For years there's been a broad bipartisan consensus that the combined problems of "loose nukes" -- weapons and materials that aren't adequately secured -- and the "brain drain" of Russian scientists -- some of whom are being lured by governments like Iran and Iraq to make those nations nuclear powers -- pose the greatest threat to national security that the U.S. faces.

That's why there's now bipartisan alarm at President Bush's decision to cut $100 million from highly successful federal programs that keep tabs on Russia's nuclear weapons and material and prevent those materials from falling into the hands of hostile states and terrorists.

The cuts are part of the administration's 2001 budget, which was approved by Congress last Thursday. Many in the security field are particularly distressed by the cuts to the Department of Energy's Nuclear Nonproliferation Office, which oversees a variety of programs dealing with both the "loose nukes" and the "brain drain" problems, in Russia especially.

These programs have traditionally received widespread bipartisan support -- so much so that in the past, Congress has allocated more than the agency has requested. Now it will face cuts of more than $60 million to its programs in Russia alone, just as those in the field say those programs are most needed and gaining momentum.

Cuts to these programs come at the same time that Bush is trying to sell allies on a multibillion-dollar missile defense system to combat nuclear ballistic missile attacks. On Monday the administration reaffirmed that it would construct a missile defense, despite a chilly response from Russia. Russian officials complain that such a system would violate the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, the hallmark agreement of arms control, and have threatened to stop reducing their own nuclear stockpile if the U.S. pursues such a plan.

Furthermore, intelligence reports indicate that the most likely form of nuclear attack the U.S. could face would not involve ballistic missiles, but would likely come under the radar of such a defense system.

Sen. Pete Domenici, R-N.M., the Budget Committee chairman and key founder of the Department of Energy's nonproliferation programs, is expected to fight to restore the cuts. "The whole idea of cutting programs before policy reviews are completed is of great concern," Domenici said in a public statement last Friday.

The New Mexico senator says he is "very hopeful" that such a review will show that increasing funding for the programs is "not only appropriate, but urgently needed." At a conference of the Institute of Nuclear Materials Management in Washington on Wednesday, Domenici will call for restoring at least some of the cuts.

But it won't be an easy task. Nonproliferation programs will have to vie for part of the same pie that will be split among all of the Department of Energy's programs -- cleanup of nuclear sites within the U.S., scientific research at the national laboratories -- not to mention efforts to deal with the nation's energy crisis. No matter how grave the national security issues involved may be, the issue arises at a time when the most pressing energy concerns facing the public are high gas prices and the West Coast electricity outages.

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