Stanford University

Assessment Paper on Non‐Proliferation

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This paper, written for a September 2011 seminar hosted by the Geneva Center for Security Policy,  analyzes developments since the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) Action Plan was adopted by concensus at the 2010 NPT Review conference. The seminar included participants from the Permanent Missions to the Conference on Disarmament, academia, and non-governmental organizations. 

An excerpt from the text, pg. 1:

"The first thing to keep in mind is that the previous Review Conference, in 2005, was a major failure. It was not the first review conference not to end up with a final document. The 1980, 1990 had failed to produce a final document agreed upon by consensus and even the historically successful 1995 review and extension conference ended up with a document which replaced the word consensus with the recognition that “a majority exists”. However, the 2005 Review Conference was widely perceived as “the biggest failure in the history of this Treaty.” Since then, the two North Korean nuclear tests in 2006 and 2009, the concerns about the Iranian nuclear program, the Syrian site of Al Kibar as well as the suspicions over the Burmese nuclear activities have fueled and renewed fears about further spread of nuclear weapons and, even, a possible collapse of the non-proliferation regime. It is true that Iran and Syria related issues have rarely been discussed during the 2010 Review Conference. However, the memory of a historical failure combined with several proliferation concerns and a de facto new nuclear weapon state – North Korea –, which status under the NPT is still open for discussion, has led to consider that “failure was never an option”, as one representative stated at the closing of the conference."

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Geneva Centre for Security Policy
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Benoît Pelopidas
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The United States, China and Strategic Stability

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China's nuclear forces, policies and posture have been very unusual since 1964. This is most likely because, unlike policy-makers in the United States, Chinese leaders tend to treat deterrence as being robust against disparities in technical details, such as the number or type of nuclear weapons. China’s current nuclear modernization, centered on the introduction of mobile missiles, creates some important challenges to crisis stability that may be difficult to resolve as long as Chinese and American policymakers hold divergent views on nuclear weapons. In this seminar, Dr. Lewis will address one option that may help clarify these diverging views. Beijing and Washington could negotiate a communiqué on strategic stability that addresses their differing perspectives and supports a sustained and effective dialogue on strategic nuclear issues between the United States and China.

Speaker bio:

Jeffrey Lewis is the Director of the East Asia Nonproliferation Program at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies. Dr. Lewis is the author of Minimum Means of Reprisal: China's Search for Security in the Nuclear Age (MIT Press, 2007) and publishes ArmsControlWonk.com, the leading blog on disarmament, arms control and nonproliferation. Before coming to CNS, he was the Director of the Nuclear Strategy and Nonproliferation Initiative at the New America Foundation.

Prior to that, Dr. Lewis was Executive Director of the Managing the Atom Project at the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Executive Director of the Association of Professional Schools of International Affairs, a Visiting Fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies and a desk officer in the Office of the Undersecretary of Defense for Policy. He is also a Research Scholar at the Center for International and Security Studies at the University of Maryland's School of Public Policy (CISSM).

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Jeffrey Lewis Director, East Asia Nonproliferation Program, James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies and publisher of armscontrolwonk.com Speaker
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No Need to Reset the Reset

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Russia watchers in the West cannot be surprised that Vladimir Putin is on his way back to the Russian presidency. Dmitri Medvedev was always his protégé, and there was no doubt that major decisions could not be made without his approval. This includes signing the New START arms control treaty, cooperating with NATO in Afghanistan and supporting U.N. sanctions on Iran — all of which should provide reassurance that Putin’s return won’t undo the most important accomplishments of the U.S.-Russia “reset.”

Yet the relationship with the West will inevitably change. For one thing, Putin can have nothing like the rapport his protégé developed with President Obama, which was built upon the two leaders’ shared backgrounds as lawyers, their easy adoption of new technologies, and their fundamentally modern worldviews.

The Bilateral Presidential Commission which Obama and Medvedev created and charged with advancing U.S.-Russia cooperation on everything from counterterrorism to health care may suffer. The relationship as a whole is not adequately institutionalized, and depends on the personal attention of Russian officials who will likely avoid taking action without clear direction from Putin, or who may be removed altogether during the transition.

Putin’s return to the presidency will also provide fodder for Western critics bent on portraying Obama and the reset as a failure, or dismissing Putin’s Russia as merely a retread of the Soviet Union.

These critics are wrong — today’s Russia bears little resemblance to what Ronald Reagan dubbed an “evil empire” — but Putin has been far more tolerant of Soviet nostalgia than his junior partner, and his next term will surely bring a new litany of quotations about Soviet accomplishments and Russia’s glorious destiny that will turn stomachs in the West.

Although he has spent his entire career within the apparatus of state power, including two decades in the state security services, Putin is at heart a C.E.O., with a businessman’s appreciation for the bottom line. Western companies already doing business in Russia can expect continuity in their dealings with the state, and it will remain in Russia’s interest to open doors to new business with Europe and the United States. The next key milestone for expanding commercial ties will be Russia’s planned accession to the World Trade Organization, which could come as soon as December.

At home, Putin faces a looming budget crisis. As the population ages and oil and gas output plateaus the government will be unable to continue paying pensions, meeting the growing demand for medical care, or investing in dilapidated infrastructure throughout the country’s increasingly depopulated regions.

This means that while Putin will seek to preserve Russia’s current economic model, which is based on resource extraction and export, he will be forced to assimilate many of his protégé’s ideas for modernizing Russia’s research and manufacturing sectors. Medvedev’s signature initiative, the Skolkovo “city of innovation,” will likely receive continuing support from the Kremlin, although it will have little long-term impact without a thorough nationwide crackdown on corruption and red tape.

Putin’s restored power will be strongly felt in Russia’s immediate neighborhood, which he has called Moscow’s “sphere of privileged interests.” Even though Kiev has renewed Russia’s lease on the Black Sea Fleet’s Sevastopol base through 2042 and reversed nearly all of the previous government’s anti-Russian language and culture policies, Ukraine is unlikely to win a reprieve from high Russian gas prices. Putin will also continue to press Ukraine to join the Russia-dominated customs union in which Kazakhstan and Belarus already participate. He may also take advantage of Belarus’s deepening economic isolation and unrest to oust President Aleksandr Lukashenko in favor of a more reliable Kremlin ally.

Putin and Medvedev have been equally uncompromising toward Georgia. Both are openly contemptuous of Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili, and it is unlikely that any progress on relations can occur until Georgia’s presidential transition in 2013.

Putin has good reason to continue backing NATO operations in Afghanistan to help stem the flow of drugs, weapons and Islamism into Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and Russia itself. Moreover, as China extends its economic hegemony into Central Asia, he may find America to be a welcome ally.

Putin appreciates the advantages of pragmatic partnerships and will seek to preserve the influence of traditional groupings like the U.N. Security Council and the G-8 while at the same time promoting alternatives like the Shanghai Cooperation Organization and the Brics.

The succession from Putin to Medvedev and back again was decided behind closed doors, and the formal transition of power is likely to take place with similar discipline. This should offer the West and the wider world some reassurance. Putin’s return to the presidency is far from the democratic ideal, but it is not the end of “reset.” Many ordinary Russians support him because he represents stability and continuity of the status quo and, for now, that is mostly good for Russia’s relations with the West.

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The Politics of Nuclear Development: China as a Case Study

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Nuclear energy is politically sensitive. For its proponents, nuclear energy is clean and highly efficient and indeed is the only alternative to fossil fuels in providing a base supply of electricity. For its opponents, nuclear energy is nothing but trouble, a symbol of war and weaponry par excellence, and one that creates environmental problems for mankind today and in the future. What is remarkable in this highly emotional debate is the general division between developed and developing countries. Asian and Gulf states are more active than many in other continents in expanding or developing their nuclear energy capacities. China is leading this expansion with 27 reactors under construction now.

Nuclear development in China highlights a series of objectives many developing countries try to balance – energy and economy, energy and development, energy and environment, energy and security, and the need for both clean energy and adequate and reliable energy supplies. It tells a counterintuitive story about Chinese politics – a single-party authoritarian political system with an extremely fragmented institutional structure in nuclear energy policy making, implementation and regulation and with highly competitive market forces in play. It provides a cautionary tale about the Chinese as well as global nuclear future. This paper discusses the challenges of nuclear energy development, using China as an example. It asks who drives it, what technology is selected and adopted, how human capital is developed, what the rules of the games are, and more importantly, which institutions are responsible for issuing licenses, regulating standards, and overseeing the compliance, and what forms of regulation do they use. At the core of these questions is if and how countries can ensure safe, secure and sustainable nuclear development.

Speaker Biography:

Dr. Xu Yi-chong is a research professor of politics and public policy at Griffith University. Before joining Griffith University in January 2007, Xu was professor of political science at St Francis Xavier University in Nova Scotia, Canada. She is author of The Politics of Nuclear Energy in China (2010); Electricity Reform in China, India and Russia: The World Bank Template and the Politics of Power (2004); Powering China: Reforming the electric power industry in China (2002); co-author of Inside the World Bank: Exploding the Myth of the Monolithic Bank (with Patrick Weller 2009) and The Governance of World Trade: International Civil Servants and the GATT/WTO, (with Patrick Weller 2004); and editor of Nuclear Energy Development in Asia (2011) and The Political Economy of Sovereign Wealth Funds (2010). All these projects were supported by the research grants from either Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC) or Australian Research Council.

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Xu Yi-Chong Professor of Research Speaker Griffith University Center for Governance and Policy
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Karl Eikenberry joins Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies

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The Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies at Stanford University is pleased to welcome Karl Eikenberry as the 2011 Payne Distinguished Lecturer. 

Eikenberry comes to Stanford from the U.S. State Department, where he served between May 2009 and July 2011 as the U.S. Ambassador to Afghanistan. In that role, he led the civilian surge directed by President Obama to reverse insurgent momentum and set the conditions for transition to full Afghan sovereignty. Earlier, he had a 35-year career in the U.S. Army, retiring in April 2009 with the rank of lieutenant general.

“I am delighted that he has joined us,” says Coit D. Blacker, FSI’s director and the Olivier Nomellini Professor in International Studies. “Karl Eikenberry’s international reputation, vast experience, and on-the-ground understanding of military strategy, diplomacy, and the policy decision-making process will be an enormous contribution to FSI and Stanford and are deeply consistent with the goals of the Payne Lectureship.”

Eikenberry is a graduate of the U.S. Military Academy, and has master’s degrees from Harvard University in East Asian Studies and from Stanford University in Political Science. He was also a National Security Fellow at the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard, and he earned an Interpreter’s Certificate in Mandarin Chinese from the British Foreign Commonwealth Office while studying at the United Kingdom Ministry of Defense Chinese Language School in Hong Kong. He has an Advanced Degree in Chinese History from Nanjing University in the People’s Republic of China.

"Karl Eikenberry first came to Stanford as a graduate student in the Political Science Department in the mid-1990s, and we are extraordinarily happy to have him back," says Stephen D. Krasner, deputy director at FSI and Graham H. Stuart Professor of International Relations. "He has an exceptional, actually unique, set of experiences and talents that will greatly enrich the intellectual community at FSI and throughout the university."

Eikenberry's work in Afghanistan includes an 18-month tour as commander of the U.S.-led coalition forces. He has also served in various strategy, policy, and political-military positions, including deputy chairman of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) military committee in Brussels, and director for strategic planning and policy for U.S. Pacific Command.

His military operational posts included service as commander and staff officer with mechanized, light, airborne, and ranger infantry units in the continental United States, Hawaii, Korea, and Italy. His military awards and decorations include the Defense Distinguished and Superior Service Medals, Legion of Merit, Bronze Star, Ranger Tab, Combat and Expert Infantryman badges, and master parachutist wings.

Eikenberry has also published numerous articles on U.S. military training, tactics, and strategy, on Chinese ancient military history, and on Asia-Pacific security issues. He was previously the president of the Foreign Area Officers Association and is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and the International Institute for Strategic Studies.

At Stanford, Eikenberry will also be an affiliated faculty member at the Center for International Security and Cooperation (CISAC) and at the Center on Democracy, Development, and the Rule of Law (CDDRL).

He will deliver this year's inaugural Payne Distinguished Lecture on Oct. 3 at the Cemex Auditorium at the Knight Management Center. The public address will be given in conjunction with a private, two-day conference that will bring to Stanford an international group of political scientists, economists, lawyers, policy-makers, and military experts to examine from a comparative perspective problems of violence, organized crime, and governance in Mexico.

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Eikenberry in Helmand, Afghanistan, with wife, Ching.
Courtesy Karl Eikenberry
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Lonjezo Frank

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Predoctoral Fellow
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Lonjezo Peter Mpinganjira Frank (formerly Lonjezo Hamisi) was a predoctoral fellow at CISAC for the 2011-2012 academic year. While at CISAC, he was a Ph.D. candidate in political science at Stanford. His doctoral dissertation focused on the diplomatic role of the United Nations Secretary-General since 1945 and used a variety of quantitative techniques to assess the autonomy of his Office vis-à-vis the U.N. member states, especially the powerful Security Council P5 states.

In 2004, Lonjezo earned an M.A. in Diplomacy & International Relations and also an MBA from Seton Hall University. At Stanford, Lonjezo has served as a teaching assistant in several international security and foreign policy classes, as well as assisted Prof. Kenneth Schultz with research on African boundary conflicts. 

Prior to enrolling at Stanford, Lonjezo worked in private sector consulting and academia. He also completed internships and developed affiliations with several public sector organizations, including, inter alia, the Office of the United Nations Under-Secretary-General and High Representative for the Least Developed Countries, Landlocked Developing Countries and Small Island Developing States; the Office of the Chairman of the Group of 77 and China, and the Office of Prof. Jeffrey Sachs, Director of Columbia University’s Earth Institute.

Last updated March 2024.

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Google Tech Talk: What I saw in North Korea and Why it Matters

CISAC Co-director Siegfried Hecker discusses energy, proliferation issues and his trips to North Korea. 

Siegfried S. Hecker

CISAC
Stanford University
Encina Hall, C220
Stanford, CA 94305-6165

(650) 725-6468 (650) 723-0089
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Senior Fellow, Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies, Emeritus
Research Professor, Management Science and Engineering, Emeritus
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Siegfried S. Hecker is a professor emeritus (research) in the Department of Management Science and Engineering and a senior fellow emeritus at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies (FSI). He was co-director of CISAC from 2007-2012. From 1986 to 1997, Dr. Hecker served as the fifth Director of the Los Alamos National Laboratory. Dr. Hecker is an internationally recognized expert in plutonium science, global threat reduction, and nuclear security.

Dr. Hecker’s current research interests include nuclear nonproliferation and arms control, nuclear weapons policy, nuclear security, the safe and secure expansion of nuclear energy, and plutonium science. At the end of the Cold War, he has fostered cooperation with the Russian nuclear laboratories to secure and safeguard the vast stockpile of ex-Soviet fissile materials. In June 2016, the Los Alamos Historical Society published two volumes edited by Dr. Hecker. The works, titled Doomed to Cooperate, document the history of Russian-U.S. laboratory-to-laboratory cooperation since 1992.

Dr. Hecker’s research projects at CISAC focus on cooperation with young and senior nuclear professionals in Russia and China to reduce the risks of nuclear proliferation and nuclear terrorism worldwide, to avoid a return to a nuclear arms race, and to promote the safe and secure global expansion of nuclear power. He also continues to assess the technical and political challenges of nuclear North Korea and the nuclear aspirations of Iran.

Dr. Hecker joined Los Alamos National Laboratory as graduate research assistant and postdoctoral fellow before returning as technical staff member following a tenure at General Motors Research. He led the laboratory's Materials Science and Technology Division and Center for Materials Science before serving as laboratory director from 1986 through 1997, and senior fellow until July 2005.

Among his professional distinctions, Dr. Hecker is a member of the National Academy of Engineering; foreign member of the Russian Academy of Sciences; fellow of the TMS, or Minerals, Metallurgy and Materials Society; fellow of the American Society for Metals; fellow of the American Physical Society, honorary member of the American Ceramics Society; and fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

His achievements have been recognized with the Presidential Enrico Fermi Award, the 2020 Building Bridges Award from the Pacific Century Institute, the 2018 National Engineering Award from the American Association of Engineering Societies, the 2017 American Nuclear Society Eisenhower Medal, the American Physical Society’s Leo Szilard Prize, the American Nuclear Society's Seaborg Medal, the Department of Energy's E.O. Lawrence Award, the Los Alamos National Laboratory Medal, among other awards including the Alumni Association Gold Medal and the Undergraduate Distinguished Alumni Award from Case Western Reserve University, where he earned his bachelor's, master's, and doctoral degrees in metallurgy.

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Deconstructing the Nuclear Accident at the Fukushima-Daiichi Plant: What Went Wrong and What are the Prospects of Recovery?

The large-scale industrial accident at the Fukushima-Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant was the culmination of three inter-related factors: external natural hazard assessment and site preparation, the utility’s approach to risk management, and the fundamental reactor design.

The reactor accident was initiated by a magnitude 9 earthquake followed by an even more damaging tsunami. However, it was the inability to remove the decay heat in the reactor core that led to core meltdown and radioactive release.

A review of the timeline of the major Fukushima accident sequences: The plant first experienced a station blackout (i.e. loss of all offsite and onsite power) due to flooding of backup critical emergency cooling equipment. The lack of an ultimate heat sink led to the fuel overheating. Subsequently, the generation of hydrogen through steam oxidation of of the fuel cladding led to chemical explosions causing significant structural damage.

The focus of this talk (presentation slides below) is on the engineering aspects of the reactor accident and the prospects for local environmental recovery. Radionuclide measurements in space and time provide important evidence for the exact evolution of fuel damage leading to partial core melting in multiple units. A review of the spent nuclear fuel pools is given where isotopic water composition and visual inspection images provide important evidence for the condition of the spent nuclear fuel.

While it will be several months to a year before we will be in a position to learn most of the lessons from this tragdy, several conclusions about defensive design, mitigation actions, and emergency response have been drawn by international organizations.

While the public health impact appears to have been low, the economic and nearby environmental consequences are severe, There is no doubt that land restoration will take over a decade and perhaps much longer. A review is given of actions taken by the Japanese government for land recovery in areas such as decontaminating top soil and local farmland as well as highly radioactive water used during ‘feed and bleed’ cooling of the core.

Edward Blandford Panelist
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