Ukraine to Get Rid of Fissionable Materials

The critics of President Obama's nuclear arms deal with the Russians made a big noise over how it wouldn't lead to anything from any other nation. Within a matter of days, they were proved wrong. Ukraine, under its new pro-Russian president Viktor Yanukovych, announced that it will get rid of all its bomb-grade radioactive materials by the end of 2012. And this happened before the 47-nation nuclear summit in Washington opened.

The Obama administration changed US nuclear doctrine a short time ago stating that the big threat to world peace was no longer the possibility of an exchange of nuclear-tipped missiles between nations but rather the risk that Al Qaeda or a like-minded group would get hold on just one and set it off. It now appears that Ukraine agrees. One must remember that Ukraine had several nuclear bombs on its territory when the Soviet Union went out of business. It, along with Kazakhstan, turned those bombs over the Russia -- effectively becoming unilateralist disarmers.

Ukraine's new move takes that even farther. Now, Ukraine is going to get rid of its 90 kilos of highly enriched uranium (HEU). HEU is uranium enriched so that it is 20% or more U₂₃₅, the only isotope of uranium that goes bang easily. Weapons-grade uranium is usually 85% or better, but 20% can be made to explode. Moreover, Ukraine is converting its nuclear reactors (this in the land of Chernobyl) to operate on low-enriched uranium.

Ukraine's 90 kilos is a drop in the bucket, though. Most public estimates place the amount of HEU in the world at 1,600 tons, almost all of it in acknowledged nuclear-weapons states, and the lion's share in Russia. In addition, there is about 500 tons of plutonium (the Hiroshima bomb was U₂₃₅, and the Nagasaki bomb was a plutonium device). In all, the two varieties of fissile material is enough for 120,000 bombs.

While there are no details on how Ukraine will dispose of the 90 kilos of HEU in its possession, it may well hand it over to the US. In America, it will either be stored or made into fuel rods for one of the country's 109 nuclear power plants. Sort of a high tech beating of swords into plowshares.

Naturally, fewer weapons don't make the world safer if there remains someone prepared to use weapons of mass destruction. However, better controls over the fissionable matter that exists, and the expenditure of such materials in power plants, make it harder for the zanies to do the rest of humanity harm.

© Copyright 2010 by The Kensington Review, Jeff Myhre, PhD, Editor. No part of this publication may be reproduced without written consent. Produced using Ubuntu Linux.

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