There is definitely a high risk of nuclear proliferation in the middle East. Most of the time, countries driven by security fears, regional ambitions or sometimes nationalism are trying to acquire nuclear weapons. So, the FP is suggesting that the US must reiterate its position on the nonproliferation of nuclear weapons. To achieve that goal, it must apply a firm rule, “no spent reactor fuel reprocessing or uranium enrichment—by anyone in the region.”
There are concerns that Saudi Arabia is consulting with China to help the kingdom mine and process uranium. Given the monarchy of Mohammed Bin Salman is capable of atrocities, then there is going to be a security problem here with the Saudi’s interest in nuclear power. Even though they intend to create a domestic nuclear industry in anticipation of high growth in domestic energy consumption, the US must act decisively and never supply Riyadh with nuclear technology.
We are told that U.S. agreements for civilian nuclear cooperation are coming up for renewal with Egypt and Morocco in 2021, and with Turkey in 2023. Sp, the nuclear industry will try to keep Congress from imposing strict rules, given both Democratic and Republican administrations traditionally support U.S. nuclear exports. But FP is suggesting that it is vital to maintain the rule of the gold standard for all three. Therefore, I must say that nuclear nonproliferation must be one of Joe Biden’s top priorities.
Marcus,
You’ve put your finger on an important issue. Once exceptions start to be be made (e.g., for Saudi Arabia), there will be no going back. And we have seen from the examples of Iraq (under Saddam), Iran and North Korea that cheating and secret reprocessing does go on. It seems all but certain that the Biden administration will take a different line toward the Saudis than his predecessor did.
–Professor Wallerstein