Solutions For Nuclear Proliferation

In an age where the nuclear threat from both rogue states and terrorist organizations weighs heavily on people’s minds, a Fletcher School graduate says the U.S. must stop the problem at its root.

Medford/Somerville, Mass. [10.27.04] During the presidential debates, both President Bush and Senator John Kerry cited nuclear proliferation as the greatest threat facing the United States today. The key to stemming the proliferation of nuclear weapons, says a Fletcher School graduate and expert in the field, is to cut off access at the source.

“The most difficult aspect of developing a nuclear weapon is getting the fissile materials,” Elizabeth Turpen – a senior associate at the Henry Stimson Center – said recently on C-SPAN’s Washington Journal. “Short-circuiting [terrorists’] potential to get access to nuclear weapons is related to the fissile materials in the nuclear weapons themselves.”

Before joining the Center, a nonpartisan think tank focused on international peace and security, Turpen worked as a legislative aide for U.S. Sen. Pete Domenici (R-N.M.) and was responsible for studying nonproliferation, defense and foreign matters.

Border security alone isn’t enough to address the problem.

“As a free society with the degree of travel and communication, I don't suggest that higher fences at our border is the most effective preventative step to take,” Turpen told C-SPAN, citing the war on drugs as an example of the ineffectiveness of border control as a counter against the entry of unwanted materials into the country.

But political and economic pressure can be very effective.

“You need to look at the regional considerations that are driving [countries to pursue nuclear weapons] and... try to create a situation where the regional situation is such that those states make a different decision based on their desire to be part of the global economic community,” Turpen said.

As an example, she cited the Nunn-Lugar program, which began in the former Soviet Union in 1991 to facilitate the transfer of nuclear arms from Belarus, Ukraine and Kazakhstan to Russia -- thus removing those three emerging nations from the nuclear sphere.

“States do make calculations like that related to being part of the global economic community and providing good jobs for their people,” Turpen told the network.

But terrorist organizations – which Turpen believes pose a greater nuclear threat than nations such as North Korea or Iran – don’t respond to political and economic pressures like sovereign nations do.

As a result, securing nuclear materials is critical to protecting the U.S. and its allies.

“The likelihood of any particular terrorist getting their hands on fissile materials is largely related to how many fissile materials are out there that are inadequately secured,” Turpen told C-SPAN. “And I would suggest that the world is awash in these materials,”

Dirty bombs or gun-type nuclear devices could be developed by the terrorists who obtain such capabilities, Turpen said, adding the U.S. could be a prime target.

“I feel like the U.S. is the lightening rod for those types of attacks,” the Fletcher School graduate said. “It's the unipolar world and we are the superpower still out there with all the wherewithal that we do have.”

Despite advancements in technology designed to make the world safer, the threat of danger will probably never be completed eliminated.

“The human pattern that I would suggest as most frightening is the fact that every time we reach a different level of technological sophistication we figure out the most destructive use of that technology,” Turpen said.

Still, she pointed to the outpouring of sympathy toward the US on September 11 as a sign that causing a global catastrophe may not be a primary concern of even the most belligerent nations.

“I think most people are not of the mind that mass destruction and bloodletting of civilians is an appropriate tool to achieve anything,” Turpen said.