Ref5

180 Making the World Safer If one fear captures the attention of the world today, it is that a nuclear weapon might fall into the hands of an aggressive state or a terrorist group with an apocalyp- tic vision of the near future. Understandably, many leaders of states, IGOs, and NGOs have worked to constrain the spread of many types of weapons. This chapter begins with a brief history of arms limitations followed by chapter sections on the worthy objectives of arms limitations and the obstacles that stand in the way of these agreements. Nuclear, biological, chemical, missile, and conventional weapons regimes are then discussed. It can be remembered that a regime is the accu- mulated norms and rules that states converge around and usually obey for a given policy area. These norms and rules of treaties restrict or outlaw particular arms. An effort will be made to appraise the strength of the various regimes to restrain some weapons and eliminate others. The regimes aim at making a safer world and, if quar- rels turn to violent conflict, rule out some of the most heinous weapons ranging from dum-dum bullets to atom bombs. A Brief History of Arms Limitations It is safe to say that across history peoples have spent much more time and energy developing weapons than trying to get rid of them, but the effort to limit weapons is about as old as warfare itself (Wheeler 2002: 19–39). Dating as far back as 5000 years, various civilizations, including the Assyrian-Babylonian, Chinese, Egyptian, Indian, Muslim, and Persian, have all designed rules for war and sometimes for specific weapons. After the seventh century ce, it was mostly Europeans that shaped today’s norms and laws governing weapons, although it was a spotty record for centuries. A well- known example is the Second Lateran Council of 1139 ce that prohibited the use of the crossbow and the harquebus, a primitive firearm. Much later, in North America, American and British negotiators agreed to demilitarize the Great Lakes region under the 1817 Rush–Bagot Agreement, an understanding that would later follow the Canadian–US boundary line all the way to the Pacific Ocean. Another example is the 1869 St Petersburg Declaration, which renounced the use of explosive projectiles weighing less than 400 grams (14 ounces). Concern over war and weapons eventually came to be expressed through the rules of manuals or declarations that would foreshadow the modern weapons conventions of international law. Some of these include Swedish King Gustavus Adolphus’ 1621 Articles of Military Laws to be Observed in the Wars, the 1863 Francis Lieber Codes that covered rules of land warfare for the Union Army during the American civil war, the European 1874 International Declaration Concerning the Laws and Customs of War, and the 1880 Oxford Manual on the Laws and Customs of War on Land. Around the turn into the twentieth century, several important arms limitations agreements appeared. The 1899 Hague Conference, attended by 28 mostly European states, came up with a convention prohibiting explosives dropped from balloons, projectiles containing asphyxiating gases, and dum-dum bullets that expanded and fragmented when striking the human body. The 1907 Hague Conference, attended

Arms Limitations for a Less Violent World 181 by 44 states including more non-European states than at the 1899 conference, added the additional rules that sea mines must be anchored and become harmless if they break loose from their moorings. The 1913 Manual on the Laws of Naval Warfare required the same for torpedoes, that they become harmless if they missed their target. Other developments between the two world wars include the 1921–2 Washington Naval Conference, which, among other important decisions, established a ratio among the major naval powers as to how many battleships each could have. Then, the 1930 London Naval Conference set limits for Great Britain, the United States, and Japan on the number of cruisers, destroyers, and submarines that each might possess, with Japan only allowed two-thirds as many as the other two naval powers. In 1936, Japan abrogated its naval agreements and built up a powerful navy, possibly to prepare for a contest with the United States for control of the Pacific Ocean. Another important inter-World War agreement was the 1925 Geneva Protocol pro- hibiting the use of gas and germ weapons in wartime.1 The inter-war years would witness a contest between the competing strategies of disarmament and arms control on how to handle arms limitations. Disarmament calls for the complete or partial elimination of weapons while arms control, more modestly, refers to limitations or caps on the numbers of existing weapons. Disarmament gained a strong footing in the 1919 Covenant of the League of Nations and was reaffirmed in the UN Charter in 1945 (Claude, Jr 1971: 294–300). Disarmament had an idealist bent that reached its high-water mark at the League- sponsored 1932 World Disarmament Conference held in Geneva. The 1925 Geneva Protocol had called for a conference like this, which meant at least getting rid of offensive weapons enabling aggression. This ambitious conference floundered over the great power struggles that set the stage for the Second World War, including Germany’s departure from both the conference and the League. Realist Hans Morgenthau never held a sanguine view of disarmament’s prospects. He saw disarmament efforts as a story of many failures, with success realized only under extraordinary circumstances. Morgenthau has famously observed that, “Men do not fight because they have arms. They have arms because they deem it necessary to fight.” Morgenthau regarded the possession of arms as symptomatic of outstand- ing political issues that require settlement before disarmament can be addressed (1973: 394, 410, 416). By the early 1960s, security specialists, much to the chagrin of disarmament advocates, began to speak of arms control as a more practical strategy than idealistic disarmament (Larsen 2002: 3). For much of the Cold War, the strained Soviet–US relationship would permit only arms control to limit weapons. The issue that overshadowed all others was what to do about the nuclear arms race. The United States, as the first state to possess the atomic bomb, made some efforts to put the nuclear genie back into the bottle. President Harry Truman’s admin- istration offered to the world the 1946 Baruch Plan, named after diplomat Bernard Baruch. Under this plan, the United States would destroy its nuclear weapons and place all nuclear knowledge under the control of an IGO empowered to restrict nuclear energy to peaceful uses. Joseph Stalin’s Soviet Union rejected the plan out- right, claiming that the United States could secretively store away a few atomic bombs.

182 Making the World Safer and would probably do so (Waller 2002: 102). Then in 1953, President Dwight Eisenhower proposed the Atoms for Peace program in a speech before the UN General Assembly. He offered to deflect nuclear energy from further weapons development and to focus on nuclear plants for generating electricity (Davis 1998: 137). Unfortunately, by this time, the proliferation of nuclear weapons was underway. Joining the United States in possession of nuclear bombs were the Soviet Union (1949), the United Kingdom (1952), France (1960), China (1964), Israel (probably 1968), India (1974), and Pakistan (1989). The latter two weaponized their nuclear devices in 1998. South Africa developed atomic weapons in 1979, but voluntarily relinquished them in 1991. North Korea may have had an atomic bomb since 1994, but is not believed to have exploded a bomb until 2006 in a possible underground test. Until fairly recently, Iraq and Libya had nuclear weapons programs. Iraq’s program ended as an outcome of the 1990–1 Persian Gulf War, and Libya, long under international pressure for its international pressure for its WMDs and state-sponsored terrorism, gave up its ambitions for atomic weapons in 2003. Iran may currently seek an atomic bomb, but the Iranian government has steadfastly claimed its nuclear develop- ments were for peaceful purposes only (Spector 2002: 119–41). It is no wonder that in the early 1960s, President John Kennedy, among other observers, had a profound fear that nuclear proliferation was unstoppable (Kile 2003: 577–609, esp. 609). The Soviet Union and the United States developed nuclear arsenals that made other nuclear powers look puny. The United States, with its long-range bombers and missiles, held a strategic edge over the Soviet Union until the 1970s, when both sides found themselves caught in an arrangement of mutually assured destruction (MAD). If one side attacked, the other would have enough nuclear might left over to retaliate, leaving both sides destroyed in a nuclear holocaust. So great were the number of missiles and warheads on both sides that some scientists hypothesized that an all- out nuclear war would cause a nuclear winter. According to this hypothesis, a full nuclear exchange would envelop the Earth with enough dust to block out the sun for months, finally killing off all life (e.g. Hewell 1984). Unlike many who viewed the nuclear balance of power, or balance of terror as Winston Churchill once called it, with dread, realist Kenneth Waltz embraced the bi-polar world structure favorably. He thought it provided a high degree of international management and stability as it allowed for a long, if cold, peace during the last half of the twentieth century (1979). For several decades, any stability achieved during the Cold War was underpinned, in large part, through arms control agreements. The 1962 Cuban missile crisis, that brought the Soviet Union and the United States to the brink of nuclear war, set these agreements in motion. Soon after this crisis the 1963 hotline agreement allowing rapid, direct communication between Moscow and Washington, the 1963 Limited Test Ban Treaty that would restrict American, British, and Soviet nuclear testing to underground sites, the 1971 Seabed Treaty prohibiting the launching of nuclear weapons from the ocean floor, and the 1974 Threshold Nuclear Test Ban Treaty reducing the size of nuclear underground explosions to 150 kilotons (1 kiloton explosive equals a 1,000 tons of TNT). Years later, a complete nuclear test ban treaty would receive widespread support, but this 1996 agreement has not yet gone into force.

Arms Limitations for a Less Violent World 183 The centerpiece of nuclear arms control is the 1968 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, which aims to include all states. The original five nuclear powers (China, France, the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom, and the United States), known as the “Nuclear Club,” were allowed to keep their nuclear weapons for an unspecified time but were barred from sharing nuclear weapons with other states. All non-Nuclear Club states would refrain from using nuclear materials and technology except for producing energy. In the early 1970s, during a period of détente of relaxed relations, the two super- powers moved toward arms control agreements that would place ceilings on the number of their most valued weapons, intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) armed with multiple nuclear warheads. These were known as the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks (SALT) agreements of 1972 and 1977. SALT I placed a cap on ICBMs, and SALT II was intended to limit multiple independently targeted re-entry vehicles (MIRVs) that could involve as many as ten warheads per missile. Unfortunately, the US Senate delayed on the ratification of SALT II and, when the Soviets invaded Afghanistan, President Jimmy Carter withdrew SALT II from fur- ther consideration by the Senate. In 1972, the superpowers wanted to further stabilize their relationship and head off a costly arms race in the area of defensive missiles. Negotiated at the time of SALT I, the Agreement on Anti-Ballistic Missiles (ABMs), designed to shoot down incoming ICBMs, would allow the two Cold War antagonists two fields of defensive missiles each but changed this to one each. This agreement saved both sides a vast investment in defensive missiles for numerous cities and military installations. This type of missile was ineffective then and still does not operate reliably today. There were other important arms control agreements known as Confidence Building Measures that applied to states in the respective alliance systems of the Soviet Union and the United States. The 1975 Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe called for Warsaw Pact and NATO states to give warning before practicing maneuvers, and the 1986 Stockholm Agreement allowed observers from each alliance to watch the other’s maneuvers. Later, negotiations for the Open Skies Agreement began in 1990 and formally entered into force in 2002, when the agreement received a sufficient number of ratifications. This accord permitted countries in both alli- ances to fly over each other’s territory with aircraft equipped with several kinds of sensing devices. The idea for the Open Skies Agreement originated from a proposal made by President Dwight Eisenhower to Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev at the 1955 Geneva Summit, but, because of historical Russian paranoia about inspections from outsiders, the plan was rejected at that time. These flights are routine today. Important conventional weapons agreements were made as well. A 1980 conven- tion focused on several kinds of inhumane weapons such as blinding laser weapons and incendiary devices. In 1990, the Soviet Union and the United States managed a drawdown of their tanks, artillery, and combat aircraft. Then in 1996, a worldwide organization of NGOs produced the Ottawa Convention calling for a complete ban on anti-personnel landmines. Although receiving much less dramatic attention than nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons, conventional weapons, in practice, have killed far more people than the three most dreaded weapons combined.

184 Making the World Safer As if to prove that disarmament as a strategy was not completely lost from the lexicon of arms limitations, a complete prohibition of biological weapons was accepted in a 1972 convention ratified by many states. This convention was the first to ban an entire category of weapons. Also widely accepted by numerous states, a 1993 convention eliminated chemical weapons and went even further than the bio- logical convention by providing for an IGO that would exercise inspection and veri- fication duties. Then, as if to amaze the world, the Soviet Union and the United States agreed in 1987 to destroy a class of intermediate-range missiles with nuclear warheads that were positioned on both sides of the Iron Curtain in Europe. Nuclear disarmament had been regarded as next to impossible. Between 1989 and 1991, the Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact collapsed raising hopes for a more general nuclear disarmament breakthrough. In the midst of this huge change, a series of Strategic Arms Reduction Talks (START) got underway. These three agreements called, not for ceiling levels, but actual reductions in missiles and warheads. While the first two were ratified, the START process began to unravel by 2002 (Roberts 2002: 181; Wittner 2003: 447–8; Levi & O’Hanlon 2005: x–xi). Objectives of Arms Limitations States want arms for a variety of reasons, ranging from prestige to security, but they also have strong motives for pursuing arms limitations. Basically, the objectives of arms limitation agreements are to save blood and treasure. Most states and their peoples want peace, and their governments often use arms treaties as one means to bolster peaceful relations. Arms limitations between adversaries can tacitly signal desires for reduced tensions and a relationship that stops short of violent conflict. Even if fighting does break out, weapons restrictions, such as the outlawry of lethal gas, will reduce the suffering in war. The massive amount of destruction wrought by two world wars, followed by dec- ades of living under the shadow of nuclear war, have sensitized those living in the early twenty-first century to put peace at a premium. Over 20 million died in the First World War and more than 50 million lost their lives in the Second World War. The First World War killed more people than all the nineteenth century wars put together, and the Second World War accounted for deaths amounting to more than half the war deaths over the past two millennia (Russell 2001: 10). After these world wars, the further loss of more than 40 million lives through 250 wars and conflicts in the Third World has also been sobering (Ball 1994: 216). The enormity of human costs in war is difficult to fathom, but certainly the “butcher’s bill of combat” is always a high price to pay. Another kind of cost is in economic wealth. Arms limitations can save billions of dollars, leaving monies available for homes, schools, hospitals, and medicines which all humankind requires. The Cold War’s decline provided some relief. Between 1987 and 1997, Warsaw Pact expenditures fell by one-third, mostly affect- ing the Soviet Union/Russian budget, while the NATO states’ costs dropped by one-fourth (Burroughs 2002: 11). Unfortunately, the war on terrorism has caused

Arms Limitations for a Less Violent World 185 costs to rise once again, especially for the United States, which alone accounts for nearly half of the world’ military expenditures. Under President George W. Bush, annual military budgets have risen sharply to cover wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. In 2009, the war is winding down in Iraq, but President Barack Obama has raised the US military commitment in Afghanistan. For the entire world, military expen- ditures for the entire world are close to $1 trillion per year.2 Moreover, numerous internal conflicts, ranging from 20 to 40 each year in as many as several dozen Third World countries, has made for a lively global arms bazaar. The much bally- hooed peace dividend talked about at the end of the Cold War, allowing old mili- tary money to become new benefits for human needs, has not been fully realized (Renner 1994). Obstacles to Arms Limitations The appealing goals of saving lives and money encourage arms limitations, but seri- ous obstacles also stand in the way of their success. Obstacles are at least two-fold. The main obstacle is the mutually felt fear states have of one another’s intentions in an anarchic world. True, the budding international society does share international law and much of the same global agenda, ranging from airport security to a more prosperous world economy; nonetheless, dangerous actors such as weapons-hungry states and terrorists still inhabit the world and threaten its order. A second and lesser obstacle, but one that sometimes hobbles potential arms treaties, involves the tech- nical problems that arise during arms negotiations. In compliance with the UN Charter that eliminates the offensive option as nor- mal state policy, many states today are committed to a defensive stance, but they can still be caught up in a vexing security dilemma. Efforts by one state to enhance its security for defensive reasons can easily cause fear and uncertainty on the part of other states. One state’s security is another state’s insecurity. States so entwined may be drawn into an arms race. Leaders may try to match or surpass the armaments of a potential adversary, and then the adversary responds in similar fashion, forcing arms acquisition into an upward spiral. The tensions endemic to an arms race might well contribute to the outbreak of war. It is equally true that weapons agreements can check arms races and help avert war (Wesson 1990: 63; O’Connell 1989: 301). Today, the political and security environment for many states has improved substantially. The Western European states, after suffering the devastation of two World Wars, have for decades had an informal understanding that it is inconceivable that one state would attack another. Gradually most of the Eastern European states are being drawn into this community as is evidenced by their inclusion in NATO, the Council of Europe with its human rights program, and the EU with its economic criteria for membership. As for Russia, it is a member only of the Council of Europe. This new environment is promising but not completely assured. Russia’s resentment of the eastward expansion of NATO and its questionable commitment to democracy are particularly troublesome.

186 Making the World Safer Many other states around the world have minimal military forces and do not seem to be lured toward expensive weapons programs, despite the realists’ past asser- tion that states are caught up in a lust for power (Morgenthau 1973: 29–41). For instance, Costa Rica got rid of its army in 1954, and Iceland manages with a small coast guard. New Zealand gives as much priority to its Disarmament Agency as it does defense arrangements (Renner 1994: 59, fn. 13). Yet, there are some states, the rogues as they are called by some leaders in the West, which seem unwilling to fit into the international order of peace and economic prosperity pursued by the majority of states. States like Iran and North Korea seem intent on nuclear weapons programs with their ultimate purposes for nuclear weap- ons unclear. Before President George W. Bush sent American military forces into Iraq in 2003, he referred to Iran, Iraq, and North Korea as the “axis of evil” because of their presumed dangerous ambitions for weapons with catastrophic conse- quences. Whether a state deserves rogue status is ultimately a matter of perspective. Should the United States be put in this category of dangerous states, instead of being regarded as a benevolent hegemon? In the opinion of some, the willingness of the United States to use “shock and awe” pre-emptive military strikes, the ongoing upgrade of its nuclear program, and the US determination to maintain unchallenge- able military supremacy qualify the United States as the “rogue superpower” (MccGwire 2005: 115–40). These Bush policies might still prove to be an aberration to the US historical record of emphasizing disarmament, peace, diplomacy, and international law. In 2009, President Obama faces a challenging domestic agenda that may force the United States to downsize militarily. Even if states can move past their fears and political ambitions to negotiate arms limitations, they still face several technical problems that can disrupt arms treaties. Power ratios require measuring the military power of one country against another. Specifically, this measure can mean deciding how many of a particular weapon each country will be allotted. Since states have military forces and weapons configured in different ways, calculating ratios among their weapons can be taxing. Perhaps the best known treaty using a ratio arrangement was the 1922 Washington Naval Treaty. This treaty dealt with the battleships of five countries that promised to arrive at the following ratio over a 20-year period: Great Britain (5), the United States (5), Japan (3), France (1.67), and Italy (1.67). In weapons negotiations, states also disagree about the orientation of weapons, basi- cally whether they are offensive or defensive weapons. Usually, military forces use offen- sive weapons when on the attack and defensive weapons to repel an attack. In practice, a theoretically clear distinction can blur. In ancient Greece, Sparta objected to the Athenians building a wall around their city, which to the Athenians seemed purely defensive. The Spartans worried that Athens, as a naval power, could attack Sparta with near impunity since the Athenian wall would blunt the effectiveness of Sparta’s famed infantry. The defensive wall allowed Athens to go on the offensive elsewhere. Arguments can also arise over a strategic weapon as distinguished from a theater weapon. Long-range bombers and ICBMs that can strike from one point to the other side of the world are strategic while a theater weapon operates within a geographical region such as North America or East Asia. The United States insisted that the Soviet

Arms Limitations for a Less Violent World 187 “backfire” bomber, which could be refueled in mid-air and reach the United States, had to be counted as a strategic weapon. The Soviets then countered that cruise missiles, attached to the wings of a B-52 long-range bomber, were also strategic weapons. Verification refers to the inspection of weapons systems, or of sites to guarantee that agreements about weapons are indeed being kept. The inspectors can be from an adversary state or an IGO. Security rests not only with a country’s armaments but on the sure knowledge that an opponent is not cheating on an arms agreement. The maximum achievements countries might hope to accomplish through arms nego- tiations rest largely on verification possibilities. Verification can include aerial sur- veillance, spy satellites, on-site inspections by arms experts, and monitoring devices such as cameras placed in sealed lock-boxes at nuclear facilities. Russia, since at least the time of Peter the Great, has been highly suspicious of outsiders so verification arrangements were slow to develop in the Soviet-American relationship. The Soviets turned down Truman’s Baruch Plan and Eisenhower’s Open Skies proposal. Spy satellites did offer some inspection opportunities by both sides and helped SALT I become a reality. The first true inspections on the territories of the two superpowers came about through the 1987 INF treaty, with American and Russian observers watching the other side destroy the rockets for medium-range missiles. Today, inspections are considered to have paramount importance for the success of weapons treaties but, unfortunately, some treaties fail to include such safeguards. Traditionally, countries have jealously guarded their sovereignty and are inclined to see inspections as unwanted intrusions. The Nuclear Regime The next several sections focus on the norms and rules that states agree to as they develop a regime for a particular weapons category and the effectiveness of that regime. The weapons’ profiles of selected states appear in Table 7.1. Nuclear weapons, along with biological and chemical weapons, are together known as Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMDs), although there is no customary or treaty law that authorita- tively defines this set of weapons.3 The WMD concept is widely understood, however, and is used by military experts, journalists, and scholars. For instance, the UN Security Council in 2004, acting under its enforcement powers, required that all states take measures to prevent the proliferation of WMDs and their means of delivery. The first atomic bombs, including those used at Hiroshima and Nagasaki, were fis- sion bombs, meaning they release an enormous explosive energy when a chain reac- tion of enriched uranium or plutonium atoms is set off in all directions. By the early 1950s, the American and Soviet bomb-makers turned to hydrogen bombs, sometimes called thermonuclear weapons because these weapons need a high degree of heat and pressure to trigger the explosive energy in a fusion process. Hydrogen bombs draw atoms together instead of driving them apart in a chain reaction. These bombs are many times more powerful than the atomic bombs dropped on Japan in 1945. Radioactive, or “dirty bombs,” can also be placed in the nuclear category. A dirty bomb is nothing more than radioactive materials, perhaps gathered from a nuclear

Arms Limitations for a Less Violent World 189 energy reactor, and attached to a conventional explosion such as dynamite or C-4 plastic. A radioactive bomb of this type is the one most accessible by terrorists to use in crowded cities for making thousands of people sick with radiation effects. Chechen rebels placed a container of cesium 137 in a Moscow park in 1996, but did not set it off. Perhaps they just wanted to show Russian authorities they could carry out such a deed. US authorities arrested Jose Padilla in 2002 and held him in detention for over three years as an “illegal non-combatant” for plotting to bring a dirty bomb into the United States. He was never convicted on this charge. A former street-gang member from Chicago who had converted to the Muslim faith, Padilla eventually had federal charges filed against him and, in early 2008, he was sentenced to 17 years for criminal conspiracy concerning overseas terrorism. Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) Since entering into force in 1970, the 1968 NPT has anchored a fairly strong and successful regime for stopping the spread of nuclear weapons. Despite dire predic- tions in the 1960s that dozens of countries might have atomic weapons in a few decades, the number of nuclear weapons states has remained relatively stable. Currently no more than 10 states have nuclear weapons or programs dedicated to building an atomic bomb in contrast to 16 in the 1980s and 21 in the 1960s.4 At the end of the Cold War, Belarus, Kazakhstan, and the Ukraine, former Soviet republics, turned over their nuclear warheads and missiles to Russia for disposal, and South Africa voluntarily destroyed its atomic bombs in 1991 and joined the NPT. Argentina, Brazil, Libya, Sweden, Taiwan, and South Korea are among the states that suspended their nuclear weapons programs altogether before making an actual bomb. Without a doubt, the NPT has helped contain runaway proliferation. Its consider- able success has not only come about through the legal mechanism of a treaty bind- ing about 190 states, but also by promoting a strong global norm, a taboo against nuclear weapons of all kinds. All the news is not good, however. India and Pakistan have never joined the NPT and now have atomic weapons. Israel probably acquired its first atomic bomb in the late 1960s, and their arsenal today could contain as many as 200 atomic bombs, although the Israeli government will not confirm or deny possession of such weap- ons. North Korea withdrew from the NPT in 2003 and claims to have had an atomic bomb since 1994, which it probably tested in 2006. President George W. Bush took North Korea off its state-terrorist list in 2008 as it dismantled its nuclear weapons facilities, but North Korea has long waged off-and-on-again weapons programs. Iran has resisted the monitoring efforts of the UN’s International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and has been reported by the IAEA to the UN Security Council. As for Iraq, its WMD program ended with the Persian Gulf War of 1990–1 and the subsequent UN arms inspections. Not only does the NPT curtail the expansion of nuclear weapons, but it points the way one day toward a world free of nuclear weapons. The original five nuclear pow- ers, or the “Nuclear Club,” were acknowledged by the treaty as legitimate possessors

Arms Limitations for a Less Violent World 191 in the 1963 Partial Test Ban Treaty and was restated as a goal in the preamble of the 1968 NPT. The UN Conference on Disarmament in Geneva produced the 1996 CTBT, after working on the project for over two years. It was hoped the CTBT would slow down nuclear arms competition and block further nuclear weapons prolifera- tion. When the CTBT enters into force, it will have a verification feature, a Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty Organization that will monitor treaty parties’ com- pliance (Cirincione 2002: 142–3). The CTBT faces a high hurdle before it can be implemented, however. All 44 states in possession of nuclear reactors, whether for weapons or energy, must ratify the treaty before it goes into force. A total of 148 countries have ratified but not all those states with nuclear reactors have made this commitment.5 Of the Nuclear Club, France, Russia, and the United Kingdom have ratified the CTBT but not China and the United States. President Bill Clinton signed the CTBT in 1996 but the US Senate has not com- pleted ratification process. The United States has so far respected the moratorium against testing nuclear weapons, nonetheless. India, North Korea, and Pakistan have not even signed the CTBT, and India and Pakistan, so far, are the only states breaking the test-ban taboo by exploding nuclear weapons underground in 1998. Despite these exceptions, a strong international norm against testing is firmly in place. The Intermediate Nuclear Force Treaty (INF) In 1987, the INF required the destruction of a class of intermediate-range missiles in Europe and their warheads shelved in an arsenal. Not only did the INF involve par- tial disarmament, this treaty also created the first major inspection and verification arrangement on weapons between the Soviet Union and the United States. The INF was very likely made possible because the Soviet leader and reformer, Mikhail Gorbachev, needed relief from weapons competition with the United States to con- centrate on his pressing economic problems at home.6 The Strategic Arms Reduction (Talks) Treaties (START) The START process built on the SALT process of the 1970s. An era of improving relations at the Cold War’s twilight led to START I, signed in 1991 and entered into force in 1993. This treaty called for a limit of 1,600 delivery vehicles (missiles and bombers) and 6,000 warheads and bombs apiece, down from over 10,000 possessed by each side. Taking 9 years to negotiate, this treaty offered multiple types of inspec- tion in its 400 pages, making it the longest and most complex of arms treaties. Continuing this favorable momentum, START II was signed in 1993 with the United States ratifying in 1996 and Russia in 2000. This agreement would take the old adversaries through two phases of nuclear downsizing before finally reaching a limit of 3,000 to 3,500 nuclear weapons on all delivery systems by 2007. START II would also prohibit MIRVED systems, or ICBMs equipped with multiple warheads. Unfortunately for this treaty, when President George W. Bush announced the US

192 Making the World Safer withdrawal from the ABM treaty in late 2001, President Vladimir Putin of Russia refused to implement START II. Another unavoidable consequence was that plans for a START III had to be scrapped. This agreement would have cut nuclear weapons to a range of 1,500 to 2,000 for each side.7 As a fallback agreement, and mostly to please President Putin, President Bush agreed to meet in Moscow and sign the 2002 Strategic Offensive Reduction Treaty (SORT), a treaty that entered into force the next year. President Bush made it clear, however, that he wanted no further nuclear weapons agreements.8 Better known as the Moscow Treaty, SORT requires a reduction in strategic nuclear weapons to range of 1,700 to 2,200 deployed weapons by December 31, 2012, when the agreement can be renewed or allowed to expire. What the Moscow treaty does not do is eliminate MIRV systems, tactical warheads, and the large stock of thousands of warheads that can be kept in storage. In April 2009, President Barack Obama and Russian President Dmitri Medvedev met in person for the first time and announced a desire to return to the START process. Nuclear Weapons Free Zones (NWFZs) The treaties discussed so far try to limit or discard nuclear weapons that already exist. A very different approach to proliferation is the NWFZs. A NWFZ is a specific region where the states of that region, say Africa or Latin America, agree that they will not acquire, make, test, or deploy nuclear weapons in any form. Article Seven of the NPT provides for these zones, which complement and reinforce the NPT by adding one more way to check nuclear proliferation. Essentially NWFZs are preclu- sion arrangements. Countries can much more easily agree to preclude nuclear weap- ons than get rid of them once they count on these weapons for their national security. Other regions wish to avoid the South Asian experience in which India developed a nuclear weapon partly because China, next door, had one, and then Pakistan fol- lowed suit because India, their adversary in three wars, had built one. Preclusion arrangements throttle an arms race before it can get underway. NWFZs have helped keep the entire southern hemisphere of the planet free of nuclear weapons. These zones include Latin America under the 1967 Treaty of Tlatelolco, the South Pacific guided by the 1985 Treaty of Rarotonga, Southeast Asia with the 1995 Treaty of Bangkok, and Africa will be governed by the 1996 Treaty of Pelindaba when it goes into force. Similarly, the 1959 Antarctica Treaty, the 1967 Outer Space Treaty, the 1971 Seabed Treaty, and the 1979 Moon Treaty ban nuclear weapons and WMDs in general. Other proposed NWFZs include the Korean peninsula, Central Asia based on five former Soviet Republics in that area, and the Baltic Sea region.9 The legality of nuclear weapons If major regions have turned their backs on nuclear weapons, why not rid the entire world of these weapons, perhaps by means of international law? The obvious answer isa political – military one: nuclear armed states view their security and status as depend- ent on these weapons and take a stern view of their sovereign right to possess them. Nevertheless, an effort to have these weapons declared illegal has, in fact, taken place. As early as 1961, the UN General Assembly passed a resolution stating that any state using nuclear weapons would be violating the UN Charter and humanitarian law.10 In 1993, the World Health Organization (WHO) asked for an advisory opinion from the ICJ about the legality of nuclear weapons but was denied standing before the court in a 11–3 ruling. The ICJ said WHO could only bring questions about health effects once a nuclear weapon has been detonated.11 The issue was more seriously engaged in 1994 when the UN General Assembly sought an advisory opinion on the question, “Is the threat or use of nuclear weapons in any circumstance permitted under international law?” In 1996, the ICJ ruled unanimously that neither customary nor treaty law specifically authorizes the threat or use of nuclear weapons, but in an 11–3 vote it also said no law prohibits these weapons either. In the narrowest vote possible, a tie-vote of seven to seven broken by the President of the court, the ICJ concluded that the threat or use of nuclear weap- ons would be contrary to the rules of international law, with the possible exception of a state facing a desperate need for self-defense. The chief concern of the court was that any use of nuclear weapons would obliter- ate the distinction between non-combatants and combatants. This distinction is one of the oldest principles behind the laws of war. Yet, the “block-buster” and napalm bombs of the Second World War had already erased the line between civilian and military persons before the two atomic bombs were dropped on Japanese cities in 1945. Fortunately, the Second World War practice of bombing cities into rubble did not establish customary law allowing such acts. Finally, the ICJ issued a unanimous opinion reconfirming the obligation under Article Six of the NPT that nuclear pow- ers must disarm these weapons. This case was reported in several hundred pages and includes numerous declarations and separate assenting and dissenting opinions by the 15 judges of the ICJ. Perhaps the safest conclusion is that this 1996 advisory deci- sion by the ICJ falls short of an unequivocal outlawry of nuclear weapons but, even so, the thrust of the decision is toward the general illegality of nuclear weapons and supports the growing taboo of international society against nuclear armaments.12 Export-control groups Not all support for an arms limitation regime operates through treaties or norms generated by international society. There are several groups of states within interna- tional society that have set up voluntary export controls to reinforce treaty prohibi- tions. These export-control states are usually called suppliers groups, and they reinforce nuclear, biological, chemical, missile, and conventional weapons regimes. In the case of the nuclear regime, two suppliers groups are at work (Gualtieri 2000: 467–86). The Zangger Committee, named after the first chairman, Dr. Claude Zangger of Switzerland, is formerly known as the NPT Exporters Committee and began meeting with ten states in 1971 and now has grown to 35. This suppliers group meets in Vienna twice a year, the host city of IAEA. The Zangger Committee restricts exports of materials and technology that would violate the Safeguards Program of the IAEA and might eventually contribute to the development of a nuclear weapon.13 The Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) began meeting in 1975 and its 39 members overlap with the membership of the Zangger Committee and largely duplicates its function. The two groups took steps to harmonize their export-control list in 1992, but with the NSG using somewhat tougher standards on the production and use of fissile materials, namely, enriched uranium and plutonium.14 Despite some duplication, operating with both groups means more states are brought on board to help. The business-oriented Bush administration apparently flouted a bedrock princi- ple of export controls by selling nuclear technology and fissile material to India, a state that is not a member of the NPT and whose nuclear reactors were not inspected by the IAEA. In the 2005 Indo-US Nuclear Agreement, many of India’s nuclear reac- tors were designated civilian in purpose, and the others military, with IAEA’s inspec- tors allowed to visit the civilian reactors. The IAEA gave its approval for the agreement, probably hoping India can be gradually drawn into the nuclear non- proliferation regime. An old idea that would assist the supplier groups and the nuclear regime in gen- eral is the proposed Fissile Materials Cut-off Treaty (FMCT) to ban fissile materials for making nuclear weapons. The UN General Assembly called for such a treaty in 1993, and UN Conference on Disarmament considered the FMCT for over a decade. President Bill Clinton offered his support in 1996, but President George W. Bush objected on the grounds that the FMCT would not be verifiable.15 This treaty has not come to fruition. Since the major nuclear powers have stopped producing fissile materials, this treaty would mainly affect new nuclear weapons states such as India, North Korea, and Pakistan and possibly Iran, assuming it wants weapons-grade fis- sile materials. Also, other policies are designed to prevent fissile materials or technology from reaching the wrong hands. In 2003, the United States began an innovative policy that has received support from an increasing list of states, accumulating to as many as 60 cooperating at various levels. Known as the Proliferation Security Initiative (PSI), the United States and cooperating states have begun interdicting suspicious cargoes by land, sea, and air that might involve the proliferation of WMDs. The first line of defense calls for states to monitor carefully their ports and customs facilities. Many states are also willing to search ships within their territorial waters regarding suspi- cious cargoes. The boldest part of PSI is the bilateral arrangements that allow par- ticipating states to board the ships of other states on the high seas. The United States has boarding agreements with Liberia and Panama, among other states, which are notorious for “selling” flags of convenience and whose ships carry a large portion of the world’s cargo (Squassoni 2005: 1–6; Levi & O’Hanlon 2005: 70–1). Another US policy has eliminated fissile material from the territory of the old Soviet Union. The 1991 Soviet Nuclear Threat Reduction Act, better known as the Nunn – Lugar Act, provided for the Cooperative Threat Reduction Program which got underway in 1993. This program has disposed of thousands of nuclear weapons, aving the ex-Soviet states of Kazakhstan nuclear free in 1995 and Belarus and the Ukraine in 1996. A danger existed that fissile materials, and even completed nuclear weapons, could reach rogue states and terrorists. In 2002, the G-8 (the leading industrial democra- cies of Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom, and the United States plus Russia) began helping with the costs in a program known as the Global Partnership against the Spread of Weapons and Materials of Mass Destruction (Campbell & Einhorn 2004: 340–1; Roberts 2002: 183ff.). The utility of nuclear weapons Perhaps the ultimate danger threatening the nuclear regime is that some states may actually believe nuclear weapons have utility. Not everyone left the Cold War behind convinced that using nuclear weapons would be an irrational act, which assumes that no goal is worthy of employing nuclear weapons. Each member of the Nuclear Club has commented on the circumstances that might justify the use of these weapons. The United States, for instance, has the largest and most sophisticated arsenal of these weapons and has considered some nuclear options. President George W. Bush’s Nuclear Policy Review of 2002 strongly suggested that his administration thought about practical applications of nuclear weapons in today’s world. Under President Bush, the United States upgraded its nuclear arsenal, at least qualitatively, while opposing the proliferation of these weapons elsewhere (Deller, Makhijani, & Burroughs 2003: 139–40; Campbell & Einhorn 2004: 322–3; Lieber & Press 2006: 42–54). In particular, the Bush administration wanted a “Robust Nuclear Earth Penetrator,” a bunker-buster that could be used to knock out underground WMD facilities in rogue states through pre-emptive strikes. This administration also desired a weapon about half the size of the Hiroshima bomb so it would be more “usable” to retaliate against biological or chemical attacks. As long as nuclear weapons states find these useful, some non-nuclear states will attempt to follow their example

The Biological Weapons Regime Biological weapons are based on living organisms, mostly bacteria and viruses. Anthrax has been used as a bacterial weapon while smallpox could be used as a viral weapon, and then there are toxins such as ricin. The dangers of rogue states or ter- rorists using these agents are very real. In 1984, a religious cult, Bhagwen Shree Rajneesh, made 750 people in the state of Oregon ill with the bacteria salmonella, but fortunately without any deaths occurring. Shortly after the 9/11 terrorist attack in 2001, an unknown party sent letters contaminated with anthrax to members of the US Congress and members of the media, killing 5 and making 18 other people ill. This anthrax incident caused widespread panic and billions of dollars in security and de-contamination costs (Cirincione 2002: 11). In early 2004, ricin was found in US Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist’s office, but no one was harmed. The biological weapons regime began with a treaty that covered both gas and germ warfare, as these categories of weapons have been called in the past. The 1925 Protocol for the Prohibition of the Use in War of Asphyxiating, Poisonous, or Other Gases, and of Bacteriological Methods (Geneva Protocol) entered into force in 1928 and today has over 130 ratifications.16 This protocol does not prohibit stockpiles of these weapons but only their use in wartime. The victors of the First World War, having witnessed thousands die or become injured by mustard and chlorine gas, wanted to be sure these heinous weapons would never be used again, and outlawed germ warfare for good measure. This treaty was mostly honored in the Second World War, although Japan is known to have set up a germ warfare facility in northern China and may have killed thousands of Chinese with this weapon. Many years would pass before another important development in the biological regime would occur. The 1972 Convention on the Prohibition of the Development, Production, and Stockpiling of Bacteriological (Biological) and Toxin Weapons and on Their Destruction is usually cited as the Biological Weapons Convention (BWC).

This convention entered into force in 1975 and has more than 160 ratifications.17 It imposes a complete ban on possession and use of biological weapons and is the first treaty to call for the elimination of an entire category of weapons. As in the case of nuclear weapons, the biological regime has an export-control suppliers group for screening all exports, including dual-use materials and technol- ogy. Something that might start out for normal civilian use could be diverted to a weapons program. Assuming this important responsibility is the Australia Group, which formed in 1985 and today has 39 members.18 It monitors chemical exports as well. Members are required to have ratified both the 1972 BWC and the chemical weapons convention that appeared later in 1992. Because of so many dual-use prob- lems, the Australia Group has a complex and difficult job, but one made somewhat easier by being able to focus on a dozen or so roguish states that are thought to have or are pursuing biological and chemical weapons programs. Sometimes these states are referred to as the “dirty dozen.” Although the BWC and the Australia Group are in place, the world is not com- pletely free of biological weapons. Usually placed on the list of suspect states for possessing these weapons are China, India, Iran, Libya, North Korea, Pakistan, Russia, Sudan, and Syria.19 Iraq supposedly has none since at least the time of the US intervention in 2003 and probably disposed of its biological weapons even earlier. For Third World states the temptation for cheap easy-to-make biological and chem- ical weapons is understandable since the technology behind atomic weapons is out of the reach of most. The Soviet Union in the 1970s and 1980s maintained a huge biological weapons program and, thus, violated the BWC on a massive scale. After the Cold War ended, Russia continued a clandestine biological weapons program into the early 1990s. Russia had 60,000 employees working in 18 facilities set up to look like pharmaceu- tical companies (Wright 2002: 13; Ainscough 2004: 166). If states keep biological weapons, especially if they are unstable and under poor security, the additional dan- ger exists that these nefarious weapons will fall into the hands of bio-terrorists. The program for dismantling nuclear weapons is also supposed to help Russia dispose of biological and chemical weapons. The US record on biological weapons is mostly a good one but does not go as far as arms limitations advocates would like to see. In 1943 during the Second World War, President Franklin D. Roosevelt said the United States would not be the first to use biological and chemical weapons and would abide by the 1925 Geneva Protocol. The United States, however, did not ratify the Geneva Protocol until 1975 (Graham, Jr 2002: 22). The United States had stockpiled biological weapons from 1942 to 1969, permissible under the Geneva Protocol, when President Richard Nixon announced the United States would destroy these stockpiles. President Nixon’s announcement helped set the stage for the United States’s 1975 ratification of the 1972 BWC, which called for exactly this act of destruction. While the BWC was the first post-Second World War weapons agreement to call for the elimination of an entire class of weapons, it has no verification and compli- ance mechanism (Guthrie, Hart, & Kuhlau 2005: 603–28, esp. 604). Often the ratify- ing states do not even turn in their voluntary reports. A protocol calling for on-site

inspections has been proposed for the BWC for some time. While President Bill Clinton said he was for it, President George W. Bush, in 2001, opposed an inspec- tions capability citing as his reasons that such inspections would threaten US bio- defense plans and US proprietary interests (Chevrier 2002: 153). As a consequence, global inspections for biological weapons are not in place. At least Russia, the United Kingdom, and the United States set-up a trilateral inspections arrangement after the bio-weapons program of Russia was discovered in the early 1990s. This arrangement permitted inspections by the three states of each other’s biological facilities to make sure they were for peaceful purposes. Unfortunately, the trilateral inspections stalled when Russia refused inspectors entry to facilities controlled by their Ministry of Defense (2002: 146–7). Finally, although the United States is very alert to the continued presence of bio- weapons in other countries, it has had at least one very serious allegation leveled against its practices. One source claims that the United States, in the late 1990s, built an anthrax weapon and did so in secrecy, clearly violating the 1972 BWC (Deller, Makhijani, & Burroughs 2003: xiii). The Chemical Weapons Regime Unlike biological weapons, chemical weapons are made from non-living materials. This category includes the mustard and chlorine gases used in the trench warfare of the First World War, and nerve gases that were first developed in Germany in the 1930s. Nerve gases block enzymes in the human body causing loss of muscle control, respiratory failure, and then death. Sarin and VX nerve agents are well-known exam- ples (Cirincione 2002: 5–6). While biological weapons are regarded as poor battlefield weapons, chemical weapons have worked all too well. In addition to the gas attacks of the First World War, Egyptian troops used gas warfare in Yemen in the 1960s. Iraq, in a much better known case, used lethal gas in the 1980s against Iranian troops, with Iran retaliating in like kind. Iraq also gassed Kurdish villagers in 1988 because Saddam Hussein accused them of disloyalty in wartime. The United States received considerable crit- icism during the Vietnam War for using tear gas to drive the Viet Cong out of their tunnels and a defoliate, known as Agent Orange, to destroy many square miles of plants and trees, so guerrilla soldiers would have fewer places to hide. Probably the greatest fear about chemical weapons today is that terrorists will acquire them. Already the terrible incident of the Japanese cult, Aum Shinrikyo, releas- ing sarin gas in the Tokyo subway system in 1995 has taken place. Twelve people died and hundreds were injured as a mass panic took place. Until this episode of terrorism occurred, Japan was regarded of as one of the safest countries in the world (Russell 2001: 231; Couch 2003: 4–5). Al-Qaida, the terrorist organization behind the 9/11 attack, has made it clear that it seeks a WMD to greatly strengthen its striking power (Couch 2003: 6–7). If an atomic device is out of reach, a chemical weapon would be the terrorist’s next best choice because it is more deadly and controllable than bio- logical agents. Chemical weapons have been called the “poor man’s atomic bomb.”

Construction of a chemical weapons regime began in the nineteenth century at the 1899 Hague Convention with a protocol banning projectiles designed to spread asphyxiating gases. Later the 1925 Geneva Protocol then prohibited the use of gas and germ agents in war, but not the making and stockpiling of these weapons. Negotiations for a comprehensive chemical convention began in the 1980s because of a worldwide concern over the use of lethal gas in the Iran–Iraq war of that decade. The result of these negotiations was the 1992 Convention on the Prohibition of the Development, Production, Stockpiling, and Use of Chemical Weapons and on Their Destruction, better known as the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC).20 The CWC went into force in 1997 and has 187 state parties. This convention not only prohibits an entire category of weapons, but goes the BWC one better by having enforcement powers requiring transparency in countries’ chemical industries. Enforcement is through the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) with its headquarters at the Hague staffed by 500 employees. Any member of the CWC can ask for verification on short notice regarding another member’s activities. The CWC is the closest arrangement yet to a WMD treaty with teeth.21 With over 70,000 tons of declared chemical weapons in the world, their destruc- tion is a big job, but based on the CWC, this task was supposed to have been accom- plished by 2007. Many countries could not meet this deadline, especially Russia with its huge stockpile of more than half the world’s total plus limited funds and technol- ogy for this task (Guthrie, Hart, & Kuhlau 2005: 611–13). As in the case of nuclear and biological weapons, the Cooperative Threat Reduction Program, initiated by the United States, is helping Russia to destroy its gas stocks. The US record on the CWC has been a good one. The United States led in negotiating the CWC from the outset and has made better progress than most at destroying its gas stocks. As with the biological regime, the Australia Group reinforces the chemical weapons regime through voluntary export controls; in fact, the Australia Group arose first as a concern with chemical weapons proliferation and added biological export controls in 1990. The 38 members monitor over 50 chemicals and specific kinds of equipment (Gualtieri 2000: 475–7). The dual-use nature of chemicals is as much a problem as it is for biological materials and technologies. The gas Iraq’s Saddam Hussein used against Iranian soldiers was supposedly made with insecticide-making equipment bought from West Germany years before. Even the solvent in ballpoint pens can help make mustard gas (Cirincione 2002: 396). At least the Australia Group, as with bio- logical exports, can focus on monitoring chemicals exported to the “usual suspects,” a dozen or more countries with possible clandestine chemical weapons programs. The Missile Control Regime The missile control regime is the only one without a treaty to ground the regime. The main line of defense against further proliferation of missiles is the Missile Technology Control Regime (MTCR), a voluntary export-control arrangement. The basic idea behind the MTCR is to limit the danger of WMDs by controlling a major delivery system that can easily carry these weapons to target.

The MTCR was established in 1987 largely at the urging of the United States and other leading industrial powers and presently has 34 members. The missiles at con- cern are non-crewed air-vehicle systems with the minimum capabilities of carrying a payload of 500 kilograms (1,100 pounds) and traveling a distance of 300 kilometers (186.2 miles). Missiles usually fall in one of three categories according to their range: short-range of 300–500 kilometers (186.2 to 310.5 miles), medium-range of 1,000– 2,000 kilometers (621 to 1,242 miles), and long-range ICBMs that can successfully launch from one site, travel through outer space, and then strike a target in a country on the other side of the planet. These missiles are often called “ballistic missiles” because they involve the science of being designed for maximum flight performance. Ballistic missiles are a special threat because they can strike very fast, with the longest flight of ICBMs measured in minutes, and there is no really effective defense against them at this point in time. They are a particularly frightening weapon capa- ble of carrying biological, chemical, and nuclear warheads (Husbands 2002: 172). The MTCR works to minimize this danger by requiring export limitations on com- plete rockets and the various parts and technologies necessary to construct missiles, including propellant fuels, gyroscopes, special metals, heat shields, electronic guid- ance systems and much else. Undelivered, one critical part can stop or undermine the development of a missile. More than 25 states have short-range missiles, and at least five regional powers (India, Israel, Iran, North Korea, and Pakistan) possess intermediate range-missiles. Five states (China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom, and the United States) have ICBMs, although China’s 18–20 ICBMS operate with a lower-level of technology than the other ICBM states, and Russia’s strategic capability is widely perceived to be much degraded since the end of the Cold War. Only the United States has ICBMS in large numbers and in a state of high readiness. And very importantly, many of the US ICBMs can be sea-launched from nuclear powered submarines (Mistry 2003: 8). One US Trident submarine alone can carries 24 ICBMs with multiple warheads and can deliver these nuclear weapons to any point on the globe. It can be argued that the US Trident submarines are the singularly most powerful weapon in the history of humankind. The chief concern over missile proliferation has been the sale of missiles or related equipment and technical know-how by China, North Korea, and Russia to other states. Supposedly China and Russia have suspended sales of this kind and cooperate with the MTCR despite lacking membership in this supplier’s group. China made this commitment in 2000 after the United States agreed to allow American indus- tries to send their satellites aloft on Chinese rockets. The focus today is on North Korea, which shocked the world with a three-stage rocket launch in 1998. The Taepo Dong I splashed into the Pacific Ocean instead of sending aloft a satellite, but still galvanized the attention of missile experts around the world. North Korea’s missiles use liquid fuel instead of the more sophisticated solid-fuel propulsion system, but can easily reach Japan and may have greater range in the future. An effort in 2006 with a Taepo Dong II did not fare well, but led to the UN Security Council forbidding further ballistic missile tests by North Korea. In direct violation of the Security Council, North Korea fired another three-stage Taepo Dong II rocket in April 2009 that may have traveled 1,900 miles before falling harmlessly in the Sea of Japan. A nightmarish scenario for Washington planners is that North Korea does have a nuclear weapon and may some day be able to fashion it as a warhead on the Taepo Dong II still in development. Moreover, North Korea is known to have helped Iran and Pakistan with their single-stage rockets, allowing these states to reach intermediate-range by 1998. Another problem that might frustrate the work of the MTCR is the ABM system under development in the United States. If this defensive missile system becomes truly workable, it may trigger a new missile arms race. A reliable defensive missile will frighten other states because it will help neutralize their retaliatory capability. China and Russia might then develop many more ICBMs to saturate US defenses and perhaps make their own ABM systems (Larsen 2001: 294). Confronting the dangers of missile proliferation, the MTCR has performed rea- sonably well, even without the support of a treaty, by reducing the proliferation problem to a few hard cases, mainly India, Iran, North Korea, and Pakistan that not only are pursuing better missiles but either have or want nuclear weapons. At least Argentina, Brazil, Egypt, South Africa, South Korea, and Taiwan have been per- suaded to give up their missile programs and of course Iraq is no longer a player in this field since being occupied by the United States in 2003. Libya terminated its missile and WMD programs in 2003, but it is difficult to say whether it was the MTCR and other weapons regimes or the US intervention in Iraq that persuaded the mercurial leader Moammar Gadhafi to change course. The MTCR seeks to be a stronger regime by inviting the widest participation pos- sible by states, even if they do not choose to be members. In 2002, the MTCR offered to non-members the International Code of Conduct against Missile Proliferation (also known as the Hague Code of Conduct). If states subscribe to this code, they make a political commitment to refrain from developing missile programs. Well over one hundred states have taken what amounts to a pledge to comply. This code was endorsed by the UN General Assembly in 2004, helping to firm up the international norm against the spread of missiles to more countries.23 If the MTCR has a serious short-coming, it is its failure to cover space-launched- vehicles (SLV). Already there are eight countries (Brazil, China, India, Israel, Japan, Russia, the Ukraine, and the United States) plus the European Space Agency that build rockets for sending satellites into space (Mistry 2003: 168). Rockets for launch- ing missiles equipped with warheads could easily be built under the cover of a space program (Speier 2000: 205–6). Dinshaw Mistry offers an appropriate and succinct evaluation of the MTCR. He says it is “partly effective, and generally necessary but rarely sufficient, as a non-proliferation tool” (Mistry 2003). The Conventional Weapons Regime In recent years, the high drama in the arms limitations field has concerned the dual danger of rogue states or terrorists gaining control of WMDs. The reality is that most casualties, both military and civilian, result from conventional arms, everything from assault rifles to battle tanks. While several significant wars have occurred among states since the Second World War, like the three India–Pakistan wars and the Iran–Iraq war, most conflicts have been internal civil wars and revolutions fought in Third Word

countries. Since most of these states do not have significant arms industries, import- ing or smuggling weapons is necessary to supply Third World fighting. This fact high- lights the need for export restraint and control by arms suppliers, both on the part of arms industries and the governments of countries where these weapons are made. The supply of conventional weapons to the world is no longer structured by the Cold War, with the Soviet Union and the United States offering an abundance of arms to client-states as rewards for their loyalty. In recent years, the arms trade has been more market-driven (Cornish 1996: 5–6). The five vetoed-empowered states of the UN Security Council, the same states as the Nuclear Club, account for nearly 80 percent of the conventional arms that find their way to Third World states, with Russia and the United States far outpacing the other three in arms exports. By itself, the United States accounts for more than half of all conventional arms sales. All together, arms suppliers of this type of weapon have left the world awash in conventional arms.24 Why would poor, underdeveloped countries, with so many pressing needs in health care, education, housing, and economic infrastructure, want to spend pre- cious dollars on killing tools? The settlement of political arguments by violence has been ubiquitous in time and place, and certainly Third World countries, troubled by ethnic strife and scarcity, have not escaped politics by means of bloodshed. Driving the sale and purchase of arms are several forces. Arms suppliers naturally want the profits that arms sales bring. Governments of many countries use weapons to stay in power, relying on everything from pistols to gunship helicopters, as well as torture devices, to carry out acts of political repression. In many failing, or failed, states the government is weak or has collapsed altogether leaving various militias vying with each other for control. In some Third World countries, guerrillas and revolutionary forces “tax” the trade in oil, diamonds, and illicit drugs to raise money for an ample supply of arms. The three Marxist revolutionary armies in Colombia, drawing hefty profits from cocaine trafficking, purchase first-quality weapons and out-gun the Colombian army until the United States supplied this army with heli- copters and machine guns, among other armaments. As a “term of industry” conventional weapons include the large arms of attack helicopters, battle tanks, artillery, warships, jet fighters, and some missiles such as ground-to-air missiles, and small arms that usually can be carried by one soldier. These weapons include pistols, assault rifles, and rocket propelled grenades (RPGs). Landmines are also conventional weapons and received a great deal of attention in the 1980s and 1990s. Several important treaties have helped create a conventional weapons regime. Often overlooked for helping end of the Cold War, with so much focus on WMDs, is the 1990 Treaty on Conventional Forces in Europe (CFE), which went into force in 1992 and now has 30 parties. At the Cold War’s close, this treaty helped reduce the large Soviet advantage in armor, artillery, combat aircraft, and helicopters, providing equal strength on the part of NATO and the Warsaw Pact (Graham 2002: 185–90). Importantly, this treaty permits inspection and verification. A noteworthy change was arranged in 1999 to allow these weapons to be designated for each country instead of along the lines of the two alliances since the Warsaw Pact dissolved after the breakup of the Soviet Union. However, the United States and a number of Western European states have not been willing to ratify the changed treaty until Russia removes weapons it has placed in Moldova and breakaway regions of Georgia. Russia, for its part, suspended participation in the CFE in 2007 because of the United States’s plans to place defensive missiles in the Republic of Czech and Poland, not far from the western border of Russia. Another support for the conventional weapons regime is the 1980 Convention on Prohibitions or Restrictions on the Use of Certain Conventional Weapons which May Be Deemed to Be Excessively Injurious or to Have Indiscriminate Effects.25 This conven- tion went into force in 1983 and has 109 states that have ratified. This lengthy title is usually cited as the Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons (CCCW). Operating without a verification system, this convention is based on four protocols with signatories required to accept at least two. The first prohibits fragmentary weapons that cannot be detected by x-ray. The second regulates landmines. While landmines can be deployed under this convention, anti-personnel mines (as opposed to those targeting armored vehicles) must be in mapped fields, detectable by de- mining equipment, and self-deactivating over time. Mines or booby-traps cannot be used against civilians. The third protocol forbids the use of flamethrowers and incendiary devices against civilians. Following rocket attacks by Palestinians in the Gaza strip, Israeli forces attacked in January 2009, using phosphorous artillery shells to create smoke screens for their infantry. Because some Palestinians were burned by these shells, the Palestinians accused Israel of being in violation of the laws of war. Blinding laser weapons are banned by the fourth protocol. Finally, a fifth protocol calls for the clean-up of old munitions. The first three protocols are in force. In a storied mobilization of the international civil society, hundreds of NGOs formed the International Campaign to Ban Landmines in 1992, instead of waiting on states to come up with a convention banning all anti-personnel landmines. In record time, a conference was organized in Ottawa, Canada in 1996 and lasted into the fall of 1997, producing a convention ready for ratification. The 1996 Convention on the Prohibition of the Use, Stockpiling, Production, and Transfer of Anti-Personal Mines and on Their Destruction (Ottawa Convention) was the result and it goes much fur- ther than the landmine protocol of the CCCW.26 That is fortunate. There are today tens of millions of landmines still in the ground, often waiting for years after a war is over to kill or maim civilian and wildlife. Millions of more mines remain on shelves of national armories. This convention requires a total ban on anti-personnel mines. The Ottawa Convention entered into force in 1999, and 156 states are parties so far. There is no verification process, but states are to report their progress on the demobilization of mines, both in the ground and on shelves, to the UN. Although China, India, Israel, Pakistan, Russia, and the United States have ratified the CCCW, they have not done so in the case of the Ottawa Convention. A recent addition to checking conventional weapons is the 2008 Convention on Cluster Munitions. There are presently five ratifications, but 30 must occur for this convention to enter into force.27 This convention prohibits the making or use of cluster bombs which scatters “bomblets” over a wide area. These sub-munitions, about the size of a flashlight battery, can have differently timed fuses set to explode minutes or hours later. They are particularly dangerous to civilians, especially curious children who discover them. During the summer war of 2006, waged against Hezbollah in southern Lebanon, Israel was sharply criticized for dropping hundreds of thousands of these bomblets. The conventional weapons regime is one where more effective export-controls are needed. Many states can make conventional weapons, and there are many customers, thus, a complex market has emerged and is difficult to monitor. Given the turgid river of weapons flowing into areas of conflict, the record of export-controls, at best, is a mixed one (Husbands 2002: 178). Although a good many states and several IGOs work diligently to stem the weapons flow, their efforts are often undone by secretive activities on the part of weapons companies. One source ranks the weapons industry as the second most corrupt; it is only surpassed in corruption by public works and construction.28 Questionable practices by arms manufacturers are called the “gray market” while outright illegal sales and smuggling are known as the “black market.” A multilayered regime of export-import controls based on global, regional, and national efforts must build-up to a level of effectiveness. In 1991, the UN General Assembly asked the Secretary-General to set up the UN Register of Conventional Arms to bolster transparency in the arms field that would result in more trust and restraint. The weapons covered are the large arms of artillery, battle tanks and other armored vehicles, combat aircraft, helicopters, warships, and certain missiles such as the ground-to-air type. The major arms exporters have responded reasonably well, but many states fail to submit their voluntary annual report on arms transfers.29 At the regional level, the EU adopted a 1998 Code of Conduct to set rigorous standards on the sale of arms. The EU has tended to focus on arms shipments to Africa where numerous countries have been or are embroiled in civil strife (Boutwel & Klare 1999: 220). The EU has also adopted the Program for Prevention and Combating Illicit Trafficking in Conventional Arms to better monitor black market arms transfers (Husbands 2002: 176). Another regional arrangement is the OAS, which produced the 2002 Inter-American Convention on Transparency in Conventional Weapons Acquisitions. It operates in a similar way as the UN Register and covers the same categories of large arms (McShane 1999: 173–8). The role of governments at the national level is of course to license carefully all weapons sales, check every shipment through customs, and prevent smuggling. Assisting a number of major arms exporters is the Wassenaar Arrangement proposed in 1995 in Wassenaar, a town in the Netherlands. Today, 44 member-states maintain export controls over conventional weapons and related dual-use equipment to avoid contributing to ongoing conflicts. Mostly North American and European countries as well as Argentina and Japan participate. Unfortunately, the important arms exporters ofBelarus,China,IsraelandSouthAfricadonottakepart.TheWassenaarArrangement is voluntary and without an enforcement mechanism. It does have a secretariat in Vienna, Austria, and meets annually to update its export-control lists, and the mem- bers exchange reports on what arms they have sold. All decisions are made by consen- sus. And finally, a “best practices” policy on small arms was agreed to in 2002.30 If conventional weapons can be said to have killed far greater numbers than WMDs, it is equally true that the sub-category of hand-held small arms has been chiefly responsible for the high-rate of casualties in the numerous internal conflicts that have cropped up in Third World countries during the 1990s. Amidst these conflicts are a stewpot of militia, rebels, ethnic clans, child soldiers, criminal gangs, and mercenaries, as well as some regular military forces, all well armed. Some fight for economic gain, some for power and turf control, and some for both of these reasons.31 Small-arms trade has been especially tough to stop. The end of the Cold War created a glut of rifles and other small arms that could cascade downward to all sorts of arms dealers and spread outward to many countries around the world (Klare 1999: 17). Not only do many countries make these weapons, creating a very difficult problem with tracing sales, but these small weapons are obviously much easier to smuggle than a bat- tle tank. They can be shipped in boxes marked “farm implements” or easily off-loaded on almost any coastline, with small boats ferrying the arms from a cargo ship to shore. Impressive efforts have been made at the global, regional, and national levels to carry out what former Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali has called “micro- disarmament.” The UN organized the 2001 Conference on the Illicit Trade in Small Arms and Light Weapons in All Its Aspects and laid out a Program for Action to combat and eradicated this pernicious trade. The most immediate step was to add a firearms protocol to the 2000 Convention against Transnational Organized Crime.32 The Protocol against the Illicit Manufacturing of and Trafficking in Firearms, Their Parts and Components and Ammunition calls for countries to make it a crime to illicitly manufacture and traffic in unlicensed firearms sales and to alter or falsify identifica- tion markings on firearms. It also requires documentation for all stages of trade. At the regional level, Europe has taken some promising steps. The EU’s Code of Conduct covers small arms as well as conventional arms in general. Additionally, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) established strict standards for trade in firearms in 2003, especially paying attention to buyers in countries with poor human rights records (Stahl 2006: 7, 25). A particularly impressive regional effort is that of the Latin American members of the OAS. These countries wrote the 1997 Inter-American Convention against the Illicit Manufacturing of and Trafficking in Firearms, Ammunition, Explosives, and Other Related Materials. This convention entered into force in 2002. To help carry out this treaty, the same countries created the 1997 Model Regulations to Control the Movement of Firearms, Ammunition, and Firearms Parts and Components (Model Regulations) that provides specific guidelines on imports and exports regarding paper work down to the registration number of each weapon. A paper trail is critical to know the origins, the final destination, and all points along the way of a weapon.33 In 1998, the UN Economic and Social Council praised the OAS arms regulations and called for similar arms rules at the global level. The Wassenaar Arrangement also helps guide states in their national policies on the export of small arms in addition to the larger conventional arms. To assist states, the Wassenaar Arrangement, as part of its 2002 “best practices” program, established the “Guidelines for Exports of Small Arms and Light Weapons” with a special focus on preventing firearms from reaching terrorists. As in the area of landmines, and other weapons, NGOs have been important actors trying to stanch the trafficking in small arms. Amnesty International, the International Action Network on Small Arms (IANSA), and the Oxford Committee for Famine Relief (Oxfam), in particular, have banded together to promote the 2000 Arms Trade Treaty (ATA) to stop “gun-running.” Having elicited support from dozens of countries, the NGOs promoted this treaty at the UN Review Conference on Small Arms in the sum- mer of 2006.34 The original conference was in 2001. The ATA grew out of a 1995 International Code of Conduct on Arms Transfers created by a list of Nobel Peace Laureates, now numbering 20 individuals and organizations that have won this prize. Another interesting NGO development is the Small Arms Survey begun in 1999 as an annual report. With help from the Swiss government at the start-up stage, the Graduate Institute of International Studies in Geneva researches and publishes each year its report on the small arms trade, and has developed a Small Arms Trade Transparency Barometer to gauge efforts aimed at stopping illicit trafficking (Small Arms Survey 2004: 134).