The challenges associated with defining what is a "nuclear weapon" or "nuclear explosive device" have more recently driven efforts to instead consider what a nuclear weapon is not. If characteristics regarding what is a non-nuclear object could be determined without requiring access to sensitive information, efforts to secure weapon-usable fissile material stocks would be strengthened. Here we will explore practical verification tools for determining the nuclear nature of objects declared non-nuclear by a host state. While the existing tools, such as those used in New START, rely on prior knowledge of some attributes of nuclear objects (e.g., the presence of a certain amount of plutonium), the proposed arrangement does not require this. Instead, it relies on a "non-nuclear template" that is constructed from a reference non-nuclear object provided by the host that can be closely examined or disassembled by inspectors. This approach is able to verify that an item presented for inspection does not contain nuclear materials, with the associated reference object allowing the use of intrusive active interrogation techniques while protecting information about the inspected object.
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