Saturday, July 31, 2010

A good start but where the end lies

The Prague summit witnessed two contradictory developments: firstly, both the U.S. and the Russian Presidents Barack Obama and Dmitry Medvedev signed a new arms deal to restrict the number of nuclear weapons each country holds and secondly, the US claimed that it can hit anywhere in 60 minutes. I feel that these contradictory developments are the hallmark of the entire history of arms reduction and disarmament. It seems that the motives of NPT, CTBT, FMCT, START is by and large the same.

The present concern of America and its NATO allies is about Russia's far larger arsenal of tactical nuclear weapons; anti-US approach of nuke developing nations like Iran, North Korea, Libya, etc.; the possibilities of leaking of nuclear technologies to anti-US terrorist groups; failure of US policy in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Africa. All these have prompted them to evolve a strategy to deal with the nuclear disarmament. It is important to note that the US and Russia hold over 90 per cent of the world's nuclear weapons.

The new US nuclear policy is based on two major assumptions: first, that the strategic situation has changed since the end of the Cold War and the US has strong enough conventional capability to deter a biological or chemical warfare attack and secondly, the United States will not use or threaten to use nuclear weapons against those non-nuclear weapons states that are party to the non-proliferation treaty and are in compliance with their nuclear non-proliferation obligations. These assumptions are is in sharp contrast with the Bush administration which in 2001 declared that nuclear weapons would be used to deter a wide range of threats, including weapons of mass destruction and largescale conventional military force.

But nevertheless, the pledge, however, does not cover Iran and North Korea because the US regards them as non-compliant with the Non-Proliferation Treaty. It is to recollect that North Korea pulled out of the treaty in 2003, while the US claims Iran is covertly engaged in developing a nuclear weapons capability, which Tehran denies.

Under these perceptions and assumptions, the US President Barack Obama and his Russian counterpart Dmitry Medvedev signed a new version of the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START) at Prague Castle. The pact, which must be ratified by both countries' legislatures, replaces the 1991 START agreement, which expired in December 2009. When the new agreement comes into effect, each nation would have to cut their number of deployed nuclear warheads to 1,550 apiece over the next seven years, which is less than the 2,200 set under 2002 deal. In 2002, Presidents George Bush and Vladimir Putin signed the Treaty on Strategic Offensive Reductions (SORT) to limit their nuclear arsenals by 2012 to 1,700-2,200 operationally deployed warheads each. The reduction to 1,550 is 74 per cent lower than the limit set in the original START deal and 30 per cent lower than the one established under the 2002 Moscow Treaty. At the same time, the United States and Russia would also have to cut by half, the number of deployed and non-deployed launchers and heavy bombers equipped for nuclear armaments, bringing the number down to 800 per country. The new START also limits the number of deployed ballistic missiles and heavy bombers to not more than 700 each. Verification would take place via 18 on-site inspections per year. Both nuclear powers needed to show they were serious about reducing their vast stocks to lend weight to efforts to curb the atomic ambitions of countries like Iran and North Korea.

Russia signed START because of its dwindling control over arms technologies. Russia's worrying factors are:
(1) the old Russian Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles (ICBM's), heavy bombers and nuclear submarines, produced during the Cold war and in the early 1990's, are either to be decommissioned or dismantled;
(2) the defence industry is struggling and often failing to replace them with versions that are more modern;
(3) the current Russian strategic nuclear arms frustration is the Bulava (SS-NX-30) sea-based ICBM that has failed in seven of its twelve tests since 2004;
(4) the Russian navy is building four new nuclear submarines of the Borey class to be fitted with the Bulava and over 40 percent of the entire defense budget is being spent on the project and the future of this project is still very uncertain;
(5) the number of Russian nuclear weapon delivery systems, both strategic and shorter range, is declining as the Soviet arsenal becomes obsolete. Under such a situation, Russia wants to limit US projects and Russia's greatest fear is that the US Senate will stall and fail to ratify the new treaty. The US Senators have already indicated that ratification is not possible without full modernization of the US nuclear arsenal. Numerous mentions of the US anti-missile system in the treaty will also complicate the process further. Most of the Senators believe that the treaty prevents ICBMs and SLBMs from being used for missile defence. Although, Obama has predicted the U.S. Senate would ratify the treaty, despite some Republicans' objections that it goes too far in reducing American military might. Under the American Constitution, all international treaties signed by the President need Senate approval to becomeeffective. A deeper analysis of the major outcome of the summit clearly indicates that USA has meticulously managed to avoid discussion over the ambitious PGS programmes. New START provisions severely protect the US ability to develop and deploy a CPGS capability. The new START in no way prohibits the United States from building or deploying conventionally armed ballistic missiles. Long-range conventional ballistic missiles would count under the Treaty's limit of 700 delivery vehicles, and their conventional warheads would count against the limit of 1550 warheads, because the treaty does not make a distinction between missiles that are armed with conventional weapons and those that are armed with nuclear weapons. One can recall that that even the prior START treaty also made no such distinction.This warhead ceiling would accommodate any plans the United States might develop during the life of this Treaty to deploy conventional warheads on ballistic missiles.

USA called the Washington Summit with two major objectives:
(1) to evolve a consensus over future course of action against Iran; and
(2) to consolidate US position in ensuring better atmosphere for their longcherished dream of signing of non-proliferation treaty. The summit is dedicated to nuclear security and the threat of nuclear terrorism. The Summit was attended by leaders of 47 nations, 37 of whom were being represented by their heads of state or government.

Gains of Washington Summit:
1. Ukraine, under pro-Russian President Viktor Yanukovich, has announced that his it would give up its stockpile of nuclear grade uranium. It will also convert its civil nuclear research facilities to operate with lowenriched uranium fuel that cannot be used for nuclear weapons.

2. Both China and USA have agreed to instruct their governments to work together on devising potential sanctions designed to punish Iran for its nuclear programme. But China described the outcome differently, without referring to sanctions.

3. Although, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has declined to support Obama's push for tough new sanctions against Iran but said that his country was willing to act as a mediator in the diplomatic standoff over Tehran's nuclear ambitions.

Limitations with the Washington summit:The greatest limitation of the summit was the participation of the countries. The important nuclear power driven countries like Romania, Uzbekistan, Bulgaria, Hungary were not invited. It is imporant to note that Romania has nearly 1500 MWe of nuclear generating capacity and sources 20 per cent of its electricity from nuclear energy, Bulgaria's two reactors account for 35 per cent of its national power grid, and Hungary has four reactors generating one-third of its power. All three countries have also figured in the list compiled by the International Panel on Fissile Material with stocks of Highly Enriched Uranium in the 10- 100 kg range. Niger and Namibia, who together account for nearly 18 per cent of the world's mined uranium were also not considered for the summit. On the other hand, insignificant nuclear powers such as Armenia and Georgia were invited. This has considerably diluted the relevance of the summit. Further, among those attending the summit are Israel, India and Pakista - three nations that have not signed the non-proliferation treaty. Both North Korea and Iran, two states with disputed nuclear ambitions, were not invited. It is important to note that Syria was also left off the invitation list because the US believed Damascus has nuclear ambitions.

Israel was represented at the summit only by a deputy prime minister, amid reports that its government is worried that Turkey and Egypt might use the occasion to raise the issue of its nuclear arsenal.

At Washington, President Obama met both the Prime Ministers of India and Pakistan and managed to satisfy both of them. USA fully endorsed India's concern over terrorism but at the same time did not offend Pakistan for this. In the course of discussion, Obama told Pakistan to take action against perpetrators of Mumbai-blast of 26/11. The US also advised Pakistan to curb the activities of anti-India terror groups operating out of that country. Obama also indicated that India could have access to David Coleman Headley, the Lashkar-eTaiba operative arraigned in Chicago for his role in 26/11. At the same time, USA tried to convince India that there would be no nuclear deal with Pakistan similar to the India-US nuclear deal. India regards these assurances as its diplomatic victory. Besides these, nuclear security and non-proliferation, food security, and poverty reduction, featured prominently in the bilateral discussions. However, in this process, USA deliberately managed to escape the discussion over India's seclusion in the new US-Afghanistan policy by only appreciating India's role in Afghanistan. It has been indicated that in order to appease Pakistani design in Afghanistan, India has been sidelined in the new US-Afghanistan policy. At the same time, India's proposal regarding Iran was not considered at all. India was of the opinion that sanctions against Iran would hurt common people and could prove counter productive and therefore, the proposal should be re-considered on humanitarian grounds. The evaluation of the outcome of the Washington Summit for India remained speculative and nothing concrete came out for India. The act of balancing between India and Pakistan has certainly diluted the stand of USA over the issue terrorism.

India’s role in nuclear non-proliferation

India's contribution in nuclear nonproliferation is significant. Since 2002, India has piloted a resolution at the UN on preventing terrorists from acquiring weapons of mass destruction. As a founder member of the International Atomic Energy Agency, India has consistently supported the central role of the IAEA in facilitating national efforts to strengthen nuclear security and in fostering effective international cooperation. India is also party to the Convention on the Physical Protection of Nuclear Material and its 2005 amendment. New Delhi is participating in the Global Initiative to Combat Nuclear Terrorism of 2006. However, India feels that without complete elimination of all nuclear weapons, the target of nonproliferation is not possible.

At Washington, India has announced to set up a "Global Centre for Nuclear Energy Partnership" in India. The Centre will consist of four Schools dealing with Advanced Nuclear Energy System Studies, Nuclear Security, Radiation Safety, and the application of Radioisotopes and Radiation Technology in the areas of healthcare, agriculture and food. The Centre will conduct research and development of design systems that are intrinsically safe, secure, proliferation resistant and sustainable. Considering the existing anomalies - the Prague speech, the Security Council resolution, the nuclear posture review, the START agreement and the Washington Summit - will all lead to the NPT Review Conference, where the nuclear weapon States are bound to face outright opposition from the non nuclear weapon States. This has been a history of nuclear non-proliferation treaties in the past. Moreover, the outcome of the Washington conference was already known. Any decision taken at the meeting is not binding on those countries that are not represented at the conference. Iran has said that the outcome of the nuclear security summit in Washington would have no impact on Iran's atomic programmes. Iran has further said that as the United States had invited the participants on a "selective" basis, there would be no obligation for countries not invited - like Iran - to follow the decisions taken at the summit.

In the ultimate analysis, it has been correctly said that the US President Barack Obama's new nuclear policy attempted to strike a compromise between the ideals of disarmament and the harsh realities of a nuclear-armed world. The first NSS did not touch any controversial issue and the threat from the Pakistan, Iran, North Korea remained undiluted. To me, any halfhearted attempt is bound to produce confusion, ignorance and would ultimately lead to deviance. Any summit which is craftly designed to only gain and not to lose anything is bound to go into the oblivion. To sum up, one can aptly analyze that at Prague nuclear arms were cut and reduced but the intention to build weapons that are more sophisticated were also reflected under Prompt Global Strike (PGS) programme. And at Washington, the need to tackle the leakages of nuclear weapons and its safety-related issue were highlighted but no concrete decision was taken against the major irritants and culprits and this has placed the summit into a nebulous and redundant category and hence, it will go into history as yet another halfhearted and one-sided summit to curb nuclear proliferation.

PGS
The Prompt Global Strike (PGS) programme was launched to enable the United States to plan and deliver military strikes anywhere on the globe in less than one hour. The PGS mission would contribute to tailored deterrence, its advocates argue, by giving the United States the ability to wield conventional weapons that possess the target-impact speed and global reach of long-range nuclear ballistic missiles, thereby creating a more adaptable deterrent. The Department of Defence (DoD) is currently exploring the full range of technologies and systems for a Conventional Prompt Global Strike (CPGS) capability that could provide the President more credible and technically suitable options for dealing with new and evolving threats. It is important to note that DOD had initially sought to achieve a PGS capability by placing conventional warheads on Trident missiles; however, Congress refused to fund the weapons system due to concerns that other countries would be unable to distinguish between conventional and nuclear Trident missiles.

In order to boost the programme, in the Fiscal Year 2009, House and Senate defence authorization bills recommended additional funding for DOD efforts to achieve a PGS capability with hypersonic vehicle technology. This indicates that the Senate is still very much interested in PGS capability. In January 2003, President George W. Bush took the first steps to transform PGS from a concept into an operational capability under Strategic Command (STRATCOM). STRATCOM was given the responsibility of “providing integrated global strike planning and command and control support to deliver rapid, extended range,precision kinetic (nuclear and conventional) and non kinetic (elements of space and information operations) effects in support of theater and national objectives The leading candidates to deliver Prompt Global Strike’s swift knockout punch are the sub-launched Trident II missile and the X-51, a cruise missile launched from a B-52 and boosted to supersonic speed by a rocket.

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