[A-List] Proliferation Treaty

[Bill Totten <shimogamo@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Of course Iran wants the bomb, and the international system
has given it everything it needs to build one.


by George Monbiot. Published in the Guardian (September 21 2004)


Poor Mr Baradei,
His mission is a parody:
He tells the states (with some aplomb)
They can and cannot have the bomb.


Here is the world's most nonsensical job description. Your duty is to work
tirelessly to prevent the proliferation of nuclear weapons. And to work
tirelessly to encourage the proliferation of the means of building them.
This is the task of the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency,
Mohamed El Baradei.

He's an able diplomat, and as bold as his predecessor, Hans Blix, in standing up
to the global powers. But what he is obliged to take away with one hand, he is
obliged to give with the other. His message to the non-nuclear powers is this:
you are not allowed to develop the bomb, but we will give you the materials and
expertise with which you can build one. It is this mortal contradiction which
permitted the government of Iran this weekend to tell him to bog off.

His agency's motto - "Atoms for Peace" - wasn't always a lie. In 1953, when
Eisenhower founded it with his famous speech to the United Nations, <1> people
really seemed to believe that nuclear fission could solve the world's problems.
An article in the Herald Tribune, for example, promised that atomic power would
create "an earthly paradise ... Our automobiles eventually will have atomic
energy units built into them at the factory so that we will never have to refuel
them ... In a relatively short time we will cease to mine coal". <2>

Eisenhower seemed convinced that the nuclear sword could be beaten into the
nuclear ploughshare. "It is not enough to take this weapon out of the hands of
the soldiers. It must be put into the hands of those who will know how to strip
its military casing and adapt it to the arts of peace." The nuclear powers,
he said, "should ... make joint contributions from their stockpiles of
normal uranium and fissionable materials" which should then be given to "the
power-starved areas of the world", "to provide abundant electrical energy". <3>
This would give them, he argued, the necessary incentive to forswear the use of
nuclear weapons.

The IAEA, its statute says, should assist "the supplying of materials, equipment,
or facilities" to non-nuclear states. It should train nuclear scientists and
"foster the exchange of scientific and technical information". <4>  Its mission,
in other words, is to prevent the development of nuclear weapons, while
spreading nuclear technology to as many countries as possible. It is also
responsible for enforcing the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), which
has the same dual purpose.

There might have been a case, while Eisenhower's dream could still be dreamt.
But to persist with this programme long after it became clear that it caused
proliferation, not containment, suggests that the global powers are living in
a world of make-believe. The International Atomic Energy Agency has put nuclear
technology "into the hands of those who will know how to strip its civilian
casing and adapt it to the arts of war".

It's not difficult. Every state which has sought to develop a nuclear weapons
programme over the past thirty years - Israel, South Africa, India, Pakistan,
North Korea and Iraq - has done so by diverting resources from its nuclear power
programme. <5>  In some cases they built their weapons with the direct
assistance of Atoms for Peace.

India developed its bomb with the help of fissionable material and expertise
from Canada, the United States, Germany, France, Norway and the United Kingdom.
Pakistan was able to answer the threat with the help of Canada, the United
States, Germany, France, Belgium, China and the United Kingdom. In the name
of peace, we equipped these nations for total war. <6>

Now there are about twenty countries which, as a result of foreign help for
their civilian nuclear programmes, could, if they choose, become nuclear weapons
states within months. <7>  When Russia shipped uranium and the technologies
required to build a bomb to Iran, it not only had a right to do so: under the
NPT it had a duty to do so. <8>

It's not yet clear whether Iran has stepped over the brink. It is plainly
enriching uranium and producing heavy water, which could enable it to build
both uranium- and plutonium-based bombs. But both processes are also legitimate
means of developing materials for nuclear power generation. To enrich uranium
from power-grade to bomb-grade you need only pass it through the centrifuges a
few more times. <9>  The Non-Proliferation Treaty gives Iran both the right to
own the materials and the cover it requires to use them for a weapons programme.
If you want to build a bomb, you simply sign the treaties, join the IAEA, then
use your entitlements to do what they were designed to prevent.

Iran certainly has plenty of motives for seeking to become a nuclear power.
Israel has enough nuclear weapons to wipe it off the map. Sheltered by the US,
it has no incentive to dismantle them and sign the NPT. Both the United States
and the United Kingdom have abandoned their own obligations to disarm, and
appear to be contemplating a new generation of nuclear weapons. <10> Both
governments have also suggested that they would be prepared to use them
pre-emptively. <11> Iran is surrounded by US military bases, and is one of
the two surviving members of the axis of evil. The other one, North Korea,
has been threatening its neighbours with impunity. Why?  Because it has the bomb.
If Iran is not developing a nuclear weapons programme, it hasn't understood the
drift of global politics.

But what can El Baradei do?  He can beg Iran to stop developing enriched uranium,
but the treaty he is supposed to be enforcing gives him no authority to do so:
the government has pointed out that it's legally entitled to pursue all the
processes he fears. This is why he's seeking to persuade it to stick to
"voluntary agreements".

I hope I don't need to explain how dangerous all this is. The official nuclear
powers have junked the NPT, while the non-nuclear powers are using it to develop
their own programmes. If Hizbullah clobbers Israel, Israel might turn on Iran,
and the Middle East could go up in nuclear dust, rapidly followed by everyone
else who has decided to join the second nuclear arms race. And the man charged
with preventing this from happening is still facilitating it.

The obvious conclusion is that you can't phase out nuclear weapons without
phasing out nuclear power. Now that the old treaty has become worse than useless,
now that the promise of an earthly paradise of free power and electricity too
cheap to meter has been shown to be false, isn't it time for a new nuclear
treaty, based not on Eisenhower's chiliastic fantasy but on grim global
realities?  Isn't it time for Mr Baradei to stop destroying the world in
order to save it?

www.monbiot.com

References:

1.  Dwight D Eisenhower, 8th December 1953. Atoms for Peace. Speech to the
United Nations General Assembly.

2.  An article by John O'Neill, published in 1945 in the New York Herald Tribune,
cited by Mohamed El Baradei, 27th June 2004. Nuclear Power: A Look At the Future.
International Conference on 50 Years of Nuclear Power, Moscow.

3.  Dwight D Eisenhower, ibid.

4.  Article III of the Statute of the International Atomic Energy Agency.

5.  All these states, with the curious exception of Israel, are listed by Paul
Leventhal in an article by William J Broad, 25th May 2004. Nuclear Weapons in
Iran: Plowshare or Sword? The New York Times. Israel's weapons programme, as
Mordechai Vanunu showed, was developed at the Israeli Atomic Energy Commission
site at Dimona, home to one of its two nuclear power plants.

6.  See for example Steven Dolley, 9th June 1998. Indian & Pakistani Nuclear
Tests: Frequently Asked Questions. The Nuclear Control Institute.
http://www.nci.org/i/ip-faq.htm

7.  William J Broad, 25th May 2004. Nuclear Weapons in Iran: Plowshare or Sword?
The New York Times.

8.  See Article IV of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons

9.  Dr Frank Barnaby, author of "How to Build a Nuclear Bomb", pers comm.

10. See Jonathan Medalia, 8th March 2004. Robust Nuclear Earth Penetrator Budget
Request and Plan, FY2005-FY2009. Congressional Research Service - The Library of
Congress; Mark Townsend, 16th June 2002. Secret Plan for N-bomb Factory. The
Observer; Richard Norton-Taylor, 18th June 2002. MoD Plans £2bn Nuclear
Expansion. The Guardian.

11. Eg Geoff Hoon, 24th March 2002. The Jonathan Dimbleby Show, ITV 1.

http://www.monbiot.com/archives/2004/09/21/proliferation-treaty/

Please also see:-

"Embarrassing find"
by Eric Margolis, Toronto Sun (September 19 2004)
http://www.canoe.ca/NewsStand/Columnists/Toronto/Eric_Margolis/2004/09/19/634925.html

"North Korea Nuke Mess Made by Bush"
by Gordon Prather, Antiwar.com (September 18 2004)
http://www.antiwar.com/prather/?articleid=3607

"Does North Korea Have What Iraq Didn't?"
by Gordon Prather, Antiwar.com (September 20 2004)
http://www.antiwar.com/prather/?articleid=3605

Bill Totten     http://www.ashisuto.co.jp/english/