Much has been discussed and written about the heightened concerns about nuclear weapons in the context of Russia’s full-scale aggression against Ukraine – the beginning of a new strategic era, which is likely to be much less stable than previous periods. There is also concern about the potential risks of escalation in the Middle East following the recent tragic events in Gaza and the confrontations between Iran and the Western powers. In addition, there are links to the threats of escalation with the fate of Taiwan, where the US is struggling with an increasingly antagonistic China.
At the same time, many, especially in Europe, who previously hesitated to support the concept of deterrence before 24 February 2022, are now strongly emphasizing the importance of strengthening deterrence measures to prevent further escalation in and around Ukraine. In all this, it is important to see the broader perspective and connections between different processes in what appears to be an increasingly chaotic, even anarchic, international system.
The need to support the NPT and demand adequate verification of arms control agreements is more relevant than ever. This should continue to guide Sweden's approach to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (TPNW) as a member of NATO.
It is clear that these are crucial issues for the upcoming NATO summit in Washington, where Sweden will participate as a member state for the first time. After the summit, the candidates competing for the US presidency will have to address the international agenda, where the risk of a transactional and predominantly bilateral approach to international relations may take precedence. In this environment, there is a tendency to ignore the existence of still relevant international treaties, including the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, the NPT, and the remaining Above-Earth Test Ban Treaty. A look back at the John F Kennedy administration in the early 1960s recalls the deep concern of the US at that time about the spread of nuclear weapons to many states around the world, including Sweden. This perspective led the US to provide informal security assurances to countries willing to sign and ratify the NPT. Had the US, and by extension the Soviet Union, abandoned this endeavor, the superpower status of both nations would have been considerably more uncertain.
When considering US-Russian relations in the Ukrainian context or US-Chinese relations regarding Taiwan, it is important to consider this historical example. As Polina Sinovets, director of the Odessa Center for Nonproliferation (OdCNP), has astutely observed, the popularity of nuclear weapons has increased due to the lack of respect for the 1994 Budapest Memorandum, which was intended to provide security for Ukraine as a non-nuclear-weapon state. Many nations now perceive the necessity of strengthening deterrence in the absence of clarity about US security guarantees and in light of perceived threats from several regional powers, especially Iran. Therefore, it is of utmost importance for NATO members to focus on this threat.
Maintaining respect for the NPT will present challenges, particularly given China’s emergence as a potential future nuclear superpower, making arms control negotiations under Article 6 extremely difficult (see below). Arms control and disarmament are no longer issues for the United States and Russia to address solely within the NPT framework. Neither party seems willing to address major issues until China’s intentions are clear.
The issue of verification also enters the picture. Ignoring the significant progress made in the area of verification during the preparation of the Iran deal about a decade ago could prove to be a disastrous mistake. What benefits have been gained by halting negotiations with Iran, especially given the current developments in which Iran is moving closer to acquiring nuclear weapons? Iran demonstrated the necessity of robust verification mechanisms, an aspect not fully recognized by most signatories to the TPNW. The fact that nearly 100 member states of the UN General Assembly have signed and largely ratified a treaty that lacks adequate verification provisions further complicates efforts to maintain international consensus on the landmark paragraph agreed at the first special session on disarmament in 1978:
“Disarmament and arms control agreements should include effective verification measures acceptable to all parties concerned to instill the necessary confidence and ensure compliance by all parties.”
SSOD 1 FINAL DOCUMENT 1978
A further examination of the conditions for a world without nuclear weapons underlines the importance of this issue.
A long way to go before verification conditions for a nuclear-free world will be discussed
A world without nuclear weapons probably requires verification on an unprecedented scale, a topic that is rarely addressed in Sweden and many other nations. The discourse on how to manage a nuclear-free world has often been dismissed as irrelevant, with the assumption that when nuclear weapons disappear, all problems are solved.
This aspect was not thoroughly examined during the negotiations on the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) in the short time allotted for its negotiation. Swedish proposals in this area lacked support from states willing to sign and ratify the treaty, as well as from many civil society organizations advocating for the treaty.
The issue of verifying nuclear disarmament was postponed by allowing the absence of nuclear-weapon states from the negotiating process. It was widely believed that their disarmament would have to take place outside the treaty framework, possibly in bilateral or small multilateral formats.
Most states that moved from declarative support to actual signing and ratification of the treaty experienced moderate threat from nuclear-weapon states, or were already covered by nuclear-weapon-free zones with some perceived protection through negative security assurances. The majority of these states lack a significant nuclear industry, except for Brazil, which supported but did not ratify the treaty, or lack advanced security cooperation with a nuclear-weapon state, except perhaps Kazakhstan.
But achieving a nuclear-weapon-free world requires preventing states and non-state actors worldwide from ever develop nuclear weapons again. Aside from the theoretical scenario of a world overseen by a functioning Security Council, the alternative could be a single global superpower capable and willing to significantly reduce its reliance on nuclear weapons, in line with the discussions initiated by President Obama in Prague in 2009.
Whether and when such a scenario would become a reality is, to say the least, uncertain.
The prospects for nuclear disarmament must also be carefully analyzed before verification requirements can be assessed.
A fundamental challenge in the current international system architecture is that nuclear arms control can no longer be effectively pursued solely within a bilateral framework involving the United States and the Russian Federation. The likelihood that China will seek parity or superiority in nuclear capabilities may have increased. This reluctance on China’s part to engage in arms control negotiations until it can negotiate from a position of strength complicates bilateral engagement between Russia and the United States, even after a potential resolution of the Russo-Ukrainian conflict.
Arms control among nuclear powers has become increasingly challenging, with nations such as the UK arguing for the need to increase rather than reduce their nuclear arsenals even before 2022.
Protecting non-proliferation through the NPT is becoming increasingly challenging
Nuclear Zero remains strongly opposed by all current nuclear powers and potentially by other nations considering the need to develop nuclear weapons, thereby circumventing the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT).
The incentive to acquire nuclear weapons may have increased significantly following Russia's full-scale war against Ukraine, beginning with the annexation of Crimea in 2014 and other aggression in eastern Ukraine. The incentives for horizontal nuclear proliferation may have increased.
Ukraine had in practice complied with many of the requirements of a state party to the TPNW – if it had existed before 2014. The country did not rely on nuclear deterrence against aggression from Russia or the West. The Russian aggression in 2014 revealed that the politically binding security assurances provided by the US and UK through the 1994 Budapest Memorandum were insufficient to deter the third signatory, Russia. This inadequacy may have been exacerbated by linguistic differences between the English and Ukrainian versions of the security commitments. The Ukrainian parliament, the Rada, was presented with a text that included the concept security guarantees while the English text spoke of security assurances. Even with legally binding security guarantees, it is widely considered unlikely that Washington or London would have risked their major cities in response to a nuclear threat to Kiev.
Increased focus on deterrence as a means for the West to prevent nuclear conflict – and conversely for Russia to enable aggression with conventional weapons
It is noteworthy that the concept of deterrence, once stigmatized during the TPNW negotiations, now enjoys more support in Western Europe and parts of Asia than ever before. Both Sweden and Finland have since 24 February 2022 recognised, with almost unanimous parliamentary support, the necessity of strengthening NATO deterrence as members of the nuclear-weapon alliance. The hope that the normative effect of the treaty would influence nuclear-weapon states to join now seems even more theoretical than before. The fact that the TPNW does not require accession to the NPT or CTBT is now seen as an even more serious shortcoming.
Russia also frequently uses the opportunity through nuclear threats to deter the West from helping Ukraine.
Nuclear deterrence has emerged as the primary strategy for deterring aggression against NATO member states, along with strengthened conventional defense capabilities.
Similar considerations are also being made by major players in Asia and, to some extent, in the Middle East. States lacking the protection of a nuclear-armed ally may consider acquiring nuclear weapons, thereby disregarding their obligations under the NPT.
Global consensus on verification and arms control is eroding
It is regrettable that the consensus on the importance of robust verification, established during the UN General Assembly special session in 1978, has eroded over time.
In Sweden, Alva Myrdal advocated the concept of disarmament rather than arms control as early as the late 1970s, questioning the sincere will of the nuclear powers to disarm. However, during the 1990s, a significant unilateral disarmament was carried out by the USA regarding its land-based nuclear weapons in Europe. At the same time, the reduction in the number of warheads after the end of the Cold War, especially in the US arsenal, can be partly explained by the need for modernization. Quantity would to some extent be replaced by quality in terms of precision, etc.
Nowadays, the idea that a nuclear disarmament process could proceed is a very complicated issue. Russia can hardly expect to benefit from having retained a large stockpile of obsolete sub-strategic nuclear weapons if major-power disarmament talks resume.
Efforts have been made, as mentioned, to develop verification systems, not only for disarmament but also for arms control, exemplified by agreements such as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action with Iran in 2015.
The assumptions underlying arms control have evolved considerably since the early days of cooperation between Presidents Reagan and Gorbachev. Trust is no longer the basis for verification, Reagan quoted an old Russian proverb that said “Trust but verify.” Support for negotiations on confidence- and security-building measures has been seriously undermined by Russia’s use of exercises as a diversion. Henceforth, arms control, whether nuclear or conventional, must rely on rigorous verification that is not based on trust. A state facing a real threat of invasion cannot afford to accept a treaty without verification unless it chooses to be defenseless. The idea that a nuclear-free world is based on trust is unconvincing.
The laudable goal of humanitarian disarmament is compromised in the process
The quest for humanitarian disarmament has suffered a setback due to the contrast between the TPNW process and Russian aggression. The threat of the use of nuclear weapons at a sub-strategic level for the first time since Hiroshima and Nagasaki contradicts the agreed statement among the P5 members of the Security Council that a nuclear war cannot be won and must be avoided.
Academic discussions on these issues are further complicated if participants use the platform for campaigning rather than listening. The Harvard Negotiation School’s goal of “negotiating by saying yes” has taken a backseat, with the suspicion that trust-building measures can be used to circumvent and surprise, potentially including through hybrid warfare that leverages AI.
"First things first"
In such a complex landscape, it is important to prioritize key issues. In nations like Sweden, the decision to refrain from acquiring nuclear weapons was made through accession to the NPT, the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, signed in 1968 and ratified in 1970.
Downplaying this commitment made by proponents of the TPNW must be countered and the importance of strengthening respect for the treaty among both nuclear and non-nuclear powers must be reinforced.
At the same time, in Europe, the primary focus must be to prevent further escalation and expansion of conflicts. Ukraine must regain control of its territory, with sufficiently verified agreements that ensure its territorial integrity and sovereignty.
At the same time, the southern dimension of European security must not be neglected, a common oversight in northern and western Europe where references to this dimension are often made dutifully without much concreteness. The ongoing developments in the Middle East will require some form of arms control as work towards a two-state solution progresses.
Notably, the Middle East witnessed the implementation of advanced arms control and verification systems as early as the 1970s and early 1980s. The issue of Iran is of great importance for the survival of the NPT, which emphasizes the need to pay attention to dishonest support for the TPNW by some Middle Eastern states, which risks undermining respect for the NPT. By describing the NPT as unequal in the relationship between nuclear and non-nuclear weapon states, a false impression is created that the TPNW – without sufficient verification – could be an alternative.
Control and Verification
The task of finding the right arguments for dissemination to the public in countries like Sweden is a very complex one. This is a problem that existed even before the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022 and also the annexation of Crimea and other regions in eastern Ukraine in 2014.
The principles often seem to conflict with each other.
If the starting point is to condemn the possession and use of nuclear weapons, the reasoning often leads to the dismissal of arguments that focus on technical measures such as verification and partial measures regarding arms control.
Conversely, if the starting point is the need for adequate verification, declaratory arms control measures such as no first use or nuclear-free zones at sea rejected as was done by NATO already in connection with the Warsaw Pact's proposal during the Stockholm Conference on Confidence- and Security-Building Measures and Disarmament in 1984-86.
Furthermore, when the need for transparency and predictability is emphasized in connection with proposals for confidence- and security-building measures, this is difficult to combine with the need for strategic ambiguity and allowing different types of contingency measures in crisis situations.
The concept of strategic ambiguity currently plays a primary role in deterrence policy in several nuclear powers, including the United States.
The importance of crisis communication
The Stockholm Initiative for Nuclear Disarmament was launched by Sweden in 2019 to improve crisis communication. Drawing lessons from the October War of 1973, crisis communication systems were considered necessary to prevent accidental nuclear conflict during escalations on the conventional war front. This need is still evident and the Swedish initiative together with Germany and other countries should be pursued and promoted also within the framework of NATO.