The Politics of Nuclear Disarmament

Obstacles to and Opportunities for Eliminating Nuclear Weapons

Tim Street

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2021
• eBook ISBN: 9781000365115
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Arms Control
• Index: Politics & International Relations

This book explores what political conditions must be established and what obstacles overcome for the fi ve offi cial Nuclear Weapon States (NWS)— China, France, Russia, the UK and US— to eliminate their nuclear weapons.

The different views and positions of a range of actors concerning nuclear weapons issues— including elite perspectives and public opinion— and the political assumptions underpinning them, are discussed to develop a more democratic approach to disarmament. Addressing the lack of detailed analysis concerning the meaning of nuclear disarmament for the domestic political orders of NWS, the book critically explores different approaches to and theories of disarmament within legal, political and technical literatures and orthodox and critical theory. It also builds on previous discussions of nuclear possession, restraint, arms control, and disarmament— concerning both nuclear possessor and non- possessor states— identifying the insights these works provide regarding how NWS disarmament may be advanced.

Contributing to theoretical debates concerning how domestic politics interacts with and determines states' international behaviour, the book will be of interest to all scholars and students of history, politics, international relations, security studies, military history, war studies, peace studies, confl ict, democracy, and global governance.

Part I

Understanding nuclear disarmament: theory and practice

1 Conceptualising nuclear disarmament

1.1 Introduction

How can we best start to understand the challenges NWS face in eliminating their nuclear arsenals? Specifically, how do we identify whom or what is responsible for the NWS’s continued possession and modernisation of nuclear weapons, and their refusal to disarm, and how might this situation change? Having reached such understandings, what progressive ideas and action supportive of NWS being able to eliminate their nuclear arsenals should we recommend? Moreover, do such investigations require us to develop a theory of nuclear disarmament, and, if so, what would such a theory look like? In order to answer these and other related questions, it is perhaps best to begin by exploring existing theories of nuclear possession and disarmament, highlighting which areas remain problematic and which require further investigation and explanation. Following this discussion, we may be able to suggest the methods and knowledge necessary to create a more complete theory, incorporating these insights into our research design. Before embarking on this approach, however, there are several issues to take into consideration.

First, we must recognise that because, in the field of nuclear weapons, definitions of both the material and ideational can be hotly contested and are the subject of much political wrangling, we should critically examine how nuclear disarmament has been defined and consider whether it is necessary or sensible to settle on one particular definition. Secondly, existing scholarly theories of nuclear disarmament generally seek to answer either one or more of the following questions:

i)How and why did South Africa and the three former Soviet states (Belarus, Kazakhstan and Ukraine) relinquish their nuclear arsenals?

ii)How and why were Iraq and Libya’s nuclear weapons programmes dismantled?

iii)Should, and if so how could and why would, (one or more of) the nine NPS relinquish their nuclear arsenals?

Studies of the first two questions attempt to explain things that have happened and are thus, naturally, based on empirical discussions of evidence. In contrast, studies addressing the third question attempt to explain how something that has not happened and is not happening could take place, and thus deploy both an empirical, and more speculative, approach. Given that my study is of the latter type, it is necessary to consider what evidence I should base the empirical part of my study on and how this evidence should be used to inform the speculative and transformative element. For example, to what extent are studies of NPS nuclear possession, nuclear disarmament by former NAS, or states that had nuclear weapons programmes, useful to considerations of NWS disarmament and how useful are findings from other studies of nuclear weapons decision-making, such as non-proliferation and restraint, that focus on the experience of NNWS?

Thirdly, it should be acknowledged at the outset that this study has a pronounced normative element because I am not just trying to explain NWS decision-making past and present, but wish to contribute to a discussion of how NWS could act in future in order to become FNWS, based on the threefold assumption that nuclear disarmament is desirable, justifiable and possible. It is thus necessary to consider what the methodological and theoretical implications are of this stance. For example, it is possible to make a heuristic suggestion at this point that my study will require a means of analysing NWS behaviour that can identify the forces enabling the production of nuclear weapons systems and that treats these processes as contingent, dynamic and open to substantial change, even if present conditions make such change seem distant and unlikely. Before beginning to review and assess existing theories of nuclear disarmament it is worth discussing each of these three issues in more depth, both to explore their significance and to try and reach some conclusions about the best way to proceed through this complex terrain.

1.2 What is nuclear disarmament?

On the face of it answering the question ‘what is nuclear disarmament?’ seems straightforward. For example, we may refer to the consensus Final Document of the 2010 NPT Review Conference (RevCon), agreed to by the 189 States Parties to the treaty, which includes an action plan consisting of ‘concrete steps for the total elimination of nuclear weapons’.¹ Despite the clear language contained in this and other intergovernmental (for example, United Nations) documents, nuclear disarmament remains a much-contested term, principally due to NWS and NNWS having quite different interpretations of what it—and the NPT itself—means, both from a political and technical point of view.

For example, civil society groups such as Reaching Critical Will point out that progress towards nuclear disarmament must be measured by the 13 Practical Steps agreed by NPT States Parties at the 2000 RevCon for the ‘systematic and progressive disarmament of the world’s nuclear weapons’.² The 2010 NPT RevCon’s Final Document reaffirmed the 13 Steps and included a 64-point action plan in order to move forward on achieving the treaty’s goals, including a commitment by NWS to reduce the salience—meaning the role and significance—of nuclear weapons in their national security policies.

Importantly, Action 2 of the 2010 RevCon’s Final Document states that all members of the NPT ‘commit to apply the principles of irreversibility, verifiability and transparency in relation to the implementation of their treaty obligations’.³ These three principles are designed to increase confidence between states and convince the international community that an NWS has implemented the legal, political and technical measures required for them to eliminate all their nuclear weapons. The aforementioned NPT agreements can also be said to form the strongest existing basis for international discussions on nuclear disarmament. This is because of the number of participating states and the fact that NWS and NNWS reached consensus, lending the NPT process significant legitimacy. Furthermore, as John Burroughs explains, in 1996 the International Court of Justice concluded that ‘the threat or use of nuclear weapons is generally illegal’ and that there exists an obligation on all states, under Article VI of the NPT, ‘to pursue in good faith and bring to a conclusion negotiations leading to nuclear disarmament in all its aspects under strict and effective international control’.⁴

However, as Reaching Critical Will points out, there are, in reality, several problems with the current approach. This is first because the NPT agreements on nuclear disarmament are actually weak, providing ‘very few benchmarks to measure progress’, and secondly, because ‘time lines were removed and the language used is vague and leaves most disputed actions open for interpretation’.⁵ Thirdly, efforts to fulfil the requirements of the action plan have so far been ‘significantly lacking’.⁶ Who or what is responsible for the current impasse? Beatrice Fihn speaks for many NNWS when she argues that responsibility lies with the five ‘official’ NWS under the NPT: China, France, Russia, the UK and the US. For Fihn, the problem is that NWS ‘somehow interpret’ Article VI of the NPT as allowing them ‘to possess nuclear weapons until they eventually decide to get rid of them’.⁷

The inequality inherent to the NPT was a result of the bipolar global order imposed by the USSR and US at the time the treaty was agreed. The two superpowers decided it was in their shared interest to preserve the status quo by preventing nuclear proliferation through technology denial. Opposing this settlement were the members of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM), a loose collective of developing nations from the southern hemisphere, and other progressively minded NNWS, which actively pushed for the inclusion of nuclear disarmament obligations in the NPT.

Fihn observes that countries that interpret Article VI as an obligation to negotiate nuclear disarmament are seen by NWS as ‘upsetting the strategic balance and even sometimes are blamed for not focusing enough on non-proliferation’.⁸ As Mukhatzhanova and Potter point out, however, non-proliferation was ‘never a central tenet’ of the NAM, since its members wanted to preserve their right to access nuclear technology and focus on abolishing nuclear weapons, as symbols of discrimination and inequality.⁹ Based on this analysis, one may conclude that if progress towards the shared goal of nuclear disarmament is to occur, then the attitudes and behaviour of NWS governments will need to significantly change so the agreed steps and action plans can be enacted.

In principle, each of the NWS supports the goal of a NWFW but each has different views on the path—for example, the form and content of multilateral negotiations required to achieve this—based on their strategic aims and objectives. One response by NWS to criticism from civil society and NNWS has therefore been to meet as a group (known as the ‘P5’) to discuss the implementation of their NPT obligations. More widely, the NWS are each committed to the ‘step by step’ approach, which consists of negotiations on a series of initial steps towards nuclear disarmament, including further bilateral reductions in nuclear weapons stockpiles between the US and Russia, the agreement of a Fissile Material Cut-Off Treaty (FMCT) and a Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT).

Thus, on the one hand, NWS have declared that they are earnestly engaged in discussions, behind closed doors, to create the political conditions that will allow them to realise their Article VI disarmament obligations. Yet, given the high salience nuclear weapons still have in NWS’s security doctrines and the significant investments being made to modernise nu...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Series Information
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• About the author
• Note on terminology
• List of abbreviations
• Introduction
• Part I Understanding nuclear disarmament: theory and practice
• Part II Obstacles to and opportunities for nuclear disarmament in and between the nuclear weapon states
• Conclusion
• Index