Down
& Out: A Nuclear Path
by Gar
Alperovitz, Alex Campbell, Thad Williamson
The
Nation (December 30, 1996) Vol. 263, No. 22: 16-20.
Copyright 1996 The Nation Company Inc.
Page
1 of 5
Thirty-five
years ago-a year before the Cuban missile crisis and two years
before he was assassinated-President John F. Kennedy tabled
a detailed treaty calling for step-by-step, worldwide, " general
and complete disarmament" (G.C.D.). With the cold war long
over and no serious threat to U.S. security, the idea is once
again relevant. Bill Clinton could-and should-launch a major
global disarmament initiative to kick off his second term.
This
month an international group of top military leaders urged
massive reductions in nuclear weapons. Gen. Lee Butler, retired,
former commander of the Strategic Air Command, now judges
that "nuclear weapons are inherently dangerous, highly expensive,
militarily inefficient and morally indefensible."
Similarly,
a recent Henry L. Stimson Center report by a blue-ribbon panel
chaired by Gen. Andrew Goodpaster - and including Paul Nitze,
Robert McNamara and a number of top cold war generals - calls
for the ultimate elimination of all the worlds nuclear weapons.
The panel stated: "In the long term, only a policy aimed at
steadily curbing global reliance on nuclear weapons-including
our own-is likely to progressively eliminate nuclear dangers."
All
this opens the way to a reconsideration of fundamental disarmament
issues. Kennedy was not the only President to see the possibilities
that a worldwide "build-down" offered the United States. Every
nation would obviously benefit if the weaponry and troops
of all were simultaneously reduced. Presidents Hoover, Roosevelt,
Truman, Eisenhower and Johnson all endorsed one or another
form of disarmament. Moreover, the United States is explicitly
committed to the goal of general disarmament, Article VI of
the 1968 Non-Proliferation Treaty, which Lyndon Johnson signed,
commits the United States to "pursue negotiations in good
faith" on a treaty for general and complete disarmament under
strict and effective international control." The same commitment
is included in the Non-Proliferation Treaty signed by President
Clinton in the spring of 1995.
American
force levels are currently roughly ten times what they were
before World War II. Despite repeated commitments "in principle"
to pursue it, the idea of general disarmament has all but
disappeared from U.S. discussion.
However,
there are new reasons to believe U.S.-and, of course, global-security
would benefit enormously from picking up the discussion of
a specific plan where Kennedy left it when he was killed.
The
old cold war paradigms had a certain built-in stability and
predictability. The current nuclear-conventional global balance
is highly unstable-and the danger of a renewed arms race is
all too real. What nervous Russian military leaders might
do in response to NATO expansion is particularly troubling;
Russia has not yet even ratified START II nuclear reductions.
Some members of the national security community are also beginning
to move away from a commitment to non-proliferation. Leonard
Spector of the Carnegie Endowment points out that "counter-proliferationists"
are again urging the United States to refine and expand our
nuclear deterrent, develop new warheads for "counter-proliferation"
and build a destabilizing anti-missile defense system.
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