WASHINGTON — Presidents, ex-presidents and near-presidents tend to win the Nobel Prize for Peace, and Sam Nunn isn’t any of those. But because of his efforts to curb the spread of nuclear weapons, the former Georgia senator has had multiple nominations.

Nunn’s steady, determined advocacy is the sort of work that tends to get the attention of those Scandinavian judges. A moderate-to-conservative Democrat, he can hardly be considered a naïve peacenik. Yet, he has dedicated himself to the proposition, distant though it may be, of a world free of nuclear weapons.

Nunn, who left the Senate in 1997, has exerted considerable influence on the policies championed by President Obama. They met shortly after Obama was elected to the U.S. Senate in 2004, when he called Nunn and asked for a meeting. Though Nunn didn’t end up in the Obama cabinet, he has continued his role as a trusted, if informal, adviser.

When Obama held a high-level summit in April to try to focus heads of state on rounding up nuclear materials that might easily fall into the hands of terrorists, it sounded as though he had taken a page from the Nuclear Threat Initiative, the organization that Nunn heads. The non-profit group, founded by Nunn and Ted Turner in 2001, has, among other things, emphasized the dangers posed by nuclear weapons that might be smuggled into the United States.

“I have thought for many years that a nuclear explosion in the U.S. is much more likely to come from (terrorists) with no return address. Even back in the early ’90s, I thought so,” Nunn told me.

While small nukes figure prominently in Hollywood thrillers from “24” to “The Sum of All Fears,” no previous U.S. president had ever raised the issue to such notice before. But Nunn is modest about his contributions to Obama’s policies.

“We have helped, hopefully, to inspire him,” he told me. “We are very gratified to have a president who gets out front on this. That’s real leadership.”

Nunn believes the nuclear summit was a success.

“Obama made progress that is measurable. . . It is an unusual thing when a president gets out front and helps to prevent a catastrophe. . . .The U.S. is probably the greatest country in the world at reacting after a disaster (but) there isn’t a whole lot of (political) payoff to preventing something that people aren’t aware may happen,” he said.

Given his expertise on nuclear proliferation and the continuing esteem of his former colleagues, Nunn may be asked to testify before the Senate on the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START), which he supports. Hammered out earlier this year between President Obama and Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, the treaty calls for a reduction in the nuclear arsenals of both countries.

Hardliners who cannot give up the old U.S.-Soviet conflict have already blasted the treaty, as have Republican opportunists who want to damage Obama and those who want to cement their standing with a militaristic GOP base. Mitt Romney, who fits easily in the latter two categories, authored an essay in Tuesday’s Washington Post saying New START could be Obama’s “worst foreign policy mistake yet,” claiming that it “gives Russia a massive nuclear weapon advantage over the United States.”

While he expects intense opposition to New START, Nunn says he is nevertheless “cautiously optimistic” about its chances for eventual Senate ratification.

“It seems to me there are at least 10 to 15 Republicans who are taking a serious look at it. The Joint Chiefs are favorable. The head of missile defense efforts has testified that nothing in it would impede our missile defense work. Obama and Biden have taken a vigorous position on making sure our (nuclear) weapons are safe, secure and reliable . . .I think all of that adds up to cautious optimism.”

Without a New START treaty, the U.S. will have no mechanism for inspecting Russia’s nuclear arsenal. That, alone, should persuade some skeptics.

In any event, Nunn says, “we have ample numbers of nuclear weapons” and that will still be true if the treaty is ratified. If we give up some, we might more easily persuade other nations to do the same.

http://blogs.ajc.com/cynthia-tucker/2010/07/07/sam-nunns-fingerprints-on-obamas-nuclear-policy/