The struggle for a Nuclear Weapons Free World

From END Info 27 - Download

By Tom Unterrainer

Where are we in terms of achieving nuclear abolition? Is it possible to make definite and precise claims about this? It might be more useful to start by looking at the current state of nuclear risks, by way of providing context for later comments. To do this, we must look at the state of play in the United States and allied powers.

I suspect that there is a consensus for the claim that nobody in the last generation did more to highlight the risks posed by nuclear weapons than former US President Donald Trump. It wasn’t just that Trump spoke about nuclear weapons so much or that his Nuclear Posture Review clearly defined such weapons as possible war fighting devices. It wasn’t just that Trump trashed non-proliferation, arms control and similar treaties and disorganised what previously stood as a relatively stable and predictable ‘nuclear order’. It wasn’t just that his administration spoke of ‘useable’ nuclear weapons and moved the US military-industrial complex into a new arms-race footing. It wasn’t even the wide-spread perception of his political unpredictability that ramped up tensions so dramatically, though it surely didn’t help. The actual scale of Trump’s impact on nuclear questions is illustrated by the fact that his own military thought he was capable of ordering a nuclear attack on China in the aftermath of his electoral defeat. General Mark Milley, chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, was so concerned at the prospect that he telephoned his Chinese counterpart, General Li Zuocheng, not once but twice to assure him that the military would not allow Trump to launch a nuclear assault. The details of these calls are contained in Bob Woodwards book, Peril. Can you imagine? General Milley seemed certain that Trump could be contained in the event of such an order. He seemed to think that such an order was a distinct possibility. What would have happened if such an order was given? Would the Imperial Presidency really have gone quietly into the night, thwarted by a General or two? Nothing seems certain.

Trump is no longer in office and, as such, tensions have most certainly been reduced from this high point. But they have not gone away. There was some hope that a Biden Presidency would open a new era of nuclear diplomacy, risk reduction and progress on disarmament. I’m afraid that none of this looks likely. Nobody thinks that Biden is about to ‘push the button’, of course. But whilst some hoped that his Nuclear Posture Review might open the way to a new, more rational, era of policy such hopes have been dashed by the removal of Leonor Tomero from the process. She was fired. An expert in non-proliferation and arms control, Tomero was seen as someone committed to undoing the damage of recent years and equally committed to taking a serious look at questions around ‘sole use’ and ‘no first use’ of nuclear weapons. What should we now expect from Biden’s Nuclear Posture Review?

His attitude towards and support for the modernisation of US nuclear weapons – in fact, not just modernisation but a whole new generation of such weapons, his failure to re-start US participation in the JCPOA (Iran Deal), the continued ratcheting of tensions with China and Russia: none of this looks promising. Even the eleventh-hour US agreement to accept Russia’s offer of extending New START for five years – a welcome move – was soured by Secretary of State Anthony Blinken’s comments, which portrayed New START in terms of restricting Russian strategic weapons and called for China to be forced into this bilateral treaty. Blinken failed to mention the US’s own strategic nuclear forces at all. The departure of Trump has allowed for the US, under Biden’s leadership, to enthusiastically re-engage with NATO, to assert US commitment to the Alliance and to move ahead with expanding NATOs activities well beyond the Atlantic region.

And then we have AUKUS – a trilateral agreement between Australia, the United Kingdom and the US – which not only tramples over the Non-Proliferation Treaty with respect to supplying nuclear power technology for non-peaceful purposes but which heralds a anglophone military pact in the South Pacific with nuclear at the heart of it.

Of course, the junior nuclear-power in the AUKUS triumvirate – the UK – has breached the NPT all on its own, with the announcement that it will increase the upper threshold of its nuclear warhead stockpile against a long-term trend and commitment to overall reductions. What did Biden and his administration make of the UK’s ‘Integrated Review’? We should assume that its contents and direction were wholly endorsed by US policymakers and military leaders.

All of which paints a troubling picture. But this is no surprise. If the risks posed by nuclear weapons were not troubling, there would be no need for meetings like this and organisational efforts like Nuke Free Europe.

So let us turn our attention towards the pressing organisational and action opportunities that exist in Europe. We have had a successful month of action, where peace and disarmament organisations in Germany, Belgium, Netherlands, Italy, France, England and Scotland mounted activities to highlight the presence of nuclear weapons, to call for an end to nuclear sharing, an end to the arms race and for states to sign the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons. Such joint activity is a big step forward.

Coming up next week is the COP climate change conference in Scotland, which will see thousands of activists gathering, discussing and planning to meet the challenge posed by impending climate catastrophe. It has been said that those of us in the peace and anti-nuclear movements see a situation where humanity is faced with two existential threats: climate change and its consequences that could become fatal within a generation and the nuclear threat, which could become fatal next year, maybe … or next month, perhaps … or maybe later this evening. Alertness to one of these risks surely opens the door for alertness to both: we should think carefully about building upon work already underway to work across these issues. Perhaps Nuke Free Europe could send a message to those demonstrating at COP, spelling out the connections between our issues.

Then there is the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons. Support for the Treaty grows and as we come to understand all the opportunities presented by the text, new opportunities for action will develop. The recent decision by Norway to attend the State Parties meeting in Vienna in March 2022 opens the prospect of other NATO member-states doing likewise. People will probably have seen NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg’s comments that the Norwegian government will have to explain itself to NATO. Stoltenberg, a former Norwegian Prime Minister himself, should perhaps concentrate on explaining himself to the Norwegian people. However, NATOs reaction to the Norwegian decision demonstrated the enduring issues with that organisation with respect to prospects for nuclear disarmament.

For the peace movement, Vienna raises the prospect of joint action and joint activity. We should surely try to meet in Vienna, but can we do more? What parts of the TPNW might offer us opportunities for concrete action? One possibility is around the question of nuclear testing. The Treaty commits signatories to seek redress for the legacies of nuclear testing. What can Ireland and Austria – two EU member states and both ratifiers of the TPNW – do, with the support of the peace movements, to hold France to account over the legacies of nuclear testing in Algeria? What about the presence of the US bombs in Germany, Italy, Belgium and the Netherlands? All these weapons are based on designs that have been tested at some point. Where were they tested? What impact did the tests have? What responsibilities might the ‘nuclear sharing’ countries have for hosting instruments of mass annihilation that have been tested at some point? Surely we should work together to find out.

What of the European Union, European Parliament and related bodies? In a recent report, The EU’s Arms Control Challenge: Bridging the nuclear divides (April 2021), Clara Portela of the EU Institute for Security Studies argues that:

the EU could consider relaxing its opposition to the TPNW and developing a modus vivendi with it. Because of the dominance of NATO allies protected [sic] by the US nuclear ‘umbrella’ among EU members, its stance on disarmament appears closer to that of the European [Nuclear Weapon States] than to those states advocating the [TPNW]. The prevalence of conservative views on disarmament accentuates the misalignment between the EU and NPT membership.

She continues:

The EU can help bridge the cleavage between those who contest the compatibility of the Ban Treaty with the NPT – mostly NATO members – and those who defend it. With the TPNW already in force, the EU can highlight that it does not rival the NPT, as its signatories remain active members of the NPT process. The Council should acknowledge thew legitimacy of the Ban Treaty as a reaction to the current disarmament stalemate, and help rebuild an agenda that engages with the entire NPT community.

This all sounds promising, and it should be hoped EU leaders take note of the arguments Portela sets out in this section of her report. Whilst it is clear that the EU is attempting to grapple with the TPNW beyond simple criticism, it seems likely that in the absence of peace movement initiatives it will attempt to reconcile the TPNW framework with a reconstruction of the accepted, ‘gradual’ and ‘step-by-step’ approach to disarmament that the Trump administration overturned. Reassembling a framework of arms control and non-proliferation would undo some of the damage inflicted by Trump but such a process should not be used to obscure or disrupt the abolitionist drives of the TPNW process.

The European peace movements should seek dialogue and cooperation with European Parliamentarians and their political groupings to ensure that the a renewed EU approach to arms control does not undercut the thrust of the TPNW. This means meetings, conferences and appealing to our existing friends in the European Parliament – as well as the two EU states already signed up to the TPNW – for joint work and cooperation.

Nuke Free Europe has focussed efforts on demands for an end to the new nuclear arms race, an end to nuclear sharing and for European states to sign up to and ratify the TPNW. These are important demands that will endure. We should also take this opportunity to think more widely about prospects for establishing a European Nuclear-Weapons-Free Zone. What would such a zone look like? Who would or could take part? How would proposals for establishing such a zone be formulated? What political levers are in place for starting a serious discussion in the political sphere? Even the ‘gradualist’ wing of disarmament exemplified by the ‘Stepping Stones Initiative’ of 2020 calls for states “to support the establishment of Nuclear Weapons-Free Zones in all regions of the world”. Similar wording was included in the 2010 NPT RevCon ‘Action Plan’. If those states and international organisations that wish to focus upon the NPT process and a gradual, incremental move to multilateral disarmament wish to avoid another ‘abolitionist wave’ like the TPNW, then they should think carefully about turning words into actions. The combined efforts of the peace movements across Europe and beyond can play an indispensable role in focussing their attention.