Tag: Nuclear Policies

So Much For The Sanctions Idea

WE know that since last February the US and NATO has imposed heavy sanctions on Russia as a penalty for invading Ukraine.

These sanctions do not seem to find a way to stop the madness now exploding (no pun intended) in Ukraine.

Sanctions, at best, are a feel good action….seldom do anything to curb any bad activity by this country or that.

Let me go off track for a moment….

As a nuclear super power where does all the uranium come from that is needed to make those lovely bombs and stuff?

Here’s a hint for you….the nation is under extreme sanctions.

Roughly one third of the enriched uranium used in the United States is now imported from Russia, the world’s cheapest producer.  Most of the rest is imported from Europe. A final, smaller portion is produced by a British-Dutch-German consortium operating in the United States. Nearly a dozen countries around the world depend on Russia for more than half their enriched uranium.
 
The company that operates the Ohio plant says it could take more than a decade for it to produce quantities that rivaled Rosatom. The Russian nuclear agency, which produces both low-enriched and weapons-grade fuel for Russia’s civilian and military purposes, is also responsible in Ukraine for commandeering the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, Europe’s biggest, sparking fears that a battle over it could cause leaks of radioactive material or even a larger meltdown.
 
It is one of the most significant remaining flows of money from the United States to Russia, and it continues despite strenuous efforts among U.S. allies to sever economic ties with Moscow. The enriched uranium payments are made to subsidiaries of Rosatom, which in turn is closely intertwined with Russia’s military apparatus.
 
I have said and written many times that this sanction thing does nothing but help politicians feel good and something they can use to separate fools from their money.
 
Not something that is common knowledge by the people….but not to worry there is plenty more that we do not know.
 
At what point do we allow this BS to continue?  (that is a rhetorical question)
 
I Read, I Write, You Know
 
“lego ergo scribo”

Biden And Nukes

I have been writing a lot about the policies that the president-elect, Joe Biden, will most likely pursue once he takes the oath of office….I admit that there are not many of the policies of his that I can say I agree with…….all I can say is that at least he is not Trump….

I have tries to cover all policies that he would likely attempt….many of them are not what the American people need…..like the idea of nuclear power….

Then there is the offer of ‘clean energy”….something the Biden/Harris team will probably push…..

Although possibly a sad comment on his predecessors, incoming U.S. president, Joe Biden, is offering the most progressive climate policy so far of any who have previously held his position.

As Paul Gipe points out in his recent blog, the Biden-Harris climate plan uses the word “revolution” right in the headline — a bit of a departure from the usual cautious rhetoric of the centrist-controlled Democratic Party.

But ‘revolution’ is proceeded by two words which let us know we are still lingering in conservative ‘safe’ territory. They call it a “clean energy revolution”, which Gipe rightly refers to as “focus-group shopped terminology.” He goes on:

”Clean energy is a term forged by Madison Avenue advertising mavens in the crucible of focus groups. It ‘polls well,’ as they say. It means one thing to one interest group, something else to another. So it’s perfect for politics in America.

“To environmentalists, it means wind and solar energy, often only those two forms of renewable energy, and sometimes only solar. It also means good times to the coal and nuclear industry. (Ever hear of ‘clean coal’?)

“So clean energy is one of those misleading words that party leaders and, importantly, fundraisers can use to elicit money from donors of all stripes. Why say renewable energy, when you want to raise money from the coal and nuclear industries?”

In Promoting New Nuclear Power, Biden-Harris Back Fiction Over Science

Just like the lie of “clean coal” the lie of “Clean nuke energy” will do nothing but create a bigger problem from the waste it will generate….

Another fine mess the Centrists will get us into.  Go Team!

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Saudi Nuke Program

Recently the Trump admin has decided to give nuke technology to the Saudis…..not to worry you can read all about it here….https://lobotero.com/2019/05/14/saudis-and-nukes/ (3 different post on the subject…check them out)…..

Then I read that the Saudis and the Chinese are working together on their nuke programs……WTF?

The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has reportedly built a uranium-enrichment facility with help from China that could put the kingdom one step closer to creating a nuclear weapon.

The facility is being built in a remote desert in the country’s northwest region and has raised concerns from the United States and other allied nations about Riyadh’s nuclear development plan, according to a Wall Street Journal report.

The facility will reportedly extract yellowcake uranium from uranium ore.

https://justthenews.com/world/middle-east/saudi-arabia-working-china-expand-nuclear-program-construct-yellowcake-facility

Yellowcake uranium….you remember that right?

It was used to justify the invasion of Iraq in 2003….and now we will trust one of the most untrustworthy international p;layers with the development of yellowcake…..

At what point does the Trump oligarchy draw the line in the sand?

To expand on this…China seems to be developing a Middle East Kingdom with their policies…..

American policymakers have long assumed that Chinese and American goals in the Middle East are largely complementary. Beijing, so the prevailing wisdom holds, is fixated on commerce, with a special emphasis on oil and gas. “China’s strategy in the Middle East is driven by its economic interests,” a former senior official in the Obama administration testified last year before Congress. “China … does not appear interested in substantially deepening its diplomatic or security activities there.” According to this reigning view, China adopts a position of neutrality toward political and military conflicts, because taking sides would make enemies who might then restrict China’s access to markets.

This oft-repeated shibboleth ignores clear signs that China is very actively engaged in a hard-power contest with the United States—a contest that the Chinese occasionally acknowledge and are capable of winning. In 2016, Xi Jinping toured the Middle East for the first time in his capacity as president of the People’s Republic of China, visiting Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and Iran. Chinese propaganda hailed the trip as a milestone. The Chinese Foreign Ministry issued a white paper on its Arab policy, the first of its kind. “We will deepen China-Arab military cooperation and exchange,” the paper read. “We will … deepen cooperation on weapons, equipment and various specialized technologies, and carry out joint military exercises.”

https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/israel-middle-east/articles/china-middle-eastern-kingdom

The Middle East may well be out of the news spotlight because of the pandemic….but there is still more going on than the media is willing to report.

For FYI….this is the unredacted IG report that Pompeo wanted NO one to read….but now you can…..a fascinating 20+ pages…..

https://www.politico.com/f/?id=00000173-df44-d479-af73-ff5e7dd00000

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Spend China And Russian Into Submission

Since we have bowed out of every nuke deal ever made and China and Russia have stepped up to get in the nuke game….but not to worry the US is willing to spend whatever it takes to crush their rivals in the nuclear arms race….

US arms control negotiator Marshall Billingslea, far from focusing on avoiding an arms race, saying that the US “sure would like to avoid it” but is also willing to spend Russia and China “into oblivion” to win a nuclear arms race.

“The president has made clear that we have a tried and truce practice here. We know how to win these races and we know how to spend the adversary into oblivion.” This was the go-to US strategy in the Cold War, where the US vastly outpsent the Soviet Union.

With the US scrapping the INF and Open Skies treaties, it seems unlikely to extend New START, making a costly arms race an increasing risk. Since the US vastly outspends everyone on the military, there seems to be an assumption they can win by just keeping up the spending.

Whether that is practical going forward, however, is another matter. With the US engaged in a costly battle with coronavirus, there was already talk the US would have to slash spending, particularly on arms, to deal with the deficit. A huge arms race is just not affordable.

(antiwar.com)

So the US cannot find the cash for a failing infrastructure or the fight against Covid-19….but they are willing to spend whatever it takes to embarrass their rivals….is that about it?

The US has enough nukes to make humanity suffer a bunch…..so do we really need more?  According to Donald the Orange….we do.

How does the US get Russia and China to the negotiating table? Senior administration officials came up the idea of carrying out the first US nuclear test explosion since 1992, and this conversation is still ongoing.

Carrying out nuclear tests is a hugely provocative move on the global scale, and yet the Trtump Administration thought it could “prove useful” in trying to get Russia and China into trilateral nuclear talks.

This probably was also informing the administration in accusing, without evidence, both Russia and China of conducting nuclear tests in secret. Global monitoring makes secret tests all but impossible, but allegating them of having done so would be cover for the US to do it too.

Officials said the December discussion on the matter didn’t end with any agreement to conduct a test, but that it is an “ongoing conversation” that they keep going back to as a possible idea in response to threats from Russia and China.

(antiwar.com)

For those too damn young to remember all the PR about nukes and the results…..let me refresh some memories…..

A professor at Georgetown University, he’s taught an undergraduate course on nuclear weapons and world politics for the past decade. He always asks the same question on the last day: How many of his students think they’ll see nuclear weapons used in their lifetime?

For many years, no more than one student would raise their hand. That made sense, he told me, because in those days, “talking about nuclear war was like talking about dinosaurs — it’s just something from the past that won’t be something in our future.”

But the past couple of years have been different. When he asked that question again this spring, roughly 60 percent of his students raised their hands. What’s more, he agrees with them. “If I had to bet at least one nuclear weapon would be used in my lifetime,” says the 40-year-old Kroenig, “my bet would be yes.”

https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/2018/10/19/17873822/nuclear-war-weapons-bombs-how-kill

We need sanity in our approaches to the rest ofm them world…not knee jerk reactions and a dash to the TV for the delivery of lies and disinformation.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

What Happened To The Arms Race?

If you are old enough to remember the Cold War then the term “arms race” is something you are aware of…..but for those youngsters here on IST….

An arms race occurs when two or more countries increase the size and quality of military resources to gain military and political superiority over one another. The Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union is perhaps the largest and most expensive arms race in history……

But thank God with the end of the Cold War the dangerous game of arms race in nuclear weapons disappeared….think again!

We ended our involvement in the INF and that is an invitation to an arms race……

If you asked the Pentagon, they would tell you in no uncertain terms that the US is not engaged in any sort of nuclear arms race. At the same time, the US is spending heavily on new nuclear weapons, and is particularly scrambling to get weapons designed to target Russia.

Officials described a recent table-top war game where Russia carried out a tactical nuclear first-strike against NATO territory during a conflict in Europe. This idea of Russia attacking first seems to be informing a lot of US policy decisions.

The exercise saw a low-yield Russian nuke deployed, and the US arsenal, still limited on lower options, ultimately decided that their only response was a much bigger strategic nuclear strike on Russia, starting a civilization-ending nuclear exchange.

Though seemingly the risk of such a war would be a deterrent against a Russian first-strike, the Pentagon is arguing they need more low-yield options so they can engage in tit-for-tat nuclear wars at a lower level.

Analysts have been very concerned about these developments, because the Pentagon very publicly views lower-yield nukes as more usable, and this risks the US deploying them in attacks on non-nuclear states.

(antiwar.com)

If there is NO arms race then why would the Pentagon be begging for more funds for nukes?

The US spends tens of billions of dollars annually on nuclear weapon modernization schemes. Every year, the Pentagon complains it is insufficient, and that continued with StratCom head Admiral Chas Richard, who warned that the US is “almost on a path to disarmament.”

Given how much the US spends, this is a vastly expensive sort of disarmament. Since the US outspends all other nuclear powers, it is hard to imagine that the problem is that the US needs to spend more, and while the admiral suggested the US should “invest smartly,” it’s clear he also wanted more money.

The narrative is that if the US continues at the current heightened level of spending they’ll still end up having to virtually rebuild their entire infrastructure or no longer be a nuclear power. This seems to be overly alarmist, but is just the sort of thing that would sell Congress on bankrolling more arms.

Still, while Strategic Command is built around always spending more money on more arms, and never couches it as an option, it must be considered if proper disarmament is worth considering. After all, if tens of billions of dollars every year can’t maintain an arsenal, the US could at least save that money by no longer pretending to be modernizing it.

(antiwar.com)

In case you want more info…..

he Pentagon’s five-year nuclear weapons plan calls for requesting at least $167 billion through 2025 — building from the $29 billion sought for next year to $38 billion, according to previously undisclosed figures.

The commitment includes research, development, procurement, sustainment and operations. It reflects a major boost to an effort started under President Barack Obama to replace aging nuclear systems, such as Minuteman III missiles and command and control systems.

It doesn’t include funding for the Energy Department’s National Nuclear Security Administration, which is requesting $19.8 billion for fiscal 2021, including $15.6 billion for nuclear weapons activities.

https://time.com/5790901/pentagon-nuclear-weapons-spending/

So all indications are that we are still in an arms race with the USSR….my bad….Russia.

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“lego ergo scribo”

A Coming Nuke Spring?

Trump in his wisdom(?) has left most of the treaties that the US has lived by for decades…..most of the nuclear treaties have been hit the hardest, INF and START….

Kolossal’naya opasnost.” In a recent BBC interview, Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev used those two words – “colossal danger” – to sound the alarm of the risk the world faces as tensions rise between Russia and the West. What prompted such strong language to describe the geopolitical standoff? Two more words: nuclear weapons.

Indeed, Gorbachev himself was a key player in unprecedented atomic disarmament a generation ago, signing the landmark 1987 accord with U.S. President Ronald Reagan to reduce arsenals of the then two superpowers with the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF Treaty). Over the past year, both the U.S. and Russia announced their withdrawal from the INF.

https://www.worldcrunch.com/world-affairs/disarmament-to-rearmament-the-quiet-return-of-nuclear-risk

I am not looking forward to a f*cked nuke policy…..I lived through all the duck and roll drills, all the fear and speculation of the nuclear holocaust to come…..

But it is 2020 and an election year….so which of the Dem candidates is capable of a nuclear policy?

Will the candidates continue to support the policy that gives the US president unfettered authority to start a nuclear war? Or will they instead lower global risk of war and publicly commit the US to a nuclear No First Use policy?

Fifty-seven years ago last month the world breathed a sigh of relief. Most of that October in 1962 had been spent on the brink of nuclear war. A stare down at a naval blockade, dramatic UN Security Council meetings, a somber Presidential address, a shot down spy plane – and through it all tense backroom negotiations and letters between Kennedy and Kruschev. Ultimately peace prevailed and we backed away from nuclear armageddon. Now the anniversary is remembered as a shining example of Presidential resolve in the face of crisis. However, that’s not the whole story.

President Kennedy’s leadership didn’t end with the removal of missiles. In some ways it was only just beginning. What he knew was that his responsibility went further. He couldn’t just prevent disaster, he needed to address the causes to prevent it from happening in the future. Some steps were taken immediately, the famous “hotline” between the Kremlin and the White House was installed. Kennedy and then Soviet leader, Nikita Khrushchev, continued the correspondence they began in the heat of the moment no longer discussing immediate moves and demands but potential long term routes toward nuclear de-escalation. Ultimately, in June of 1963 President Kennedy publicly outlined his “Strategy for Peace” in a speech at American University. In it he committed to ending US nuclear weapons testing, voiced his support of the global nuclear testing ban, and called for the pursuit of “complete disarmament.” By October of 1963, the US Senate had ratified the Limited Test Ban Treaty and the path seemed set for de-escalation.

https://www.commondreams.org/views/2019/11/05/which-2020-candidates-are-ready-address-threat-nuclear-weapons

As I look at the candidates we have left in the race I cannot see any of them with a solid nuclear policy…..my candidate being antiwar may be the only one I would trust to come up with a good solid proposal…..the rest of the 2020 field is just Neocons in Dem clothing.

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“Lego Ergo Scribo”

Space Saturday

Yep that time again….the old professor will force feed some news that has been missed….

Remember a few weeks ago Russia lost a rocket in a horrific explosion……some believe that it was an experiment in nuclear propulsion…..https://lobotero.com/2019/08/19/that-wayward-missile/

And that is the next fuel for space exploration….nukes.

Humanity’s next giant leap could be enabled by next-gen nuclear tech, NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine said.

During the sixth meeting of the National Space Council (NSC) today (Aug. 20), the NASA chief lauded the potential of nuclear thermal propulsion, which would harness the heat thrown off by fission reactions to accelerate propellants such as hydrogen to tremendous speeds. 

Spacecraft powered by such engines could conceivably reach Mars in just three to four months — about half the time of the fastest possible trip in a vehicle with traditional chemical propulsion, said NSC panelist Rex Geveden, the president and CEO of BWX Technologies Inc. 

https://www.space.com/nuclear-propulsion-future-spacecraft-nasa-chief.html

Think back to the SciFi movies you have seen in the past…..wormholes were the preferred way to space travel…..well looks like scientist have a formula…..

Everybody wants a wormhole. I mean, who wants to bother traveling the long-and-slow routes throughout the universe, taking tens of thousands of years just to reach yet another boring star? Not when you can pop into the nearest wormhole opening, take a short stroll, and end up in some exotic far-flung corner of the universe. 

There’s a small technical difficulty, though: Wormholes, which are bends in space-time so extreme that a shortcut tunnel forms, are catastrophically unstable. As in, as soon as you send a single photon down the hole, it collapses faster than the speed of light.

But a recent paper, published to the preprint journal arXiv on July 29, has found a way to build an almost-steady wormhole, one that does collapse but slowly enough to send messages — and potentially even things — down it before it tears itself apart. All you need are a couple of black holes and a few infinitely long cosmic strings.

https://www.space.com/building-a-wormhole-with-cosmic-strings.html

That is Saturday and I need a break…MoMo sez ….TTFN

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Can We Talk Nukes?

Closing Thought–30Jul19

Nukes for Iran….Nukes for North Korea….nukes for the Saudis…..plus the nations that already have a cache of nukes…US, India, Pakistan, Russia, China,UK, France, Israel……

So how about putting the issue of nukes on the table for these debates?

Don’t you―as stand-ins for the American people―think it might be worthwhile to ask the candidates some questions about how best to avert a global catastrophe of unprecedented magnitude?

You mass media folks lead busy lives, I’m sure. But you must have heard something about nuclear weapons―those supremely destructive devices that, along with climate change, threaten the continued existence of the human race.

Yes, thanks to popular protest and carefully-crafted arms control and disarmament agreements, there has been some progress in limiting the number of these weapons and averting a nuclear holocaust. Even so, that progress has been rapidly unraveling in recent months, leading to a new nuclear arms race and revived talk of nuclear war.

Do I exaggerate? Consider the following.

https://www.commondreams.org/views/2019/07/29/dear-moderators-pre

Not to worry for these candidates will not face any demanding questions like nukes…instead the MSM will give them softball questions to answer and the higher in the polls the softer the questions.

“Lego Ergo Scribo”

Nukes For China

We have heard all the spurious arguments for the nuke policies for Iran and North Korea……but what about a strategy for a nuclear power and one of our biggest opponents? China.

A diverse range of external stimuli, including technological trends and geopolitical shifts, is leading the strategic community of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) to reconsider existing nuclear policy, strategy, and operations. According to Chinese open sources, U.S. global conventional precision strike systems, U.S. missile defenses, and India’s nuclear weapons modernization, among other threats, could shake the PRC’s faith in longstanding nuclear doctrine and posture. The 2013 Science of Military Strategy confirms that “the nuclear security circumstances facing China in overall terms are trending toward complexity.”   In response to such challenges, some Chinese analysts have proposed loosening the no-first-use policy and undertaking quantitative and qualitative improvements to China’s nuclear forces.

A departure from enduring nuclear policy and strategy may also reflect China’s growing power and sense of purpose as it seeks to reshape its surroundings and accelerate the erosion of the U.S. position in the Western Pacific. Indeed, Chinese analysts are exploring Cold War history in Europe, from which they may be drawing lessons about the vulnerabilities of U.S. extended deterrence in Asia. While it remains unclear how and to what extent Chinese nuclear strategy will advance Beijing’s expanding ambitions, the internal debates suggest that China may be increasingly inclined to adopt a more coercive nuclear strategy.

https://www.realcleardefense.com/articles/2019/07/17/chinese_nuclear_weapons_strategyleaning_towards_a_more_proactive_posture_part_ii_external_drivers_of_potential_changetechnical-military_developments_and_perceptions_of_credibility.html

China continues to confront the US and its Asian allies on many fronts and yet the president is concerned over a country that is not yet a nuclear power…..where is the sanity there?

I believe you ignore China’s nukes at your own peril.

Enrichment

The Iran nuke deal is toast…..Pompeo and the hawks have been beating their anemic chests and sanctions have been installed and now the Iranians are starting to enrich again…..

Iran announced Sunday it will increase its uranium enrichment to an unspecified level beyond the terms of its 2015 nuclear deal with world powers, reports the AP, breaking another limit set under the accord and furthering heightening tensions between Tehran and the US. Setting another unspecified 60-day deadline for the deal, Iran took further steps toward pressuring Europe while urging further diplomacy to save an agreement that President Trump unilaterally pulled the US from a year ago. Hopes for saving the faltering deal appear increasingly dim, however, as the Europeans have been unable to offer Iran any effective way around US sanctions that block Tehran’s oil sales abroad and target its top officials. But Iran’s recent measures, while of concern to nuclear non-proliferation experts, could be easily reversible if Europeans offer Iran the sanctions relief it seeks.

Iranian officials said the new level of uranium enrichment would be reached later Sunday, but did not give a percentage. Under the nuclear deal, the cap for enrichment was set at 3.67%. “Within hours, the technical tasks will be done and enrichment above 3.67% will begin,” Iran nuclear agency rep Behrouz Kamalvandi said. The IAEA said “inspectors in Iran will report to our headquarters as soon as they verify the announced development.” Kamalvandi also stressed that Iran will continue to use only slower, first-generation IR-1 centrifuges to increase enrichment, as well as keep the number of centrifuges in use under the 5,060-limit set by the nuclear deal. But Kamalvandi stressed that Iran is able to continue enrichment “at any speed, any amount and any level.” “For the enrichment we are using the same machines with some more pressure and some special technical work,” he said. The decision to ramp up uranium enrichment came less than a week after Iran broke the deal’s 660-pound limit on uranium.

Now that Iran has decided to restart their enrichment program what does that mean?

Learn what it is and what it takes to make it a success.

Uranium is a silvery-grey metal, an element found in tiny amounts almost everywhere, but rarely in concentrated densities.

The World Nuclear Association says that uranium mines are operational in some 20 countries, though about half of global production comes from just 10 mines in six countries: Canada, Australia, Niger, Kazakhstan, Russia and Namibia.

Uranium is often mined though a form of “fracking”, or hydraulic fracturing, in which water injected with oxygen is forced at high pressure through rock containing uranium, extracting the element before pumping it to the surface.

The liquid is then filtered, and the dissolved uranium is removed from the water by a process known as ion exchange – a similar chemical process to that used in some household water filters to remove impurities.

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/07/beginner-guide-enriching-uranium-190707051824231.html

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