Nuclear Age Peace Foundation

Category: Nuclear Abolition

  • Another Nuclear Anniversary

    Once upon a time making nuclear bombs was the biggest thing a country could do. But not any more; North Korea’s successful nuclear test provides rock-solid proof. This is a country that no one admires.

    It is unknown for scientific achievement, has little electricity or fuel, food and medicine are scarce, corruption is ubiquitous, and its people live in terribly humiliating conditions under a vicious, dynastic dictatorship. In a famine some years ago, North Korea lost nearly 800,000 people. It has an enormous prison population of 200,000 that is subjected to systematic torture and abuse.

    Why does a miserable, starving country continue spending its last penny on the bomb? On developing and testing a fleet of missiles whose range increases from time to time? The answer is clear: North Korea’s nuclear weapons are instruments of blackmail rather than means of defence. Brandished threateningly, and manipulated from time to time, these bombs are designed to keep the flow of international aid going.

    Surely the people of North Korea gained nothing from their country’s nuclearisation. But they cannot challenge their oppressors. But, as Pakistan celebrates the 11th anniversary of its nuclear tests, we Pakistanis — who are far freer — must ask: what have we gained from the bomb?

    Some had imagined that nuclear weapons would make Pakistan an object of awe and respect internationally. They had hoped that Pakistan would acquire the mantle of leadership of the Islamic world. Indeed, in the aftermath of the 1998 tests, Pakistan’s stock had shot up in some Muslim countries before it crashed. But today, with a large swathe of its territory lost to insurgents, one has to defend Pakistan against allegations of being a failed state. In terms of governance, economy, education or any reasonable quality of life indicators, Pakistan is not a successful state that is envied by anyone. Contrary to claims made in 1998, the bomb did not transform Pakistan into a technologically and scientifically advanced country. Again, the facts are stark. Apart from relatively minor exports of computer software and light armaments, science and technology remain irrelevant in the process of production. Pakistan’s current exports are principally textiles, cotton, leather, footballs, fish and fruit.

    This is just as it was before Pakistan embarked on its quest for the bomb. The value-added component of Pakistani manufacturing somewhat exceeds that of Bangladesh and Sudan, but is far below that of India, Turkey and Indonesia. Nor is the quality of science taught in our educational institutions even remotely satisfactory. But then, given that making a bomb these days requires only narrow technical skills rather than scientific ones, this is scarcely surprising.

    What became of the claim that the pride in the bomb would miraculously weld together the disparate peoples who constitute Pakistan? While many in Punjab still want the bomb, angry Sindhis want water and jobs — and they blame Punjab for taking these away. Pakhtun refugees from Swat and Buner, hapless victims of a war between the Taliban and the Pakistani Army, are tragically being turned away by ethnic groups from entering Sindh. This rejection strikes deeply against the concept of a single nation united in adversity.

    As for the Baloch, they deeply resent that the two nuclear test sites — now radioactive and out of bounds — are on their soil. Angry at being governed from Islamabad, many have taken up arms and demand that Punjab’s army get off their backs. Many schools in Balochistan refuse to fly the Pakistani flag, the national anthem is not sung, and black flags celebrate Pakistan’s independence day. Balochistan University teems with the icons of Baloch separatism: posters of Akbar Bugti, Balaach Marri, Brahamdagh Bugti, and ‘General Sheroff’ are everywhere. The bomb was no glue.

    Did the bomb help Pakistan liberate Kashmir from Indian rule? It is a sad fact that India’s grip on Kashmir — against the will of Kashmiris — is tighter today than it has been for a long time. As the late Eqbal Ahmed often remarked, Pakistan’s poor politics helped snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. Its strategy for confronting India — secret jihad by Islamic fighters protected by Pakistan’s nuclear weapons — backfired terribly in the arena of international opinion. More importantly, it created the hydra-headed militancy now haunting Pakistan. Some Mujahideen, who felt betrayed by Pakistan’s army and politicians, ultimately took revenge by turning their guns against their sponsors and trainers. The bomb helped us lose Kashmir.

    Some might ask, didn’t the bomb stop India from swallowing up Pakistan? First, an upward-mobile India has no reason to want an additional 170 million Muslims. Second, even if India wanted to, territorial conquest is impossible. Conventional weapons, used by Pakistan in a defensive mode, are sufficient protection. If mighty America could not digest Iraq, there can never be a chance for a middling power like India to occupy Pakistan, a country four times larger than Iraq.

    It is, of course, true that Pakistan’s nuclear weapons deterred India from launching punitive attacks at least thrice since the 1998 tests. Pakistan’s secret incursion in Kargil during 1999, the Dec 13 attack on the Indian parliament the same year (initially claimed by Jaish-i-Muhammad), and the Mumbai attack in 2008 by Lashkar-i-Taiba, did create sentiment in India for ferreting out Pakistan-based militant groups. So should we keep the bomb to protect militant groups? Surely it is time to realise that these means of conducting foreign policy are tantamount to suicide.

    It was a lie that the bomb could protect Pakistan, its people or its armed forces. Rather, it has helped bring us to this grievously troubled situation and offers no way out. The threat to Pakistan is internal. The bomb cannot help us recover the territory seized by the Baitullahs and Fazlullahs, nor bring Waziristan back to Pakistan. More nuclear warheads, test-launching more missiles, or buying yet more American F-16s and French submarines, will not help.

    Pakistan’s security problems cannot be solved by better weapons. Instead, the way forward lies in building a sustainable and active democracy, an economy for peace rather than war, a federation in which provincial grievances can be effectively resolved, elimination of the feudal order and creating a society that respects the rule of law.

    It is time for Pakistan to become part of the current global move against nuclear weapons. India — which had thrust nuclearisation upon an initially unwilling Pakistan — is morally obliged to lead. Both must announce that they will not produce more fissile material to make yet more bombs. Both must drop insane plans to expand their nuclear arsenals. Eleven years ago a few Pakistanis and Indians had argued that the bomb would bring no security, no peace. They were condemned as traitors and sellouts by their fellow citizens. But each passing year shows just how right we were.

    Pervez Hoodbhoy teaches nuclear physics at Quaid-i-Azam University in Islamabad, Pakistan.
  • A Roadmap to Abolition

    A Roadmap to Abolition

    A plan to achieve a world without nuclear weapons must be built upon a roadmap or outline of what needs to be accomplished. The principal concerns in moving to zero are that all nuclear weapons are accounted for, that the weapons are verifiably and irreversibly dismantled, that all states have confidence in the system, and that there is an effective way to stop potential cheaters. The roadmap will need a proposed timeframe, but one that is sufficiently flexible to allow for necessary verification and confidence building in the system. The roadmap will thus have to be built on a phased and transparent approach as well as one that is verifiable and irreversible.

    President Obama stated during his campaign for the presidency, “A world without nuclear weapons is profoundly in America’s interest and the world’s interest. It is our responsibility to make the commitment, and to do the hard work to make this vision a reality.” (1) He then went further in his Prague speech in April 2009, committing America “to seek the peace and security of a world without nuclear weapons,” and setting forth a number of steps to move the world in this direction. (2)

    President Obama and others have suggested that the path to a world free of nuclear weapons could be a long one, beyond his own life. This is possible, but it could also happen much more rapidly with strong political will and leadership from the United States. The Roadmap proposed below suggests that the goal could be achieved within a timeframe of 10 to 17 years, that is, between 2019 and 2026. This is a goal that the United States cannot achieve alone, but that cannot be achieved without the United States. President Obama has provided a vision and the political will to begin the process in a serious way. He has made possible what has seemed impossible.

    The steps outlined by President Obama form the basis for Phase 1 of a Roadmap to Abolition. The three additional phases can take us to a world without nuclear weapons. If we take the year 2009 as the opening of Phase I, we can outline a world without nuclear weapons in four phases as follows:

    Phase 1 (1 to 2 years)

    US commitment to a world free of nuclear weapons. (Prague speech) (3)

    US and Russia begin bilateral negotiations on the reduction and elimination of their nuclear arsenals. (Joint Statement) (4)

    US and Russia complete negotiations on new START agreement, reducing the number of nuclear weapons in their respective arsenals to under 1,000 weapons, deployed and in reserve. The agreement must contain effective measures of verification, including challenge inspections. (In Prague speech, agreed to complete negotiations within 2009, but provided no details on numbers)

    US and Russia launch global effort to gain control of all loose nuclear weapons and materials. (Joint Statement)

    US host Global Summit on Nuclear Security and other measures to prevent nuclear terrorism. (Prague speech) Initiate negotiations at this Global Summit for a Nuclear Weapons Convention, banning research, development, manufacture, possession, threat or use of nuclear weapons. (5)

    Negotiate new global treaty to cut off production of nuclear weapons and weapons-grade materials. (Prague speech)

    Seek universal adherence to International Atomic Energy comprehensive safeguards, including the Additional Protocol. (Joint Statement)

    Provide the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) with adequate resources to do provide comprehensive safeguards. (Prague speech)

    US and Russia convene arms reduction negotiations with the other three nuclear weapons states recognized in the NPT (UK, France and China).

    US ratification of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (Prague speech)

    Strengthen the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (Joint Statement)

    Limitations on missile defense installations reinstituted.

    Phase 2 (3 to 5 years)

    The five NPT recognized nuclear weapons states agree to provide accurate and verifiable accounting of their nuclear arsenals and weapons-grade materials.

    US and Russia agree to reduce their nuclear arsenals to under 300 weapons each, deployed and reserve.

    UK, France and China agree to freeze production of nuclear materials and weapons and cut their arsenals in half, not to exceed 100 nuclear weapons each.

    The four non-NPT nuclear weapons states (Israel, India, Pakistan and North Korea) and all nuclear capable states agree to provide accurate and verifiable accounting of their nuclear arsenals and material.

    The four non-NPT nuclear weapons states agree to freeze production of nuclear materials and weapons and cut their arsenals to under 25 nuclear weapons each.

    The nine nuclear weapons states continue negotiations on a Nuclear Weapons Convention banning the research, development, manufacture, possession, threat or use of nuclear weapons and prepare a draft treaty.

    Complete the required ratifications of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty so that it enters into force.

    Achieve universal adherence to IAEA comprehensive safeguards.

    Complete process for gaining control of all loose nuclear weapons and weapons-grade materials.

    Implement strict international controls on all weapons-grade nuclear materials and the technologies to create such materials.

    New treaty to cut off production of weapons-grade fissile materials enters into force.

    US-Russian agreement to ban intermediate-range missiles extended to become global ban on intermediate-range and long-range missiles.

    Phase 3 (3 to 5 years)

    Global conference held to complete and sign Nuclear Weapons Convention.

    Nuclear Weapons Convention ratified by all nuclear capable states and enters into force.

    US and Russia reduce their arsenals to under 100 weapons each, deployed and reserve.

    UK, France and China reduce their arsenals to under 25 weapons each.

    Non-NPT nuclear weapons states reduce their nuclear weapons to under 10 weapons each.

    Phase 4 (3 to 5 years)

    The end game: final steps are taken in accord with the Nuclear Weapons Convention to eliminate all nuclear weapons from the planet with sufficient safeguards and punishments for violators to assure that they will not be recreated.

    (1) “2008 Presidential Candidate Quotes,” Web site of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation: https://wagingpeace.davidmolinaojeda.com/menu/resources/surveys/2008_pres_cand/cand_quotes_page.php.

    (2) “Speech on Nuclear Issues delivered in Prague,” April 5, 2009, Web site of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation:   https://wagingpeace.davidmolinaojeda.com/articles/2009/04/05_obama_prague_speech.php.

    (3) All reference to “Prague Speech,” refer to the citation in footnote 2.

    (4) All references to “Joint Statement,” refer to “Joint Statement by President Dmitriy Medvedev of the Russian Federation and President Barack Obama of the United States of America,” Web site of The Associated Press, http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5iVZVQZKurqCWMUl_tMQk8_IatXKAD979LOBG4.

    (5) The Lawyers’ Committee on Nuclear Policy/International Association of Lawyers Against Nuclear Arms, the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War and the International Network of Engineers and Scientists Against Proliferation created a Model Nuclear weapons Convention in 1997 and updated it in 2007.  The Model Nuclear Weapons Convention has been submitted to the United Nations by the Republic of Costa Rica and Malaysia.  See the Web site of the Lawyers’ Committee on Nuclear Policy: http://lcnp.org/mnwc/.

    David Krieger is President of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation.

  • 17 Nobel Peace Laureates Call for a Nuclear Weapons-Free World

    Sixty-four years ago, the horror of atomic bombs was unleashed on Japan, and the world witnessed the destructive power of nuclear weapons. Today, with just a year until the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) Review Conference convenes at the United Nations in the spring of 2010, we, the undersigned Nobel Peace Laureates, echo U.S. President Barack Obama’s call for a world without nuclear weapons and appeal to the leader of every nation to resolutely pursue this goal for the good of all.

    We find ourselves in a new era of proliferation. Despite the near universal ratification of the 1970 treaty, which binds states to nuclear disarmament, little progress has been made to fulfill this pact and eliminate nuclear weapons from our world. On the contrary, as the nuclear powers have continued to brandish their weapons, other nations have sought to produce their own nuclear arsenals.

    We are deeply troubled by this threat of proliferation to non-nuclear weapon states, but equally concerned at the faltering will of the nuclear powers to move forward in their obligation to disarm their own nations of these dreadful weapons.

    The fact that humanity has managed to avoid a third nuclear nightmare is not merely a fortunate whim of history. The resolve of the A-bomb survivors, who have called on the world to avert another Hiroshima or Nagasaki, has surely helped prevent that catastrophe. Moreover, the millions who have supported the survivors in their quest for peace, as well as the reality of our collective restraint, suggest that human beings are imbued with a better, higher nature, an instinct for inhibiting violence and upholding life.

    In the months leading up to the NPT Review Conference, this higher nature must rise to guide our efforts. Nations are now reviewing progress in the treaty’s implementation and mapping a path forward. For the first time in many years, the opportunity exists for genuine movement toward reducing and eliminating nuclear arms.

    As this process unfolds, world leaders will be faced with a stark choice: nuclear non-proliferation or nuclear brinkmanship. We can either put an end to proliferation, and set a course toward abolition; or we can wait for the horrors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki to be repeated.

    We believe it is long past time for humanity to heed the warning made by Albert Einstein in 1946: ”The unleashed power of the atom has changed everything save our modes of thinking, and we thus drift toward unparalleled catastrophe. We shall require a substantially new manner of thinking if mankind is to survive.”

    We know that such a new manner of thinking is possible. In the past ten years, the governments of the world, working alongside international institutions, non-governmental organizations, and survivors, have negotiated treaties banning two indiscriminate weapons systems: landmines and cluster bombs. These weapons were banned when the world finally recognized them for the humanitarian disaster they are.

    The world is well aware that nuclear weapons are a humanitarian disaster of monstrous proportion. They are indiscriminate, immoral, and illegal. They are military tools whose staggering consequences have already been seen in the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and the long-term impacts of those attacks. Eliminating nuclear weapons is indeed a possibility — more than that, it is a fundamental necessity in forging a more secure planet for us all.

    As Nobel Peace Laureates, we call on the citizens of the world to press their leaders to grasp the peril of inaction and summon the political will to advance toward nuclear disarmament and abolition. To fulfill a world without nuclear weapons, and inspire a greater peace among our kind, humanity must stand together to make this vision a reality.

    * This declaration was published by the Hiroshima Peace Media Center

  • Daisaku Ikeda’s 2009 Peace Proposal and the Challenge of Abolishing Nuclear Weapons

    Daisaku Ikeda’s 2009 Peace Proposal and the Challenge of Abolishing Nuclear Weapons

    Daisaku Ikeda has always been a staunch advocate of nuclear weapons abolition. In his 2009 Peace Proposal, his 27th annual Peace Proposal, Ikeda makes “sharing of efforts for peace toward the abolition of nuclear arms” one of the three major pillars he proposes “for transforming the current global crisis into a catalyst for opening a new future for humanity….” The other two pillars are “sharing of action through tackling environmental problems” and “sharing of responsibility through international cooperation on global public goods.” Ikeda makes a powerful case for humanity rising out of necessity to a new level of global cooperation to overcome the shared threats to our common future.

    As always, Ikeda’s view of nuclear weapons is unambiguous. He refers to these weapons, as did his mentor Josei Toda, as an “absolute evil.” He is clear that these weapons “are incompatible not only with the interests of national security but with human security.” This understanding forms the basis for his uncompromising commitment to the abolition of nuclear weapons.

    At the governmental level, Ikeda proposes action at three levels. First, he suggests the prompt convening of a US-Russia summit, at which “basic agreement for bold nuclear arms reduction plans could be reached” in advance of the 2010 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) Review Conference. I agree with him fully on this point, and it would seem that President Obama, who has already sent Henry Kissinger to Russia for preliminary talks, does as well.

    What might be accomplished at a US-Russia summit? I would argue for four needed outcomes. First, announce that the common goal of both countries is a world free of nuclear weapons. Second, agree as a next step toward this goal to reduce the arsenals of each side, deployed and reserve, to no more than 1,000 nuclear weapons by the year 2010. Third, commit to taking the nuclear weapons on both sides off hair-trigger alert. Fourth, extend the provisions of the 1991 START I agreement, which is set to expire in December 2009, so that its provisions for verification are retained.

    Ikeda’s second proposal for action at the governmental level is, building on the US-Russia agreements, to convene a five state summit for nuclear disarmament, composed of the five initial nuclear weapons states (US, Russia, UK, France and China). He sees their mandate being to create “a roadmap of truly effective measures to fulfill their disarmament obligation stipulated in Article VI of the NPT.” Thus, he seeks to keep the nuclear weapons states that are parties to the NPT focused on their obligation to achieve nuclear disarmament.

    The third Ikeda proposal for government action is pursuing the challenge of concluding a Nuclear Weapons Convention (NWC), a new treaty that would “comprehensively prohibit the use, manufacture, possession, deployment and transfer of nuclear weapons.” Ikeda realizes, though, that action by governments is unlikely to succeed in this effort without the involvement of civil society. “To realize an NWC,” he states, “it is vital that people of the world raise their voices and strengthen solidarity in the manner seen in the campaigns for the Mine Ban Treaty and the Convention on Cluster Munitions, but on an even greater scale.”

    Awakening the people of the planet to the peril that nuclear weapons pose to them and their loved ones may be the most important single effort that can be made by those of us currently inhabiting the planet. Thus, I am particularly encouraged by Daisaku Ikeda’s call for a People’s Decade for Nuclear Abolition. It is critical that people everywhere embrace this issue and take positive action for a world free of nuclear weapons. Governments have been too slow to act on their own, regardless of the dangers nuclear weapons pose to humanity and the human future.

    Even more enlightened governments, such as the Obama administration, need outspoken support from their citizens if they are going to meet the challenges of nuclear weapons abolition. With concerted global action during a People’s Decade for Nuclear Abolition, it may be possible to move governments with unprecedented speed so as to reach the goal set forth by the Mayors for Peace of a world free of nuclear weapons by the year 2020.

    Daisaku Ikeda’s 2009 Peace Proposal is an inspirational statement from a man who has chosen hope. Realizing the goals of the proposal for peace and nuclear abolition will require the active engagement of committed individuals and groups across the globe.

    David Krieger is President of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation and a Deputy Chair of the World Future Council.

  • Time to Ban the Bomb and the Reactor

    This speech was delivered to delegates at the 2009 Non-Proliferation Treaty Preparatory Committee at the United Nations

    With the world’s hopes newly raised by inspiring statements from prominent leaders urging the elimination of nuclear weapons, including pledges by Presidents Obama and Medvedev, to work for “a nuclear free world,” the recent establishment of the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) could actually enable us to realistically fulfill the Non-Proliferation Treaty’s mission for nuclear disarmament. In January, Germany, together with Denmark and Spain, launched IRENA in Bonn with 75 nations who signed its founding statute. Since IRENA is the Greek word for peace, this auspicious initiative is particularly well-named as the Agency is designed to spread the fruits of clean, safe sustainable energy, enabling the planet to avoid nuclear proliferation and catastrophic climate change and assist developing countries to access the abundant free energy resources provided by our Mother Earth.

    IRENA precludes reliance on fossil, nuclear and inefficient traditional biomass energy. With an International Atomic Energy Agency, promoting dangerous and toxic nuclear power technology, and an International Energy Agency, founded during the 1970s oil crisis to manage the fossil fuel supply, IRENA’s launch could not have been timelier as the world wrestles with the twin crises of nuclear proliferation and global warming. We urge every nation to join IRENA by signing its founding statute and to forego or phase out deadly nuclear technology, whether for war or for peace.

    Throughout the years of this NPT process, we NGOs have warned states parties that the spread of nuclear energy spells disaster for efforts to control the proliferation of nuclear weapons or to mitigate the impacts of climate change, threatening the very future of humanity’s existence. Distinguished physicians at these meetings have described for you the awful physical effects of carcinogenic pollution from nuclear power with increased cancer, leukemia, and birth defects in every community where nuclear reactors spew their lethal poisons into the air, water and soil. Since we last spoke to you, new German studies show a 60% increase in solid cancers and a 117% increase in leukemia among young children living near German nuclear facilities between 1980 and 2003.

    Indigenous leaders from around the planet have stood here and told you about the awful horrors wreaked on their communities from uranium mining. We reminded you of the creation story of the Rainbow Serpent, asleep in the earth, guarding over those elemental powers which lie outside of humankind’s control and how any attempt to seize those underworld elements will disturb the sleep of the serpent, provoking its vengeance: a terrible deluge of destruction and death. At the World Uranium Hearing, the world was warned that:

    The Rainbow Serpent has been wakened. Men turned into shadows, cancer, women giving birth to jellyfish babies, leukemia – since the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945, since the Bravo test in the Bikini Islands, and since the Chernobyl catastrophe in April of 1986, we know that the Rainbow Serpent doesn’t differentiate between uranium’s military and peaceful uses. Death is everywhere it touches. But what we perhaps don’t realize is that the destructive properties of uranium are unleashed the moment it’s mined from the ground.

    We have told you there is no known solution to the storage of nuclear waste which lasts for hundreds of thousands of years, spewing its silent poisons into our air, earth and soil, injuring not only the living, but unborn generations to come—our very genetic heritage. The United States, in 2009, cancelled 30 year-old plans to bury nuclear waste at Yucca Mountain Nevada because it cannot safely contain the long-lived poisons that the nuclear industry lobbied to bury there for eons. After more than 60 years of ignorantly and mindlessly amassing huge quantities of toxic radioactive poisons, heedless of the consequences to earth’s biosphere, yet another Commission is to be appointed to yet again “study the issue”. We don’t have a clue! Rational behavior would demand we should stop making any more nuclear waste until, and if ever, we can figure it out!!

    In France, held up as the exemplar of a country enjoying the “benefits” of nuclear power, its nationally owned Areva, the largest nuclear corporation in the world, is plunged into debt. Its reprocessing center at La Hague has produced massive discharges of radiation into the English Channel and has over nine thousand containers of radioactive wastes with no safe place to go. In Japan, the costs from the earthquake last year that crippled seven reactors at Kashwazaki are still rising. In the UK, the Sellafield nuclear recycling plant is mired in debt and costly breakdowns.

    We have explained to you how the nuclear industry promotes false information about nuclear power’s ability to mitigate the effects of catastrophic climate disasters. Millions of dollars are spent in marketing campaigns to convince the public that nuclear power will prevent global warming. But the evidence is incontrovertible that nuclear power is the slowest and costliest way to reduce CO2 emissions. Financing nuclear power diverts scarce resources from investments in renewable energy and energy efficiency. Enormous sums spent for nuclear power would worsen the effects of global warming by buying less carbon-free energy per dollar, compared to investing those sums in sun, wind or efficiency. Nor is nuclear power carbon free. It uses fossil fuels for the mining, milling and processing of uranium, as well as for reactor decommissioning and waste disposition and depends on a grid usually powered by coal. It is unreliable in extreme weather conditions and needs back up power to prevent meltdown. In the summer of 2004, France had to shut down a number of reactors during an extreme heat wave.

    We have spoken to you of the folly of lusting for mastery of nuclear technology as a matter of “national pride”. This is holdover thinking from the 1960s when nuclear power developed in industrialized nations. Many scientists in developing countries were trained in nuclear technology as part of the Atoms for Peace programs in the US, Russia and Europe during the late 1950s and in the 1960s. Nuclear power growth stalled in the industrialized countries by the late 1980s, especially after the tragedies of Three Mile Island and Chernobyl, and as its economic burdens became clear. But by then the former young scientists were entrenched in running the industry and like their nuclear reactors were now middle aged and unwilling to let go of their positions of power.

    The nuclear renaissance was to be a passing on of the inheritance to the next generation but real world constraints are making this generation of new reactors even more problematic than the last and the nuclear baton is not likely to pass out of the existing “club”. The enormous cost and safety problems are still here. In the industrialized nations, the nuclear industry has great difficulty in recruiting nuclear engineers. Due to global shortages in nuclear reactor components it’s not possible for the world nuclear industry to build more that 10 reactors a year at most for the next decade. Because all of the operating reactors will have to be retired in that time, 1070 reactors would have to be built in 42 years, or about 25 reactors per year, in order for nuclear technology to lower carbon emissions of even one billion tons per year.

    In a “wedge” model which assumes that nuclear power could replace a portion of the energy used by coal fired plants, the effort expended would be insufficient to have even the smallest impact on climate change. And because the limited supply of production capacity to produce new reactors creates a seller’s market, the industry is much more likely to sell to countries with nuclear experience. This is due to the risks associated with inordinately long lead times for new construction, security and liability issues, and already existing infrastructure. Thus developing countries or countries with no nuclear industry will probably be rebuffed and are well advised to put their energy investments into much more reliable renewable sources

    Nevertheless, proposals to try to control civilian nuclear fuel production have sparked new interest in acquiring nuclear technology by countries that never wanted such technology before. A top-down, hierarchical, centrally controlled nuclear apartheid fuel cycle is being planned, creating a whole new class of nuclear “have nots” who can’t be trusted not to turn their “peaceful” nuclear reactors into bomb factories. It’s just so 20th century! These discriminatory proposals are doomed to fail. With the growing chorus of promising new calls for a nuclear free world, there is no need for any nation to have a virtual bomb in the basement. Far better to leap frog over this antiquated, poisonous 20th century technology and expend your financial and intellectual treasure on clean, safe renewable energy, averting the twin catastrophes of nuclear proliferation and radical climate change, while adding your nation’s voice to the growing numbers of world leaders demanding that negotiations for nuclear weapons abolition move forward.

    Critical energy investment choices must be made now if we are to prevent the looming climate calamity. Every thirty minutes, enough of the sun’s energy reaches the earth’s surface to meet global energy demand for an entire year. Wind has the potential to satisfy the world’s electricity needs 40 times over and could meet all global energy demand five times over. The geothermal energy stored in the top six miles of the earth’s crust contains an estimated 50,000 times the energy of the world’s known oil and gas resources. Global wave power, tidal and river power are vast untapped stores of clean energy. IRENA is dedicated to supporting nations to develop and share the research and technology that will enable us to harness that abundant, free energy to secure the future of our planet.

    While the NPT guarantees to States which agree to abide by its terms an inalienable right to so-called peaceful nuclear technology, it is highly questionable whether such a right can ever be appropriately conferred on a State. During the Age of Enlightenment natural law theory challenged the divine right of kings. The United States’ Declaration of Independence spoke of “self-evident truth” that all men are “endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights …to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” Where does “peaceful nuclear technology” fit in this picture?!? Just as the signing of the Comprehensive Test Ban abrogated the right to peaceful nuclear explosions in Article V of the NPT, we urge you to adopt a protocol to the NPT mandating participation in the newly launched International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) which would supersede the Article IV right to “peaceful” nuclear technology.

    Civil Society’s Model Nuclear Weapons Convention, now an official UN document, includes an Optional Protocol Concerning Energy Assistance which would phase out nuclear power and provide funding and assist nations to shift to non-nuclear sustainable energy sources. Universal enrollment in IRENA, coupled with a moratorium on new reactors and fuel production, while phasing out nuclear power by relying on safe, renewable energy, must become an integral part of the good faith negotiations required to eliminate nuclear weapons. We urge your enrollment and participation with IRENA. Since IRENA was launched in January with 75 countries, two new countries, Belarus and India have signed its Statute. NGOs will campaign for 100% universal participation in IRENA by the 2010 Review Conference. Please join us!! Add your nation to the list!! It’s time to give peace a chance!

    Alice Slater is the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation’s New York representative.

  • Not a Weapon of Choice

    This article was originally published in the Times of India

    On Sunday, North Korea launched a long-range missile which Pyongyang described as a success but US experts said had been a failure. Of greater historical significance was the speech delivered the same day in Prague by US president Barack Obama. During the Democratic primary campaign last year, Hillary Clinton famously declared that both Senator John McCain and she had actual job experience to qualify to be commander-in-chief. All that Obama had done, by contrast, was to deliver one speech in Chicago opposing the Iraq war.

    As we know, Clinton fatally underestimated the power of speech. Obama at his best combines linguistic eloquence and powerful oratory with substance and gravitas. On Sunday, he addressed one of the most critically important topics of our day that literally has life and death implications for all of us, wherever we may be.

    The dream of a world free of nuclear weapons is an old one. It is written into the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty (NPT), which balances the prohibition on non-nuclear states acquiring these weapons with the demand on the five NPT-licit nuclear powers Britain, China, France, Russia and the US (N5) to eliminate their nuclear arsenals through good-faith negotiations. Considering that the NPT was signed in 1968 and came into effect in 1970, the N5 have not lived up to their bargain.

    The dream has been kept alive by many NGOs, a coalition of like-minded countries and a plethora of international blue ribbon commissions. A major difficulty is that the abundant “zero nuclear weapons” initiatives have been stillborn because of zero follow-up and a failure to address real security concerns.

    If we examine the geostrategic circumstances of the existing nuclear powers, the two with the least zero security justification for holding on to any nuclear weapons are Britain and France. Nor can North Korea justify nuclear weapons on national security grounds. It seems to play a nuclear hand as a bargaining chip, the only one it has. Israel’s security environment is harsh enough with many in its neighbourhood committed to its destruction to make its reliance on nuclear weapons understandable. Pakistan will not give up its nuclear weapons while India still has them. India’s main security benchmark is not Pakistan but China. Neither China nor Russia will contemplate giving them up for fear of the US. This is why the circuit-breaker in the global nuclear weapons chain is the US.

    Obama’s speech acknowledged this. The US cannot achieve the dream on its own, he said, but it is prepared to lead based on the acknowledgement of its special moral responsibility flowing from being the only power to have used atomic weapons. He thus lays down the challenge to others to follow. And he outlines concrete follow-up steps that are practical, measurable and achievable.

    Obama’s strategy is to map out a vision and then outline the roadmap to achieve it. These include ratification of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty negotiated way back in 1997; a new treaty banning fissile material; reducing the role of nuclear weapons in US national security strategy; and a new strategic arms reduction treaty with Russia that is bold and legally binding. Washington will also host a global summit on nuclear security within one year.

    Such measures by the N5 must be matched by robust action against the proliferation threat. At the very least, Obama reclaims the moral high ground for Washington to pursue a vigorous and robust non- and counter-proliferation strategy. More resources and authority for institutions like the International Atomic Energy Agency and the Proliferation Security Initiative will be provided. Countries leaving or breaking the NPT must face real and immediate consequences. An international fuel bank could be created to assure supply to countries whose interest is limited to peaceful uses of nuclear energy. All vulnerable nuclear material around the world for example, loose nukes in Russia will be secured within four years. Black markets like A Q Khan’s will be broken up, trade in nuclear materials detected and intercepted in transit, and financial tools used to disrupt dangerous trade.

    Obama is right in saying that reaching the goal will require patience and persistence. But he may be wrong in saying that it may not be achieved in his lifetime. He should set down the marker for achieving it by the end of his second term if re-elected. Without a deadline, no one will work to make it happen; rather, they will retreat into the vague formula of “yes, some day, eventually”.

    Obama may also be mistaken in pinning faith on the global regime centred on the NPT which, he said, “could reach the point where the centre cannot hold”. The NPT is already a broken reed, with far too many flaws, anomalies, gaps and outright contradictions. For example, the promise that those who break the rules must be punished cannot be enforced against India. The India-US civil nuclear agreement, however justified and necessary, breaks NPT rules. A new clean nuclear weapons convention might be a better goal to pursue.

    That’s a minor quibble. More important is the broad sweep of Obama’s commitment, based on national interest and personal conviction, to freeing us from the fear of nuclear weapons.

    Ramesh Thakur is founding director of the Balsillie School of International Affairs in Waterloo, Canada.

  • Obama’s Nuclear Challenge

    This article was originally published in The Nation

    “So today, I state clearly and with conviction America’s commitment to seek the peace and security of a world without nuclear weapons,” President Obama said at the open-air rally in Prague on April 5. With these words came a change in the global air, as if a window had been opened a crack in a dark room that had been sealed shut for decades. On only two previous occasions had an American president proposed the abolition of nuclear arms. The first was Truman’s proposal at the United Nations in 1946 to place all nuclear technology under international control and devote it entirely to peaceful purposes, and so to strangle the nuclear age in its cradle. Stalin’s Soviet Union, bent on developing the bomb, would not agree.

    The second was the summit meeting at Reykjavik, Iceland, in 1986, where President Reagan and General Secretary Gorbachev came within an ace of agreeing to full nuclear disarmament. Their bid foundered on Reagan’s Strategic Defense Initiative, which he would not give up and Gorbachev would not accept. Thereafter the pronuclear consensus was restored. Its chief assumption, embodied in the doctrine of deterrence, was that safety from nuclear weapons paradoxically depended on their continued presence. Unremitting readiness to carry out genocide and worse had somehow been accepted as an inescapable commitment of even the greatest civilizations.

    Obama’s words disrupted this collective suicidal trance. He placed his commitment in an appropriate context: Prague had been the scene of Czech protests against Soviet domination, and Obama saluted those “who helped bring down a nuclear-armed empire without firing a shot.” The reference was doubly fitting. In the first place, the popular movement broke the spell of omnipotence that had surrounded the totalitarian empire. Like the bomb, the Soviet Union had been shielded by a reputation of immovability. The resistance movements in Czechoslovakia and elsewhere, using the “power of the powerless,” in the phrase of Václav Havel, gave the lie to this illusion. They revealed the possibility of “the impossible” and made it happen. Obama acknowledged the parallel with nuclear disarmament when he took note of those “who hear talk of a world without nuclear weapons and doubt whether it is worth setting a goal that seems impossible to achieve,” and, advising Czechs to remember the lessons of their Velvet Revolution, declared fatalism “a deadly adversary.”

    In the second place, it was that same resistance, together with Gorbachev’s perestroika, that by ending the cold war opened the clearest path to nuclear disarmament since 1946. Now that the rivalry that had been used to justify the threat of annihilation had been liquidated, might it be possible to eliminate the weapons that posed that threat? Might this “impossible” thing also be possible? The first three post-cold war presidents passed up the opportunity. Obama has seized it.

    Unfortunately, as soon as he announced the goal of abolition, he added that it would not “be achieved quickly, perhaps not in my lifetime.” With those words, the crack of the window seemed to narrow, the moral gloom thickened and the fatalism he had just renounced settled in again. Sighs of relief were almost audible among the upholders of the pronuclear consensus. As The Economist noted, “The world may never get to zero. But it would help make things a lot safer along the way if others act in concert. If North Korea and Iran can keep counting on the protection of China and Russia in their rule-breaking, progress will be all too slight.” In other words, a likely insincere commitment to abolition is to be a new talking point in stopping others from joining the nuclear club, which, for its part, will go on as before.

    A further sentence in Obama’s speech gave support to such views. Speaking of the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty (NPT), the president said, “The basic bargain is sound: countries with nuclear weapons will move toward disarmament, countries without nuclear weapons will not acquire them.” But moving toward disarmament is not the same as disarming. It is one thing to say to the world, “We all must do without nuclear weapons,” and quite another to say, “You must do without nuclear weapons, and we will keep 1,500 of them for as long as we are all alive.” In the latter case, the abolition commitment would become one more layer of hypocrisy in a situation already overloaded with it. But after more than sixty years of deceptive promises, the countries that do without nuclear weapons will not accept a “bargain” that gives a new lease on life to a double standard they already reject.

    These fears are mitigated by the agenda of measures Obama announced as first steps toward abolition. A wish list of arms controllers of recent years, they include ratifying the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty; negotiating a fissile material cutoff treaty; negotiating mutual cuts in nuclear warheads with Russia, perhaps to a level of 1,500 or 1,000; and fortifying the NPT. These proposals would be welcome in any context, but they take on added meaning when viewed as way stations on a journey to a nuclear-weapons-free world. Most interesting, perhaps, was Obama’s promise to host a Global Summit on Nuclear Security in the next year. Will it concentrate solely on nonproliferation or acknowledge the indispensable link between that goal and full nuclear disarmament? The answer, of course, will not depend on Obama alone. He has brought the nuclear dilemma back into public view. But his vision is a work in progress, a ground of contention on which all who desire disarmament are invited to exert themselves.

    Was Obama’s speech historic? Not yet. It was an invitation to participate in history. It will be historic if we make it so. Obama says he is prepared to postpone abolition until he has died. He is 47. I wish him long life. Let us free the world of nuclear weapons while he is still among us.

    Jonathan Schell is is the Harold Willens Peace Fellow at The Nation Institute and teaches a course on the nuclear dilemma at Yale. He is the author of The Seventh Decade: The New Shape of Nuclear Danger.

  • The Unthinkable Becomes Thinkable: Towards the Elimination of Nuclear Weapons

    The meeting of US and Russian presidents has prompted us to speak out about the global abolition of nuclear arms. The urgency can hardly be exaggerated: nuclear weapons may come into the possession of states that might use them as well as stateless terrorists—creating new threats of unimaginable proportion.

    A noble dream just several years ago, the elimination of nuclear arms is no longer the idea of populists and pacifists; it is now a call of professionals—politicians known for their sense of realism and academics for their sense of responsibility.

    An inspiration to discuss a world free from nuclear peril came from a statement by four US statesmen, two Democrats and two Republicans. In ‘A World Free of Nuclear Weapons’ (Wall Street Journal, January 4, 2007), former US secretaries of state George Schultz and Henry Kissinger, former defence secretary William Perry, and former chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee Sam Nunn proposed several measures in pursuit of this goal. A year later, in another article expanding their initiative, they used this metaphor: “[T]he goal of a world free of nuclear weapons is like the top of a very tall mountain. From the vantage point of our troubled world today, we can’t even see the top of the mountain, and it is tempting and easy to say we can’t get there from here. But the risks from continuing to go down the mountain or standing pat are too real to ignore. We must chart a course to higher ground where the mountaintop becomes more visible” (WSJ, Jan. 15, 2008).

    These words provoked an avalanche of support from leading figures on the British political scene, from Italian politicians from the left, centre and right, and eminent figures on the German political scene, whether Social Democrats, Christian Democrats or Liberals.

    In January 2009, 130 world politicians and scientists gathered in Paris to sign the Global Zero Declaration. Elsewhere, the governments of Australia and Japan established an International Commission on Nuclear Non-proliferation and Disarmament. Leading research centres in all corners of the globe are working on reports to provide arguments for a political decision on the total elimination of nuclear weapons.

    We are now adding our voice from Poland, a country tested by the atrocities of World War II, and familiar with the nuclear threats of the Cold War period. A country heavily affected by the nuclear disaster in Chernobyl.

    This growing concern mirrors the perception of new threats and risks. The invention of nuclear weapons—which served the goal of deterrence during the Cold War, with the world divided into two opposing blocks—answered the needs and risks of the time. Security rested on a balance of fear, as reflected in the concept of mutual assured destruction. In that bipolar world, nuclear weapons were held by only five global powers, permanent members of the UN Security Council.

    Today the global picture is different. Sparked by the Solidarity movement in Poland, the erosion of communist systems in Central and Eastern Europe led to our region’s new “Springtime of the Peoples”. With the Warsaw Pact dissolved and the Soviet Union disintegrated, the bipolar world and its East-West divide vanished. And the hope for a better future came to our hearts.

    An order based on the dangerous doctrine of mutual deterrence, was not, however, replaced with a system founded on cooperation and interdependence. Destabilization and chaos followed, accompanied by a sense of uncertainty and unpredictability. Nuclear weapons are now also held by three states in conflict: India, Pakistan and Israel. Given the development of the nuclear programmes in North Korea and Iran, both these countries may also become nuclear-weapon states, and there is a real danger that this group may further expand to include states where governments will not always be guided by rational considerations. There is also the risk that nuclear weapons may fall into the hands of non-state actors, such as extremists from terrorist groupings.

    We share the view that an effective non-proliferation regime will not be possible unless the major nuclear powers, especially the USA and Russia, take urgent steps towards nuclear disarmament. Together, they hold nearly 25,000 nuclear warheads—96% of the global nuclear arsenal.

    It gives us hope that US President Obama recognizes these dangers. We note with satisfaction that the new US administration has not turned a deaf ear to voices from statesmen and scientists. The goal of a nuclear-free world was incorporated in the US administration’s arms control and disarmament agenda. We appreciate the proposals from the UK, France and Germany. Russia has also signaled recently in Geneva its readiness to embark upon nuclear disarmament.

    Opponents of nuclear disarmament used to argue that this goal was unattainable in the absence of an effective system of control and verification. But today appropriate means of control are available to the international community. Of key importance are the nuclear safeguards of the International Atomic Energy Agency. The world must have guarantees that civilian nuclear reactors will not be used for military purposes – a condition for non-nuclear-weapon states’ unrestricted access to nuclear technologies as proposed recently Prime-Minister Brown in his initiative on A global nuclear bargain for our times. This is specially urgent at the present time, with the search for new energy sources and a “renaissance” of nuclear power.

    The 2010 NPT Review Conference calls for an urgent formulation of priorities. The Preparatory Committee will meet in New York this May, and this is where the required decisions should be made. The main expectations are for a reduction of nuclear armaments, a cutback in the number of launch-ready warheads (de-alerting), negotiations on a Fissile Materials Cut-off Treaty, ratification of the Comprehensive Test-Ban Treaty, and other means of strengthening practical implementation of the Non-Proliferation Treaty, especially its universal adoption.

    The time has come for a fundamental change in the proceedings of the Geneva-based Disarmament Conference. It has for years failed to meet the international community’s expectations.

    We share the expectation expressed by the academics, politicians and experts of the international Warsaw Reflection Group, convened under auspices of the Polish Institute of International Affairs in co-operation with the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) that consideration should be given to the zero option as a basis for a future multilateral nuclear disarmament agreement. The Group’s report, Arms Control Revisited: Non-proliferation and Denuclearization, elaborated under chairmanship of Adam D.Rotfeld of Poland and drafted by British scholar Ian Anthony of SIPRI was based on contributions made by security analysts from nuclear powers and Poland as well as from countries previously in possession of nuclear weapons (South Africa) and countries where they had been stored: post-Soviet armouries were located in Belarus, Kazakhstan and Ukraine. The fact that these new states were denuclearized as part of the Safe and Secure Disarmament programme provides a valuable lesson.

    Today we have to set the process of gradual nuclear disarmament in motion. It will not produce results overnight but would give us a sense of direction, a chance to strengthen non-proliferation mechanisms, and an opportunity to establish a global, cooperative non-nuclear security system.

    The deadliest threat to global security comes from a qualitatively new wave of nuclear proliferation. The heaviest responsibility is shouldered by the powers that hold the largest arsenals. We trust that the presidents of the USA and Russia, and leaders of all other nuclear powers will show statesmanlike wisdom and courage, and that they will begin the process of freeing the world from the nuclear menace. For a new international security order, abolishing nuclear weapons is as important as respect for human rights and the rights of minorities and establishing in the world a governance based on rule of law and democracy.

    This article was originally published in Polish in the Gazeta Wyborcza on April 3, 2009

    Aleksander Kwaśniewski was Polish president between 1995 and 2005; Tadeusz Mazowiecki was prime minister in the first non-communist government of Poland (1989-1990); Lech Wałęsa, leader of the Solidarity movement and Nobel Peace Prize laureate (1983), was Polish president between 1990 and 1995.

  • Imagine There’s No Bomb

    There has never been a better time to achieve total nuclear disarmament; this is necessary, urgent and feasible. We are at the crossroads of a nuclear crisis. On the one hand, we are at an alarming tipping point on proliferation of nuclear weapons, with a growing risk of nuclear terrorism and use of still massively bloated arsenals of the worst weapons of terror. On the other, we have perhaps the best opportunity to abolish nuclear weapons.

    For the first time, a US president has been elected with a commitment to nuclear weapons abolition, and President Barack Obama has outlined a substantive program to deliver on this, and shown early evidence that he is serious. He needs all the support and encouragement in the world. We do not know how long this opportunity will last. Unlike the last one, at the end of the Cold War, it must not be squandered. An increasingly resource- and climate-stressed world is an ever more dangerous place for nuclear weapons. We must not fail.

    Like preventing rampant climate change, abolishing nuclear weapons is a paramount challenge for people and leaders the world over – a pre-condition for survival, sustainability and health for our planet and future generations. Both in the scale of the indiscriminate devastation they cause, and in their uniquely persistent, spreading, genetically damaging radioactive fallout, nuclear weapons are unlike any other weapons. They cannot be used for any legitimate military purpose. Any use, or threat of use, violates international humanitarian law. The notion that nuclear weapons can ensure anyone’s security is fundamentally flawed. Nuclear weapons most threaten those nations that possess them, or like Australia, those that claim protection from them, because they become the preferred targets for others’ nuclear weapons. Accepting that nuclear weapons can have a legitimate place, even if solely for “deterrence”, means being willing to accept the incineration of tens of millions of fellow humans and radioactive devastation of large areas, and is basically immoral.

    As noted by the Weapons of Mass Destruction Commission headed by Dr Hans Blix: “So long as any state has nuclear weapons, others will want them. So long as any such weapons remain, there is a risk that they will one day be used, by design or accident. And any such use would be catastrophic.” The only sustainable approach is one standard – zero nuclear weapons – for all.

    Recent scientific evidence from state-of-the-art climate models puts the case for urgent nuclear weapons abolition beyond dispute. Even a limited regional nuclear war involving 100 Hiroshima-sized bombs – just 0.03 per cent of the explosive power of the world’s current nuclear arsenal – would not only kill tens of millions from blast, fires and radiation, but would cause severe climatic consequences persisting for a decade or more. Cooling and darkening, with killing frosts and shortened growing seasons, rainfall decline, monsoon failure, and substantial increases in ultraviolet radiation, would combine to slash global food production. Globally, 1 billion people could starve. More would succumb from the disease epidemics and social and economic mayhem that would inevitably follow. Such a war could occur with the arsenals of India and Pakistan, or Israel. Preventing any use of nuclear weapons and urgently getting to zero are imperative for the security of every inhabitant of our planet.

    The most effective, expeditious and practical way to achieve and sustain the abolition of nuclear weapons is to negotiate a comprehensive, irreversible, binding, verifiable treaty – a Nuclear Weapons Convention (NWC) – bringing together all the necessary aspects of nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation. Such a treaty approach has been the basis for all successes to date in eliminating whole classes of weapons, from dum-dum bullets to chemical and biological weapons, landmines and, most recently, cluster munitions.

    Negotiations should begin without delay, and progress in good faith and without interruption until a successful conclusion is reached. It will be a long and complex process, and the sooner it can begin the better. We agree with UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon that the model NWC developed by an international collaboration of lawyers, physicians and scientists is “a good point of departure” for achieving total nuclear disarmament.

    Incremental steps can support a comprehensive treaty approach. They can achieve important ends, demonstrate good faith and generate political momentum. Important disarmament next steps have been repeatedly identified and are widely agreed. They remain valid but unfulfilled over the many years that disarmament has been stalled. The 13 practical steps agreed at the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty Review conference in 2000 should be upheld and implemented. They include all nuclear weapons states committing to the total elimination of their nuclear arsenals; entry into force of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty; negotiations on a treaty to end production of fissile material; taking weapons off extremely hazardous high alert “launch on warning” status; and negotiating deep weapons reductions. But at the same time a comprehensive road map is needed – a vision of what the final jigsaw puzzle looks like, and a path to get there. Not only to fit the pieces together and fill the gaps, but to make unequivocal that abolition is the goal. Without the intellectual, moral and political weight of abolition as the credible and clear goal of the nuclear weapon states, and real movement on disarmament, the NPT is at risk of unravelling after next year’s five-yearly review conference of the treaty, and a cascade of actual and incipient nuclear weapons proliferation can be expected to follow.

    Achieving a world free of nuclear weapons will require not only existing arsenals to be progressively taken off alert, dismantled and destroyed, but will require production of the fissile materials from which nuclear weapons can be built – separated plutonium and highly enriched uranium – to cease, and existing stocks to be eliminated or placed under secure international control.

    The International Commission on Nuclear Non-proliferation and Disarmament announced by Prime Minister Kevin Rudd in Kyoto last June and led with Japan is a welcome initiative with real potential. It could most usefully direct its efforts to building political momentum and coalitions to get disarmament moving, and promote a comprehensive framework for nuclear weapons abolition.

    Australia should prepare for a world free of nuclear weapons by “walking the talk”. We should reduce the role of nuclear weapons in our own security policies, as we call on nuclear weapon states to do. To ensure that we are part of the solution and not the problem also means that the international safeguards on which we depend to ensure that our uranium does not now or in the future contribute to proliferation, need substantial strengthening and universal application. Our reliance on the “extended nuclear deterrence” provided by the US should be reviewed so that Australian facilities and personnel could not contribute to possible use of nuclear weapons, and we anticipate and promote by our actions a world freed from nuclear weapons. Canada championed the treaty banning landmines, or Ottawa Treaty; Norway led the way on the cluster munitions with the Oslo Convention. Why should the Nuclear Weapons Convention the world needs and deserves not be championed and led by Australia and become known as the Canberra (or Sydney or Melbourne or Brisbane) Convention?

    This article was originally published in The Age

    Malcolm Fraser is the former prime minister of Australia. Sir Gustav Nossal is a research scientist. Dr Barry Jones is a former Australian Labor government minister. General Peter Gration is a former Australian Defence Force chief. Lieutenant-General John Sanderson is former chief of the army and former governor of Western Australia. Associate Professor Tilman Ruff is national president of the Medical Association for Prevention of War Australia.

  • President Obama Calls for a World Free of Nuclear Weapons

    President Obama Calls for a World Free of Nuclear Weapons

    In a remarkable speech for any American leader, President Obama, speaking in Prague on April 5, 2009, provided new hope for a world free of nuclear weapons. “I state clearly and with conviction,” he said, “America’s commitment to seek the peace and security of a world without nuclear weapons.” He told his audience that America, as the only country to have used nuclear weapons, “has a moral responsibility to act.”

    For many years the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation has been calling for US leadership for a nuclear weapons-free world, based on the understanding that if the US does not lead, significant progress will not be possible. For the past two presidencies this leadership has been largely lacking. During the George W. Bush presidency, the US was the leading obstacle to nuclear disarmament. Now, with President Obama, there is a dramatic shift and the goal of US leadership for a nuclear weapons-free world that once seemed far distant, if not impossible, appears at hand.

    President Obama’s speech in Prague was a world changing moment, a promise of unprecedented historical change on the most profoundly dangerous issue confronting not only America but the world. In this speech he recognized the imperative for our common security of eliminating nuclear weapons and of America’s unique moral responsibility to lead this effort.

    He made it clear that while America cannot do it alone, it will lead by its actions. He called for “concrete steps,” including reducing the role of nuclear weapons in US national security strategy and urging other nuclear weapons states to do the same, reducing the number of nuclear weapons in its arsenal, working aggressively for US ratification of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, seeking a new treaty to end production of fissile materials for weapons, strengthening the Non-Proliferation Treaty, creating an international fuel bank to reduce the risks of proliferation, assuring that nuclear weapons will not be acquired by terrorists, leading an international effort to gain control of vulnerable nuclear materials throughout the world within four years, and hosting a Global Summit on Nuclear Security within the year.

    President Obama recognized that a world without nuclear weapons “will not be reached quickly.” He cautioned that such a world may not occur within his lifetime, and that achieving it will require “patience and persistence.” But this was not a speech about timeframes or deadlines. It was a speech setting forth a much needed vision and providing a promise of US leadership. He has taken an important step toward the goal of a nuclear weapons-free world by articulating this vision and committing to work toward it. Now a more comprehensive plan must be formulated and implemented.

    With the political will that President Obama has provided, it is possible that we could move far more rapidly toward a world of zero nuclear weapons than could previously be imagined. Political will and US leadership have been the most significant missing elements for achieving a world free of nuclear weapons. Now that these elements are in place, we may be surprised by how quickly the planning and implementation process can proceed toward the total global elimination of these unconscionable weapons.

    President Obama is a man of great vision, a leader that sees beyond the horizon. When he encounters a problem requiring change, he addresses it and proposes solutions. His leadership on the issue of a nuclear weapons-free world comes none too soon. In his speech, he has faced the threat of nuclear weapons squarely. The vision and the initial steps toward achieving it that he has articulated deserve our strong support.

    As President Obama noted, there will be many who will say that it cannot be done. But these naysayers cannot steal the future from those who seek a world free of nuclear threat or those committed to building a world at peace. The President will need the American people standing with him and saying, “Yes, we can.”

    David Krieger is President of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation (www.wagingpeace.org) and a Councilor of the World Future Council.