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The Economist
May 5th 2018
Briefing
Global security
23
2
anti-missile shield that Ronald Reagan pro-
posed in the 1980s, which the Soviets took
more seriously than they needed to. Such
defences couldbe verydestabilising if they
were able to deal with the diminished
forces with which an attacked adversary
might fight back. It is on that second-strike
capability that deterrence rests.
Theoretically, saysMichael O’Hanlon, a
strategist at Brookings, arms-control agree-
ments could cope with some of these wor-
ries. A New
START
follow-on could, for ex-
ample, allow each side to field an extra
offensive weapon for every ten intercep-
tors deployed by the other. He concedes
that energy weapons, if eventually shown
to be effective formore than point defence,
would be much more complicated to ac-
count for. Mr Samore, however, reckons
that anymissile-defence limitationswould
be “politically toxic” inAmerica. And ifen-
ergy weapons were to work, he says, en-
tirely newways of delivering nuclear war-
heads will be needed, such as the ones Mr
Putin is so excited about. MrMillerworries
that some in the Trump administration, for
which read Mr Bolton, may want to push
missile-defence technologies further; if
they do, the certain response from Russia
and China would be to make their war-
headsmore numerous andmore nimble.
Another big concern is cyber-weapons.
Daryl Kimball of the Arms Control Associ-
ation, a think-tank, says that cyber-attacks
on nuclear command-and-control systems
could “vastly increase crisis instability”.
Yet nobody has any good ideas about how
an arms-control agreement can cope with
such a possibility. Mr Einhorn says any
weapon that is defined by software is al-
most impossible to verify. Mr Miller sug-
gests that when it comes to cyber, deter-
rence may be the only option: “It is a
regime of self-help,” he says.
Most arms-control experts think that
the best that canbe hoped for are newtalks
with the Russians, possiblydrawing inoth-
er nuclear-weapons states, on enhancing
crisis stability, and the establishment of in-
ternational norms banning the use of
cyber in specific circumstances, such as
disabling an adversary’s strategic com-
mand-and-control systems.
A little funny in the head
Unfortunately, ifbilateral arms control is in
bad shape, so too is its multilateral equiva-
lent. The Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty,
adopted in 1996, has yet to come into force.
Three of the 44 designated “nuclear-capa-
ble states” which have to ratify it, India,
Pakistan andNorth Korea, have yet even to
sign it. Eight of the signatories, including
America, have not ratified it.
The Fissile Material Cut-off Treaty, also
first discussed in the 1990s, is in a similar
state oflimbo. Itwould seekto stop thepro-
duction of weapons-grade uranium and
plutonium by the five recognised nuclear
weapons states (America, Russia, China,
France and Britain) and the four that are
not members of the nuclear Non-Prolifera-
tion Treaty (
NPT
)—the three mentioned
above and Israel. Pakistan, though, has
been blocking negotiations on the basis
that the treaty does not deal with the large
stockpiles of uranium and plutonium that
other countries have.
The
NPT
itself remains, 50 years after it
was first signed, the bedrock multilateral
nuclear-arms control agreement. It is seen
by nearly all parties as worth preserving.
But the last reviewconference in 2015was a
fractious affair; the next one, in 2020, is
shaping up to be even worse. The gulf be-
tween the nuclear-weapon states (and
their close allies) and the rest haswidened.
The nuclear-weapon states pay lip service
to the incremental nuclear disarmament
the treaty asks of them while at the same
time modernising their forces to face the
next 50 years; this makes the nuke-nots
ever angrier.
A consequence of their frustration is
that some 130 states—about two-thirds of
the
NPT
’s membership—last year com-
bined to create, under
UN
auspices, a new
treaty on the Prohibition ofNuclearWeap-
ons (known also as the Nuclear Ban
Treaty). The nuclear-weapon states boy-
cotted the discussions leading up to the
treaty’s adoption in July, arguing that it is a
distraction from other disarmament and
non-proliferation initiatives, such as the
Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty and the
Fissile Material Cut-off Treaty. They also
have a reasonable concern that countries
might choose to move from the
NPT
to the
new treaty and thus avoid the
NPT
’s rigor-
ous safeguards against illicit fissile-materi-
al production.
A more immediate threat to the
NPT
is
the high probability that Mr Trump,
goaded byMr Bolton and his hawkish new
secretary of state, Mike Pompeo, will on
May 12th refuse to renew the presidential
waiver needed to prevent nuclear-related
sanctions on Iran from snapping back.
Should he do so, America will be in viola-
tion of the 2015 deal that curbs Iran’s nuc-
lear programme, the Joint Comprehensive
Plan of Action (
JCPOA
). The deal is be-
tween Iran and the five permanent mem-
bers of the
UN
Security Council—America,
Britain, China, France and Russia—plus
Germany. Detractors such as the president
complain that it is time-limited and that it
fails to stop Iran’s regional meddling or its
ballisticmissile programme, and that these
are fatal flaws. Israel’s prime minister, Bin-
yamin Netanyahu, eggs on such criticism.
On April 30th he made much play of evi-
dence that Iran had lied about the military
part of its nuclear programme.
This line of attack does not hold water.
Iran’s near-nuclear capabilitywas not a se-
cret: it was the reason for acting. The world
had to choosewhether to accept it as a nuc-
lear-weapon state, or one perched on the
threshold; to go to war; or to negotiate an
arms-control agreement. That agreement
is meticulously crafted for very specific
purposes: backing Iran away from the nuc-
lear threshold; blocking all its pathways to
building a nuclear device for at least ten
years; and hindering it fromdoing so there-
afterwithout being caught.
If Mr Trump pulls America out of the
deal the other parties will try to save it. But
the blow, not just to the Iran deal but to any
future attempts at multilateral arms con-
trol, could be fatal. As well as enlightened
self-interest and rigorous verification,
arms-control agreements depend on a de-
gree of trust that the parties to them will
honour their commitments even when
governments change. Persuading North
Korea to give up its nuclear weapons in re-
turn for sanctions relief and security guar-
anteeswas never very likely. PullingAmer-
ica out of the Iran deal, when there is no
evidence that Iran has broken its undertak-
ings, just a few weeks before a summit
with North Korea’s leader, Kim Jong Un,
seems certain to make it less likely still. As
Sir Lawrence says of Russia, “A degree of
trust is needed.”
Arms control, MrO’Hanlon says, “often
gets a bad rap, but it is an extraordinarily
valuable tool.” And it is one that the nuc-
lear powers risk losing through a mix of
complacency, neglect, ignorance and mal-
ice. It is within Mr Trump’s power to do
something about it. He could make a start
by holding his fire on the Iran deal while
his European allies work to meet some of
his concerns, and by indicating a willing-
ness to extend New
START
—something
which would require little more than the
stroke ofa pen. “Presidents cananddo turn
on a dime,” Ms Gottemoeller says, more in
hope than expectation. There is no sign yet
that this onewill.
7
And then there were 9,345
Estimated global nuclear warheads*, 2018
Source: Federation of American Scientists
*Not including retired warheads
United States
3,800
Russia
total 4,350
France
300
China
270
Britain
215
Pakistan
130-140
India
120-130
Israel
80
North Korea
20-60
= 20 warheads
Deployed Stockpiled
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