Mutually Assured Stability

Simon Saradzhyan, a research fellow at Harvard Kennedy School’s Belfer Center, writing about tactical nuclear weapons in The Moscow Times (December 20, 2011), indicates: “Given the scarcity of benefits and abundance of costs of these arsenals, Moscow should join Washington in negotiating measures to bring tactical nukes into the realm of bilateral arms control. The two powers can start with defining the weapons and exchanging information on their past reductions and current stockpiles. They could then negotiate the verifiable reduction of their stockpiles and their consolidation in one or two of the best-guarded facilities.”

He concludes:  “It is time that Russia and United States move away from deterrence based on a 20th-century concept of mutually assured destruction. Instead, they should move toward what experts on both sides have referred to as mutually assured stability. Consolidation and reduction of tactical nuclear weapons will facilitate this transition, advancing both countries’ common vital interests in preventing the use of nuclear weapons. These measures will also allow Moscow to allocate more funds to building conventional forces capable of countering more imminent threats to Russia’s security, such as a low-intensity insurgency or local conflicts, without risking a nuclear Armageddon.”

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Unfinished Business on Tactical Nuclear Weapons

Frank Klotz, Susan Kuch, and Franklin Miller, writing in a December 14, 2011 New York Times op-ed article, recall how in 1991 U.S. President George H.W. Bush and Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev in a reciprocal Presidential Nuclear Initiative led the way to taking thousands of tactical nuclear weapons out of service and in some cases eliminating them all together.  This was accomplished on the basis of unilateral, parallel actions without an arms control treaty.

The authors believe that it is time to take up unfinished business of reducing tactical nuclear weapons.  They indicate: “The next logical step would be for both countries to disclose, on a reciprocal basis, the location, types and numbers of tactical nuclear weapons that remain.

“This should pose few problems for the United States and its allies; well-informed accounts of deployed American weapons have been around for years. But disclosing such data might prove difficult for Russia, given its penchant for secrecy and the political risks of confirming it does indeed possess a far greater number of these weapons.

“If such difficulties can be overcome, these two steps would enhance transparency and mutual confidence. In the process, they could help pave the way to future negotiations on reducing both tactical and nondeployed nuclear weapons.”

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Salvaging the CFE Treaty: Options for Washington

In a March 2010 paper from the Brookings Institution, Anne Witkowsky, Sherman Garnett, and Jeff McCausland offer ideas that remain relevant even as the Conventional Forces in Europe (CFE) Treaty is more-or-less in suspension.  Entitled Salvaging the Conventional Armed Forces in Europe Treaty Regime: Options for Washington, this 39-page paper presents four options. 

 1)     Continue the current policy course of seeking parallel actions by NATO members and Russia to resume Russian CFE implementation and move toward the Adapted CFE Treaty, with some additional inducements to Moscow.

2)     Continue the current policy course while opening the Adapted CFE Treaty to amendment.

3)     Initiate provisional application of Adapted CFE Treaty, but with conditions.

4)     Decline to continue implementing the CFE Treaty and manage a “soft landing” for the end of the CFE regime.

 See full paper.

The Future of NATO’s Nuclear Weapons: A German Perspective

Ambassador Rolf Nikel, Federal Commissioner for Disarmament and Arms Control at the German Federal Foreign Office, explains Germany’s approach to questions surrounding tactical nuclear weapons based in Europe in light of NATO’s Strategic Concept and Deterrence and Defense Posture reviews. His views appear in Nuclear Policy Paper No. 9 in a series put together by the Arms Control Association, BASIC, and the Institute for Peace Research and Security Policy at the University of Hamburg.

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This Week from BASIC: NATO needs to act on nuclear policy

This week NATO foreign ministers meet (7th & 8th), less than six months before the summit in Chicago. They have a full agenda, not least the debates over the management of withdrawal from Afghanistan and discussing lessons from the Libya experience. They will also consider the deterrence and defense posture review (DDPR) that has been developing behind closed doors, but still in a surprisingly unformed state given its planned completion in May. Internal expectations are not high for significant change, but this really is not good news…

To read the full article by Paul Ingram, visit the following page on BASIC’s website: http://www.basicint.org/news/2011/week-nato-needs-act-nuclear-policy

Whither the Conventional Forces in Europe Treaty?

Daryl G. Kimball in a November 22, 2011 post on Arms Control NOW wrote: “Today, the Obama administration announced it ‘would cease carrying out certain obligations under the Conventional Armed Forces in Europe (CFE) Treaty with regard to Russia.’  The announcement is a symptom of the long-running disputes that have emerged over CFE implementation over the years and the inability of key parties to reach common ground, despite the Obama administration’s recent diplomatic overtures on the issue.”

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NATO’s Incredible Nuclear Strategy: Why U.S. Weapons in Europe Deter No One

Edmony Seay, writing in the November 2011 issue of Arms Control Today, reports: “At its November 2010 summit in Lisbon, NATO proclaimed itself a nuclear alliance, declaring that any change in the status of the 200-odd U.S. B61 gravity bombs stored in various sites around Europe would have to be made by consensus among all 28 allies.”

Seay indicates: “NATO, however, has a big problem. The confluence of several serious challenges has placed in doubt the safety, security, and effectiveness of the alliance’s nuclear deterrent: The weapons and their means of delivery are old, the weapons systems are vulnerable to sabotage and pre-emption; and these systems lack credibility, both operationally and politically.”

He points out: “The justification for continued deployment of U.S. nuclear weapons in Europe rests on four main arguments: deterrence, reassurance, signaling, and burden sharing. A realistic examination of these arguments reveals that each of them is unconvincing at best.”

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Strategic Choices on Tactical Weapons

An editorial in the November 2011 issue of Arms Control Today recalls how “President George H.W. Bush and Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev agreed in 1991 to withdraw most U.S. and Soviet forward-deployed tactical nuclear weapons and dismantle a large portion of those weapons. These actions reduced tensions and the risk of nuclear catastrophe as the Soviet Union broke apart.”

The editorial continues: “Twenty years later, however, there have been no formal talks reducing the remaining tactical nuclear stockpiles. This is due in part to Russia’s belief that tactical weapons help counter Chinese and NATO forces and the view among some in NATO that U.S. forward-deployed nuclear weapons are a symbol of alliance cohesion.  In the coming weeks, NATO leaders can take decisive steps to change the alliance’s outdated nuclear policy and open the way for reductions of these Cold War nuclear relics.”

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NATO Deterrence Review Gets Under Way

Oliver Meier, writing in the October 2011 issue of Arms Control Today, reports: “NATO has agreed on the process for its deterrence and defense posture review, launched at the alliance’s summit in Lisbon last November.  The North Atlantic Council (NAC), NATO’s political decision-making body, on Sept. 14 approved specific posture-review taskings to guide drafting of the final report, which is to be adopted at the summit next May 20-21 in Chicago.

“Although there is now agreement on the process, several diplomats and officials, speaking on the condition of anonymity, expressed differing expectations about the focus and outcome of the review, particularly its nuclear elements.”

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The Potential Demise of the CFE Treaty: A Major Concern for Turkey

Richard Weitz of the Hudson Institute in an article was first published in the Turkey Analyst, a biweekly publication of the Central Asia-Caucasus Institute & Silk Road Studies Joint Center, writes:  “Moscow’s decision to ‘suspend’ its compliance with the Conventional Forces in Europe (CFE) Treaty since December 2007 now remains one of the few visible sources of tension in the otherwise significantly improved relationship between Turkey and Russia. Yet, like other NATO countries, Turkey has sought not to bury the CFE but to praise and revive it. Turkish officials are calling for further negotiations and mutual concessions in order to restore the treaty framework. Perhaps the most immediate concern behind Turkish unease at the potential demise of the CFE regime is that it could worsen tensions between Armenia and Azerbaijan.”

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