Missile Defense or Non-Proliferation: Where is Real Security?

Frida Berrigan and Michelle Ciarrocca are Research Associates at the World Policy Institute, New School University in New York.

Over the past few weeks, world leaders gathered at the United Nations to discuss the progress made and challenges ahead in their commitment "to pursue negotiations in good faith" towards a nuclear weapons-free world. The Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), a historic document signed in 1968, provides a structure for global nuclear disarmament. As UN Secretary General Kofi Annan said, the NPT is the "most important international agreement in the field of disarmament since the start of the nuclear age" and a "major success for the cause of peace."

The world still has far to go in achieving the Treaty's goal of nuclear abolition, but significant progress has been made since the treaty went into force three decades ago. The International Court of Justice, in a landmark finding, declared the use of nuclear weapons illegal unless national survival is at stake. Argentina, Belarus, Brazil, Kazakhstan, South Africa, South Korea, and the Ukraine have opted for a non-nuclear future, abandoning nuclear weapons and nuclear explosives projects. And while it was generally assumed in the 1960s and '70s that by the turn of the century dozens of countries would be nuclear-capable, only three countries--India, Pakistan, and Israel--have joined the nuclear club.

Furthermore, the United States and Russia have made significant reductions in their nuclear arsenals since the signing of the NPT. And Russia helped the Review Conference open on a positive note by ratifying both START II (which would reduce US/Russian nuclear arsenals to 3500 each) and the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty. Yet, as the Review Conference for the NPT came to a close May 19, most delegates agreed that foremost among challenges to nuclear disarmament are the US push for modifications to the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty and insistence on deploying a National Missile Defense system.

US pronouncements about deploying NMD have sparked bitter denunciations by officials in Beijing and Moscow, as well as condemnation from delegates representing France, Great Britain, South Africa, and others. In total, "the whole world is asking the United States not to build NMD, but no one in Washington is listening," says Daniel Plesch, Director of the British American Security Information Council.

The pursuit of National Missile Defense and changes to the ABM Treaty could jeopardize, or even unravel, recent modest progress. Russia has linked START II implementation to the preservation of the ABM Treaty while the US has linked nuclear reductions to changes in the ABM treaty that would allow for a US missile defense system. US NMD efforts have prompted Russia to revise its nuclear doctrine to include the possibility of first nuclear use "if all other means of resolving a crisis situation have been exhausted or turn out to be ineffective." Russia has also indicated it would deploy more Topol-M missiles in order to overcome any US anti-missile system. All of which reinforces UN Secretary General Kofi Annan's warning, that deployment of even a modest NMD system "could well lead to a new arms race."

To date, the Clinton administration, the Pentagon, and Congress seem impervious to mounting criticism within and outside of the US. Furthermore, Washington seems willing to squander its best chance in over a decade to reduce the number of nuclear warheads by thousands for the costly, unworkable promise of a National Missile Defense system. As Stephen Schwartz of the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists points out, the US is willing to "forsake deep reductions in the Russian and American arsenals in favor of deploying a limited missile defense against a threat that doesn't yet exist."

With more than $70 billion spent since Reagan's 1983 push for a missile shield that would render nuclear weapons "impotent and obsolete" and an annual sticker price of $4 billion, NMD has yet to demonstrate any workable models. The interceptor and component tests have been plagued with everything from cost overruns to technical glitches and test rigging. And many experts agree that the tightly scripted tests are not representative of real world threats where countermeasures and decoys would accompany attacks by a rogue state.

The continued pursuit of NMD will have far-reaching consequences for the future of arms control and the eventual goal of nuclear abolition. It means a false sense of security for Americans and an increased threat of nuclear war for the world. National Missile Defense represents the weakest line of defense against nuclear missiles with the greatest costs, both monetarily and politically. In contrast, the Non-Proliferation Treaty and other cooperative initiatives such as the START process and the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty promise to reduce and eliminate the threat posed by nuclear weapons, thereby offering real security against the threat of nuclear war.

What to do now?

June is the month to make noise about Missile Defense. The month begins with Clinton's Moscow Summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin where they are expected to knock heads about changes to the ABM to allow for Missile Defense. The month ends with a key test of the NMD interceptor system slated for June 26th. Based on the outcome of this test Clinton is expected to make a decision on pursuing National Missile Defense sometime in the fall.

• Call, write, email, or fax President Clinton and tell him not to bargain away our best chance for nuclear disarmament for a harebrained "Son of Star Wars" scheme.
  Phone: 202/456-1414; Fax: 202/456-2461; <president@whitehouse.gov>
  The White House, 1600 Pennsylvania Ave., Washington DC 20500
• Contact your elected representatives and let them know that you oppose National Missile Defense, and you and a thousand of your closest friends view it as a threat to nuclear nonproliferation and disarmament. For a Congressional directory visit www.dnet.org
• Make disarmament an election issue. The mainstream candidates need to be reminded that seven out of ten Americans are for reductions in nuclear weapons arsenals. George W. Bush is for NMD and for withdrawing from the ABM if Russia fails to agree to treaty changes. While Gore rests on the laurels of 1980s nuclear arms control achievements, he bears some responsibility for our current sorry state of affairs. Send copies of your letters to the Nader Campaign while you're at it. 202/265-4000.
  

Pentagon Classifies a Letter Critical of Antimissile Plan

Dr. Theodore Postol, professor of science & national security studies at MIT, claims that there are serious scientific flaws in the Pentagon's proposed missile defense plan. Postol wrote a letter to the White House on May 11, with reports to support his technical claims. Dr. Postol contends that the goal of enabling the interceptors to distinguish incoming weapons from clouds of decoys is impossible to achieve, and that this was clearly demonstrated in a 1997 test.

The Pentagon has moved swiftly to have Dr. Postol's letter classified secret, in what the professor identifies as an ongoing effort to curb the debate on this $60 billion project.

(Excerpted from article by William Broad, New York Times 5/20/00)

For more information, contact Global Network Against Weapons & Nuclear Power in Space, POB 90083, Gainesville, FL 32607; 352/337-9274; www.globenet.free-online.co.uk