June 2024
By Xiaodon Liang and Shizuka Kuramitsu

China has not provided a “substantive response” to three U.S. strategic risk-reduction proposals and has declined to schedule a follow-on meeting to a November 2023 bilateral meeting on arms control and nonproliferation matters, U.S. officials said.

But diplomatic engagement continues on other tracks. Chinese and U.S. delegations met in Geneva on May 14 to begin a dialogue on strategic risks associated with artificial intelligence (AI). U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin spoke with his counterpart, Chinese Defense Minister Adm. Dong Jun, for the first time in 18 months on May 31 on the sidelines of the Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore.  U.S. officials confirmed that nuclear weapons concerns were on the agenda.

According to U.S. officials, the United States at the November meeting proposed risk reduction measures on missile launch notifications, a crisis hotline, and space deconfliction. China “has declined a follow-on meeting and has not provided a substantive response to the risk reduction suggestions we put forward,” Bonnie Jenkins, U.S. undersecretary of state for arms control and international security, testified May 15 before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

Jenkins said that the United States would continue to “increase diplomatic pressure” on China to be more transparent about its nuclear forces. Citing the Defense Department estimate that China will increase the number of its operational warheads from 500 warheads currently to 1,000 by 2030, she said the buildup raised questions about China’s nuclear posture and strategic goals.

The United States also has urged China and Russia to mirror the unilateral U.S. statement that humans, rather than AI, always should be in control of nuclear weapons. Speaking to reporters May 2, Paul Dean, principal deputy assistant secretary of state at the Bureau of Arms Control, Deterrence, and Stability, described that commitment as “an extremely important norm of responsible behavior.”

But when asked by reporters on May 13, a U.S. spokesperson declined to confirm that nuclear command and control would be prioritized during the talks with China in Geneva. According to a summary of the talks issued May 15 by the U.S. National Security Council, the two sides discussed “respective approaches to AI safety and risk management,” and the United States raised concerns about Chinese “misuse” of AI. The Associated Press on May 15 described hints of tension between the parties and said that the Chinese delegation criticized U.S. restrictions on exports of computer hardware that are critical to research in the AI field.

Meanwhile, China has continued to reaffirm its nuclear no-first-use policy. Arriving in France for a state visit May 5, Chinese President Xi Jinping, writing in the French newspaper Le Figaro, “stressed that nuclear weapons must not be used, and a nuclear war must not be fought.”

In response to questions from Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), Jenkins said she was aware of a specific Chinese no-first-use proposal but the matter would have to be taken up by the interagency process. Jenkins added that she had questions about how China’s no-first-use policy was compatible with its current nuclear weapons buildup.

Jenkins also said that, in bilateral discussions with China, the United States stressed the importance of being a responsible nuclear power and how Russian threats of nuclear use are irresponsible.

Xi “has played an important role in de-escalating Russia’s irresponsible nuclear threats, and I am confident that [he] will continue to do so,” European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said in a May 6 press statement, following talks with Xi and French President Emmanuel Macron.

On a May 16 state visit to China, Russian President Vladimir Putin agreed with Xi to deepen the “comprehensive strategic partnership of coordination for the new era” as they commemorated this year’s 75th anniversary of Chinese-Russian diplomatic relations, according to reports from the Chinese Foreign Ministry.

June 2024
By Carol Giacomo

U.S. President Joe Biden came under fresh pressure to halt the transfer of weapons to Israel after the state launched a deadly bombardment of Rafah that killed at least 45 people.

On May 28, CNN reported that its analysis of videos and a review by explosive experts showed that U.S.-made munitions were used in the Rafah attack, which occurred May 26, two days after the International Court of Justice ordered Israel to “immediately” halt its military offensive in the southern Gaza city.

Earlier in the month, Biden threatened to suspend the delivery of some U.S.-made offensive weapons if Israeli forces entered population centers in Rafah, a refuge for civilians fleeing the fighting that is also viewed as a Hamas stronghold. U.S. laws and a U.S. presidential directive impose requirements on presidents to curb U.S. weapons transfers to countries that violate international humanitarian law or fail to avoid harming civilians.

But even after Israeli strikes killed what the Gazan Health Ministry said were dozens of people sheltering in tent camps and wounded 249 more, the White House suggested that the military offensive still had not crossed a redline that would force significant changes in U.S. support for Israel.

On May 28, National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said that what the Biden administration does not want to see in Rafah is a “major ground operation” in which “thousands and thousands of troops [are] moving in a maneuvered, concentrated, coordinated way against a variety of targets on the ground.”

He said that type of operation was not happening, and “I have no policy changes to speak of,” although he called the deaths in Rafah “devastating.”

For months, the Biden administration has straddled the sensitive question of whether Israel has violated U.S. and international humanitarian law as it sought to punish Hamas for the extremist group’s brutal Oct. 7 attack that killed more than 1,200 Israelis and foreign nationals.

One particular deadly attack occurred on April 1 when seven employees of World Central Kitchen, an aid group, were killed by Israeli airstrikes. The Israeli military took responsibility for the catastrophe, The New York Times reported on April 8, and said it presumed some of World Central Kitchen’s vehicles were carrying militants, raising new questions about Israel’s ability to identify and protect civilians.

On May 10, the Biden administration announced the results of its internal review of Israel’s use of U.S.-provided weapons in the war in Gaza, as called for in National Security Memorandum-20. (See ACT, March 2024.)

The report said that “it is reasonable to assess” that U.S. weapons have been used in violation of humanitarian law and that Israel has acted in ways that blocked U.S. humanitarian assistance. But it does not make a specific enough finding to trigger sanctions against Israel.

The report also found that the U.S. intelligence community “assesses that Israel could do more to avoid civilian harm.”

U.S. law, regulation, and the Conventional Arms Transfer Policy require the United States to withhold military assistance when U.S. weapons are used in contravention of international humanitarian law.

Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), who authored a proposed legislative amendment that prompted the drafting of the national security memorandum, said the report “ducks the ultimate questions that [it] was designed to determine,” according to AI Monitor.

The issue has divided the State Department, where some officials urged Secretary of State Antony Blinken to conclude that Israel has violated the terms of the memorandum and others pressed him to certify that it did not.

In early May, the Biden administration paused the delivery of a shipment of 3,500 500- and 2,000-pound bombs to Israel, Axios reported May 5, but other weapons continue to flow.

The United States provides more weapons to Israel than any other country, including $80 billion last year. Since Oct. 7, these transfers have included bombs, artillery shells, precision guidance kits, guided missiles, drones, and ammunition.

Israel’s Rafah operation has spawned international outrage and a demand for an end to the fighting, including from leaders in the European Union, the United Nations, Egypt, and China. The chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court has requested arrest warrants for Israel’s prime minister and defense minister, and the Biden administration has expressed concern about the lack of a clear Israeli plan for postwar Gaza.

June 2024
By Libby Flatoff and Shizuka Kuramitsu

A senior U.S. Republican senator appeared to suggest that Israel should consider using nuclear weapons to defeat Hamas in Gaza, drawing criticism from arms control activists and others for normalizing talk of an option that the world has long considered anathema.

During a May 8 hearing at which he faulted the Biden administration for halting the delivery of some weapons to Israel, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) demanded of top U.S. defense officials, “Would you have supported dropping bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki during World War II?…Do you think that was disproportionate?”

“You’re going to tell (Israel) how to fight the war when everybody around them wants to kill all the Jews? Give Israel what they need to fight the war. This is Hiroshima and Nagasaki on steroids,” Graham told Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Charles Brown at a Senate Appropriations subcommittee hearing.

Four days later on NBC, Graham again justified the use of nuclear weapons on Nagasaki and Hiroshima because the weapons were used “to end a war we [could not] afford to lose” and insisted, “Give Israel the bombs they need to end the war they can’t afford to lose.”

Whether Graham actually was advocating the first nuclear weapons use since World War II or not, the comments landed with a thud in Tokyo where Japanese Foreign Minister Yoko Kamikawa described the remarks as “not appropriate” at a May 10 press conference.

She said that Japan “has been expressing for a long time…[that] the use of nuclear weapons does not match the spirit of humanitarianism, which is the ideological foundation of international law, because of their tremendous destructive and lethal power.”

She added that Japan had reiterated this point to U.S. officials. 

On May 14, Kamikawa addressed the issue again, telling reporters that “[i]t was very regrettable that such remarks have been made repeatedly.”

The Japan Confederation of A- and H-Bomb Sufferers Organizations, also called Nihon Hidankyo, sent a letter to the U.S. Embassy in Tokyo requesting a retraction of Graham’s remarks, NHK reported on May 15. “The remarks go against international humanitarian law…. [N]ow that the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons has come into effect, the remarks can only be described as an anachronistic and malicious delusion,” the letter said.

In addition, the mayors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, in separate press conferences on May 16, condemned Graham’s justification of atomic bombings on their cities, according to Jiji Press.

Graham’s comments “run counter to the direction we should be taking in the future toward our ideals [of a nuclear-free world],” which U.S. President Joe Biden reaffirmed in Hiroshima at the 2023 Group of Seven meeting, Kazumi Matsui, the mayor of Hiroshima, said. (See ACT, June 2023.) “With humanitarian and catastrophic consequences brought about by atomic weapons in mind, nothing can justify the use of nuclear weapons,” Shiro Suzuki, the mayor of Nagasaki, said.

Meanwhile, the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons, the 2017 Nobel Peace Prize laureate, wrote on social media May 13 that “likening the situation in Gaza to Hiroshima and Nagasaki [is] utterly unacceptable” and Graham’s statements “shouldn’t be normalized.”

Graham’s remarks garnered the most attention, but other U.S. politicians expressed similar views. Appearing on Newsmax on May 14, Rep. Greg Murphy (R-N.C.) also invoked Hiroshima and Nagasaki and said, “[T]his is where Israel has every single right in the world to press this conflict further.”

Rep. Tim Walberg (R-Mich.) was caught on video at a town hall meeting on March 25 suggesting that the United States should use a nuclear bomb on Gaza to “get it over quick…. [Gaza] should be like Nagasaki and Hiroshima.”

Walberg later denied that he was calling for the use of nuclear weapons, claiming instead that he “used a metaphor to convey the need for both Israel and Ukraine to win their wars as swiftly as possible, without putting American troops in harm’s way.” But Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.), the first Palestinian-American member of Congress, criticized Walberg, saying he “is not the first member of Congress to use despicable, violent, dehumanizing language to describe their genocidal intent in Gaza and will not be the last.” 

Despite Israel’s long-standing refusal to acknowledge having a nuclear weapons program, Israeli Heritage Minister Amichai Eliyafu said on Radio Kol Barama that using nuclear weapons in Gaza was “one of the possibilities,” the Times of Israel reported on Nov. 5.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu denied this possibility and suspended Eliyafu, but Eliyafu in January again “urged that Israel must find ways for Gazans that are more painful than death to defeat them and break their morale, as the [United States] did with Japan,” Middle East Monitor reported on Jan. 6.

June 2024
By Michael T. Klare

An international conference that drew more than 1,000 participants, including government officials from 144 nations, showed strong support for regulating autonomous weapons systems, but reached no conclusion on exactly how that should be done, organizers said.

There is a “strong convergence” that these systems “that cannot be used in accordance with international law or that are ethically unacceptable should be explicitly prohibited” and that all other autonomous weapons systems “should be appropriately regulated,” Austrian Foreign Minister Alexander Schallenberg, chair of the Vienna Conference on Autonomous Weapons Systems, said in his closing summary.

The April 29-30 conference, hosted by Austria, focused attention on the dangers posed by the unregulated deployment of these weapons systems, sometimes called “killer robots,” and on mobilizing support for negotiations leading to legally binding restrictions on such systems.

Schallenberg and other participants expressed concern that, without urgent action, these systems, which can orient themselves on the battlefield and employ lethal force with minimal human oversight, could soon be deployed worldwide, endangering the lives of noncombatants. The foreign minister spoke of a “ring of fire” from the Russian war on Ukraine to the Middle East to the Sahel region of Africa and warned that “technology is moving ahead with racing speed while politics is lagging behind.”

“This is the Oppenheimer moment of our generation,” Schallenberg said. “The preventative window for such action is closing.”

Over two days of plenaries and panels, speakers from academia, civil society, industry, and the diplomatic community addressed the dangers posed by autonomous weapons systems and various strategies for regulating them. Numerous experts warned that once untethered from human control, these systems could engage in unauthorized attacks on civilians or trigger unintended escalatory moves.

As reflected in public statements and panel discussions, there was near-universal agreement that, in the absence of persistent human control, the battlefield use of such systems is inconsistent with international law and human morality. But participants expressed some disagreements over the best way to regulate them.

The conference occurred at a watershed moment in the international drive to impose international controls on autonomous weapons systems. For the past 10 years, a UN group of governmental experts has been meeting under the auspices of the Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons (CCW) to identify the dangers posed by these devices and assess various proposals for regulating them, including a protocol to the CCW banning them altogether.

During these discussions, many participants in the group of experts coalesced around the so-called two-tiered approach, which would ban any lethal autonomous weapons systems that cannot be operated under persistent human control and would impose strict regulations on all other such weapons. But because the CCW operates by consensus, progress toward implementation of these proposals has been blocked by several countries, including Russia and the United States, that oppose legally binding restrictions on these systems.

This impasse has sparked two alternative approaches to their regulation. The advocates of a legally binding instrument, having lost patience with the group of experts, have urged the UN General Assembly to consider such a measure.

In December, the UN General Assembly passed a resolution expressing concern over the dangers posed by these systems and calling on the secretary-general to conduct a study of the topic in preparation for a General Assembly debate scheduled for the fall. (See ACT, December 2023.)

An alternative approach, favored by the United States, the United Kingdom, and several of their allies, calls for the adoption of voluntary constraints on the use of autonomous weapons systems. As affirmed in a document titled “Political Declaration on Responsible Military Use of Artificial Intelligence and Autonomy,” released by the U.S. State Department in November, there are legitimate battlefield uses for such systems as long as they are used in accordance with international law and “within a responsible human chain of command and control.” (See ACT, April 2024.)

Based on statements by panelists and government officials, most participants in the Vienna conference appeared to favor the first approach, abandoning the CCW and pursuing a legally binding instrument, preferably through the General Assembly.

“The process at the CCW is a dead end because of the rule of consensus and the possibility of certain states, like Russia, blocking any meaningful measures on autonomous weapons,” Anthony Aguirre, executive director of the U.S.-based Future of Life Institute, said. “I think we need a new treaty, and that treaty needs to be negotiated in the UN General Assembly.”

Most of the states represented at the conference, including Austria, Belgium, Brazil, Chile, Egypt, Germany, Mexico, Pakistan, Peru, New Zealand, South Africa, and Switzerland, echoed Aguirre’s view, asserting support for negotiations leading to such a treaty. But other states, including Australia, Canada, Italy, Japan, Turkey, the UK, and the United States, indicated that the CCW remains the most appropriate forum for further discussion of autonomous weapons systems regulation.

With the conference behind them, Schallenberg and his allies are looking to preserve the convergence of views that the conference achieved and ensure that it is brought to bear at the General Assembly in September.

June 2024
By Xiaodon Liang

Russia conducted military exercises involving nonstrategic nuclear weapons in late May and framed the drills as a response to statements and actions by NATO in support of Ukraine. The invocation of nuclear options perpetuates a pattern of nuclear saber-rattling by Russia since the start of its full-scale invasion of Ukraine. (See ACT, September 2022.)

In a May 6 press release announcing the exercises, the Russian Foreign Ministry said the drills were intended to send a “sobering signal to the West.” Russia’s complaints include the delivery of French, UK, and U.S. strike missiles to Ukraine and the authorization of their use against targets in Russia. The Russian statement also referenced French President Emmanuel Macron’s May 2 interview with The Economist reaffirming that France has not ruled out sending its own troops to Ukraine.

Dmitry Medvedev, deputy chairman of the Russian security council, stated in a May 10 social media post that, under “certain circumstances,” the response to attacks against targets on Russian territories would not be limited to Ukraine and may involve “a special kind of arms.”

France and the United Kingdom have provided Ukraine with the Storm Shadow air-launched cruise missile, known in France as the SCALP-EG, for defense against the Russian invasion. The Russian statement describes the missile as a “long-range” weapon. Manufacturer MBDA lists a 250 kilometer range, but the UK Air Force claims the missile can operate out to 550 kilometers. These missiles first arrived in Ukraine last summer, but UK Foreign Minister David Cameron’s May 2 statement that the UK would not object to Ukraine using the missile against targets in Russia provoked the Russian response.

The Russian statement also criticized the United States for developing and producing ground-launched missile systems that would have been barred previously by the now-defunct Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty. The statement said that Russia would terminate its unilateral moratorium on the deployment of these systems if the United States were to deploy such missiles in Europe or the Asia-Pacific region. (See ACT, May 2024.) U.S. intelligence believes that Russia had already deployed a weapons system barred by the INF Treaty, the 9M729 cruise missile. (See ACT, June 2019.)

The United States has not transferred missile systems to Ukraine that would have fallen within INF Treaty restrictions, but it has provided Kyiv with the Army Tactical Missile System, a ballistic missile with an estimated range of 300 kilometers, the State Department said on April 24. The Russian statement also criticized this transfer. A Defense Department spokesperson on May 6 described the announcement of the nonstrategic nuclear exercises as “irresponsible rhetoric,” adding that there was no change observed in Russia’s strategic posture.

The Russian Defense Ministry announced the first phase of the exercise in a May 21 Telegram social media post and said it involved units equipped with the Iskander missile system assigned to the Southern Military District, as well as aircraft of the Russian Aerospace Forces bearing the Kinzhal hypersonic missile. No end date was mentioned.

According to the ministry, the exercises involved handling nuclear warheads and pairing them with missiles, as well as maneuvers by the missile launchers and aircraft. In a Telegram post May 6, the ministry said that naval vessels would participate.

Russia often includes nonstrategic nuclear weapons in regular, large-scale exercises, but does not publicize separate drills of nonstrategic missile units. The delivery vehicles operated by these units may include shorter-range tactical missiles with a range of up to 300 kilometers, as well as longer-range missiles.

Estimates of the total number of Russian nonstrategic nuclear weapons are imprecise, but U.S. intelligence and independent sources place the number between 1,000 and 2,000.

Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko confirmed on May 9 that his country’s military forces would take part in the nonstrategic nuclear weapons exercises, Tass reported. Days earlier, the Belarusian military had ordered snap inspections of units equipped with the Iskander missile system and the Su-25 combat aircraft.

Russian President Vladimir Putin announced in June 2022 that Russia would provide Belarusian forces with the nuclear-capable Iskander and configure Belarusian Su-25s for a nuclear role. In March 2023, he added that nuclear weapons would be stored in Belarus.

Open-source investigations conducted by independent analysts and The New York Times confirm progress in constructing a likely nuclear weapons storage site near Asipovichy, Belarus. In March, NATO officials, including Lithuanian Defense Minister Arvydas Anusauskas, told Foreign Policy that Russian nuclear forces had redeployed into Belarus.

June 2024
By Mina Rozei

The United States has accused Russia of violating the international chemical weapons ban by using choking and riot control agents multiple times in its full-scale war against Ukraine and has imposed new sanctions as punishment.

In a May 1 statement, the U.S. State Department said that it had “made a determination…that Russia has used the chemical weapon chloropicrin against Ukrainian forces in violation of the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) [and]…has used riot control agents as a method of warfare in Ukraine, also in violation of the CWC.”

“The use of such chemicals is not an isolated incident and is probably driven by Russian forces’ desire to dislodge Ukrainian forces from fortified positions and achieve tactical gains on the battlefield,” the department added.

But on May 7, the Technical Secretariat of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), which oversees the CWC, released a statement saying that it had been “monitoring the situation on the territory of Ukraine since the start of the war in February 2022” and that despite allegations reported by Russia and Ukraine to the OPCW, the evidence of chemical weapons use remained “insufficiently substantiated.”

In its statement, the State Department said that, in coordination with the Treasury Department, it is sanctioning three governmental entities associated with Russia’s chemical and biological weapons programs and four Russian companies providing support to such entities. The entities include a Russian specialized military unit that the United States claims facilitated the use of chloropicrin against Ukrainian troops.

The Treasury Department is separately sanctioning three entities and two individuals involved in procuring items for military institutes involved in Russia’s chemical and biological weapons programs, pursuant to a separate weapons of mass destruction nonproliferation authority, the State Department said.

It also announced new sanctions against “more than 280 individuals and entities” connected to Russia’s energy, mining, and military sectors in an effort to stem “Russia’s ability to wage its war against Ukraine.”

On May 2, Russian spokesperson Dmitry Peskov denied the U.S. accusations, saying “Russia has been and remains committed to its obligations under international law in this area.”

This is not the first time there have been reports of Russia using riot control agents on the battlefield or chloropicrin in Ukraine. In February, the Ukrainian military published a statement claiming that Russia had been using chloropicrin throughout 2023. (See ACT, March 2024.) Russia has denied these allegations repeatedly, but the Ukrainian army has claimed that at least 500 soldiers have been treated for exposure to toxic substances, including one who died from suffocating on tear gas, according to Al Jazeera on May 2.

Chloropicrin, a choking agent that causes severe irritation to the eyes, skin, and lungs, was used in World War I and is listed under Schedule 3 of the CWC as a banned agent whose use constitutes chemical warfare.

The use of riot control agents is permitted in certain circumstances. They often are used by police forces worldwide to quell protests, but they are prohibited on the battlefield because soldiers confined to trenches without gas masks are forced either to flee dugouts and trenches under enemy fire or risk suffocation.

The OPCW cautioned that the situation in Ukraine “remains volatile and extremely concerning regarding the possible re-emergence of use of toxic chemicals as weapons.” This comes after the OPCW verified chemical weapons attacks in Syria by the Syrian government in 2013 and the Islamic State group in 2018, marking an uptick in the use of chemical agents in war after decades in which they were considered taboo.

In its statement, the OPCW noted that Russia continues to deny “making use of such weapons” and said that, in order for the OPCW "to conduct any activities pertaining to allegations of use of toxic chemicals as weapons,” CWC states-parties would have to make a formal request. “So far, the Secretariat has not received any such request for action” in Ukraine, the statement said.

The Ukrainian parliament on April 24 ratified an additional agreement on privileges and immunities for technical assistance visits between Ukraine and the OPCW secretariat. This action creates the legal basis for Ukraine to cooperate with OPCW technical assistance visits for analyzing samples of toxic chemical agents that may have been used by Russian forces in Ukraine.

The OPCW also said that it remains open to information from states-parties and will continue to support Ukraine under CWC Article X, which provides assistance and protection to a state-party that has been attacked or threatened with attacks by chemical weapons.

 

June 2024
By Kelsey Davenport

North Korea is continuing to test new military systems and pledging to build up its nuclear arsenal further in response to U.S. and South Korean activities.

On May 18, North Korea said it tested a new ballistic missile with an “autonomous navigation system.” The state-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said the test verified the “accuracy and reliability” of the new navigation system.

On the same day, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un visited a military production facility and expressed “great satisfaction” with the work being done in “bolstering up” the “nuclear war deterrent of the country.” According to KCNA, he stressed the importance of accelerating certain production activities to further expand North Korea’s nuclear forces.

These new capabilities are driving South Korea to prepare to respond to large-scale aerial attacks from North Korea. Seoul held a drill focused on repelling North Korean projectiles, including ballistic missiles and cruise missiles. In a May 14 press release, South Korean Air Force Lt. Gen. Kim Hyung-soo said that recent conflicts overseas demonstrate that initial responses to “large-scale aerial provocations determine the success or failure of the war.”

North Korea continues to justify expanding its nuclear arsenal as necessary to respond to what it says are security dynamics and hostile U.S. policy toward Pyongyang. Pyongyang reiterated that it would expand its arsenal after Washington conducted a subcritical nuclear test in May.

In a May 20 report, KCNA described the U.S. test as a “dangerous act” and said Washington has “revealed” that its strategic goal is to “militarily control other countries with the unchallenged nuclear edge.”

The test has added “new tension” to the security situation on the Korean peninsula, the statement said. North Korea will not tolerate a “strategic imbalance” on the Korean peninsula and will reconsider its deterrence posture in response, the statement said.

In addition to showcasing new systems, North Korea conducted a military exercise designed to test the country’s preparedness for a nuclear counterattack.

According to KCNA, North Korea on April 22 tested its “nuclear trigger” command-and-control system for the first time. This system enables Pyongyang to switch rocket launchers from conventionally armed shells to nuclear armed shells. This capability “substantially” strengthens North Korea’s “prompt counterattack capacity.” The test also provided an opportunity to reexamine the “reliability of the system of command, management, control, and operation of the whole nuclear weapons forces.”

KCNA reported that rocket launchers used in the drill accurately struck their targets and that Kim expressed “great satisfaction” with the drill and noted that plans to build up the country’s nuclear forces have been “translated into reality.”

North Korea is compelled to “more overwhelmingly and more rapidly bolster up its strongest military muscle” in response to the “ceaseless military provocations” from “hostile forces,” KCNA said.

Specifically, the statement condemned recent South Korean-U.S. joint airborne exercises held in April, which KCNA described as “extremely provocative and aggressive.”

The United States continues to defend the necessity of joint military exercises. Daniel Kritenbrink, assistant secretary of state for East Asian and Pacific affairs, said on May 14 at the Brookings Institution that the United States has no choice but to “double down” on military cooperation with South Korea and Japan in response to North Korea’s military developments and rejection of U.S. calls for dialogue. He said U.S. cooperation with regional allies has “reached unprecedented levels” to counter the growing threat from North Korea.

Kritenbrink also referenced the importance of enforcing sanctions against North Korea, saying that the United States is left with “no choice but to focus on these harder elements of our strategy.”

As part of the U.S. sanctions strategy, Japan, South Korea, and the United States coordinated a joint statement endorsed by 50 states condemning Russia’s veto in the UN Security Council of a resolution that would have extended the panel of experts charged with assessing the implementation of UN sanctions on North Korea. (See ACT, May 2024.) The panel’s mandate officially ended April 30.

The statement said it is “imperative” for UN member states to comply with Security Council resolutions and that states “must now consider how to continue access to this kind of objective, independent analysis in order to address [North Korea’s] unlawful [weapons of mass destruction] and ballistic missile advancements.”

North Korea responded to the statement by saying that any efforts to reestablish a panel of experts is “bound to meet self-destruction with the passage of time.” In a May 5 statement, Kim Song, North Korea’s representative to the United Nations, said that the panel of experts and the UN sanctions regime is a “tool for the hegemonic policy” of the United States.

June 2024
By Shizuka Kuramitsu

For the second consecutive time, the UN Security Council rejected a draft Russian resolution that called on countries to ban all weapons in space, not just weapons of mass destruction.

The vote on May 20 was 7-7, with Switzerland abstaining. It was the same losing tally as when Russia, backed by China, first requested a vote on a similar resolution on April 24. The resolution requires nine votes for adoption.

The back-to-back votes reflect a political duel triggered in February by U.S. allegations that Russia is developing a space-based nuclear anti-satellite (ASAT) capability in violation of the 1967 Outer Space Treaty, which prohibits the deployment of “nuclear weapons or any other kinds of weapons of mass destruction” in space.

Since then, U.S. suspicions about Russian activities have deepened, prompting Mallory Stewart, U.S. assistant secretary of state, to warn on May 3 that the United States will continue using its “diplomatic tools” to raise this issue bilaterally, in the United Nations, and in other multilateral forums “until Russia provides credible assurances that they have ceased these efforts.”

In an effort to discourage the Russian program, Japan and the United States in April proposed a resolution reiterating support for the treaty. But that resolution failed when Russia used its veto to block the measure on April 24. The final vote was 13-1, with China abstaining. (See ACT, May 2024.)

During debate on the May 20 vote, Robert Wood, the U.S. deputy UN ambassador, dismissed the Russian draft resolution as “the culmination of Russia’s campaign of diplomatic gaslighting and dissembling.”

“[O]ver the past several weeks, and following widespread condemnation from a geographically diverse group of member states in the General Assembly…Russia has sought to distract from its dangerous efforts to put a nuclear weapon into orbit,” Wood said.

Russian UN Ambassador Vasily Nebenzia accused states that did not support the Russian draft of favoring “a free hand for the expedited militarization of outer space.”

He emphasized that the Russian draft intended to reaffirm “states’ commitments not to use space for the deployment of any forms of weapons, including weapons of mass destruction,” and said that this “is the language that our American colleagues had refused to include in the text…from the very beginning.”

Russia’s draft was co-sponsored by Belarus, China, Nicaragua, North Korea, and Syria.

Adrian Hauri, Switzerland’s deputy UN ambassador, said his country abstained because “the spirit of flexibility and a framework of trust were lacking” and its suggestions were not taken into consideration despite its support for several elements of the Russian draft.

In her May 3 comments at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, Stewart said that the Russian satellite suspected of carrying components for a potential nuclear ASAT weapon is in “unusual” orbit in “a region of higher radiation than normal lower-earth orbits, but not high enough of a radiation environment to allow accelerated testing of electronics,” which is the scientific purpose of the satellite claimed by Russia.

On May 20, Wood said that another Russian capability, a counterspace weapon, was deployed “into the same orbit as a U.S. government satellite” and it “follows prior Russian satellite launches likely of counterspace systems to low earth orbit in 2019 and 2022.” Pentagon spokesperson Air Force Maj. Gen. Pat Ryder confirmed this assessment May 21 .

Russian officials continued to deny that the country has a new ASAT capability. Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov called the U.S. allegation “fake news” while Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said that Russia “act[s] absolutely in accordance with international law, we do not violate anything,” Tass reported on May 22.

Meanwhile, according to Pavel Podvig, a nuclear expert, and The Wall Street Journal, the satellite to which Stewart referred likely is the Cosmos-2553, which was launched Feb. 5, 2022. But Breaking Defense reported on May 22 that “as of yet…no official has publicly named Cosmos-2553 as the satellite in question.”

June 2024
By Daryl G. Kimball

The U.S. National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) announced that it had successfully carried out a subcritical experiment on May 14 at an underground facility at the Nevada National Security Site.

In a May 16 statement, the NNSA said the experiment, its 34th at the former U.S. nuclear weapons testing site, provided “valuable information to…improve our modeling and simulation capability, part of the science-based [S]tockpile [S]tewardship [P]rogram.”

The agency said “the experiment performed as predicted.” It “did not form a self-sustaining, supercritical nuclear chain reaction” and therefore was “consistent with the zero-yield standard” of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT).

The United States, China, and Russia continue to engage in weapons-related activities at their former nuclear testing sites. Although the treaty’s International Monitoring System is operational and more effective than originally envisioned, very low-yield nuclear test explosions such as these subcritical experiments still can be difficult to detect without on-site inspections, which will not be in place until after the treaty’s entry into force.

To address concerns about activities at former nuclear test sites, NNSA Administrator Jill Hruby announced in June 2023 that her agency is “open to working with others to develop a regime that would allow reciprocal observation with radiation detection equipment at each other’s subcritical experiments to allow confirmation that the experiment was consistent with the CTBT.”

In November 2023, Corey Hinderstein, now NNSA acting principal deputy administrator, and Marvin Adams, NNSA deputy administrator for defense programs, told Arms Control Today that the agency has been investigating technical approaches to potential confidence-building measures that could be applied to subcritical experiments without revealing classified information. Adams suggested that the most reliable strategy for independent verification of the absence of a nuclear explosion would involve measuring for the absence of a self-sustained chain reaction. That would be indicated by a very rapid drop-off in the production of neutrons and gamma rays from the experiment, he said.

To date, no technical discussions on confidence-building measures relating to subcritical experiments have been held among U.S., Chinese, and Russian officials.

June 2024
By Kelsey Davenport

States met at the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to discuss nuclear security challenges and opportunities, but an objection from Iran prevented the participants from adopting a ministerial declaration with recommendations for strengthening the nuclear security regime.

The ministerial-level International Conference on Nuclear Security (ICONS), held May 20-24 in Vienna, provided a forum for more than 130 states to discuss challenges to nuclear security, promote collaborative efforts for enhancing nuclear security, and support the IAEA’s work in this area.

In opening remarks on May 20, IAEA Director-General Rafael Mariano Grossi said the IAEA is “at the forefront of adapting nuclear security to new challenges” and referenced the role that the agency is playing in supporting nuclear security in Ukraine.

Grossi emphasized the importance of nuclear security “throughout all the steps of the nuclear fuel cycle” and described nuclear security as “part of the social contract that underpins the existence and growth of nuclear power.”

This meeting is the fourth ICONS conference and the first to conclude without a ministerial declaration. The conference focused on four themes: policy and regulations for nuclear security, technology for nuclear security detection and response, human capacity building, and cross-cutting nuclear security issues, such as the interface between security and safety.

After Iran’s objection, the co-presidents of the conference issued the draft ministerial declaration as a joint statement. Most participating states endorsed the statement in plenary remarks.

David Turk, U.S. deputy energy secretary, said the meeting comes at a time of “great change, both positive and negative” for global nuclear security efforts and described the lack of a ministerial declaration as “regrettable.” In a May 24 speech, Turk called for “renewed determination to protect nuclear facilities and material” and expressed U.S. support for the joint statement.

The joint statement calls on IAEA member states to ensure that highly enriched uranium (HEU) and separated plutonium are “appropriately secured and accounted for” and encourages states to “further minimize HEU in civilian stocks” when feasible.

The statement emphasizes that “any attacks or threats of attacks against nuclear facilities devoted to peaceful purposes may compromise nuclear security” and highlights the importance of “addressing computer security risks” to protect against cyberattacks.

The statement also recognizes the challenges and benefits posed by emerging technologies, such as artificial intelligence, and the importance of international cooperation in addressing these issues. In addition to the commitments in the joint statement, many countries used the meeting as an opportunity to announce progress on national initiatives to strengthen nuclear security and make new commitments.

Since the ICONS meeting in 2020, the United States has assisted in the disposition of 160 kilograms of weapons-usable nuclear materials in foreign countries and hosted an IAEA mission to assess the physical security of a nuclear facility, Turk said. He noted that the United States continues to contribute to the IAEA Nuclear Security Fund and reiterated U.S. support for the agency’s nuclear security work.