On December 3, at the University of Pennsylvania’s Annenberg School of Communications, Project for Nuclear Awareness Executive Director Ed Aguilar was a featured panelist in the debate, “Nuclear Weapons: Use Them or Lose Them?” Stated otherwise, the theme was: “Resolved: Nuclear weapons must be eliminated from the globe.”
Sponsored by Global Zero and Penn’s International Relations Program, the program also featured fellow panelists Drew Portocarrero, Executive Vice President of the World Security Institute (Global Zero); Dr. Michael Horowitz, Penn Political Science Department; and Dr. Andrew Glencross, with Dr. Bruce Newsome of Penn’s International Relations Department as the discussion moderator.UCS and PSR note that the odds are that as long as we have nuclear arsenals, especially in large numbers, they will one day be used. Did you know Sen. Dick Lugar took a survey of 85 security experts, who said the odds of a nuclear attack somewhere in the next 10 years was 20%? That’s much greater than the risk of an earthquake in San Francisco, or a catastrophic hurricane in New Orleans or South Florida. Do we really want to keep running that risk forever? That’s what Global-Non-Zero means, in our view.

Ed Aguilar’s Remarks:

We have a duty to disarm all nuclear weapons, for at least three reasons:
Legally, the Non-Proliferation Treaty, Art. VI, says we have a “good-faith duty to negotiate” an early end to the arms race, “leading to nuclear disarmament.” That’s clear language we signed, in a legal bargain, to keep others from arming. Ethically, nukes are an existential threat to the planet. We have a duty to preserve all life, not threaten the planet with destruction. Strategically, even ex-Cold Warriors such as Henry Kissinger say— You cannot deter a terrorist; safer to destroy the weapons, before they can ever be used. We have the best conventional weapons anywhere, plenty to deter states from attack. Finally, nukes cost us $52.4 B annually. They distract us from the collaboration on health, poverty, and the environment that we should be undertaking world-wide. We can stop these weapons.

For decades, the NPT succeeded in keeping nukes from spreading. Then we had the lost decade, from 1998 to 2008, and threats rose again as people doubted we’d enforce the NPT on weapons states. But there are new opportunities—President Obama in his April 5 Prague speech refocused US nuclear policy from continuous development of a vast arsenal, with threat of use, to reduction and eventual elimination of the risk.

We can’t disarm all at once, but we can take these next steps:
First, ratify the Comprehensive Test Ban. Second, enforce the Non-Proliferation Treaty. Sign a Treaty on Control of Fissile Materials. Sign, ratify, and enforce those treaties that will reduce US-Russian arms. Do the same with China.

Also, take our missiles off hair-trigger alert, which risks accidental war, and agree that the only mission for nukes is to defend against a nuclear attack, not for offensive purposes.

Of course we need more broadly to strengthen the UN, and the IAEA enforcement agency. But it is time to start looking also beyond the NPT. Just two good examples:

Great Britain proposed, and we discussed it at a meeting I attended in Geneva, a Verification Commission, that the major powers and the UN would set up with technical experts, similar to the IGPCC on Climate Change, to create a new MVS—an international Monitoring and Verification System, to keep countries from cheating. And 2d, George Perkovich at the Carnegie Endowment, along with James Acton, have proposed an independent collaboration among governments and civil society to explore compliance issues—even after we verify a threat, we need to act to prevent that threat from actually materializing. Finally, President Obama is planning a major Nuclear Summit Conference in Washington, D.C. We should ask that not only governments, but civil society groups, be invited to discuss just how we move forward on these agendas.

Let me end with a personal note. In 1991, when the Soviet Union was about to dissolve, people said—what will happen to the Soviet nukes in Ukraine and Kazakhstan? My friend George Bunn, of LAWS and Stanford, said we can stop this. He and others quietly visited those countries, and helped persuade the Foreign Minister of Ukraine and the Kaakhs they were better off without the dangers and costs of nukes. This is also the principle behind NWFZ, which have spread from Latin America all the way to Southeast Asia and the Pacific. We can no longer say, let George do it. We have to unite in a mighty movement, sparked by groups like Global Zero and PNA, to say, this time, both governments and civil society must work together, and move toward a Global Treaty to Eliminate Nuclear Weapons. We have PNA booklets about this treaty, and about a World Court role in this issue, hot off the presses. If you’re interested in more about what we’re doing, Kim, Ian, and Katie, of our youth network, are here and can tell you about our next trip to Congress, and our Spring conferences in Philly. Thank you very much.

Follow-up: What can you do?

You can come to visit Congress with us. Recently, PNA and some twenty college-age youth met with Congress and the State Department about our agenda. On February 11, we’re having a Congressional Seminar on Capitol Hill, about US-Iran relations, and non-proliferation, and you can call us and sign up for this Seminar and Congressional visits. And on March 3, we’re having an exciting international conference at Chestnut Hill College, on Globes of Conflict, Zones of Peace, with a leading international lawyer, Carlos Vargas Pizarro, of IALANA, Craig Eisendrath, and other PNA experts, to explore nuclear weapons free zones, how they work and how to expand them. Please go to the Web, or sign up for our email list, to get an invitation to these.

A Regime of Global Non-Zero:

On the surface, we’re debating whether we should have zero nukes, or some nukes. Underneath, we’re discussing: what’s safer and better for the US and the world, nuclear weapons, or a world without the risks they create?
To say: “Zero nukes would be nice, but it’s impractical, we’ll never get there, and if we did, X or Y would cheat.” This seems like a self-fulfilling prophecy of failure. It also ignores our current commitments under the NPT, or Non-Proliferation Treaty. Under Article IV of that treaty, the non-nuclear states agree not to “go nuclear.” In Article VI, the nuclear states are committed to “negotiate in good faith on effective measures” relating to “cessation of the arms race at an early date and to nuclear disarmament.” So Permanent Non-Zero, is a legal non-starter. The only legal way to do it, would be to withdraw from our treaties, which would be going backwards and counter-productive.

How about the argument of relative risks, or relative cost-benefit analysis?

Scientific groups such as

Instead, let’s consider the Verification Commission. Let’s look at the five-point program from S-G Ban Ki-Moon, including his endorsement of the Model NW Convention proposed by Costa Rica and other states. This is a convention that PNA had a hand in, and we have endorsed as one way to achieve the objective of a transparent, verifiable, and enforceable regime for a nuclear weapons-free world.

The Roman general Flavius said:—“If you want peace, prepare for war.” But speaking in Philadelphia recently, Hans Blix said: “If you want peace, prepare for peace.” With a Convention such as the one endorsed by the Secretary-General, will we be preparing for peace, not for a long, destabilizing, expensive arms race and potential devastating nuclear war.