Nuclear Disarmament

Todays Globe and Mail responded to President Barack Obama’s Prague speech on nuclear disarmament with an editorial entitled, “The bomb is here to stay.” Mr. Obama, the editorial declares, “cannot seriously believe that a world without nuclear weapons is possible.” The following was sent to the G&M as a letter to the editor.

The American commitment to “a world without nuclear weapons” is not the invention of President Obama (The bomb is here to stay, April 6); it predates his Prague speech by a full four decades.

The Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), negotiated in 1968, mandates the elimination of nuclear weapons. In 2000 the US and other nuclear weapon states again pledged “the total elimination of their nuclear arsenals.”

Rather than “Obamaian Utopiansim,” detailed measures to reduce and eliminate nuclear arsenals are a belated nod to hard core realism. For there can be no credible expectation that the measures your editorial applauds – a test ban, an end to the production of weapons-grade fissile materials, effective controls over existing nuclear materials – could be sustained in a world where some states continue to refine and deploy nuclear arsenals.

It is not Wilsonian idealism but “Kissingerian realism” that your editorialist should invoke. A year ago Henry Kissinger, with such icons of mainstream American security thinking as George Shultz, William Perry, and Sam Nunn, concluded that “without the vision of moving toward zero, we will not find the essential cooperation required to stop our downward spiral” toward greater insecurity.

You welcome a plan to strengthen the NPT, but it is utopianism of the worst order to believe this can be achieved while ignoring Article VI of the treaty – that is, the disarmament article.

That is why, for example, the UK Government has undertaken a major 6-step initiative “to accelerate disarmament amongst possessor states, to prevent proliferation to new states and to ultimately achieve a world that is free from nuclear weapons.” Among the steps is a full examination of the verification measures and institutions required for complete nuclear disarmament – that is, for nuclear weapons to be subject to the same prohibitions as chemical and biological weapons. Would that the Canadian Government would join the effort (Halting Nuclear Madness: Where’s Canada?, April 6).

As anticipated,[i] the just concluded 60thAnniversary NATO Summit in France and Germany launched a process to review the Alliance’s Strategic Concept, including its nuclear weapons doctrine, with a view to adopting a new strategy at the next Summit.

The final paragraph of the declaration on Alliance Security[ii] speaks of “renovating the Alliance,” which begs the obvious question of why further renovate a house whose original design has long given way to a series of unwieldy lean-tos and whose function has little relevance to a dramatically changed neighborhood. But in the meantime and until that basic questioned is addressed, NATO’s nuclear chamber certainly needs some serious attention.

“A broad-based group of qualified experts” is to assist the Secretary-General who, in turn and in consultations with NATO states, is to develop the new Strategic Concept for approval at the Portugal summit a year from now.

The much longer Summit Declaration,[iii] which also promises a new Strategic Concept, devotes only one of its 62 paragraphs (para 55) to nuclear issues, but it does include a welcome repetition of earlier declarations that “arms control, disarmament and non-proliferation will continue to make an important contribution to peace, security, and stability” (para 54). The nuclear paragraph reaffirms the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and calls on NATO members to work constructively toward a successful outcome for the 2010 Review Conference. The NATO leaders point out that the arsenals of member states have been “dramatically reduced” and they promise an ongoing commitment “to all objectives enshrined in the Treaty.” They also call for universal adherence to the International Atomic Energy Agency’s “Additional Protocol” – an agreement to allow more intrusive and effective inspections of nuclear facilities. Both Iran and North Korea are called on to adhere to all relevant UN Security Council Resolutions.

A re-reading of the current Strategic Concept, adopted by the Washington NATO Summit in 1999,[iv] leaves little doubt of the need for major nuclear renovation. Eight of its paragraphs include substantive references to nuclear weapons, all reflecting an architectural style firmly rooted in the 1980s.

The 1999 document argues (para 46) that, due to “the diversity of risks with which the Alliance could be faced, it must maintain the forces necessary to ensure credible deterrence and to provide a wide range of conventional response options.” It then goes on to say, “the Alliance’s conventional forces alone cannot ensure credible deterrence. Nuclear weapons make a unique contribution in rendering the risks of aggression against the Alliance incalculable and unacceptable. Thus, they remain essential to preserve peace.”

Deterrence is presented as a broad, essentially open-ended, threat to use nuclear weapons against any aggressor – including, by implication, non-nuclear weapon states. The ultimate deterrent, i.e., “the supreme guarantee of the security of the Allies,” is described as being “provided by the strategic nuclear forces of the Alliance, particularly those of the United States” (para 62) – which, in the context of NATO expansion to the east, means the post-Cold War era has been one of the steady geographic expansion of the American nuclear “umbrella.”

The 1999 Strategic Concept sets out a commitment to the indefinite retention of nuclear weapons in Europe (para 46): “To protect peace and to prevent war or any kind of coercion, the Alliance will maintain for the foreseeable future an appropriate mix of nuclear and conventional forces based in Europe and kept up to date where necessary, although at a minimum sufficient level.”[v]

Current NATO strategy also holds that “nuclear forces based in Europe and committed to NATO provide an essential political and military link between the European and the North American members of the Alliance. The Alliance will therefore maintain adequate nuclear forces in Europe” (para 63).

The recent Obama-Medvedev statement[vi] is a measure of the extent to which NATO’s current retentionist nuclear doctrine is a serious security anachronism – out of date and out of place in the new security environment. Among other things, the American and Russian leaders declared the commitment of their “two countries to achieving a nuclear free world.” They also emphasized their support for the NPT, and called for negotiations toward “a verifiable[vii] treaty to end the production of fissile materials for nuclear weapons.” They emphasized the importance of the entry into force of the nuclear test ban treaty and US President Obama promised to work for American ratification.[viii] They also agreed to begin negotiations on a new Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START) with a view to reaching record low levels of legally binding limits on strategic nuclear weapons.

Language for a new NATO approach to nuclear weapons is available in the Obama-Medvedev statement, in the burgeoning anthology of nuclear abolition statements, and the logic on which the NPT itself was originally constructed – namely, that nuclear weapons, far from being “essential to preserve peace”, are ultimately an unacceptable risk to humanity, and that their elimination, not their retention, is essential to security.

Rather than asserting that the “strategic nuclear forces of the Alliance” are “the supreme guarantee of the security of the Allies,” NATO’s new Strategic Concept would do well to reflect the new reality articulated by Mikhail Gorbachev’s warning that “with every passing year [nuclear weapons] make our security more precarious.”[ix] Indeed, a new NATO statement could borrow from the 2008 statement by Henry Kissinger and his colleagues[x] and thus also acknowledge that “without the vision of moving toward zero, we will not find the essential cooperation required to stop our downward spiral” toward greater insecurity.

Over the course of the next year NATO states will have the opportunity to restate the vision and to make major efforts towards its realization.

eregehr@ploughshares.ca

Notes

[i] “NATO summit: a chance to kick the nuclear habit,” Disarmingconflict post, 18 February 2009. http://disarmingconflict.blogspot.com/2009_02_01_archive.html [ii] Declaration on Alliance Security, Issued by the Heads of State and Government participating in the meeting of the North Atlantic Council in Strasbourg/Kehl on 4 April 2009. http://www.nato.int/cps/en/natolive/news_52838.htm [iii] Strasbourg/Kehl Summit Declaration, Issued by the Heads of State and Government participating in the meeting of the North Atlantic Council in Strasbourg/Kehl on 4 April 2009. http://www.nato.int/cps/en/natolive/news_52837.htm [iv] NATO. 1999. The Alliance’s Strategic Concept, Approved by the Heads of State and Government participating in the meeting of the North Atlantic Council in Washington D.C. on 23rd and 24th April 1999. http://www.nato.int/docu/pr/1999/p99-065e.htm. [v] There are currently estimated to be between 150 and 240 nuclear weapons, all US B61 gravity bombs, held in five countries in Europe – Belgium, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, and Turkey. All of the European countries hosting US nuclear weapons are non-nuclear weapon state parties to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). [vi] Available at CBS News “Political Hotsheet.” 1 April 2009. http://www.cbsnews.com/blogs/2009/04/01/politics/politicalhotsheet/entry4909175.shtml [vii] Obama’s support for a “verifiable” treaty is a reversal of the Bush policy. [viii] Also a reversal of Bush policy. [ix] Gorbachev, Mikhail. 2007. The nuclear threat. The Wall Street Journal, January 31. http://online.wsj.com/article/SB117021711101593402.html#. [x] Shultz, George P., William J. Perry, Henry A Kissinger, and Sam Nunn. 2008. Toward a nuclear-free world. The Wall Street Journal, January 15. http://online.wsj.com/public/article_print/SB120036422673589947.html.

Some 2,000 of the world’s 25,000 nuclear warheads are on constant high alert on missiles that could be launched within minutes of an order to do so. Most governments and security experts have come to the conclusion that these missiles should be “de-alerted.” Why is Canada reluctant?

During the 2008 US election campaign, Candidate Barack Obama was unequivocal. “Keeping nuclear weapons ready to launch on a moment’s notice,” he said, “is a dangerous relic of the Cold War. Such policies increase the risk of catastrophic accidents or miscalculation.” He promised to “work with Russia in a mutual and verifiable manner to increase warning and decision time prior to the launch of nuclear weapons.”[i]

The New York Times yesterday urged the President to “unilaterally” take all US nuclear weapons off “hair-trigger alert.”[ii]

“Hair trigger” is not a technical term, but it does describe a dangerous reality. Bruce Blair, a foremost US expert on missile launch procedures, having been a U.S. Air Force nuclear launch officer, refers to the “launch-ready alert” status of hundreds of missiles carrying thousands of warheads – all in a state of readiness that would allow them to be “launched within a very few moments” of a decision to do so.[iii]

While some currently serving military leaders in the US[iv] are publicly resisting any effort toward across-the-board downgrades in alert status, former US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, along with other eminent and former Cold War security leaders in the United States, has called on Washington to “take steps to increase the warning and decision times for the launch of all nuclear-armed ballistic missiles, thereby reducing risks of accidental or unauthorized attacks. Reliance on launch procedures that deny command authorities sufficient time to make careful and prudent decisions is unnecessary and dangerous in today’s environment.”[v]

The danger is rooted in a “launch on warning” policy and capability. Because both the US and Russia fear that the other side could launch a pre-emptive strike to destroy all their missiles in their silos, they have made it known that they won’t leave the missiles in their silos in the event of an expected attack. They are fully prepared (that is, the systems are physically capable and they are politically willing) to launch their weapons out of their silos within minutes of a warning of a possible incoming attack.

All of this would have to happen in a matter of 10 to 15 minutes – when satellite sensors warn of an attack, already several minutes after a launch, the signal must be assessed, the information forwarded to the President, advice given, and a decision made whether or not to fire a retaliatory response. Depending on the launch site and target, a missile from Russia would be at the American target in less than 30 minutes.

If the decision was to retaliate, then the launch order would be given and the missiles fired – and once fired, there is no calling them back. If a minute later, the warning turned out to be mistaken, nuclear war would nevertheless have been launched, for the Russians would then detect an attack and launch their own retaliatory strike and the cataclysm beyond imagining would be our collective fate.

And false warnings do occur. In a widely reported 1995 incident, the Russian detection system mistook a Norwegian weather rocket for a US nuclear armed missile launched from a US submarine in the North Atlantic, heading for Russia. So convinced were the Russians that they were under attack, the warning was sent up the chain of command to the Russian President and the “nuclear briefcase” that contains the codes and retaliatory options was opened and ready for the President’s go ahead – mercifully, it was finally determined that the warning was a false alarm.[vi]

All 187 signatories to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, including Canada, were sufficiently convinced in 2000 of the dangers in such a scenario that they collectively called for “concrete measures” to “reduce the operational status of nuclear weapons,”[vii] so that it would be impossible to launch a missile within that timeline and before absolute confirmation of attack.

In 2007 and 2008 the UN General Assembly passed resolutions specifically focused on de-alerting, calling for “further practical steps to be taken to decrease the operational readiness of nuclear weapons systems, with a view to ensuring that all nuclear weapons are removed from high alert status.”[viii] Only three states – France, the UK, and the US – voted against it. Canada abstained.

Why the Government of Canada has chosen this moment of growing global momentum in support of de-alerting to withhold its support is far from clear. Declaring support for de-alerting in principle, Canada refused to support the de-alerting resolution because, it explained, of a need to “balance our disarmament objectives with our security obligations.”[ix]

For the 141 States that supported the resolution, security is the whole point of de-alerting. It is the current “launch-ready alert” status of these weapons that undermines global security, obviously because it opens up the possibility of a nuclear cataclysm triggered by a false alarm.

In explaining its action, Canada went on to say that it could not support the de-alerting resolution because “deterrence remains an important element of international security, and a fundamental component of the defence strategy of NATO.” As former Canadian Disarmament Ambassador and Senator, Douglas Roche, points out, however, “some of the most important non-nuclear NATO states (Germany, Norway, Italy, Spain) voted yes.”[x] Apparently they don’t regard it as inconsistent with deterrence. And, of course, it is clear that Henry Kissinger doesn’t think that de-alerting is somehow antithetical to deterrence. (The primary point about deterrence is that it is not threatened because even in the event of a pre-emptive strike against land-based missiles, both the US and Russia would have plenty of retaliatory capacity remaining on board submarines. Of course, the most pertinent point about deterrence is that when it has manifestly failed and a nuclear attack is definitely on its way, just what is the point – humanly, politically, morally – of adding to the catastrophe with a retaliatory strike?)

Canada did support a general resolution on nuclear disarmament which called for “the nuclear-weapon States to further reduce the operational status on nuclear weapons systems,”[xi] because this resolution adds the phrase, “in ways that promote international stability and security.” But a number of Canada’s NATO allies rightly conclude that “promoting international stability and security” is exactly what de-alerting does.

On the same day that the New York Times called for immediate de-alerting, a large international group of non-governmental organizations wrote a letter to the American and Russian leadership, warning that “it is unrealistic to assume that nuclear deterrence will work perfectly forever. With the passage of time, the use of nuclear weaponry, due to madness, malice, miscalculation, or malfunction becomes an inevitability. Thus it is imperative that as a first step towards reducing and eliminating the immense danger these weapons pose to all nations and peoples, that the US and Russia agree to remove their nuclear weapons from high-alert status.”[xii]

In the midst of this groundswell of global support for prudent and long overdue measures to prevent the accidental triggering of nuclear holocaust, Canada’s reluctance is unlikely to be decisive, but it is surely unseemly.

eregehr@ploughshares.ca

Notes
[i] “Arms Control Today 2008 Presidential Q&A: Democratic Nominee Barack Obama, 24 September 2008, http://www.armscontrol.org/system/files/20080924_ACT_PresidentialQA_Obama_Sept08.pdf.
[ii] “Watershed Moment on Nuclear Arms,” Editorial, New York Times, 25 March 2009.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/25/opinion/25wed1.html.
[iii] Bruce G. Blair, “A Rebuttal of the U.S. Statement on the Alert Status of U.S. Nuclear Forces.” World Security Institute, 13 October 2007. Available at the Lawyers Committee on Nuclear Policy (http://lcnp.org/disarmament/opstatus-blair.htm).
[iv] Elaine Mr. Grossman, “Top US General Spurns Obama Pledge to Reduce Nuclear Alert Posture,” Global Security Newswire, 27 February 2009. http://gsn.nti.org/gsn/nw_20090227_8682.php.
[v] Shultz, George P., William J. Perry, Henry A Kissinger and Sam Nunn. 2008. Toward a Nuclear-Free World. Wall Street Journal, January 15. http://online.wsj.com/public/article_print/SB120036422673589947.html.
[vi] Steven Starr, “High-alert nuclear weapons: the forgotten danger,” Scientists for Global Responsibility Newsletter. Issue 36, Autumn 2008 (e-mail distribution).
[vii] Steps 9.d of the practical steps agreed to at the Review Conference of the Parties to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons. 2000. Final Document. 24 May. http://f40.iaea.org/worldatom/Press/Events/Npt/NPT_Conferences/npt2000_final_doc.pdf.
[viii] “Decreasing the operational readiness of nuclear weapons systems,” UN General Assembly Resolution A/Res/63/41. 12 January 2009. http://daccessdds.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/N08/473/25/PDF/N0847325.pdf?OpenElement.
[ix] Ottawa’s reservations were set out in its 2008 “explanation of vote” statement in the First Committee regarding its abstention on the resolution “Decreasing the operational readiness of nuclear weapons systems” (A/C.1/63/L.5 and A/Res/63/41). http://www.reachingcriticalwill.org/political/1com/1com08/EOV/CanadaL5.pdf.
[x] Douglas Roche and Jim Wurst. “Canada and Nuclear Disarmament Analysis of Canada’s Votes in the U.N. Disarmament Committee 2007. A Paper Prepared for an Expert Seminar, “Restoring Canada’s Nuclear Disarmament Policies,” held in Ottawa, 3-4 February 2008. http://www.gsinstitute.org/mpi/pubs/2007_Canada_FC_votes.pdf.
[xi] “Renewed determination towards the total elimination of nuclear weapons,” UN General Assembly Resolution A/Res/63/73. 2 December 2008.
http://daccessdds.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/N08/475/17/PDF/N0847517.pdf?OpenElement.
[xii] “Letter by Organizations Worldwide to Obama, Medvedev, Putin, Biden, Lavrov and Clinton on Operating Status of Nuclear Weapon Systems,” 25 March 2009 (email distribution).

The international security community is undergoing a remarkable shift in professional judgment on the merits and possibility of abolishing nuclear weapons.

United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon took up that theme with a new directness when he told a New York audience of academics and diplomats in October 2008 that “a world free of nuclear weapons would be a global public good of the highest order.” He spoke of a nuclear “taboo,” recalled that the very first resolution of the UN General Assembly was a call for the elimination of all weapons of mass destruction, challenged nuclear weapon states to meet their disarmament obligations under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), and urged them to finally negotiate a global convention prohibiting all nuclear weapons.

In many ways more noteworthy was the statement in January 2007 (followed up in 2008) by former US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger (Shultz 2007), joined by three other senior American leaders in diplomacy and security affairs, to “endorse setting the goal of a world free of nuclear weapons and working energetically on the actions required to achieve that goal.” Former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev in turn endorsed their commitment to eliminate nuclear weapons: “It is becoming clearer that nuclear weapons are no longer a means of achieving security.” Although he did not name NATO, Gorbachev directly contradicted its claims with the further assertion that “in fact, with every passing year they make our security more precarious.”

A group of recently retired British generals has also rejected the United Kingdom’s nuclear weapons as “completely useless as a deterrent to the threats and scale of violence we currently, or are likely to, face.” The UK is in fact already engaged in examining the verification mechanisms needed to support the reliable elimination of nuclear weapons and Prime Minister Gordon Brown has promised UK leadership in an “international campaign to accelerate disarmament amongst possessor states, to prevent proliferation to new states, and to ultimately achieve a world that is free from nuclear weapons” (Brown, 2008). And in February the UK Foreign Secretary set out a six-point plan to rid the world of nuclear weapons (Guardian 2009).

Despite NATO’s formal doctrine that nuclear weapons are “essential” to “preserve peace,” most of its member states are non-nuclear weapon state signatories to the NPT and thus have already disavowed nuclear weapons for themselves. They still, according to current strategy, formally seek cover under Washington’s nuclear umbrella, but now even the US is led by an Administration committed, as the Obama White House website puts it, to pursuing the “goal of a world without nuclear weapons.” Indeed, the Obama Administration is preparing for talks to extend or replace the 1991 US-Soviet Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START), which expires in December. Reports suggest that “President Obama will convene the most ambitious arms reduction talks with Russia for a generation, aiming to verifiably slash each country’s stockpile of nuclear weapons by 80 per cent” (Reid 2009).

Political and military figures in Germany, including former Chancellor Helmut Schmidt, the United Kingdom, including three former Foreign Secretaries, Norway, Italy, and others, have all called for the elimination of all nuclear arsenals. So too has a former NATO Secretary-General, George Robertson, along with groups of Nobel Laureates and security and foreign policy professionals from many countries.

A recent global appeal, under the banner of Global Zero, supported by The Simons Foundation of Canada, declares that “to protect our children, our grandchildren and our civilization from the threat of nuclear catastrophe, we must eliminate all nuclear weapons globally. We therefore commit to working for a legally binding verifiable agreement, including all nations, to eliminate nuclear weapons by a date certain.” This is not only the sentiment of traditional disarmament advocates; rather it is the initiative of Richard Burt, chief arms negotiator for the first President Bush. He is joined by a diverse group, including, US SenatorChuck Hagel, former Canadian Foreign Affairs Minister Lloyd Axworthy, former US President Jimmy Carter, US author and academic Jonathan Schell, former US Defense Secretary Robert McNamara, Archbishop Desmond Tutu of South Africa, and dozens of others. A significant added feature of the Global Zero appeal is its call for a strict and accountable timeline.

Publics around the world, long alert to the nuclear danger, are by all accounts eager to support efforts to eliminate nuclear weapons. A survey of 21 key states found that 76 per cent of people questioned favour a global agreement that “all countries with nuclear weapons would be required to eliminate them according to a timetable,” while “all other countries would be required not to develop them” (World Public Opinion.Org 2008). Public support for the total elimination of nuclear weapons is higher than the global average in China, France, the UK, and the US, but lower than average in Russia and India (although still 69 per cent and 62 per cent respectively). In Pakistan support is only at 46 per cent, but even there more favour total nuclear disarmament than oppose it (World Public Opinion.Org 2008).

This global nuclear weapons taboo is buttressed by an international movement that involves national and municipal governments and a global civil society that includes nongovernmental organizations, faith communities, professional and service groups, researchers, and academics. Mayors for Peace, led by the Mayor of Hiroshima, has mobilized the leaders of 2,635 cities in 134 countries and regions around the world to endorse a campaign to eliminate nuclear weapons by 2020.

It is a community that shares the inescapable conviction that the almost limitless destructive power of nuclear weapons can never be a source of human safety or the foundation for durable peace.

Recent statements and declarations in support of the abolition of nuclear weapons (a sampling, rather than an exhaustive list):

Ban Ki-Moon, UN Secretary-General. 2008. The United Nations and security in a nuclear-weapon-free world. Address to the East-West Institute, October 24.

http://www.un.org/apps/news/infocus/sgspeeches/search_full.asp?statID=351.

Beckett, Margaret. 2007. A World Free of Nuclear Weapons. Speech to Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Washington. June 25.

http://www.carnegieendowment.org/events/index.cfm?fa=eventDetail&id=1004&&prog=zgp&proj=znpp&zoom_highlight=Margaret+Beckett.

Bramall, Field Marshal Lord, General Lord Ramsbotham and General Sir Hugh Beach. 2009. UK Does Not Need a Nuclear Deterrent. The Times, January 16.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/letters/article5525682.ece.

D’Alema, Massimo, Gianfranco Fini, Giorgio La Malfa, Arturo Parisi, and Francesco Calogero. 2008. For a Nuclear Free World. July 2008. http://2020visioncampaign.org/pages/446.

Global Zero Declaration. 2008. http://www.globalzero.org/.

Gorbachev, Mikhail. 2007. The Nuclear Threat. Wall Street Journal, January 31.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB117021711101593402.html.

Hurd, Douglas, Malcolm Rifkind, David Owen and George Robertson. 2008. Stop worrying and learn to ditch the bomb. The Times, June 30.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/guest_contributors/article4237387.ece.

Kroto. Sir Harold. 2009. Open Letter to the President of the United States of America Barack Obama. International Network of Engineers and Scientists for Global Responsibility (signed by 12 additional Nobel Laureates). January 20.

http://www.inesap.org/sites/default/files/OpenLetterPresidentObama.pdf.

Schmidt, Helmut, Richard von Weizsacker, Egon Bahr and Hans-Dietrich Genscher. 2009. Toward a nuclear-free world: a German view. International Herald Tribune, January 9.

http://www.iht.com/bin/printfriendly.php?id=19226604.

Shultz, George P., William J. Perry, Henry A Kissinger and Sam Nunn. 2007. A World Free of Nuclear Weapons. Wall Street Journal, January 4.

http://www.fcnl.org/issues/item_print.php?item_id=2252&issue_id=54.

———. 2008. Toward a Nuclear-Free World. Wall Street Journal, January 15.

http://online.wsj.com/public/article_print/SB120036422673589947.html.

Store, Jonas Gahr. 2008. Envisioning a World Free of Nuclear Weapons. Foreign Minister of Norway, June 2008. http://www.armscontrol.org/act/2008_06/Store.

UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office. 2009. Lifting the nuclear shadow: Creating the conditions for abolishing nuclear weapons. http://www.fco.gov.uk/en/fco-in-action/counter-terrorism/weapons/nuclear-weapons/nuclear-paper/.

The Whitehouse Website. 2009. The Agenda: Foreign Policy.http://www.whitehouse.gov/agenda/foreign_policy/.

eregehr@ploughshares.ca

Canada’s failure to push for key non-proliferation conditions in its moves toward resuming civilian nuclear cooperation with India aided the undermining of global standards, but it’s not too late for some corrective measures.

Bruce Cheadle of the Canadian Press reported over the weekend that International Trade Minister Stockwell Day has just wrapped up his four-day trade mission to India and the two countries are very close to a formal deal on nuclear transfers.

The report includes a good account of the non-proliferation worries and reservations linked to such a deal — sections excerpted below (for the full article go to note[i] for the link). Following the excerpts is an elaboration of four key non-proliferation measures that should be part of any civilian nuclear deal with India.[ii]

OTTAWA — The Conservative government has tarnished Canada’s long-standing stature as a non-proliferation advocate in its pursuit of the rich commercial possibilities of nuclear trade, say critics.

…

“Given that Canada is going to pursue nuclear co-operation with India — and that’s now inevitable — there are some very basic non-proliferation conditions that I think should still be put on those arrangements,” Ernie Regehr of Project Ploughshares said Friday.

…

Mr. Day, who served as public safety minister in the Conservative government until Oct. 30, said he put “safety and security first” in the trade negotiations. But activists argue that no matter what safeguards Canada puts in place, civilian nuclear aid to India, by definition, frees up domestic Indian capacity for its military program.

“That’s the battle that we lost when the (Nuclear Suppliers Group) agreed to the exemption,” said Mr. Regehr, echoing sentiments expressed by governments from New Zealand to Sweden. ”And it’s a very serious loss.”

Mr. Regehr would like to see a written commitment that India won’t test another nuclear bomb, verifiable limits on India stockpiling uranium and airtight, forward-looking bans on enrichment technology transfers [elaborated below].

“There’s no implication that Canada’s uranium would go to the weapons program,” said the non-proliferation expert. “It would go only to safe-guarded facilities. But there’s nobody monitoring where the domestic (Indian uranium) goes.”

Under the international moratorium, India had to choose between feeding civilian energy or military programs. “Now it’s in a position to do both without restraint,” said Mr. Regehr.

…

“Canada has abdicated its historic leadership role in the establishment and maintenance of the global nuclear non-proliferation norm,” Douglas Shaw, an international affairs expert at George Washington University in Washington, D.C., said in an e-mail.

“As the first state to choose not to build an independent nuclear arsenal, Canada’s behaviour plays an essential role in defining this standard of globally responsible sovereignty.” Shaw maintained that any India-Canada deal on peaceful nuclear co-operation erodes “both Canada’s global leadership role and the international nuclear non-proliferation regime.”

Mr. Regehr said he can’t fault the Conservatives for looking out for Canada’s commercial interests. “I don’t blame Canada for, in the end, going with the consensus that emerged at the Nuclear Supplier Group,” he said. “I think where Canada was a huge disappointment is that it withdrew itself entirely from the debate . . . . It communicated volumes to other states: Here we have a staunch non-proliferation advocate being quiet on the question.”

Mr. Day doesn’t dispute that Canada’s low-profile support of the NSG decision was internationally significant.

The conditions that Canada should put on civilian nuclear trade with India are at least fourfold:

The first is the very basic expectation that India will not test another nuclear device and that if it does all cooperation will cease.

In a political pledge linked to the NSG action, India said it remained committed to “a voluntary, unilateral moratorium on nuclear testing,” but it refused all efforts to make a permanent end to testing part of the deal. And given India’s clear commitment to continued nuclear warhead production, internal Indian demands for more testing could at some point become irresistible. US legislation requires any American nuclear cooperation to be halted in the event of another Indian test. Other suppliers were also adamant on the point, and Canada should certainly write into any nuclear cooperation agreement that a test would end it.

Indeed, we should go further and join other states in mounting renewed pressure on India to sign the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty – it is India’s refusal to do so that is one of the central obstacles to the Treaty’s entry into force, a treaty that is repeatedly declared by the international community as one of the most urgently required measures to prevent further vertical and horizontal nuclear proliferation.

Second, suppliers are rightly wary of supplying India with uranium at levels that would permit stockpiling. If India is able to build up a large reserve of imported fuel for its civilian reactors it would in effect build up immunity to any sanctions that would almost certainly follow another weapons test. With a large stockpile of fuel at hand, India could be emboldened to ignore the wrath of the international community and conduct further tests in support of its still growing weapons arsenal.

A third caution raised by suppliers is that nuclear cooperation not include the supply of nuclear reprocessing or uranium enrichment technology – technologies that can be used to produce fuel for civilian reactors and nuclear weapons alike. US domestic law prohibits the export of enrichment and reprocessing equipment and technology to any state outside the NPT and the nuclear suppliers group is considering making a similar restriction part of its own supplier guidelines – a condition that Canada supports.

Fourth, it must be remembered that the new willingness to engage in civilian nuclear cooperation with India was ostensibly designed to win nonproliferation gains. India was to be brought into the nonproliferation club. As it turned out, India managed to avoid any new and binding commitments, but it did make a number of important and welcome political commitments.

Besides agreeing to continue its testing moratorium and to separating civilian and military nuclear facilities and programs, placing the former under International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) safeguards, India promised, among other things, to adopt the IAEA’s Additional Protocol, allowing more intrusive inspections of civilian nuclear facilities, to support negotiations toward a Fissile Material Cut Off Treaty, and to support the goal of eliminating nuclear weapons and the negotiation of a convention toward that end. These are political commitments, and while India rejected all efforts to make the NSG waiver conditional on any of them, paragraph 3 of the NSG decision nevertheless insists that it is “based on” these and other commitments.

The question now is, what will Canada and the international community do to monitor the extent to which India actually makes good on its solemn promises. It is now the responsibility of the Nuclear Suppliers Group and any states entering into new civilian nuclear cooperation arrangements with India to ensure – logically through an annual review – that India acts on those commitments in support of global nonproliferation efforts.

eregehr@ploughshares.ca

Notes

[i] January 23, 2009 at 5:06 PM EST, http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20090123.wcanind0123/EmailBNStory/International/.

[ii] They were set out in this space on November 18, 2008 (https://www.igloo.org/disarmingconflict/conditioni) and in Embassy, January 7, 2009 (http://www.embassymag.ca/page/printpage/regehr-1-7-2009).N

While Afghanistan will certainly dominate the talk at the 60th Anniversary NATO Summit in April, leaders are also scheduled to launch a process to review the Alliance’s Strategic Concept, a key element of which is a controversial and outdated nuclear doctrine.[i]

The Strategic Concept – the current version of which was adopted in 1999 – is the Alliance’s official statement of purpose and outlines its force posture and approach to collective security. Nine of its 65 paragraphs refer to nuclear weapons, the central claim being that the nuclear arsenals of the United States in particular, but also of the United Kingdom and France, are “essential to preserve peace” and are “an essential political and military link between the European and North American members They are supposed to keep your sexual life intact! viagra sales in india jealt.mx treats erectile dysfunction effectively, which is a condition characterized by the inability to achieve or maintain an erection for intercourse. This is because they normally have uncontrolled sugar in their blood system, which slows down the symptom of erectile dysfunction by inhibiting http://www.jealt.mx/servicios-dictamenes.html generic viagra discount PDE 5 enzymes and supporting cyclic GMP. This means there should be some form of sexual stimulation, whether it jealt.mx viagra without side effects is thinking about having great sex, or lightly stroking one another. Regular use of NF Cure capsule with Shilajit capsule improves vitality, cialis 5 mg vigor and energy levels. of the Alliance.”[ii]

Firmly rooted in east-west deterrence and nuclear war-fighting assumptions, NATO doctrine is markedly out of sync with the new anti-nuclear counsel from such Cold War stalwarts as Henry Kissinger, Helmut Schmidt, Richard Burt and a host of other government leaders and security professionals now calling for accelerated nuclear disarmament.

In his recent speech to the 45th Munich Security Conference, Mr. Kissinger reaffirmed his earlier call for the pursuit of a world without nuclear weapons, pointing out that “any use of nuclear weapons is certain to involve a level of casualties and devastation out of proportion to foreseeable foreign policy objectives.”

Richard Burt, the senior arms control official in the Administration of the first President Bush, now works through the Global Zero initiative, supported by The Simons Foundation of Canada and a broad range of public figures, for the abolition of nuclear weapons. The group is pledged to work “for a legally binding verifiable agreement, including all nations, to eliminate nuclear weapons by a date certain.”

Even the Alliance leader is now committed, as the Obama White House website puts it, to pursuing the “goal of a world without nuclear weapons.”

All of these statements represent a rather a large shift away from NATO’s claim that nuclear weapons are “the supreme guarantee of the security of the Allies.”

This recent wave of nuclear abolition statements by mainstream security professionals is rooted in two linked concerns.

First, the 20,000-plus nuclear warheads remaining in current arsenals, several thousand of them poised on missiles ready for firing at a moment’s notice, represent an ongoing threat of mass indiscriminate destruction to the point of global annihilation.

Second, that threat is heightened by the growing risk that nuclear weapons, as well as weapons-friendly technologies and nuclear materials, will spread to more states, and even to non-state groups.

NATO thus has the opportunity to fashion a new strategic doctrine that, on the one hand, takes full account of the threats posed by nuclear weapons, and, on the other hand, takes full advantage of the political momentum that is now finally available to allow states to get serious about doing something about that threat. Rather than continuing to insist, for example, that nuclear weapons “preserve peace,” NATO doctrine would do well to follow the new realism of former Soviet Leader Mikhail Gorbachev’s assessment that “with every passing year [nuclear weapons] make our security more precarious.”

Inasmuch as all NATO members are signatories to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), a good place to start would be for the new Strategic Concept to welcome the groundswell of calls for the world without nuclear weapons that the NPT envisions. Responding to those calls NATO should then reaffirm its commitment to implementing the disarmament and nonproliferation priorities and procedures elaborated through the NPT review process.

One important measure of NATO’s sincerity will be its handling of the 150-250 US tactical nuclear weapons that remain in Europe. If it were to take up the proposal of former German Chancellor Helmut Schmidt that those now in Germany be removed, and then also remove those in the four other European states that currently host them, NATO would earn important disarmament bona fides and give a major boost of confidence to a seriously flagging non-proliferation regime. It would also honor the longstanding international call that all nuclear weapons be returned to the territories of the states that own them.

Non-nuclear weapon states of the NPT that are not part of NATO rightly regard the removal of nuclear weapons from the territories of European non-nuclear weapon states as essential for full compliance with Article I of the Treaty. The NPT requires that “each nuclear-weapon State Party to the Treaty undertakes not to transfer to any recipient whatsoever nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices or control over such weapons or explosive devices directly, or indirectly.”

The nuclear disarmament and nonproliferation regime is currently under severe stress. The failure of nuclear weapon states to fully implement the disarmament provisions of Article VI of the NPT, along with NATO’s ongoing claim that it plans to rely on nuclear weapons for the foreseeable future, has entrenched the double standard of nuclear “have” and “have not” countries. In the long run, that double standard is not sustainable. NATO cannot credibly claim that the security of NATO states sheltered within a peaceful Europe requires nuclear weapons, while at the same time calling on all other states, including those in conflict zones such as South Asia or the Middle East, to fully and unconditionally reject nuclear weapons.

At the coming Summit NATO has an opportunity to begin the process of reinventing its security doctrine, to take new initiatives to end its reliance on nuclear weapons, and to engage other states with nuclear weapons in the serious pursuit of reciprocal disarmament, and in the process revitalize the NPT.

eregehr@ploughshares.ca

Notes

[i] This article appeared in the February 18, 2009 issue of Embassy. http://www.embassymag.ca/page/view/nato_summit-2-18-2009.

[ii] Detailed references for all quotes and sources are available in Ploughshares Briefing 09-1: Ernie Regehr, NATO’s Strategic Concept and the Nuclear Abolition Imperative. February 2009. http://www.ploughshares.ca/libraries/Briefings/brf091.pdf.

Obama has promised it, his Defense Secretary isn’t convinced, but now you can vote on it. At Change.org you can help construct a list of priorities for the new American Administration that includes US leadership to abolish nuclear weapons in the top 10 (the direct link is below).

Last fall President-elect Barack Obama told the Arms Control Association that “as president, I will set a new direction in nuclear weapons policy and show the world that America believes in its existing commitment under the nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty to work to ultimately eliminate all nuclear weapons.”[i]

But his Defense Secretary, Robert Gates, shows some reluctance. Not only does he have doubts about ratification of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty,[ii] but Gates told a Carnegie Endowment gathering last fall that “as long as other states have or seek nuclear weapons – and can potentially threaten us, our allies and friends – then we must have a deterrent capacity that makes it clear that challenging the United States in the nuclear arena – or with other weapons of mass destruction – could result in an overwhelming, catastrophic response.”[iii]

President-elect Obama’s responses to the Arms Control Association also paid homage to deterrence: “as long as states retain nuclear weapons, the United States will maintain a nuclear deterrent that is strong, safe, secure, and reliable.”

All of which means that if nuclear abolition is to become an American priority, Washington thinking still needs to undergo some major changes.

With the new Administration coming in nuclear disarmament prospects will be better than they have been for a long time, but it will still take some doing to overcome the unconstructive formulations and assumptions that apparently remain in the thinking of Secretary Gates.

Gates says, for example, that as long as others “seek” nuclear weapons the US must retain a nuclear deterrent. That is a formula for the indefinite perpetuation of nuclear weapons, for as long as the US and other states retain nuclear weapons, there will always be some hitherto non-nuclear states that will seek them.

Gates also says that the possible possession by other states of “other weapons of mass destruction” is a reason for America to retain nuclear weapons. But the potential for some states to acquire chemical or biological weapons will never be eliminated once and for all; the question is how to deal with that ongoing possibility. It is not to threaten nuclear annihilation but to work through established and upgraded mechanisms for verification and for the implementation of the two treaties that already ban chemical and biological weapons.

What Mr. Gates says on behalf of the US, that nuclear weapons must be retained to deter those of others and to shield the US from unacceptable threat, could be as legitimately said by virtually every other country. Indeed, many countries without nuclear weapons could make a much more urgent claim that they are threatened by nuclear, chemical, or biological weapons, as well as by countries with vastly superior conventional forces, and thus make the case for acquiring nuclear weapons so that they too can assure any state that challenges them with “an overwhelming, catastrophic response.”

The US has the capacity to fundamentally alter this self-defeating formula. And the alternative, the push for the elimination of nuclear weapons that Mr. Obama has promised, will be pursued only through the engagement of an informed public. The US and the international community are well served by a highly informed and expert disarmament and non-proliferation community that has for decades been setting out a credible policy road map. The work of that community is now being supported and legitimized by a growing chorus of mainstream or “establishment” figures – personalities as diverse as Henry Kissinger, George Shultz, and Mikhail Gorbachev, together with others like Shaharyar Khan, a former Pakistani foreign minister, retired Air Chief Marshal Shashindra Pal Tyagi of India, and former British foreign secretary Malcolm Rifkind. The recent appeal by the Global Zero group adds the critically important demand for a clear timeline for reaching the goal of total elimination.

And after the leadership declaration has been made, the policies formulated, and the endorsements added, it is the global public voice that is needed to make nuclear abolition a serious political priority.

That is where initiatives like the Change.Org appeal to the public for “Ideas for Change in American” come in. The hope that nuclear weapons abolition will become a priority of the new US Administration can be given voice by going to

http://www.change.org/ideas/view/us_leadership_to_abolish_nuclear_weapons_globally and then voting for “US leadership to abolish nuclear weapons globally.”

eregehr@ploughshares.ca

Notes

[i] President-elect Obama’s views on nuclear arms control are perhaps most clearly and succinctly presented in his response to a series of questions posed by the Washington-based Arms Control Association. Arms Control Today 2008 Presidential Q & A: President-Elect Barack Obama, Special Section, Arms Control Association, http://www.armscontrol.org/system/files/Obama_Q-A_FINAL_Dec10_2008.pdf.

[ii] See DisarmingConflict post of 5 January 2009, http://disarmingconflict.blogspot.com/2009/01/complication-and-compromise-on-obamas.html.

[iii] Elaine M. Grossman, “Gates Sees Stark Choice on Nuke Tests, Modernization,” Global Security Newswire, The Nuclear Threat Initiative, 29 October 2008, http://www.globalsecuritynewswire.org/gsn/nw_20081029_2822.php.

The Obama Administration’s promise of early action to ratify the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty is shaping up to become a direct challenge to the prominently declared views of his Defense Secretary.

President-elect Barack Obama’s campaign position on the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) was unambiguous:[i] “I will work with the U.S. Senate to secure ratification of the CTBT at the earliest practical date.”[ii]

Obama’s promised approach to nuclear weapons generally is to pursue their elimination while insisting that “as long as [other] states retain nuclear weapons, the United States will maintain a nuclear deterrent that is strong, safe, secure, and reliable” (emphasis added). The reference to reliability speaks to opponents of CTBT ratification who insist that warhead reliability deteriorates over time and that the current US stockpile needs ongoing testing.

A proposed alternative to testing selected warheads in the existing and aging stockpile is the controversial and still unfunded Reliable Replacement Warhead (RRW) program. Currently the viability of existing warheads is monitored without testing under the Stockpile Stewardship Program (SSP). The SSP does not replace warheads (that is, it does not build new warheads), but does maintenance on them, including the replacement of parts. But there are those, including Mr. Obama’s Defense Secretary, Robert Gates, who argue that either the US must retain the prerogative to test warheads in the existing stockpile or build new warheads that will be regarded as reliable well into the future. They call it “modernization” and it is what the RRW program was supposed to do.

Last Fall Gates told a Carnegie Endowment for International Peace audience that “there is absolutely no way we can maintain a credible deterrent and reduce the number of weapons in our stockpile without resorting to testing our stockpile or pursuing a modernization program.”[iii] Gates has indicated support for CTBT ratification, but only on condition of modernization of the US arsenal – that is, on condition of building new warheads.

President-elect Obama, on the other hand, has insisted, in response to an Arms Control Association question[iv] on whether existing US warheads can fulfill the deterrent role that Obama says is still needed, that “I will not authorize the development of new nuclear weapons and related capabilities.”

That seems to be an unambiguous rejection of the Reliable Replacement Warhead program and it promises to put the new President on a collision course with his Defense Secretary on the CTBT ratification issue. Gates says, either test old warheads or build new ones; Obama says, no testing and no new warheads.

For Obama to hold firm on CTBT ratification without allowing new warheads to be built will probably require some compromise by both the President and the Defense Secretary. For the President to ratify the CTBT he will require the support of two-thirds of the Senate, leaving the Democrats on their own well short. To win over the Republicans needed, Obama and Gates may well take up a compromise suggested by Michael O’Hanlan of the Brookings Institute. Obama would prohibit the building of any new warheads at this time, but would not insist on “never”; Gates would accept a significant delay in any warhead replacement program on grounds that his doubts about the reliability of existing warheads are based on their condition 25 to 50 years from now.[v]

A new Interim Report of the Congressional Commission on the Strategic Posture of the United States[vi] could give support to the same compromise formula. The Commission also links ratification of the CTBT to an active program for maintaining the reliability of existing warheads, but it focuses on the Stockpile Stewardship Program which does not include the modification of existing warheads or any mandate to build new warheads.

The Commission lauds the ongoing success of the current warhead “Life Extension Program” (leaving one to contemplate the perverse irony that the preservation of warheads capable of killing many millions is designated a “life extension” program). That aside, the Commission’s Interim Report indirectly also makes the case for punting on the warhead replacement issue by pointing out that the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) has confirmed that the plutonium pits in warheads do not decay nearly as quickly as earlier anticipated – which should bolster US “confidence” in the reliability of existing warheads, thus permitting both CTBT ratification and stockpile reductions.

Success for Barak Obama, not to mention fidelity to his campaign promises, requires that he work for the ratification of the CTBT while also refusing in the timeframe of his presidency to permit the building of new warheads, and that his Defense Secretary becomes a champion of the same compromise.

eregehr@ploughshares.ca

[i] President-elect Obama’s views on nuclear arms control are perhaps most clearly and succinctly presented in his response to a series of questions posed by the Washington-based Arms Control Association. Arms Control Today 2008 Presidential Q & A: President-Elect Barack Obama, Special Section, Arms Control Association, http://www.armscontrol.org/system/files/Obama_Q-A_FINAL_Dec10_2008.pdf.

[ii] He also promised to “launch a diplomatic effort to bring onboard other states whose ratifications are required for the treaty to enter into force.” Those “other states” are the 44 states listed in Annex II of the CTBT, namely, states that pursue some elements of nuclear programming or have some nuclear technology or materials and which must all ratify the CTBT before it can enter into force. Three of the Annex II states have yet to sign (North Korea, India, and Pakistan) and nine[ii] (including the US) have yet to ratify the Treaty.

[iii] Elaine M. Grossman, “Gates Sees Stark Choice on Nuke Tests, Modernization,” Global Security Newswire, The Nuclear Threat Initiative, 29 October 2008, http://www.globalsecuritynewswire.org/gsn/nw_20081029_2822.php.

[iv] See Note i.

[v] Michael O’Hanlon, “A New Old Nuclear Arsenal,” 25 December 2008, Washington Post, http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/12/24/AR2008122402032.html.

[vi] The Congressional Commission on the Strategic Posture of the United States, Interim Report, 15 December 2008, facilitated by the United States Institute of Peace, Washington, http://www.usip.org/strategic_posture/sprc_interim_report.pdf.