Models of Engagement with Russia's Closed Nuclear Cities

Since the collapse of the Soviet Union, the United States and other governments have undertaken a number of programs to help Russia address the economic stability concerns that could create potential for theft of nuclear material or sale of nuclear knowledge to the countries of concern and rogue groups. Programs such as the U.S. Nuclear Cities Initiative (NCI), European Nuclear Cities Initiative (ENCI), UK-RF Closed Nuclear Cities Partnership (UK-RF CNCP), and Elimination of Weapons- Grade Plutonium Program (EWGPP) have represented an unprecedented effort by the international community to help the Russian Federation physically downsize and reduce the capacity of its nuclear weapons complex in closed nuclear cities. The experiences of these programs in the very difficult political and economic environment in Russia’s closed nuclear cities provide a valuable basis for developing a set of success indicators with Russia’s closed nuclear cities or other countries where economic instability could create proliferation concerns. This paper will provide an overview of several programs and the unique environment of several closed cities as examples and propose a set of success indicators. This set of indicators could serve as the pre-planning stage of future projects and could be utilized by program managers of U.S. and international programs. In addition, it could serve as one basis for project selection, helping ensure that lessons learned from experiences in these cities can be shared with other programs.