Barack Obama Speech on Nuclear Issues
Select remarks on nuclear issues from Senator Barack Obama's speech to the Chicago Council on Global Affairs on April 23, 2007.
The third way America must lead again is by marshalling a global effort to meet a threat that rises above all others in urgency - securing, destroying, and stopping the spread of weapons of mass destruction.
As leaders from Henry Kissinger to George Shultz to Bill Perry to Sam Nunn have all warned, the actions we are taking today on this issue are simply not adequate to the danger.
There are still about 50 tons of highly enriched uranium - some of it poorly secured - at civilian nuclear facilities in over forty countries around the world. In the former Soviet Union, there are still about 15,000 to 16,000 nuclear weapons and stockpiles of uranium and plutonium capable of making another 40,000 weapons scattered across 11 time zones. And people have already been caught trying to smuggle nuclear materials to sell them on the black market.
We can do something about this. As President, I will lead a global effort to secure all nuclear weapons and material at vulnerable sites within four years - the most effective way to prevent terrorists from acquiring a bomb.
We know that Russia is neither our enemy nor close ally right now, and we shouldn't shy away from pushing for more democracy, transparency, and accountability in that country. But we also know that we can and must work with Russia to make sure every one of its nuclear weapons and every cache of nuclear material is secured. And we should fully implement the law I passed with Senator Dick Lugar that would help the United States and our allies detect and stop the smuggling of weapons of mass destruction throughout the world.
While we work to secure existing stockpiles of nuclear material, we should also negotiate a verifiable global ban on the production of new nuclear weapons material.
As starting points, the world must prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons and work to eliminate North Korea's nuclear weapons program. If America does not lead, these two nations could trigger regional arms races that could accelerate nuclear proliferation on a global scale and create dangerous nuclear flashpoints. In pursuit of this goal, we must never take the military option off the table. But our first line of offense here must be sustained, direct and aggressive diplomacy. For North Korea, that means ensuring the full implementation of the recent agreement. For Iran, it means getting the UN Security Council, Europe, and the Gulf States to join with us in ratcheting up the economic pressure.
We must also dissuade other countries from joining the nuclear club. Just the other day, it was reported that nearly a dozen countries in and around the Middle East - including Syria and Saudi Arabia - are interested in pursuing nuclear power.
Countries should not be able to build a weapons program under the auspices of developing peaceful nuclear power. That's why we should create an international fuel bank to back up commercial fuel supplies so there's an assured supply and no more excuses for nations like Iran to build their own enrichment plants. It's encouraging that the Nuclear Threat Initiative, backed by Warren Buffett, has already offered funding for this fuel bank, if matched two to one. But on an issue of this importance, the United States should not leave the solution to private philanthropies. It should be a central component of our national security, and that's why we should provide $50 million to get this fuel bank started and urge other nations, starting with Russia, to join us.
Finally, if we want the world to deemphasize the role of nuclear weapons, the United States and Russia must lead by example. President Bush once said, "The United States should remove as many weapons as possible from high-alert, hair-trigger status - another unnecessary vestige of Cold War confrontation." Six years later, President Bush has not acted on this promise. I will. We cannot and should not accept the threat of accidental or unauthorized nuclear launch. We can maintain a strong nuclear deterrent to protect our security without rushing to produce a new generation of warheads.
