hicago, February 27,2002: Today, the Boardof Directors of the Bul-letin of the Atomic Scien-

tists moves the minute hand of the“Doomsday Clock,” the symbol ofnuclear danger, from nine to sevenminutes to midnight, the same settingat which the clock debuted 55 yearsago. Since the end of the Cold War in1991, this is the third time the handhas moved forward.

We move the hands taking intoaccount both negative and positivedevelopments. The negative devel-opments include too little progresson global nuclear disarmament;growing concerns about the securityof nuclear weapons materials world-wide; the continuing U.S. preferencefor unilateral action rather than co-operative international diplomacy;U.S. abandonment of the Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty and

U.S. efforts to thwart the enactmentof international agreements designedto constrain proliferation of nuclear,chemical, and biological weapons;the crisis between India and Pak-istan; terrorist efforts to acquire anduse nuclear and biological weapons;and the growing inequality betweenrich and poor around the world thatincreases the potential for violenceand war. If it were not for the posi-tive changes highlighted later in thisstatement, the hands of the clockmight have moved closer still.

The Bulletin of the Atomic Scien-tists, founded by a group of WorldWar II-era Manhattan Project scien-tists, has warned the world of nucle-ar dangers since 1945. The Septem-ber 11 attacks, and the subsequentand probably unrelated use of themail to deliver deadly anthraxspores, breached previous boundariesfor terrorist acts and should have

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From the Board of Directors:

4 Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists March/April 2002

been a global wake-up call. Movingthe clock’s hands at this time reflectsour growing concern that the inter-national community has hit the“snooze” button rather than respondto the alarm.

Troubling trends and missed opportunitiesMore than 31,000 nuclear weaponsare still maintained by the eightknown nuclear powers, a decrease ofonly 3,000 since 1998. Ninety-fivepercent of these weapons are in theUnited States and Russia, and morethan 16,000 are operationally de-ployed. Even if the United States andRussia complete their recently an-nounced arms reductions over thenext 10 years, they will continue totarget thousands of nuclear weaponsagainst each other.

Furthermore, many if not most of

It’s sevenminutesto midnight

the U.S. warheads removed from theactive stockpile will be placed in stor-age (along with some 5,000 war-heads already held in reserve) ratherthan dismantled, for the express pur-pose of re-deploying them in somefuture contingency. As a result, thetotal U.S. stockpile will remain atmore than 10,000 warheads for theforeseeable future. Russia, on theother hand, seeks a verifiable, bindingagreement that would ensure retiredU.S. and Russian weapons are actual-ly destroyed, a position we support.

Despite a campaign promise to re-think nuclear policy, the Bush ad-ministration has taken no steps tosignificantly alter nuclear targetingdoctrine or reduce the day-to-dayalert status of U.S. nuclear forces. IfRussia is no longer an adversary,what is the rationale for retaining theability to incinerate more than 2,000Russian targets in as little as 30 min-utes (or at all)?

Meanwhile, the U.S. nationalweapons laboratories, with the sup-port of some in Congress, are hard atwork refining existing warheads anddesigning entirely new weapons, witha special emphasis on those able toattack and destroy hardened anddeeply buried targets. And to ensurethat such new designs can be tested,the U.S. administration seeks toshorten the time required to resumetesting to as little as twelve months—a move that can only encourage othercountries, including India, Pakistan,and China, to consider resuming test-ing. Although the United States hasnot conducted a full-scale test since1992—and the administration says ithas no plans to resume testing at thistime—it refuses to recognize the over-whelming international support forthe Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty(CTBT) and refuses to participate ininternational meetings to discuss im-plementing the treaty. Should the re-quired signatories, including Indiaand Pakistan, fail to ratify theCTBT, thus jeopardizing its entryinto force, the world will lose an es-sential tool in halting the further de-

velopment and spreadof nuclear weapons.

Russia and the UnitedStates continue to main-tain enormous stock-piles of fissile material.Russia has more than1,000 metric tons ofweapon-grade uraniumand about 140 metrictons of weapon-gradeplutonium, and theUnited States has nearly750 metric tons ofweapon-grade uraniumand 85 metric tons ofweapon-grade plutoni-um. (Just 55 pounds—25 kilograms—of weapon-grade ura-nium, or 17.6 pounds ofplutonium—8 kilograms—are neededto construct a rudimentary nuclearweapon.)

Fortunately, of the hundreds of at-tempted smuggling transactions in-volving radioactive materials thathave been thwarted since 1991, thevast majority involved materials thatwere not weapons usable or were ofinsufficient quantity to construct anuclear weapon. Only 18 of thesecases involved the theft of weapon-grade uranium or plutonium from fa-cilities in the former Soviet Union. Atthe same time, Al Qaeda operativeswere actively seeking to acquire ra-dioactive materials to fashion either acrude nuclear weapon or a radiolog-ical dispersion device, commonlyknown as a “dirty bomb.”

The increase in the number ofsmuggling attempts in recent yearsserves as a clear warning that sur-plus nuclear weapons and weaponsmaterials may not be entirely secure.Yet since 1991, successive U.S. andRussian administrations have failedto push for either a full inventory ofweapons and materials, or for mea-sures to confirm their destruction.As a result, it is now essentially im-possible to verify whether all materi-als in the United States and Russiaare accounted for or whether allweapons are secure. This squan-

dered opportunity has enormous se-curity ramifications.

The U.S. administration’s deci-sion to withdraw from the ABMTreaty is a matter of great concern.The administration’s rationale—that the treaty is a relic that endan-gers U.S. security interests—is disin-genuous. Regrettably, the UnitedStates was unwilling to considerany compromise that would havepreserved the basic framework ofthe treaty, and therefore blockedpursuit of a compromise that wouldhave allowed additional testing butmaintained some limits on defenses.Abandoning the treaty will have se-rious repercussions for years tocome.C

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The crisis between India and Pak-istan, touched off by a December 13terrorist attack on the Indian parlia-ment, marks the closest two stateshave come to nuclear war since theCuban Missile Crisis. When thehands of the clock were moved for-ward in 1998, to nine minutes tomidnight, it was in part in anticipa-tion of just this sort of scenario.

Nuclear proliferation continues topose dangers, both regionally and in-ternationally. Of the countries mostoften described as seeking nuclear

weapons and/or ballistic missiles—Iraq, Iran, and North Korea—NorthKorea has repeatedly signaled itswillingness to turn back, including adecision last year to extend its unilat-eral moratorium on missile flighttests through 2003. Yet the U.S. ad-ministration has abandoned negotia-tions with that country, and in hisState of the Union message, PresidentGeorge W. Bush lumped all threecountries together as an “axis ofevil,” warning that, “The UnitedStates of America will not permit theworld’s most dangerous regimes tothreaten us with the world’s most de-structive weapons.” The preferenceimplicit in this statement for preemp-tive force over diplomacy, and forunilateral action rather than interna-tional cooperation, is likely to com-plicate efforts to defeat terrorism andstrengthen global security.

The confluence of the rise of ex-tremists who sacrifice their lives fortheir cause combined with weaponsof mass destruction is an especiallyworrisome development. So too isthe increased awareness since Sep-

tember 11 that terror-ists need not manufac-ture or purchase fissilematerials to fashion acrude nuclear weaponor release dangerousamounts of radiation.They need only attackpoorly guarded nuclearpower plants and nucle-ar weapons facilities,which contain sizablequantities of these mate-rials. Significantly, Presi-dent Bush acknowledgedon January 29, 2002,that diagrams of U.S. nu-clear power plants werefound among Al Qaedamaterials in Afghanistan.

When resetting theclock we have oftennoted that the growingdisparities between richand poor increase thepotential for violence

and war. Poverty and repressionbreed anger and desperation. Charis-matic leaders with easy answers preyon the dispossessed and disaffected,channeling their anger into dangerousand destructive activities. The globalcommunity must recognize these factsand do much more to address them.The success of the war on terrorismdepends not only on disrupting anddestroying terrorist organizations, butalso on eradicating the conditionsthat give rise to terror.

We therefore fully support thestatement circulated by Bulletinsponsor John Polanyi and signed by110 Nobel laureates last December,which reads in part, “The only hopefor the future lies in cooperative in-ternational action, legitimized bydemocracy. . . . To survive in theworld we have transformed, we mustlearn to think in a new way.”

Some welcome developmentsAt the same time, we want to recog-nize some welcome trends. Since welast set the clock in 1998, the 187governments party to the NuclearNon-Proliferation Treaty, includingthe major nuclear powers, agreed toa comprehensive set of commitmentsand measures to enhance nonprolif-eration and fulfill long-standing nu-clear disarmament pledges. Theseagreements were rightly heralded asa political breakthrough, but the realtest will be in how seriously the nu-clear powers take their obligations toimplement the practical steps towhich they have agreed. In this re-gard, we welcome France’s disman-tling of its Pacific nuclear test siteand military reprocessing facilitiesand commend Britain’s research pro-gram on verifying multilateral reduc-tions in nuclear weapons as earlysteps in the right direction.

U.S. funding and technical assis-tance continues to make significantand cost-effective contributions to in-ternational security by working toensure that Russian nuclear weaponsare dismantled, and that nuclear ma- C

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terials and nuclear expertise do notleave Russia. Much remains to bedone, however. After initially ques-tioning the value of these cooperativeprograms, the Bush administrationnow seeks to increase their funding.

Since 2000, Russia has urged theUnited States to agree to reductionsin the two countries’ arsenals to1,500 warheads each. PresidentBush’s announcement in November2001 that U.S. “operationally de-ployed strategic warheads” would bereduced to between 1,700 to 2,200by 2012—an intention reaffirmed inthe administration’s Nuclear PostureReview in January—is positive news.It is also the first major commitmentto reducing nuclear weapons madeby either the United States or Russiasince 1997. Although there are seri-ous questions about how permanentthese reductions will be, and howlong they will take to enact, they arenevertheless an important step awayfrom the grotesque levels of theCold War.

What it would take to turn back the clockAs a first step in moving toward asafer world, we urge the UnitedStates and Russia to commit to re-duce their nuclear arsenals to nomore than 1,000 warheads each bythe end of the decade. Each sideshould be free to choose its ownmeans for achieving this goal, butboth should commit, in writing, totransparency and verification provi-sions to ensure that the cuts are car-ried out and the delivery systems andwarheads dismantled. Both countriesshould commit to storing and dispos-ing of the resulting fissile material ina manner that makes the reductionsirreversible. In addition, each sideshould commit to destroying at leasthalf of the inactive weapons it cur-rently stores within five years, andcommit to destroying them all within10 years.

These reductions must include tac-tical nuclear weapons as well. Signif-

icantly, the Bush admin-istration’s Nuclear Pos-ture Review calls forstudying whether thenavy should be permit-ted to retire its nuclear-armed cruise missiles. Ifthese weapons were re-tired, only about 150 airforce bombs stored inseven European coun-tries would remain inthe U.S. operational tac-tical stockpile. We urgethe swift retirement anddestruction of all tacti-cal nuclear weapons inEurope, and stronglyencourage all states withnuclear weapons tobegin negotiations toeliminate these weaponsworldwide.

We also urge the United States andRussia to finally recognize the end ofthe Cold War by abandoning thepractice of maintaining thousands ofnuclear weapons on high alert, readyto be fired within minutes. This prac-tice, born of fear and uncertaintyduring the Cold War, is a dangerousanachronism.

Significantly greater funding mustbe provided to secure and safeguardnuclear weapons and weapons mate-rials in Russia, the United States, andelsewhere. For example, the currentlevel of U.S. funding to assist Russiawith such efforts is less than a third ofthe $3 billion annual expenditure rec-ommended by an Energy Departmenttask force last year. If weapons mate-rials and expertise are not more tight-ly controlled, no city in the worldwill be safe from nuclear attack.

A Fissile Material Cut-off Treatymust be placed back on the interna-tional arms control agenda. Everyyear that passes without a verifiablemeans of stopping the productionworldwide of nuclear weapons mate-rials makes the task of constrainingnuclear proliferation more difficult.In addition, as part of such an agree-ment, all states with fissile material

inventories should declare their cur-rent holdings and submit to an inter-national verification and transparen-cy regime that would continuouslymonitor surplus inventories and de-velop safe, effective, and permanentdisposal options.

The United States should reconsid-er its plans to walk away from theABM Treaty in June. As the U.S. in-telligence community recently con-cluded, ballistic missiles are neitherthe most likely nor the most destruc-tive threat facing the United States.

Other measures that would in-crease global stability include a banon the deployment of space-basedweapons, whether designed to dam-age or disrupt satellites or to attacktargets on the ground or in the air;full adherence by all parties to theChemical Weapons Convention; andthe resumption of negotiations on averification protocol for the Biologi-cal Weapons Convention. Strongerinternational support for the globalmovement to limit the spread ofsmall arms and to ban land mines,which each year maim or kill tens ofthousands of people, most of theminnocent civilians, would also be awelcome and necessary development.

The clock is ticking. �CO

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