World Nuclear Forces

(Stockholm, 3 June 2013) Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) today launches the findings of SIPRI Yearbook 2013, which assesses the current state of international security, armaments and disarmament. Key findings include: (a) Alone among the five legally recognized nuclear weapon states, China expanded its nuclear arsenal in 2012; (b) The number of personnel deployed with peace operations worldwide is falling rapidly, due to the withdrawal from Afghanistan; (c) Progress towards a global ban on cluster munitions stalled in 2012.

At the start of 2013 eight states—the United States, Russia, the United Kingdom, France, China, India, Pakistan and Israel—possessed approximately 4400 operational nuclear weapons. Nearly 2000 of these are kept in a state of high operational alert. If all nuclear warheads are counted, these states together possess a total of approximately 17 265 nuclear weapons (see table), as compared with 19 000 at the beginning of 2012.

The decrease is due mainly to Russia and the USA further reducing their inventories of strategic nuclear weapons under the terms of the Treaty on Measures for the Further Reduction and Limitation of Strategic Offensive Arms (New START) as well as retiring ageing and obsolescent weapons.

At the same time, all five legally recognized nuclear weapon states—China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States—are either deploying new nuclear weapon delivery systems or have announced programmes to do so, and appear determined to retain their nuclear arsenals indefinitely. Of the five, only China seems to be expanding its nuclear arsenal. India and Pakistan are both expanding their nuclear weapon stockpiles and missile delivery capabilities.

‘Once again there was little to inspire hope that the nuclear weapon-possessing states are genuinely willing to give up their nuclear arsenals. The long-term modernization programmes under way in these states suggest that nuclear weapons are still a marker of international status and power,’ says SIPRI Senior Researcher Shannon Kile.

World Nuclear Forces, 2013:

Country	Deployed Warheads*	Other Warheads	Total 2013	Total 2012
USA	2150	5550	7700	8000
Russia	1800	6700	8500	10000
UK	160	65	225	225
France	290	10	300	300
China		250	250	240
India		90-110	90-110	80-100
Pakistan		100-120	100-120	90-110
Israel		80	80	80
Total	4400	12865	17265	19000

Source: SIPRI Yearbook 2013 * “Deployed” means warheads placed on missiles or located on bases with operational forces.

Peacekeeper Numbers Drop Sharply—Syrian Crisis Exposes Gap Between Principles and Action:

The number of peacekeepers deployed worldwide fell by more than 10 per cent in 2012, as the withdrawal of international forces from Afghanistan got under way.  At 233 642 personnel, the total was still more than double the number deployed in 2003.  These personnel were deployed in 53 operations worldwide, one more than in 2012.

‘We are certainly going to see total peacekeeper numbers keep falling this year, and probably next year too, as a result of the NATO drawdown in Afghanistan,’ said Dr Jaïr van der Lijn, a SIPRI Senior Researcher, who leads SIPRI’s work on peace operations, peacebuilding and conflict management. ‘How far they fall, and what the future peacekeeping landscape looks like, is going to depend on how many troops are eventually deployed in Mali, the broader Sahel region and, potentially, Syria, as well as on states’ willingness to take action to improve the protection of civilians through peace operations and implement the responsibility to protect instead of just bemoaning the failures. Austerity measures will also play a role, but paradoxically, austerity might well encourage states to send more troops to other peace missions in order to avoid domestic pressure to cut their armed forces.’

The United Nations appeared paralysed on the Syria crisis. The new principle of an international responsibility to protect populations if the national government fails to do so—the basis of the 2011 intervention in Libya—was not invoked, as China and Russia threatened to veto any action through the UN and other Security Council members opposed outside ‘interference’ in Syria’s domestic affairs.

‘The lack of action over Syria in 2012 highlighted the weakness of international commitment to the responsibility to protect.  In the end, national interests and deep-rooted fears that the responsibility to protect undermines the principle of state sovereignty, seem to weigh heavier than the plight of populations caught up in conflict,’ said van der Lijn.


Cluster Munitions Control Efforts Stall In 2012:

Attempts to enhance international controls on the use, production, trading and stockpiling of cluster munitions had a disappointing year in 2012, as supporters of the 2008 Convention on Cluster Munitions proved unable to persuade any new states to sign the convention. Major cluster munitions producers that have not signed or ratified the convention include Brazil, China, Egypt, India, Israel, South Korea, Russia and the United States. Several of these states have in the past used cluster munitions. Cluster munitions disperse multiple smaller munitions, some of which can explode months or years later causing civilian casualties.

‘As long as the major producers stay outside the Cluster Munitions Convention, they can argue that cluster munitions remain a “legitimate” means of waging war and military-industrial product—even if most seem to have acknowledged their potentially grave humanitarian impacts,’ said SIPRI Researcher Lina Grip, co-author of a new section of the Yearbook looking at humanitarian arms control.

Read the Press release in Swedish, Catalan and Spanish (PDF)

Nuclear States Developing New Weapons In Defiance Of Treaty

All five legally recognised nuclear states 'appear determined to retain nuclear arsenals indefinitely', says Stockholm Institute

Richard Norton-Taylor reports:

All five legally recognised nuclear states as defined by the non-proliferation treaty – China, France, Russia, the UK and US – are either deploying new nuclear weapons and delivery systems or plan to do so, according to a leading international research organisation.

The countries "appear determined to retain their nuclear arsenals indefinitely", says the latest yearbook published by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (Sipri).

At the start of 2013, eight states – the US, Russia, UK, France, China, India, Pakistan and Israel – possessed approximately 4,400 operational nuclear weapons. Nearly 2,000 of these are kept in a state of high operational alert. If all nuclear warheads are counted, these states together possess a total of approximately 17,265 nuclear weapons, says the Sipri report.

Signatories of the non-proliferation treaty, including the UK, pledge to work towards nuclear disarmament.

"Once again there was little to inspire hope that the nuclear-weapon-possessing states are genuinely willing to give up their nuclear arsenals. The long-term modernisation programmes under way in these states suggest that nuclear weapons are still a marker of international status and power," said the Sipri senior researcher Shannon Kile.

Of the five "official" nuclear states, China appears to be expanding its nuclear arsenal while India and Pakistan are expanding both their nuclear weapon stockpiles and their missile delivery capabilities, Sipri says. Pakistan is also expanding its main plutonium-production complex at Khushab, Punjab.

Sipri estimates that Israel has approximately 80 intact nuclear weapons, 50 for its Jericho II medium-range ballistic missiles and 30 for gravity bombs carried by aircraft. Israel may also have produced non-strategic nuclear weapons, including artillery shells and atomic demolition munitions, says the yearbook.

Robert Wall reports:

The three [China, India and Pakistan] added an estimated 10 warheads each to their inventories, with China’s arsenal now reaching 250 devices, the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute said today in releasing a new yearbook. Pakistan holds 100 to 120 units and India 90 to 110, while North Korea may have as many as eight warheads with an uncertain operational status, it said.

“The long-term modernization programs underway in these states suggest that nuclear weapons are still a marker of international status and power,” said Shannon Kile, a senior researcher at the organization. “All are making qualitative improvements.”

The U.S., with the world’s largest defense budget, is set to spend $214 billion in the next decade on related activities, he said. “The irony is that with President Obama’s Prague address in 2009 calling for the gradual elimination of nuclear weapons, in fact the U.S. is determined to retain its triad of nuclear forces for the indefinite future,” Kile said in reference to the mix of long-range bombers, missiles, and submarine-launched capabilities the Pentagon maintains.

China, too, is pursuing a “qualitative” improvement of its inventory, Kile said. U.S. spending, including on long-range conventional strike capabilities, is driving China to make its own missiles more mobile and harder to attack, he said.

India is similarly working on expanding its capabilities to use nuclear weapons through new ballistic missiles in development. “With India we see the gradual expansion of its longer-range ballistic missile capabilities which are not really targeted at Pakistan but rather at China,” Kile said.

The French nuclear warhead inventory, the world’s third largest, remained unchanged at 300 units with the U.K. also maintaining a level stockpile at 225 devices. Israel, which has never publicly acknowledged its stockpile, is estimated to remain at 80 warheads, Sipri said.

“There was an extraordinary number of tests of nuclear-capable launch systems conducted in 2012,” Kile said. “That really is a good indicator of the commitment of all of these countries to modernize or expand their arsenals.”

Tragic Consequences For Nations Who Abandon Nuclear Program

"The tragic consequences in those countries which abandoned halfway their nuclear programs... clearly prove that the DPRK (Democratic People's Republic of Korea) was very far-sighted and just when it made the (nuclear) option," North Korea's KCNA news agency said.

Via: "Yahoo News"

Time-Lapse Map of Every Nuclear Explosion Since 1945

By Isao Hashimoto

Japanese artist Isao Hashimoto has created a beautiful, undeniably scary time-lapse map of the 2053 nuclear explosions which have taken place between 1945 and 1998, beginning with the Manhattan Project's "Trinity" test near Los Alamos and concluding with Pakistan's nuclear tests in May of 1998. This leaves out North Korea's two alleged nuclear tests in this past decade (the legitimacy of both of which is not 100% clear).

Each nation gets a blip and a flashing dot on the map whenever they detonate a nuclear weapon, with a running tally kept on the top and bottom bars of the screen. Hashimoto, who began the project in 2003, says that he created it with the goal of showing"the fear and folly of nuclear weapons." It starts really slow — if you want to see real action, skip ahead to 1962 or so — but the buildup becomes overwhelming.

US Reveals 21st Century NATO’s Global Priorities

Written by: Rick Rozoff
April 30, 2012
Courtesy Of "EurAsia Review"

The State Department’s top Eurasia hand addressed the House Committee on Foreign Affairs’s Subcommittee on Europe and Eurasia on April 26 to present Washington’s perspective and expectations of next month’s summit of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.

In a presentation titled “The Chicago Summit and U.S. Policy,” the Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary for European and Eurasian Affairs, Tina Kaidanow, laid out what the military alliance’s main powerhouse and financial backer demands of its 27 allies and in so doing indicated many of the top geopolitical objectives of her department and the U.S. government as a whole for the upcoming years.

Commenting on the fact that the May 20-21 gathering of over fifty heads of state from nations supplying troops for the longest war in her nation’s history, that in Afghanistan, will occur in Chicago, only the second NATO summit in the U.S. and “the first ever outside of Washington,” Kaidanow reiterated the main purpose of the world’s only military bloc:

“Our hosting of the Summit is a tangible symbol of the importance of NATO to the United States, as well as an opportunity to underscore to the American people the continued value of the Alliance to the security challenges we face today…NATO is vital to U.S. security. More than ever, the Alliance is the mechanism through which the U.S. confronts diverse and difficult threats to our security…Our experiences in the Cold War, in the Balkans, and now in Afghanistan prove that our core interests are better protected by working together than by seeking to respond to threats alone as individual nations.”

What the House members listening to her, if not the casual reader, would understand by the above comments is that NATO is the chief vehicle employed by the State Department, White House and Pentagon to advance American political, economic and military interests in Eurasia and increasingly the rest of the world. As such, it’s well worth the U.S.’s effort to provide the preponderance of its funding and military assets and further engineer its evolution into an expanding, ultimately global, military-political network.

Kaidanow included an elementary school primer-level synopsis of NATO’s history from its founding – “For…40 years…we..stood united in purpose against the specter of communism” – until the fall of the Berlin Wall, after which “NATO helped to rebuild Central and Eastern European countries while integrating them into the trans-Atlantic community of democratic states.”

The latter was accomplished by absorbing every former Soviet ally in the Warsaw Pact, and three past Soviet republics, into the alliance from 1999-2009, in the process conscripting troops from every one of them for deployment to war zones in Iraq and Afghanistan. No troops from the Warsaw Pact except the Soviet Union had been deployed outside Eastern Europe during the entire Cold War period.

Her presentation dutifully echoed that of her boss, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, in the latter’s speech at the World Affairs Council 2012 NATO Conference on April 3. The U.S. is the only NATO member whose leading officials speak authoritatively in advance of the outcome, in fine detail, of the upcoming summit as the nation effectively determines the agenda, with a friendly nod in the direction of its fellow NATO Quint states – Britain, France, Germany and Italy – but nevertheless calling all the important shots. One wonders why, except for a vain propensity for pageantry and pomposity, summits are held at all given that the results have been decided upon long in advance.

Early in her talk Kaidanow invoked the new Strategic Concept adopted at the last NATO summit in 2010, particularly highlighting the bloc’s Article 5 mutual military assistance (war) clause, affirming that “First and foremost, NATO remains committed to the Article 5 principle of collective defense.”

That article is responsible for the stationing of 152,000 troops, at peak strength, from 50 nations in Afghanistan.

When Kaidanow spoke of “integrating them [twelve Eastern European nations incorporated into NATO from 1999-2009] into the trans-Atlantic community,” she was in fact if not openly confirming the practical results of NATO expansion: To provide the U.S. and its Western allies with air, infantry, naval, radar and drone surveillance, missile, strategic airlift, cyber warfare and other bases and facilities east of the former Berlin Wall and legionaries for neocolonial wars and military occupations in the Balkans, Asia and Africa.

She has been no disinterested observer in that process. In her current position and in a post that preceded it, Kaidanow has cultivated and consolidated the power of what are without dispute Washington’s two most favored – and pampered – satraps, Georgia’s Mikheil Saakashvili and Kosovo’s Hashim Thaci, than whom there are no less savory and more malicious heads of state in the world. If the sociopathic ghoul in Kosovo and the megalomaniacal self-styled reincarnation of the medieval King Davit IV in Georgia are indicative of the U.S.’s political alliances, and if an empire can be judged by the foreign stooges it employs, then Washington has plummeted to a new imperial nadir.

Like most of the current American foreign policy elite, Kaidanow cut her teeth in the Balkans in the 1990s, her first State Department assignments being in the U.S. embassies in Serbia (1995-1997) Bosnia (1997-1998) and Macedonia (1998-1999), in the last instance focusing on neighboring Kosovo.

She attended the infamous Rambouillet conference in February of 1999 where the American delegation headed by Secretary of State Madeleine Albright threw down the gauntlet to Yugoslavia with the infamous Appendix B ultimatum and set the stage for the 78-day war that began on March 24. Rambouillet was also the debut of American asset Thaci, then an underworld kingpin and head of the so-called Kosovo Liberation Army, who was even then being groomed as the head of state be became in 2008 ahead of Kosovo’s unilateral declaration of independence in February of that year. Four years later a majority of the world’s nations still don’t recognize his organized crime-ridden fiefdom as a nation.

Kaidanow was the Chief of Mission and Charge d’Affaires at the U.S. Office in Kosovo from July 2006 to July 2008, until the George W. Bush administration appointed her the first American ambassador on July 19 of the latter year.

In 2009, as Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs (her position as Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary, a promotion, was obtained last July), she visited Georgia a year after the Saakashvili regime invaded South Ossetia, thereby provoking a five-day war with Russia, and met with Defense Minister Bachana (Bacho) Akhalaia to discuss modernizing the nation’s armed forces (described as “reforms”), the impending deployment of U.S. Marine Corps-trained Georgian troops to Afghanistan to serve under NATO command and the U.S.-Georgia Charter on Strategic Partnership signed four months after the war of the preceding year. She returned two months afterward for the same purpose.

In her April 26 appearance before the House committee, she hailed NATO as an alliance of “like-minded states who share our fundamental values of democracy, human rights, and rule of law.” NATO’s first war, against Yugoslavia thirteen years ago, and its partnerships with nations in former Soviet space have produced the likes of Hashim Thaci and Mikheil Saakashvili. Democracy, human rights and the rule of law.

Speaking of goals to be discussed and promoted at the Chicago summit, she said:

“In addition to being a collective security alliance, NATO is also a cooperative security organization. Unlike an ad hoc coalition, NATO can respond rapidly and achieve its military goals by sharing burdens. In particular, NATO benefits from integrated structures and uses common funding to develop common capabilities.”

That is, NATO is a mechanism for the permanent military integration of European states for the purpose of the U.S. securing auxiliary troops for wars outside the Euro-Atlantic zone.

Concerning the first of three main items of discussion at the summit, the war in Afghanistan, Kaidanow asserted:

“[T]he Summit will make clear that NATO will not abandon Afghanistan after the ISAF mission concludes. In Chicago, the Alliance will reaffirm its enduring commitment beyond 2014 and define a new phase of cooperation with Afghanistan.”

As to the true and residual purpose of the Afghan campaign, she added, “we must continue our efforts to develop NATO’s role as a global hub for security partnerships,” which Afghanistan has been used as the crucible for.

The latter relates to the third point, building worldwide military partnerships, regarding which one is reminded of Aesopian cautionary tales about being offered cooperation by wolves and lions. Upon hearing such propositions, a sensible creature starts inching backward into the sheep pen or out of the lair.

The other priority at next month’s summit is what both Kaidanow and Clinton before her referred to as critical defense capability requirements, with the former saying, “NATO’s ability to deploy an effective fighting force in the field makes the Alliance unique” and that, pressuring allies to cough up the funds to ensure it, “its capacity to deter and respond to security challenges will only be as successful as its forces are able, effective, interoperable, and modern.”

To reinforce and flesh out the above, she added:

“The United States is modernizing its presence in Europe at the same time that our NATO Allies, and NATO as an institution, are engaged in similar steps. This is a clear opportunity for our European Allies to take on greater responsibility. The U.S. continues to encourage Allies to meet the two percent benchmark for defense spending and to contribute politically, financially, and operationally to the strength and security of the Alliance.”

She, like her superior at Foggy Bottom, accentuated several key projects in Europe, the most important of which is the U.S.-created European Phased Adaptive Approach interceptor missile system.

Kaidanow acknowledged commitments already obtained to that end in Poland, Romania, Turkey and Spain and said, “We would welcome additional Allied contributions.”

Another summit item is the further integration and expansion of intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) capabilities. Lest anyone be confused about the purpose of those and mistake them as in any way defensive in character, the following comments from Kaidanow will disabuse them of the notion:

“Allies contributed more combat power in Libya than in previous operations (almost 90 percent of all air-to-ground strike missions in Libya were conducted by European pilots, as compared to 10 percent in the Kosovo air campaign in 1999). However, Libya demonstrated considerable shortfalls in European ISR capabilities as the U.S. provided one quarter of the ISR sorties, nearly half of the ISR aircraft, and the vast majority of analytical capability. This past February, NATO defense ministers agreed to fund the Alliance Ground Surveillance (AGS) program. The five drones that comprise this system will provide NATO with crucial information, including identifying potential threats, monitoring developing situations such as humanitarian crises, and distinguishing possible targets for air strikes.”

She also spoke of the now over eight-year patrol of the Baltic Sea sky by NATO warplanes which this year has been extended to 2018, which is to say in perpetuity, revealing an interesting link along the way: “This helps assure the security of allies in a way that is cost effective, allowing them to invest resources into other important NATO operations such as Afghanistan.”

Kaidanow also assured her congressional interlocutors – again in advance; see above comments – that next month’s NATO summit will endorse the Deterrence and Defense Posture Review (DDPR).

Doing so “will reaffirm NATO’s determination to maintain modern, flexible, credible capabilities that are tailored to meet 21st century security challenges. The DDPR will identify the appropriate mix of nuclear, conventional, and missile defense capabilities that NATO needs to meet these challenges…”

She then touted the role of NATO’s global partnership arrangements, “working with a growing number of partners around the world,” as they “allow the Alliance to extend its reach, act with greater legitimacy, share burdens, and benefit from the capabilities of others.”

Regarding which regions among others the expanding military partnerships will be focused on, Kaidanow stated: “In light of the dramatic events of the Arab Spring and NATO’s success in Libya, we envision a particular focus on further engagement with partners in the wider Middle East and North Africa region.”

She also promoted a new category of nations being cultivated for full NATO accession called aspirant countries – currently Bosnia, Georgia, Macedonia and Montenegro – which are “all working closely with Allies to meet NATO criteria so they may enter the Alliance.”

Regarding the most controversial of those four candidate nations, Georgia, she insisted:

“U.S. security assistance and military engagement support the country’s defense reforms, train and equip Georgian troops for participation in ISAF operations, and advance its NATO interoperability. In January, President Obama and President Saakashvili agreed to enhance this cooperation to advance Georgian military modernization, defense reform, and self-defense capabilities…U.S. support for Georgia’s territorial integrity within its internationally recognized borders remains steadfast, and our non-recognition of the separatist regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia will not change.”

*****

The U.S. makes decisions for the military bloc it created and its 27 allies rubber-stamp them.

With the results already determined, the claim by NATO that it is an alliance of equals and that their summits are in any many deliberative is given the lie.

What has already been decided, as confirmed by Deputy Secretary Kaidanow on April 26, is that NATO will remain the world’s only nuclear alliance, one which will continue stationing U.S. strategic weapons on air bases in European countries under NATO’s nuclear sharing arrangement.

That NATO military forces, including the NATO Training Mission – Afghanistan, will remain in Afghanistan long past 2014.

That the U.S. will steadily expand its interceptor missile system from one end of Europe to the other under NATO auspices.

That the U.S. and NATO will continue to move military forces and equipment to Russia’s borders.

That the hallmark of NATO mutual obligations is the bloc’s Article 5, which commits all members to intervene, up to and including going to war, on behalf of any member state which requests intervention.

That NATO will be used to recruit national contingents from scores of nations for military actions like those in Afghanistan and Libya.

That NATO will continue to build a global military network even beyond its 80 or so current members and partners.

That the U.S.-led organization will even more aggressively promote itself as an international – as the only international – military intervention force.

Nuclear "Security" and Nuclear Hypocrisy

Posted by "Sayf Maslul"


Courtesy Of "Global Research and YouTube"

As the so-called "international community" once again meets to mouth political platitudes about stopping nuclear proliferation, many are now pointing to the numerous pieces of evidence demonstrating that, contrary to their official position, these very governments are invested in the proliferation of nuclear materials and nuclear weapons around the globe.

This is the Global Research backgrounder from GRTV.ca

Now I Become Death, The Destroyer Of Worlds

Submitted By "Sayf Maslul"

Courtesy Of "YouTube"



J. Robert Oppenheimer was an American theoretical physicist, best known for his role as the scientific director of the Manhattan Project, the World War II effort to develop the first nuclear weapons, at the secret Los Alamos laboratory in New Mexico. He is known colloquially as "the father of the atomic bomb". Taken from the Atomic Age video collection.

Nuclear Powers Plan Weapons Spending Spree

US To Spend £700bn In Next Decade While Russia and Pakistan Among Those Assigning Roles To Weapons Beyond Deterrence 

By Richard Norton-Taylor 
Sunday 30 October 2011 16.48 EDT 
Courtesy Of "The Guardian"

The world's nuclear powers are planning to spend hundreds of billions of pounds modernising and upgrading weapons warheads and delivery systems over the next decade, according to an authoritative report published on Monday.

Despite government budget pressures and international rhetoric about disarmament, evidence points to a new and dangerous "era of nuclear weapons", the report for the British American Security Information Council (Basic) warns. It says the US will spend $700bn (£434bn) on the nuclear weapons industry over the next decade, while Russia will spend at least $70bn on delivery systems alone. Other countries includingChina, India, Israel, France and Pakistan are expected to devote formidable sums on tactical and strategic missile systems.

For several countries, including Russia, Pakistan, Israel and France, nuclear weapons are being assigned roles that go well beyond deterrence, says the report. In Russia and Pakistan, it warns, nuclear weapons are assigned "war-fighting roles in military planning".

The report is the first in a series of papers for the Trident Commission, an independent cross-party initiative set up by Basic. Its leading members include former Conservative defence secretary Sir Malcolm Rifkind, former Liberal Democrat leader and defence spokesman Sir Menzies Campbell and former Labour defence secretary Lord Browne.

There is a strong case, they say, for a fundamental review of UK nuclear weapons policy. The Conservatives in Britain's coalition government say they want to maintain a Trident-based nuclear weapons system. However, they have agreed to a "value for money" audit into a Trident replacement as four new nuclear missiles submarines are alone estimated to cost £25bn at the latest official estimate. The Lib Dems want to look at other options. The paper, by security analyst Ian Kearns, is entitled Beyond the United Kingdom: Trends in the Other Nuclear Armed States.

Pakistan and India, it warns, appear to be seeking smaller, lighter nuclear warheads so they have a greater range or can be deployed over shorter distances for tactical or "non-strategic" roles. "In the case of Israel, the size of its nuclear-tipped cruise missile enabled submarine fleet is being increased and the country seems to be on course, on the back of its satellite launch rocket programme, for future development of an inter-continental ballistic missile (ICBM)," the report notes.

A common justification for the new nuclear weapons programmes is perceived vulnerability in the face of nuclear and conventional force development elsewhere. For example, Russia has expressed concern over the US missile defence and Conventional Prompt Global Strike programmes. China has expressed similar concerns about the US as well as India, while India's programmes are driven by fear of China and Pakistan.

Pakistan justifies its nuclear weapons programme by referring to India's conventional force superiority, the report observes.

In a country-by-country analysis, the report says:

• The US is planning to spend $700bn on nuclear weapons over the next decade. A further $92bn will be spent on new nuclear warheads and the US also plans to build 12 nuclear ballistic missile submarines, air-launched nuclear cruise missiles and bombs.

• Russia plans to spend $70bn on improving its strategic nuclear triad (land, sea and air delivery systems) by 2020. It is introducing mobile ICBMs with multiple warheads, and a new generation of nuclear weapons submarines to carry cruise as well as ballistic missiles. There are reports that Russia is also planning a nuclear-capable short-range missile for 10 army brigades over the next decade.

• China is rapidly building up its medium and long-range "road mobile" missile arsenal equipped with multiple warheads. Up to five submarines are under construction capable of launching 36-60 sea-launched ballistic missiles, which could provide a continuous at-sea capability.

• France has just completed deployment of four new submarines equipped with longer-range missiles with a "more robust warhead". It is also modernising its nuclear bomber fleet.

• Pakistan is extending the range of its Shaheen II missiles, developing nuclear cruise missiles, improving its nuclear weapons design as well as smaller, lighter, warheads. It is also building new plutonium production reactors.

• India is developing new versions of its Agni land-based missiles sufficient to target the whole of Pakistan and large parts of China, including Beijing. It has developed a nuclear ship-launched cruise missile and plans to build five submarines carrying ballistic nuclear missiles.

• Israel is extending its Jericho III missile's range, and is developing an ICBM capability, expanding its nuclear-tipped cruise missile enabled submarine fleet.

• North Korea unveiled a new Musudan missile in 2010 with a range of up to 2,500 miles and capable of reaching targets in Japan. It successfully tested the Taepodong-2 with a possible range of more than 6,000 miles sufficient to hit half the US mainland. However, the report, says, "it is unclear whether North Korea has yet developed the capability to manufacture nuclear warheads small enough to sit on top of these missiles".

Iran's nuclear aspirations are not covered by the report.

Nuclear Double Standards

The United States and Its Allies Should Look At Their Own Nuclear Policy Before Criticizing Iran

By Mersiha Gadzo
September 13, 2010
Courtesy Of "The Varsity"

For years, the United States and its allies have accused Iran of being a major nuclear threat because it has violated the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. Ironically, the real violators of the NNPT are the same nations accusing Iran. The U.S. and its allies have never been able to confirm their accusations with concrete proof since they are based entirely on suspicion. While the media continues to attack Iran, illegal nuclear activities made by the West remain widely unknown to the public.

Iran, unlike Israel, is a signatory of the 1970 NNPT, which requires the International Atomic Energy Agency to make frequent unannounced inspections in order to verify that the country’s nuclear program remains within the bounds of the treaty. The IAEA has made over 2,700 snap inspections in Iran and have repeatedly stated that they have found no evidence of a weapons program and that non-diversion of nuclear material is continually being verified.

United Nations Security Council investigations, led by former Director General of IAEA, Mohamed El-Baradei, have repeatedly shown that Iran has no military component to its program. In an interview for the German magazine, Der Spiegel, in July 2010, El-Baradei stated “I do not believe that the Iranians are actually producing nuclear weapons… in general, the danger of a nuclear-armed Iran is overestimated, some even play it up intentionally.”

One of the treaty’s main principles is non-proliferation. This means the five nuclear weapon states (U.S., France, United Kingdom, Russia, and China) agree not to transfer nuclear weapons. Yet the IAEA and the media have completely disregarded that the U.S. has actively been contributing to the proliferation of nuclear arms in Europe. The U.S. has thus far supplied 480 thermonuclear bombs to the so-called “non-nuclear states”: Belgium, Germany, Holland, Italy, and Turkey.

According to University of Ottawa emeritus professor Michel Chossudovsky, three out of the eight U.S. nuclear air bases are situated in Germany.

Israel, an “undeclared nuclear state,” has obtained an estimate of 200 nuclear devices and has the Middle East’s largest and most advanced chemical and biological warfare facilities. Its refusal to sign the 189-nation NNPT enables it to easily threaten its neighbours. El-Baradei stated at a press conference in October 2009 that, “Israel is the number one threat to the Middle East given the nuclear arms it possesses.” Israel has refused to allow inspections into its nuclear program for 30 years, while Iran is complying with its obligations and allowing inspectors into its nuclear sites.

Iran has never launched a war in modern times but since 1900 has been invaded by Britain, the Soviet Union, Russia, and Iraq. It is surrounded by nuclear powers such as Israel, Pakistan, India, and Russia. The former three have yet to sign the treaty.

The signatories of the treaty are required to gradually eliminate all of their nuclear weapons and yet 40 years later none of the original signers (U.S., Britain, France, the Soviet Union, and China) have complied. Instead, all of them have steadily enhanced their nuclear arms.

The U.S. has invaded other countries, most recently Afghanistan and Iraq, and is the only nation to ever use a nuclear weapon against another nation. The U.S. is also notorious for organizing coups against democratically elected governments, overthrowing regimes, and waging illegal wars. The U.S. has no right to bully Iran when the U.S. itself is a major violator of the NNPT and of international law. Therefore, it is a double standard for the United States and its allies to curtail Iran developing peaceful nuclear technology.