World in "disarray," IAEA director says

Graham Allison highlights key points of his speech

In the News

February 13, 2008

Author: Graham Allison, Director, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs; Douglas Dillon Professor of Government; Faculty Chair, Dubai Initiative, Harvard Kennedy School

This past weekend at the Munich Conference on Security Policy, IAEA Director Mohamed ElBaradei said the world was in "disarray." ElBaradei worries not only about extremists acquiring nuclear material or a weapon, but also that the case of Iran indicates a new trend of countries developing a nuclear capability — rather than a weapon — as an "insurance policy." ElBaradei rightly emphasized that the only way to prevent the regime from completely unraveling is to follow the advice of the Gang of Four and pursue the abolition of nuclear weapons.

Here is a summary of ElBaradei's main points:

- People are not born Mother Teresa or suicide bombers. It is the environment in which they grow.

- The nuclear technology is out of the tube, completely out of the tube. We have seen the AQ Khan network, that any country with a mid-level industrial infrastructure can develop the know-how to develop a nuclear weapon. We have seen as witnessed by Iran, a new phenomenon. In addition to nuclear states, you can be a nuclear capable while continuing to be kosher while within the NPT treaty. That is a new phenomenon which we really have to address."

- You don't need to have a nuclear weapon, enough to buy yourself an insurance policy, as I call it, and sit on it. You can come with economic justification for it, but let's not kid ourselves, 90% of that is insurance, a deterrence. Why do I have deterrence? Because the big boys continue to rely on nuclear weapons. The big boys continue to say, we need nuclear weapons, we need to continue developing modern nuclear weapons, we need mini nukes, we need bunker busters, but it is bad for you to have nuclear weapons. Well, simply if you go anywhere, people will tell you this is called double standard. It is not sustainable.

- Unless weapons states lead by example, they have to show the way, that we are making good on our commitment to move towards nuclear disarmament. And that is not now a fantasy. When I see people like George Shultz, or Henry Kissinger, or Sam Nunn, talking about abolition, these are not people who are naïve or not aware of security deterrence. These are people through maturity who have come to the conclusion that nuclear weapons are decreasingly effective. And if you really want to protect ourselves, you have to move towards nuclear abolition.

- The one issue which is also the most threatening to me is illicit trafficking, the possibility that extremist groups will get their hands on nuclear weapons or nuclear material. This to me is the most danger we are facing today.

- For an extremist group, the concept of deterrence is irrelevant. If they have it they will use it.

- Response, what do we do. We need to slash the number of nuclear weapons, obviously, drastically. We need to change the deployment status. We need to develop what I call, you know, multinational approach to fuel cycle. No country alone should have the ability to enrich or reprocess.

- In that environment, you will have a much stronger moral authority to go after any who proliferates. And again, as Kissinger and company have said, we need to have a system to deter and respond to possible cheaters. We need a system to do that.

- Finally on the elephant in the room, which is Iran... There are 3 phases of Iran: Iran's past, the present and the future.

They could not get nuclear power reactor as in the past, so they had to go underground. However, this created a confidence deficit, because they did not report to us. They were in violation of their treaty obligation and we had to reconstruct that past. We are making good progress, and I am going to report by the end of the month.

Going to be talking about Iran's weaponization program this week: "and if they did [have a program] they have to come clean.

As for the present, although they are not implementing de jure the additional protocol, de facto they are allowing us to have good understanding of what is happening today.

I cannot verify future intention. I cannot verify regime behavior in the future. That is clearly a question of confidence. Confidence could only be built through direct negotiation... The earlier you get into direct negotiations, and you will clearly cover regional security, because the Iranian nuclear issue is the tip of the iceberg of regional security in the Middle East. The earlier we can do that, the better secure all of us will be.

More coverage can be found at the Los Angeles Times:
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-iran10feb10,1,1559352.story?ctrack=1&cset=true

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