The Iran-IAEA LEU-for-TRR-fuel deal is running out of time, President Obama says. And as the LEU–TRR deal goes, it’s pretty safe to say, so goes the West’s preferred strategy of engagement and de-escalation of tensions. This is just the latest episode in the month-long miniseries, “Negotiating over the Airwaves.” Matters are actually looking up a …
Votkinsk Portal Monitoring Facility
by | 2009-11-12 | 15 Comments
Credit: Otto Stokes Within the community, we have been going back and forth on whether the United States is still present at Russia’s Votkinsk Machine Building Plant. As far as I can tell, the US still staffs the Votkinsk Portal Monitoring Facility, which basically allows the United States to count mobile missiles leaving the Votkinsk …
When Arms Control Gets Way Too Personal
by | 2009-11-12 | 5 Comments
What has been the worst display of wounded egotism, dressed up as a difference over arms control policy? On my scorecard, it’s a tie between Teller vs. Oppenheimer and Nitze vs. Warnke. J. Robert Oppenheimer always had qualms about nuclear weapons. His moral reservations grew appreciably when the Truman administration was contemplating a crash program …
More on the BUP
by | 2009-11-10 | 10 Comments
I am giving a talk today at AAAS on the Bandar Abbas Uranium Production (BUP) Center, which was the subject of Jonathan Tirone’s story last week. The talk is by invitation, but I simply plan to walk through the images to see if we can confirm the BUP is operating at full capacity and discuss …
