IF YOU WANT IT DONE RIGHT,DO IT YOURSELF

Some have argued that the transatlantic rancor over the Iraq war made cooperation, especially on nonproliferation, unlikely. In contrast, this article, documents post-invasion instances of nonproliferation cooperation, with particular emphasis on the Proliferation Security Initiative and the EU-3 Initiative—the British, French, and German negotiations with Iran over its suspected nuclear activities. In addition to documenting French and British participation in these initiatives, the article analyzes why they have chosen to participate and argues that France and Britain have participated in both efforts because they are committed to avoiding future Iraq-like preventive wars.     

One Step Forward,Two Steps Back

This article explores the potential impact of U.S. disarmament leadership on the nuclear diplomacy of North Korea and Iran, the “defiant states.” The first part of the article introduces the concept of “interaction capacity,” which measures a state's integration into international society, based on its physical communication systems and its adoption of shared norms. The theory predicts that lower levels of interaction capacity will generate a greater propensity for nuclear defiance, as the affected states reject and try to resist integration pressures. In the second and third parts of the article, this conceptual framework is applied to the cases of North Korea and Iran. The analysis suggests that efforts to reassert U.S. disarmament leadership could increase the alienation of North Korea and Iran, leading to provocation and escalation of nuclear tensions. The final part of the paper explores the policy implications of this analysis for the potentially defunct six-party talks, for hopes of renewed negotiations with Iran, and for the 2010 Review Conference of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons.     

KICKING THE HORNETS’ NEST

This article applies the concept of nuclear ambivalence to the case of the Islamic Republic of Iran. Nuclear ambivalence differs from other approaches to understanding nuclear proliferation in that it focuses on the deeply misunderstood relationship between the two potential uses of nuclear power: energy and weapons. According to this theory, the civilian applications of nuclear technology cannot be separated from the potential military applications and vice versa. Ambivalence, therefore, extends into the realm of states’ nuclear intentions, making it impossible to know with certainty what a potential proliferator's “true” intentions are. This article will demonstrate that the concept of nuclear ambivalence applies in the case of Iran, suggesting that current international nonproliferation efforts run the risk of encouraging rather than discouraging Iranian weaponization. The final section outlines recommendations for policy makers to reverse this counterproductive nonproliferation approach.     

NEGOTIATING NONPROLIFERATION: Scholarship,Pedagogy, and Nuclear Weapons Policy

In nuclear nonproliferation negotiations, many governments pursue multiple objectives, and changes in policy can occur rapidly—and often unexpectedly. For these reasons, understanding nonproliferation requires empathy and imagination rather than just historical fact. This article considers one teaching tool to encourage such insight—simulations—and demonstrates how teaching and scholarship can interact to improve our understanding of the complex decisions and negotiations involved in nuclear nonproliferation. The article consists of five parts: first, it explains the benefits of simulations as both a policy development tool in Washington and as a teaching tool in universities; second, it describes the pedagogical strategy of the Stanford University simulation program; third, it shows how the simulations have identified and highlighted theoretical and substantive insights that are often neglected in scholarly studies of nonproliferation; and fourth, it describes how students are tested to enhance the learning experience from the simulation. Fifth and finally, the article provides concluding observations about how using simulations in the classroom can help scholars develop insights that improve their understanding of real-world nuclear negotiation dynamics and outcomes.     

CHINA AND THE U.S. BEYOND THE KOREAN PENINSULA

China-U.S. cooperation over the most difficult security problem in Northeast Asia—the North Korean nuclear issue—in essence projects its bigger power game amid the tectonic shifts of Asian geopolitics. The nuclear issue affords a test case to gauge the future posture of China and the United States in East Asia and their partnership in that conflict-prone region. Approaches to resolving this issue must take into account the geopolitical realignment of Asia, Washington's reorientation of relations with its Asian allies, and China's rise as an influential regional player and the subsequent regional response. However, the long-standing mistrust between China and the United States is contributing to a lack of substantial progress in Korean nonproliferation efforts. The declared nuclear test by Pyongyang further put the denuclearization cooperation between China and the Unites States on the line. China-U.S. cooperation in denuclearizing Pyongyang may either produce lasting stability for the region or create ‘‘collateral damage,’’ with the North Korean issue paling in comparison.     

COURTING THE GLOBAL SOUTH WITH “DUAL-BENEFIT” NONPROLIFERATION ENGAGEMENT

President Barack Obama and an array of other Western leaders continue to assert that the spread of weapons of mass destruction (WMD) to non-state actors is one of most pressing challenges to global security today. Yet, Western efforts to engage governments—particularly governments across the global South—in a practical nonproliferation dialogue have largely yielded disappointing results. This viewpoint examines the need for a new strategy to engage the developing world in nonproliferation programs. It argues that strategies focused strictly on WMD nonproliferation are unsustainable, and ultimately are destined for failure. An alternative “dual-benefit” nonproliferation engagement strategy utilizes the enlightened self-interest of partner governments needed to achieve broad-based buy-in among all partners. In a concluding section, we recommend that the “Group of 8” Global Partnership Against the Spread of Weapons and Materials of Mass Destruction standardize this model of nonproliferation engagement as it sets out to identify and fund WMD nonproliferation capacity-building initiatives beyond the states of the former Soviet Union.     

Strategic Ambiguity: Nuclear Sharing and the Secret Strategy for Drafting Articles I and II of the Nonproliferation Treaty

ABSTRACT

Since the 1950s, the United States has engaged in nuclear sharing with its NATO allies. Today, 150-200 tactical nuclear weapons remain on European soil. However, the Treaty on the Non-proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) prohibits the transfer of nuclear weapons to non-nuclear weapon states. The potential discrepancy between text and practice raises the question of how the NPT's negotiators dealt with NATO's nuclear-sharing arrangements while drafting the treaty that would eventually become the bedrock of the international nonproliferation regime. Using a multitiered analysis of secret negotiations within the White House National Security Council, NATO, and US-Soviet bilateral meetings, this article finds that NATO's nuclear-sharing arrangements strengthened the NPT in the short term by lowering West German incentives to build the bomb. However, this article also finds that decision makers and negotiators in the Lyndon B. Johnson administration had a coordinated strategy of deliberately inserting ambiguous language into drafts of Articles I and II of the Treaty to protect and preserve NATO's pre-existing nuclear-sharing arrangements in Europe. This diplomatic approach by the Johnson administration offers lessons for challenges concerning NATO and relations with Russia today.     

NONPROLIFERATION POLICY CROSSROADS:

On October 1, 2008, Congress enacted a proposal that originated with President George W. Bush in 2005 to approve an unprecedented nuclear trade pact with India by removing a central pillar of US nonproliferation policy. Despite the numerous political challenges confronting the Bush administration, the initiative won strong bipartisan support, including votes from Democratic Senators Joseph Biden, Hillary Clinton, and Barack Obama. The four-year struggle to pass the controversial US-India nuclear trade agreement offers an exceptionally valuable case study. It demonstrates a classic tradeoff between the pursuit of broad multilateral goals such as nuclear nonproliferation and advancement of a specific bilateral relationship. It reveals enduring fault lines in executive branch relations with Congress. It vividly portrays challenges confronting proponents of a strong nonproliferation regime. This article is based on an analysis of the negotiating record and congressional deliberations, including interviews with key participants. It assesses the lessons learned and focuses on three principal questions: how did the agreement seek to advance US national security interests?; what were the essential elements of the prolonged state-of-the-art lobbying campaign to win approval from skeptics in Congress?; and what are the agreement's actual benefits—and costs—to future US nonproliferation efforts?     

Reflections on Transparency and Monitoring under the 1993 United States-Russian Federation Highly Enriched Uranium Purchase Agreement

ABSTRACT

The 1993 Highly Enriched Uranium (HEU) Purchase Agreement between the United States and Russian Federation is often described as one of the world's most successful nuclear nonproliferation programs. In 2013, the two states achieved the agreement's major goals of downblending 500 metric tons of Russian weapon-origin HEU to low enriched uranium (LEU) and delivering all resultant LEU to the United States. At one time, the LEU delivered under the agreement generated nearly 10 percent of all electricity in the United States. The agreement achieved its nonproliferation goals through a unique government/industry partnership. Commercial executive agents contracted for the annual sale and delivery of downblended LEU, while the US and Russian governments exercised reciprocal transparency monitoring measures to demonstrate that all LEU delivered under the agreement was derived from Russian weapons-origin HEU, and that the same LEU was used for exclusively peaceful purposes in the United States. The commercial development, negotiations, and implementation of the agreement have been well documented. This article describes the scope of US transparency monitoring activities in Russian HEU processing facilities, as well as Russian monitoring in the United States. In addition, it discusses the results of twenty years of reciprocal transparency monitoring and data analysis, and outlines lessons learned that are potentially applicable to future transparency monitoring and verification regimes and similar cooperative efforts.     

The Relative Efficacy of the Biological and Chemical Weapon Regimes

The biological and chemical weapon nonproliferation and disarmament regimes are often put forward as models of what the nuclear nonproliferation regime could (or should) be. But are these regimes effective? If so, is one stronger and/or more effective than the other? What is it that makes them relatively stronger than the nuclear nonproliferation regime? In this article, we return to and expand upon a framework for assessing regime health and effectiveness. We utilize this framework to engage in a comparative analysis of the chemical weapon (CW) and biological weapon (BW) nonproliferation regimes, respectively. Our analysis reveals that these two regimes are comparatively healthier than their nuclear counterpart. While some of their behavioral features might be troubling—such as the disputes over stockpile destruction of CW—these tend to be mitigated by the presence of a strong norm against possession and proliferation of both CW and BW. This norm is adequately embedded into the existing institutional features of the regimes in ways that do not exist in the nuclear nonproliferation regime.     

The Iranian nuclear dilemma: light at the end of the tunnel?

In February 2012, Iran announced its willingness to resume negotiations with the Western powers. This statement followed in the wake of a damning report by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Board of Governors and the imposition of additional sanctions by the international community on an Iranian economy already under pressure. Tehran's announcement also coincided with increased speculation regarding an Israeli military strike on Iranian nuclear facilities. At the same time, however, this seemingly positive step appeared to be undermined by Iran's concomitant announcement that “huge” technical progress has been made on Iran's nuclear programme. This article will explore the significance of the recent political, diplomatic and technical developments in the Iranian nuclear affair and situate them in the broader context of Tehran's nuclear strategy. The analysis will assess the potential for this latest phase in the Iranian nuclear crisis to reverse Iran's current trajectory and initiate a rapprochement between Iran and Western powers.     

INDO-U.S. SPACE COOPERATION

In January 2004 U.S. President George W. Bush and Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee announced the Next Steps in Strategic Partnership (NSSP), a bilateral initiative to expand cooperation in the areas of civilian space activities, civilian nuclear programs, and high-technology trade and to expand discussions on missile defense. Today, India and the United States view the NSSP initiative as a tool to transfer high-technology items to India without compromising U.S. nonproliferation goals. The success of this proposal depends on U.S. efforts to modify its nonproliferation regulations and India's efforts to implement stringent regulations to control the flow of sensitive technologies within its borders. This report examines the Indo-U.S. NSSP initiative and associated agreements, discusses the set of reciprocal steps agreed upon by India and the United States, reviews the extent of technology transfer permissible under existing U.S. nonproliferation regulations, and presents some preliminary conclusions on the NSSP agreement.     

“The major prize”: apartheid South Africa’s accession to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, 1988–91

ABSTRACT

This article focuses on the final years of South Africa’s nuclear-weapon program, particularly on the decision-making process leading up to the signature of the 1968 Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) by the South African government in 1991. In August 1988, after two decades of defiance, negotiations between the apartheid government and the NPT depository powers (the United Kingdom, the United States, and the Soviet Union) ensued at the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in Vienna. Despite South Africa being the only state to give up its indigenously developed nuclear weapons and subsequently join the nonproliferation regime, little is known about how the national position on NPT accession and IAEA safeguards evolved. Research carried out in multiple archives using hitherto untapped primary sources and interviews with key actors from several countries show how domestic and regional political dynamics influenced Pretoria’s position on entering the nonproliferation regime. In the process, the F.W. de Klerk government managed to skillfully exploit international proliferation fears to advance its own agenda, thereby connecting South African NPT accession with that of the neighboring Frontline States coalition of Angola, Mozambique, Tanzania, Zambia, and Zimbabwe.     

REFASHIONING AUSTRALIA'S NUCLEAR BARGAIN?

This article explores the challenges that Australia faces in reconciling its commitments to nonproliferation and uranium exports during a time when the international nuclear nonproliferation regime is under major stress and the world uranium market is bullish. The “grand bargain” that has framed Australian participation in the nonproliferation regime and the nuclear fuel market since the 1970s was only tenable in an era of stagnant uranium demand and a stable nuclear balance. However, contemporary nuclear proliferation dynamics and the revival of interest in nuclear energy have accentuated the incompatibility between Australia's commitment to nonproliferation and the desire to profit from uranium exports. The contemporary international strategic environment, international nonproliferation regime, and nuclear energy market are characterized by developments that not only undermine the basis of Australia's grand bargain, but also present challenges and opportunities for the refashioning of Australian policy.     

BRAZIL AND MEXICO IN THE NONPROLIFERATION REGIME

Latin American countries have historically followed different paths and logics toward the nonproliferation regime. Some states have unconditionally advocated for global and nonproliferation efforts, while others have vehemently opposed such measures or remained ambivalent toward the regime itself. By historically comparing two of Latin America's most influential countries—Brazil and Mexico—this study identifies the underlying domestic conditions and external influences that explain their differences in behavior and policy toward the nonproliferation regime. Because little is known about the reasons why different Latin American countries adopt these different approaches, the purpose of this article is to resolve this problem, primarily by focusing on the ways in which evolving civil-military relations and US influence have shaped nonproliferation policy preferences in Latin America. It concludes with a discussion of how these historical cases might shed light on current nonproliferation policies in Latin America.     

“GOOD COP/BAD COP” AS A MODEL FOR NONPROLIFERATION DIPLOMACY TOWARD NORTH KOREA AND IRAN

Scholarly and popular literature in the recent past has framed nonproliferation diplomacy toward both Iran and North Korea as an example of “good cop/bad cop,” a social-psychological strategy borrowed from law enforcement to describe a process for forcing a confession by subjecting a target to stressful emotional contrast. This article examines those two cases, roughly covering the period since 2003, when the most recent attempts to deal with the Iranian and North Korean proliferation threats began, in light of criteria for employment of the good cop/bad cop strategy. There is some evidence that within the framework of the six-party talks with North Korea and within the framework of the EU-3-U.S. diplomacy toward Iran, the players seeking nonproliferation have adopted good cop/bad cop roles to that end. The article concludes, however, that while there are similarities to the interrogation room technique, the complexity of the international political environment as compared to the interrogation room has prevented the states involved from successfully adopting or effectively exploiting good and bad cop roles. Substantial and exploitable differences of interest among them, and the availability of alternative “escape routes” for the target state, raise serious questions about the applicability of the good cop/bad cop strategy to these two nonproliferation cases, and even about its applicability in future nonproliferation challenges.     

The Power of the NPT: International Norms and Ukraine's Nuclear Disarmament

ABSTRACT

There is a lingering disagreement among scholars on how the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) affects nonproliferation and disarmament outcomes. Drawing on constructivist scholarship on international norms, this article examines the extent of the NPT's effect in the case of Ukraine's nuclear disarmament. In the wake of the Soviet Union's collapse, Ukraine found itself host to the world's third largest nuclear arsenal. Despite Ukraine's initial commitment to become a non-nuclear state, it proceeded along a difficult path toward NPT accession. Most controversial and directly at odds with the NPT was Ukraine's claim to ownership of its nuclear inheritance as a successor state of the Soviet Union. This article argues that, while much domestic discourse about the fate of these nuclear weapons was embedded in the negotiation of Ukraine's new identity as a sovereign state vis-à-vis Russia and the West, the NPT played an important, structural role by outlining a separate normative space for nuclear weapons and providing the grammar of denuclearization with which Ukraine's decision makers had to grapple.     

BANKING ON NONPROLIFERATION

In the past decade, governments have increasingly relied on financial sanctions to counter the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction. By targeting not only individuals and entities involved in illicit activities, but also banks that allow transactions to occur, financial sanctions were expected to stanch the flow of funds that support proliferation and compel compliance with international law—notably by Iran. Ten years later, Iran's nuclear program has advanced, calling into question the effectiveness of financial sanctions. Previous research evaluating the effectiveness of financial sanctions has focused on the impact of sanctions on the targeted country or on the enforcement of sanctions by the international community. Little attention has been devoted to their implementation by banks and government agencies. Based on interviews with US and European bank and government representatives, this article argues that the inefficiency of financial sanctions is due to shortcomings in training and information support from governments to financial institutions; governments on both sides of the Atlantic have provided little or no assistance to enable banks to identify patterns of proliferation financing and implement the sanctions regime. To transform financial sanctions into effective nonproliferation tools, governments need to play a greater role in their implementation.     

Local contestation against the European Union Rule of Law Mission in Kosovo

ABSTRACT

This article examines local contestation against the European Union Rule of Law Mission in Kosovo (EULEX), manifesting itself in local actors publicly demanding a change in the mission’s mandate and/or its operations. The article investigates how EULEX’s actions and its effectiveness are perceived and reacted upon by the local actors. It shows that local contestation is mainly fueled by (1) conflicting sovereignty claims by the majority Albanians and the minority Serbs; (2) the understanding of sovereignty by parts of society as entailing exclusive authority; and (3) dissatisfaction with the mission’s effectiveness. By addressing EULEX from a bottom-up perspective—that of the local actors—the article underlines the limitations of EU policies in post-conflict Kosovo.     

ACHIEVING THE VISION OF THE NPT

This article assesses the prospects for a strategy of incrementalism to lead to achievement of the core bargain of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons: non-nuclear weapon states' nuclear nonproliferation in exchange for nuclear weapon states' nuclear disarmament to the point of “global zero.” Game theory, prospect theory, and liberal international theory are used to evaluate the potential of a strategy of incrementalism. While separately each has insights to offer, it is when all three theoretical approaches are used in tandem that meaningful explanatory gains emerge. The article concludes that incrementalism probably cannot lead to complete nonproliferation and global nuclear zero. Instead, signal events (as described by prospect theory) are needed to “punctuate” incremental processes in negotiations (best explained by liberal international theory) in order to move past hindrances such as international structural constraints (exemplified by game theory) and the conservative risk-taking propensities of state elites (described by prospect theory).