Negotiating the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty

Origins of the Nuclear Order

Roland Popp, Liviu Horovitz, Andreas Wenger, Roland Popp, Liviu Horovitz, Andreas Wenger

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2016
• eBook ISBN: 9781315536552
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Military & Maritime History
• Index: Politics & International Relations

This volume offers a critical historical assessment of the negotiation of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) and of the origins of the nonproliferation regime.

The NPT has been signed by 190 states and was indefinitely extended in 1995, rendering it the most successful arms control treaty in history. Nevertheless, little is known about the motivations and strategic calculi of the various middle and small powers in regard to their ultimate decision to join the treaty despite its discriminatory nature. While the NPT continues to be central to current nonproliferation efforts, its underlying mechanisms remain under-researched. Based on newly declassified archival sources and using previously inaccessible evidence, the contributions in this volume examine the underlying rationales of the specific positions taken by various states during the NPT negotiations. Starting from a critical appraisal of our current knowledge of the genesis of the nonproliferation regime, contributors from diverse national and disciplinary backgrounds focus on both European and non-European states in order to enrich our understanding of how the global nuclear order came into being.

This book will be of much interest to students of nuclear proliferation, Cold War history, security studies and IR.

1 Introduction¹

Small and middle powers in the emergence of a discriminatory regime

Roland Popp

The 1968 Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) is widely regarded as the cornerstone of the broader nonproliferation regime that aims to forestall the further spread of nuclear weapons and related technologies. The NPT has been signed by 190 states and was indefinitely extended in 1995, making it the most successful arms control treaty in history. While it is central to current global nonproliferation efforts and routinely cited as a successful compromise ("a grand bargain") between the competing priorities of nonproliferation, disarmament and access to peaceful nuclear technologies, the treaty’s underlying mechanisms are less widely understood.

The main theoretical conundrum of the NPT is its apparent success in spite of the fact that it is openly discriminatory in defining two different classes of parties to the treaty, nuclear (NWS) and non-nuclear-weapon states (NNWS). While the reason for its acceptance by NWS is easy to understand, since the treaty legitimizes their possession of nuclear weapons, the decisions by NNWS to accede are much harder to grasp. First and foremost, the regime established by the NPT was deeply asymmetrical, since it openly violated the fundamental principle of the modern international state system: the norm of sovereign equality. This formal inequality established in the NPT is the root cause of the ongoing dispute over the real purpose behind the treaty and what is often called the need for a balanced implementation of its three "pillars" of nonproliferation, disarmament, and peaceful uses of nuclear technology.²

Given the NPT’s present-day centrality, the shortage of accounts examining the historical circumstances of its creation is surprising. In fact, this also holds true for the emergence of the wider nonproliferation regime, which has been neglected by historians in favor of other aspects of nuclear policy during the Cold War. Earlier research dealing with the NPT primarily covered the negotiations between the superpowers in the 1960s and the role of nonproliferation in the wider politics of détente, usually with a special focus on Western alliance dynamics and on the future nuclear status of the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG). As a consequence, there has been very little investigation of the motivations and strategic calculi of the various middle and small powers that joined the treaty.³ The recent "renaissance" (Scott Sagan) in nuclear studies promises to make up for this negligence. The present volume is part of these ongoing efforts to widen our knowledge and understanding of the nuclear realm.⁴

The contributions in this volume investigate various aspects of the NPT negotiations which so far have not received much attention. Above all, the main focus of this volume is the attitudes and positions adopted by a selection of NNWS up to 1968, when the treaty was opened for signature. The chapters included in the volume focus on both European and non-European states. The positions of the latter have so far been largely ignored by scholars, despite their significant role in the maintenance of the regime in the present. Based on newly declassified archival and previously inaccessible other evidence, these country studies give an impression of how governments other than the superpowers perceived the global proliferation threat and how they reacted to efforts at the creation of a global agreement to forestall such proliferation. Quite a number of the cases covered in the volume deal with states which seriously considered, if only temporarily, acquiring an independent nuclear deterrent. Indeed, one of the cases studied here, India, ultimately abstained from joining the NPT and instead manufactured her own nuclear weapons.

Those states which decided to accede to the NPT faced the challenge of protecting their own interests of various kinds, such as preventing nuclear acquisition by neighboring states, receiving defense commitments from their allies, developing their civilian nuclear capabilities and protecting their commercial competitiveness. As the various chapters demonstrate, there is no single answer as to why NNWS ultimately acceded to the NPT – the decisions were filtered through a multitude of often conflicting factors and influences, juxtaposing domestic politics, considerations of prestige, bureaucratic infighting, technological competence, personal rivalries, regional confrontations, patron-client relationships, and scientific ambitions based on "developmentalist" identities, to name but a few.

Part I: nuclear nonproliferation and alliance cohesion

The contributions to this volume examine the disposition of NNWS towards the general idea of a global nonproliferation agreement as well as the various attempts of middle and small powers to wield their influence on the drafting process of the NPT. Mirroring the historical sequence of events leading to the NPT, Part I of the volume starts by focusing on the setting in a divided Europe during the Cold War and by weighing the interdependent issues of extended deterrence, alliance cohesion and proliferation concerns.

Roland Popp’s contribution traces the structural conditions of the time and the specific actions by the superpowers as they prepared the stage for serious negotiations on nonproliferation in the early 1960s, leading to the agreement between Moscow and Washington on the basic provisions of the NPT in late 1966 and the subsequent cooperation between the two in finalizing the treaty after shepherding it through international institutions. Popp identifies three distinctive time periods on the way towards the conclusion of the NPT, and he synthesizes existing interpretations with archival source material from US archives in order to identify openings for questioning or revising the prevalent master narrative on the emergence of the NPT. Besides the US, Soviet and British perspectives, another state on which a considerable amount of new scholarship is available is the FRG.

Andreas Lutsch offers a reinterpretation of the West German position on nonproliferation based on a broad empirical foundation. Dissenting from the prevalent view in the literature regarding the FRG’s genuine ambitions for national control over nuclear weapons, Lutsch instead interprets Bonn’s policies as being inspired by a "limited nuclear revisionism" which had as its objective to strengthen and enhance its own position inside the Western alliance. Following this interpretative line, the emergence of the NPT had an only limited effect on the FRG and, according to Lutsch, none at all with a view to nonproliferation, given the non-existence of actual intentions with regard to nuclear acquisition.

In line with the recent trend towards investigating the nuclear convictions of specific leaders and individuals in IR literature on proliferation, Elmar Hellendoorn traces the development of Dutch nonproliferation policies, based on documents which had been unavailable until recently. Providing an interesting example of a non-great power faced with the dangers and opportunities that, for a middle power like the Netherlands, emanated from the appearance of a new instrument of international politics such as the NPT, Hellendoorn stresses the pivotal role of Max van der Stoel inside the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. According to Hellendoorn, van der Stoel used the NPT negotiations to abandon the inherited position on a future European nuclear option in order to strengthen the Atlanticist orientation in Dutch foreign policy. Hellendoorn’s argument, however, transcends the dimension of simple bureaucratic politics, as he stresses the intentional leveraging of internationalist ideas by van der Stoel and his supporters, demonstrating how difficult it is in practice to distinguish between utilitarian and idealistic motives.

Leopoldo Nuti offers new information on the Italian case which resembles the West German one in many respects. He portrays Rome’s initial reaction to early NPT drafts as even more hostile than Bonn’s, mostly due to a strong desire for status parity vis-à-vis other European powers of similar size. In an interesting exposition of states' multifaceted reactions to the emerging nonproliferation regime, Nuti analyzes the parallel Italian efforts to influence the final treaty text while simultaneously expanding its own nuclear capabilities in the fields of nuclear naval propulsion and uranium enrichment as well as intensifying nuclear collaboration with the French.

In her original contribution, Laurien Crump-Gabreëls highlights an aspect of nonproliferation diplomacy which often goes unmentioned. Based on a wide array of source materials from Eastern European archives, she examines the nuclear debate amongst the members of the Warsaw Pact. Confirming many accounts in the past two decades, Crump-Gabreëls provides ample evidence for the limitations of Soviet hegemony inside the Eastern Bloc and the unexpected freedom of maneuver of smaller states vis-à-vis Moscow. Her special focus is on the unique position, in this context, of Romania, which used the NPT consultations to underline and strengthen its ambitions towards a more independent position, de facto blocking any Warsaw Pact decision-making on the treaty for a considerable time. Hers is a good example of the opportunities provided to small and middle powers during the NPT negotiation phase. At the same time, she demonstrates how the disunity of NNWS played into the hands of the superpowers, since Romanian objections absolved Moscow from serious consultations, resulting in a fait accompli which in the end Bucharest itself was forced to accept.

Part II: global and regional dynamics in negotiating the NPT

Part II of the book moves away from the European theater and analyzes the global dimensions of the fledging regime. The main factors impinging upon the negotiations substantially differ from the European setting. Ideas of nuclear sharing play only a peripheral role, if any, while questions of the credibility of extended deterrence are still relevant. A reoccurring issue in many chapters is the 1964 nuclearization of the People’s Republic of China (PRC), the formative event for the appraisal of the nonproliferation idea in most of East Asia, South Asia, and Oceania. Another discernible aspect is the basic mistrust and skepticism vis-à-vis the intentions of the superpowers that was prevalent in the capitals of those states which regarded themselves as part of the Global South.

In her examination of the Australian case, Christine Leah identifies various objectives and purposes behind Canberra’s nuclear policy, some of which, however, proved to be irreconcilable. Leah diverts from the majority view in the existing literature, and downgrades the contribution of reaffirmed US security guarantees for Australia’s ultimate decision to join the treaty. She outlines the strong sense of abandonment and a perceived threat from China, Indonesia, and Japan amongst the ruling elite and the remarkable determination to pursue a nuclear option, if only a latent one, through heavy investment in a civilian nuclear infrastructure. These concerns shaped the contentious internal debates on the NPT. According to Leah, apart from accomplishing the technological status of nuclear latency, it took a general calming of the security situation in East Asia in the early 1970s and a change in government before the country could accede to the NPT.

Vinod Kumar focuses on India’s diplomatic activism during the NPT negotiations against the backdrop of a changing security setting in South Asia in the aftermath of the 1964 PRC nuclear test. The emergence of the NPT forced Delhi to decide between Nehruvian internationalism and non-aligned leadership on one hand and the strategic need to counter the Chinese challenge on the other. While much more limited than the other contributors by official secrecy and the unavailability of pivotal evidence, Kumar examines in detail the volatile Indian diplomatic record during the negotiations in UN committees and the desperate attempts to reconcile the conflicting determinants of Indian policy. He demonstrates the interplay between strategic pressures and growing resentment against what Indians perceived as an asymmetrical and even discriminatory treaty. These factors ultimately persuaded one of the global pioneers of disarmament and arms control to reject the NPT.

Similar threat perceptions deriving from the PRC test were detectable in Japan. As Fintan Hoey demonstrates in his chapter, based on Japanese source material, the country shared with India a strong aversion to all things nuclear, having been the only country in history to have suffered an attack by atomic weapons. Hoey confirms recent findings by other scholars regarding the ambivalence of Japanese nuclear abstinence as codified in the famous "Three Non-Nuclear Principles" of 1967. While the public affirmation seemed to turn Japanese accession to the NPT into a foregone conclusion, Hoey portrays the somewhat confusing route taken by Tokyo as resulting from several and often contradictory sources such as public opinion, a substantial lobby inside the strategic elite favoring an independent deterrent, the need to recalibrate the alliance relationship with Washington, and the desire for the reversion of Okinawa.

Jonathan Hunt’s contribution deals with the successful efforts by Latin American and Caribbean states, parallel to the ongoing NPT negotiations, to establish a nuclear-weapon-free zone (NWFZ) in their world region, thereby offering an alternative route towards nonproliferation. Based on impressive multi-archival research, Hunt’s contribution focuses on the interplay between the two negotiation processes. His chapter is at the same time a country case study on the specific role played by Mexico in that respect. His examination of the way in which Mexican nonproliferation diplomacy succeeded in leveraging its prominent role regarding regional denuclearization into the position of an influential participant in the wider NPT negotiations provides an outstanding example of the opportunities offered to small and middle powers during that period.

Departing from national perspectives and instead investigating interactions inside international institutions in order to highlight heretofore underappreciated aspects of nonproliferation diplomacy, Jacob Darwin Hamblin analyzes the implementation of the safeguards regime at the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) against the backdrop of ongoing NPT negotiations. Departing from conventional wisdom, Hamblin identifies European suppliers as the main proponents of laxness and flexibility with respect to nuclear technology transfers, ultimately rendering many of those transactions "invisible" to safeguards. Contradicting the general trend towards more robust nonproliferation obligations as set by the movement towards the NPT, his chapter demonstrates how delicate the nonproliferation regime in fact was in its early years.

Taking stock of the emerging regime

Taken together, the chapters in this volume offer a comprehensive, if not complete, and critical historical assessment of the negotiation of the NPT during the middle Cold War and of the beginnings of the global nuclear order. In the final chapter, Andreas Wenger and Liviu Horovitz reflect and synthesize the main findings of the various chapters. Their answer as to why an overwhelming majority of states joined the regime in the end, despite its discriminatory aspects, builds upon the fundamental but also ambivalent relationship between nuclear technology and political power that informs the nuclear choices of small and medium powers.

Notes

1 The contributions in this volume are based on papers first presented at the conference "The Making of a Nuclear Order: Negotiating the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty" in Ittingen, Switzerland, March 1–2, 2014, convened by the Center for Security Studies (CSS) at ETH Zurich in collaboration with the Nuclear Proliferation International History Project (NPIHP) funded by the Carnegie Corporation of New York.

2 See Steven E. Miller, Nuclear Collisions: Discord, Reform and the Nuclear Nonproliferation Regime (Cambridge, MA: American Academy of Arts and Sciences, 2012).

3 Two exceptions are the older works, albeit on a very limited empirical basis: Onkar S. Marwah and Ann Schulz, ed., Nuclear Proliferation and the Near-Nuclear Countries (Cambridge, MA: Ballinger Pub. Co, 1975); Johan Jørgen Holst, ed., Security, Order and the Bomb: Nuclear Weapons in the Politics and Defence Planning of Non-Nuclear Weapon States (Oslo: Universitetsforlaget, 1972). On the wider regime, see the contributions in Roland Popp and Andreas Wenger, ed., "Special Issue: The Origins of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Regime," The International History Review 36, no. 2 (2014): 195–323.

4 Scott Sagan, "Two Renaissances in Nuclear Security Studies," in H-Diplo/ISSF Forum on "What We Talk about When We Talk about Nuclear Weapons," June 15, 2014, at http://issforum.org/ISSF/PDF/ISSF-Forum-2.pdf (last accessed March 20, 2016).

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• Notes on contributors
• 1 Introduction: small and middle powers in the emergence of a discriminatory regime
• PART I Nuclear nonproliferation and alliance cohesion
• PART II Global and regional dynamics in negotiating the NPT
• PART III Conclusion
• Index