Transparency in Armaments

These historical insights on the treatment in the CD of agenda item 7, Transparency in Armaments, were offered by UNIDIR as background to the debate on that issue in the Conference on 14 August 2012 under the presidency of Ambassador Jean-Hughes Simon-Michel (France).

During the 1991 session of UNGA the EU and Japan sponsored a resolution on transparency (46/36L). Recalling the 1990 Gulf War, the resolution asserted that no single state especially in areas of tension should be able to strive for levels of armaments that did not bear any relationship to its self-defence needs.  The CD was requested to address the question of the excessive and destabilizing accumulation of arms and to elaborate universal and non-discriminatory practical means to increase openness and transparency in this field.

Initially, there was no consensus in the CD on inscribing this issue as an agenda item. However, agreement was eventually reached to hold informal meetings chaired by a Special Coordinator. In 1993 the CD established an Ad Hoc Committee on Transparency in Armaments. Disagreement soon emerged over whether resolution 46/36L did or did not limit the mandate just to the UN Register of Conventional Arms. Some members took the view that the subsidiary body should focus on the gradual expansion of the Register to include all categories and types of arms including WMD. Other states, however, opposed inclusion of WMD in the Register because to do so would imply international acceptance of transfers of such weapons.

Work in the Ad Hoc Committee came to an end in 1995 when members were unable to reach agreement on its re-establishment. Since then, CD delegations, as with agenda items 5 and 6, have not envisaged re-convening a subsidiary body, preferring instead the appointment of a Special Coordinator to seek the views of members on the most appropriate way to deal with this issue. The item has become a place of convenience for raising issues about conventional weapons rather than for seeking new agenda items to cover those issues.

This posting was published for UNIDIR by Tim Caughley, Resident Senior Fellow

New types of WMD and new systems of such weapons; radiological weapons

NEW

WMD

These historical insights on the treatment in the CD of agenda item 5, "New Types of WMD and New Systems of such Weapons; Radiological Weapons", were offered by UNIDIR as background to the debate on that issue in the Conference on 14 August 2012 under the presidency of Ambassador Jean-Hughes Simon-Michel (France).

This issue was first presented to the UN General Assembly (UNGA) in 1969 by Malta, and the CD in turn was tasked with considering the implications of possible military applications of laser technology. Early conclusions of the CD were that (a) laser technology applied to weapons did not warrant consideration at that time, and (b) the possibilities of radiological warfare were of limited significance for arms control.

In 1975, however, the then Soviet Union, tabled a draft international agreement in UNGA on the prohibition of the development and manufacture of new types of weapons of mass destruction and new systems of such weapons. When discussion of the item resumed in the CD, the USSR indicated that its purpose was to cover “ray” (i.e., radiological) weapons affecting human organs and behaviour as well as genetic weapons affecting heredity. But Western states, while supporting efforts to ban particular weapons of mass destruction, objected to the conclusion of a comprehensive convention banning unspecified future weapons.

This issue also arose at the First Special Session of the General Assembly devoted to Disarmament (UNSSOD-I). The final document included a compromise between a general prohibition approach and the idea of specific agreements and stated that, “a convention should be concluded prohibiting the development, production, stockpiling and use of radiological weapons”.

During the 1980s a subsidiary body on radiological weapons considered a number of working papers but no consensus emerged. Since 1993 no subsidiary body has been re-established. In 2002, Germany tabled a discussion paper for revisiting the issue in light of new threats. The item was also discussed in 2006 in plenary, and from 2007 onwards in informal settings. Discussions remained inconclusive. 

As with agenda items 6 and 7, CD delegations have not in recent years envisaged re-convening a subsidiary body, preferring instead the appointment of a Special Coordinator to seek the views of members on the most appropriate way to deal with this issue.

This posting was published for UNIDIR by Tim Caughley, Resident Senior Fellow

WMD: Giving new expression to the “conscience of humanity”

In a statement issued on 15 March this year at the end of their latest meeting, the foreign ministers of the G8 uttered some commendably strong words about biological weapons. The statement was made in the context of preparations for the seventh review conference of the Biological and Toxin Weapons Convention (BTWC) which will take place in Geneva this December. It is worth setting out their commitment in full:

"4. Guided by the objective of a more secure and safer world, and convinced that the use of such weapons is unacceptable to the conscience of humanity and would pose a grave threat to international security, we reaffirm our commitment to fully respect all obligations under the BTWC and in particular to never, under any circumstances, develop, produce, stockpile or otherwise acquire, retain or use this type of weapon."

This statement bears scrutiny in several respects. Is it not merely a routine affirmation of existing, legally binding obligations on biological weapons that might be expected to be made in the lead-up to an important, five-yearly review conference? The G8 foreign ministers certainly affirm the undertaking in article 1 of the BTWC that their countries will never in any circumstances develop, produce, stockpile or otherwise acquire or retain these kinds of weapons. But they go further in specifically precluding use of them.

Efforts to remedy the curious omission from article 1 of the word “use” amongst the prohibitions of the BTWC are not new, and are not the purpose of these comments. Attention is drawn, however, to the foreign ministers’ statement that use of biological weapons would be “unacceptable to the conscience of humanity”. This inhibition is interesting at several levels.

First, the words just quoted differ from the phraseology used in the BTWC itself. In the preamble to the Convention, the relevant term is the slightly stronger “repugnant to the conscience of mankind”.

But let’s not quibble about words. More significantly, are there analogies that can be drawn with other weapons of mass destruction? For instance, would the same group of states brand all weapons of mass destruction as “unacceptable to the conscience of humanity”? If is safe to think that they would refer to chemical weapons in the same vein, it is surely a no-brainer that the use of nuclear weapons would be even more unacceptable.

The Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) makes it quite clear that parties undertake never under any circumstances to use chemical weapons, based on their determination “for the sake of all mankind, to exclude completely the possibility of use of [such] weapons”. The CWC moreover reaffirms the principles, objectives and obligations of the Geneva Protocol of 1925 which, like the BTWC, also invokes the conscience of the civilised world (“the use in war of asphyxiating, poisonous or other gases … has been justly condemned by the general opinion of the civilized world; and … prohibition of such use … shall be universally accepted as a part of International Law, binding alike the conscience and the practice of nations”).

What about the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty (NPT)? The parties to that treaty are very clear about the risks of using nuclear weapons. The opening words of the NPT speak about “the devastation that would be visited upon all mankind by a nuclear war and the consequent need to make every effort to avert the danger of such a war and to take measures to safeguard the security of peoples”.

This passage from the preamble of the NPT possesses a clarity that is somewhat lacking in the commitment in the body of the treaty (article VI) to bring about nuclear disarmament and thereby avert the devastation of a nuclear war. But that is not the end of the story. In much the same way that, over time, the prohibitions in the BTWC have been interpreted as including the use of biological weapons, the NPT parties have augmented and strengthened the nuclear non-proliferation regime.

The significance attached by the NPT parties at their five-yearly review conferences to producing consensual outcomes, adopted without voting, invests those outcomes with strong moral and political, if not legal, force. Expressed in the 2010 review conference outcome, for instance, is a reaffirmation of the unequivocal undertaking of the nuclear weapon states to accomplish the total elimination of their nuclear arsenals leading to nuclear disarmament, to which all NPT parties are committed under article VI.

And in the context of the G8’s inhibition that is the subject of these observations, the NPT review conference also expressed its “deep concern at the catastrophic humanitarian consequences of any use of nuclear weapons” and reaffirmed the need for all states at all times to comply with applicable international law, including international humanitarian law.

In the light of this expression of concern by the NPT parties, how likely is it that G8 foreign ministers prior to the next NPT review conference might echo their recent BTWC statement and describe the use of nuclear weapons as being unacceptable to the conscience of humanity? Unless they are prepared radically to alter the statement they issued prior to the 2010 review conference, then the answer is “not very likely”. Their ambitions for that conference amounted to no more than the following: “We are committed to seeking a safer world for all and to creating the conditions for a world without nuclear weapons, in accordance with the goals of the NPT. … Our goal is a safer and more secure world for all”.

For the G8 nations, Japan amongst them, to state that the use of nuclear weapons is unacceptable to the conscience of humanity is more difficult than it would (and should) seem. There is an issue in the US as to whether an apology for the use of atomic weapons over Hiroshima and Nagasaki would be appropriate. But there is a more fundamental matter at stake, one in which the notion of use of nuclear weapons gives way to considerations surrounding possession of those armaments.

This brings us to a conundrum about the possession of nuclear weapons. Nations with nuclear arsenals like to claim that possession is an insurance policy against attack by an aggressor. Inherent in that assertion is that the possessor’s threat of use deters its enemies. But does the deterrence theory hold water? The risk of relying on nuclear weapons for deterrence is the subject of the latest opinion piece of George Schultz, William Perry, Henry Kissinger and Sam Nunn in the Wall Street Journal.

The four former US political and military leaders advance the view that reliance on nuclear weapons for deterrence is becoming “increasingly hazardous and decreasingly effective”. The prospect in the Cold War era of “mutual assured destruction” – an unrestrained nuclear war between superpowers - raised “enormous inhibitions” against employing the weapons. In the opinion of the four statesmen, these inhibitions opened a gap between the psychological advantage of possessing such a powerful deterrent and the readiness of leaders actually to take the responsibility for the extent of loss of life and destruction that would result from unleashing them.

In other words, the military commander in the field possessed a class of weapon that had the potential to make a decisive (though horrifying, and ultimately suicidal) impact, but the use of which was unlikely ever to be authorized by the commander in chief. Faced with this reality, US defence leaders, the opinion piece chillingly recounts, made serious efforts to give the president “more flexible options for nuclear use short of global annihilation”.

In a world in which there has been an increasingly strong and widespread impulse against the production, let alone use, of other weapons of mass destruction such as biological and chemical weapons, it is tempting to conclude that leaders of nations possessing nuclear arsenals would be inhibited from deploying any options for nuclear weapons use, flexible or otherwise. Those inhibitions would be primed, one hopes, above all by the unthinkability of sanctioning the use of weapons that would be indiscriminate in their effect, killing soldiers and civilians alike, and wreaking immediate environmental damage with lingering, long-term pollution of land, water and atmosphere. And, as we have witnessed in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, long-term human suffering as well.

The four statesmen envisage a “safer and more stable form of deterrence” without spelling it out in detail. They appear to place their faith mainly in encouraging a “joint enterprise among nations” that would be the vehicle for greater cooperation, transparency and verification. Given the paralysis of the Conference on Disarmament, current limitations of routine deliberative and review forums (First Committee of the UN General Assembly, UN Disarmament Commission, various regular meetings of states parties), and the allergic reaction of nuclear weapon states to the notion of convening a fourth UN General Assembly special session on disarmament, one is left wondering what are the options and avenues for such a joint enterprise.

The spirit of the G8 foreign ministers in respect of one category of weapons of mass destruction and the NPT’s recent expression of deep concern at the catastrophic humanitarian consequences of any use of another such category are commendable. Noble expressions of the conscience of humanity are important in providing the context for prohibitions on the use of all weapons of mass destruction. But the challenge for the international community in the case of nuclear weapons is to harness these impulses and back them with the force of law in a formal process or framework leading towards the elimination of nuclear arsenals.

As international processes to achieve the treaties banning anti-personnel mines (1997) and cluster munitions (2008) have demonstrated, inspired leadership amounting in effect to a “joint enterprise among nations” in response to a humanitarian imperative can overcome procedural blockages and achieve the stigmatisation of an entire class of weapons. This may not be the kind of enterprise envisaged by the four statesmen, but the clamour for it is undoubtedly growing.

This is a guest post by Tim Caughley. Tim is a Resident Senior Fellow at UNIDIR.

Note: The G8 is comprised of Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia, the United States, and the United Kingdom. The European Union has been associated with the G8 since 1977.

The use of weapons

On 30 June I discussed technology historian David Edgerton's thought provoking book The Shock of the Old: Technology and Global History Since 1900, especially the relevance of use-centred accounts of technological development and 'creole technology'.

Edgerton's work also challenges conventional wisdom as to the significance of certain technologies. Among the examples he discusses are World War Two technologies we're accustomed to thinking as central to eventual Allied victory - strategic bombing and the first use of atomic weapons.

During the war, British air commanders such as Sir Arthur 'Bomber' Harris claimed that continued area bombing of targets in German-occupied Europe were devastating. However, a United States Strategic Bombing Survey (USSBS) found a wide range of evidence to contradict this after the war had ended. In contrast, the USSBS's assessment of the American bombing of Japan - which overall was much less heavy in terms of tonnage of bombs dropped - was that it did similar damage "because the bombs were more concentrated in time and more accurately delivered".

These are not new facts, but they're often overlooked. One obvious lesson is that technologies in themselves don't ensure success in war, especially if the adversary has time to respond and adapt, as the Third Reich did to several years of area bombing. While of course this had its costs, area bombing also had costs for the Allies. In 1940 there weren't many other options for an isolated Britain to take the offensive than to bomb what it could hit with its air force (that is, cities rather than the precision targets the RAF thought it could strike in planning before the war). But later in the war there were more options, yet the UK was heavily invested in its bombing strategy by then and found it hard to change, except for limited periods (like the run-up to D-Day). It's worth recalling that Stalin never doubted that the opening of a Western land offensive - not area bombing - was the only way to relieve the military pressure on the Soviet Union. The terrible fire-bombing of Dresden in February 1945 immortalized in Kurt Vonnegut's novel Slaughterhouse Five occurred in part because the Allies wanted to demonstrate to the Soviets that their air power was of some use.

Assessments of the usefulness (the utility) of a given technology have to be made against the most effective alternatives, not simply the absence of them. The USSBS compared conventional and atomic bombing in Japan in terms of resources required to achieve equivalent effects - that is, death and damage caused. While the total destructive power of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki atomic bombs was great, a lot of the energy was not directed at the target. Edgerton explains that "What the report was suggesting was that an atomic raid did the same sort of damage as a standard large conventional one, a few per cent at most of the destruction meted out to Japan from the air."

However morally distasteful such calculations may strike us, they are illuminating. Edgerton points out that the American atomic bombs were products of an industrial effort costing just under US$2 billion (or $20 billion in 1996 dollars). At the time, it cost around $3 billion to construct the 4,000 or so B-29s used exclusively in long distance operations against Japan, including to drop the atomic bombs:

"One billion dollars to destroy a city which would have been destroyed at minimal additional cost by one [large] conventional raid represented an awful lot of 'bucks per bang' ... In other words, by reducing the conventional material available [since resources are finite], the atomic programme, it could be argued, lengthened the war and this cost lives. That we do not see this is partly the result of a carefully fabricated myth put about after the war, that the bomb brought the war to a quick end and saved no fewer than 1 million US lives. This myth depended on the dubious counterfactual argument that the Japanese would have fought on and on had they not suffered atomic bombing, and that the only other way of defeating them involved an invasion that would have cost 1 million lives. In other words, this argument assumed that blockade and conventional bombing were ineffective by comparison with the atomic bomb."

Yet, based on USSBS and other data, blockade and conventional bombing clearly did have profound effects on Japan's war-making capacity. It means that, in 1945, arguments for the efficacy of atomic weapons compared with other means at the time were doubtful - they were not thought to be the war-winners we may consider them to be in hindsight.

And post hoc rationalization remains strong about huge weapons programmes like the Manhattan Project. Moreover, the post-war American atomic programme, including bombers and missiles, cost nearly US$6,000 billion in 1996 prices according to Edgerton - roughly one-third of all defence expenditure and just under the total spent on social security by the United States. These programmes were regarded as crucial tools of national defence and might. Yet, Edgerton further point out:

"Had the [Second World] War extirpated militarism from the world and had the development of weapons stopped, the rocket and the A-bomb would not have been seen as harbingers of the future, but more likely as the last dreadful examples of the irrationality of war and military technology."

In Nazi Germany the V-2 rocket is - notoriously - believed by some historians to be responsible for killing twice as many people involved in its production (mainly due to starvation) as were killed at the receiving end of the weapon. At a cost of one-quarter of the American atomic bomb programme, the German military could have had thousands of fighter planes, tanks, motorized vehicles and artillery pieces it desperately needed late in the war. The Nazis's own pursuit of a military technology oblivious to the alternatives sapped its strength - testimony indeed to the need to be aware of the relative costs of different technologies.

Moral arguments for nuclear disarmament or those based on the costs to civlians are - despite their importance - often pooh-poohed by the so-called realists. So whatever one feels about the rightness or not of the atomic bombing of Japan in 1945, Edgerton's type of analysis seems highly relevant. At a time now when new uses are being sought for existing nukes and new nuclear weapons are being proposed for development, such resources are desperately needed for pressing global problems of massive significance like global warming and sustainable development.

John Borrie


Reference

David Edgerton, The Shock of the Old: Technology and Global History Since 1900, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007.

Picture taken of the atomic bombing of Nagasaki on August 9, 1945, from Wikipedia.

NPT: States in the Sin Bin

It is the poems you have lost, the ills
From missing dates, at which the heart expires.
Slowly the poison the whole blood stream fills.
The waste remains, the waste remains and kills

(Missing Dates by William Empson 1999)

Sin is a concept that has resonance in most cultures. It is variously described as wrongful behaviour in specific situations or even a state of mind. Immoral, shameful, harmful, or alienating acts (or thoughts) are considered sinful. The designation of immoral and shameful varies from culture to culture, even within a single religion or philosophy.

A great deal of attention has been paid to the spectrum of good and bad behaviour. From lesser or venial sins (stealing cookies from the tin, lying to save another’s dignity etc.) to those of the grave or mortal variety (murder, rape, pedophilia and so on) the range of sinful behaviours is broad.

The degree of seriousness attached to each type of sin prescribes its future impact on the sinner and the sinned against – and each exacts a different penalty ranging from small penitential acts to utmost damnation. For example in Islam, there are several gradations of sin ranging from mistakes to transgressions to utmost wickedness and depravity. Buddhism has a code of ethics, the Pañcasīla, and in Hinduism, sin is an intentional transgression of divine law – a course of action that results in negative consequences. Judaism teaches that sin is an act, not a state of being. There is intentional sin, accidental sin and transgression through being unaware and through no fault of your own.

Then there is the distinction between sins of commission and sins of omission. The sin of omission is a failure to act when one should. It is a failure to achieve goodness, rather than a deliberate act of evil. It is therefore seen as less grievous than a sin of commission which involves a deliberate act of bad – an intentional act of evil.

One of the key features of the 2008 NPT PrepCom has been an emphasis on what constitutes compliance with all articles of the Treaty. In carrying out an article-by-article assessment of compliance with the Treaty, we get a much better sense of overall compliance with the Treaty and passion for the aims of the NPT.

But, it’s important to look at compliance in the context of the gravity of non-compliance. For the purposes of this blog, I am going to examine what possible non-compliance actions may occur through the lens of different types of sin.

Let's take Articles I and II of the NPT:

Article I Each nuclear-weapon State Party to the Treaty undertakes not to transfer to any recipient whatsoever nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices or control over such weapons or explosive devices directly, or indirectly; and not in any way to assist, encourage, or induce any non-nuclear weapon State to manufacture or otherwise acquire nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices, or control over such weapons or explosive devices.
Article II Each non-nuclear-weapon State Party to the Treaty undertakes not to receive the transfer from any transfer or whatsoever of nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices or of control over such weapons or explosive devices directly, or indirectly; not to manufacture or otherwise acquire nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices; and not to seek or receive any assistance in the manufacture of nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices.

A mortal sin against the Treaty would be the sin of Commissioning (acquiring, manufacturing, transferring, receiving…) a nuclear weapons programme. A less appalling, but still mortal, crime would be one of commissioning a nuclear weapons hedge programme – i.e. a programme that would develop the technology necessary to make nuclear weapons but not go as far as to make them. Both of these serious sins would probably involve deceit, betrayal of trust, bare-faced lying and theft. Most certainly the perpetrators would be guilty of pride, lust and envy while about it (a reminder here of the seven deadly sins: lust, gluttony, greed, sloth, wrath, envy and pride). Both would strike a mortal blow at the essence of the Treaty. More venial sins committed against Article I could include, for example, turning a blind eye to front companies and their exports, excusing government scientists carrying out “little experiments” or not even prosecuting those caught red-handed at such exploits.

In Article III, States Parties undertake to accept safeguards from the IAEA and to do so within a given timeframe. A generous interpretation for the forty or so states that have yet to conclude their safeguards agreement with the Agency would be to call that failure a sin of omission. A more grave sin would, for example, be the supply of nuclear material without the application of full-scope safeguards.

Article IV regards to the inalienable right of all the Parties to the NPT to develop research, production and use of nuclear energy for peaceful purposes without discrimination and in conformity with Articles I and II of the Treaty. Transgression of this inalienable right could well take the form of denial of license to companies wishing to sell and export technical know-how to a State that is suspected of violation of key NPT provisions, although this could be the result of a false judgment. On the other hand non-conformity with Articles I and II whilst attempting to import nuclear knowledge would constitute the more serious sin in that it would involve lying continually. It would constitute a fundamental betrayal of trust.

In the case of Article VI in which: “Each of the Parties to the Treaty undertakes to pursue negotiations in good faith on effective measures relating to cessation of the nuclear arms race at an early date and to nuclear disarmament, and on a Treaty on general and complete disarmament under strict and effective international control” context is all important. States without nuclear weapons, while being required to comply with the article, do not possess the same degree of responsibility for the execution of Article VI as the nuclear weapons states.

Failure to pursue negotiations year after year on effective measures relating to nuclear disarmament is, at the very least, a repeated sin of omission. As Ogden Nash put it, repeated acts of omission are the second kind of sin, that lays eggs under your skin (see reference at end). They lie there, irritate, cause agony and eventually hatch, affecting the health of the sinner, sometimes in a grave manner. When coupled with more serious sin – such as bad faith in negotiations or a profession of desire for disarmament while saying how nuclear weapons are fundamental to the security of the possessor state ad infinitum – then the soul of the Treaty is in mortal danger.

At the end of the Treaty text, Article X reads:

Each Party shall in exercising its national sovereignty have the right to withdraw from the Treaty if it decides that extraordinary events, related to the subject matter of this Treaty, have jeopardized the supreme interests of its country. It shall give notice of such withdrawal to all other Parties to the Treaty and to the United Nations Security Council three months in advance. Such notice shall include a statement of the extraordinary events it regards as having jeopardized its supreme interests.

If a state withdraws from the NPT when in violation of the Treaty – perhaps causing others to withdraw for the reason that their supreme interests are thus jeopardized – then it has committed a heinous sin. Such a act has betrayed just about every substantive article in the Treaty either before or during the act of withdrawal (of course if it then fails to notify properly, well that is indeed something to get worked up about). If afterwards, the state refuses to repent and continues to commit crimes against the Treaty (such as carrying out a nuclear weapon test), then what can be done to restore faith in the NPT and in the whole regime?

This brings us to the issue of repentance and atonement. In all the world’s main religions and in the humanist philosophical approaches, there is a way back from sin. This almost always takes the following form:

1. an admission of guilt;
2. an apology;
3. penance/atonement of some kind - usually in the form of righting the wrong committed;
4. Forgiveness of the sinner by the sinned against.

In the case of the transgression, betrayals, sins of commission, omission, venial and mortal against the NPT over the last forty years, there must be a way for the sinners to atone and for the rest to forgive. In many cases the sinners are also the ones sinned against, so considerable tolerance on all sides is required – as is an understanding that to go forward, we have to put the past with all its wrongs behind us.

This will require a huge amount of trust among all parties – which is of course, for the most part, sorely lacking in the nuclear non-proliferation regime. But for all that, we must start somewhere.

One way to right a wrong and begin a process of building trust would be for the US and other signatories to ratify the CTBT and bring it in to force. This would restore trust in the process (including in the CD) and in the countries not yet party to the CTBT.

Another important step would be to engage all states in the Middle East in a negotiation towards a zone free of WMD. Another would be to ensure that all transgression of Articles I and II are taken to court either within the country that they are committed or within another country that has an interest. Also all NPT States could ratify the Additional Protocol and make that a condition of supply.

There are many more suggestions for atonement and building trust I could make but I suggest instead that you click on www.wmdcommission.org and read “Weapons of Terror” if you haven’t already done so. I can’t resist one last critical suggestion however and that is to resolve the DPRK nuclear weapons problem with full disclosure and complete, verified disarmament, so that North Korea could, one day, return to the fold.

This is a guest blog by Dr Patricia Lewis, UNIDIR Director. Patricia’s other blogs on the NPT can be located by typing ‘NPT’ into the search box at right.


Reference

“It is the sin of omission, the second kind of sin, that lays eggs under your skin. The way you really get painfully bitten is by the insurance you haven't taken out and the checks you haven't added up the stubs of and the appointments you haven't kept and the bills you haven't paid and the letters you haven't written”. (Portrait Of The Artist As A Prematurely Old Man, Ogden Nash).

Picture: William Hogarth, Satan, Sin and Death (A Scene from Milton's `Paradise Lost') circa 1735-40, part of an exhibition at the Tate.

NPT: Man Friday

Following the tabling of his draft Chairman’s summary, the mighty Ambassador Volodymyr Yel’chenko of Ukraine (pictured above) held a final meeting of the PrepCom on Friday morning the 9th May. Throughout the two weeks of the PrepCom, Ambassador Yel’chenko had been trying – with increasing irritation – to get states to engage in an interactive debate. Not until this last session did the delegations reward his entreaties. The Nigerian representative’s reference to Ambassador Yel’chenko’s smooth performance being akin to how you never see a monkey sweat (because of its thick hair, apparently) was lost on most delegations, although it’s notable that the NPT Chairman does have a some luxurious locks that could just be hiding mild perspiration in the face of the task of getting a successful outcome.

The Chairman’s summary (now the Chairman’s working paper as it was not adopted by the meeting) is an attempt to reflect the main points of debate made in the two weeks of meetings. Working papers are closely read and ideas are taken from them, speeches made are listened to carefully and any suggestions are added into the pot. Of course not every small suggestion makes the cut. Much depends on how many times a point is made, how strong is the support and how contentious is the issue.

Issues such as disarmament and non-proliferation education made it up the charts (paragraph 29 out of 63 – no longer an issue relegated to an afterthought), a paragraph on the WMD Commission, the Reykjavik Revisited initiative from the Hoover Group, and reference to the environmental consequences of uranium mining all resonated in the text. Many other key issues were there and, as Chair’s texts go, it was very comprehensive; the major points made during the two weeks were there.

However, there were a couple of notable exceptions.

During the two weeks, much of the fire was fanned by the issue of what lay behind the attack by Israeli forces on a Syrian facility last September. Those of you who have yet to see the CIA footage on the Syrian facility should click here and see for yourself. In addition, the concerns over Iranian activities, the IAEA findings and the UN Security Council process, along with the E3+3 process that met in London on 2 May were cause for much debate.

Many states clearly have major concerns about Iran’s enrichment programme. However, as the US pointed out, the Chairman’s text goes easy on both Syria and Iran compared with the strength of the discussion and the content of papers during the PrepCom. In addition, the paper omits completely the charge made by the US that the DPRK was involved in the building of the Syrian facility. So DPRK gets let off the hook in that regard, as well as in others.

Dr Christopher Ford of the US delegation asked if the Chairman’s text was influenced by Iran’s intransigence last year in the 2007 Vienna PrepCom – at which all debate was held up by Iran. Was there indeed a fear that, if strong language on Iran and Syria had been included in the text, either country (or another for that matter) would hold up the adoption of the report as a whole and the PrepCom would end in disarray? Ford contended (just prior to when Syria was to take the floor) that there was no way that Syria could possibly feel hard done by the Chairman’s working paper and thus could not possibly complain about it. He added that despite US disappointment and reservations about the text, it did not intend to impede proceedings or hold the adoption of the report hostage, as had occurred last year.

In that way, I think he demonstrated that often those delegations that cause more fuss and are prepared to hold the meeting hostage to their demands, gain more in a meeting room than those who try to find compromise and behave well.

However, we shouldn’t lose heart. The meeting room isn’t real life. Bad behaviour in a meeting room might gain you a few negotiating score points. But, out there in the real world, such antics can attract a payback. As long-term readers of this blog well know, Tit for Tat is a game often played for real.


This is a guest blog by Dr Patricia Lewis, UNIDIR Director. Patricia’s other blogs on the NPT can be located by typing ‘NPT’ into the search box at right.

Reference

Statements and other documents from the NPT PrepCom can be found at its official website here. As of posting, the Syrian and UK ‘right of reply’ statements were not available.

Rebecca Johnson of the Acronym Institute has been providing ongoing analysis of the NPT Prepcom on the Acronym's website here.

Picture of Ambassador Yel'chenko is from the NPT PrepCom site.

Once more unto the breach ...

This week is a rare pause in a fairly comprehensive schedule of multilateral disarmament meetings that stretches until June. We've reported on the UN Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons' (CCW) work earlier this month, and last week and this week there were regional events on cluster munitions in Mexico City and Bangkok.

While all of this was going on, the second five-yearly review meeting of the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) met in The Hague. With the mainly bilateral focus of other diplomatic activity there, those involved in the CWC - not least on the civil society side - sometimes find the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) a bit of a lonely outpost compared with the multilateral hothouse atmospheres in Geneva, New York and even Vienna. In his very useful daily reports on the CWC review conference, researcher Richard Guthrie had this to say:

"The Hague remains less NGO-friendly than Geneva, New York or Vienna. A major part of this derives from less experience engaging with NGO activities. The experience of this Review Conference seems to be that a greater number of delegates appear to recognise that NGOs have a useful role to play in the efforts to reduce the global threat from the hostile uses of poisons."

It's about time, although, historically, the CWC is by no means alone in the arms control field in resisting diverse inputs. Meanwhile, this time around the CWC didn't have an easy time of it in attempting to achieve a review meeting outcome, which took until the early hours of Saturday morning. A declaration text has yet to emerge publicly, but my understanding is that wording on terrorism (including whether UN Security Council resolution 1540 could be specifically mentioned) and what to do about countries about to miss their treaty-mandated deadlines for destruction of their chemical weapons were at issue. You can read all about it, including Richard's daily reports, on the civil society web resource page Daniel Feakes and his colleagues set up for the Second CCW Review Conference.

Next week, the second preparatory meeting of three for the 2010 review conference of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) commences in Geneva. Disarmament Insight blog readers may recall that the first PrepCom in May last year in Vienna was very tough, with various Iran-related procedural shenanigans right up until the end of the meeting.

It's difficult to see how this second NPT PrepCom will be easier, but let's cross our fingers. Many Geneva-based disarmament diplomats in the corridors of the Palais already have a faintly harried look - the meeting hasn't even started! - although caucusing of various kinds has, of course, been underway for some time. And, there will be a great number of side events associated with the NPT. We hope to bring you updates from time to time on these nuclear doings.

As if the NPT wasn't enough, the Conference on Disarmament resumes on 12 May - although hopes it would achieve a work programme in 2008 after a decade of deadlock look once again to be fading. There is also the Dublin Conference to negotiate a treaty banning cluster munitions that cause unacceptable harm to civilians from 19 to 30 May, which many from Geneva will attend. Then there are the intersessional meetings of the Anti-Personnel Mine Ban Convention back in Geneva for a week from 2 June, the IAEA Board of Governors meeting in Vienna at the same time....it's all go.

Fortunately, there is a way to keep track of most of this. Geneva Forum, which along with UNIDIR collaborates in bringing you Disarmament Insight, has a very useful disarmament calendar on its website. It's worth bookmarking in your web browser.

John Borrie

Photo by author of space sculpture in the Palais des Nations grounds.

Disarmament & Globalisation: Old & New Wisdoms

Around the time that the Wall Street Journal published a well-received and watershed opinion-editorial by Henry Kissinger, Sam Nunn, Charles Schultz and others signalling a potential new beginning in nuclear disarmament public policy, a new project emerged—entitled ‘Disarmament and Globalisation’—based at the School of Oriental and African Studies in London, United Kingdom. As was reported on this blog later in 2007, momentum picked up in June when the UK Foreign Secretary echoed the op-ed’s call and those of many others for a world free of nuclear weapons. Great: the ‘D-word’ was making something of a comeback, this could only be a good thing and we pressed on with our work.

However, with this apparent progress there still seemed to be a disparity between calls for nuclear disarmament and the Trident renewal in the UK or the continuing debate over the Reliable Replacement Warhead program in the United States.

What also appeared evident, and at SOAS we heard it most clearly, was that there were still no clear links being made between disarmament of Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) and the problems caused by conventional weapons, especially the huge stocks and holdings of heavy conventional weapons, that are so damaging to development in the Third World. Efforts to understand demand for WMD by smaller countries—perhaps in order to counter Western conventional supremacy—must be given greater emphasis. It should also be recognised that the fallacy that interstate conflict was a thing of the past actually permitted the decline of the arms control and disarmament agenda.

Our project aims to build on the growing consensus in many constituencies that action on disarmament must be a priority for national governments in the run up to what will be a crucial review conference of the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) in 2010, and that this should be done by reference to disarmament in its humanitarian context. A large part of this emerging work will be an emphasis on the development of public policy surrounding both issues—nuclear and WMD disarmament on the one end and conventional weapons and the impact on development on the other. Currently, work on these two large fields is largely undertaken in separate universes, both in the way policy is developed (i.e. in separate departments) and in the way it is studied and taught. Yet there is no logic for them to do so.

There is also often a disparity between the academic findings on disarmament issues and the policy development at the national and multilateral levels. John Borrie and Christian Ruge have written about a gulf between policy-making and research communities in disarmament that can be difficult to bridge. Policy-makers sometimes pay only cursory attention—if any—to research. It is also the case that academic research, particularly in the International Relations field, has fallen behind reality. Bridging these gaps is a key part of finding innovative solutions to old problems, as well as emerging ones.

We hope to play a part in understanding how governments formulate their approach to a major multilateral process like the NPT, in understanding how civil society and the media above all can influence this at the national or regional level. Don’t forget that without the public campaigns backing up the scientific evidence, negotiations on climate change, for example, could not have progressed to the extent they have, with even the US making major changes to its traditional standpoint in order to reach consensus.

The project aims to culminate in a world summit in 2009 or early 2010, timed to coincide with the NPT RevCon and impact on it. An interesting research theme will be to research how it is possible to reverse the negative expectations surrounding these negotiations, especially considering the failure of the 2005 NPT RevCon to produce a final document. A thread of the work then will focus on affecting governmental negotiation positions and on creating useful advocacy proposals both for national representatives and the major intergovernmental or supranational institutions.

Article VI of the NPT requires States to negotiate both nuclear disarmament and a final treaty for general and complete disarmament. While the latter is generally regarded as being a long way off, it is our belief that we actually possess a good number of effective treaties (the ‘old wisdoms’) that can be extended and combined with the newer legislative and export-control measures encapsulated by UNSCR 1540 (the ‘new wisdoms’) to produce a comprehensive approach. It is not beyond the realm of possibility that by establishing and reinforcing the notion that disarmament commitments under the NPT do not just end at the comma, an effective trajectory for arms control in the 21st century can be found.

After a year or so of start-up, the project launches at a conference on 7 January 2008. I hope to report back on progress in the coming months.


This is a guest blog by Poul-Erik Christiansen, a researcher at the Centre for International Studies and Diplomacy, at the School for Oriental and Asian Studies (www.cisd.soas.ac.uk).

Reference

Photo of United Nations Security Council chamber in New York, courtesy of Paula Eyzaguirre and Thomas Nash.

Arms and Non-State Groups

The biggest threat facing the world today, according to some, is weapons of mass destruction (WMD) in the hands of terrorists. A chilling enough scenario, granted, but how likely is it actually to transpire? And what about weapons other than WMD in the hands of non-State groups broadly defined? Shouldn't we be worried about that as well?

Indeed, there is plenty to be worried about, as was highlighted this week by a UNIDIR seminar on "Preventing the Spread of Weapons to Non-State Armed Groups." Interestingly, participants seemed to be less worried about the prospect of terrorists building or otherwise acquiring a nuclear device than they were about them getting their hands on such relatively low-tech devices as shoulder-fired guided missiles capable of downing commercial airliners.

It all seemed to boil down to a (albeit inexact) calculation of risk; understood as probability multiplied by consequences. One speaker rated the probability of terrorists acquiring nuclear weapons as being so low as to drastically reduce the overall risk, despite the dire consequences of it actually happening. Another pointed out that - in the age of the biotech revolution, suicide bombings and global travel - a more effective way for terrorists to use weapons of mass destruction might be to infect themselves with a new strain of a deadly virus and travel on international flights, potentially unleashing a global pandemic.

For me, however, the most interesting part of the whole debate centered on the acquisition by non-State groups of conventional weaponry; something that happens all the time. Most States represented in the UNIDIR seminar came into being as a result of armed struggle - i.e. as non-state armed groups rising up against colonial powers or pre-existing States. Obviously, States existing today have a strong interest in maintaining the status-quo by crushing all non-State groups that undermine their sovereignty or threaten their very existence . However, some States still seem to reserve the right to arm non-State groups in other countries, using them as tool of foreign policy to promote regime change.

The debate on preventing the spread of weapons to non-State armed groups tends to become immediately polarized along the lines of "terrorist" vs. "freedom fighter." Although the UNIDIR seminar did not manage to avoid this completely, it did suggest some interesting nuances. For example, participants suggested that it is more useful to speak about terrorist "acts" than about terrorist "groups" and that, since there are many different kinds of non-State armed groups - e.g. aspiring or not to statehood; engaging or not in attacks on civilians - it is not useful to paint them all with the same brush.

The thorny issue of arming non-State groups did not feature very prominently in last week's international conference in Geneva on small arms transfer controls (see my posting of August 23), which is perhaps one of the reasons that the conference was so successful. The issue will have to be dealt with head on, however, by the nascent UN process leading towards the negotiation of a legally-binding Arms Trade Treaty regulating the transfer of all conventional weapons. I have a feeling it will be a difficult nut to crack.


Patrick Mc Carthy

Reference

Photo credit: Monohex on flickr

BWC: 2007 Meeting of Experts

If you were in the Palais des Nations last Friday morning, you might have heard applause emanating from one of the conference chambers. That was the end of the 2007 Meeting of Experts of the Biological Weapons Convention (BWC). In comparison to other events in the Palais like the Human Rights Council, it was a low-key gathering. It is, however, the latest chapter in the reinvigoration of multilateral efforts to strengthen the norms against poisoning and deliberate spreading of disease.

One of the highlights of the meeting was the official launch of the new Implementation Support Unit (ISU) for the BWC. The ISU has three staff. As the ISU’s size suggests, it isn’t designed to solve the problem of biological weapons by itself. Rather, it was created to help states help themselves. They decided not to contain resources dedicated to addressing these weapons in a single monolithic institution but to keep them in the hands of governments and other international organizations, where most of the time they are dedicated to other issues, such as tackling naturally occurring infectious disease.

The ISU, however, will be key in bringing these resources together when necessary, and ensuring that they are interwoven to form a new type of fabric - one that will offer the flexibility of lycra, the strength of silk but be as soft on political sensitivities as cashmere is on skin. (Ed – Piers, I think we need to get you to the pub for a pint and a game of darts.)

Last week’s BWC meeting was an important opportunity for experts from governments, international and non-governmental organizations to meet and discuss national and regional measures and approaches to implement the provisions of the Convention. This year’s discussions had a special focus on law enforcement. While clearly not the stuff of newspaper headlines, this kind of collective work is absolutely crucial to building a norm that’s effective in preventing biological weapons, and identifying emerging risks to the regime.

By all accounts the BWC meeting was considered a success, with many substantive proposals. As importantly, there’s a renewed sense of confidence present despite past difficulties stewardship of the Convention has faced. This will help move the BWC higher up national agendas and strengthen impetus for implementing its obligations.

Although it’s clear that there’s no ‘one size fits all’ solution to implementing the BWC, a number of common understandings, themes and elements emerged during the course of the meeting. There was also a shared sense that better use could be made of the new ISU as a catalyst in better coordinating and managing implementation activities. Another important sense was that there’s a need to build national capacities – in addition to guidance and advice on enacting legislation and regulations, some states need practical assistance to be able to enforce and manage such measures.

The ideas and proposals tabled at this meeting come on top of more general discussions on national implementation held in BWC meetings in 2003 and the review of the BWC’s operation late last year. The next annual Meeting of BWC States Parties, due to be held this December, will be tasked with ‘cooking up’ these raw ingredients into something more accessible and polished that can then be ‘served’ to those states looking to improve or enhance their national arrangements or who have just joined the treaty (4 countries already have this year.)

There is an old maxim that a chef is only as good as his last meal. So if the BWC is to continue to be at the forefront, it will be critical that each and every one of its meetings add something new to the ‘stockpot’. This one certainly did, and it bodes well for December’s menu.


This is a guest blog by Dr. Piers Millett, a member of the BWC Implementation Support Unit team.


References

The BWC Implementation Support Unit’s website can be viewed here.

Video entitled "What You Should Know About Biological Warfare (1952)", available on Youtube at www.youtube.com/watch?v=a6NdxEmqvtk.

Beckett & Nunn: It’s okay to use the “D” word again

Friday it was the Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons expert meeting in Geneva, Monday it’s the Carnegie Non-Proliferation Conference in Washington D.C. It’s a jet-set life, and I have the jetlag to prove it (cue: yawn, hair swish. Eat your heart out Paris Hilton).

In disarmament and non-proliferation terms, the U.S. scene is a bit of a fish bowl. Viewed from the outside certain things in there can seem distorted, and from the inside the outside world is definitely distorted. So it’s useful from time to time to dunk one’s self into it to try to get a sense of what’s really going on, hence Carnegie.

The last Carnegie Conference I attended was, I think, in 2002. At that time the U.S. was still reeling from the September 11 attacks and there was some uncertainty as to which direction the Bush Administration would go in arms control terms.

A lot has changed in the intervening five years, but some things remain the same. The Carnegie Conference itself remains – unsurprisingly – overwhelmingly American in the composition of its participants, albeit with a smattering of Eurotrash and others like me. The coffee is still bracingly North American bad. And, after years of fierce noises and metaphorical hand smacking from the government arms control establishment here whenever the D-word “disarmament” is mentioned, the concept still seems almost entirely excised from the collective vocabulary of American-based thinktankers and policy makers – despite it remaining alive and well in other parts of the world, for instance in the output of the Weapons of Mass Destruction Commission.

But the wind seems to be changing direction. This morning, Senator Sam Nunn signaled the changed by wearing his newfound commitment to nuclear disarmament on his sleeve in remarks to the Conference. Although head of the Nuclear Threat Initiative, Nunn had until recently apparently considered talk of disarmament as irresponsible. Not now. In nuclear proliferation terms, he said, the world was in "a perfect storm".

Meanwhile, although six months old, there is still buzz about Nunn’s Wall Street Journal op-ed with Henry Kissinger, George Schultz and Bill Perry – not a pinko, liberal among them - calling for a world free of nuclear weapons. Arms control greybeards (there are plenty of them here) are still pinching their arms in confusion.

But there was more to come. British Foreign Minister Margaret Beckett delivered the lunchtime keynote. Yesterday the Financial Times had carried the scoop that Beckett might have something significant to say, and she didn’t disappoint. Forget the summary of her remarks on the FCO website, below is a link to the full speech in which Beckett, referring to the Wall Street Journal op-ed by Nunn et al, called for a truce

“in a sterile stand-off between those who care most about disarmament and those who care most about proliferation. The dangers of such mutually assured paralysis - as [Kofi Annan] termed it - are dangers to us all. Weak action on disarmament, weak consensus on proliferation are in none of our interests. And any solution must be a dual one that sees movement on both proliferation and disarmament - a revitalisation, in other words, of the grand bargain struck in 1968, when the Non-Proliferation Treaty was established.”

Bold words and a good speech outlining some constructive, albeit modest, steps the U.K. is taking or is prepared to take in company with others. From where I was sitting I certainly felt Beckett’s conviction. And it sent a firm signal nuclear disarmament is going to assume some priority for incoming British Prime Minister, Gordon Brown.

It remains to be seen, of course, what influence this will have on Gordon Brown’s counterpart dwelling just a couple of streets away on Pennsylvania Avenue, or how much political capital Britain will be ultimately prepared to expend to this end. But although there were many sobering issues to consider during today’s discussion (Iran, North Korea, nuclear terrorism to name but a few) Beckett’s statement was welcome indeed. Signs of renewed progress toward a nuclear-free world would be even more welcome.


John Borrie


References

Transcript of British Foreign Minister Margaret Beckett’s speech is here.

The Wall Street Journal op-ed by Nunn etal is here (subscription required).

An interesting 25 February New York Times article analyzing Nunn’s change of heart (apparently thanks in part to media mogul Ted Turner) is here.

The WMD Commission’s report and other resources are here.

The 24 June FT article is here.

Photo courtesy of author.

On the Ropes

BBC Radio Four (Intelligent Speech is how the Beeb modestly describes it) has some of the best radio programmes in the English-speaking world.

Many will be familiar with the BBC World Service. But unless you’ve lived in the numerous isles off just of the west European coast, chances are that you will not quite understand how addictive the station is. From aficionados of Women’s Hour to eccentric fans of Mornington Crescent and Just a Minute, Radio Four listeners are a peculiarly well-read, well informed group of obsessives. (I should here, I suppose - if I have to - give the The Archers addicts a mention. But they’re a very strange lot and are probably right now listening to one of the twice-repeated daily episodes dedicated to the sleepy, fictitious farming town of Ambridge and its drama-queen inhabitants).

(Disarmament Insight team note – for our part, we’re addicted to Melvyn Bragg’s weekly BBC Radio Four show and pod cast on the history of ideas, In Our Time.)

It was to just such an erudite public audience that Dr Hans Blix, former Director-General of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and former Chairman of the UN Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission in Iraq bared his soul.

On the Ropes is a half-hour interview slot in which journalist John Humphreys interviews famous people about a difficult time in their lives, in which they have had to endure stormy weather.

Dr Blix was asked tough questions about the time leading up to the 2003 invasion of Iraq. No doubt all reading this will remember how Dr Blix, along with Dr ElBaradei of the IAEA, regularly faced the Security Council to give accounts of the progress that UN inspectors were making in the search for weapons of mass destruction (WMD) in Iraq.

In the On the Ropes interview we learned of Dr Blix’s dawning realization that there were no major stocks of biological weapons in Iraq, or any other type of WMD for that matter. He was also increasingly uncomfortably aware that this understanding was not going to be able to stop the war. He talked also in the interview about Dr David Kelly, the British bioweapons inspector who died soon after the invasion.

The interview is thought-provoking, honest and, at times, moving. It’s a fascinating account of how one man – Blix – with the knowledge was also powerless to stop the war, despite being able to tell the facts openly and honestly. Something this Swedish lawyer is still determined to do.

I recommend you take the time to listen to On the Ropes and – who knows? – you may become as addicted to Radio Four as the rest of us.


Guest blog from Patricia Lewis

Patricia is Director of UNIDIR.


References

Dr. Blix’s radio interview is online at: http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/ontheropes/pip/sy4r8/

BBC Radio 4’s show entitled “In Our Time” can be downloaded at: http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/history/inourtime/

Photo of Hans Blix retrieved from Flickr, see http://www.flickr.com/photos/epsen/447192121/