Will Japan react to North Korea's missile and nuclear programmes?

Nakagawa was refereeing to North Korea's rocket launch on 5 April that many believe was actually a test of a ballistic missile, rather than the launch of a communications satellite as claimed by North Korea. Nakagawa believes that

North Korea

has deployed some Rodong medium-range ballistic missiles equipped with nuclear weapons.

The nuclear-weapon test carried out by Pyongyang in October 2006 also stimulated some commentators in Japan to argue that Japan should go nuclear. Until North Korea’s nuclear and missile programmes provoked concern, public discussion about the nuclear issue had been considered a national taboo ever since the nuclear destruction of Hiroshima and Nagaski during the Second World War. Many argue that Japan’s Constitution rules out

Japan

possessing nuclear weapons.

According to a report by the Associated Press (2), North Korea has restarted its facility to reprocess plutonium from spent reactor fuel elements, an important step away from North Korea’s agreement at a 2007 Six-Party meeting (the six parties are China, Japan, North Korea, South Korea, Russia, the USA) to disable its nuclear facilities in return for energy aid and other concessions. North Korea is believed to have enough plutonium to fabricate about six nuclear weapons.

If Japan, at some future date, takes the political decision to acquire nuclear weapons, how quickly could it do so? The technology needed to produce nuclear weapons is the same as civil nuclear technology.

Japan

has a very advanced civil nuclear technology – one of the world’s most advanced. It has, therefore, the fissile materials, highly-enriched uranium and plutonium, and the nuclear physicists and engineers needed to produce nuclear weapons in a short time – months rather than years. Japan is, therefore, regarded as a latent nuclear-weapon country, which could relatively quickly become an actual nuclear-weapon power.

It would be very surprising, to say the least, if Japan did not have some people investigating the design of nuclear weapons, using available open and covert information, and performing feasibility studies of possible designs. This initial work would involve paper and computer studies and possibly some proto-type non-nuclear testing but would not be directed towards the production of nuclear weapons.

The work would probably have been initiated without a decision by the political leadership but by defence bureaucrats. But political leaders will almost certainly be involved in any decision to move to the development and production stages of a nuclear-weapon programme.

If Japan does take the political decision to fabricate nuclear weapons, it will probably use plutonium-239 as the fissile material and the implosion method to fabricate its first nuclear weapons (3).

Apart from the mining of uranium, Japan is operating all the elements of the complete nuclear fuel cycle, including the design and construction of reactors. Having no uranium that can be mined economically, it imports yellow cake (U₃O₈) but it has industrial plants to convert and enrich uranium and to fabricate reactor fuel elements. And it is also has a commercial reprocessing plant at Rokkasho-Mura, operated by Japan Nuclear Fuel Limited.

The Rokkasho-Mura Reprocessing Plant (RRP), with an operating capacity of 800 tonnes of spent nuclear power reactor fuel per year, is the world’s most up-to-date reprocessing plant (4). The output of RRP is not the usual plutonium dioxide, but plutonium dioxide mixed with uranium dioxide, or MOX (mixed oxide). But the plutonium dioxide and the uranium dioxides can be separated by straightforward chemistry; the plutonium could then be used to fabricate nuclear weapons.

Japan already has a stockpile of plutonium that could be used directly in a nuclear-weapon programme. About 400 kilograms of plutonium are in critical assemblies at Tokai-Mura, Ibaraki Prefecture. This plutonium is of the type preferred by nuclear-weapon designers to fabricate the most effective nuclear weapons (5). There is enough of it to produce at least 100 nuclear weapons.

A critical assembly is designed for studying structures that contain fissile materials (plutonium or highly enriched uranium) in a configuration and quantity sufficient for realization of a nuclear fission chain reaction. Such experiments are necessary for checking the correctness of calculations related to both nuclear reactors and nuclear weapons.

Japan could also use the plutonium produced in its nuclear-power reactors to produce nuclear weapons. It now has a stockpile of civil plutonium (reactor-grade plutonium) totalling more than 43 tonnes; about 20 per cent of the total global stockpile of civil plutonium of about 250 tonnes (6). For an advanced technological country like Japan, reactor-grade plutonium is just as good as weapon-grade plutonium to produce nuclear weapons (7).

Japan plans to use eventually fast breeder reactors (FBRs) fuelled by plutonium and has been developing them for some time. These reactors differ from other types in that they produce more fuel than they consume. Uranium-238 in the core of the reactor and in a ‘blanket’ placed around the core is converted into plutonium-239.

The plutonium can be used to fuel another breeder so that enough nuclear fuel becomes available not only to keep the reactor going but also to fuel a new one of the same size. Eventually, a family of breeder reactors becomes self-sustaining in nuclear fuel, requiring only a relatively small yearly replenishment of uranium-238. Breeder reactors are attractive to Japan because it has no suitable indigenous uranium.

The plutonium recovered from the breeder reactor run in an optimum way is precisely the type of plutonium needed to fabricate the most effective nuclear weapons. The Joyo experimental FBR has been operating since 1977. The Monju prototype FBR started up in April 1994 but it has not operated since December 1995 when a sodium leak occurred and it had to be shut down (8).

Japan has the technical means to build advanced nuclear weapons within months. Whether or not it does so will depend on the political judgment of Japan’s ruling elite. The political leaders will first assess the country’s strategic needs, its national interest, and the political consequences of becoming a nuclear-weapon power.

Japan is currently defended by the American nuclear umbrella, provided by US nuclear forces in the Asia/Pacific region, and there is no current security need for Japan to acquire nuclear weapons. However, because of events such as the North Korean nuclear and missile developments, the nuclear issue is under discussion and the public seems to being softened up for a possible decision.

This discussion is not new. Since the 1950s, leading politicians have, for time to time, argued that Japan should seriously consider acquiring nuclear weapons (9). Throughout most of this period, the main justification has been national security, but usually explicit threats have not been defined. Today, the threats are more explicitly spelt out.

Nevertheless, Japan may not acquire nuclear weapons unless it feels its security is significantly threatened, particularly by a weakening of the American nuclear umbrella. However, according to a report by the US Congressional Research Service, if it does acquire them it “could set off an arms race with China, South Korea, and Taiwan. India and/or Pakistan may then feel compelled to further expand or modernize their own nuclear weapons capabilities” (10). The consequences for global security would indeed be severe.

References

1. Nakagawa floats sobering option: going nuclear, Kyodo News, 20 April, 2009.

2. Kwang-Tae Kim, NKorea says it has restarted nuclear facilities, Associated Press, Seoul, South Korea, 25 April 2009.
www.news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090425/ap_on_re_as/as_koreas_nuclear

3. Frank Barnaby and Shaun Burnie, Thinking the Unthinkable: Japanese nuclear power and proliferation in East Asia.
www.japannuclear.com/nuclearpower/program

4. GlobalSecurity.org, Rokkasho Reprocessing Plant, see
www.globalsecurity.org/wmd/world/japan/rokkasho.htm

5. Tadahiro Katsuta and Tatsujiro Suzuki ,

Japan

’s Spent Fuel and Plutonium Management Challenges, International Panel on Fissile Materials, September 2006,
www.fissilematerials.org

6. Citizens' Nuclear Information Center (CNIC), MOX and Nuclear Weapons, 2 March 2009.
www.cnic.jp/english/topics/cycle/MOX/shipment/elbaradeiletter2mar09.html

7. Richard L. Garwin, Reactor-Grade Plutonium Can be Used to Make Powerful and Reliable Nuclear Weapons: Separated plutonium in the fuel cycle must be protected as if it were nuclear weapons, Federation of American Scientists, August 26, 1998.
www.fas.org/rlg/980826-pu.htm

8. World Nuclear Association, Nuclear Power in

Japan

, March 2009.
www.world-nuclear.org/info/inf79.html

9. Frank Barnaby and Shaun Burnie, Thinking the Unthinkable: Japanese nuclear power and proliferation in East Asia, The Asia-Pacific Journal: Japan Focus, September 8, 2005.
www.japanfocus.org

10.Emma Chanlett-Avery and Mary Beth Nikitin, Japan’s Nuclear Future: Policy Debate, Prospects, and U.S. Interests, Congressional Research Service Report, Washington DC, 19 February 2009.
www.fas.org/sgp/crs/nuke/RL34487.pdf

Key words :

Future Energies

By Frank Barnaby

future energies,

north korea

nuclear programme

japon

missile

Will Japan react to North Korea's missile and nuclear programmes?

By Frank Barnaby

future energies,

north korea

nuclear programme

japon

missile

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