Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty

Introduction

The Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT)—described as the "longest sought and hardest fought for arms control treaty in history"—was opened for signature in September 1996. The CTBT obligates countries that sign and ratify "not to carry out any nuclear weapon test explosion or any other nuclear explosion." It provides for an extensive verification regime including an International Monitoring System (IMS) to detect nuclear explosions, a global infrastructure for satellite communications from IMS stations to an International Data Center (IDC) that processes and distributes data to State Parties, and for on-site inspections, which may be requested by any State Party to determine whether suspected cheating has occurred. To implement these verification arrangements, the treaty establishes a Comprehensive Test Ban Organization (CTBTO) located in Vienna.

To enter into force, the CTBT must be ratified by the 44 countries that in 1996 possessed nuclear research or power reactors. At present, 41 of these 44 countries have signed the treaty but only 31 have ratified. Non-signatories include India, North Korea, and Pakistan. The United States, which led the effort to conclude a CTBT and was the first to sign the treaty is, along with China, among those who have signed but not ratified. In 1999, the U.S. Senate, whose advice and consent is required for international treaties to become valid and binding, voted not to give its consent to ratify. Beside partisan considerations, this was prompted by concerns with the ability of the United States to maintain the safety, security, and reliability of the U.S. nuclear weapons stockpile, and with the adequacy of the treaty’s verification provisions to detect low-yield tests. The current administration, which in general is skeptical of the value of arms control treaties as a means of enhancing U.S. national security has said that it will not seek Senate reconsideration of the treaty. However, it supports the continuation by all states of the voluntary testing moratorium that is in place, as well as maintaining and completing the IMS, which is seen as value added to U.S. national technical means of detection. But the administration does not support funding for or participation in on-site inspection related activities that would be used as part of challenge inspections after the treaty entered into force.

Background and History

For decades, states seeking to limit nuclear weapons have called for a CTBT in the conviction that a comprehensive test ban would foreclose the ability to develop new and more powerful types of nuclear arms and would be an important stepping stone to the objective of ultimately eliminating all nuclear weapons. Historically, the nuclear powers have depended on nuclear testing to develop new types of nuclear weapons, and to a far lesser extent, to confirm the reliability of their arsenals. The United States and other countries concerned about nuclear proliferation also have supported a CTBT as a means for slowing the spread of advanced nuclear weapon capabilities to additional countries. They have argued that although a state seeking to develop nuclear weapons may not need to conduct a test to build a simple fission bomb, such tests would be necessary to develop more complex and powerful thermonuclear weapons. Some argue that testing would also be necessary for a new nuclear state to develop small warheads for ballistic or cruise missiles.

First proposed by Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru in 1954, successful negotiations on a comprehensive ban became feasible only after the end of the Cold War. Nonetheless, important limits on nuclear testing were adopted during the 46-year hiatus between Nehru’s initiative and the conclusion of a CTBT in 1996. Negotiations between the United States, the United Kingdom, and the Soviet Union were first started in 1958 following Premier Khrushchev’s announcement of a unilateral test ban and President Eisenhower’s subsequent proposal for test-ban negotiations. Efforts receded in the wake of the May 1960 U-2 incident in which a U.S. reconnaissance plane was shot down over the USSR leading to the souring of U.S.-Soviet relations.

In the aftermath of the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis, which brought the U.S. and USSR to the brink of nuclear war, discussion of a comprehensive test ban was renewed. Disagreement over verification measures, in particular Soviet resistance to on-site inspection of suspected underground testing, precluded agreement on a comprehensive treaty. But shared recognition of the growing danger of above-ground testing to the global environment led to the conclusion of a Limited Test Ban Treaty (LTBT) in 1963. The LTBT prohibited the conducting of any nuclear weapon test explosion or any other nuclear explosion in the atmosphere, under water, or in outer space thereby limiting future tests to those conducted underground. The LTBT was regarded not as an end point, but as a step in the direction of an eventual comprehensive test ban. The treaty preamble underscored that the parties agreed to a limited test ban in the context of "seeking to achieve the discontinuance of all test explosions of nuclear weapons for all time" and that they remained "determined to continue negotiations to this end." (ed.: emphasis added)

The LTBT was complemented in 1974 and 1976, respectively, by a threshold test ban treaty (TTBT), and a treaty on peaceful nuclear explosions (PNET). The former established a threshold of 150 kilotons for underground nuclear tests, thereby imposing a limit on the power of new nuclear weapons; the latter was intended to regulate and limit to the same threshold explosions for peaceful nuclear purposes.

The 1968 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT)—the foundation of the nuclear non-proliferation regime and the most widely adhered to arms control treaty in history—included in its preamble a reassertion of the LTBT commitment to seek to achieve the discontinuance of all nuclear test explosions. The test ban question was raised in all of the subsequent review conferences of the NPT, held every five years, starting in 1975. Differences between the weapon and non-weapon state parties to NPT over the issue accounted for failure to achieve consensus in a number of conference Final Declarations. The 1995 Review and Extension Conference had the task not only of reviewing implementation of the NPT, but also of deciding on its future duration. The NPT had been concluded for an initial period of 25 years from entry into force (1970), at which time the parties were to meet to decide whether to extend the treaty indefinitely or for a fixed period or periods of time (Article 10). The decision was to extend the treaty indefinitely. That decision was made in the context of an agreement on a set of Principles and Objectives for nuclear nonproliferation and disarmament that included, as a key requirement, completion of the negotiation of a universal and internationally verifiable comprehensive test ban treaty no later than 1996. Negotiation of the treaty took place in the Conference on Disarmament (CD), as mandated by the United Nations General Assembly in 1995.

The 1996 deadline was met although not without difficulty. Three issues in particular were sources of controversy. One was a U.S. proposal to include an "easy-out" provision enabling a state to leave the treaty after ten years without any need to provide justification. That drew considerable fire and was withdrawn by the United States in January 1995. A second was whether the treaty should allow very small (low-threshold) nuclear tests or should ban all nuclear tests. A complete ban was agreed to. The third, involving entry into force, was whether the treaty should become legally binding after a certain number of states had ratified it or whether ratification by specific states would be required. The negotiators chose the second option, stipulating that entry into force was conditioned on signature and ratification by all 44 states included in the most recent International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) list of states operating nuclear power or research reactors. India, which at the time was a non-nuclear weapon state, argued that the treaty should include a specific commitment by the nuclear weapon states to eliminate their nuclear weapons in a negotiated finite span of time, and made its support of the draft treaty contingent on such a commitment. India also rejected the entry-into-force formula, contending that in light of its stated inability to endorse the treaty as drafted, making ratification of specific states a requirement for entry into force was contrary to customary international law rules that no obligation can be imposed on a state without its consent. On these grounds, it blocked the consensus needed under CD operating rules to move a treaty to the United Nations General Assembly for consideration. Consensus was bypassed by Australia’s presenting the treaty directly to the General Assembly, which approved it by an overwhelming majority (158 to 3 with 5 abstentions). The treaty was opened for signature on September 24, 1996. The United States was the first state to sign.

Basic Provisions

States parties to the CTBT undertake not to carry out any nuclear weapon test explosion or any other nuclear explosion, and to prohibit and prevent any such nuclear explosion at any place under its jurisdiction or control. Parties further undertake to refrain from causing, encouraging, or in any way participating in the carrying out of any nuclear weapon test explosion or any other nuclear explosion (Article 1). The CTBT thus prohibits every kind of nuclear explosion whatever its purpose. The treaty is, however, a test ban treaty and does not address the use of nuclear weapons in war. Nor does it prohibit non-nuclear explosions that may be relevant to maintaining nuclear weapons such as hydrodynamic tests, hydronuclear experiments, or computer simulations.

Article 2 of the treaty provides for the establishment of a Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty Organization (CTBTO), comprising an Executive Council for decisionmaking and a Technical Secretariat to implement the treaty. Until such time as the CTBT enters into force, a Preparatory Commission consisting of the signatory states, supported by a provisional technical secretariat, and having the standing of an independent, international, intergovernmental organization, serves to ensure that the necessary steps have been taken to have the treaty enter into force when the 44 requisite states ratify. This includes promoting signature and ratification of the treaty, providing a forum for consultation and cooperation among State Parties, and establishing a global verification regime to monitor compliance with the test ban once it becomes effective. As of January 2003, the Preparatory Commission had met 19 times. A main function of the technical secretariat (a position which also was established on a provisional basis pending entry into force) is to build up the global verification regime and to provisionally operate the International Monitoring System and the International Data Center and related global communications infrastructure, as well as provide training in support of the treaty.

Article 9 stipulates that the treaty is of unlimited duration. However, consistent with most arms control treaties, it also provides that a State Party retains the right to withdraw on six months’ notice if it decides that "extraordinary events related to the subject matter of the treaty have jeopardized its supreme interests." There is also a provision (Article 8) for a review of the treaty 10 years after entry into force to determine whether its objectives and purposes are being met, and to take into account any relevant new scientific and technological developments.

Treaty Verification

Article 4, amplified by a protocol to the CTBT, provides for the establishment of a unique global verification regime consisting of the International Monitoring System (IMS), an International Data Center (IDC), on-site inspections, and confidence-building measures. It stipulates that the verification system must be functioning at the time the treaty enters into force. Responsibility for completion of this task rests in the hands of the Preparatory Commission and its technical secretariat. The CTBT is the first multilateral arms control treaty providing for cooperative establishment and operation of a worldwide remote sensing network for international treaty monitoring.

The IMS relies on seismic, hydroacoustic, and infrasound (explained below) monitoring technologies to detect transient signals, which are created when energy is released underground, underwater, or in the atmosphere environments. Radionuclide monitoring technologies collect and analyze air samples for evidence of the physical products created and dispersed by the winds. Sixteen radiochemical laboratories support radionuclide monitoring. A total of 321 seismological, hydroacoustic, infrasound, and radionuclide monitoring stations capable of detecting possible nuclear explosions underground, in water, and in the atmosphere, are to be located in 90 countries. When completed, data from each station will be linked to a satellite enabling information to be transmitted to the IDC in Vienna, Austria. The IDC, in turn, will distribute to all states wishing to receive information a bulletin of events detected and located within two days of the event. Member states have the final responsibility for analyzing the data. At present, this remains a work in progress.

The seismological component of the IMS detects and locates seismic events. The system includes 50 primary seismic stations supplemented by 120 auxiliary seismic stations. The principal use of seismic data in the verification system of the CTBT is to distinguish between an underground nuclear explosion and the frequent earthquakes and conventional explosions that occur around the globe.

Hydroacoustic monitoring detects sound waves produced by natural and man-made phenomena in the world’s oceans. Because of the very efficient transmission of acoustic energy in the oceans, only a few stations are required for the IMS. Stations are extremely sensitive and can pick up acoustic waves from underwater events, including explosions, even those at transcontinental distances. A total of 11 stations are included in the CTBT global verification regime.

Infrasound stations, of which there will be 60, detect low-frequency sound waves in the atmosphere produced by natural and man-made events. They enable technicians to distinguish between natural phenomena such as meteorites, explosive volcanoes, and meteorological events on the one hand, and man-made phenomena such as re-entering space debris, rocket launches, and atmospheric explosions on the other.

Radionuclide stations detect radioactive particles released from atmospheric explosions or vented from underground and underwater explosions.

On-site inspection of suspect locations to clarify whether a nuclear explosion has been conducted is provided for in the treaty as a final verification measure. As a general proposition, on-site inspection is the most politically sensitive form of verification, involving physical presence on the sovereign territory of a state, in this case, under adversarial conditions. Every State Party has a right to request an on-site inspection. The provisions regarding on-site inspection in both Article 4 and the Protocol are extensive and detailed. A request may be based on IMS-derived information, or national technical means of verification (for example, remote sensing satellites to monitor activity or reconnaissance aircraft) or both. A request for a special inspection cannot be based on information collected through espionage. Before an on-site inspection may be undertaken, however, 30 of the 51 member Executive Council must vote to authorize the action. The inspection must be conducted in the least intrusive manner possible, so as to protect the national security interests of the inspected State Party and may include managed access measures, (i.e., access restricted within the inspection area to protect sensitive installations and confidential information not related to the purpose of the inspection). Frivolous or abusive requests entail costs for the requesting state ranging from paying the expenses incurred by the CTBTO in conducting the inspection to being barred from serving on the Executive Council. The treaty also encourages states to resolve questions regarding possible violation through consultation before resorting to the on-site inspection procedures. Currently, the United States government supports the IMS and IDC but not the development of on-site inspection capabilities. This reflects the administration’s view that IMS is an independently useful addition to U.S. information and intelligence on possible nuclear testing, while on-site inspection is a treaty-specific activity that it does not currently support.

Entry-Into-Force Conferences

Article 14 (2) of the treaty provides for a conference to be held three years after it is opened for signature to promote the ratification process. The first such conference was held in October 1999 in Vienna. It affirmed that the CTBT was an effective nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation measure and underscored the importance of a universal and internationally verifiable comprehensive treaty. At that time, 154 states had signed the treaty and 51 had ratified. Since then, 11 more states have signed and 46 more have ratified, including three nuclear weapon states (France, Russia, and the U.K.), giving a total of 165 signatories and 97 ratifying states. (See current list of countries that have signed and/or ratified the CTBT.) Twenty-seven states still have not signed. A second conference on facilitating entry into force of the CTBT was held at the United Nations in November 2001. The conference continued to press for entry into force, underscored the importance of the treaty in nuclear disarmament as a means of achieving global security, and highlighted the progress made in creating the IMS. Importantly, the United States did not participate, officially or unofficially, in the conference because of the reversal of U.S. policy towards the CTBT, brought about by the U.S. Senate’s rejection of the treaty in November 1999 and the inauguration, in January 2001, of President George W. Bush, who opposes the pact.

Separately, in September 2002, the Foreign Ministers of Australia, Netherlands, and Japan presented a joint ministerial statement on the CTBT at the United Nations on behalf of 49 states underscoring that the rise in international tensions since the CTBT was negotiated made entry into force even more urgent, affirming the central role of the treaty in global peace and security, and calling on those states whose ratifications were essential to entry into force to do so quickly. A third entry-into-force conference is scheduled to convene in Vienna in September 2003.

Key Issues

The United States is one of the remaining 13 states whose ratification is necessary for the CTBT to enter into force. Arguably, U.S. absence is especially important because it deprives Washington of playing the kind of leadership role it has exercised in arms control and nonproliferation through much of the last half century, including the CTBT. A non-participant is poorly placed to argue that others should do what it has itself not done. The Clinton administration supported the CTBT but failed to organize an effective campaign on behalf of the treaty in the Senate. Conservative Republican Senators opposed to the treaty did organize effectively and won over moderate, uncommitted Republican Senators. These efforts and parliamentary maneuvers that brought CTBT ratification to a vote before the Clinton administration had time to build support for the treaty led to its defeat.

Although animosity toward President Clinton and other domestic political considerations played a role in the Senate vote, substantive issues were more important to the outcome. Some treaty opponents argued that arms control treaties like the CTBT are simply not in the U.S. national security interest and should not be pursued. Most opponents of the treaty, however, were not inherently opposed to arms control but were driven by three main substantive concerns about the CTBT, which remain at the center of debate more than three years after the Senate voted:

1. STOCKPILE STEWARDSHIP: the impact of the treaty on the ability of the United States to maintain the safety and reliability of its nuclear stockpile and the adequacy of the science-based Stockpile Stewardship Program (SSP), established to ensure that the enduring stockpile remains a safe, effective, and reliable deterrent without having to rely on nuclear testing;
2. VERIFICATION: the capability of the international nuclear test monitoring system to detect low-yield explosions, and hence, how effective and reliable the verification system could be considered to be; and
3. NONPROLIFERATION BENEFITS: whether the treaty in fact offered significant nonproliferation benefits as claimed by its supporters.

The details of these three issues:

    1. The adequacy of stockpile stewardship relates to confidence in the nuclear deterrent in situations where deterrence (the ability to inflict such overwhelming destruction and pain as to prevent a potential aggressor from attacking) is still deemed central to security. Critics contended that without nuclear testing, the United States will be unable to maintain its nuclear weapon expertise or ensure the safety and reliability of its nuclear stockpile, and that in these circumstances, it would not be able to maintain the necessary confidence in its nuclear deterrent. As well, those dependent on U.S. extended deterrence could lose confidence in its security guarantees and, in some circumstances, might reconsider their nonproliferation undertakings. Opponents of the treaty argued that the cadres of nuclear weapon scientists will lose competence over time in the absence of testing, and that testing in the past has revealed deficiencies in deployed weapons that might not otherwise have been discovered. They took the position that there is no assured alternative to testing and that the stockpile stewardship program, intended as a substitute, is not adequate as it stands today. Some went further and maintained that stockpile stewardship will never be a sufficient alternative to testing; that components of nuclear weapons degrade in unpredictable ways, and that it will take at least a decade to determine if computer simulation (upon which much of the stewardship program is based) is truly a viable surrogate for testing. The CTBT is a permanent zero-yield treaty that forecloses nuclear testing. Opponents concluded that it is imprudent and not in the national security interest of the United States to permanently tie the government’s hands by ratifying a treaty that removes the availability of nuclear testing as a tool for maintaining the safety and security of the stockpile and the integrity of nuclear deterrence.

    Supporters of CTBT, on the contrary, argued that the science-based stockpile stewardship program, which was designed as a functional equivalent to nuclear testing (even before conclusion of the CTBT) and expanded over time, was sound, and with sustained administration support and congressional funding, would remain so. They agreed that the stewardship program has to be rigorous, that it must include a capacity to remanufacture aging weapons to their original specifications (something that is not adequate today), and that a high-quality work force has to be maintained.

    They noted that testing has traditionally related to the development of new weapons rather than to confirming the reliability of existing ones and that the United States has taken a commitment in the NPT to work toward the elimination of existing nuclear weapons, not toward the development of new types of weapons for which testing would be required. A National Academy of Science report of July 2002 on technical issues related to the CTBT underscored that "Even in the absence of constraints on nuclear testing, no need was ever identified for a program that would periodically subject stockpile weapons to nuclear tests. Nuclear testing never provided and was never intended to provide a statistical basis for confidence in the performance of stockpiled weapons." Treaty proponents also pointed out that when President Clinton agreed to a zero-yield CTBT, he expressly included a number of safeguards to protect against unanticipated contingencies. (The treaty does not specifically define what constitutes a test. Zero-yield is used in the CTBT to describe a test ban in which all tests that have a yield of nuclear explosive energy would be prohibited.). Safeguards refer to conditions under which the United States would enter into a CTBT. One of those safeguards is a provision that if the secretaries of Defense and Energy inform the president that a high level of confidence in the safety or reliability of a nuclear weapon type that was deemed critical to the U.S. national deterrent could no longer be certified, the president, in consultation with the Congress, would be prepared to withdraw from the CTBT under the "supreme national interests" clause (Article 9 of the treaty) in order to conduct whatever testing might be required (Safeguard F). Furthermore, non-nuclear testing, which relates to all of the non-nuclear parts of the warhead, is not precluded by the CTBT and is a central component of the stockpile stewardship program.

    2. The second issue, verification, focused on whether, and to what extent, a state could successfully conduct a nuclear test and evade detection. Critics have argued that the treaty verification regime is not sufficient to detect low-yield tests (of less than one kiloton). As a consequence, sophisticated advanced nuclear weapon states such as Russia and China, it is argued, would be able to conduct militarily significant tests without being detected, enabling them to verify the reliability of their weapons or even to develop new ones while the United States would be restrained by its commitment to honor the test ban. Such cheating, critics contend, could give these countries a military advantage over the United States, which would honor its non-testing obligations. The opponents of CTBT focus on evasion strategies such as de-coupling of underground nuclear tests or anonymous testing in open ocean areas (such as the still unresolved incident of a suspected nuclear explosion in the Indian Ocean in 1979) where even if detected, it would be difficult, if not impossible, to attribute it to any particular state. Additionally, opponents have asserted that the treaty cannot be effectively enforced in the event of a violation. As an example, they cite on-site inspection limitations such as the right of a challenged state to declare certain areas (limited in size) as off limits to inspection.

    Supporters contended that the treaty verification system coupled with U.S. national monitoring capabilities would create a mutually reinforcing system that increases the prospect of detecting such tests that neither system alone would likely be able to do and, therefore, serves U.S. national security interests. They have acknowledged that it is not possible to detect every low-yield nuclear explosion, but they also have maintained that tests below the one kiloton level (which is the level at or below which states might arguably be able to carry out an undetected explosion) would add little if anything of significance to the nuclear capabilities or level of nuclear threat posed by advanced nuclear states like Russia and China, and that to the extent that it served as a reliability test, it would not provide any significant military advantage.

    As for less advanced nuclear states such as India or Pakistan, or potential newcomers like Iran or Iraq with little experience or design sophistication, it is unlikely that they would be able to successfully carry out undetected low-level tests Techniques such as detonating nuclear devices in large underground cavities (de-coupling) in order to reduce the seismic signal of a several kiloton device to below one kiloton are regarded as problematic at best especially for countries without substantial experience in underground nuclear testing.

    Treaty advocates contend that the verification system is a valuable addition to U.S. monitoring capabilities and that the two together increase the prospect for detecting militarily significant testing, especially as the treaty provides for short-notice on-site inspections, thereby reducing even further the prospect of testing going undetected. The Bush administration, while opposed to the CTBT has stated, in the context of promoting a new strategic arms reduction treaty with Russia, that U.S. force postures are no longer linked to those of Russia, because of the fundamental change in the relationship from one of strategic rivalry to one of cooperation and collaboration. To date, however, this new orientation has not apparently reduced the administration’s concerns about Russian cheating scenarios under the CTBT.

    3. Treaty opponents have argued that the CTBT would not create any significant or meaningful obstacle to nuclear proliferation and would not only not impede further nuclear proliferation as treaty proponents claimed, but could carry costs to the United States. Those costs were defined in terms of the earlier arguments regarding the negative consequences to the United States of being unable to test the safety, security, or reliability of the nuclear stockpile and of undetected cheating by other countries. Critics also have questioned whether growing real or perceived uncertainty about the integrity of the U.S. nuclear deterrent could cause allies and others dependent on U.S. extended deterrence to reconsider their non-nuclear weapon status.

Furthermore, they have contended that rogue regimes that were undeterred from proliferating despite being adherents to the NPT (e.g., Iraq, North Korea) would not be deterred by a CTBT. In fact, states interested in first-generation nuclear devices about which a great deal was known almost everywhere (i.e., simple fission weapons) could have confidence in the reliability of such weapons even without testing, making the CTBT a non-factor in their calculating the costs and benefits of seeking nuclear weapons. Finally, they see redundancy in the CTBT—states party to the NPT (only India, Israel, and Pakistan are outside the NPT) are already obligated not to acquire nuclear weapons and the CTBT offers no nonproliferation benefit vis-à-vis them. As for the three states not bound by the NPT, they are advanced enough to be able to build more nuclear weapons, even relatively sophisticated fission devices, in which they could have high confidence without testing. Hence, the CTBT does not foreclose further proliferation on their part.

Proponents argue that although the CTBT cannot stop nuclear proliferation by itself, it is a key element of U.S. nonproliferation strategy. They assert that a ban on all nuclear tests would make it more difficult for existing nuclear weapon states to develop new, more advanced nuclear weapons than they already have, and would impede new nuclear states in moving from simple one-stage fission devices to advanced, two-stage thermonuclear weapons without testing, which would carry with it a high risk of detection by (and presumably the response of) the international community. The CTBT thus raises the political costs of testing, both for the five nuclear weapon states acknowledged by the NPT (the U.S., U.K., Russia, China, and France) and for the three non-NPT states (India, Israel, Pakistan) that have nuclear weapons, as well as for any other state seeking to proliferate.

Additionally, supporters of the treaty underscore that a CTBT is specifically stated in the preamble to the NPT as an objective to be achieved in the process of moving toward nuclear disarmament, which Article 6 of the NPT includes as one of the aims of that treaty. Completing and implementing a universally applicable, non-discriminatory, and internationally verifiable CTBT was one of the objectives specified in the decision to extend the NPT indefinitely in 1995 and pursuing and achieving a comprehensive test ban is thus highly relevant to nonproliferation and to international judgments on whether the United States is meeting its political commitments.

Shalikashvili Report

Following the Senate defeat of the CTBT, President Clinton appointed General John Shalikashvili, a former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, as Special Advisor for the CTBT with a mandate to meet with Senators, national laboratory directors, and other officials to hear their concerns about the treaty, clear up misconceptions, and recommend steps the administration might propose as a possible basis for Senate reconsideration. The report was completed in January 2001 in the final days of the Clinton administration. While acknowledging that the CTBT was not perfect, Shalikashvili judged that the advantages of the treaty to the United States outweighed the drawbacks, and that on balance, it would enhance U.S. national security and nonproliferation objectives. The report concluded that the CTBT was important to American security because it played to U.S. strengths, including conventional military superiority, broad knowledge of nuclear weapons based on extensive test experience, and substantial advantages in stockpile stewardship capability. It also concluded that other states could not significantly advance their nuclear weapons capabilities through tests below the detection threshold and that above that threshold, verification capabilities were better than critics assumed. The report included a number of recommendations for improving stewardship of the nuclear stockpile, for improving monitoring and verification capabilities, and for dealing with the indefinite nature of the treaty, and urged the incoming administration to work with congress to re-evaluate the CTBT in light of those considerations.

Bush Administration Policy

During the 2000 presidential campaign, George W. Bush took the position that the CTBT would not stop nuclear proliferation and that it was not verifiable or enforceable. Since taking office, the president has made it clear that he will not be asking Congress to reconsider the treaty, but that he does support the moratorium on nuclear tests that has been in place for the United States since 1992. At the same time, the administration has taken several steps indicative of emerging policies that would contradict the provisions of the CTBT and the test moratorium. The Nuclear Posture Review, completed in December 2001, called for the development of new nuclear weapon capabilities (either by modifications to existing warheads or possible development of new nuclear weapons) to provide a wider range of options for dealing with hardened and deeply buried targets. Subsequently the administration requested $15 million to begin a three-year feasibility study on development of a new nuclear warhead for deep-earth penetration. Congress endorsed the study, but subject to a number of restrictions including a Defense Department report on the military requirements for such a device, the nuclear-use policy that would apply to it, the categories of targets it would be intended to hold at risk, and an assessment of conventional weaponry to accomplish the same objectives. In addition, the Congress mandated a study by the National Academy of Sciences on the short- and long-term effects of using a nuclear earth penetrator on nearby civilian population and U.S. military personnel who might carry out operations in the area after such use. The development of a new weapon could lead to the resumption of nuclear testing and a consequent breaking of the moratorium.

Congress also made a decision to ask the administration to prepare cost estimates for readying the Nevada Test Site for resumed testing within 6, 12, 18, and 24 months. The current readiness time for the test site is 36 months. While no formal changes in policy have taken place, these developments point toward the possibility of a change that would have significant impact on the CTBT and the test moratorium and on nuclear testing by a number of countries that for the present have felt constrained by the moratorium.

Proponents of change emphasize the changing international environment, with new states potentially threatening U.S. security and interests by developing weapons of mass destruction, and the importance of addressing those threats by taking the initiative and not counting only on deterrence but also on defense and pre-emptive actions. Opponents of change point out that from the U.S. perspective, the purpose of pursuing a CTBT has been to prevent non-nuclear countries from acquiring nuclear weapons and lesser nuclear states from making the transition from simple nuclear devices to thermonuclear weapons—both of which are intended to serve U.S. national security. From this perspective, a change in U.S. policy on nuclear testing (and on the utility of nuclear weapons) could have a strong adverse affect in political and security terms.

Next Steps

Whatever the short-term developments may be, it is clear to critics and supporters of the CTBT and the broader nonproliferation community that the nature and scope of challenges to U.S. national security are growing more complex. The biggest challenge may be determining whether protecting U.S. national security and that of U.S. friends and allies can be achieved while preserving the regime or whether choices might have to be made. With this in mind, there are at least three questions deserving consideration and debate:

1. How should the United States government proceed with respect to the CTBT? Should it undertake a systematic review of the report submitted by General Shalikashvili and other reports prepared by organizations such as the National Academy of Sciences that provide analysis of technical considerations related to the treaty?
2. If deterrence of aggression for the foreseeable future depends on a reliable and credible nuclear capability, can that objective be achieved without maintaining a testing program? What policy should be pursued with respect to the testing moratorium that has been in place for the United States since 1992?
3. Is there a choice to be made between protecting national security interests and preserving the nonproliferation regime or are these objectives inseparable?

Resources

Websites

• Acronym Institute, Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT), www.acronym.org.uk.
• Arms Control Association, The CTBT: Documents, News, and Analyses, www.armscontrol.org.
• BASIC, The Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, www.basicint.org.
• Center for Defense Information, Nuclear Testing, www.cdi.org.
• Coalition to Reduce Nuclear Dangers, Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty Site, www.clw.org.
• CTBTO Preparatory Commission, www.ctbto.org.
• Federation of American Scientists, Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, www.fas.org.
• Physicians for Social Responsibility, Security Programs, www.psr.org.
• United Nations, Conference on Disarmament, www.unog.ch.
• WMD 411, Proliferation and Use of Nuclear Weapons, www.nti.org.
• WMD 411 Bibliography, Nuclear Weapons, Multilateral Organizations and International Nonproliferation Treaties, www.nti.org.

Articles and Reports

• Lawyers Alliance for World Security, "White Paper on the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty," Fall 2000, www.lawscns.org.
• Kathleen C. Bailey, "The Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty: An Update on the Debate," National Institute for Public Policy, March 2001, www.nipp.org.
• National Institute for Public Policy, "The Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty: Few Benefits – Very High Costs," www.nipp.org.
• Rebecca Johnson, Boycotts and Blandishments: Making the CTBT Visible," Acronym Institute, Issue No. 61, November-December 2001, www.acronym.org.uk.
• Phillipp C. Bleek, "UN Conference Shows Support for Test Ban; U.S. Absent," Arms Control Today, December 2001, www.armscontrol.org.
• Daryl G. Kimball, "CTBT Rogue State?" Arms Control Today, December 2001, www.armscontrol.org.

Official Documents and Reports

• Independent Commission on the Verifiability of the CTBT, Final Report, www.ctbtcommission.org.
• U.S. Department of State, Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, www.state.gov.
• U.S. State Department, Findings and Recommendations Concerning the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty (Shalikashvili Report), www.state.gov.

Books and Printed Material

• Thanos P. Dokos, Negotiations for a CTBT 1958-1994 (University Press of America, 1995).
• T.T. Poulose, The CTBT and The Rise of Nuclear Nationalism in India: Linkage Between Nuclear Arms Race, Arms Control, and Disarmament (Lancers Books).