Item Certification for Arms Reduction Agreements: Technological and Procedural Approaches

The All Russian Scientific Research Institute of Experimental Physics (VNIIEF) and Los Alamos National Laboratory have been jointly investigating possible means for authenticating a declared item as a nuclear warhead under a future arms control treaty. Radiation measurement technologies that are well understood by the two countries are available to confirm several attributes of containerized nuclear warheads as they would arrive at a dismantlement facility. The confirmation of these attributes would provide some confidence that the declared items were nuclear warheads, but would not establish this fact with certainty. Procedures and techniques proving that the declared warhead was removed from an operational nuclear weapon delivery system, combined with attribute measurements, could significantly increase the level of confidence that a declared item was a nuclear warhead. This paper describes proposed technologies and procedures to conduct attribute measurements and establish that a declared warhead was removed from an operational nuclear delivery system. It discusses the possible difficulties of using these technologies and procedures in the context of a U.S.-Russian nuclear arms control agreement, summarizes joint work that has been done to address these problems and identifies areas for further research.