bruno tertrais ; the political an strategic

7/27/2019 Bruno Tertrais ; The Political an Strategic

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I.

Thank you for coming. My purpose here today is toimagine under which conditions it would becomerealistic to expect that nuclear capable States give uptheir nuclear weapons. I am known to some of youas being on rather conservative on these matters,and you probably expect here a hawkish, if not cyni-cal approach of the question of nuclear disarmament.That is not the way I want to deal with the matter. Ihave no vested personal interest in the existence ofnuclear weapons and if they were to disappear with-out any net security loss for the international com-

munity, I would be glad to focus my attention else-where. I began my career nearly 20 years ago deal-ing with human rights issues and I would be morethan happy to go back to them.

The late Sir Michael Quinlan used to describe the

conversation on disarmament as having been for along time a dialogue of the deaf between what hecalled the righteous abolitionists and the dismis-sive realists. I do not claim to have Michaels intel-lectual and rhetorical skills, and even less to havehis delightful mastery of the English language. But Iwould like to consider this lecture as a modest trib-ute to his intellectual legacy and to his immensecontribution to an enlightened dialogue on the ques-tion of nuclear weapons, in an effort to reduce theexisting division in two firmly entrenched camps,each side being intimately persuaded that he is right

and the other is wrong.

I have always encouraged the French government tobe a full participant in this debate, and to deal with

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B R U N O T E R T R A I S

Matre de recherche la Fondation pour la

Recherche Stratgique

The Political and Strategic

Conditions of Nuclear Disarmament

Lecture given at the occasion of the 2009 NPT PrepCom,Residence of the French Ambassador to the United Nations,

New York, 7 May 2009


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the question of disarmament with an open mind. Iwould like to thank the ambassador for his hospital-ity and I trust that this is a symbol of Frances readi-ness to support and encourage this discussion. I dothink that the agenda currently promoted by Franceand the European Union which as you know fo-cuses on transparency and irreversible moves todemonstrate our goodwill on disarmament issues is the right one for now. I also do think that the pos-sibility of Iran becoming a nuclear-capable State is amuch bigger and immediate threat to the regimethan the alleged non-compliance of Nuclear-Weapon States with Article VI of the NPT. But I alsothink that one can effectively deal with short-termissues only when one has a broader view of thelonger-term context.

II.

There are several different scenarios under which

the end of nuclear weapons could be considered. Iwill describe three which taken together will, I be-lieve, pretty much cover the realm of the thinkable. Iwill call them the abolition scenario, theinterdiction scenario, and the elimination sce-nario.

One first scenario would be a deliberate decision toget rid of nuclear weapons after a major nuclearevent be it an act of terrorism of a nuclear war. Theimpact and outcome of such a horrible event wouldnot be preordained. It is possible that a successful

use of nuclear weapons or rather one perceivedashaving been successful, whatever the meaning ofthat word would actually lead to a nuclear free-for-all, and even herald a shift towards nuclear war-fighting doctrines. But there is also a significantprobability that it would trigger a political processleading to rapid nuclear disarmament, accompaniedwith immense global public pressure. For heuristicpurposes I call it the abolition scenario. While theword abolition has recently become a synonym fortotal nuclear disarmament, I believe that it carries amoral dimension that is particularly appropriate to

such a scenario.

III.

A second scenario is that of a deliberate, thoughtfuldecision to reduce the role and numbers of nuclearweapons with a view to achieving a nuclear weapon-free world in a reasonable timeframe a matter of afew decades, but still in our lifetime. This is a favor-ite of many in the disarmament community. I call itthe interdiction scenario. Let me spend a few min-utes on this one before moving to the main thrust of

my presentation. I believe that a deliberate politicalprocess of nuclear disarmament would have to be ledby the United States. I do not think that non-nuclear

countries could band together to force nuclear-capable States to disarm. Neither do I believe thatglobal public pressure absent the aforementionedscenario of a nuclear event could be mobilized in away that would make a significant enough impacton world leaders (with or without flashy documen-taries, T-shirts and e-mail campaigns). And only theUnited States has the capability and the potentialwill to attempt such a historical move.Of course this would not be enough. Washingtonwould need to enlist one other major power in itscrusade to obtain what could be called a politicalcritical mass. Russia could be one, assuming thatthere was a modus vivendion the political and secu-rity issues pertaining to the Eurasian landmass thatsatisfied its ambitions. China could be another, if theTaiwan issue was solved in a way that satisfied itswishes and its relationship with India takes a turnfor the better.

But my main point here is the following: this sce-nario assumes significant changes in the politicaland security environment, but not radicalchanges.And absent such radical changes, the interdiction ofnuclear weapons is, from my point of view, a seri-ously dubious prospect.

The main reason behind my skepticism is that manywill resist the interdiction of nuclear weapons forfear that a non-nuclear world would make majorwar much less unthinkable. I share this concern,and I am largely in tune with Sir Michael in this re-

gard (even though I prefer the cautious expressionthat I just used to the more brutal assertion that itwould make the world, quote, safe for conventionalwar, unquote). As Harry Truman once said, let usnot become so preoccupied with weapons that welose sight of the fact that war itself is the real vil-lain. The last time the deadly mechanics of waramong major powers were put into motion was ex-actly 70 years ago. Children born in 1945 are nowreaching retirement age without having ever seenmajor war. It is a remarkable exception in historicalterms. While there may be other reasons for this

state of fact, it is very hard for me to believe that thecaution induced by the possession of nuclear armsdid not play a very significantrole here.

Bear in mind also that in the absence of nuclearweapons, some UN-mandated military interven-tions might be made more difficult. Do not get mewrong: of course the possession of nuclear weaponsis not needed to send forces abroad in the service ofthe world community. But I would like you to thinkabout the following: would it have been as easy forthe United States and its partners to mobilize such

broad coalitions in 1950 for South Korea, and in1991 for Kuwait, if they had not known that theirvital interests would be protected whatever hap-


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pened? I offer this Gedankenexperimentas food forthought. My point is that we need to be careful ofwhat we wish for. To some extent, the possession ofnuclear weapons may be a form of common good.And it also gives or should give those who areendowed with them a special responsibility towardsthe maintenance of global peace and security.

I do not want to dwell on the immense problems thatwould also need to be addressed should there be, to-morrow (all things equal that is, with a broadly un-changed strategic and political context), a seriousdrive towards the interdiction of nuclear weapons.Suffice it to say that the current US quantitative andqualitative superiority in long-range conventionalstrike platforms to say nothing of non-nuclear mis-sile defense, space and cyberwarfare capabilities would constitute an unacceptable American edgeover Moscow and Beijing even assuming that there isa long-term dtente between them and the United

States. I am not certain either that countries cur-rently protected by the US umbrella would be satis-fied by the idea that this protection could equally beapplied with conventional weapons. When one facesa nuclear-armed major power, one always faces thepossibility of a rather quick, almost certain, andprobably painfuldeath as an organized entity. Thatis, the possibility of inflicting unacceptable damage(an expression adopted by almost all nuclear capablecountries). Maintaining the same level of deterrence,both for the protector and the protected, would notbe easy with conventional weapons only, especially

if there are still significant chemical and biologicalprograms in some countries. More precisely, it ispossible that an adversary could bank on the factthat our societies would not have the stomach for asustained conventional strategic bombing campaignagainst a major power. This could make deterrencemuch less credible.

IV.

This leads me to my third and main scenario, the onethat I call the elimination scenario. What distin-

guishes it from the two previous ones is that it sup-poses that the utility of nuclear weapons has beendramatically reduced, allowing first for massive andrapid reductions for going to the base camp, inreference to an ongoing study supported by the Nu-clear Security Project and then to elimination that is, to the mountaintop. (To be sure, I am not en-tirely certain that the mountaineering metaphor isactually the most relevant one, because in fact, thetrekking might be longer and more difficult than theclimbing. For once nuclear-capable countries havestopped investing in their deterrent, the cost-

effectiveness of maintaining nuclear forces may de-crease rather quickly. But that is another story.)

My elimination scenario comprises two discretevariants. The first variant assumes that alternativesto nuclear weapons have been brought to existence.It happens in a world that remains dominated, as isthe case today, by national rivalries and insecurities.The second variant assumes that nuclear weaponsor any equivalent thereofare not needed anymore. Ithappens in a world where strategic and politicalconditions have been fundamentally altered. I amassuming here that most of the nuclear programshave been driven by perceived deep insecurities and to a lesser extent by the need for national powerand influence.

If you allow me an easy intellectual shortcut, let ussay that the first one is dominated by ThomasHobbes, and the second one by Immanuel Kant. Or,to use a more trivial but perhaps more illuminatingexpression especially for science fiction buffs, let ussay that the first one happens in a Mad Maxworld

that of today and the second in a Star Trekworld.(I am indebted to a well-known Swedish verificationexpert for that metaphor).

Let me start with variant one. From a politicalstandpoint, one could imagine that the value of nu-clear weapons would greatly decrease if there was,for instance, a serious reform of the UN SecurityCouncil. It may help avoiding another India, so tosay, that is, a country going nuclear at least partlyfor reasons of prestige and influence nuclear test-ing as blowing your way to global power, so to say.

(France and the United Kingdom reasoned alongsimilar lines in the 1950s even though they weremembers of the Security Council.) But from a strate-gic standpoint, there is no alternative to nuclearweapons on the horizon. Biological weapons havebeen banned and this ban, incidentally, was madepossible in part by the existence of nuclear weapons.Their effects are most of the time uncontrollable,and most importantly, they cannot threaten the de-struction of political, military and economic targets.Advanced conventional weapons and electronicwarfare do not scare leaders and populations the

way nuclear weapons do. And I know no realisticprospect in the scientific world for making cost-effective means of destruction that would be as effi-cient and as scary as nuclear weapons. Antimatter,for instance, has about zero prospect for becoming atool of war in the foreseeable future. (That is goodnews, by the way.)

Variant two of my scenario is different. It assumesthat the strategic and political functions tradition-ally assumed by nuclear weapons have no valuewhatsoever anymore. It assumes that the perceived

need for protection of vital interests, and the urgefor international recognition and influence havelargely disappeared. This supposes in particular


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that some of the key regional crises that have beenwith us for more than 60 years have been solved forgood. Im talking about Kashmir, Palestine, Taiwan,or the division of the Korean peninsula. It would be anecessary prerequisite, but not the only one to saythat one can solve the proliferation problem bysolving regional crises has always sounded to me asa very incomplete and in fact rather lazy approach.Another condition, for instance, would be the ab-sence of any significant State-based biological threat.

But it would not be enough for nuclear-endowedcountries to voluntarily give up their nuclear weap-ons. What would more likely be needed in fact is aprofound transformation of international relations.There should be the perception that we are on ourway to reach some form of global democraticpeace. The very notion of using significant militaryforce without a collective mandate would be on itsway to become obsolete. The same goes for the sanc-

tity of national sovereignty. I am not saying that wecould get rid of nuclear weapons only if we lived inHeaven. I am saying that a realistic prospect forelimination without very, very significant changes inthe political and strategic parameters that rule theworld is hard to imagine. At least for what is gener-ally called the foreseeable future, that is the coming30 or 40 years. In that sense, I agree with BarackObama: elimination will probably not occur in mylifetime.

In a sense, Article VI of the Nonproliferation Treaty

has it exactly right: there has to be a link betweennuclear disarmament on the one hand, and generaland complete disarmament on the other.

I have not dealt with the thorny issue of enforce-ment, or with that of verification the latter a well-worn hobbyhorse of our British friends, who havedevoted considerable energy to this question, to thebenefit of the whole community. But I would like tosubmit the following hypothesis: such issues wouldbe much easier to resolve in a world which is the oneI just described. By definition, it assumes a degree of

trust among nations and an ability to cooperate thatwould be unprecedented. (I am reminded of an argu-ment that was heard in US policy circles in the run-up to the Iraq war. The idea was that we were askingso much to Saddam Hussein in terms of intrusiveinspections and loss of sovereignty that it was bydefinition unacceptable for him, because it would ineffect mean the end of his grip on the country andthus on his regime.) I am not claiming that enforce-ment and verification would not be a problem. I amjust saying that the causality factors should not bereversed: the political and strategic conditions that

would allow for the elimination of nuclear weaponswould be the sameas those which would be neededfor efficient enforcement and verification. The exis-

tence of a few holdouts and of potential cheaterswould be a problem, but a secondary one. Likewisefor the question of know-how. One coulddisinventnuclear weapons. Many ancient crafts have been ineffect disinvented. For instance, it is not easy todayto do the same kind of cooking as was done in theMiddle Ages, because in addition to the recipe, youneed the right tools and the right ingredients andmany of them are just not available anymore. So, forall these reasons, in the world that I just described,assuming we have solved the issue of fissile materi-als, nuclear hedging would by and large be a non-issue.

V.

I have painted a picture with a very broad brush,and there are many, many issues that I have notdealt with. And perhaps some of you will have beendiscouraged by my certainties. However, I am also

an optimist and make no apologies for being one. Ido believe that whereas the idea a world withoutwar cannot be on the radar screen of most of ourpolicy makers, it should not be discarded as an illu-sion by policy thinkers. The urge for collective vio-lence in order to gain territory and resources mayhave been a useful evolutionary strategy for millen-nia, but societal and cultural changes are going sofast today that to claim that it is irreversibly part ofhuman nature is, I believe, increasingly impru-dent. I take solace, in this regard, in the fact that in-terstate war in the classical sense of the term has

now become, in statistical terms, an exceptionalevent. What I hope is that it will not take anotherglobal catastrophe a major war, another kind ofman-made event, or an environmental disaster toget to the Kantian world I described.

I cannot support the goal of a nuclear-free worldwithout qualifications or conditions. Aside from themoral undertones it carries, this expression fails tosee that nuclear weapons carry terrible risks buthave also been a source of freedom. I have alreadymentioned the two global police operations of 1950

and 1991, but the point also works in reverse. An-other favorite working hypothesis of mine is the fol-lowing: most supporters of nuclear disarmamentalso opposed the Iraq war, and were glad that theFrench took the lead in global opposition to the in-tervention. But I am not entirely certain that Francewould have done so in such a confident way had itnot been a nuclear power.

I will leave it to that at this point. But I would like toconclude by saying that the vision I cansubscribe tois that of a peaceful, safe nuclear-free world, to use

the words of Japanese Foreign Minister HirofumiNakasone. A key operating principle here is the no-tion of undiminished security for all, which has


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Bruno Tertrais

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appeared several times in NPT documents. This in-cludes the majority of the world population whichbenefits, directly or indirectly, from security pro-vided by nuclear weapons. What we need to find is

an agreement on the most cost-effective steps to-wards reducing the needfor nuclear weapons. It willbe hard. But that is not a reason not to try. Thankyou.

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