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Nuclear Testing

Test Ban Supporters Welcome Indonesian Ratification of the CTBT: New Momentum for Entry Into Force of 1996 Pact

Test Ban Supporters Welcome Indonesian Ratification of the CTBT: New Momentum for Entry Into Force of 1996 Pact

(Washington, D. C.) Today,  the Indonesian parliament approved the ratification of the 1996 Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, which bans all nuclear weapons test explosions and establishes a global system for detecting and deterring clandestine test explosions.

February 12, 2012

Science Replaces Nuclear Tests

Science Replaces Nuclear Tests

Volume 2, Issue 14, November 3, 2011

A front-page story in today’s Washington Post (“Supercomputers Offer Tools for Nuclear Testing--and Solving Nuclear Mysteries”) illustrates how far the U.S. Stockpile Stewardship Program has come since nuclear explosive tests ended in 1992. Scientists at the three U.S. national laboratories now have a deeper understanding of nuclear weapons than ever before.

February 12, 2012

The Reykjavik Summit 25 Years Later: Resources from Arms Control Today

The Reykjavik Summit 25 Years Later: Resources from Arms Control Today

(Washington, D.C.) – Twenty-five years ago this month, President Ronald Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev met in Reykjavik, Iceland and moved to the verge of an agreement to rid the world of nuclear weapons.

In their article, “Reykjavik: When Abolition Was Within Reach,” in the October issue of Arms Control Today, Thomas Blanton and Svetlana Savranskaya of the National Security Archive at George Washington University delve into primary-source documents to fill out the historical picture of the October 11-12 summit.

February 12, 2012

Sorting CTBT Fact From Fiction

Sorting CTBT Fact From Fiction

Volume 2, Issue 9, June 20, 2011

After 1,030 U.S. nuclear test explosions, there is simply no technical or military rationale for the United States to resume nuclear explosive testing. At the same time, it is in the U.S. national security interest to prevent nuclear weapons testing by others.

February 12, 2012

1999 CTBT Safeguards

The CTBT Safeguards are:

A. The conduct of a Science Based Stockpile Stewardship Program to insure a high level of confidence in the safety and reliability of nuclear weapons in the active stockpile, including the conduct of a broad range of effective and continuing experimental programs.

B. The maintenance of modern nuclear laboratory facilities and programs in theoretical and exploratory nuclear technology which will attract, retain, and ensure the continued application of our human scientific resources to those programs on which continued progress in nuclear technology depends.

C. The maintenance of the basic capability to resume nuclear test activities prohibited by the CTBT should the United States cease to be bound to adhere to this treaty.

D. Continuation of a comprehensive research and development program to improve our treaty monitoring capabilities and operations.

E. The continuing development of a broad range of intelligence gathering and analytical capabilities and operations to ensure accurate and comprehensive information on worldwide nuclear arsenals, nuclear weapons development programs, and related nuclear programs.

F. The understanding that if the President is informed by the Secretaries of Defense and Energy -- advised by the Nuclear Weapons Council, the Directors of the DOE’s nuclear weapons laboratories and the Commander of the U.S. Strategic Command -- that a high level of confidence in the safety or reliability of a nuclear weapon type which the two Secretaries consider to be critical to our nuclear deterrent could no longer be certified, the President, in consultation with Congress, would be prepared to withdraw from the CTBT under the standard “supreme national interest” clause in order to conduct whatever testing might be required.

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