I think we’re heading for a scary certainty that Burma has a nuclear weapons program. James Fallows from the Atlantic has a detailed blog post up on nuclear weapons in Burma, citing a new report from the Bangkok Post. Fallows cites both the Bangkok Post report and the insight of an informed friend who works in defense-related efforts, concluding “We have seen in recent world history the danger of leaping to conclusions about which dangerous regimes have what new weaponry. But to me this was news worth putting on the worry-scope…”
The Arms Control Wonk blog also has a post on Burma, examining a “big odd box” – a building with possibly nuclear purposes. First mentioned by the Sydney Morning Herald, among other sources, the building could be the basis of a nuclear reactor. It could also relate to Burma’s mysterious tunnels, that we talked about in a previous post.
Now I caveat. None of this is certainty; it’s just people speculating about open-source information. And while a lot of knowledgeable people seem to be worried about this, there’s no consensus. Andrew Seith, author of Burma and Nuclear Proliferation: Policies and Perceptions and a Research Fellow at the Griffith Asia Institute thinks that the evidence is weak.