The Forum on Contemporary Europe (FCE) continues a multiyear study of the challenges facing European Union integration and global crisis intervention. The increasingly complex demands straining Europe and its trans-Atlantic relations—labor migration, spending on welfare economies, globalized cultures, and threats of terrorism, coupled with Europe’s struggle to ratify a single constitution—underline the need to measure prospects for unification and the EU’s ability to function as a coordinated international actor. This year, FCE is broadening its work to assess the role an integrated EU can play in addressing the world’s most troubling crises.

EU INTEGRATION: THE CASE OF TURKEY

The forum has explored the question of Turkey’s EU membership with Stanford scholars, European leaders, and the public. In spring 2006, former German foreign minister Joschka Fischer and author Christopher Hitchens offered candid analyses of EU expansion. Hitchens challenged commonplace descriptions of “Christian Old Europe” antagonized by “Islamicized” secular Turkey. Europe and Islam are not newly in contention, he said, but are playing out a centuries-old relationship grounded in the European and Ottoman empires in the Eastern Mediterranean. For Hitchens, the portrait of clashing civilizations obscures the crises facing minority Kurdish and neighboring societies whose survival is at stake in EU expansion.

Delivering the Payne lecture, Fischer noted the dilemma of seeking to achieve popular ratification of a European constitution at a time when public attention is galvanized by the Turkish candidacy. Fischer rejected common comparisons between European state rulings on Islamic traditions and models of U.S. multiculturalism. Fischer found admirable aspects of the U.S. inspiration but questioned its relevance for mediating myriad EU interests. For Fischer, the EU as a supra-state actor holds the promise to democratize conflict resolution in the deliberative model of the European Parliament and legitimate its role as a peacekeeping actor.

EU INTERVENTION: CRISIS MANAGMENT AND COMBATING INTERNATIONAL TERRORISM

The forum’s new focus on EU crisis intervention began with addresses by Sir Richard Dearlove, former head of Britain’s Security Services (MI-6), and Alain Bauer, former vice president of the University of Paris–Sorbonne and director of France’s National Institute for Higher Studies in Security, who discussed EU counterintelligence and international early-warning protocols. Greek Ambassador Alexandros Mallias spoke on the Eastern Mediterranean context that frames the Turkish candidacy, the economics of EU integration, and prospects for responding to the tensions in Cyprus. Austrian Ambassador Eva Novotny spoke on Austria’s immediate past EU presidency, evaluating the impact of the EU Council’s intervention in the Israel-Lebanon crisis. Professor Josef Joffe spoke on his new book, Uberpower: The Imperial Temptation of America, and the prospects for U.S.–EU interaction in global affairs.

The forum’s fall series brought public acclaim when Daniel Cohn-Bendit, co-president of the European Parliament Greens/New Alliance Parties, delivered FCE’s 2006–2007 “Europe Now” address, cosponsored by Stanford’s Abbasi Program in Islamic Studies and the Woods Institute for the Environment. Speaking to an overflow crowd, and meeting separately with faculty and researchers, Cohn-Bendit focused his public remarks on European Integration: Society, Politics, and Islam. A European Parliament leader, Cohn-Bendit spoke on his party’s proposal to deploy Joschka Fischer as the EU representative to Middle East peace negotiations. Expanding and integrating the EU, Cohn-Bendit argued, is the most reasonable strategy for strengthening Europe’s role in international relations and crisis intervention.

The Forum on Contemporary Europe continues to deepen scholarly and public understanding of the EU promise to achieve democratic governance, economic growth, security, and social integration among its member states and in its foreign engagements.

On November 16, 2006, FSI convened its annual international conference, A World at Risk, devoted to systemic and human risk confronting the global community. Remarks by Stanford Provost John Etchemendy, FSI Director Coit D. Blacker, former Secretary of State Warren Christopher, former Secretary of Defense William J. Perry, and former Secretary of State George Shultz set the stage for stimulating discussions. Interactive panel sessions encouraged in-depth exploration of major issues with Stanford faculty, outside experts, and policymakers.

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Invoking Jane and Leland Stanford’s desire to educate students to become useful, contributing citizens, Etchemendy said, “We can best serve that mission today by producing graduates well-versed in the complex problems of a world at risk and willing to make the difficult choices that might lead to their solution.”

“It has been acutely apparent to us at FSI that we must actively engage a world at risk,” stated FSI director Coit D. “Chip” Blacker, “risk posed by the growing number of nuclear issues on the international agenda; the insurgency in Iraq; global poverty, hunger, and environmental degradation; the tensions of nationalism versus regionalism in Asia; infectious diseases; terrorism; and the geopolitical, financial, and ecological risks of the West’s current energy policies, especially its voracious appetite for oil.”

Introducing three Stanford luminaries, Blacker said, “One of the remarkable things about Stanford is the privilege of working with some of the outstanding intellects and statesmen of our time. Warren Christopher, William Perry, and George Shultz tower among them.”

“As Stanford University’s primary forum for the consideration of the major international issues of our time, we at FSI are dedicated to interdisciplinary research and teaching on some of the most pressing and complex problems facing the global community today.” – Coit D. “Chip” Blacker, Director, Freeman Spogli Institute“The Middle East has descended into hate, violence, and chaos,” said Warren Christopher, the nation’s 63rd secretary of state. “It really is a dangerous mess.” Discussing the Israeli incursion into Lebanon, the war in Iraq, and Iran’s regional and nuclear ambitions, he said the U.S. has aggravated these threats by “action and inaction.” Nonetheless, the U.S. remains the most influential foreign power in the region. “We must not give up on the Middle East,” he said. “We have to return to old-fashioned diplomacy with all its frustrations and delays.”

“We live in dangerous times,” stated William J. Perry, the nation’s 19th secretary of defense and an FSI senior fellow. “Last month about 1,000 of our service personnel in Iraq were killed, maimed, or wounded; the Taliban is resurging in Afghanistan; North Korea just tested a nuclear bomb; and Iran is not far behind. China’s power is rising and Russia’s democracy is falling.” As Elie Wiesel wrote, he said, “Peace is not God’s gift to its children. Peace is our gift to each other.” Comparing major security issues of 1994 to today, Perry assessed the nuclear arms race, North Korea, Iran, and Iraq. He noted that the Clinton administration had eliminated more than 10,000 nuclear weapons and urged that the work continue, because “the danger of terrorists getting a nuclear bomb is very real.”

Citing North Korea’s 2006 missile and nuclear tests, Perry said he was concerned that a robust North Korean nuclear program will stimulate a “dangerous arms race in the Pacific” and increase “the danger of a terrorist group getting a nuclear bomb.” “Iran is moving inexorably toward becoming a nuclear power,” Perry said. “We are facing new dangers,” he concluded, “and we must adjust our thinking accordingly.”

“The world has never been at a more promising moment than it is today,” said George Shultz, the nation’s 60th secretary of state. “All across the world, economic expansion is taking place. The U.S. is giving fantastic leadership to the global economy.” For Shultz, the imperative is to prevent the security challenges “from aborting all these fantastic opportunities.”

“The Middle East has descended into hate, violence, and chaos. The U.S. remains the most influential foreign power in the region. We have to return to old-fashioned diplomacy with all its frustrations and delays.” – Former Secretary of State Warren ChristopherU.S. leadership should inspire the world, Shultz said, advocating four initiatives. We should aspire to have a world with no nuclear weapons. We should take a different approach to global warning, based on the Montreal Protocols. “This is a gigantic problem we need to do something about and can do something about,” he said. We should build greater understanding of the world of Islam. We must combat rising protectionism. The postwar system reduced tariffs and quotas, promoting trade and growth. “The best defense is a good offense,” Shultz stated. “We need a lot of leadership in that arena.”

Plenary I, chaired by Chip Blacker, examined systemic risk. Elisabeth Paté-Cornell, Burton and Deedee McMurtry Professor and Chair of Management Science and Engineering, discussed how scientists measure risk, asking what can happen, what are the chances it will, and what are the consequences? “The good news is that the worst is not always the most certain,” she noted. Citing challenges of intelligence analysis, she said, “Certainty is rare; signals are imperfect; there is a tendency to focus on one possibility (groupthink) and underestimate others; and it is difficult to assess and communicate uncertainties.” “Success is not guessing in the face of uncertainties,” she said. “It is describing accurately what is known, what is unknown, and what has changed.”

Scott D. Sagan, professor of political science and director of CISAC, examined “Iran and the Collapse of the Global Non-proliferation Regime?” The crux of the issue, Sagan noted, is the emergence of two dangerous beliefs, “deterrence optimism” and “proliferation fatalism.” In Sagan’s view, too little attention has been given to why Iran seeks a nuclear weapon. Arguing that U.N. sanctions are unlikely to work and military options are problematic, Sagan said a negotiated settlement is still possible if the U.S. offers security guarantees to Iran, contingent on Tehran’s agreement to constraints on future nuclear development. As Sagan concluded, “Instead of accepting what appears inevitable, we should work to prevent the unacceptable.”

Siegfried S. Hecker, CISAC co-director, tackled the challenge of “Keeping Fissile Materials out of Terrorist Hands.” Although nuclear terrorism is an old problem, today there is easier access to nuclear materials, greater technological sophistication, and a greater proclivity toward violence. The greatest risk, he said, “is an improvised nuclear device built from stolen or diverted fissile materials.” “Given a few tens of kilograms of fissile material, essentially a grapefruit-sized chunk of plutonium,” he stated, “terrorists will be able to build and detonate an inefficient, but devastating Hiroshima- or Nagasaki-like bomb.” The most likely threat is a so-called “dirty bomb,” he said, which would be a “weapon of mass disruption, not destruction,” but still able to cause panic, contamination, and economic disruption, making risk analysis imperative to mitigate its consequences.

“We are facing new dangers and we must adjust our thinking accordingly. As President Lincoln said, ‘The occasion is piled high with difficulty, and we must rise with the occasion. As our case is new, so we must think anew, and act anew.’” – Former Secretary of Defense William J. PerryTurning to human risk, Michael Osterholm, director of the University of Minnesota’s Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy, addressed “Pandemic Influenza: Harbinger of Things to Come?” “The risk is one that a pandemic is going to happen,” he told a riveted audience. Comparing the great influenza of 1918 with the pandemics of 1957 and 1968, he noted that pandemics have differed in season of onset, mortality rates, and number of cases. Avian influenza has a 65 percent mortality rate and could affect 30–60 percent of the world’s 6.5 billion people, producing 1.6 billion deaths worldwide and 1.9 million deaths in the U.S. Inevitably, mutation will reduce its lethality.

“It is not a matter of if, just when and where” the pandemic will strike, said Osterholm. Noting that vaccines will not be available in numbers needed, he argued for measures to safeguard families, communities, and essential infrastructure, such as police, firefighters, and health-care workers. Just-in-time inventory practices, he said, have increased vulnerability to disruptions in food supply, transportation, equipment, and communications, making it vital to plan in earnest, now.

Plenary II, chaired by FSI deputy director Michael A. McFaul, assessed risks to humans from “Natural, National, and International Disasters.” Stephen E. Flynn, Jeane J. Kirkpatrick Senior Fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations and a trade and transportation security expert, decried the “artificial firewalls between homeland and national security.” The Hart-Rudman Commission of 1998 warned of a catastrophic attack on U.S. soil, yet we did not rethink national security even after 9/11. We must approach security as a transnational issue, with no clear “domestic” and “international” lines, he urged. More than 65 percent of critical infrastructure is privately owned and has been given inadequate attention by federal authorities. Hurricane Katrina exposed the vulnerabilities. “We face more threats from acts of God than acts of man,” Flynn stated. We need to move from a concept of “security” to one of “resiliency,” he said, greatly improving our ability to withstand a man-made or natural disaster.

David G. Victor, FSI senior fellow and professor of law, addressed three faces of energy security: oil, natural gas, and climate change. Oil prices are volatile, future fields are in places difficult to do business, and the global supply infrastructure is vulnerable, posing the risk of a one- to six-month supply disruption. For Victor, who directs FSI’s Program on Energy and Sustainable Development, the big threat is less supply than a potential demand-side shock, driven by the U.S. and China. Europe relies on an unreliable Russia for 25–30 percent of its natural gas needs, making it imperative to switch to cheaper, more reliable LNG from North Africa and the Middle East. Oil and gas price volatility has driven further dependence on coal-fired plants, with dire consequences for carbon emissions. New coal plant lifetime emissions, Victor said, are equal to all historic coal emissions, making it critical to invest in advanced technology to protect the environment.

“The world has never been at a more promising moment than it is today. All across the world economic expansion is taking place. Poverty is being reduced dramatically as China and India expand, along with Brazil.” – Former Secretary of State George ShultzPeter Bergen, CNN terrorism analyst and producer of Osama bin Laden’s first television interview, offered the dinner keynote, “Successes and Failures of the War on Terrorism Since 9/11.” Assessing negatives, Bergen noted that al Qaeda continues to carry on attacks from its base in Pakistan; Afghanistan is beset by instability; more than 20 million Muslims in Europe remain dangerously un-integrated; bin Laden has not been apprehended and continues to inspire followers through terrorist attacks; Iraq is an unstable breeding ground for jihad; and anti-Americanism is on the rise. Enumerating positives, there has been no follow-on attack on the U.S.; the government has made the country safer; many Muslims have rejected jihad; plots have been foiled and suspects apprehended across the globe. Weighing whether fighting the terrorists abroad has made the U.S. safer here, Bergen was equivocal: The U.S. can identify and eliminate only so many people and cannot stay in Bagdad forever. A network of educated, dedicated terrorists remains, he warned, capable of bringing down commercial aircraft or deploying a radiological bomb.

Several years ago, a high-level Israeli official asked me to tell him everything I could about how the Israelis might find their Palestinian Mandela. His question was interesting and appropriate but also troubling because the Afrikaners didn’t really “find” Mandela. It took several months before the answer came to me. Show me the Palestinian to whom you Israelis are willing to lose, and I will to show you your Palestinian Mandela.

My friend had overlooked the fact that Mandela and the African National Congress had won in South Africa. The decisive element in the so-called miracle was that white South Africans had, in one way or another, accepted this outcome and had made it, if not their victory, then certainly something other than their defeat.

Much has been written about the many factors that drove the process forward, but no one would deny that Mandela’s leadership played a decisive role. Although he was offered his freedom numerous times if he would just give up the struggle against apartheid, it was a deal that only a quisling would make. Made of sterner stuff, Mandela refused to make the fundamental concession that the Afrikaners sought.

De Klerk’s decision to release Mandela unconditionally came in response to the unrest that had rendered the country ungovernable. De Klerk had hoped to engage Mandela in a lengthy process of negotiation in which he could be coaxed into making critical compromises. Nevertheless, after many ups and downs, it was de Klerk, not Mandela, who made the fundamental compromises.

How did this unbelievable turn of events come about? I think that a fundamental shift took place in the way de Klerk saw Mandela. De Klerk came to power thinking that Mandela was the only African who could make the concessions needed to keep Afrikaner South Africa afloat. Slowly, he came to see Mandela instead as the African who could give Afrikaners a future they could live with.

Mandela let no opportunity pass to talk about the place of white South Africans in the new South Africa. He emphasized time and again that majority rule did not mean the domination of the white minority by a black majority. Seeking a “middle ground between white fears and black hopes,” Mandela laid the very foundation for peace—“We do not want to drive you into the sea”—because there would be no peace unless white South Africans heard and believed his words.

In virtually every statement, Mandela presented a vision of the future in which white South Africans would be appreciated and respected. Those who heard him felt that they, their family, and their community could have a satisfying and secure life in what he was describing. Rather than offering concessions that would prop up the old, Mandela was offering a future to many who had begun to doubt that they had one.

It is worth noting that Mandela had no particular liking or even personal respect for de Klerk. Their relationship was often rancorous, especially at crucial moments toward the end of the negotiations. Indeed, Mandela went so far as to say publicly that de Klerk was “not fit to be a head of a government,” and yet his worst nightmare was that de Klerk might not be there when he needed him. Mandela confessed, “Whether I like him or not is irrelevant. I need him.”

Israelis need to find a Palestinian Mandela, and Palestinians need to find an Israeli Mandela. However, the Mandela they need to find is not the leader who will make the concessions they seek but the one to whom they can make the concessions they say they cannot offer. Mandela was this kind of leader: His actions and unequivocal words gave witness to a future that Afrikaners could embrace without fear.

Progress toward peace between the Israelis and Palestinians is not stalled because no one can envision the final settlement. Every thoughtful observer knows that some rough approximation of the Clinton formula is the only deal possible. The question is not so much what is needed—this much is known. The real question is who will lead us there.

What nuclear threats do we face today? America went to war because its leadership believed Iraq had nuclear and other weapons of mass destruction. We are reminded daily of the potential dangers of Iran turning its quest for nuclear energy into a weapons capability. We are locked in a deep struggle to get North Korea to give up its nuclear status demonstrated in last fall’s test. Concerns about Russia’s nuclear arsenal are resurfacing. And, we are constantly reminded that we must wage America’s “war on terror” to avoid the nexus of international terrorism and nuclear weapons.

All nuclear threats are not alike. How do these and other nuclear threats compare in terms of severity or likelihood? And how can we effectively address them? It is useful to think of today’s nuclear threats at three levels. First is an all-out exchange of nuclear warheads—hundreds of them—that would destroy civilization as we know it. Next is a limited, but still disastrous exchange—tens of warheads —that would create levels of destruction not seen since World War II. The third level is the use of one or several nuclear bombs, which would threaten our way of life. Reframing the nuclear threat in this way allows us to gauge our level of concern and formulate meaningful preventive strategies.

An all-out nuclear exchange could occur today only between the United States and Russia, which still maintain many thousands of warheads in their nuclear inventories. A nuclear war between these two countries represents the only existential threat to the United States.

The end of the Cold War rendered this threat highly improbable but not impossible. An accidental or unauthorized launch followed by a response is still possible. To eliminate this threat, the United States and Russia should follow through on detargeting and commit to de-alerting their nuclear forces—to remove them from high alert status that allows a launch within minutes to pre-identified targets.

The two nations should commit to making major reductions in their nuclear stockpiles and eventually eliminating them. In the midst of the Cold War, President Ronald Reagan and Soviet General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev reduced their stockpiles and even came close to an agreement to lead the world in abolishing nuclear weapons. Last January in a Wall Street Journal op-ed, George Shultz, William J. Perry, Henry Kissinger, and Sam Nunn called for a renewal of that vision by outlining steps to be taken now.

To move more rapidly toward much smaller numbers, I would add that leaders in both nations should undertake a zero-base nuclear assessment that would answer this question: If you were creating a stockpile from scratch today, how many weapons would you need to meet the current threat? Such a calculus would yield much lower numbers than trying to decide how many weapons you can live without. U.S. and Russian nuclear postures toward China should also carefully avoid provoking a Chinese nuclear buildup.

An exchange of tens of nuclear warheads is somewhat less improbable than nuclear war between Russia and the United States. But at this level, potential confrontations include nuclear exchanges between India and Pakistan, or between the United States and China—over Taiwan, for example, or on Russia’s southern border, or in the Middle East, between Israel and possibly Iran in the future. To limit the possibilities, it is crucial to stop more countries from acquiring nuclear weapons. The fewer fingers on the nuclear trigger, the better.

The United States should play a leading role in reinforcing the nuclear nonproliferation regime, centered on the 37-year-old Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), which allows a country to come within a whisker of building a bomb. A global expansion of nuclear power will pose additional challenges to the system. We need new rules of engagement for expanding nuclear power, including viable international controls on uranium enrichment and plutonium reprocessing.

To encourage non-nuclear weapon states to keep their end of the NPT bargain and refrain from acquiring the bomb, the five nuclear weapon states must show a greater commitment to working in good faith toward eventual elimination of their arsenals, as pledged under Article VI of the treaty.

Security guarantees from the United States and other nuclear weapon states can help curb some countries’ nuclear ambitions by alleviating fears of invasion by major world powers or by regional foes. India and Pakistan—two nuclear weapon states that aren’t parties to the NPT—should continue to pursue confidence-building measures to avoid miscalculation and potential nuclear war. We should help realize the nuclear-free zones that states are calling for in the Middle East, on the Korean peninsula, in Central Asia and in as many other regions as possible.

The United States and other states with nuclear weapons can also lower the risk of limited war by declaring a no-first-use policy, reserving nuclear weapons only as weapons of last resort.

The use of one or several nuclear bombs today is more likely than it was during the Cold War. If detonated in a big city, the damage would be catastrophic. Humankind would survive such a catastrophe, but it could gravely threaten our way of life. A country or a terrorist group in possession of a rudimentary nuclear bomb could deliver such a weapon in a van, boat, or plane. North Korea could do so, in desperation; Israel could do so in response to an existential threat; and under current doctrine, the United States or Russia could do so in response to a chemical, biological, or radiological attack. More likely, and hence of greater concern, is that terrorists would use a nuclear bomb, if they could get one.

The most likely route for terrorists to acquire a bomb is to devise one from stolen or diverted fissile materials. Theft or diversion of a ready-made weapon is far less likely.Building a rudimentary bomb is not easy but is judged to be within the capabilities of some sophisticated terrorist groups if they are able to obtain fissile materials.

Although it is widely recognized that keeping bomb materials out of terrorists’ hands is essential, the difficulty of doing so, especially from a technical standpoint, is not well understood. Only a few tens of kilograms of plutonium or highly enriched uranium are required for a bomb, yet almost 2 million kilograms of each exist in the world today, and some of it is not adequately secured. Securing these materials requires greater commitment to nuclear materials safeguards by all countries that possess them. It calls for greater urgency to protect and eventually eliminate highly enriched uranium in research reactors and facilities around the world. Bilateral or multilateral sting operations to intercept nuclear black market trade may help locate material already outside of state control. International cooperation in building databases and detection systems will improve nuclear forensics and attribution.

Each level of nuclear threat implies a different strategy of prevention. But three common aspects emerge as priorities for national and international policymaking:

• The fewer nuclear weapons, the better.
• The fewer fingers on a nuclear trigger, the better.
• Keeping fissile materials out of terrorists’ hands is essential.

Finally, this is not a problem for the United States alone to solve. It can only be solved through international cooperation.

Suicide bomb ers are not all alike . Palestinians prepare elaborate martyr videos before their killings and become celebrities afterward, while Iraqi Sunnis kill their fellow citizens in obscurity. In Afghanistan, the suicide bombers have their own distinction: They are known for their ineptness, often blowing themselves up without killing anyone else.

“They’re not efficient,” said Martha Crenshaw, a senior fellow at the Center for International Security and Cooperation (CISAC) at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies. She arrived at Stanford this summer, after several decades of studying terrorism as a professor of government at Wesleyan University in Middletown, Conn.

Afghan suicide bombers tend to be poorer, younger and less educated than suicide bombers elsewhere, Crenshaw said during a recent CISAC seminar. She cited a United Nations report that accused the Taliban of strapping explosives to boys, despite a commitment not to recruit those too young to have facial hair. Promises of motorcycles and cell phones have been used as inducements.

One boy whose mission failed was interviewed by U.N. workers. “He somehow thought he would survive the attack and get to spend the money they had promised him, not quite understanding that he would not be there,” Crenshaw said in an interview following her talk.

In Afghanistan, as elsewhere, the person wearing the explosives belt or driving the car bomb is the least valuable person in the terror group, Crenshaw said. The key people are the bomb maker and the organizer: “They never send the bomb maker with the bomb.” In Israel, security officials target the bomb makers for assassination.

“It’s the organization that decides who’s going to be attacked and when and where and why,” Crenshaw said. “Then they recruit somebody to carry it out. So the person carrying the bomb really is just a foot soldier.”

Afghanistan’s most famous suicide attack happened in 2001, just two days before the 9/11 assault on the United States. Al-Qaida operatives masquerading as journalists preemptively blew up tribal warlord Ahmad Shah Massoud in anticipation that he might aid U.S. troops if they eventually invaded Afghanistan in search of Osama bin Laden.

Today, al-Qaida, the Taliban and Hizb-i-Islami (the group led by Gulbuddin Hekmatyar) aim their suicide attacks at U.S. and Afghan government forces, but the victims are overwhelmingly civilian bystanders, often large numbers of children. Many of the bombers, Crenshaw said, are recruited from religious schools across the border in Pakistan.

The predominant motivation for terrorists to employ suicide attacks is strategic, not religious, according to Crenshaw. One suicide bomber kills many people, a perfect example of what the U.S. military calls asymmetric warfare. According to the United Nations, since the 1980s suicide bombers have been involved in only 4 percent of the world’s terror attacks, but have caused 29 percent of the deaths.

Crenshaw gave her CISAC talk the day of the bloody suicide-bomber attack on Pakistani opposition leader Benazir Bhutto. With some 140 deaths and 500 injuries, it was the deadliest of more than 50 suicide attacks in Pakistan in recent years. Bhutto survived without injury, but if she had died, the volatile country could have come unglued, according to Crenshaw. “It shows you how one major suicide bombing could make a big difference,” she said.

Her interest in terrorism began in graduate school in the late 1960s. Her first book, Revolutionary Terrorism (Hoover Institution Press, 1978), was on guerilla warfare against the French during the Algerian war for independence from 1954 to 1962. It still sells on Amazon, for $100.

How does one research suicide bombers, since most of them, by definition, are dead? “We don’t have very many studies that are based on extensive interviews,” Crenshaw said. The one well-known body of work based on interviews involves failed Palestinian suicide bombers held in Israeli prisons. But the prisoners have told their stories so often that it is difficult to separate truth from imagination, according to Crenshaw.

Scholars of terrorism in general can turn to trial transcripts, databases of newspaper stories or the “Harmony Project” documents captured from al-Qaida and posted online by the U.S. Military Academy at West Point.

But less has been written specifically about suicide bombers. “In Iraq, it’s very difficult to know who they were, even. They’re dead and they’re blown to bits, too,” Crenshaw said. “You might not have a hand with fingerprints, for example. Surprisingly enough, often they do seem to find heads. But still, how do you identify someone in Iraq, where you don’t have a record of who the population is to begin with? There are no identity cards, no nothing. Really, we’re just guessing.”

The predominant motivation for terrorists to employ suicide attacks is strategic, not religious, according to Martha Crenshaw.

Crenshaw’s most recent paper, “Explaining Suicide Terrorism: A Review Essay” (Security Studies, Vol. 16, No. 1, January 2007), relied on the bookstore: She bought and read 13 books about suicide bombers, then produced a review of them all as a guide to other researchers.

CRENSHAW'S RESEARCH AGENDA
Why is the United States the target of terrorism? Crenshaw is answering this question, as a lead investigator with the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism at the University of Maryland, a Department of Homeland Security Center of Excellence. Her research focuses on groups that have targeted the United States or its interests since the mid-1960s, placing incidents in context by comparing them with instances in which groups displayed similar anti-American ideas but did not resort to terrorism.
"Contrary to popular belief, only about 10 percent of active terrorist groups have targeted the United States," she says. "You have to get into the local politics to see what's going on" with anti-U.S. terrorism abroad. Such attacks can be aimed at the local regime, she explained.
Crenshaw is also editing a book tentatively titled The Consequences of Counterterrorist Policies in Democracies, to be published by the Russell Sage Foundation which supported the research.
And "The Debate over ‘New' versus ‘Old' Terrorism," a paper Crenshaw presented at the 2007 American Political Science Association meeting, is set to appear in an edited volume. Crenshaw questions common claims that terrorism in recent years has taken on a completely new character, more religious and lethal.
"Terrorism has changed over time, but there is no fundamental difference between ‘old' and ‘new' terrorism," she said. Researchers and policymakers should "ask why some groups cause large numbers of civilian casualties and others do not," she said, "rather than assuming that religious beliefs are the explanation for lethality."

The diplomatic initiative launched by President Bush in the wake of North Korea's nuclear weapon test in October 2006 has made substantial progress in rolling back the nation's drive to become a nuclear power.

That success, however, will be for naught if the administration fails to follow through on promises it made to encourage the Democratic People's Republic of Korea to destroy its nuclear weapons programs. The United States must honor its commitments in order to begin normalizing relations with North Korea.

Unfortunately, a recent barrage of criticism against the administration's policy aims to derail this process. Even as Pyongyang has taken more than 80 percent of the required steps to disable its Yongbyon nuclear weapons facilities, the fulfillment of US obligations has stalled.

The critics who want to stymie all forward movement, are, for the most part, the same specialists who can take credit for jettisoning in 2003 the agreement with North Korea, known as the 1994 Agreed Framework, which had stopped its plutonium production for almost a decade. Only after the collapse of the Agreed Framework did the North Koreans process the fissile material needed to build and test nuclear weapons. Three years later, in 2006, the president adopted a more realistic policy that is now under attack.

Many of the policy's critics denounce a declaration of the North's nuclear programs that has not yet been finished and argue that we must have clarity about North Korea's role in the construction of a Syrian nuclear facility and its uranium enrichment path to nuclear weapons.

Whatever the role of Korea in the Syrian reactor project, that facility no longer exists. Israel destroyed it last September.

Last year, the United States downgraded from medium to low its confidence level that North Korea continues to pursue a uranium enrichment program. In October, Pyongyang allowed US inspectors into a missile factory, where it said that aluminum tubes suspected of being used in that program were being remade into missile parts. North Korea handed over aluminum samples that later showed traces of enriched uranium, but analysis was inconclusive.

The United States apparently has secured Pyongyang's agreement to pursue these types of "clarifying" activities. Moreover, China has agreed on the importance of a verification regime aimed at assuring a "complete and correct" declaration, and a key goal of the next round of talks would be to fashion that regime.

Recent developments are even more impressive. On May 8, the North Koreans passed to a US State Department official a trove of 18,822 pages of operating records for the Yongbyon 5MWe reactor and reprocessing plant, which date back to 1986. That is 18,822 pages more than we ever had before, and begins a verification process previously impossible.

Also, the International Atomic Energy Agency and US nuclear experts have overseen the shutdown and continuing disablement of all key plutonium production facilities at Yongbyon. Discussions have been held to ship out the monitored unused reactor fuel rods.

If diplomacy is to succeed, Washington needs to begin delivering on some of the promises it has made as part of the Six-Party agreements. It must move toward normalizing relations with Pyongyang: That means beginning "the process of removing the designation of the DPRK as a state-sponsor of terrorism" and starting to "advance the process of terminating the application of the Trading with the Enemy Act with respect to the DPRK."

We know that North Korea seeks better relations with the United States to create the environment essential to facilitate economic recovery, give it more diplomatic space, and smooth the way for an upcoming political succession. Since the New York Philharmonic concert in Pyongyang last February, it has begun portraying the United States in a more positive light to its own people, laying the groundwork for a major breakthrough in relations with the United States.

This breakthrough is needed if the United States is to achieve its ultimate objective: to cap, roll back, and completely eliminate the North's nuclear weapons program.

Critics in Washington, like those in Pyongyang, are afraid of exploring the future and only want to cling to the past. That isn't the way out.

John W. Lewis, professor emeritus at Stanford University, is coauthor of "Negotiating with North Korea: 1992-2007."

The Bush administration's North Korea strategy is being criticized from the right and the left for letting Pyongyang off the hook. Some advocate scuttling the six-party talks. Others suggest slowing our own compliance with the agreement to get North Korea to make a full declaration of its nuclear program first. We disagree with both positions. Our mantra should be: It's the plutonium, stupid.

North Korea does have the bomb -- but a limited nuclear arsenal and supply of plutonium to fuel its weapons. The Yongbyon plutonium production facilities are closed and partially disabled.

In separate visits to North Korea in February, we concluded that the disablement was extensive and thorough. We also learned that Pyongyang is prepared to move to the next crucial step of dismantling Yongbyon, eliminating plutonium production. This would mean no more bombs, no better bombs and less likelihood of export. After this success, we can concentrate on getting full declarations and on rolling back Pyongyang's supply of weapons and plutonium.

We must not miss this opportunity, because we have the chance to contain the risk posed by North Korea's arsenal while we work to eliminate it. As dismantlement proceeds, negotiations should focus concurrently on the plutonium declaration, the extent of the uranium enrichment effort and Pyongyang's nuclear exports.

Pyongyang's declaration of 30 kilograms of plutonium (sufficient for roughly four to five bombs) falls short of the estimate of 40 to 50 kilograms, based on our past visits. We believe that North Korea is prepared to produce operating records and permit access to facilities, equipment and waste sites for verification. Obtaining and verifying its declaration of plutonium production and inventories is imperative. Let's proceed.

Pyongyang continues to claim that it has made no efforts to enrich uranium, despite strong evidence to the contrary. Although it appears unlikely that these efforts reached a scale that constitutes a weapons threat, a complete accounting is required. Dismantlement of the Yongbyon facilities should not, however, be postponed to resolve this issue. In October 2002, the Bush administration accused North Korea of covert uranium enrichment, only to have Pyongyang withdraw from the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and produce plutonium to fuel the arsenal that we are now attempting to eliminate.

Nuclear exports are of greater concern. As recently revealed evidence demonstrates, North Korea sold nuclear technology to Syria, much as it sold missile technology. North Korea must cooperate if we are to get to the bottom of the Syrian incident and ensure that it is not repeated elsewhere. Israel eliminated the Syrian threat, for now, by bombing the reactor at Al Kibar. But it is imperative that Pyongyang reveal the nature and extent of its export operations and, most important, whether it has similar deals underway with Iran.

We do not advocate letting Pyongyang off the hook, but a "confession" regarding Syria is not the critical issue. We have good knowledge of what the North Koreans supplied to Syria. What we really need is information from North Korea that will help us deal with potential threats. For example, was North Korea acting alone, or was it part of a more sophisticated proliferation ring involving Pyongyang's trading partners and suppliers? North Korea's leadership must resolve all three declaration issues fully, and these will take time to verify.

To ultimately succeed in the peaceful elimination of nuclear weapons, we must understand why North Korea devoted its limited resources to going nuclear. The September 2005 six-party joint statement addresses many of these concerns, promising mutual respect for national sovereignty, peaceful coexistence, and a commitment to stability and lasting peace in Northeast Asia, as well as normalization of relations. Given the acrimonious history of our relations, such steps require a transformation in the relationship between North Korea and the United States, a change that will first require building trust -- step by step.

The six-party negotiations have put us on that path, and there is much evidence of winds of change blowing in North Korea that will make navigating that path easier (the recent New York Philharmonic concert in Pyongyang is one such symbol of change; the joint industrial facility at Kaesong is another). But North Korea's reluctance to provide full declarations and the Syria revelations have moved us in the wrong direction.

Nevertheless, walking away from the talks or slowing them at this point would be counterproductive. Instead, in its remaining months, the Bush administration should focus on limiting North Korea's nuclear capabilities by concluding the elimination of plutonium production. If it can also get answers on the Syrian operation and resolve the question of uranium enrichment, it will put the next administration in a stronger position to finally end the nuclear threat from North Korea.

Siegfried S. Hecker and William J. Perry are with the Center for International Security and Cooperation at Stanford University. Hecker was director of the Los Alamos National Laboratory from 1986 through 1997. Perry was secretary of defense from 1994 through 1997.