Pakistan and India have nuclear arsenals of at least 30 and 50 weapons respectively and neither are members of the NPT. With long simmering religious and ethnic tensions over the Kashmir region, this is an explosive situation to say the least. Unfortunately, U.S. policy has not helped to move these two nations toward disarmament and treaty membership. This is especially true in the case of India, where recent U.S. policy has actually increased the chances of further weapons proliferation. In 2008, the Bush administration signed the U.S. India Nuclear Agreement, a lucrative business deal for U.S. companies to supply India with nuclear technology and fuel for its civilian nuclear reactors. The problem? The deal does not have adequate safe guards to insure that the nuclear fuel supplied by the U.S. cannot be transferred to weapons production. The deal requires checks on some, but not all of India’s nuclear power plants- leaving room for potential transfer of the fuel to weapons production. One could argue that this amounts to a U.S. violation of the NPT. Instead of simply affirming the deal, the Obama administration should push for more comprehensive safeguards- such as systematic inspection of all nuclear power plants to which the fuel is sent. The Obama administration should also use their leverage through the deal to pressure India to join the NPT.

The Obama administration should pressure Israel and leading Arab states to take leadership for a nuclear weapons free zone in the Middle East. A Middle East nuclear weapons free zone would require that Israel first publicly acknowledge the existence of its estimated 200 weapon nuclear arsenal and join the NPT. The U.S. bankrolls Israel with billions in military aid annually and is also a major contributor to leading Arab states like Egypt. U.S. financial support provides a handful of carrots and sticks with which to pressure for a Middle East nuclear weapons free zone.

The NPT is an important cornerstone in achieving nuclear disarmament. Under Article VI, the NPT mandates:

Each of the Parties to the Treaty undertakes to pursue negotiations in good faith on effective measures relating to cessation of the nuclear arms race at an early date and to nuclear disarmament, and on a Treaty on general and complete disarmament under strict and effective international control.

However, the main problem with the NPT is that it does not set up a set time frame for disarmament. The NPT is already 40 years old. The fact is, “pursuing negotiations in good faith” has not gotten us far enough. The United States still has thousands of weapons, and 2500 on high alert.

Also, the NPT discourages membership by new nuclear weapons states like India and Pakistan with unfair double standards that favor old nuclear weapons states like the U.S. and Russia.

To achieve nuclear disarmament in our lifetime we need the NPT, but we also need a supplement to the NPT, The Nuclear Weapons Convention (NWC). The NWC prohibits the “development, testing, production, stockpiling, transfer, use and threat of use of nuclear weapons.” It also requires all states possessing nuclear weapons to disarm and destroy their nuclear weapons according to a series of phases over a set time frame of 15 years.

The NWC was introduced to the United Nations in 1997 by a number of civil society groups that included Lawyers Committee on Nuclear Policy, International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War, and Lawyers Alliance for World Security. The NWC was submitted to the UN General Assembly in 2007 by Costa Rica and Malaysia and passed the General Assembly with 127 countries voting “yes”, including China, India, Iran, and North Korea. The U.S., Russia, Israel and France voted “no”.

The best U.S. diplomatic finessing would be to support the Nuclear Weapons Convention with a resounding YES! U.S. leadership on the NWC as well as the NPT is just what the doctor ordered for our collective nuclear headache.
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