A careful sifting of the Bush Administration's 1,300-page budget proposal shows that it intends to cut Department of Energy spending to curb proliferation of nuclear weapons 11%, or $100 million. But several programs directed to Russian nuclear weapons and former weapons scientists would be cut even deeper.

	PAY US Russian scientists from the nuclear city Arzamas-16 took to the streets of Moscow demanding long-overdue salary payments in fall 1998. Conditions haven't improved much since then. ITAR-TASS PHOTO

For instance, the "nuclear cities initiative" is slated for a 75% reduction--from $26.6 million to $6.6 million.

The program's goal is to create alternative employment opportunities for Russian nuclear scientists living and working in 10 "nuclear" cities where weapons design and production had been their livelihood. DOE had focused on three cities; the Bush proposal would focus on only one and spend less on it.

Other programs include one to secure weapons-usable nuclear materials by upgrading security where the materials are now stored. The proposal calls for a $31 million cut to $139 million.

A portion of this program addresses a U.S.-Russian deal to destroy or immobilize 50 tons of excess plutonium in both countries. The Bush proposal would end funding to immobilize the U.S. share, but double funding for a mixed oxide fuel fabrication facility to prepare plutonium as fuel for civilian nuclear power reactors, an approach opposed by many in Congress. Russian plutonium disposition would get a 5% increase to $57 million by using funds set aside by Congress in 1999 but never spent.

Also proposed for cuts are R&D demonstration programs to reduce the threat of chemical and biological weapons. These programs would be reduced by 30% to $28 million.

Whether the proposal will stand is unclear. Sen. Pete V. Domenici (R-N.M.), chairman of the Budget Committee and the appropriations subcommittee that deals with the DOE budget, calls the nonproliferation cuts "troubling" and says he will seek to restore the $100 million.

"There is no more important issue," he comments, "than to help the Russians protect and properly dispose of their nuclear materials and capabilities."

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