During Richardson’s Dec. 16-20 trip, South Korea participated in live-fire drills that prompted a threat of retaliation by North Korea. Cooler heads prevailed, and North Korea did not respond.

“I am very encouraged by the news that North Korea will not react militarily to South Korea’s drills,” Richardson said. “During my meetings in Pyongyang, I repeatedly pressed North Korea not to retaliate. The result is that South Korea was able to flex its muscles, and North Korea reacted in a statesmanlike manner. I hope this will signal a new chapter and a round of dialogue to lessen tension on the Korean peninsula.”

Richardson gained some concessions from the North Koreans, including allowing nuclear inspectors to return to the country. He also negotiated a deal where North Korea agreed to sell buy fresh fuel rods from nuclear power plants to a third party.

South Korea said it was too early to tell if the offer from North Korea was genuine or not.

“We need to assess overall the scope of inspection and the motivation behind North Korea agreeing to let IAEA inspectors back in,” South Korean Foreign Ministry spokesman Kim Young-sun told reporters Monday.

Richardson also discussed a military commission that would involve representatives from North Korea, South Korea and the United States to monitor and prevent conflicts in the disputed areas of the West Sea.

Richardson was not in North Korea on an official State Department trip. Richardson has traveled to the secretive country before and received diplomats in New Mexico from the country.

The Washington Post reported “there’s talk that outgoing New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson may be off to North Korea next week for a private chat with top officials at the invitation of key people in the nuclear crowd over there.”

Earlier this year, Richardson “lobbied fiercely” to go to North Korea. Former presient Jimmy Carter ended up going instead and secured the release of an American prisoner.

Last year, North Korean diplomats met with Richardson in Santa Fe.

This Thursday in Wilmington, N.C., officials from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the government agency responsible for overseeing the country’s nuclear energy activities, are slated to present a report laying out the environmental impacts of a proposed uranium enrichment facility, a key step in approving the facility’s license. While NRC staff will spend nearly five hours in Ballroom 5 of the Warwick Center at the University of North Carolina going over the details of their report, it is what they won’t discuss that has arms control advocates worried.

[Security1] Advocates are focusing their attention on the proposed General Electric Hitachi uranium enrichment plant in Wilmington to shine a spotlight on what they see as a systemic flaw at the NRC: The commission does not conduct broad assessments of the proliferation concerns associated with licensing projects.

The proposed facility would, if successful, use laser technology for the first time to enrich uranium to power commercial nuclear reactors. Arms control advocates say that commercialization of the technology in the United States could lead other countries to follow suit, raising concerns about the technology falling into the wrong hands. Countries like Iran and South Korea have worked in the past to develop laser enrichment programs, and the experts fear successful commercialization of the technology in the United States would prove the technology’s viability and lead them to redouble their efforts.

There are a number of lingering questions surrounding the technology. Arms control advocates say it is unclear just how easy it would be to produce highly enriched uranium, which is used to make nuclear weapons, with the technology. And they worry that laser enrichment facilities could be difficult to detect for purposes of inspection by the International Atomic Energy Agency, the group responsible for enforcing nuclear safeguards.

“The benefits might be worth the risks,” said James Acton of the Nuclear Policy Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. “But the problem we have at the moment is we don’t know what the risks are. We don’t know how serious or significant they are. There’s just no way to make an informed decisions.”

The NRC and the Department of Energy have no mandatory framework for answering these questions, the arms control advocates say. While the Energy Department has conducted voluntary assessments of proliferation risk in the past, the NRC has long maintained that it does not need to conduct such an analysis.

GE Hitachi, for its part, maintains that the Energy Department and the State Department have “been tasked” with considering proliferation risks of the project, but the company could not provide any details on the results of any such assessment. The NRC, though it maintains that a separate proliferation assessment is not warranted, says that it follows a number of procedures to “guard against the unauthorized transfer of the technology.”

Responding to a Jan. 20 letter from Tom Clements, Southeast nuclear campaign coordinator for Friends of the Earth, the NRC said the commission “considers a nuclear nonproliferation impact assessment outside the scope of the agency’s statutory responsibilities.” The letter — signed by Office of Nuclear Material Safety and Safeguards Director Michael Weber — notes that the NRC already “limits the availability of special nuclear material”; “controls proliferation of sensitive technologies, both information and equipment, through physical protection, personnel security, information protection, and export controls”; and “participates in international activities to control nuclear materials, technology, facilities and equipment.”

Clements, in an interview with TWI, said the unwillingness of NRC to conduct a proliferation assessment “reveals a dangerous double standard, in my opinion, that the U.S. is more concerned about the proliferation risk of other countries and not from U.S. technology and materials which in the long run may pose global proliferation risks.” Clements, who is a staunch opponent of nuclear power, said the Energy Department has voluntarily prepared proliferation assessments in the past, but there is no requirement to do so.

“The lack of proper review of the proliferation risk of nuclear technologies is a problem endemic with both the NRC and [the Energy Department],” Clements said. “I am not aware of any requirement for the preparation of a document assessing the proliferation risk of U.S.-origin nuclear technologies.”

Miles Pomper, senior research associate at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies at the Monterey Institute of International Studies, says that other countries are more likely to begin to adopt laser enrichment technology if GE Hitachi is able to demonstrate its success on a commercial level. The federal government needs to determine what the proliferation risks are if other countries begin commercializing this technology, he said. “What we’ve really been looking for is just someone to take this into account before moving forward with the technology,” Pomper said. “There’s no kind of studies, there’s no kind of action in terms of the government or others doing anything about this.” Pomper added that the Energy Department has no “formal responsibility” for conducting such an assessment.

Pomper, along with a number of other arms control advocates, signed on to a Sept. 30, 2009, letter to the NRC raising questions about the proposed laser enrichment facility. “Given the great difficulty of detecting laser isotope enrichment facilities, their spread could undermine U.S. nonproliferation efforts and the ability of the International Atomic Energy Agency to confirm the absence of undeclared nuclear activities,” the letter said.

Acton, of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, raised similar concerns. Although he says he is not “ideologically opposed” to laser enrichment technology, he pointed to what he calls the “follow the leader” effect. “Once one country tries to commercialize a technology like laser enrichment, if it does so successfully, it’s more or less inevitable that other countries are going to follow,” he said.

Acton laid out two main questions that need to be answered in a proliferation assessment. The first is how easily the technology can produce highly enriched uranium, which is used in nuclear weapons. The second is whether laser enrichment facilities would be difficult to detect and inspect if they were used in other countries like Iran. Acton said it is very difficult to detect the presence of nuclear centrifuge plants for the purposes of inspection.

“So, what about laser enrichment? Would a small, secret laser enrichment plant be easier to detect than a centrifuge plant? If the answer is yes, I’m not particularly worried about it,” Acton said. “If it’s harder to detect than a centrifuge plant, it would add to our problem very significantly.”

Michael Tetuan, a spokesperson for GE Hitachi Nuclear Energy, said “protecting this technology is obviously our highest concern.” He also said that both the State Department and Energy Department “have been tasked with looking at the proliferation aspects of this,” but he was not able to offer any further details on what specifically the departments considered. Tetuan also said that much of the information is likely classified, leaving little opportunity for the public to evaluate the proliferation risks.

Responding to the concerns, David McIntyre, an NRC spokesperson, said, “The idea that U.S. development of laser enrichment technology would set an example that other countries would follow presupposes that other countries would be able to procure or develop the technology.”

NRC’s current procedures ensure against proliferation, McIntye said. “NRC limits the availability of special nuclear material; controls proliferation of sensitive technologies, both information and equipment, through physical protection, personnel security, information protection, and export controls; and participates in international activities to control nuclear materials, technology, facilities and equipment,” McIntyre said. He also noted that the government conducted an assessment of the proliferation risks of laser enrichment technology when it negotiated an agreement with Australia to allow use of the technology in the United States.

“As to whether U.S. development of laser enrichment capacity will set an example for other countries to follow, that is a policy question for the president, other federal agencies such as the Department of State, and the Congress,” McIntyre said.

A spokesperson for the Nuclear Energy Institute, the nuclear industry’s trade association, directed requests for comment to GE Hitachi. An Energy Department spokesperson did not respond to requests for comment.

“The Committee for the Peaceful Reunification of Korea, accordingly, formally declares that from now on it will put into force the resolute measures to totally freeze the inter-Korean relations, totally abrogate the agreement on non-aggression between the north and the south and completely halt the inter-Korean cooperation.

“In this connection, the following measures will be taken at the first phase:

“1. All relations with the puppet authorities will be severed.

“2. There will be neither dialogue nor contact between the authorities during (South Korean President) Lee Myung Bak’s tenure of office.

“3. The work of the Panmunjom Red Cross liaison representatives will be completely suspended.

“4. All communication links between the north and the south will be cut off.

“5. The Consultative Office for North-South Economic Cooperation in the Kaesong Industrial Zone will be frozen and dismantled and all the personnel concerned of the south side will be expelled without delay.

“6. We will start all-out counterattack against the puppet group’s ‘psychological warfare against the north.’

“7. The passage of south Korean ships and airliners through the territorial waters and air of our side will be totally banned.

“8. All the issues arising in the inter-Korean relations will be handled under a wartime law.

“There is no need to show any mercy or patience for such confrontation maniacs, sycophants and traitors and wicked warmongers as the (South Korean President) Lee Myung Bak group.”

South Korean President Lee Myung-bak announced that the South will close shipping lanes to the impoverished North and cease all economic activity with it. He plans to get the United Nations Security Council to address the Cheonan attack — a move that has the backing of the White House. “Secretary Clinton and Ambassador Rice are each consulting very closely with their Korean counterparts,” read a White House statement issued at 1 a.m. today, “as well as with Japan, China, and other UN Security Council member states in order to reach agreement on the steps in the Council.”

The operative part of the statement:

Specifically, we endorse President Lee’s demand that North Korea immediately apologize and punish those responsible for the attack, and, most importantly, stop its belligerent and threatening behavior.  U.S. support for South Korea’s defense is unequivocal, and the President has directed his military commanders to coordinate closely with their Republic of Korea counterparts to ensure readiness and to deter future aggression.  We will build on an already strong foundation of excellent cooperation between our militaries and explore further enhancements to our joint posture on the Peninsula as part of our ongoing dialogue.

Flying back from a major economic summit in China, Clinton declined to say that the Chinese, North Korea’s last remaining benefactor, saw the Cheonan incident as the U.S. and the South Koreans do.  But “the Chinese recognize the gravity of the situation we face,” she said. “The Chinese understand the reaction by the South Koreans, and they also understand our unique responsibility for the peace and stability on the Korean Peninsula.” Clinton added that the North Koreans have caused “a highly precarious situation” on the Korean peninsula.

Speaking last week at the Pentagon, Defense Secretary Robert Gates pointedly noted that whatever strain from two extended wars that the U.S. Army and Marine Corps feel doesn’t apply to the forces that would respond to a resumption of hostilities in Korea. “If there were a problem in Korea, our main arms would be the Navy and the Air Force,” Gates said. “And so we — those are not stretched in the same way that the — that the ground forces are. But again, the key to remember — the key thing to remember here is that this was an attack on a South Korean ship, and the South Koreans need to be in the lead in terms of proposing ways forward.”

This act of aggression is one more instance of North Korea’s unacceptable behavior and defiance of international law. This attack constitutes a challenge to international peace and security and is a violation of the Armistice Agreement.

South Korea’s president, Lee Myung-bak, warned of “resolute countermeasures” against the North. This is the North Korean response, according to The Washington Post:

North Korea immediately denounced the investigation as a “sheer fabrication” and accused the South of “pointing a dirty finger at us like a thief.” It added that if there is any retaliation or punishment of the North, it will respond with “various forms of tough measures including all-out war.”

Which probably counts as a restrained response from Pyongyang. A battery of senior administration officials will be in Beijing this weekend for wide-ranging talks, which will now include the prospect of referring the dispute to the United Nations Security Council.

“The summit’s purported accomplishment is a nonbinding communique that largely restates current policy and makes no meaningful progress in dealing with nuclear terrorism threats or the ticking clock represented by Iran’s nuclear weapons program,” said Sen. Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.), a prominent critic of Obama’s nuclear policies.

“Prominent” is not the same as “sensible,” or even “alert.” Yes, it’s true. The summit did not cause the Iranian government to renounce its illicit uranium enrichment. Nor did it convince the North Koreans to relinquish their stockpile of nuclear weapons. But there’s just no way that Kyl’s criticism holds water, and it calls into question whether he actually understands what just happened over the last two days.

As I wrote yesterday, we now enter a period of two years’ worth of implementation on nuclear security, and that will determine the ultimate success of the conference. But nothing here “restates current policy” for 46 nations on the planet. Here’s Laura Holgate, a National Security Council senior aide, explaining to the press yesterday what the communique will yield:

We would expect to see consolidation of stocks of highly enriched uranium and plutonium, and reduction in the use of highly enriched uranium. Action on the communiqué would increase the number of countries signing up to some of the key international treaties that you’ve been hearing about on nuclear security/nuclear terrorism, as well as add to those countries who are cooperating under mechanisms like the global initiatives to combat nuclear terrorism, building capacity for nuclear security among law enforcement, industry and technical personnel.

The communiqué also calls for the International Atomic Energy Agency to receive the financial and expert support that it needs to develop nuclear security guidelines and to provide advice for its member states on how to implement them.

None of this consensus existed before the summit. Certainly no concerted action outside what the U.S. and the Russians agreed to do under the Nunn-Lugar nuclear-security initiative took place to any meaningful degree. Kyl is entitled to be skeptical that any of this is meaningful. He’s not entitled to say the nuclear-security landscape is unchanged from Sunday.

Similarly, to say that the summit represents “no meaningful progress in dealing with nuclear terrorism threats” is to ignore the fact that Chile and Canada and Mexico just agreed to swap out their highly-enriched uranium stocks and the U.S. and Russia just agreed to destroy enough plutonium for 17,000 nuclear bombs and Ukraine will eliminate all its highly-enriched uranium, to say nothing of other “house gifts” for elimination of weapons-grade material. Nor does it describe the commitment made to strengthen, with real verifiable financial investment, legal, regulatory and export mechanisms to monitor the movement of nuclear material and lock down what nuclear material exists. “To the extent that countries maintain nuclear materials — whether in their civil or military sector — the solution to making sure that terrorists don’t get it is straightforward,” Gary Samore of the NSC explained yesterday. “It’s just a question of putting the resources in place — the programs in place in order to ensure that it’s well protected and accounted for.” That actually removes the threat of nuclear terrorism, since if terrorists can’t get the nuclear material, there can’t be any nuclear terrorism. Again: while implementation is the key, the nuclear-security world is different and much better this morning than it was on Sunday.

Finally: What about Iran? The Obama administration believes it’s gotten Chinese President Hu Jintao’s acquiescence to pushing a sanctions resolution through the United Nations Security Council after a meeting between Obama and Hu at the summit. Again, we’ll see. But a consequence of the summit, clearly, is diplomatic isolation of proliferant countries or violators of the nuclear-security rules of the road. In a matter of weeks, that isolation will be marshaled at the U.N., first in a sanctions resolution targeting the Iranian regime’s financial interests and then in a May conference to strengthen the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty. If Kyl would prefer the U.S. simply wave its fist at Iran and fail to rally international support for confronting its enrichment activities, we saw the result of that approach over the past seven years: thousands of spinning Iranian centrifuges. And hundreds of tons of unsecured nuclear material that terrorists could attempt to steal.

We have the opportunity, as partners, to ensure that our progress is not a fleeting moment, but part of a serious and sustained effort. And that’s why I am so pleased to announce that President Lee has agreed to host the next Nuclear Security Summit in the Republic of Korea in two years. This reflects South Korea’s leadership, regionally and globally, and I thank President Lee and the South Korean people for their willingness to accept this responsibility.

For more on what fills the gap between the 2010 and 2012 nuclear security summits, see my new piece.

Clinton, however, explained that the new declaratory posture for when the U.S. will reserve the right to nuclear retaliation isn’t actually aimed at Iran or North Korea. It’s to put the rest of the world on notice that there are severe security risks for not being a good-faith member of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty:

[The NPR] is also clear that this is putting everybody on notice. We don’t want more countries to go down the path that North Korea and Iran are. And some countries might have gotten the wrong idea, if they looked at those two over the last years. And so we want to be very clear. We will not use nuclear weapons in retaliation if you do not have nuclear weapons and are in compliance with the NPT.

What she might also have added is that since most of the rest of the world’s nations are good-faith members of the NPT, then the world is arguably more likely to support a U.S. effort that tethers nuclear defense to compliance with an international treaty. That calculation will face its first test when the U.S. pushes for economic sanctions against Iran at the U.N. Security Council later this spring.

One big question in the new U.S. doctrine concerns Pakistan. Pakistan isn’t a member of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty. Its security services, particularly the powerful Inter-Services Intelligence agency, have nebulous ties to al-Qaeda and its affiliates, the people whom today’s Nuclear Security Summit in Washington is concerned with preventing from getting nuclear materials. Those extremists have proven their intent to attack America. The Obama administration surely does not want to even implicitly threaten Pakistan, a nation with whom it has taken great pains for the last year-plus to cultivate relations. But if al-Qaeda in Pakistan directs an attack against the U.S., what does the NPR say about retaliation in that case? What effort must the U.S. accordingly make to determine possible ISI complicity? What does the NPR look like in Islamabad? Already, according to The New York Times, President Obama is paying some calculated inattention to increased Pakistani nuclear development at the summit this week.

Anticipating GOP objections on missile defense or rogue-state proliferation, Clinton said she wasn’t suggesting New START in itself would lead to a change in Iranian or North Korean proliferation efforts. But she said that ratification would remove objections at the United Nations Security Council to placing “tough” economic sanctions on Iran (“as strong a resolution as we possibly can”) and would “boost our credibility as we ask other countries to help shore up the nonproliferation regime.” Ratifying the treaty can “persuade other nations to support serious sanctions against Iran.” In other words: if you vote against New START, you’re letting the Iranian regime effectively off the hook.