Pentagon Protects Nuclear Modernization Programs in FY17 Budget
Aaron Mehta | Defense News
The Pentagon’s fiscal 2017 budget keeps all its nuclear modernization programs on track, keeping alive concerns from both inside and outside the department about a coming “bow wave” of modernization expenses. The building will spend roughly $3.2 billion on programs to modernize and recapitalize the service’s nuclear submarines, bombers, Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles (ICBM) and nuclear equipped cruise missiles in 2017, a total that will increase throughout the Future Years Defense Program (FYDP).
Congress Throwing Kitchen Sink at Iran Less Than One Month After Nuclear Deal Takes Effect
Karoun Demirjian | Washington Post
The Iran deal’s opponents couldn’t pick apart the nuclear pact before it was implemented, but just weeks later, lawmakers are regrouping to come after Tehran in every other way they can. In this week alone, lawmakers will gather for at least five separate committee meetings specifically dedicated to reviewing Iran’s actions ranging from its compliance with the nuclear pact to its dedication to locating and freeing still-missing former FBI agent Robert Levinson, who disappeared in Iran in 2007.
North Korea Continues to Evade UN Sanctions to Get Material for Nuclear, Ballistic Missiles Programs: Experts
Sneha Shankar | International Business Times
North Korea continues to evade United Nations sanctions, using flights, ships and the international financial system to procure material needed for its nuclear and ballistic missiles programs, U.N. experts said, according to the Associated Press (AP). Pyongyang claimed Sunday that it successfully launched a satellite, a move the international community believes is a cover to test North Korea’s intercontinental ballistic missile.
N.K. Capable of Harvesting Plutonium in Weeks, on Way to Field KN-0
Chang Jae-soon | Yonhap News Agency
North Korea has run its nuclear reactor for long enough to harvest plutonium "within a matter of weeks to months" and Pyongyang is also believed to have taken "initial steps" toward fielding a road-mobile intercontinental ballistic missile, the U.S. intelligence chief said Tuesday. Director of National Intelligence James Clapper unveiled the assessment in his "Worldwide Threat Assessment" report submitted to the Senate Armed Services Committee, days after North Korea carried out a banned missile launch following its fourth nuclear test a month earlier.
How is Fukushima’s Cleanup Going Five Years After its Meltdown? Not So Well.
Anna Fifield | Washington Post
Seen from the road below, the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power station looks much as it may have right after the catastrophic earthquake and tsunami that caused a triple meltdown here almost five years ago. The No. 3 reactor building, which exploded in a hydrogen fireball during the disaster, remains a tangle of broken concrete and twisted metal.
Reinforcing Deterrence on NATO's Eastern Flank
David A. Shlapak, Michael Johnson | RAND Corporation
Russia's recent aggression against Ukraine has disrupted nearly a generation of relative peace and stability between Moscow and its Western neighbors and raised concerns about its larger intentions. From the perspective of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), the threat to the three Baltic republics of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania—former Soviet republics, now member states that border Russian territory—may be the most problematic of these.