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National Security Strategy 1998

By banning all nuclear test explosions for all time, the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) constrains the development of dangerous nuclear weapons, contributes to preventing nuclear proliferation and to the process of nuclear disarmament, and enhances the ability of the United States to monitor suspicious nuclear activities in other countries through a worldwide sensor network and on-site inspections. Nuclear tests in India and Pakistan in May 1998 make it more important than ever to move quickly to bring the CTBT into force and continue establishment of the substantial verification mechanisms called for in the treaty. The President has submitted the treaty, which 150 nations have signed, to the Senate and has urged the Senate to provide its advice and consent this year. Prompt U.S. ratification will encourage other states to ratify, enable the United States to lead the international effort to gain CTBT entry into force and strengthen international norms against nuclear testing. Multilateral and regional arms control efforts also increase U.S. and global security. We seek to strengthen the Biological Weapons Convention (BWC) with a new international regime to ensure compliance. At present, we are negotiating with other BWC member states in an effort to reach consensus on a protocol to the BWC that would implement an inspection system to deter and detect cheating. We are also working hard to implement and enforce the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC). The United States Senate underscored the importance of these efforts with its April 24, 1997 decision, by a vote of 74-26, to give its advice and consent to ratification of the CWC. The next key step is legislation to implement full compliance with the commercial declarations and inspections that are required by the CWC.
In Europe, we are pursuing the adaptation of the 1990 Conventional Armed Forces in Europe (CFE) Treaty, consistent with the Decision on Certain Basic Elements adopted in Vienna on July 23, 1997 by all 30 CFE states. Success in this negotiation will ensure that this landmark agreement remains a cornerstone of European security into the 21st century and beyond. We continue to seek Russian, Ukrainian and Belarusian ratification of the 1992 Open Skies Treaty to increase transparency of military forces in Eurasia and North America. We also promote, through international organizations such as the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), implementation of confidence and security-building measures, including the 1994 Vienna Document, throughout Europe and in specific regions of tension and instability—even where we are not formal parties to such agreements. The agreements mandated by the Dayton Accords demonstrate how innovative regional efforts can strengthen stability and reduce conflicts that could adversely affect U.S. interests abroad.
President Clinton is committed to ending the tragic damage to innocent civilians due to anti-personnel landmines (APLs). The United States has already taken major steps in the spirit that motivated the Ottawa Convention, while ensuring our ability to meet international obligations and provide for the safety and security of our men and women in uniform. On June 30, 1998, we met—one year ahead of schedule—the President’s May 1996 commitment to destroy all of our non-self-destructing APLs by 1999, except those we need for Korea and demining training. To expand and strengthen the Administration policy on APLs that he announced on September 17, 1997, President Clinton signed Presidential Decision Directive 64 in June 1998. It directs the Defense Department to end the use of all APLs, even of self-destructing APLs, outside Korea by 2003 and to pursue aggressively the objective of having APL alternatives ready for Korea by 2006. We will also aggressively pursue alternatives to our mixed anti-tank systems that contain anti-personnel submunitions. We have made clear that the United States will sign the Ottawa Convention by 2006 if we succeed in identifying and fielding suitable alternatives to our self-destructing APLs and mixed anti-tank systems by then. Furthermore, in 1997 the Administration submitted for Senate advice and consent the Amended Landmine Protocol to the Convention on Conventional Weapons, which bans the unmarked, long-duration APLs that caused the worldwide humanitarian problem. We have established a permanent ban on APL exports and are seeking to universalize an export ban through the Conference on Disarmament in Geneva. In 1998 we are spending $80 million on humanitarian demining programs, more than double that of the previous year, and through our “Demining 2010” initiative have challenged the world to increase the effectiveness and efficiency of removing landmines that threaten civilians.

Nonproliferation Initiatives
Nonproliferation initiatives enhance global security by preventing the spread of WMD, materials for producing them and means of delivering them. That is why the Administration is promoting universal adherence to the international treaty regimes that prohibit the acquisition of weapons of mass destruction, including the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), the CWC and the BWC. The NPT was an indispensable precondition for the denuclearization of Ukraine, Kazakhstan, Belarus and South Africa. We also seek to strengthen the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) safeguards system and achieve a Fissile Material Cutoff Treaty to cap the nuclear materials available for weapons. A coordinated effort by the intelligence community and law enforcement agencies to detect, prevent and deter illegal trafficking in fissile materials is also essential to our counter-proliferation efforts. The Administration also seeks to prevent destabilizing buildups of conventional arms and limit access to sensitive technical information, equipment and technologies by strengthening multilateral regimes, including the Wassenaar Arrangement on Export Controls for Conventional Arms and Dual-Use Goods and Technologies, the Australia Group (for chemical and biological weapons), the Missile Technology Control Regime (MTCR) and the Nuclear Suppliers Group. We are working to harmonize national export control policies, increase information sharing, refine control lists and expand cooperation against illicit transfers.
Regional nonproliferation efforts are particularly important in three critical proliferation zones. On the Korean Peninsula, we are implementing the 1994 Agreed Framework, which requires full compliance by North Korea with nonproliferation obligations. In the Middle East and Southwest Asia, we encourage regional arms control agreements that address the legitimate security concerns of all parties and continue efforts to thwart and roll back Iran’s development of weapons of mass destruction and Iraq’s efforts to reconstitute its programs. In South Asia, we seek to persuade India and Pakistan to bring their nuclear and missile programs into conformity with international nonproliferation standards and to sign and ratify the CTBT.
Through programs such as the Nunn-Lugar Cooperative Threat Reduction Program and other initiatives, we aim to strengthen controls over weapons-usable fissile material and prevent the theft or diversion of WMD and related material and technology. We are working to strengthen the Convention on the Physical Protection of Nuclear Material to increase accountability and protection, which complements our effort to enhance IAEA safeguards. We are purchasing tons of highly enriched uranium from dismantled Russian nuclear weapons for conversion into commercial reactor fuel, and working with Russia to redirect former Soviet facilities and scientists from military to peaceful purposes.
To expand and improve U.S. efforts aimed at deterring proliferation of WMD by organized crime groups and individuals in the NIS and Eastern Europe, the Defense Department and FBI are implementing a joint counter proliferation assistance program that provides appropriate training, material and services to law enforcement agencies in these areas. The program’s

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