainty of 90 percent or betterrdquo is belied by theadmission that the US inspection team had no sample of North Korean ura-nium86 Additionally these concentrations can differ greatly even within a sin-gle mine making it hard to identify a distinctive ordfngerprint87 The uranium intwo of the three cylinders was natural uranium while the other held depleteduranium the latter is generally useless for creating either nuclear weapons or


79 Glenn Kessler ldquoNorth Korea May Have Sent Libya Nuclear Material US Tells Alliesrdquo Wash-ington Post February 2 200580 David E Sanger and William J Broad ldquoTests Said to Tie Deal on Uranium to North KoreardquoNew York Times February 2 200581 Sanger and Broad reported isotopic ratios Kessler reported plutonium Ibid and KesslerldquoNorth Korea May Have Sent Libya Nuclear Material US Tells Alliesrdquo82 Quoted in Sanger and Broad ldquoTests Said to Tie Deal on Uranium to North Koreardquo83 David E Sanger and William J Broad ldquoUsing Clues from Libya to Study a Nuclear MysteryrdquoNew York Times March 31 200584 Glenn Kessler and Dafna Linzer ldquoNuclear Evidence Could Point to Pakistanrdquo WashingtonPost February 3 200585 Steve Fetter ldquoNuclear Archaeology Verifying Declarations of Fissile-Material ProductionrdquoScience and Global Security Vol 3 Nos 3ndash4 (1993) pp 237ndash25986 See Sanger and Broad ldquoTests Said to Tie Deal on Uranium to North Koreardquo87 Jon B Wolfsthal ldquoNo Good Choices The Implications of a Nuclear North Koreardquo HouseCommittee on International Relations 109th Cong 1st sess February 17 2005

fuel while the total extractable weapons-grade uranium content of the formerwas about 7 kg far too little for a ordfrst-generation nuclear weapon88 Given thatthe North Koreans had not even started attempting to acquire enrichment ca-pabilities in 200089 the depleted uranium is most likely the by-product of Paki-stani enrichment This is additional evidence that the uranium must have atleast passed through Pakistan on its way to Libya consistent with the existingstructure of the nuclear network One of AQ Khanrsquos middlemen BSA Tahirreported that the cylinders had been ordmown to Libya aboard a Pakistani air-plane in 2001 With respect to the ordfnancial evidence US and foreign ofordfcialswho had seen the documents in question said that they did not show that pay-ments went directly to North Korea90 Nor were the payments necessarily fornuclear materials they could equally have been for missile transfers91 Thesuppression of information by the United States that Pakistan was the likelyintermediary in the deal and the high probability that the container originatedin Pakistan upset US allies92 because it appeared that the US governmentwas manipulating intelligence information to put pressure on North Korea93

tacit knowledge and the spread of nuclear weapons

Nuclear proliferation networks are more likely to adopt star structures thanring or clique structures in part because nuclear proliferation has greater tacit


88 Two of the three cylinders delivered to Libya (one small and one large) contained natural ura-nium hexaordmuoride (UF6) the other small cylinder contained depleted UF6 at 03 percent enrich-ment The large one had 1600 kg of UF6 the small ones had 25 kg each Libya received the largecylinder in February 2001 and the small ones in September 2000 See IAEA Board of GovernorsImplementation of the NPT Safeguards Agreement of the Socialist Peoplersquos Libyan Arab Jamahiriya IAEAreport GOV200433 International Atomic Energy Agency May 28 2004 httpwwwfasorgnukeguidelibyaiaea0504pdf p 3 and IAEA Board of Governors Implementation of the NPTSafeguards Agreement of the Socialist Peoplersquos Libyan Arab Jamahiriya IAEA report GOV200459 In-ternational Atomic Energy Agency August 30 2004 httpwwwfasorgnukeguidelibyaiaea0804pdf p 4 Based on a natural uranium percentage of 071 percent this would give a totalof 116 kg of U-235 assuming a standard tails assay of 03 percent and an HEU enrichment of 93percent 72 kg of HEU could be extracted about a third of the amount necessary for a small ordfrst-generation implosion weapon Depleted uranium can be put in a blanket around a reactor core toproduce plutonium or as a tamper in a nuclear weapon but it cannot be usefully enriched89 Central Intelligence Agency Nonproliferation Center ldquoUnclassiordfed Report to Congress on theAcquisition of Technology Relating to Weapons of Mass Destruction and Advanced ConventionalMunitionsrdquo July 1ndashDecember 31 200190 Sanger and Broad ldquoUsing Clues from Libya to Study a Nuclear Mysteryrdquo91 I thank Paul Kerr for pointing this out See Jeffrey Lewis and Paul Kerr ldquoA Financial Linkin That AQ KhanndashNorth KoreandashLibya UF6 Daisy Chainrdquo April 1 2005 httpwwwarmscontrolwonkcomindexphpid=50992 Kessler and Linzer ldquoNuclear Evidence Could Point to Pakistanrdquo93 Dafna Linzer ldquoUS Misled Allies About Nuclear Export N Korean Material Landed in Paki-stan Instead of Libyardquo Washington Post March 20 2005

knowledge requirements Tacit knowledge is knowledge that cannot be formu-lated in words or symbols but must be learned through trial and error poten-tially under the direct tutelage of someone who has already learned it nuclearweapons design and production in particular depends heavily on such knowl-edge Both Britain and the Soviet Union attempted to replicate the US designfrom documents that they possessed yet they had to devote major resourcesbefore they proved useful Every nuclear program has required more timethan the three and a half years the Manhattan Project took to build the worldrsquosordfrst atomic weapon despite the transfer of information and even scientistsfrom one program to another94 One of the major preoccupations of the USnuclear weapons complex is to retain tacit knowledge in the absence of test-ing95 Ballistic missile development while also requiring some tacit knowl-edge96 would seem to be easier to transfer If tacit knowledge was not restrict-ing transfers of nuclear technology the missile and nuclear networks wouldhave connections between the same states for example because Libya andIran trade missile technology they would be likely to trade nuclear technologyas well Yet this has happened in only one case between Pakistan and NorthKorea

This constraint structures the proliferation networks Only the central hubcan dispatch experts to train new proliferants in constructing and operatingequipment whereas satellite states might be able to help each other with ac-quiring equipment but not with providing tacit knowledge The hub mightalso have ordfnancial incentives to restrict information transfer for example sell-ing parts for centrifuges but not instructions on how to build them Individualsatellite nodes are usually likely to form ties (nuclear or not) with each otherthrough their common connections with the hub thus decreasing chances of apotential dismantlement of the network by eliminating the hub Such actorsmdashcalled ldquostructurally equivalentrdquo in network termsmdashhave a propensity to act insimilar ways often forming ties or networks between themselves when direct


94 Donald MacKenzie and Graham Spinardi ldquoTacit Knowledge Weapons Design and theUninvention of Nuclear Weaponsrdquo American Journal of Sociology Vol 101 No 1 (July 1995) pp 44ndash9995 Alexander H Montgomery ldquoReconstructing Reliability Conordfdence in Nuclear Weapons un-der Science-Based Stockpile Stewardshiprdquo masterrsquos thesis University of California Berkeley May199996 Donald MacKenzie Inventing Accuracy A Historical Sociology of Nuclear Missile Guidance (Cam-bridge Mass MIT Press 1993)

competitive pressures are weak97 Tacit knowledge requirements howeverhelp to suppress these ties

Although some nonstate actors (eg Tahir and Tinner) involved in nuclearproliferation networks have been able to individually supply a few parts forcentrifuges they cannot provide the crucial tacit knowledge required to oper-ate them Parts from the AQ Khan network manufactured by the Malaysiancompany SCOPE were seized en route to Libya in October 2003 by a coalitionof Western states Yet these parts only constituted about 15 percent of the totalnumber of parts for Libyarsquos centrifuges and none of the most sensitive parts98

While decentralized manufacturing may be efordfcient in some ways both thelack of a direct connection and an inability to rapidly supply parts and feed-back on their performance further hinder nonstate actors from properly sup-plying parts let alone providing a complete proliferation solution Iran forexample reported that ldquomany difordfculties had been encountered as a result ofmachine crashes attributed to poor quality [imported] componentsrdquo99

Although AQ Khan supplied both plans and parts it appears that withoutthe tacit knowledge required to produce nuclear weapons the successful de-velopment of a nuclear capability requires much trial and error Indeed thisseems to have been North Korearsquos problem As Mark Hibbs has noted ldquoOneofordfcial said that some information suggests the DPRK may have lsquoslavishly fol-lowed a recipersquo calling for some more advanced components or materials ascalled for in the design package provided by its helpersrdquo100 Although Iran hasnot fallen into this trap the numerous problems it has encountered in its pro-gram underscore the difordfculty of transferring tacit knowledge The parts thatIran bought on the black market for its centrifuges (outside the AQ Khan net-work) were of highly variable quality neither the sellers nor the Iranians knewhow to judge their quality101 Iran is building a yellowcake-to-UF6 conversionplant at Isfahan based on Chinese blueprints Yet it has had difordfculties produc-


97 Competitive pressures or direct negative ties can overcome the tendency of structurally equiv-alent actors to cooperate unless faced with a greater threatmdashfor example animosity between Iranand Iraq98 David Albright and Corey Hinderstein ldquoLibyarsquos Gas Centrifuge Procurement Much RemainsUndiscoveredrdquo March 1 2004 httpwwwisis-onlineorgpublicationslibyacent_procurehtml99 IAEA Board of Governors GOV200363 p 7100 Hibbs ldquoCIA Assessment on DPRK Presumes Massive Outside Help on Centrifugesrdquo101 Mehdi Mohammadi ldquoIran Press Ofordfcial Interviewed on Nuclear Activities since 1970rdquo BBCMonitoring International Reports Keyhan (Tehran) translated from Persian April 28 2005

ing high-quality UF4 (uranium tetraordmuoride) and converting it into UF6102 Al-though less evidence is available from Libyarsquos program the lags in timebetween receiving parts from the AQ Khan network and constructing its fa-cilities as well as other difordfculties seem to indicate the presence of similarproblems According to one observer these problems suggest that Libyabought ldquonuclear technology without actually knowing how it workedrdquo103

Yet materials acquisition is only one step in the nuclear weapons acquisitionprocess Even with a bomb design many intermediate steps are required to de-velop a nuclear arsenal Being able to cast ordfssile materials and high explosivesinto the necessary shapes requires extensive experience104 As Siegfried Heckerhas noted ldquoThe real secrets are in the details of the metallurgy the manufac-turing and the engineeringrdquo105 AQ Khan apparently attempted to pass onthese secrets offering ldquouranium re-conversion and casting capabilitiesrdquo106 Hissuccess in describing the necessary processes in sufordfcient detail however ap-pears to have been limited These weapons also require a delivery system al-though some of the countries discussed here have advanced ballistic missileprograms miniaturizing toughening and ordftting a nuclear device that can beused as a nuclear warhead on a missile is not a straightforward task

The bomb in the design that Libya acquired from the AQ Khan networkwas too large to ordft on any of its ballistic missiles107mdashor indeed possibly onany missile in development by North Korea or Iran both of which may havealso received copies of the design Accounts describe the design as ldquocruderdquoand incomplete108 Some sources note that the core device has a mass of about500 kg109 most attribute the design to the fourth Chinese nuclear test in1966110 Yet the total mass of the core device reentry vehicle and ballast ismuch greater the warhead that most closely ordfts this description is the one on


102 Joseph Cirincione personal communication June 3 2005 from conversations with Westernofordfcials and IAEA experts103 Quoted in Crawford ldquoLibya Was Far From Building Nuclear Bombrdquo104 MacKenzie and Spinardi ldquoTacit Knowledge Weapons Design and the Uninvention of Nu-clear Weaponsrdquo105 Quoted in William J Broad and David E Sanger ldquoPakistanirsquos Black Market May Sell NuclearSecretsrdquo New York Times March 21 2005106 Pierre Goldschmidt IAEA deputy director-general and head of the Department of Safe-guards ldquoImplementation of Safeguards in the Islamic Republic of Iranrdquo statement to the IAEABoard of Governors March 1 2005107 Crawford ldquoLibya Was Far From Building Nuclear Bombrdquo108 David E Sanger ldquoThe Khan Networkrdquo paper presented at the Conference on South Asia andthe Nuclear Future Stanford California June 4ndash5 2004109 Albright and Hinderstein ldquoIran Countdown to Showdownrdquo110 Sanger and Broad ldquoAs Nuclear Secrets Emergerdquo

the Chinese DF-2A a 32-ton 21-meter-long 165-meter-wide missile deployedfrom 1966 to 1979 This warhead a 12-kiloton device weighs 1290 kg with a200 kg reentry vehicle the total payload would be almost 1500 kg111 By con-trast all of the missiles currently or previously owned or in development byLibya Iran and North Korea are designed with a maximum intended payloadof at most 1000 kg112 Although range can be traded for payload whether thewarheads are small enough to ordft on the missiles is unclear Scud-based mis-siles have a diameter of 088 meters the missile with the largest diameter avail-able to these new proliferantsmdashNorth Korearsquos Nodong 1mdashis 132 meters wide16 meters long and weighs 1625 tons making it a third of a meter narrowerand half the mass of the DF-2A113 South Korearsquos National Intelligence Servicereported in 2005 that North Korea lacked the technology to put warheads onmissiles114 Even though other methods could still be used for delivery (egfrom an aircraft in a shipping container or in a truck) they are all consider-ably less desirable For example if Iran wants to deter a state with advancedair defenses such as Israel a ballistic missile is likely to have far more successit has signiordfcant command and control advantages as well

Past and Future Counterproliferation Efforts

Numerous strategies for dissuading proliferants and dissolving proliferationnetworks have been attempted but few have been successful Threatening re-gime change has been minimally effective and isolating or containing ldquoroguerdquostates has been counterproductive coinciding with the growth of networks be-tween them By contrast offering beneordfts that closely mirror some of the coremotivations of these states to proliferate has met with some success

A policy of regime change is unlikely to encourage cooperation and is verylikely to convince proliferators that they need nuclear weapons to deter theUnited States It is self-defeating US threats of forcible regime change are


111 John W Lewis and Hua Di ldquoChinarsquos Ballistic Missile Programs Technologies StrategiesGoalsrdquo International Security Vol 17 No 2 (Fall 1992) pp 5ndash40112 Daryl Kimball ldquoWorldwide Ballistic Missile Inventoriesldquo (Washington DC Arms ControlAssociation May 2002) httpwwwarmscontrolorgfactsheetsmissilesasp113 Joseph Bermudez Jr ldquoA History of Ballistic Missile Development in the DPRKrdquo OccasionalPaper 2 (Monterey Calif Monitoring Proliferation Threats Project Center for NonproliferationStudies Monterey Institute of International Studies 1999) httpcnsmiisedupubsopapersop2op2pdf p 27114 Jeong-ho Yun ldquoNorth Korea Canrsquot Put Nuke Warheads on Missiles NISrdquo Choson Ilbo (Seoul)February 15 2005

likely to increase the number of states that seek a nuclear capability and bol-ster existing proliferatorsrsquo programs as a defensive reaction North Korea re-acted to the invasion of Iraq by claiming that it was reprocessing all of its 8000spent fuel rods in late April 2003115 then in late August 2003 it threatened totest a nuclear device116 The Bush administration touts Libyarsquos disarmament asan example of the threat of regime change working yet this argument does nothold up under scrutiny Libya had been attempting to rehabilitate itself foryears and a ordfnal agreement was well in the works before the invasion of Iraqor the interception of the BBC China117 Indeed one Western diplomat sug-gested that Libya tipped off the United States about the shipment perhaps as agood-faith gesture others have speculated that Libya made the order expect-ing or intending it to be intercepted to exaggerate the size worth and progressof its nuclear program118

A policy of isolation or containment such as that applied to Iran and Iraq bypast US administrations is a strategy that falls short of regime change In-deed the threat of isolation itself can be an important bargaining tool Yet likeeconomic coercion119 threatening isolation is more effective than carrying itout The immense efforts made by the United States to isolate and contain Iranproved successful in delaying completion of the Bushehr nuclear reactor in the1990s but this strategy gave Iran no incentive to cooperate and did little toprevent the transfer of technology from second-tier suppliers

The practice of isolation can even be counterproductive Many of the statesin the current second-tier proliferation networks (as well as those in past net-works for example South Africa and Israel)120 are isolated from the rest of theinternational system whether through their own choices or through deliberatepolicies by the United States and other powerful actors Isolation has beenidentiordfed as a possible correlate of nuclear weapons programs121 If ldquoroguerdquo


115 David E Sanger ldquoNorth Korea Says It Now Possesses Nuclear Arsenalrdquo New York TimesApril 25 2003116 David E Sanger and Joseph Kahn ldquoNorth Korea Says It May Test an A-Bombrdquo New YorkTimes August 29 2003117 Flynt L Leverett ldquoWhy Libya Gave Up on the Bombrdquo New York Times January 23 2004118 Crawford ldquoLibya Was Far From Building Nuclear Bombrdquo and Michael Roston ldquoPolishingUp the Story on the PSIrdquo National Interest June 9 2004 httpwwwinthenationalinterestcomArticlesVol3Issue23Vol3Issue23RostonPFVhtml119 Daniel W Drezner ldquoThe Hidden Hand of Economic Coercionrdquo International Organization Vol57 No 3 (July 2003) pp 643ndash659120 David Albright and Mark Hibbs ldquoSouth Africa The ANC and the Atom Bombrdquo Bulletin ofthe Atomic Scientists Vol 49 No 3 (April 1993) pp 32ndash37121 Jo and Gartzke ldquoDeterminants of Nuclear Weapons Proliferationrdquo

states are stopped from connecting with the rest of the world they will belikely to connect with each other insteadmdashwith potentially disastrous conse-quences The United States has facilitated connections between isolates bymarginalizing them both in its rhetoric and policy and since Ronald Reaganrsquosadministration grouping them as ldquoroguesrdquo ldquopariahsrdquo or ldquooutlawsrdquo122 TheClinton administration slowly moved away from this policy in 1997 after theappointment of Madeleine Albright as secretary of state who shifted US rhet-oric to ldquostates of concernrdquo in June 2000123 The Bush administration quickly re-turned to the ldquoroguerdquo state rhetoric then escalated it by referring to Iran Iraqand North Korea as members of an ldquoaxis of evilrdquo124 Later John Bolton ex-panded the ldquoaxisrdquo to include Libya Syria and Cuba125 This uncompromisingrhetoric limits US policy options and places the United States in a difordfcult ne-gotiating position The United States and the United Kingdom could not reachan agreement with Libya until the Bush administration complied with a re-quest by high-level British ofordfcials to remove Bolton from the US negotiatingteam Boltonrsquos unwillingness to compromise was preventing Libya from ac-cepting a deal126

By contrast diplomatic incentives and economic beneordfts including aid andsuspension of sanctions have been successful in the past in an unexpectedplacemdashNorth Korea Given its security relationships the DPRK might seem tobe a ldquohard caserdquo for using these tools for counterproliferation127 Yet two ofNorth Korearsquos three main demands for eliminating its nuclear program are forthe United States to ldquorecognize the DPRKrsquos sovereigntyrdquo and to ldquonot hinder[its] economic developmentrdquo128 North Korea has consistently responded posi-tively to US diplomatic overtures economic beneordfts and threats of economic


122 See Robert S Litwak Rogue States and US Foreign Policy Containment after the Cold War(Washington DC Woodrow Wilson Center Press 2000) and Robert S Litwak ldquoNon-prolifera-tion and the Dilemmas of Regime Changerdquo Survival Vol 45 No 4 (Winter 2003) pp 7ndash32123 Madeleine K Albright ldquoSecretary of State Madeleine K Albright Interview on the DianeRehm Show WAMU-FMrdquo June 19 2000124 Bush ldquoState of the Union Addressrdquo125 John R Bolton ldquoBeyond the Axis of Evil Additional Threats from Weapons of Mass Destruc-tionrdquo remarks to Heritage Foundation Washington DC May 6 2002 httpwwwstategovtusrm9962htm126 Michael Hirsh ldquoBoltonrsquos British Problemrdquo Newsweek May 2 2005 httpwwwmsnbcmsncomid7614769sitenewsweek127 North Korea is unique in the world it is geographically surrounded by two nuclear powers(Russia and China) and two latent powers (Japan and South Korea) and has US troops are de-ployed on its border128 ldquoConclusion of Non-aggression Treaty between DPRK and US Called Forrdquo Korean CentralNews Agency October 24 2002

sanctions when deemed credible and when combined with clear red lines Forexample during the 1993ndash94 crisis threats of sanctions were met with NorthKorean bellicosity The North Koreans believed that with its ally China on theSecurity Council multilateral sanctions would never pass Quiet diplomacycombined with a good-faith effort by the United States to negotiate with NorthKorea convinced China to warn the DPRK on June 10 1994 that it might notveto sanctions This threat and a clear delineation by the United States of redlines that would trigger sanctions brought the North Koreans to the bargainingtable129 Similarly diplomatic and symbolic gestures by the United Statesmdashforexample making joint statements with the DPRK after meetings and replacingits gas-graphite nuclear plants with light-water nuclear reactors rather thanwith conventional power plantsmdashwere key to North Korean concessions dur-ing the crisis These gestures were effective because they allowed North Koreato maintain its status as an equal of the United States and as a nuclear state al-beit not a nuclear weapons state130

The Bush administration should adopt a policy of proliferation pragmatismthat balances credible threats of force with promises of beneordfts to convince thecurrent hubs of North Korea and Pakistan and potential new hubs such as Iranto cooperate Incentives must be matched with statesrsquo underlying motivationsfor proliferation Such incentives could include recognition by important statesand membership in international organizations as well as economic beneordftsincluding aid and suspension of sanctions

north korea

North Korea should be offered a grand bargain in which its security economicand diplomatic concerns are treated as legitimate rather than secondary mat-ters to be resolved after disarmament131 the United States has not yet at-tempted to test North Korea in this way Convincing the North Koreans that itis not going to be invaded is more likely to prod them into voluntarily givingup their program than is the threat of regime change


129 On Chinarsquos threat see Don Oberdorfer The Two Koreas A Contemporary History rev ed (NewYork Basic Books 2001) p 320 On establishing clear red lines see Joel S Wit Daniel Ponemanand Robert L Gallucci Going Critical The First North Korean Nuclear Crisis (Washington DCBrookings 2004)130 See Alexander H Montgomery ldquoA Tale of Two Crises US-DPRK Nuclear Dynamicsrdquo paperpresented at the annual conference of the American Political Science Association Chicago IllinoisSeptember 2ndash5 2004131 On this topic see Michael E OrsquoHanlon and Mike Mochizuki ldquoToward a Grand Bargain withNorth Koreardquo Washington Quarterly Vol 26 No 4 (Autumn 2003) pp 7ndash18

The North Korean declaration on February 10 2005 that it had ldquomanufac-tured nukes for self-defencerdquo seemed to be a new twist in the North Koreancrisis132 Rather than being an abrogation of the talks this statement waslargely a set of requirements for continuing negotiations as elaborated byNorth Korearsquos representative to the United Nations on February 19133 TheSouth Korean government played down the announcement as being short ofdeclaring nuclear weaponsndashstate status134

Although some observers argue against rewarding North Korea or otherstates for bad behavior for fear of emulation135 it is unlikely that any othercountry would ever aspire to be in North Korearsquos position isolated from therest of the world dependant on others for basic needs and desperate enoughto attempt to sell its security Moreover given the lack of other credible op-tions making a deal with North Korea is better than threatening regimechange or relying on China to pressure it136 Six-party talks between ChinaJapan North Korea Russia South Korea and the United States began inAugust 2003 after North Korea withdrew from the NPT and ground to a haltafter the third session in June 2004 South Korearsquos offer in June 2005 to provideelectricity to North Korea (despite previous objections from the Bush adminis-tration to including additional inducements) is widely credited with bringingNorth Korea back to the six-party talks137 Others argue that pacts such as theAgreed Framework can be easily violated because covert programs cancontinue out of view138 Yet this argument highlights the problem that coun-tries must ultimately comply willingly with the terms of disarmamentmdashandtherefore inducements must be offered that tackle the fundamental incentivesthat countries have to proliferate As US State Department ofordfcial PaulaDeSutter notes ldquoIf we go into this and North Korea has not made such a deci-


132 ldquoDPRK Ministry of Foreign Affairs Statementrdquo Korean Central News Agency February 102005133 Chan-ho Kang and Myo-ja Ser ldquoNorthrsquos Envoy Lists Conditionsrdquo Joong-Ang Ilbo (Seoul) Feb-ruary 19 2005134 ldquoNorth Korea Not Yet a Nuclear Weapons State Seoulrdquo Reuters February 13 2005135 Ari Fleischer press brieordfng James S Brady Press Brieordfng Room April 29 2003 httpwwwwhitehousegovnewsreleases20030420030429-3html136 As Robert Gallucci the Clinton administrationrsquos chief negotiator with the North Koreansduring the 1993ndash94 crisis put it ldquoListen Irsquom not interested in teaching other people lessons Irsquominterested in the national security of the United States If thatrsquos what yoursquore interested in are youbetter off with this deal or without it You tell me what yoursquore going to do without the deal andIrsquoll compare that with the dealrdquo Quoted in Scott Stossel ldquoNorth Korea The War Gamerdquo AtlanticMonthly JulyAugust 2005 pp 97ndash108137 Joel Brinkley ldquoRice Claims US Role in Korean About-Facerdquo New York Times July 14 2005138 Bolton ldquoThe Bush Administration and Nonproliferationrdquo

sion this is going to be like pulling teeth and our conordfdence at the end maynot be what we would like it to berdquo139 Unlike North Korearsquos plutonium pro-gram even a production-scale centrifuge facility would be difordfcult to detectvia technical means Given the challenges of remote sensing willing compli-ance is necessary for disarmament

Threats of force alone cannot stop North Korea from trading either its mis-sile or nuclear technologies It is not a member of the MTCR and its missile ex-ports do not violate any laws a shipment of Scuds from the DPRK wasstopped by Spanish commandos acting on US intelligence in December 2002but had to be permitted to reach its destination in Yemen140 Now that NorthKorea is no longer a de facto member of the NPT it is similarly unconstrainedto trade in nuclear technology although recipients that are members of theNPT would be in violation if they accepted nuclear technology for the purposeof pursuing a weapons capability Yet the North Koreans have been willing totrade both its nuclear and missile programs for recognition symbolic rewardsand economic assistance141 North Korea should be tested to see if it will accepta credibly backed bargain including these three elements

pakistan

The Bush administration has claimed success in shutting down the AQ Khannetwork that supplied both Pakistan and other proliferators but its lack of co-operation with the IAEA and an unwillingness to push Pakistan have ham-pered US efforts142 Not only is Pakistanrsquos network continuing to operate butit may be re-creating parts of it with new middlemen Joseph Cirincione direc-tor of nonproliferation at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peaceargues ldquoThe network hasnrsquot been shut down Itrsquos just gotten quieter Per-haps itrsquos gone a little deeper undergroundrdquo143 Pakistan continues to seek partsfor its nuclear program abroad Swiss authorities stopped two attempts by theAQ Khan network in 2004 to purchase aluminum tubes from Russia forPakistanrsquos use144 The existence of any network of suppliers not within


139 Quoted in Reuben Staines ldquoVerifying NK Nuke Dismantlement Tough Task USrdquo KoreaTimes (Seoul) January 31 2005140 Thom Shanker ldquoIf the Scuds Were Going to Iraqrdquo New York Times December 15 2002141 On North Korearsquos willingness to trade its nuclear program see Selig S Harrison ldquoInsideNorth Korea Leaders Open to Ending Nuclear Crisisrdquo Financial Times (London) May 4 2004 Onits missile program see Oberdorfer The Two Koreas pp 439ndash440142 Sanger and Broad ldquoAs Nuclear Secrets Emergerdquo143 Quoted in Louis Charbonneau ldquoPakistan Reviving Nuclear Black Market Experts SayrdquoReuters March 15 2005144 ldquoKhanrsquos Nuclear Network Still Trying in 2004 to Buy Nuclear Technology Swiss Reportrdquo As-sociated Press May 26 2005

Pakistanrsquos direct control makes proliferation more likely suppliers who ordfll or-ders for Pakistanrsquos program can ordfll the same orders for other proliferants Astrong US effort to establish a ordfssile material cutoff treaty (FMCT) that in-cludes Pakistan would undercut these suppliers if Pakistan stops producingordfssile materials demand for centrifuge parts will drop signiordfcantly

Although Pakistan is unlikely to roll back either its nuclear or missile pro-grams the United States and the other members of the MTCR should make it ahigh priority to ensure that it joins the MTCR and adopts domestic controls onnuclear and missile technologies Pakistan (as well as India and Israel) shouldbe brought inside the nuclear nonproliferation regime possibly by relaxing themembership standards for nuclear export control consortia including theZangger Committee and the Nuclear Suppliers Group More informationabout the extent of the AQ Khan network and other potential buyers (as wellas the actual recipients) is also needed the United States should push Pakistanto reveal the identity of the ldquofourth countryrdquo that Khanrsquos network may havesupplied or demonstrate that this country is ordfctional145

iran

If the North Korean and Pakistani hubs are effectively shut down the next log-ical step would be to turn to nodes that could evolve into new hubs The ad-vanced state of Iranrsquos missile and nuclear programs as well as its activeparticipation in both networks would suggest that it is a likely candidate totake over the central role of spreading nuclearmissile technologies Indeed asis shown in Figure 3a Iran has already formed a mini-hub of missile prolifera-tion between Libya North Korea and Syria The positive response of Iran topotential diplomatic and economic beneordfts offered by the EU in exchange forthe temporary suspension of its uranium enrichment program in November2004 pending a ordfnal agreement is another indication that these tools can bevery useful in a context that is normally dominated by security considerationsSuggestions that the United States should continue to play the ldquobad coprdquo toEuropersquos ldquogood coprdquo with respect to Iran miss the point of the analogy thegood cop is convincing only if he can credibly restrain the bad cop without aclear signal from the United States that it will accept the outcome of negotia-


145 Evidence found in shipping records indicates a possible fourth country beyond North KoreaIran and Libya Barton Gellman and Dafna Linzer ldquoUnprecedented Peril Forces Tough CallsPresident Faces a Multi-front Battle against Threats Known Unknownrdquo Washington Post October26 2004

tions and not take military action Iran is unlikely to accept an offer from theEU to restrict its nuclear activities

The United States should send such a signalmdashand soon before Iran gives upon negotiations entirely President Bushrsquos assertion that ldquothis notion that theUnited States is getting ready to attack Iran is simply ridiculousrdquo was under-mined when he continued lsquolsquoAnd having said that all options are on the ta-blerdquo146 The minor concessions of airplane parts and support for World TradeOrganization membership offered by Secretary of State Rice are insufordfcientthese gestures appear to be ldquohawk engagementrdquo where offers over the lastyear in support of the EUrsquos efforts (promptly rejected by Iran) are made to le-gitimize coercive action later147 Instead the United States should take seri-ously the feelers sent out by former Iranian President and head of theinordmuential Expediency Council Hashemi Rafsanjani to open diplomatic chan-nels and deal directly with Iran148 The election of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad aspresident of Iran instead of Rafsanjani in June 2005 should not be used by theUnited States as a reason to avoid talks The election does not change Iranrsquosunderlying reasons for pursuing nuclear technology which are intertwinedwith factors such as international prestige and national pride as much as any-thing else149 As a result it will be difordfcult to eliminate Iranrsquos nuclear programcompletely (just as North Korea required nuclear power reactors in 1994 tosave face) but creative applications of technology and diplomacy could pro-duce a lasting compromise that keeps Iran short of the nuclear weaponsthreshold

Conclusion

States are neither as determined nor as advanced in their pursuit of nuclear ca-pabilities as proliferation determinists suggest Part of the reason for this is thedifordfculty of transmitting tacit knowledge to new proliferators which restrictsthe structure of nuclear proliferation networks Two main implications ordmow


146 Quoted in Elisabeth Bumiller ldquoBush Says Europe Should Not Lift China Arms Banrdquo NewYork Times February 22 2005147 Victor D Cha ldquoHawk Engagement and Preventive Defense on the Korean Peninsulardquo Inter-national Security Vol 27 No 1 (Summer 2002) pp 40ndash78148 ldquoRegion Tehran Wants US to Open Diplomatic Channelrdquo Daily Times (Lahore) March 272005149 George Perkovich ldquoIran Nuclear Power as National Priderdquo Khaleej Times (Dubai) March 262005 and Neil MacFarquhar ldquoAcross Iran Nuclear Power Is a Matter of Priderdquo New York TimesMay 29 2005

from this analysis First existing proliferation networks should be shut downby eliminating the hubs while preventing new ones from emerging Second afull range of incentives instead of the threat of regime change should be usedto convince hub states to stop nuclear transfers

Both time and diplomatic energy are in short supply however the immedi-ate need is to cap and roll back the proliferation of networks created by Paki-stan and North Korea and to keep new hubs such as Iran from taking theirplace Tailored incentives and disincentives must be applied to these statesThese policies require both carrots and sticks and need to be broadened be-yond security-minded proposals to include diplomatic symbolic and eco-nomic incentives and disincentives

This does not mean that policymakers can become proliferation procrastina-tors and wait until the time is ripe to eliminate these networks Nor does itmean that they should become proliferation determinists clamoring for regimechange and taking drastic steps (eg military action against North Korea Iranor Pakistan) that could have severe consequences Policymakers have both thetime and the tools to stop these hubs By acting like proliferation pragmatistspolicymakers can dismantle these hubs before they form a network of ties sodense that it will be impossible to pull apart


setrdquo on proliferating nor as advanced in their nuclear capabilities asdeterminists claim3 To dismantle the network of existing proliferation pro-grams the administration should instead move toward a policy of ldquoprolifera-tion pragmatismrdquo This would entail abandoning extreme rhetoric using a fullrange of incentives and disincentives aimed at states seeking to acquire a nu-clear capability targeting the hubs of proliferation networks and engaging indirect talks with the Islamic Republic of Iran and the Democratic PeoplesrsquoRepublic of Korea (DPRK)

In practice the Bush administrationrsquos nonproliferation policies have beenmore varied and less aggressive than its rhetoric would suggest For exampleit has been willing to enter talks with North Korea and Libya despite describ-ing both as ldquoroguesrdquo Strong words can be used strategically to convinceproliferators that accepting a settlement offer would be better than continuingto hold out Yet the administrationrsquos unyielding rhetoric has placed the UnitedStates in a position from which it is difordfcult to back down4 combined with alack of positive incentives this stance has convinced proliferators that theUnited States will not agree to or uphold any settlement short of regimechange Moreover the administration has not formulated any coherentcounterproliferation policies other than regime change and an aggressive formof export control enforcement known as the Proliferation Security InitiativeWith respect to two of the key proliferators todaymdashIran and North KoreamdashtheBush administration has shown little interest in offering any signiordfcant incen-tives or establishing any clear red lines Instead it has relied almost exclu-sively on China to convince the DPRK to give up its nuclear program and hasdeclined to join the United Kingdom France and Germany in talks with Iran

Proliferation determinists present two arguments First dense networksamong second-tier proliferators such as Iran North Korea and Libya and pri-


Advisor Dr Condoleezza Rice to the Reagan Lecturerdquo February 26 2004 httpwwwwhitehousegovnewsreleases20040220040228-1html John R Bolton ldquoThe Bush Adminis-tration and Nonproliferation A New Strategy Emergesrdquo panel 1 of a hearing of the House Com-mittee on International Relations 108th Cong 2d sess March 30 2004 httpwwwstategovtusrm31010htm and Richard Cheney ldquoRemarks by the Vice President at Westminster CollegerdquoApril 26 2004 httpwwwwhitehousegovnewsreleases200404print20040426-8html3 John R Bolton ldquoPreventing Iran from Acquiring Nuclear Weaponsrdquo remarks to the Hudson In-stitute August 17 2004 httpwwwstategovtusrm35281htm4 As Vice President Dick Cheney has argued ldquoI have been charged by the president with makingsure that none of the tyrannies in the world are negotiated with We donrsquot negotiate with evil wedefeat itrdquo Quoted in Warren P Strobel ldquoAdministration Struggles to Find Right Approach to NKorea Talksrdquo Knight Ridder December 20 2003















































































































































north korea










pakistan






iran






Conclusion






















































































































































north korea










pakistan






iran






Conclusion

















































































































































north korea










pakistan






iran






Conclusion












































































































































north korea










pakistan






iran






Conclusion




































































































































north korea










pakistan






iran






Conclusion
































































































































north korea










pakistan






iran






Conclusion


























































































































north korea










pakistan






iran






Conclusion




















































































































north korea










pakistan






iran






Conclusion
















































































































north korea










pakistan






iran






Conclusion












































































































north korea










pakistan






iran






Conclusion






































































































north korea










pakistan






iran






Conclusion

































































































north korea










pakistan






iran






Conclusion





























































































north korea










pakistan






iran






Conclusion
























































































north korea










pakistan






iran






Conclusion



















































































north korea










pakistan






iran






Conclusion














































































north korea










pakistan






iran






Conclusion







































































north korea










pakistan






iran






Conclusion


































































north korea










pakistan






iran






Conclusion






























































north korea










pakistan






iran






Conclusion
























































north korea










pakistan






iran






Conclusion

















































north korea










pakistan






iran






Conclusion













































north korea










pakistan






iran






Conclusion








































north korea










pakistan






iran






Conclusion




































north korea










pakistan






iran






Conclusion






























north korea










pakistan






iran






Conclusion

























north korea










pakistan






iran






Conclusion



















north korea










pakistan






iran






Conclusion














north korea










pakistan






iran






Conclusion










north korea










pakistan






iran






Conclusion














pakistan






iran






Conclusion










pakistan






iran






Conclusion










iran






Conclusion










Conclusion










