CTR Accomplishments

The CTR program has accomplished much in the three short years of its existence, and the bulk of the achievements have been in just the past year. The program has facilitated the return to Russia of over 1,000 warheads from Belarus, Kazakhstan, and Ukraine; the removal to secure storage of over 2,500 warheads from missile and bomber bases; the deactivation of four regiments of SS-19 ICBMs in Ukraine; the removal of 750 missiles from their launchers; and the elimination of approximately 630 strategic launchers and bombers throughout the NIS. CTR assistance also helped prompt Ukraine to begin early deactivation and shipment to Russia of SS-19 and SS-24 warheads and to accede to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty as a non-nuclear-weapons state, thereby allowing the START I treaty to enter into force.

CTR has contributed to other efforts to prevent proliferation. Over 5,000 former Soviet weapon scientists and engineers once engaged in nuclear weapons research are now or soon will be employed on peaceful, civilian research projects, thus reducing the threat of the transfer of their deadly expertise to potential proliferant states. The Project Sapphire mission in November 1994 to remove 600 kilograms of highly enriched uranium to the United States from Kazakhstan was partially financed with CTR funds.

Submarine Dismantlement in Russia

The CTR program's total "obligation rate" (the rate at which DoD places funds for this program under contract to procure goods and services) during the past fiscal year is another success story. The program got off to a slow start, mainly as a result of the time it took to obtain agreements for cooperation with the NIS and the often difficult task of getting the recipient governments to specify technical requirements sufficient to solicit goods and services from U.S. businesses. But at the end of FY94, the obligation rate had increased four-fold over what it had been at the end of FY93, and we expect obligations at the end of the current fiscal year to be at least six-and-a-half times what they were at the end of FY93. Obligations have risen from $30 million in early 1993 to $500 million today. This represents a remarkable achievement programmatically, as well as an actual accomplishment in threat reduction in the new independent states.