On June 24, the Financial Times published an op-ed by Senator John Kerry calling for the "next president [to] breathe life into an emerging bipartisan vision of a nuclear-weapons-free world." A week later the Financial Times published a countering letter by Senator Jon Kyl. The following Proliferation Analysis reproduces Senator Kyl's letter with a point-by-point rebuttal (in italics). Senator Kyl is an important, albeit minority, voice in American debates on nuclear issues; we welcome opportunities to debate and dialogue on these issues with him.
Sir, Senator John Kerry writes that the next US president should commit to a world without nuclear weapons ("America looks to a world free of nuclear weapons", June 25). Simply put, US national security - and that of our friends and allies - will not permit a nuclear-weapons-free world in the foreseeable future.
Neither Senator Kerry nor most other serious thinkers about the nuclear future claim that the security, verification and enforcement conditions necessary to create a world without nuclear weapons can be achieved any time soon. The issue is whether it is in the interest of the United States and global security to vigorously pursue this objective. Purposefulness would not guarantee success, but it would provide opportunities to test whether the necessary positive conditions can in fact be created. If they could, the world would become more secure from nuclear dangers than it will be if current nuclear trends continue as Senator Kyl urges.
First, more than 31 countries currently have security guarantees with the US, many of which place those countries under the so-called US nuclear umbrella. The most recent Nato strategic concept made this point: "The supreme guarantee of the security of the Allies is provided by the strategic nuclear forces of the Alliance, particularly those of the United States."
A nuclear-weapon free world should and would only be achieved in close consultation with U.S. allies and other friends. A central requirement of U.S. leadership would be to develop confidence with its allies and friends that security commitments would be maintained, and indeed strengthened by the removal of nuclear threats. The U.S. nuclear umbrella was extended in the Cold War when U.S. conventional military predominance did not exist and fears of Soviet or Sino-Soviet military expansion were real. But if nuclear weapons were eliminated globally through reciprocal, verifiable, and enforceable steps, the balance of wealth and power in the world suggests that the U.S. and its allies could maintain their security against non-nuclear threats. (If nuclear threats remained, the U.S. would not eliminate its nuclear weapons.)
We must be aware of the cascade of proliferation that will likely result if the world loses confidence in the US deterrent. Countries such as Japan, South Korea, Germany and Turkey rely on the US deterrent so that they don't have to develop their own. Saudi Arabia has expressed interest in obtaining civilian nuclear power; the only logical explanation for this move is that the Saudis are concerned that Iran will acquire nuclear weapons.
Senator Kyl here makes a common mistake in conflating deterrence with nuclear deterrence. The U.S. (and other powers) will always insist on retaining deterrent capabilities. But these capabilities need not include nuclear weapons if all others who possess these weapons implemented verifiable and enforceable commitments to eliminate them. In the context of a world in which Russia, China, Pakistan, et al. eliminated their nuclear arsenals, and Iran and North Korea no longer posed acute nuclear threats, it would be politically and strategically unrealistic for Japan, South Korea, Germany and Turkey to counter such a trend and acquire nuclear weapons on their own. Indeed, these key non-nuclear-weapon states have clear traditions favoring the global elimination of nuclear weapons. They would welcome being enlisted in the deliberations over how to proceed incrementally toward this objective in ways that buttress their security ties with the U.S. Rather than let Senator Kyl speak for these states, U.S. leaders should invite their leaders and experts to join explorations of this issue.
Second, rogue nations such as North Korea, Iran and Syria continue to seek weapons of mass destruction, including nuclear weapons capability. The US cannot assume a posture of disarmament while regimes such as these seek the world's most dangerous weapons.
None of the current possessors of nuclear weapons, including the U.S., would move close to eliminating their nuclear arsenals if the threats of proliferation posed by North Korea, Iran and Syria were not verifiably and assuredly removed. Yet, the United States' capacity to rally the international support necessary to remove these proliferation threats is undermined by the chest-thumping double standard represented in Senator Kyl's argument. In IAEA and UN Security Council deliberations, and in debates in many capitals, the continued high salience that the U.S. and other nuclear-weapon states give to their own nuclear arsenals prompts resistance to “punishing” Iran. Charges of discrimination, hypocrisy and neo-colonialism may be rebuttable, but they are politically potent in many of the countries and agencies that the U.S. needs to put on its side in countering proliferation. Moreover, as many U.S. military leaders privately note, the U.S. nuclear arsenal is not a useable instrument in countering these proliferation threats.
Third, every nuclear weapons power - with the exception of the US - is currently modernising its nuclear weapons and weapons delivery systems. Robert Gates, the US defence secretary, recently observed that Russia has chosen to modernise its nuclear weapons in place of conventional weapons. Yet the US continues to permit its nuclear forces to atrophy and decline.
While differences exist among the modernization programs of the U.S., Russia, China, France, the U.K., India, Pakistan and Israel, it is true that these countries' military nuclear establishments have not retired. Again, the key point is whether pursuit of the goal of a nuclear-weapon free world offers a better prospect for ending these states' reliance on nuclear weapons than does the course recommended by Senator Kyl. This is a circular problem: Russia and China, for example, are improving their nuclear deterrent capabilities to ensure their survival against advancing U.S. conventional capabilities and ballistic missile defenses. None of these rivals has the illusion that the U.S. nuclear arsenal is atrophying. The U.S. has spent tens of billions of dollars in recent years maintaining a sophisticated arsenal of 10,000 nuclear warheads and has by far the most advanced laboratories and infrastructure dedicated to this task. No U.S. adversary thinks that U.S. nuclear weapons would not "work." Indeed, as a thought experiment, consider whether anyone doubts that Israel's nuclear weapons would work, even though Israel has not conducted a nuclear weapon test and is ready to ratify the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, unlike the United States which has conducted 1,030 nuclear test explosions.
In 2006 Tony Blair, then UK prime minister, explained the purpose of the British modernisation programme in this way: "The government's judgment, on balance, is that though the cold war is over, we cannot be certain in the decades ahead that a major nuclear threat to our strategic interest will not emerge."
The government of the United Kingdom has embraced the objective of moving vigorously to try to create conditions for eliminating all nuclear arsenals, which Senator Kyl rejects. U.S. and global interests would be served if Washington, on a bipartisan basis, joined with the U.K.
French president Nicolas Sarkozy echoed that sentiment earlier this year when he called his nation's nuclear deterrent "the nation's life insurance policy" and approved its modernisation.
France's open-ended embrace of nuclear deterrence is highly problematic. By not conditioning his country's retention on nuclear weapons to the ongoing existence of nuclear threats, President Sarkozy has undermined the cause of nonproliferation that his government otherwise effectively champions. Nevertheless, France, unlike the U.S., has ratified the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, dismantled its testing facilities, eliminated all its land-based nuclear missile systems, and reduced its arsenal to 300 total weapons. If Senator Kyl wishes to cite France as an exemplar, perhaps he should urge the U.S. to take such steps, too.
Contrary to Senator Kerry's hopes, US national security - and that of our friends and allies - will be best ensured if the next US president acts to stop 17 years of neglect and decay by following the good example of the British and the French nuclear weapons modernisation programmes.
Jon Kyl,
Republican, Arizona
Former member, House Armed Services Committee, Senate Intelligence Committee
George Perkovich is vice president for studies and director of the nonproliferation program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.
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