Christoph Bluth

Civilian Nuclear Cooperation and the Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons

In his article, Matthew Fuhrmann challenges the conventional wisdom about the relationship between civilian nuclear cooperation and nuclear weapons proliferation.1 The literature on nuclear proliferation focuses on the demand side and explains decisions to acquire nuclear weapons on the basis of security threats, hegemonic ambitions, national identity, or related factors.2 The role of civilian technical nuclear cooperation is generally discounted as a motivating factor in the acquisition of nuclear weapons capabilities. Fuhrmann argues that there is a causal connection between peaceful nuclear cooperation and proliferation and that civilian nuclear assistance over time increases the likelihood that states will initiate nuclear weapons programs. The implications of the notion that civilian nuclear technology promotes nuclear proliferation are disturbing, because they lead to the conclusion that the central bargain of the nuclear nonproliferation regime—namely, access to civilian nuclear technology in return for the renunciation of nuclear weapons—is not viable and that instead the Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) might be a vector for the spread of nuclear weapons technology. The central thesis of Fuhrmann’s article seems implausible. Nuclear proliferation is exceedingly rare. One hundred eighty-nine states are members of the NPT, including ave nuclear states. There are only four states that are not members of the NPT and that have nuclear weapons. Of the four, the last one to make the decision to go nuclear and that received civilian nuclear assistance started its nuclear program in 1972. North Korea went nuclear in the absence of civilian nuclear assistance.3 Belarus, Kazakhstan, Correspondence: Nuclear Cooperation and Proliferation

Détente and conventional arms control: West German policy priorities and the origins of MBFR

The standard view of the negotiations on mutual and balanced force reductions 1973–86 is that no progress was made because the Warsaw Pact sought to protect its existing advantage in conventional forces in Europe, while the western side was against any reductions. Moreover, the political objectives of the talks (for the eastern side the conclusion of CSCE, for the western side the maintenance of domestic support for troop commitments to Europe) were achieved without any progress in the negotiations. Research in German archives shows that for a time there was strong support in the west German government for far more ambitious goals seeing the talks as a mechanism to affect fundamentally the structure of European security on the basis of more radical force reductions. This paper analyses the results of this research, its influence on the official west German position on MBFR and the interaction with the decision‐making process in the NATO alliance.

The Irrelevance of ‘Trusting Relationships’ in the Nuclear Non‐Proliferation Treaty: Reconsidering the Dynamics of Proliferation

In a recent paper Jan Ruzicka and Nicholas J. Wheeler have posited that the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) is an example of several ‘trusting relationships’. The authors assert that ‘since the end of the 1990s the trusting relationships embodied in the NPT have come under strain’ and that this accounts for the fact that the ‘treaty is facing growing pressures that are eroding what has been an effective barrier to nuclear weapons proliferation’. This article questions the assumptions underlying this analysis. It argues that the approach taken by Ruzicka and Wheeler fundamentally misconceives the dynamics of nuclear non-proliferation. The policy implications generated by this approach are impractical and downright dangerous as they fail to address the causes of proliferation and instead exacerbate the problem further.

Between a Rock and an Incomprehensible Place: The United States and the Second North Korean Nuclear Crisis

Abstract This paper is concerned with the second North Korean nuclear crisis and the Six-Party Talks. It seeks to explain the collapse of the Agreed Framework resulting from the shift in U.S. policy under the Bush administration and the decision by North Korea to resume nuclear activities. It discusses the origins, the course and the failure of the Six-Party Talks prior to their resumption in July 2005. It shows how the political philosophy of the Bush administration led it to adopt tactics that were unsuitable for the achievement of the objective of disarmament. Likewise, Pyongyang proceeded from assumptions that were erroneous, and Washington proved to be impervious to its threats and brinkmanship. Thus, while North Korea strove to improve its bargaining power, it had no strategy of how to make use of it, having lost the gains achieved under the Agreed Framework. The article elucidates the structural impediments to a successful outcome, which consist in the divergent objectives among the parties to the ...

The Warsaw Pact and Military Security in Central Europe During the Cold War

The two central vectors of the military confrontation of the Cold War were the strategic nuclear stand-off and the military confrontation in Europe. Both at a political and the military-technical level, the military balance in Europe was a central factor in the perception of the threat and the deliberations about strategy. This article examines the perception that the Warsaw Pact had of its opponent, the NATO alliance, in the military confrontation in Europe. It does so by looking at the evolution of the military balance in Europe and analyzes how military doctrine and strategy evolved in response to the military situation and the perceptions of NATO capabilities in doctrine, using documentation, from East German archives, that sheds new light on the controversies surrounding Warsaw Pact military strategy in Europe.

Arms control as a part of strategy: the Warsaw Pact in MBFR negotiations

New archival materials have become available that allow us to test the conventional interpretation of Warsaw Pact policy towards conventional arms reductions in Europe. They shed new light on the objectives of the Eastern side in talks on mutual and balanced arms reductions, how it approached the dispute over the assessments of the military balance and sought to preserve its advantages while constraining West German military capabilities, and demonstrate that Soviet military leaders perceived a shift in the conventional military balance in favour of the West in the 1980s.

India and Pakistan: a case of asymmetric nuclear deterrence

Abstract Ever since decolonization and the partition of the former British colony of India into the states of India and Pakistan, there has been an enduring conflict between them, which has resulted in various crises. It has continued despite dramatic changes in the geopolitical environment. The conflict is over national identity, territory, and the power position in the region. The Pakistani elite have been unable to accept the division of Jamma and Kashmir and seek equal status with India, while India sees itself as a great power in the region. The conflict escalated into war at the very creation of the state of Pakistan in 1947–48, as well as in 1965 and 1971. The war in 1971 resulted in the division of Pakistan, a defeat that instilled a great sense of insecurity in Pakistan and a greater determination to find a way to overcome Indias military superiority. In order to balance Indias conventional military superiority, Pakistan acquired a small-scale nuclear weapons capability using bombers and medium...

The Soviet Union and the Cold War: Assessing the Technological Dimension

The military competition engendered by the Cold War provoked rapid and sustained innovation in military technology. New information that has become available since the end of the Cold War permits a detailed reassessment of technical capabilities and developments in the Soviet Union, both with respect to strategic nuclear forces and to conventional weapons. This article shows that initially Soviet capabilities were subject to severe technical weaknesses that imposed major constraints on strategic options, but these were largely overcome by the 1980s. If the Soviet Union can be said to have lost the arms race, it was with respect to conventional technology. The article shows how in the perception of Soviet military planners the balance of power in Europe shifted against the Warsaw Pact in the 1980s.

Toward nuclear superiority? U.S. strategic nuclear power in the twenty-first century

Abstract This paper considers the evolution of U.S. strategic arms policy after the end of the Cold War. It discusses the internal debates in the U.S. government concerning the structure and purpose of U.S. strategic nuclear forces in the context of strategic arms control agreements during the Clinton period and the reasons for the failure of significant reform. It examines the Bush administrations Nuclear Posture Review and the emergence of the “New Triad” involving strategic nuclear and conventional offensive strike systems, and active and passive defenses. It also analyzes the reorganization of the defense infrastructure in the context of an international environment in which “rogue states,” regional conflicts and sub-state conflicts have become the main contingencies. The paper critically assesses the assumption of U.S. strategic arms policy and concludes that the full implementation of the “New Triad” is neither likely nor advisable, but that nuclear weapons should remain weapons of last resort to d...

The Challenge of the Future

The seismic shifts in the international system at the end of the 1980s and the unification of Germany have provoked a large spectrum of different views about the future role of the United Germany in the new Europe. Some scholars and politicians expressed the expectation that, with the restraints of the postwar settlements having been removed, Germany would now develop a foreign and security policy in keeping with its position in the international system. As the country with the largest economy in Europe, the central position between East and West and the largest population in Western Europe, playing a leading role in Europe, not least by virtue of being the largest net contributor to the budget of the European Union, it would assume a leadership role in Western Europe and Central Europe. It would overcome its Machtvergessenheit, in the words of Hans-Peter Schwarz, and assert its national interests. Christian Hacke thus declared the national interest as the guiding principle for Germany’s future foreign policy and sought to develop some principles for the global power against its will (Weltmacht wider Willen).1