Disarmament Depends on Others, Nuclear Powers Say

By Greg Webb
Global Security Newswire

WASHINGTON — Nuclear-armed powers this week reaffirmed their commitment to total nuclear disarmament provided other nations move first to ease security concerns (see GSN, April 29).

Their spirited defense of nuclear weapons came during the first of two weeks of meetings by Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty members in Geneva to lay the groundwork for the pact’s 2010 review conference.

Non-nuclear nations have, as expected, leveled heavy criticism at the five countries the treaty permits to have nuclear weapons, with the condition that those states promise “to pursue negotiations in good faith on effective measures relating to cessation of the nuclear arms race at an early date and to nuclear disarmament.”  The five — China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States — have argued this week that they have made dramatic reductions in their nuclear arsenals to meet their treaty obligations.

As the NPT meeting moved into more topic-specific sessions, the nuclear powers also sought to describe the reasons they retain their arsenals.

“The world in which the NPT as negotiated is not today’s world, and states party will do themselves, and the treaty regime, a great disservice if they pretend otherwise,” said U.S. delegation leader Christopher Ford in a statement today.  Treaty members “should be wary of reflexively adhering to yesterday’s approaches just because they seemed to make sense yesterday.

“The most likely risk of the threat or use of nuclear weapons in our world comes not from the five nuclear-weapon states at all, but rather from the potential acquisition of nuclear weapons technology by nonstate actors such as terrorists, from proliferation to dangerous regimes such as Iran or North Korea, or from escalation involving nuclear-weapons possessing NPT nonparties.”

British Ambassador John Duncan concurred.

“It is important … to realize that the conditions for complete disarmament are not solely in the gift of nuclear-weapon states,” he said in the British statement.  The main hurdles were concerns that some nations have violated the treaty and others have not joined it.

“A world in which complete nuclear disarmament became a possibility would be one in which we could all be confident in the compliance by all states with their nonproliferation obligations under a universalized NPT,” Duncan said.

For its part, France noted other WMD and missile threats as justification for retaining its nuclear weapons.

“We are currently witnessing the rise of other threats:  certain nuclear arsenals are still expanding, biological proliferation and chemical proliferation are continuing, as is the proliferation of ballistic and cruise missiles,” said Ambassador Jean-Francois Dobelle in the French statement.

Russia focused its gaze on other world powers, particularly the United States and Washington’s plans to deploy missile defenses in Europe (see related GSN story, today).

“The Russian leadership [has] repeatedly declared Russia’s willingness to continue reducing its strategic nuclear stockpiles,” said a Russian statement.  “At the same time, there can be no nuclear disarmament without taking into account the process of strategic defensive arms.  We believe that any unilateral plans to deploy global missile defense systems, given implementation of the nuclear and conventional global blitzkrieg concept, undermines strategic stability.”

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