Trump on War: Korea edition

I'm compiling some statements and tweets from President Donald Trump concerning various alleged threats to US (or international) security.

This post focuses on North Korea. I may add to it as I find additional material. Note: I'm not currently compiling all the stories based on leaked reports, which claim the administration has seriously considered war with North Korea. The administration withdrew its choice for ambassador to South Korea, reportedly, because he was opposed to so-called "bloody nose" strikes against North Korea.

This is from Trump's remarks prior to a briefing on the Opioid crisis, August 8, 2017:

Q    Any comment on the reports about North Korea’s nuclear capabilities? 

THE PRESIDENT:  North Korea best not make any more threats to the United States.  They will be met with fire and fury like the world has never seen.  He has been very threatening beyond a normal state.  And as I said, they will be met with fire, fury, and, frankly, power, the likes of which this world has never seen before.

More from Trump's speech to the UN on September 19, 2017:

North Korea’s reckless pursuit of nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles threatens the entire world with unthinkable loss of human life. 

It is an outrage that some nations would not only trade with such a regime, but would arm, supply, and financially support a country that imperils the world with nuclear conflict.  No nation on earth has an interest in seeing this band of criminals arm itself with nuclear weapons and missiles. 

The United States has great strength and patience, but if it is forced to defend itself or its allies, we will have no choice but to totally destroy North Korea.  Rocket Man is on a suicide mission for himself and for his regime.  The United States is ready, willing and able, but hopefully this will not be necessary.  That’s what the United Nations is all about; that’s what the United Nations is for.  Let’s see how they do 

It is time for North Korea to realize that the denuclearization is its only acceptable future.  The United Nations Security Council recently held two unanimous 15-0 votes adopting hard-hitting resolutions against North Korea, and I want to thank China and Russia for joining the vote to impose sanctions, along with all of the other members of the Security Council.  Thank you to all involved. 

But we must do much more.  It is time for all nations to work together to isolate the Kim regime until it ceases its hostile behavior.

The President spoke in Seoul, South Korea on November 7, 2017. The speech sounded much like the ones George W. Bush used to give about Iraq back in 2002. This is a long excerpt, but it is telling:

The North Korean regime has pursued its nuclear and ballistic missile programs in defiance of every assurance, agreement, and commitment it has made to the United States and its allies. It’s broken all of those commitments. After promising to freeze its plutonium program in 1994, it repeated [reaped] the benefits of the deal and then — and then immediately continued its illicit nuclear activities. 

In 2005, after years of diplomacy, the dictatorship agreed to ultimately abandon its nuclear programs and return to the Treaty on Non-Proliferation. But it never did. And worse, it tested the very weapons it said it was going to give up. In 2009, the United States gave negotiations yet another chance, and offered North Korea the open hand of engagement. The regime responded by sinking a South Korean Navy ship, killing 46 Korean sailors. To this day, it continues to launch missiles over the sovereign territory of Japan and all other neighbors, test nuclear devices, and develop ICBMs to threaten the United States itself. The regime has interpreted America’s past restraint as weakness. This would be a fatal miscalculation. This is a very different administration than the United States has had in the past. 

Today, I hope I speak not only for our countries, but for all civilized nations, when I say to the North: Do not underestimate us, and do not try us. We will defend our common security, our shared prosperity, and our sacred liberty. 

We did not choose to draw here, on this peninsula — (applause) — this magnificent peninsula — the thin line of civilization that runs around the world and down through time. But here it was drawn, and here it remains to this day. It is the line between peace and war, between decency and depravity, between law and tyranny, between hope and total despair. It is a line that has been drawn many times, in many places, throughout history. To hold that line is a choice free nations have always had to make. We have learned together the high cost of weakness and the high stakes of its defense.
America’s men and women in uniform have given their lives in the fight against Nazism, imperialism, Communism and terrorism. 

America does not seek conflict or confrontation, but we will never run from it. History is filled with discarded regimes that have foolishly tested America’s resolve. 

Anyone who doubts the strength or determination of the United States should look to our past, and you will doubt it no longer. We will not permit America or our allies to be blackmailed or attacked. We will not allow American cities to be threatened with destruction. We will not be intimidated. And we will not let the worst atrocities in history be repeated here, on this ground, we fought and died so hard to secure. (Applause.) 

That is why I have come here, to the heart of a free and flourishing Korea, with a message for the peace-loving nations of the world: The time for excuses is over. Now is the time for strength. If you want peace, you must stand strong at all times. (Applause.) The world cannot tolerate the menace of a rogue regime that threatens with nuclear devastation. 

All responsible nations must join forces to isolate the brutal regime of North Korea — to deny it and any form — any form of it. You cannot support, you cannot supply, you cannot accept. We call on every nation, including China and Russia, to fully implement U.N. Security Council resolutions, downgrade diplomatic relations with the regime, and sever all ties of trade and technology. 

It is our responsibility and our duty to confront this danger together — because the longer we wait, the greater the danger grows, and the fewer the options become. (Applause.) And to those nations that choose to ignore this threat, or, worse still, to enable it, the weight of this crisis is on your conscience. 

I also have come here to this peninsula to deliver a message directly to the leader of the North Korean dictatorship: The weapons you are acquiring are not making you safer. They are putting your regime in grave danger. Every step you take down this dark path increases the peril you face.

And Trump's State of the Union address on January 30, 2018:

North Korea’s reckless pursuit of nuclear missiles could very soon threaten our homeland.

We are waging a campaign of maximum pressure to prevent that from happening.
Past experience has taught us that complacency and concessions only invite aggression and provocation.  I will not repeat the mistakes of past administrations that got us into this dangerous position.

We need only look at the depraved character of the North Korean regime to understand the nature of the nuclear threat it could pose to America and our allies.
Otto Warmbier was a hardworking student at the University of Virginia.  On his way to study abroad in Asia, Otto joined a tour to North Korea.  At its conclusion, this wonderful young man was arrested and charged with crimes against the state.  After a shameful trial, the dictatorship sentenced Otto to 15 years of hard labor, before returning him to America last June — horribly injured and on the verge of death.  He passed away just days after his return. 

Otto’s Parents, Fred and Cindy Warmbier, are with us tonight — along with Otto’s brother and sister, Austin and Greta.  You are powerful witnesses to a menace that threatens our world, and your strength inspires us all.  Tonight, we pledge to honor Otto’s memory with American resolve.

Some key tweets, arranged chronologically:

The U.S. has been talking to North Korea, and paying them extortion money, for 25 years. Talking is not the answer!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 30, 2017

Military solutions are now fully in place,locked and loaded,should North Korea act unwisely. Hopefully Kim Jong Un will find another path!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 11, 2017

Just heard Foreign Minister of North Korea speak at U.N. If he echoes thoughts of Little Rocket Man, they won't be around much longer!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 24, 2017

North Korean Leader Kim Jong Un just stated that the “Nuclear Button is on his desk at all times.” Will someone from his depleted and food starved regime please inform him that I too have a Nuclear Button, but it is a much bigger & more powerful one than his, and my Button works!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 3, 2018

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Nuclear weapons radio interview

I was recently interviewed by Philosophy Professor Avery Kolers for his "Ethics Forward" local radio program (on WFMP-LP 106.5 FM). The show's topic "Fire and Fury" was about nuclear weapons, deterrence, and tensions between the U.S. and North Korea.

Now that it has been broadcast over the airwaves, you can listen to the broadcast online at Soundcloud:




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Samantha Power in Louisville

I attended this talk by Samantha Power on Monday at the University of Louisville:


I'm not sure UN Ambassador Power said anything really new about American foreign policy, but news reports tended to emphasize two points -- her call for bipartisan foreign policy and her argument against new Congressionally-imposed sanctions on Iran.

If you were not paying close attention, her arguments about the value of economic sanctions seemed to be inconsistent. She criticized the economic embargo against Cuba, claiming that after more than 50 years of failure, the Obama administrations simply wants the U.S. to try a new approach. Yet, at the same time, she praised the success of economic sanctions against Burma (a pet issue of host Senator Mitch McConnell) and other recent sanctions against Iran.

Power argued that unilateral sanctions on Cuba had failed, while collective sanctions on Iran had succeeded. She didn't really talk about this distinction vis-a-vis Burma, but I know the EU also sanctioned Myanmar (Burma). On Cuba:

Even though the Castro regime has been repressing the Cuban people for decades, it is America that has been seen as Goliath picking a fight with David. I’ve seen this first-hand at the United Nations. Last October, for the 23rd year in a row, the UN General Assembly voted overwhelmingly to condemn the U.S. embargo on Cuba. Out of the UN’s 193 member-states, we were only one of two that voted to defend the embargo.

As for Iran, Power argued that the international sanctions regime is largely responsible for bringing Iran to the bargaining table, where it seems willing to limit its ability to produce nuclear weapons. However, new sanctions would backfire, undermining the collective sanctions that she claimed are "exponentially more effective than bilateral sanctions alone."

If we pull the trigger on new nuclear-related sanctions now, we will go from isolating Iran to potentially isolating ourselves. We go from a position of collective strength to a position of individual weakness.

All of these points were framed around a theme of bipartisanship. Power repeatedly emphasized that Republicans and Democrats in Washington fundamentally agreed about the goals of American foreign policy, even as they disagreed about the means to achieve them:

But what is often lost in the coverage of these debates is the fact that they’re disputes about means, not ends; about tactics, not objectives; about how America can tackle complex global challenges, and not whether we ought to try. As Thomas Jefferson once put it, “Every difference of opinion is not a difference of principle.”

In the introductory remarks, University of Louisville President James Ramsey introduced a visiting Army War College Fellow who is auditing my graduate IR seminar this spring.


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Iraq's New Old Chemical Arsenal

Yesterday, a student asked me about the recent news reports indicating that Iraq did, in fact, have "weapons of mass destruction" back in 2002 and 2003 when the U.S. was attempting to justify a "preemptive" war. The New York Times reported that American soldiers were injured in the past decade by chemically-armed munitions found in Iraq.

Already, a slew of articles in the media have debunked the claim that this vindicates George W. Bush and his Iraq misadventure. This Washington Post piece is perhaps the best since it primarily quotes Bush administration claims from the pre-war period.

The Times piece certainly does not try to claim that Bush is vindicated:

The discoveries of these chemical weapons did not support the government’s invasion rationale. 

After the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, Mr. Bush insisted that Mr. Hussein was hiding an active weapons of mass destruction program, in defiance of international will and at the world’s risk. United Nations inspectors said they could not find evidence for these claims. 

Then, during the long occupation, American troops began encountering old chemical munitions in hidden caches and roadside bombs. Typically 155-millimeter artillery shells or 122-millimeter rockets, they were remnants of an arms program Iraq had rushed into production in the 1980s during the Iran-Iraq war. 

All had been manufactured before 1991, participants said. Filthy, rusty or corroded, a large fraction of them could not be readily identified as chemical weapons at all. Some were empty, though many of them still contained potent mustard agent or residual sarin. Most could not have been used as designed, and when they ruptured dispersed the chemical agents over a limited area, according to those who collected the majority of them. 

In case after case, participants said, analysis of these warheads and shells reaffirmed intelligence failures. First, the American government did not find what it had been looking for at the war’s outset, then it failed to prepare its troops and medical corps for the aged weapons it did find.

Read the piece and it offers more reason to believe that these revelations do not help the save the Bush administration's reputation:

Participants in the chemical weapons discoveries said the United States suppressed knowledge of finds for multiple reasons, including that the government bristled at further acknowledgment it had been wrong. “They needed something to say that after Sept. 11 Saddam used chemical rounds,” Mr. Lampier [“a recently retired Army major who was present for the largest chemical weapons discovery of the war”] said. “And all of this was from the pre-1991 era.” 

Others pointed to another embarrassment. In five of six incidents in which troops were wounded by chemical agents, the munitions appeared to have been designed in the United States, manufactured in Europe and filled in chemical agent production lines built in Iraq by Western companies.

A decade ago, when I was blogging regularly about this, the media would occasionally report about old chemical munitions found it Iraq. I posted this passage on May 19, 2004:

What is very clear is that there was no vast infrastructure of WMD programs and no readily deployable arsenal. The nuclear program was dead. No one denies Iraq had chemical weapons in the 1980s and that scientists could again make them. What is the appropriate level of threat justifying preventive war? 

I ended up writing and publishing a number of pieces about that question and the so-called "Bush Doctrine" of "preemptive war." In one of them, I quoted from this exchange involving David Kay, who was the head of the Iraq Survey Group in 2003 (the original team looking for WMD) and then-U.S. Senator Mark Dayton:

DAYTON: Which weapons of mass destruction qualify in that upper echelon of truly mass destruction? 

KAY: Well, I think all of us have and would continue to put the nuclear weapons in a different category. It's a single weapon that can do tremendous damage, as opposed to multiple weapons that can do the same order of damage. As you know, the fire-bombing of Tokyo, in terms of number of people killed, was roughly equivalent to a single bomb in Nagasaki, but it took a lot more aircraft to do it. 

So I still treat, and I think we should politically treat, nuclear as a difference. But I must say, the revolution of biology, some developments in cyber -- I think we're going to have a blurring out there of capabilities. And that makes the control and makes the intelligence problem far more difficult to estimate. 

DAYTON: Just based on your general knowledge, how many countries would you say in the world today would qualify under the category of developing weapons of mass destruction-related program activities or having such activities?

KAY: Senator Dayton, I hesitate to give you an off-the-cuff number because I know it'll probably is going to be like the 85 percent; I'm going to have to live with it for longer than I want to.I would say that in the nuclear area, in addition to those that we know have possessed nuclear weapons, that includes India... 

DAYTON: I want to go to the vernacular that we're using in this broader category. 

KAY: The broader category. Oh, I suspect you're talking about probably 50 countries that have programs that would fall somewhere in that broader vernacular. 

DAYTON: So if we're going to take out those countries or their governments which are engaged in what we would call weapons of mass destruction-related program activities, we're going to be cutting quite a world swathe. 

KAY: Well, Senator Dayton, I think you're on to the issue. We no longer are going to be living in a world in which we can control capabilities. Intentions are what are going to be important.

Kay is correct. The war was primarily justified based on the threat allegedly posed by Iraq's nuclear program. If the bar for preemptive war is lowered to justify attacks against states with potentially menacing chemical or biological capabilities, then states with such preemptive doctrines could launch attacks against thousands of universities or industries in dozens of states.


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Service odds and ends

I neglected to blog about a couple of service contributions in mid-to-late December 2013.

First, I was interviewed by a former student about the new U.S.-Iranian nuclear deal. You can find his piece at Rudaw, a Kurdish Iraqi English-language outlet. I'm quoted at the end of the December 30 story:

Rodger Payne, Chair and Professor of Political Science at the University of Louisville, Kentucky said that the new deal may help the Iranian economy, but might also raise fears among some of Iran’s neighbors. 

“The states that are unhappy either fear that Iran will become more powerful as a result of easing economic sanctions or by secretly continuing its nuclear program in violation of the agreement,” Payne told Rudaw. 

He said that some countries may still be in favor of a military strike to stop Iran’s nuclear ambitions, or advocate tougher sanctions. But “the world wants Iran’s oil, so there are limits on just how extensive sanctions can be in this case.”

That was accurate, but I was questioned about why some neighboring states oppose the deal. I personally think these fears are over-stated and that the deal looks very good, especially when contrasted to the prospect of American or multilateral military strikes.

On December 12, I traveled up to Antioch College to speak as part of their Global Seminar in Governance. Most of the school's (very small) student body turned out to hear me talk about "Democratic Governance in a Global Context." I addressed various possible meanings of this phrase and favored global deliberation about American use of force in the alleged service of international purposes.


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Non-Proliferation in 2013

On Monday, I attended a lunchtime talk by Ambassador Susan Burk, former Special Representative to the President for Nuclear Non-Proliferation. Her talk, sponsored by the Center for Asian Democracy, was entitled “Reducing Nuclear Dangers: Challenges and Opportunities for the International Non-Proliferation Regime.” It was the second in a recent series of talks on nuclear nonproliferation.

Ambassador Burk did a nice job of presenting the conventional wisdom about the Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) and regime. She reviewed some of the history, talked about her own experiences attending three review conferences, and briefly overviewed some of the concern about potential proliferants.

However, Burk didn't really talk about Article VI of the NPT or U.S. responsibility to reduce its nuclear weapons. I guess the ideals expressed in President Obama's 2009 Prague address have lost some of their power.

One of my former graduate students asked Burk a question about the potential illegality of nuclear weapons, but I had to attend another event before I could hear the response. Apparently, Burk does not believe nuclear weapons are illegal for the original five nuclear weapons states of the NPT.


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Pakistan: Failed or Rogue State?

Pictured: A.Q. Khan, "Father of Pakistan's Nuclear Weapons Program." 

It has been a few weeks since the anniversary of Osama bin Laden's death. However, I meant to blog this line from a May 2011 piece by Cyril Almeida, a columnist for Pakistan's widely-read Dawn.

"If we [Pakistan] didn’t know [bin Laden was in Abbottabad], we are a failed state; if we did know, we are a rogue state."

Almeida continues with a question, "But does anybody really believe they didn’t know?"

Some readers may recall that I presented a conference paper about Pakistan as a possible target in the "war on terror" back in October 2008. In that paper, I argued that Pakistan could easily have been viewed as a foe all the way back in September 2001.

Actually, I've not been especially kind to Pakistan on this blog for some years:

• In 2003, I noted that Pakistan was viewed by many security analysts as the "typhoid Mary" of nuclear proliferation. Thanks, A.Q. Khan.
• In 2004, I noted Pakistani apparent support for militants in Kashmir that were interlinked to al Qaeda. Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence is typically implicated in this sponsorship.
• In 2006, some of the (allegedly) ISI-sponsored militants committed a violent act of terror in Mumbai. Also, Hamad Karzai worried openly about militants operating in Afghanistan based in Pakistan. 
• By 2007, the national security apparatus of the U.S. government considered Pakistan's border areas with Afghanistan a sanctuary for al Qaeda. 
• Since 2008, the U.S. has been committing acts of war inside of Pakistan. 
• Moreover, throughout 2007 and 2008, Pakistan played a significant role in U.S. electoral politics, as Democrats were especially willing to sound hawkish about this long-time U.S. ally. 

Pakistan is the "ally from hell" according to a December 2011 Atlantic piece by journalists Jeffrey Goldberg and Marc Ambinder. While they discuss many of the same problems I've been addressing on this blog over the years, the authors end their piece by taking on the question of command and control of Pakistan's nuclear weapons. Indeed, they urge U.S. policymakers to remain "focused on the most important goal: keeping Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal secure and holstered." That might not be easy, as they report:

In 2006, General Kidwai, the SPD [Strategic Plans Division] leader, told a U.S. audience at the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, California, that Pakistan maintained for its nuclear arsenal the functional equivalent of two-person control and permissive action links, or PALs—coded locks meant to prevent unauthorized arming of a weapon. When asked about Pakistan’s PAL protocols, one former U.S. defense official replied, “It has never been clear to me what Pakistani PALs really entail. The doctrine is ‘two people’—but is it two people to unlock the box around the warhead, or is it two people to launch the thing once you’ve mated the warhead to the missile?”

In short, bin Laden is dead, but there are still many reasons for security analysts to worry about Pakistan. A nuclear-armed failed state is just as worrisome as a rogue state with the bomb.  

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Elsewhere

I realize the blogging around here has been light, but you can find several more substantive posts of mine elsewhere in the blogosphere.

At Duck of Minerva, I wrote a post today "Hypocrisy Watch" concerning the U.S.-South Korean flap about nuclear reprocessing. Once again, I find neorealists perhaps a little too interested in hypocrisy.

June 14, I blogged "So long for now, New England," which briefly mentions a personal academic angle to my family's June college tour.

Duck readers also had the opportunity to read about my car purchasing decisions and the demise of Journolist.

Meanwhile, on my Climate Politics: IR and the Environment blog for e-IR, I finally wrote several recent posts. Here are the titles and opening sentences:

Global Governance and Geoengineering
July 18, 2010 

In a review of Jeff Goodell’s new book on geoengineering, How To Cool The Planet: Geoengineering and the Audacious Quest to Fix Earth’s Climate, Grist’s David Roberts notes that the topic raises a variety of “big questions about progress, responsibility, [and] the future of humanity.” Roberts:
To begin with, consider that by some estimates a l…

Framing climate change
July 12, 2010 

At my home institution, I’m involved in a project to reduce carbon emissions via individual behavioral changes. A relatively small group of scholars and administrators have been looking at some interesting theoretical and empirical social science research to bolster our efforts.
To understand what I have in mind, consider an example of behavioral change mentioned ear…

Scientific illiteracy and religion
July 10, 2010 

The May/June 2010 Utne Reader has a brief piece on science versus religion that reframes classic tensions in terms of climate change:
Everyone needs to remember, however, that “not all of the religious have a problem with science,” Chris Mooney, author of Unscientific America: How Scientific Illiteracy Threatens Our Future, tells Free Inquiry (Feb.-March 2010). An atheist (a…

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Quick Quacks

Apparently, I've been thinking quite a bit about nuclear threats lately:

Today, at Duck of Minerva I posted "Relieved? Why HEU should still worry." It briefly discusses the remaining threat of highly enriched uranium, a problem that lingers even if the sanctions against Iran prove effective.

June 2, I posted "Belligerence 101: North Korea options," which compares the hawkishness of the Bush and Obama administrations on the question of North Korea.

May 30, you can find "The downsizing of WMD," which concerns the WMD allegations levied against the Michigan militia members who were planning domestic acts of terror.

From May 17, read "Iran's setbacks: Buying time?" It discusses some reasons to worry about Iran's nuclear program given their technical progress to-date.

My "Nuclear transparency" post appeared on May 16. It concerns some recent disclosures the Obama administration made about U.S. nuclear weapons capabilities.


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Duck days

April 9 at Duck of Minerva, I blogged "Nuclear Arms Control," about Hillary Clinton's visit to Louisville to sell the latest nuclear START agreement to Senator Mitch McConnell -- and the rest of us.

April 7, I posted "New Nuclear Posture," about that Obama administration's Nuclear Posture Review. The U.S. announced that it (mostly) would not use nuclear weapons against non-nuclear weapons states. Believe it or not, that is actually news.


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Is Nuclear Deterrence Dead as the Dodo Bird?

The title of this post is also the title of one of my papers for next week's International Studies Association Annual Meeting in New Orleans. I've been a bad blogger for weeks because in the past 6 to 8 weeks, I've completed a draft chapter on the Iraq war (from a critical theory perspective), a coauthored chapter on the politics of climate change, another ISA paper on "Teaching Global Politics Through Film: The Role of Comedy" and this paper.

Here's the revised abstract:

Supporters and opponents of nuclear deterrence are clearly engaged in a renewed “contest” about the status of a long-standing normative idea in international relations. While the reality and logic of nuclear deterrence is often taken-for-granted, recurrent debates about the meaning and effectiveness of the norm arguably reflect an ongoing legitimacy crisis. Academic critics of nuclear strategy have for the most part simply revealed and explained the many contradictions in deterrence theorizing and practice. Most of these critics seek to correct, perfect, and reinforce the fundamental logic of deterrence. In contrast, the primary concern here is whether the growing recognition of the contradictions, irrationalities, and even absurdities of nuclear deterrence might usher in the strategy’s demise—and potentially create the conditions for, and/or provide the impetus to, a world free of nuclear weapons. Empirically, much attention is directed at the anti-nuclear activism of numerous prominent former and current public officials and military leaders who have condemned nuclear weapons and called for a world without them. Alternatively, the paper explores whether the death of deterrence might merely assure the long life of preventive war strategies (like the “Bush Doctrine”)? In terms of international relations theory, this paper serves as an immanent critique of nuclear deterrence.

Comments welcome.

I'll try to be a better blogger in the near future.

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Duck snorts

Today, at Duck of Minerva, I blogged "Academia and 'JournoList,'" which discusses a left-leaning listserv for journalists, policy wonks and academics. Are you, or have you ever been a member...

March 7, I blogged "Israeli threat inflation?" The post is about whether Iran has crossed a nuclear threshold on the way to making weapons.

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Duck doings

Today, at the Duck of Minerva, I blogged "New 'crimes against humanity'?" The piece considers the claims various political figures have tossed about concerning biofuel production. I also note some additional uses of this phrase in contemporary political debates.

On May 6, I blogged "The taboo," which is about the lack of debate concerning Israeli nuclear weapons -- especially in the US. Why is OK to talk of obliterating Iran, but not OK to talk about Israel's arsenal? [Note: this post originally appeared here, but I'm noting the Duck cross-posting because it was mentioned in a Chronicle of Higher Education footnoted from academic blogs post.]

Finally, May 2, I posted "Power outage" about the apparent decline in home runs in baseball following the most recent crackdowns against steroid use by players. Since posting some early season data, the major league HR rate has risen to 40.7 at bats per homer (from 41.8 in April). That's still down significantly from the rate during the rest of the aughts.


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The Taboo

Political Scientists John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt received a lot of heat for their recent work about the power of the Israeli lobby inside the United States.

Mearsheimer and Walt raised issues that are rarely discussed in the United States. Indeed. some describe this topic as "the third rail" of US foreign policy debate.

Now that the power of "the Lobby" has been made part of the US public debate, Israel's nuclear weapons program should also be scrutinized more publicly. Ordinarily, that subject is taboo.

Lew Butler (who used to chair the Ploughshares Fund) explained in an op-ed in the SF Chronicle, November 30, 2007:

Estimates are that there are probably as many as 200 [nuclear weapons] in the Israeli arsenal, including thermonuclear (hydrogen) ones.

What is surprising is that there is almost never any public discussion in the United States, and certainly none in the White House or the Congress, about these weapons.

...Clearly, the Bush administration is not going to talk publicly about our understanding, if any, with Israel about its nuclear weapons. And no member of Congress is rushing to get into a subject as politically delicate as this one. That leaves it to those of us in private life to begin the debate, for the sake of the United States and Israel.

Part of the reason nobody wants to talk about Israeli nuclear weapons is that any debate would quickly reveal American hypocrisy. How can the US put pressure on Iran or North Korea about their proliferation if it turns a blind eye to Israel?

The unspoken basis for U.S. policy about Israel's nukes seems to be that we don't want our enemies to have such weapons but we don't worry as much if our friends, like Israel, Pakistan and India, have them.

However, the lack of debate about Israel's arsenal occasionally causes US political leaders to make careless and immoral threats. Hillary Clinton's recent warning that she would "obliterate" Iran if it attacked Israel led me to note the following in comments:

I don't know why Israel's nuclear force isn't sufficient to deter Iran's. Estimates suggest that it has 100s of deliverable weapons, some in the form of accurate cruise missiles on relatively invulnerable submarines.

Butler asks a set of related questions

Is there any understanding between Israel and the United States, its principal source of military aid, about their use? If so, does the understanding cover "no first use," similar to the policy advocated in the United States at the height of the Cold War? What would the United States do if Israel were ever under an attack that might lead it to a nuclear response? Has the United States ever talked with Israel about its refusal to sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty? For Israel, are the weapons more of a danger to its security than a defense?

I see no reason to avoid public debate about these issues.

An honest discussion about Israel's arsenal might lead the US to adopt policies that would reduce its hypocrisy. For example, achieving genuine nonproliferation in the Middle East might require Israel to abandon its reliance upon nuclear weapons. Alternatively, perhaps the US and the regional states could embrace some kind of mutual deterrence based on Iran maintaining a secure second strike force. Iran does not currently have a nuclear-armed ally willing to extend deterrence on its behalf.

How would the US respond if Russia announced that it would obliterate Israel if it used nuclear weapons against Iran?


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Clinton: When to obliterate Iran

I have some security question fors Senator Clinton. First, what policy choices should the U.S. pursue so as to avoid "doing something that would be reckless, foolish, and tragic."

CLINTON: Well, the question was, if Iran were to launch a nuclear attack on Israel, what would our response be? And I want the Iranians to know that if I am president, we will attack Iran. And I want them to understand that. Because it does mean that they have to look very carefully at their society. Because whatever stage of development they might be in their nuclear weapons program, in the next 10 years during which they might foolishly consider launching an attack on Israel, we would be able to totally obliterate them. That's a terrible thing to say, but those people who run Iran need to understand that. Because that, perhaps, will deter them from doing something that would be reckless, foolish, and tragic.

Certainly, Dick Cheney was wrong pretending that deterrence cannot work against Iran.

However, it is morally reprehensible to talk lightly of obliterating a society. Would the U.S. really punish millions of innocent people if their government acted reprehensively? How could this be consistent with just war theory? Just think about proportionality for one moment.

Do all the Catholics in Pennsylvania who apparently voted for Clinton know about this?


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Duck

Yesterday, at the Duck of Minerva, I posted "History lesson: PA 1980."

April 21, I blogged "Nuclear umbrella" concerning what the Democratic candidates said in the California debate about nuclear deterrence and proliferation in the Middle East.

From Friday April 11, you can find "Teaching from the blogosphere."


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Non-Proliferation Perspective

This fact is remarkable:

Signed by all of the world's nations except India, Israel, and Pakistan (North Korea withdrew in 2003), it [the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty] empowered the IAEA to control and monitor the spread of nuclear technology—all with a budget of only $350 million a year, less than that of the Washington, D.C., police department.

The International Atomic Energy Agency is far more important to global politics than is the DC police force.

Why? Well, despite the recent NIE, the Bush administration is still selling the idea of Iran as a nuclear threat.

The IAEA is thus an important buffer preventing the use of force against Iranian nuclear facilities.

Keep this in mind as the world continues to debate the Bush administration's view of Iran: The IAEA, of course, was correct about Iraq's nuclear program -- when the Bush administration was very wrong.

Though hawks in the Bush administration doubted its value, the IAEA was recognized for its successes in 2005, when it won the Nobel Peace Prize.


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Missing Joe Biden: Iran-Pakistan edition

South Carolina is hosting a Democratic primary today and even though John Edwards has been creeping up on Hillary Clinton in some recent polls, the media mostly frames the contest as a two horse race.

Meanwhile, I've been recalling a few of the campaign highlights from candidates already out of the running.

For example, consider this cogent point made by Senator Joe Biden in the October 30 presidential candidate forum at Drexel in Philadelphia. He was questioned by NBC's Tim Russert, who was trying to get the candidate to make one of those stupid issue pledges:

Russert: Senator Biden, would you pledge to the American people that Iran would not build a nuclear bomb on your watch?

Biden: I would pledge to keep us safe. If you told me, Tim -- and this is not -- this is complicated stuff; we talk about this in isolation. The fact of the matter is, the Iranians may get 2.6 kilograms of highly-enriched uranium.

But the Pakistanis have hundreds -- thousands of kilograms of highly-enriched uranium. If by attacking Iran to stop them from getting 2.6 kilograms of highly-enriched uranium, the government in Pakistan falls, who has missiles already deployed with nuclear weapons on them that can already reach Israel, already reach India, then that's a bad bargain.

Biden: Presidents make wise decisions informed not by a vacuum in which they operate, by the situation they find themselves in the world.

I will do all in my power to stop Iran from getting a nuclear weapon, but I will never take my eye off the ball. What is the greatest threat to the United States of America: 2.6 kilograms of highly enriched uranium in Tehran or an out-of-control Pakistan? It's not close.

Now there's a guy who knew what he was talking about -- at least on this question.


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What Iranian nuclear program?

This is all over the blogosphere, but I wanted to save the link for myself. The latest official National Intelligence Estimate for Iran (public version) says that Iran is NOT developing a nuclear weapon. They stopped military work years ago:

We judge with high confidence that in fall 2003, Tehran halted its nuclear weapons program

Because Iran has a uranium enrichment program, the NIE also says this in the following clause: "we also assess with moderate-to-high confidence that Tehran at a minimum is keeping open the option to develop nuclear weapons."

More conclusions:

We assess with moderate confidence Tehran had not restarted its nuclear weapons program as of mid-2007, but we do not know whether it currently intends to develop nuclear weapons.

We continue to assess with moderate-to-high confidence that Iran does not currently have a nuclear weapon.

Tehran’s decision to halt its nuclear weapons program suggests it is less determined to develop nuclear weapons than we have been judging since 2005. Our assessment that the program probably was halted primarily in response to international pressure suggests Iran may be more vulnerable to influence on the issue than we judged previously.

As Patrick Jackson notes, this part of the NIE is interesting given what the US has been saying about Iran's President these past two years:

Our assessment that Iran halted the program in 2003 primarily in response to international pressure indicates Tehran’s decisions are guided by a cost-benefit approach rather than a rush to a weapon irrespective of the political, economic, and military costs. This, in turn, suggests that some combination of threats of intensified international scrutiny and pressures, along with opportunities for Iran to achieve its security, prestige, and goals for regional influence in other ways, might—if perceived by Iran’s leaders as credible—prompt Tehran to extend the current halt to its nuclear weapons program.

We just might get a negotiated solution yet.

It seems quite unlikely now that the U.S. could muster a case for war before the end of the Bush administration.


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At the Duck

Readers might be interested in my recent posts at the Duck of Minerva blog:

Today, I blogged "Sarah Sewall and COIN." It concerns the efforts of the leader of a Harvard Human Rights center to make counterinsurgency less deadly to civilians.

Thursday, October 11, I blogged "Securing Our Survival" about a security conference at the University of Pittsburgh. The meeting focused on both global warming and nuclear proliferation.

Tuesday, October 2, I took note of a University of Chicago professor's appearance on Comedy Central: "Mearsheimer on Colbert."

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