Fighting ProliferationChapter 9
I have tried in the past to make two basic points about the problems the proposed light water reactor (LWR) transfer to North Korea poses for the United States: (1) It sets a bad example by rewarding violation of international norms. We have all heard that this case is not supposed to set a precedent. Still, it is hard to explain why it is good for the US to give LWRs to North Korea because it already has a bomb program and bad for Russia to sell LWRs to Iran because it doesn’t yet have a bomb program. (2) Although the US–North Korean arrangement is often described as involving the dismantlement of North Korea’s nuclear weapons program, realistically, the arrangement only requires North Korea to put its plutonium production facilities on hold. The assumption that the North Koreans badly want the LWRs and therefore will be under pressure to perform their side of the deal is, to my mind, highly questionable. If they really wanted electricity, they never would have picked the complex and lengthy nuclear option. In practice, the US will be under pressure to perform to avoid restart of plutonium production.
I would like to shift the focus and consider the practical aspects of the project from the point of view of a potential participant—say, South Korea—assuming the project does go forward. I don’t pretend to any special expertise on Korean affairs, but I do have some experience with nuclear affairs.
I would like to raise a number of questions about the LWR project and related inspection and security matters—questions to which I would want answers if I were a participant. If the questions have been addressed in recent meetings of the Korean Peninsula Energy Development Organization (KEDO)—which was set up to run the North Korean project—we haven’t yet heard the answers.
First, consider the LWR project. One would do well to keep in mind the difficulty of building a technologically complex project of this sort anywhere, under any auspices. It is espe- cially difficult in a country that lacks the basic technological context. In a project of this sort, success depends on a high level of cooperation among all participants—including the recipient.
Can we realistically expect that sort of cooperation from the North Koreans, even if their objections to a South Korean LWR are overcome? Will North Korea play the part assigned to it by a multinational foreign project group? In fact, who will be in charge of the project? Normally, it is the owner. Is this North Korea? Is it KEDO? How does KEDO enforce its decisions unless North Korea agrees with them?
Who will be in charge of the construction site? Normally, the owner has the right to control quality and shut down the project if the owner is not satisfied with the work. Will North Korea have this right?
Again, normally, the builders use a large component of local labor and local contractors. Will that be the case here? Will North Korean law apply at the work site? Who will be in charge of project security? Whose armed guards will patrol the site?
Who will train the North Korean workers and technical staff? As a practical matter, it will have to be the South Koreans. Will North Korea agree to take instruction from South Korea?
Who will operate the reactors if they are actually built? Who will train the operators? Who will approve the qualifications of the operators? Will South Korea, which has the most reason to be concerned in the event of an accident, have a voice in these decisions?
Who will license the plant for operation? Whose safety standards will be used? Are we satisfied with a North Korean licensing approval?
How will we deal with the nuclear safety requirement that the LWRs must be connected to reliable sources of outside power for shutdown cooling and emergencies? Who will be responsible for necessary major upgrading of the North Korean electrical transmission grid?
Let me turn to international inspection issues as they affect the project. Under the agreement, the North Koreans are supposed to let the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) inspect the disputed waste site before key nuclear components are supplied. Very likely, some of these components would be from the United States. Let us be optimistic and assume that the IAEA will actually get a look at the site some years from now.
Suppose further that the IAEA concludes that no significant amount of plutonium was separated in the past. That conclusion is likely to involve a degree of judgment—the situation is bound to involve technical uncertainties. Will the IAEA make public its data or at least let South Korea see it? Normally, the IAEA works in secrecy. One is supposed to trust its judgment. Is that acceptable here? Interestingly, the US has described the inspection condition as requiring North Korea to satisfy the IAEA. That is not necessarily the same as getting to the bottom of how much plutonium was separated. Realistically, the manner in which the IAEA resolves uncertainties will be affected by the interests of the major parties. Does South Korea want the IAEA to give North Korea the benefit of the doubt or to err on the side of caution?
Now suppose, in the alternative—although I find this hard to imagine—that the IAEA concludes that North Korea separated some number of kilograms of plutonium. What happens then?
The answer is pretty clear as it applies to US exports of nuclear equipment. The approval of such exports would depend on first having in place a US–North Korean agreement for cooperation. I don’t see how such an agreement could be approved or any nuclear-export licenses issued until the IAEA inspects the disputed sites. An IAEA conclusion that significant past plutonium separation occurred would mean, of course, that the North Koreans will have been branded as nuclear cheaters and liars. That will be so even if the incident is somehow passed off as a material-accounting “mistake.” In these circumstances, it is difficult to imagine US export approvals from the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission and the Congress.
If US components are essential, what then happens to the project? And what happens to the thousands of South Korean workers in North Korea who are building the reactors?
Since almost everyone thinks the North Koreans did separate plutonium, we might want to think now about the consequences. Or are we counting on the IAEA not finding out? Or do we hope that a change in North Korea will rescue the situation?
What about North Korea’s existing nuclear program? This must involve several thousand persons. If we believe that North Korea was interested in building a bomb, some of these scientists and engineers must have been working on bomb design and manufacture. What are these people doing now?
If North Korea has really separated one or two bombs’ worth of plutonium, is it reasonable to believe that it will resist completing the job? Do we want to know the answer?
These are some of the questions that come to mind immediately. We could easily come up with a much longer list. Do satisfactory answers exist?