McCain’s nuke plan is good, but could go farther

Yesterday, Senator John McCain gave a speech that described how his administration would enhance global nuclear security. The speech addressed all of the most important issues relating to nuclear security and Senator McCain endorsed a variety of sound ideas. But for the U.S. to obtain the leverage it needs to make significant progress against current and future nuclear proliferation rogues, future U.S. policy will need to go farther than what Senator McCain proposed.

Media headlines from the speech discussed Senator McCain’s willingness to discuss further warhead reductions with Russia and China. But Russia and China, being rational players, are the least important nuclear worries for the U.S. The gravest nuclear problem for the U.S. and the world is proliferation to rogue states and non-state actors. The top priority of U.S. nuclear security policy should be to obtain leverage over this problem.

In practice, obtaining leverage over the proliferation problem means being able to gain international cooperation in economically, financially, and politically isolating rogue proliferators such as Iran and North Korea. In order to gain this cooperation, it must be clear to even anti-American third parties that the rogue proliferators, and not the U.S., are the “bad guys.” And in order to achieve this state of perception, the U.S. should state its willingness to disarm itself of its nuclear weapons, if the rest of the world does the same and enters into other agreements and arrangements that would make these conditions enforceable.

I believe there is no chance, zero, that the rest of the world would agree to these conditions. Therefore, the U.S. will be a nuclear weapons state for the indefinite future. But declaring the reasonable conditions under which the U.S. would disarm its nuclear inventory would allow the U.S. to gain the political and diplomatic leverage it will need to organize international coalitions against existing and future proliferation rogues.

Senator McCain’s speech listed some of arrangements that would be part of enforcing a hypothetical nuclear weapons-free world:

1) Fissile Material Cut-off Treaty, making it illegal to produce weapons-grade fissile material and reactor-grade fissile material without international supervision.

2) Establish international enrichment centers, guarantee access to this output, while banning any country from having its own enrichment capability.

3) Undisclosed transfers of nuclear technology would be illegal and subject to punitive interdiction.

4) Enlist more countries into the Proliferation Security Initiative, and encourage the Initiative to use military force to interdict suspected illegal nuclear shipments.

These steps, plus some additional enforcement measures, would be the minimum necessary to enforce a nuclear weapons-free world.

Needless to say, these measures would be a severe encroachment on sovereignty, thus guaranteeing they would never be agreed to, especially by some rising developing countries. Although the U.S. government seems to have lost its interest in nuclear weapons, that is certainly not the case elsewhere in the world. In the developing world, and among non-state terror groups, nuclear weapons are seen as the “great equalizer.” Aided by bureaucratic allies such as IAEA director Mohamed ElBaradei, countries such as Iran and North Korea have turned the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty on its head, using it as a highway instead of a barrier to the Bomb.

The developing world has viewed U.S. hesitancy to push for nuclear disarmament as hypocrisy. In current circumstances, this is not helpful for the U.S., since the U.S. needs the international community to cooperate on severe economic and financial sanctions against nuclear proliferation rogues such as Iran.

And although a nuclear weapons-free world will not ever come about, ironically it is the U.S. that would be the greatest beneficiary in such a world. America’s vast conventional and technological military superiority would be even more decisive in a nuclear-free world. That is the best reason why the rest of the world will never accept Senator McCain’s reasonable proposals.

But that is all the more reason why the U.S. should vigorously push for them. Even better, the U.S. should pledge to disarm itself of nuclear weapons if these proposals were effectively adopted and if all other countries similarly and verifiably disarm.

Again, there is no chance of any of this actually happening. But what the U.S. needs now is the diplomatic leverage to round up large coalitions against the nuclear rogues. Getting on the good side of the issue, while making the rogues look very bad, would be a big boost to this important diplomatic effort.

POSTSCRIPT

Senator McCain also mentioned reducing or eliminating deployments of tactical nuclear weapons in Europe. Does the U.S. maintain tactical nuclear weapons in Europe in order to deter a Russian attack on Europe? The European Union has twice the population of Russia, at least twelve times Russia’s economic output, and exceeds Russia in science and technology. Two members of the EU are nuclear weapon states. It would seem that Europe has the capability of deterring Russia all by itself. It is about time Europe grew up and established its own nuclear weapons doctrine.