High-Level Expert Group Meeting
2 April 1985
Paris, France
Chaired by Jacques Chaban-Delmas
The exchange of views between the participants ranged
widely over issues concerning nuclear disarmament and
international security, generating discussions which were
useful in the preparation of this report. The report
however reflects the views of the President, Jacques
Chaban-Delmas only.
From the outset, the United Nations and the international
community as a whole have had to come to terms with the
realities of the nuclear age.
Since then disarmament, and in particular nuclear
disarmament by the very nature of atomic weapons, has
always been regarded as a global problem concerning all
the nations of the world. At the same time, the central
importance of bilateral U.S.-Soviet relations has become
accepted as an inevitable reality in arms control
negotiations.
The 1950s were marked by the rivalry between the two most
heavily armed powers and the careful avoidance of direct
confrontation in view of the dangers of mutual
destruction. This had a lasting impact on the situation in
Europe, where the confrontation was at the outset the most
intense; this impact was positive insofar that no armed
conflict between the East and West has yet taken place in
Europe. Similarly, changes have gradually occurred in the
basic context of the international security issue, and the
international debate on disarmament has been
transformed.
It is not easy to reconcile the interests of all the
primordial responsibilities of a few nations, particularly
when the achievement of aims, which are in principle
endorsed by all nations, is dependent on the changing
state of bilateral relations between the United States and
the USSR.
This is unquestionably one of the main causes of the
current arms control crisis.
In view of the now overwhelming importance of the balance
of U.S. and Soviet forces in the arms negotiations, it is
clear that the serious deterioration of relations between
the two superpowers over the last ten years (from the
mid-seventies onwards, and particularly since events in
Afghanistan at the end of 1979) has done much to
compromise the arms control process. Mutual suspicion and
confrontation have again become the basis for relations
between Washington and Moscow, bringing to an end the
period of detente during which some degree of progress had
been achieved in arms control. From this point of view,
the current arms control crisis is perhaps above all a
crisis in U.S.-Soviet relations and perhaps also in more
general terms a crisis in international relations as a
whole.
The crisis is reflected above all in the breakdown of the
standards of international behaviour embodied in the
United Nations Charter, and this is in my opinion the
second key aspect of the current arms control crisis. This
trend, which has extremely serious consequences for the
international community as a whole, was rightly deplored
in the UN Secretary General's recent annual report.
Although prohibited by the Charter, the use of force has
become so widespread that it is now almost considered as a
normal way of settling differences. The same trend lies
behind direct military intervention (even by the
superpowers), a renewed outbreak of terrorism and the use
of arms (such as chemical weapons) that are prohibited by
international law. In the case of chemical weapons, whose
use has become widespread even in so-called peripheral
conflicts (Iran-Iraq) vast problems can be expected in the
future, in view of the dangers of the proliferation of
these weapons of mass destruction, and their link with
atomic weapons (as a means of response or dissuasion).
Thirdly, technological advances - which are difficult to
control and whose implications are difficult to predict -
further complicate the disarmament equation to such an
extent that it may be seriously doubted whether a solution
can be found. The arms control rules laid down during the
sixties and seventies were appropriate for a state of
technical development which is now outdated.
The miniaturization of weapons, the fact that vehicles can
be armed with either conventional or nuclear warheads, and
new technical specifications (enabling range of power to
be modified at will) mean that conventional approaches to
arms issues - involving the classification of arms into
fixed categories (nuclear conventional) - are now partly
outdated. These developments threaten to make current
verification methods extremely difficult to use
(monitoring satellites have also become vulnerable to
attack). In the face of the current global uncertainty
regarding the future of the strategic system, and in view
of the wide range of technological changes currently
taking place (in atomic, conventional and space weapons),
the arms control process is in search of a new logic and
new guidelines.
It is not surprising that the many impasses of the last
few years have given rise to growing pessimism about arms
control, and increasing impatience with a debate whose
complexity often seems to mask the sterility of the
negotiations, and have led some to begin a dangerous
search for alternative solutions.
These solutions are all less concerned with addressing the
real causes of the arms race and its most concrete
manifestations - the accumulation and qualitative
modernisation of weapons - than with issues which are now
denounced as constituting major destabilizing factors of
the strategic situation.
It seems to have become more urgent to denounce strategic
doctrines than to make real arms reductions. Declarations
of intent are preferred to effective reductions. The
stance adopted by certain sections of public opinion (at
least in those countries where they have the freedom to
express themselves) is, it is argued, more important than
the actions of governments, as only this can make the
latter realize where their "true interests" lie.
In short, scepticism towards disarmament as a whole has in
many cases led to posturing rather than action;
"unilateralism" is thus proposed as the solution to the
impasse of conventional negotiations, the formal
denunciation of intentions is preferred to effective
reductions in arsenals, and non-verifiable declarations
are considered to be superior to concrete agreements.
This escapist attitude towards the nuclear disarmament
debate in turn increases disillusionment with the arms
control process as a whole.
This situation, in which the force of the disarmament
process is being dissipated in scholastic disputes, and in
which the bases of a fragile consensus amongst the
international community on the priorities and terms of
disarmament are being eroded, calls for a clarification of
the basic elements of the process, its limitations and its
possibilities.
Can nuclear disarmament be considered independently of
other international factors?
After the failure of the Baruch Plan (1974) and the end of
hopes for general and complete disarmament to enable the
world to return gradually to a pre-nuclear state, some
degree of consensus was established from the end of the
fifties onwards on a gradual and essentially bilateral
approach to arms control. The international community as a
whole (with the exception of China and France) approved
this policy, and put their trust in the principle of arms
control.
This consensus was lost as a result of U.S.-Soviet tension
at the end of the seventies, and the feeling that arms
control negotiations had not so much restricted the arms
race as guided it in directions about which the
negotiators had preferred not to ask questions. This
developed first in the Third World countries, which felt
they had been duped by the renunciation of atomic weapons
in the NPT, whereas the two superpowers had hardly reduced
their arsenals. Later, in the Western democracies, the
breakdown of the consensus on disarmament, and earlier on
nuclear dissuasion in general, was promoted by the spectre
of pacifist protests in 1980-1982. Although limited to
some West European countries and North America, and
although motivations varied widely from country to
country, pacifist protests had a considerable impact both
inside and outside the Western nations.
Hasty and no doubt exaggerated conclusions were drawn
concerning the "crisis of dissuasion" and the consensus on
Western defence. Indeed, these conclusions are still
referred to in international gatherings in 1985 to call
dissuasion into question, when in fact the retreat and
disarray of the pacifists throughout Europe is now
obvious. Whether discussing the deployment of the new
medium-range missiles, which was at the centre of their
action, or plans for anti-missile defense in space, the
pacifist movement now seems both confused and
unintelligible.
For its part, rather behind times in terms of changes in
the real world, the UN debate on nuclear disarmament has
continued in New York (First Commission) and Geneva
(Disarmament Conference), carried along by the momentum of
the 1975-1980 period. In fact, the basic elements of the
arms control debate have changed profoundly since then.
Two opposing concepts are put forward: the first is the
product both of the double rejection of dissuasion
mentioned earlier, and of the arms control negotiations of
the sixties and seventies. Nuclear weapons are held to be
an absolute evil, while nuclear disarmament is an absolute
objective, to be given priority over all other aspects of
the international military situation. A fundamental
distinction is thus drawn between the prevention of
nuclear war (through disarmament) and the prevention of
other wards, which is completely disregarded.
The second and opposite view emphasizes that for almost
half a century, nuclear weapons have constituted one of
the central elements of the balance of forces, and thus of
peace, and that such weapons cannot be uninvented; as a
result, nuclear arms cannot be considered in isolation
from the other aspects of the balance of forces.
Similarly, nuclear disarmament cannot be dissociated from
the even more fundamental objective of the reduction of
all arsenals (nuclear and non-nuclear) and the stability
of security in the various regions of the world. More than
150 armed conflicts have taken place since Hiroshima, and
in this context, the objective should not be merely to
prevent nuclear war, but to prevent all wars.
According to the first attitude, reflected for example in
the New Delhi declaration of six heads of state and
government on 25 January of this year, there is no greater
priority than "the prevention of a nuclear war", which is
becoming more likely each day. Humanity is seen as a
condemned man, who does not know the time and date of his
death, but whose execution is only a matter of time.
The responsibility for this situation, whereby the nuclear
powers are considered to be holding the whole planet
hostage, is attributed entirely to the doctrine of
dissuasion. In the opinion of the authors of the New Delhi
declaration, the essential failing of this doctrine is
that traditional political and military thinking is
transposed on to a completely new situation dominated by
nuclear weapons, and the fact that such weapons can only
be used for suicidal purposes, not only for the parties in
conflict but also for the whole human race.
Finally it is agreed that, although the process of nuclear
arms reduction must begin with the two most heavily armed
powers, the nuclear powers can no longer be completely
trusted to achieve this objective.
The need therefore, it is argued, is for public opinion
(presumably where it can be freely expressed) to put
pressure on governments and encourage all actions leading
to this end.
The tendentious and oversimplified nature of this analysis
can easily be demonstrated:
- No reference is made to the economic cost of
conventional weapons (which are greater than those of
atomic weapons), and of modern conventional conflicts (the
conflict between Iraq and Iran has already caused loss of
life comparable to that of the major offensives of World
War I). This failure to make any reference to conventional
weapons is particularly serious in that it is infinitely
more likely that a limited conflict involving the use of
conventional weapons could escalate into nuclear war, than
that the latter would break out unexpectedly. Rather than
the accumulation of nuclear arms resulting in war, it is
imbalances in a given region which can result in a source
of tension and errors of calculation leading to a
conflict. The importance assumed by nuclear weapons in the
balance of forces in Europe is in fact the result of a
longstanding Soviet predominance in conventional
forces.
- The analysis also disregards the moderating influence of
nuclear weapons on the behaviour of the two superpowers,
and more particularly their concern since the sixties to
avoid a direct confrontation of the type which developed
over the Cuban crisis and Berlin. No account is taken of
the fact that in Europe, it is precisely the danger of
nuclear retaliation on the aggressor's own territory which
has prevented the outbreak of any conflict, despite the
local imbalance in conventional forces.
- By ignoring the problems of the East-West balance and
the specific nature of regional situations in order to
deal in abstract terms with the "survival of humanity",
the authors of the declaration hope to transform the
debate concerning the causes of the international
situation into a kind of exorcism of nuclear weapons, thus
putting the clock back for the disarmament cause to the
time of cold war propaganda.
In their eyes it would seem, it is of little importance
that the East-West balance has ensured peace, as no-one
can be sure that this will always be the case in the
future, and that an accident will not occur: the more
serious probability of more numerous "tolerable" conflicts
is tacitly preferred to the hypothesis, whose consequences
would, in their opinion, be global and incalculable.
The constantly propounded theme of a massive and
continuous increase in nuclear weapons does not reflect
the true situation. In fact, American stocks of warheads
have been reduced by a quarter since 1960, and their power
has been cut by three-quarters in comparison with the
situation 25 years ago. Similarly, the number of NATO
nuclear weapons stationed in Western Europe continues to
fall, even allowing for the current modernisation
programme. The qualitative and quantitative evolution of
nuclear arsenals, at least on the Western side, is
extremely important in assessing the effects of the
"nuclear winter", a theory often proposed by those who
believe in the absolute primacy of nuclear disarmament. If
this theory is sound, as the authors of the New Delhi
declaration seem to think, the reduction of the available
explosive power would be a decisive consideration in
determining the climatological consequences of a possible
nuclear conflict.
In short, the problem of nuclear disarmament is clearly
now seen in moral, rather than political and technical
terms (this is reflected in the references to our
responsibility to future generations, and the "colonial"
situation of non-nuclear nations), which usually have no
real relation to the strategic and political situation of
the regions of the world, which is however of essential
importance in ensuring future peace. In doing so, the
representatives of this approach were no doubt right to
raise certain ethical questions which during the seventies
had been overshadowed by the dialectics, rather than the
objectives of negotiation. But by adopting this stance,
and by encouraging criticism of their governments (which
paradoxically shows that only Western democratic countries
and not Eastern bloc countries were expected to provide
ideas, proposals and concessions in negotiations which had
however been boycotted by the USSR for a year) the
proponents of this approach to nuclear disarmament had
their own arguments on the immorality of nuclear weapons
and the intolerable nature of the indefinite maintenance
of dissuasion turned against them by the advocates of
non-nuclear alternatives, the policy of "no first use of
nuclear weapons" together with the massive use of new
conventional technology, and the strengthening of
conventional forces, or various schemes for "total"
antiballistic defence systems). All this goes to prove
that the rejection of dissuasion can only channel military
rivalry into other directions, which in this case are
non-nuclear.
In this respect, the difficulty currently experienced by
radical critics of dissuasion in adopting a position on
the "star wars" programme is a reflection of the
reshuffling of positions, whereby the anti-nuclear
arguments of the pacifist left are now used in turn by the
conservative supporters of defensive technology.
In the face of this offensive against dissuasion which is
now being manipulated by the advocates of "total nuclear
disarmament" allied with the proponents of conventional
defense and of the "strategic defensive shield", it is now
more important than ever to remind ourselves of the other
alternative, which is based on a political and strategic
(rather than an exclusively moral) analysis of
international security in a nuclear age. As this analysis
forms part of a historical analysis of factors of
stability in Europe and the rest of the world over the
last 25 years, it may seem - wrongly - to be conservative,
in terms of the current nuclear status quo. In fact, if
its essential principles are examined, they can be shown
to be just as valid in 1985 as they ever were in the
past.
The basic principles are as follows:
1. Problems of international security cannot be
arbitrarily disassociated from each other, and the
legitimate concern of avoiding the outbreak of nuclear war
must not result in the abandonment of the major priority
of preventing the outbreak of all wars without
exception.
2. Nuclear weapons cannot be uninvented. There is no
technological or rhetorical alternative to this reality.
Nuclear weapons will not become "obsolete" or "impotent".
We cannot be certain that research conducted by either the
Americans (SDI) or the Soviets will result in the
obsolescence of nuclear weapons, and even if it did, how
much would it cost, how long would it take, and what
degree of success would be achieved? Nor will nuclear arms
be exorcized by non-verifiable undertakings which are
supposed to control their use without changing the real
situation in the slightest, as such weapons would still be
maintained in the arsenals. We must not allow the
disarmament process to fall a victim to the rhetorical
excesses of the inter-war period.
"Declare war on the atom" is no more adequate a solution
to the problem of world peace than was the earlier slogan
of "Make war on war".
3. For almost 40 years, discussion has contributed to
stability and peace between East and West. The European
nations, living on the continent with the greatest
accumulation of nuclear, chemical and conventional
weapons, have been spared major conflicts on their
territory, as a result of dissuasion and the fact that any
aggressor would suffer immense damage on his own
territory. Whatever the difficulties experienced by some
sections of public opinion in coming to terms with
dissuasion, it is surely preferable to seeing their
country devastated by a conventional conflict which would
have become more likely, and which in any case could
escalate from that level. No European will relish the
thought of a return to the possibility of "limited war" on
the European continent even if it was an "old fashioned
conventional war".
4. The verifiable and gradual limitation of nuclear
weapons can only be attained in so far as a balance can be
achieved at lower levels. Arms control is possible only if
each party believes that its security will not be affected
and this state of affairs cannot prevail for long unless a
global balance is seen to exist. It is probably on this
last point that the difficulties experienced during the
mid-seventies, which helped to precipitate a serious
crisis in arms control, are likely to have the most
lasting repercussions during the second half of the
eighties and beyond.
It would seem, however, that arms control discussions must
be the starting point for a new East-West dialogue, which
will probably be quite different from that of the period
of "detente", as will the hopes placed in it.
Despite the hopefully more favourable political situation
we face today - with a new leader in the Kremlin and a
more favourable attitude in Washington towards
negotiations with the Eastern bloc - the context for the
latest arms control initiative would seem to be
extraordinarily problematic.
- the mutual suspicion of the two superpowers is apparently greater than ever before,
- a series of technological revolutions is on the horizon which could, if not call into question the pre-eminence of offensive as against defensive systems (as reflected in the 1972 ABM treaty), at least result in the re-introduction of defensive weapons into the East-West nuclear equation,
- the traditional problems of verification are becoming increasingly complex as a result of new developments in weapons technology (miniaturization, mobility, the combined civil and military nature of technology, etc.), at a time when the need to comply with approved specifications has taken a new political and technical dimension. The task is so formidable that the temptation of blocking the possibility of concrete and verifiable results has already made itself felt:
- one alternative is that of unilateral measures, not enshrined in formal agreements. The parties would find these easier to comply with, as the commitments involved would be revocable at any time. This approach could be broadly summed up as a "prior display" of intended behaviour, accompanied by explanations of motivation intended for the information of the other party;
- the other alternative is to renounce some traditional arms control objectives (for example, the reduction of the heaviest ICBMs), and to put pressure on technologists to achieve advances which will bring about the desired developments (as in the theory whereby the creation of a defensive system would discourage investment for the development of heavy ballistic missiles, and thus make the cost of maintaining this strategic weapon prohibitive).
The first alternative lacks teeth. Depending on your
viewpoint, the second is either obviously true (arms
control must take account of technological factors which
affect the development of arsenals) or an admission of
impotence.
Yet the international community as a whole, and the two
most heavily armed powers in particular can have other
hopes for the end of the eighties, and the beginning of
the next decade.
If we accept that nuclear disarmament is a very long term
process, and that there is little chance of ever managing
to "eliminate completely nuclear arms wherever they
exist", the problem is to codify the balance of dissuasion
by an arms control process, in order to consolidate
international security at the lowest possible level of
weapons.
In concrete terms, eight longstanding objectives should be
pursued:
1. To achieve a quantitative and qualitative balance of
offensive weapons at a substantially lower level. If both
the Soviet and U.S. arsenals were reduced by two-thirds,
this would not affect the balance of dissuasion in the
slightest. On the contrary, significantly smaller arsenals
would mean that nuclear weapons would be used for what
they were first intended, the punishment of the aggressor,
rather than in battle, where there would be a temptation
to make pre-emptive strikes. In the light of the current
imbalance of vulnerability, at least in terms of
land-based offensive nuclear weapons (currently to the
advantage of the USSR), and in view of the failure of the
SALT and START talks intended to reduce the Soviet arsenal
of heavy missiles, the idea of reintroducing defensive
systems has recently found favour with the Americans. The
reintroduction of the defensive approach will, it is
argued, promote disarmament, as eventually offensive
systems (or at least ballistic missiles) would be rendered
"impotent and obsolete". Without entering into the details
of this highly controversial question, and while
noting that at least theoretically and after immense
financial investment, the reintroduction of defensive
systems would perhaps make it possible to reduce the
danger of surprise pre-emptive attacks against the
retaliatory weapons of the two superpowers, the following
remarks should be made:
- the reintroduction of the defensive approach could itself give rise to other instabilities which are thought by some to be at least as serious as the current instability (the party feeling itself to be losing the defensive arms race could be tempted to strike first, and make the most of its advantage before it was too late).
- the same result, that is the lessening of the risk of surprise attacks could be achieved by negotiation. A significant reduction in offensive weapons, together with the reinforcement of the provisions of the 1972 ABM treaty, would make the defensive shields unnecessary, as their essential purpose is to protect against second-strike retaliatory weapons.
2. This type of reduction of offensive weapons, together
with the freeze on defensive systems, would raise the
problem of the tertiary powers. France, China and the
United Kingdom have however each indicated the conditions
under which they could envisage direct participation in
the nuclear disarmament process: that the two superpowers
should achieve substantial reductions in their nuclear
arsenals: that defensive systems should not be
reintroduced; and that the negotiations should take into
account all weapons, including conventional weapons, which
could be used against Europe.
3. As a corollary of the two previous points, the results
already achieved by negotiation must be protected from
quantitative and qualitative destabilization. In this
respect, it is essential to prevent developments in
defensive weapons from causing the multiplication of
offensive weapons (in order to saturate the planned
defensive systems), and to prevent agreements negotiated
by the superpowers from increasing their invulnerability
while making third parties more vulnerable. It is also
important that arms limitation agreements should not be
entered into if they contradict existing patterns of
political solidarity, as this would threaten peace even
more than the level of arms itself.
4. To this end, and in order to ensure a stable
correlation between a lower level of offensive weapons,
and the non-deployment of defensive systems, concrete
measures should be taken, including in particular:
- a moratorium on high-orbit anti-satellite systems, to protect those satellites which are of most importance for maintaining the strategic balance (attack detection and navigation), and to prevent the avoidance of the provisions of the 1972 ABM Treaty by means of ASAT tests.
- negotiations to limit low-orbit ASAT systems, either by the adoption of obligatory specifications for existing systems, or of confidence-building measures (such as "rules of the road")
- the re-endorsement of the provisions of the ABM Treaty, and the opening of bilateral negotiations to complete those provisions on points where ambiguity can give rise to problems of compliance (for example, radar systems and the ABM capabilities of some tactical systems).
5. Alongside the reduction of nuclear arms ceilings, it is
also necessary to reduce imbalances in conventional
weapons by meas of regional negotiations (for example in
Europe, to move on to the second phase of the EDC once
substantial results have been achieved on the Stockholm
confidence-building proposals, and the incorporation of
the MFBR negotiations into the EDC).
6. In this context, it is now more essential than ever
before to achieve an international system for verifying
the non-production of chemical weapons, and the
destruction of existing stocks over a ten-year period.
The militarily attractive nature of chemical weapons, as
attempts are made to increase the nuclear threshold in
Europe, the dependence of modern armies on complex
logistics which are therefore vulnerable to this type of
attack, and the changes of the proliferation of chemical
weapons in the Third World all call for an intensification
of the negotiations currently in progress under the
auspices of the Geneva Disarmament Conference.
At present, and although it is the only substantial issue
on the agenda, the delegations in fact devote no more than
the equivalent of three months a year to this task. Many
delegations, particularly from the Third World, seem
ill-equipped to deal with the increasingly complex
discussions.
It is already clear that the vast problems of
verification, and those associated with the destruction of
stocks in approved plants kept under close surveillance,
call for the creation of veritable international
institution, with a staff and resources comparable with
those of the IEAE. This institution is all the more
vitally needed in view of the fact that the acquisition of
miliary chemical capabilities can be disguised behind
civil industrial development; this has been clearly shown
in recent conflicts, such as that between Iran and
Iraq.
The question to be asked is whether the political will of
the world community to solve the chemical weapons problem
before it becomes insoluble is strong enough to bring
about the type of solutions adopted in the sixties and
seventies for the control of civil nuclear activities.
7. Moreover, the problem of ending nuclear tests as one
stage of a controlled process of nuclear disarmament must
also be resolved.
The nuclear tests issue arose out of a specific historical
context of international disapproval caused by atmospheric
tests from 1950 to 1969. In fact, this was less an arms
control than an ecological issue, and was dealt with in
the treaty of 1963.
The political significance of the CTB has remained,
despite the realization that the effectiveness of a
measure of this type would be limited:
- from the non-proliferation viewpoint: the fact that South Africa and Israel are believed to possess "untried" nuclear capabilities shows that the "successful explosion" criterion is not essential to give credibility to a nation's nuclear capability.
- from the nuclear disarmament viewpoint: the enhancement of nuclear weapons as a result of underground testing has brought a decrease in explosive power, and more reliable safety and control systems.
In fact, the problem of nuclear tests cannot be
dissociated from the complex of questions raised by the
limitation of nuclear arms as a whole (see points 1 to
4).
8. Gradually to develop the capabilities of international
technical verification: It is increasingly unlikely that
technologically advanced nations will accept the current
monopoly of the USSR and the USA in the field of
verification satellites. In addition, the wider
availability of remote sensing data and advances in
commercially available image technology will
unquestionably lead to a greater transparency of military
activities as a whole. To prevent the existing imbalance
in verification capabilities from resulting in anarchy,
some degree of international control of verification
activities, under the terms of a specific agreement, is
essential. With this in mind, France's proposal in 1978 to
create an International Monitoring Satellite Agency seems
more relevant than ever.
I will complete this rapid overview of possible courses of
action in the disarmament field by discussing the
essential issue of nuclear proliferation. What impact
would the implementation of this type of nuclear
disarmament programme have on the consolidation of
international non-proliferation, particularly by 1995,
when the signatories of the NPT must decide whether to
renew the Treaty?
Article 6 of the NPT established a link between vertical
and horizontal proliferation. To avoid giving the
impression that the NPT was perhaps only a nuclear
disarmament treaty for states which were already disarmed,
the three signatory nuclear powers committed themselves to
opening negotiations concerning the reduction and eventual
elimination of their nuclear arsenals.
This was a political commitment for which no date was
specified. Indeed, it is hard to imagine how it could have
been otherwise.
Does this mean that the future of non-proliferation -
which is not necessarily the same thing as the NPT - must
be closely linked to the changing fortunes of bilateral
strategic negotiations between the Soviet Union and the
USA? Here again we come up against the question, raised in
the introduction, of the link between US-Soviet
negotiations and the role of the international community,
which has been a matter of concern for the international
community ever since the failure of the Baruch Plan in
1947.
Although the political interest of some states - aiming to
obtain a military nuclear capability - may lead them to
emphasize the direct causality of the excessive nuclear
capabilities of the two superpowers and the concern of the
lesser powers, in order to legitimize their decision to
proliferate, it would be a dangerous misconception to
regard the nuclear abstinence of most countries as merely
a common sacrifice made in conjunction with the more
privileged nations, in the ultimate hope of achieving "the
eradication of nuclear weapons".
On the one hand, this type of link with nuclear
negotiations (whose results may or may not be achieved) is
likely to weaken the cause of non-proliferation for
reasons other than the motives of non-nuclear states for
deliberately not taking the nuclear option. On the other
hand, to argue that the individual decision of non-nuclear
states not to proliferate is the result of a bilateral
pact with reciprocal obligations to ignore the fact that
one of the most politically significant motives for
adopting non-proliferation is the state's decision
concerning its own security interests in a given regional
context. Fortunately, these interests are usually far
better served by the non-nuclearization of their
respective regions.
Moreover, although the dialectics of nuclear disarmament
and non-proliferation have been intermingled since the
beginning of the nuclear age, the need to find stable
solutions to each means that separate approaches must be
maintained.
The sudden erruption of nuclear weapons in international
life called for what Einstein called a new way of thinking
about world problems, while dissuasion paradoxically
modified "the function of military equipment, which had
earlier been to make war, and what was now to make war
impossible" (B. Brodie).
To judge from the absence of nuclear conflicts up to the
present day, and from the fact that direct East-West
confrontation had been deliberately avoided, the
international system has shown itself to be remarkably
adaptable, in spite of the profound changed in the balance
of forces which have taken place over the last half
century.
The fact that the accumulation of arms had not
systematically resulted in rising tensions suggests that
the causal link between the two phenomena is more complex
than would at first appear. Tension does result in more
arms, but the reverse is not always inevitable.
However, it is in the reciprocal perceptions of the
changing level of danger that the investment already made,
the impossibility of achieving major transformations, the
length of time taken to modernize the main weapons
systems, and the perpetual fear of technological
surprises, are clearly sources of inflexibility in all
arms control negotiations.
Greater transparency of intentions and of planned
programmes, despite the fundamental differences existing
between the politics of the Eastern bloc and that of the
western countries, and a rapprochement on all matters
which can help to stabilize the situation at a time when
arms control in held back by uncertainty regarding the
desirable strategic balance for the end of the century,
all these are essential elements in the dialogue between
states, even before any arms limitation agreement is
concluded.
Beyond that, only a return to certain standards of
behaviour laid down in the United Nations Charter will
protect the international community from the jungle law
and anarchy which threaten it. This return to a certain
international political order should above all form a
basis for arms negotiations during the next decade. No
progress will be made on disarmament and arms control
unless a minimum degree of confidence is achieved in the
international system, and in its capacity to take account
of the security needs al all states, and not merely of the
two superpowers. In addition to the technical
recommendations proposed for negotiations in progress and
those which seem desirable, it is above all necessary for
states to comply with the principles of the United Nations
Charter, that is the idea that the conflicts and
differences which inevitably arise between nations with
divergent interests must be resolved not by resorting to
force, but by the patient and determined search for a
peaceful solution.