Foreign Relations of the United States, 1969–1976, Volume E–14, Part 2, Documents on Arms Control and Nonproliferation, 1973–1976

31. Paper Prepared by the National Security Council Under Secretaries Committee¹

Washington, March 1, 1974.

[Omitted here is a table of contents.]

ACTION PLAN FOR IMPLEMENTING NATIONAL SECURITY DECISION MEMORANDUM 235

I. Introduction

This Action Program has been prepared by the Under Secretaries Committee in compliance with NSDM 235 dated October 4, 1973.² NSDM 235 reported that following his review of NSSM–150 (United States Policy on Transfer of Highly Enriched Uranium for Fueling Power Reactors), the President had directed that an action program (with options and argumentation, as appropriate) should be developed by the Committee. The program was to consider the diplomatic and other steps the U.S. might consider taking with other nations, and in particular other supplier nations, “with regard to the security, non-proliferation, political and economic aspects associated with the increasing growth and dissemination of nuclear power industries, with particular focus on potential problems associated with highly enriched uranium.”

With regard to future exports by the U.S. of highly enriched uranium, the President also decided that the U.S. will:

—Review any future requests for the supply of large quantities of highly enriched uranium abroad on a case-by-case basis without an a priori presumption of supply. (It is recognized, however, that the U.S. has informed the European Community that its requests for supply of highly enriched uranium will receive sympathetic consideration.)

—Require that a recipient have acceptable physical security measures in effect.

—Weigh the position of the recipient with respect to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty in reviewing and deciding on requests for supply.

—Not require as an essential precondition of supply that fuel fabrication and reprocessing take place in the United States or in multi-nationally-owned facilities, but will consider this factor in reviewing and deciding on requests for supply.

II. The Key Issues Considered

While the specific decision already taken relates to supply of highly enriched uranium,³ the NSDM makes it clear that the action plan is to take on a broader perspective. Primary among the related factors which should be considered are 1) that plutonium, rather than highly enriched uranium, is the weapon material that will become available in the near term to many nations in sizeable quantities, and 2) that wide distribution of enrichment capability could soon overshadow questions of U.S. supply of HEU. Accordingly, in preparing this proposed Action Program, the following four major questions have been considered:

1. How should the U.S. apply the new policy to future transfers of U.S. highly enriched uranium to other nations?

2. What action, if any, should the U.S. take in informing other existing or potential supplier nations of the more restrictive procedures that the U.S. now proposes to apply in exporting highly enriched uranium? The objective of any such consultations would be to encourage other potential suppliers to adopt policies comparable to our own.

3. Are these constraints also applicable in whole or in part to plutonium? If so, what initiatives, if any, should be taken with other countries to assure their adoption?

4. What, if anything, can be done to assure adequate physical security for plutonium and HEU in foreign custody which is produced indigenously, and hence not subject to supplier constraints?

5. Should the U.S. seek common understandings with other advanced nations—based on the limitations set forth in NSDM 235—concerning possible constraints on international transfers of equipment and technology related to plutonium, uranium enrichment and fuel element reprocessing?

These last two questions were not addressed in the NSSM 150 study. However, in the context of potential consultations with other suppliers on the international availability of fissile material, consideration of these questions is highly desirable. This paper and its annexes provide the relevant background in these areas. U.S. policy on export of enrichment technology was exhaustively considered in the studies which led to the U.S. offer to share gaseous diffusion technology. In order to focus this study on consultations which could be undertaken in the short term, only consultations based on existing U.S. policy (including the NSDM 235 decisions) are discussed. This would seem appropriate, since (1) U.S. control policy would form an acceptable basis for international control understandings, at least in the short term and (2) questions of the adequacy of U.S. controls in the longer term, in view of potential technical developments in uranium enrichment methods, are being considered in a separate study.

III. Conclusions and Recommendations

Four options for consultations are identified:

A. Consult with other suppliers on policy for supply of highly enriched uranium.

B. Consult also on supply policy for plutonium.

C. Promote the general international application of acceptable physical security on nuclear material.

D. Consult on restrictions on export of enrichment and reprocessing equipment and technology.

On balance, it is concluded that the options are not mutually exclusive but rather should constitute elements in an overall U.S. effort to ensure adequate control of nuclear weapons material. It is recommended that the U.S. undertake a series of coordinated diplomatic initiatives pointed at achieving agreements with other states in the areas covered by all the options.

The following are the main observations and objectives which lead to this recommendation:

—the need for stimulating adequate physical security constraints throughout the world (and hopefully based on U.S. or, as a minimum, IAEA standards) is pressing, and should be made equally applicable to plutonium and highly enriched uranium;

—generally, whether or not the recipient nation participates in the NPT should be a significant factor in Governmental decisions to supply important nuclear assistance, taking into account the actual status of its safeguards negotiations with the IAEA;

—where opportunities present themselves efforts to establish multilateral reprocessing and fuel fabrication plants should be encouraged;

—special efforts may have to be made to dissuade certain countries (the Republic of China being a good example) from accumulating quantities of plutonium in excess of their immediate needs. In these cases special efforts should be made to encourage the storage of excess plutonium in the U.S. or in multinational facilities. (In the case of the ROC, AEC has agreed to store in the U.S. the ROC-produced plutonium which will be separated in the British Nuclear Fuels Ltd. reprocessing plant in the U.K.)

—it should be recognized that if for any reason we are seriously concerned about the recipient’s continuing willingness and ability to honor agreements, the supply of sensitive material and technology should be avoided.

—it is desirable for the U.S. to encourage other suppliers of technology to adopt regulatory constraints similar to its own 10 CFR Part 110 (see Appendix E). Moreover, agreement on special constraints in the field of transfers of enrichment technology as outlined in this paper are warranted.

The recommended consultations, from a tactical standpoint, would consist of three parallel but not necessarily separate sets of approaches, to be inaugurated over the next several months:

1. A series of consultations with other potential international suppliers of enriched uranium or plutonium on constraints governing supply, including desirable physical security measures. In the course of these consultations we would seek to generate a broad recognition of the necessity and importance of adequate physical security measures should override commercial considerations. The recent AEC regulations would serve as the guidelines for these discussions, with the understanding that compliance with the IAEA guidelines on physical security should be the minimum standard.⁴

2. Talks with other states likely to possess weapons grade material, and with the IAEA, on the relative merits of concluding an international convention prescribing basic standards concerning physical protection of nuclear materials and facilities. Again our objective should be to gain acceptance of the U.S. standards to obtain greater assurance of security.

3. Talks with other suppliers of technology and equipment in the reprocessing and enrichment fields on desirable new constraints or guidelines that should be followed in these areas drawing on (a) U.S. experience in implementing Part 110 and (b) the specific recommendations appearing on pages 46 to 48 of this paper relating to limitations in the field of enrichment.

In general, the international constraints suggested in this study are extensions of existing U.S. constraints. Thus adoption of the action plan outlined here should have no major economic penalty for the U.S., and its success could prevent some potentially substantial losses of U.S. equipment or toll enrichment sales by equalizing terms among suppliers. It must be recognized, however, that in some cases U.S. export sales can be lost if consumers consider our terms to be onerous or if failure to meet the criteria disqualifies certain states from receiving our products.

The precise timing scenario and content of the foregoing consultations would need to be carefully developed to minimize the possibility of overloading the circuit and producing hostile reactions at the NPT Review Conference to be held in the Spring of 1975. Moreover, the other countries consulted may vary with the subject matter.

Periodic reports on the progress of these efforts would be submitted by the Under Secretaries Committee to the President and the principals for their information, with any recommendations for further action.

[Omitted here are the remainder of the paper and the appendices.]

1. Summary: The paper presented an action plan for implementing NSDM 235 concerning the transfer of highly enriched uranium to foreign countries.

   Source: Ford Library, National Security Adviser, NSC Program Analysis Staff Files, Convenience Files, Box 32, Security Aspects of Growth and Dissemination of Nuclear Power Industries Paper. Secret. All brackets are in the original except those indicating text omitted by the editors or footnotes in the original document. NSDM 235 is Document 18.

2. See Appendix A. [Footnote is in the original.]
3. Highly enriched uranium, or HEU is uranium containing 20% or more of the 235 isotope. [Footnote is in the original.]
4. The DOD feels that the AEC regulations should constitute the minimum acceptable standard. While the other agencies participating in this study agree that the U.S. regulations should serve as the strongly preferred point of departure in consultations, they note that (1) the IAEA standards were formulated by an international working group in which the U.S. participated, (2) some differences in national practices may be unavoidable, and (3) acceptance of IAEA standards as a minimum would be preferable to having no global improvement of physical security measures at all. [Footnote is in the original.]