Question for Karl Rove about the Spread of Nuclear Knowledge

• 84. March 5th, 2008 Cody wrote:

  Before addressing Karl Rove’s responses to the questions brought forward by any group, I think it is first important to note his initial presence as he took the podium. Speaking only for a few minutes, before allowing the videotaped questions, Rove took on a grandfatherly persona. Rove’s posture was an informal one: one hand in pants pocket while the other gestured sporadically. Mr. Rove’s opening story appealed both to our interests as Cold War scholars, and to his prurient interest in winning over and charming the class. He spoke of his proud involvement with Radio Free Europe and how he witnessed many private Soviet citizens who secretly listened to the broadcasts as they desired freedom very badly. This story, without a doubt, was chosen by Rove for three very specific reasons: 1) To prove to the class he could be a gentle caring man for people in other countries, 2) To appeal to the American value of freedom, and 3) That these people in foreign countries desperately want freedoms like ours.

  Rove’s good mood continued, too, after the first two groups asked their questions. Once he began answering the third group’s (B) question, however, his mood began to shift toward slightly annoyed. Noticing the opening screen of the question mentioned the Acheson-Lilienthal Report, Rove immediately reported to the class that this, “… led to the Baruch Report”, in a correct assumption that we were all aware of this. Rove then became quiet, listened to the question in its entirety, and began to defend his quote used in the video, while forgetting the question at hand (regarding the inevitable distribution of nuclear weaponry knowledge).

  Karl Rove’s answer to Group B was both a defensive stand, and humble resignation to the state of the Iraq War. Rove stated that the United States believed that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction because Saddam Hussein wanted us to, and that he was purposely floating false information out to intelligence agencies. Rove also proposed the rhetorical question to the class asking whether or not we got it wrong when we though Iraq had WMDs, to which he answered, “You bet we did.” Rove then went on to further imply that even though there were intelligence mistakes made, that it was at the fault of Saddam, who had ignored the United Nations (even making reference to Hussein extending “one giant finger” to the U.N.) and spreading false information.

  Thinking the answer session of this question was over, the class began to transition to the next group’s question. Rove, however, sensed the class wasn’t totally on board with his answer and intercepted the silence by asking/telling the class, “You know the Baruch Plan was wrong right?” He then continued, giving an example that if the Taliban had a nuclear weapon, then they surely would have used it on 9/11?

  It was at this moment of Karl Rove’s visit that I finally began feverishly scribbling in my notepad, reminding myself to re-read the Baruch Report and find if there would truly be a link between its theoretical implementation and the eventual use of a nuclear weapon by a terrorist organization. As my demeanor changed, so did Rove’s. He was no longer the kind, grandfatherly storyteller, but a concerned diplomat addressing a crowd that he seemed to perceive as weak and vulnerable on homeland security.

  Baruch’s plan, which Rove criticized, was plainly laid out by Bernard Baruch in a June 14, 1946 speech given at Hunter College in New York before the United Nations Atomic Energy Commission. In this speech Baruch calls for the creation of the “International Atomic Development Authority” which would regulate and control all worldwide uses of atomic energy. An attempt at nuclear monopoly didn’t work out so well for the United States, as the Soviets quickly established themselves in the nuclear world, so what would have been the correct path for us to take?

  In my opinion, however, Baruch’s outline was flawed. First, the plan was brutish, allowing the I.A.D.A to penalize “…only by the concurrence of each of the five great powers – the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, the United Kingdom, China, France, and the United States.” In addition, he states, “There must be no veto to protect those who violate their solemn agreements not to develop or use atomic energy for destructive purposes.” Finally, and most importantly for current discussion is Baruch’s assertion that, “Presumably no nation would think of starting a war with only one bomb.”

  With this rather damning quote, I can finally understand where Karl Rove would loosely translate the Baruch Plan into something that would allow the Taliban to get their hands a nuclear weapon. Baruch is probably right, no nation probably would start a war with just one nuclear bomb in their arsenal, but in the age of terrorism, any strike is seen as overwhelmingly successful by the enemy.

  If I could pull Mr. Rove aside and ask him one more question, it would deal with this issue. What could we have done in the 1940s, with the advantage of hindsight, to prevent the scary nuclear culture that would ensue throughout the Cold War and into today? Was a nuclear standoff between two great foreign powers (the United States and the Soviets) advantageous in the long run because we now know that a launch by one power means a counter launch, thus possibly leading to world-wide destruction? If there was a better plan in place originally, which regulated atomic energy, would we have to fear terrorists getting their hands on some under guarded weapon created during the arms race?

  It seems that with a better nuclear plan in place over 60 years ago, we could’ve avoided some of the mess that we are in now. I do agree with Rove, though, as does any sane American. I do not want the Taliban or any terrorist organization getting their hand on nuclear weaponry. That much is a given. My fear is that the ability for them to do so was made easier by the scarred history of the race for atomic weapons and the lack of any regulation during its early years.

  All Baruch quotes and other inferences:

  Baruch, Bernard. Speech before the first session of the United Nations Atomic Energy Commission. Hunter College, New York. 14 June 1946
  (the speech was part of class materials)

• 86. March 5th, 2008 Dominick wrote:

  Karl Rove walked in from the back, with no real slew of security, no entrance parade. In fact, it’s probably safe to say that some didn’t even realize he had arrived in the classroom. He had a smile on his face. He was addressing a class on “Cold War Rhetoric”. He probably thought, “No problem. I had Vodka shots with Gorbachev. I was in Moscow when the Soviet Union fell. I have plenty of cool stories. These kids will be easy. That lecture tonight will be the tough part.” It didn’t turn out quite that way. The first two groups asked intelligent, thought-out questions that Rove answered to the best of his ability. I actually thought he was very pleasant and somewhat witty for a man who ran such a calculating political machine. In fact, I felt bad when the time came to ask him the “most demanding question, as voted on by the class”, according to our moderator, Gordon Mitchell. That question was the beginning of the end of Mr. Rove’s cheerful afternoon.

  We began with a report, followed by a Rove quote contradicting the report, followed finally by our question of whether it is in fact possible to stop the spread of nuclear knowledge. He was initially angered that our questioner, who he referred to as “Mr. B” was not in attendance. Second, he was noticeably annoyed that we inferred from his quote that knowledge of nuclear weapons alone was enough to justify the war in Iraq. He responded that he “never said that” and knowledge alone is not enough. His further justification for the Iraq war was that “Saddam wanted the world to think he had them [WMD]”. After another minute of talking about Iraq, Rove shifted his focus to the question. I was surprised that he didn’t dodge or avoid the actual question, seeing that he could have finished on the Iraq note. He was very focused on the question at hand, which was pleasant to see. He said that while you cannot control the spread of nuclear knowledge, you can control the spread of such knowledge into the hands of “evil people”. Finally, he finished by saying that the Baruch Plan and the Acheson-Lilienthal Reports “had it wrong”, and that global shared control of knowledge was not a good idea. He cited terrorist organizations such as the Al Qaeda and the Taliban as reasons why shared knowledge could not work. As a little side note, it became evident from that point on that Rove was a little agitated and nearly blew off the question by Group F, our fifth group.

  In regards to Rove’s answer, he must be given credit because he did not duck it. He answered it straightforwardly. Unfortunately, his answer was wrong. It’s safe to say that his views on this case are mostly unfounded in the court of public opinion. He made several comments that, had we be given more time, he would have had to explain further and more clearly. First, he said that Saddam Hussein wanted the world to think he had WMD. Now, we put his comments at the Ideas Festival and this comment together then we should get the justification for the war in Iraq, according to Rove. Saddam kept in place the knowledge base to recreate the weapons and he wanted the world to think he had WMD are, according to Rove, the reasons we went into Iraq. The problem is, Rove did not use these reasons to justify going into Iraq in 2003. In 2003, The Administration said that undoubtedly Saddam had WMD and posed a threat to the world. Now, even though we know he didn’t have them, he wanted us to think he did and his scientists could have produced them if they wanted. Therefore, according to Rove, the war was still justified. You run down a slippery slope here of creating policies of the “act now, ask questions later” variety. Seeing that we are still in Iraq today, I (as well as many) would like to see a United States foreign policy of “Find the truth now, and act on it.”

  A second problem I had was that Rove said we cannot control the spread of knowledge, but we can control its distribution into the hands of “evil people”. Many people would beg to differ. If we had such a tight grip on “evil people”, Osama Bin Laden would be dead, not… wherever he is. The point is that Rove’s answer really makes no sense. He says it is not possible to control the spread of knowledge, but it is possible to keep it out of evil hands. If we can’t control it generally, how do we then control it specifically? Since there are so many evil people in the world, it is clearly impossible to keep it from everyone. As a result, this answer seems to be high on rhetoric, low on substance.

  The conclusion I have come to is that Karl Rove is quick on his feet, but not that quick. When given a sophisticated, demanding question, with facts, he can be stumped. Overall, though, he deserves a lot of credit for standing in the line of fire. I’m sure he didn’t expect that much heat from an informal meeting with Pitt’s Cold War Rhetoric class.

• 90. March 5th, 2008 Marc wrote:

  It was a particularly interesting experience for me having Karl Rove come in as a guest speaker to my “Cold War and Rhetoric” class; especially considering that I was the one to bring him to the University of Pittsburgh in the first place (on behalf of the Pitt Program Council). More often than not, I identify myself with liberal views and it was a strange choice to bring Mr. Rove (someone who usually does not agree with my beliefs), to my college campus. During this special classroom session, I was a member of Group B to which Mr. Rove would answer whether or not he believed it was possible to control the spread of knowledge of nuclear weapons technology.

  In his response, Mr. Rove admitted that despite early U.S. intelligence reports that claimed the Saddam Hussein had WMDs, it was proven that he did not. This led to the statement by Rove that the U.S. was wrong in our accusations of Hussein in reference to him having WMDs. Mr. Rove stated the reason that we had the incorrect intelligence was due to the fact that Saddam wanted the world to think that he had this power and wanted to be feared. According to Rove, this level of Saddam claiming to have weapons was so powerful that top Iraqi military leaders were calling for the usage of these non-existent biological weapons right before the fall of Baghdad. With this statement, Mr. Rove said that the reasons for going to war with Iraq were adequate due to the fact that he was claiming to develop/have these weapons for ten years after the first gulf war which was in direct violation with the sanctions forced on Iraq after the first war.

  Mr. Rove then addressed how information cannot always be reliable and sometimes the government must be proactive when dealing with such things as nuclear technology. He gave the example of Libya’s Muammar al-Qaddafi whom was fearful after the fall of Saddam and thus admitted to his own active efforts to create WMDs. Rove stated that this showed a weakness in U.S. intelligence being that no one had realized just how advanced their weapons program was.

  At this point Mr. Rove chose to answer the question more directly as far as if the U.S. can control the initial spread of knowledge so that the U.S. does not have to go into countries like Iraq and Iran in the first place. He stated that it is difficult to control the spread of knowledge, but it is possible to stop the proliferation of “bad knowledge” from the people who should not have it (Iraq, North Korea and Iran). The example of “bad knowledge” that Mr. Rove used repeatedly was that of “delivery systems” for WMDs. In a final tie-in with the video-question Mr. Rove disagreed with the ideas of Lilienthal, Baruch and Bohr. He said that these theorists had the ideas of security all wrong when looking at a U.S. model. Security cannot be reached through sharing information because not all countries have the same values and laws. In closing, Rove stated that if the Taliban has such a weapon as a result of having this shared knowledge, they surely would have used it on 9/11 and that the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip would also not be confined by the same rules of restraint that the U.S. abides by.

  When studying Mr. Rove’s response, I found it to be rather conflicted. Only in the last minute or so of his response did he begin to actually talk about whether or not information could be controlled to which he ultimately said that it can in certain respects to what kind of information goes to what types of people. The first hole in this logic is his lack of explanation as far as how one can control certain types of information and stop it from reaching only the bad people while possibly passing it on to peaceful nations. However, the bigger flaw in this response was in the majority of the argument being a defense of why the U.S. headed into Iraq and how intelligence may never be entirely accurate.

  By citing Libya and Iraq as intelligence failures would almost seem to invalidate Mr. Rove’s response as far as not sharing information to these nations. First, it proves that Libya did have the knowledge to create WMDs even without the U.S. specifically giving it to them and that they were going through this process without the U.S. intelligence agencies even suspecting it. This would mean that Mr. Rove was incorrect in his claim that the spread of such sensitive information can be prevented.

  A policy of openness as suggested by Niels Bohr and the Acheson-Lilienthal plan to have a global control of nuclear technology would seem to be the only other course that the U.S. could try due to the failure of the PSI and “controlling WMD knowledge” from the “bad people.” If this level of openness was employed prior to the outbreak of the Cold War; it is a possibility that there would be a significantly lesser threat of nuclear terrorism. The Cold War was largely a battle between two different ideals and those ideals became armed with WMDs. If there was more sharing of information between these opposing powers, it is conceivable that the arms race would not have escalated the way it did. The arms race forced the Soviet Union to spread its military budget so thin that by the end of the conflict, the Russians were left with a military in shambles.

  In another failure in U.S. intelligence, the U.S. has been surprised time and time again by the poor state of the Soviet Union when it fell. While intelligence may have hinted to a country undergoing a change, it came as a shock to see a country with a navy that is falling apart (ex. The Kursk incident) and nuclear material/weapons that are far from being under lock and key. As stated by an episode of PBS’s “Frontline”, many of Russia’s nuclear site remain “unsafeguarded” in accordance to the IAEA. If there had been a level of openness and shared knowledge between nations and a greater level of control over such powers, then we as a nation would not have to struggle to identify who has this dangerous knowledge.

  It would behoove Mr. Rove when thinking about how to go about talks with Iran (should he join the McCain campaign), to reconsider the offer to Iran that President Bush discussed in his 2008 State of the Union address and begin talks with them before they “prove” that they do not have any “bad knowledge.” By beginning talks now, the U.S. can best prevent being “surprised” by anymore Libyas that have the knowledge that we already did not know and the U.S. can avoid the embarrassment of entering another county on the assumption that someone had WMD knowledge that actually may not.

  Work Cited

  PBS, “Frontline: Loose Nukes: Investigating The Threat of Nuclear Smuggling,” November 19, 2007 .

• 103. March 6th, 2008 Allison wrote:

  Karl Rove has had a lot of unique experiences in his life. Born December 15, 1950 he had a chance to observe much of the Cold War. By the end of the Cold War, he was an up and coming political figure in the world. He had the opportunity to see the fall of the Soviet Union first hand. In 2002 and 2003 he chaired the White House Iraq Group. This put him in the powerful position of attempting to convince the American people that Saddam Hussein was a threat to the United States. One thing that helped to sell the American people on this idea was the thought that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. Since the invasion of Iraq it has been proven that there were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.

  At the Aspen Ideas Festival Karl Rove was asked if he felt personally responsible for selling the war the way he did. He responded by saying “I make no apologies. It was the right thing to do. The world is better off with him gone. We all thought he had weapons of mass destruction; the whole world did. He didn’t. But I will tell you this; go back and read the Duelfer and the Kay reports; both of them say the same thing. Which is, that while they found that he did not, they did find that he kept in place the experts, and scientists; the knowledge base if you will to recreate these weapons. He kept together the dual use facilities, which could be for biological and chemical weapons put back into operation relatively quickly and he kept the desire.”

  After showing a quote from the Acheson-Lilienthal report and playing the clip of this answer at the Aspen Ideas Festival Karl Rove was asked the question “If knowledge of weapons production alone is the standard to justify preventative war, Mr. Rove is it possible to control the spread of knowledge given the argument of the Acheson-Lilienthal report that the spread of nuclear technology is inevitable?”

  Karl Rove first reinforced his belief that Saddam Hussein did have weapons of mass destruction. He pointed out that not only did the United States think this, but the rest of the world did as well. The reason for this according the Rove is that Hussein wanted the world to think this. Hussein had failed to comply with inspections, and for years after the Gulf War had claimed to be developing them. Hussein had wanted the world to think he was powerful, and the world believing he had weapons of mass destruction did this.

  Though he admitted that the intelligence on Iraq made people believe that there were weapons of mass destruction when there were not, Rove also warned that intelligence could be wrong the other way. For this he cited the example of Muammar al-Gaddafi, the leader of Libya. Rove claimed that situation caused al-Gaddafi to admit to having many more weapons than the intelligence of the world had thought. Rove also made the claim that the decision to go into Iraq led to al-Gaddafi admitting this.

  Rove went on to speak about what could be done to control nuclear weapons. He seemed to feel that one thing that could be done was to control the material necessary to build a nuclear weapon. He spoke about the Proliferation Security Initiative, President Bush’s strategy to combat weapons of mass destruction. He explained that under the program the United States would take the lead and other countries would do what they can. He did admit that there was no way to control countries using the shield of developing nuclear power for peaceful purposes and then developing a nuclear weapon the way that India did.

  Before he moved on to the next question, Rove made a point in saying that the ideas endorsed by Niels Bohr, The Acheson-Lilienthal Report, and the Baruch plan were wrong. All of them felt that information about nuclear technology should be shared and that there should be an attempt to have international control of it. Rove claimed that sharing information would have allowed the information to fall into the hands of people who would have used it against the United States such as the Taliban.

  After listening to the question there was an obvious change in Rove’s tone. He seemed to become more defensive than he had been in answering the first two questions. Within his response he did not seem to address the question until the very end. He spent a lot of time talking about intelligence about nuclear weapons capability first before speaking about whether or not the information can be controlled and how that can happen.

  Rove’s response did not fully answer the question and seemed to at some points contradict itself. Though he claimed that there is a way to control nuclear technology and material, he admitted that leaders have been able to develop it without the help or even the knowledge of their actions by the United States. Rove used examples of the countries developing weapons of mass destruction without the help of the United States, and then went on to say that the United States could and should attempt to keep this information secret. The fact that the United States believed Saddam Hussein had developed nuclear weapons is one example of the fact that the United States knows they cannot fully control knowledge, technology, and material to enough of an extent to feel secure. The example of Libya only shows this more. Without the known help of any nation known to have nuclear weapons Libya was able to develop technology far beyond what the United States thought it had. To do this Libya had to have access to the information and material showing once again the United States cannot control these things.

  Rove seemed very willing to speak about the failures of the United State’s intelligence on the nuclear capabilities of the rest of the world. This may be a way of avoiding speaking of the failures of the United State’s policies. Though better intelligence would most likely have lead to more successful policies, would better policies on the sharing of knowledge to begin with have created a situation where intelligence was not the only thing relied upon? We will never know if the ideas endorsed by Niels Bohr, the Acheson-Lilienthal report, and the Baruch plan would have successfully created international control of nuclear technology. These ideas were never implemented, and so there is no way to know what their result would have been. The United States instead attempted to pursue a policy of secrecy. One thing that history has proven is that the plan of secrecy did not work. Nations across the world were able to develop nuclear weapons without the global sharing of information. Rove seemed very willing to simply ignore this lesson when answering the question.

  Works Cited
  “In Conversation with Karl Rove III, 2007.” Aspen Ideas Festival. The Aspen Institute.
  “Karl Rove.” Wikipedia. Updated February 28, 2008. Accessed March 5, 2008.

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