US out of Ostrich Mode: other nations and WMD

Great Debates
1

A Memo to the United States from One of its Citizens –
You cannot prevent other countries of the Earth from acquiring nuclear weapons and other tactical weaponry, and cannot pursue an effective foreign policy based on the notion that you should and can. Get over it. Deal with it. Stop embarrassing us. Quit whining and lead the planet into the new millennium as if tomorrow mattered.

SUBTEXT A – You cannot enunciate a persuasive argument for why the rest of the world should refrain from acquiring nuclear weapons (and etc) on moral grounds and as good citizen-nations of a nuclear-safe Earth. The nations of the Earth do not see any compelling “higher” reason why the USA, which has a nuclear arsenal, should be telling other countries that they are out of line if they attempt to acquire one for their own safety, protection, and/or sense of global arrogance.

Now, obviously, if you have the wherewithal to prevent other countries from developing nuclear potential (and etc), the US appeal to the higher interests and ethical consciences of the rest of the world is irrelevant except as window dressing to disguise a real message of “I’ve got a big stick and I’m telling the rest of you slobs, don’t pick up no sticks, just be peaceful-like or I’ll bash your head in”. Well, …

SUBTEXT B – You can’t enforce it. You can’t put the genii back in the bottle. You were not able to keep the USSR from acquiring nuclear capabilities back in the 1950s. Your efforts since that time have not prevented China, India, Pakistan, North Korea, and who knows what other countries from acquiring them as well. Iraq will have nukes (assuming an Iraq exists to have them); actual and/or future equivalents of Idi Amin, the Taliban, the IRA, the SLA, Greenpeace, PETA, and the Unabomber will have nukes if they have sufficient determination. And short of imposing a world-wide dictatorship as tight as the Orwellian Big Brother state, that’s the way it is. As the technology spreads, it becomes ever harder to prevent yet one more party from acquiring it from one who has it now.

RECOMMENDATIONS – You know that Standing-on-Higher-Ground rhetoric that is so perpetually a part of how we think of ourselves in the US, and how the US represents itself to the rest of the world? Democracy, fairness, freedom, opportunity? Competition from a fair starting point and reasonable limits preventing the victor of the moment from planting a boot in the neck of the momentarily vanquished? Well, it might be a damned good time to start living it as if it mattered. Because I think it does. I think the window of opportunity in which the US can set an example of treating all other sovereign entities (and its own citizens of course) as if they were capable of blowing up the world if badly mistreated, while refraining from belligerent destructive behaviors of its own even though it is capable of them, is of limited duration and shrinking daily.

Right now we are setting an example. Not a good one.

Do unto other sovereign nations as you would have other sovereign nations do unto you. And unto their neighbors.

Set an example.

And put down the %#&#@! big stick.

2

Apparently the US and the UN are in agreement on this subject, and in disagreement with you.

3

thanks!

::cc’s memo to the UN as well::

4

Fallacy #1 - you can prevent other countries from acquiring nuclear weapons, etc. The international community has, through persuasion, sanctions, and other policies, ended nuclear programs in Brazil, South Africa, and Argentina, just to name three countries.

Fallacy #2 - the U.S. has never requested or demanded that the rest of the world should refrain from acquiring nuclear weapons. It has objected to particular nations acquiring nukes - to wit, Iraq and N. Korea. Given the recent history of both nations, the objections seem prudent.
The US has never taken the position that the rest of the world, except for the US, shouldn’t have nukes. We have never threatened to attack, for example, Great Britain or France unless they disarm.

Fallacy #3 - nonproliferation has actually been extremely effective. Probably 3/4 of the world’s nations, if not more, are capable of building nukes. The theoretical work has been done; all that’s necessary now is engineering and acquisition of raw materials. Every country in Europe is capable of building nukes (well, maybe not Andorra), yet only three have them.
Can you think of any other weapon at the pinnacle of military power that so many nations decided not to acquire?

Sua

5

So by your thinking Ahunter3 would you advocate the US handing, say, four nukes to every country on earth that doesn’t have one?

6

Non proliferation policies as Suasponte correctly said have helped a lot. Consider my country for example, we actually export nuclerar technology (last year we sold a reactor to Australia for example). If we wanted building nuclear weapons would be very easy fo us. And yet we have not a single one.
We are now a democracy with huge economic problems, WMD would be another one that we are not willing to face.
But Suasponte you can imagine that U.S.A, the country that with all the tools you described “persuaded” us to sign the non-proliferation treaty is incapable of preventing other countries of building their own, in a future the situation can change.
As an example the new elected Brazilian goverment had to explain a few weeks ago that their intention of developing nuclear texhnology was for peacefull purposes only. They almost kill us of fear.
Pakistan built them so did India and U.S.A treated them with gloves because of realpolitik. We will all be sorry of that huge mistake in the near future.

7

Estilicon, you are dead on, as well; India and Pakistan scare me, too.

I think that you can analogize nonproliferation to gun control, without that pesky 2nd Amendment but also without cops and search warrants. Ideally, everyone gets rid of their guns, but that’s not going to happen. So you persuade as many people as you can to not buy guns and you clamp down hard when someone with a criminal record or mental illness tries to get one.

So if Norway or Singapore gets the Bomb, we tsk at them. If Burma gets the Bomb, we invade - 'cause the junta in charge there are nuts.

Sua

8

When I was in college the left was for total disarmament. Now I hear, “the US should just get over everyone having nukes.” I feel old.

I would add to Sua’s list: disarmament will be stymied through horizontal (from nation to nation) proliferation. The existing nations will not reduce. Then, once there are many nuclear nations, they all ‘need’ to increase their stockpiles.

Bright side: my nation has a small leg up in the ABM department. Negative side: we need to.

9

Beagle, I think age has a lot to do with it. Assuming we are of a generation, we grew up scared shitless of the Bomb, with the omnipresent recognition that the nukes could start flying at any time, and we’d all be dead in twenty minutes.

I think this current blithe attitude is born out of a generation that doesn’t have a real fear that the nukes they think it’s fine for everyone to have will be used on them.

Sua

10

Sua did an admirable job of countering the OP’s argument. As much as I enjoyed that, I enjoyed even more your post Estilicon. It is getting just a tad tiresome listening to people say that everything the U.S. does is wrong. Thanks for a new perspective to the problem of enforcing non-proliferation. I’m sure there are many of us that regret the fact that India and Pakistan slipped thru the net. Perhaps some day we can get them to join those that have abandoned their programs in a peaceful manner.

11

Virtually every debate topic in HS and college somehow involved nuclear war arguments.

Strange, all the so-called “disads.” (disadvantage to opponents argument) we used to argue are coming true. In the late 1980s we used to argue that nukes would proliferate, chemical and biological weapons would proliferate, terrorists would get them, Israel and the Palestinians would continue to cause huge conflicts, the Koreas - same, China - Taiwan also. We argued that the War on Drugs would snowball into attacks on civil rights. We argued about cloning, genetic engineering. People even suggested that trying to combat terror in the future would infringe on our liberty. All of this before most of it happened.

One thing which may save us is cooperation with Russia - not many people saw that coming. If the two of us decide to crack down - diplomatically, of course - on the proliferation of weapons (along with one of Bush’s ‘coalitions of the willing’), we may stand a chance of avoiding a totally nuclearized world.

12

Let me elaborate. I’ll even backtrack on a minor point.

Although the policy of non-proliferation could be described as a (qualified) success rather than the failure I accused it of being, consider the impact of the following as factors in that success:

a) The US did not turn around after WW II and start nuking its opponents. Despite the often-heard accusation that we are Yankee Imperialist Pig Warmongers, we’ve been at least modestly self-restrained about using overt brute force (i.e., WMA). Thus, it could be said that for the most part we did set a good example. Imagine, if you will, what the success of non-proliferation would have been if we had done a pre-emptive strike against the Soviet Union in the years between WW II and their first successful nuclear tests.

b) The fact that we did not do so could arguably be attributed to the absence of provocation as significant as that represented by Iraq today. I myself would not make such an attribution, but if one were to believe that the situation today is different and thus justifies or demands that we land with both feet like the USSR going into Prague, one could then go on to say that non-proliferation has been as successful as it has been largely because we have not had to bare our teeth, so other countries did not fear our aggression and were inclined to believe our motives were more altruistic than a desire to be the only one on the playground with a stick.

c) Therefore highlighting something that would be a major point anyway: it hasn’t been all that long since Trinity and Hiroshima. Time keeps moving along, and as time increases so does the spread of nuclear know-how. Which really was my point about not being able to stuff the Genie back in the bottle.

And I’m saying we need to do more than plan for the short-term situation because the long-term prospect for non-proliferation is pretty damn bleak, and I think the time to start laying the groundwork for a foreign policy predicated on virtually everyone being armed to the teeth (or as much as they wish to be, at any rate), and aimed at establishing how we can live in peace with each other nonetheless.

13

kniz said:

I take you are including the the United States in this as well? Or is it only other countries you are insisting on disarming, while you retain the big stick to enable you to enforce your ideologies on others? That is certainly what it sounds like you are saying.

Estilicon do you have a cite for this?

As far as I am aware the only recator we have is at Lucas Heights in Sydney and it is to do with medical radiation. We have no nuclear power stations in Australia, let alone a nuclear weapons program.

14

You’re right, we can’t prevent it. Solution? Isolationism. Don’t make enemies. Don’t continue to make enemies by supporting Israel.

Other countries don’t like how we treat them? Refuse to deal with any countries. Let the corporations trade where they will, but keep national policy out of it.

Isolationism or fiery death. Two choices. I pick the former.

15

I thought we already talked about this.

I guess you just weren’t convinced by those saying that international trade without national policy is pretty much impossible, then? :slight_smile:

Hijack: Damn, was that thread active in DECEMBER? It feels like a lot longer than that! Where the hell did the time go?!

16

I agree that the long-run prospects for nuclear non-proliferation aren’t that good.

For one things past succes in this respect is sometimes overstated. The US hasn’t been able to prevent Israel, India and Pakistan from acquiring nukes. If it fails to prevent North Korea from giving up its nukes all bets are off and every major power in East Asia will go nuclear. Pakistan is proving to be a major nuclear proliferator and the US can’t seem to do much about it.

Secondly whatever limited success the US has had has been based on persuasion and the belief that the US is a responsible player in a multilateral system. That reputation is being undermined by the actions and rhetoric of the Bush administration. This point has been made by the well-known scientist Steven Weinberg (who also writes about nuclear strategy).

17

I agree that the long-run prospects for nuclear non-proliferation aren’t that good.

For one things past succes in this respect is sometimes overstated. The US hasn’t been able to prevent Israel, India and Pakistan from acquiring nukes. If it fails to prevent North Korea from giving up its nukes all bets are off and every major power in East Asia will go nuclear. Pakistan is proving to be a major nuclear proliferator and the US can’t seem to do much about it.

Secondly whatever limited success the US has had has been based on persuasion and the belief that the US is a responsible player in a multilateral system. That reputation is being undermined by the actions and rhetoric of the Bush administration. This point has been made by the well-known scientist Steven Weinberg (who also writes about nuclear issues).

I hope I am wrong about this but I think the US and rest of the world needs to prepare for a world where nuclear weapons are much more widespread than now.

18

Okay, so nuclear non-proliferation collapses, and the world is armed. What does that mean? Simply a new type of politics? Eternal Cold War-style tension? Inevitable holocaust?

19

The difference was that I actually read up on a few things. There was a lovely article in the December issue of Liberty, quoting Zogby polls taken of people in the Middle East and actual quotes from Osama. Those polls and those quotes quite clearly demonstrated to me that Israel is the real sticking point with these people, and that appeasement will work if we abandon Israel. I will see if I can find online links to these polls and data, so that I can put to rest this notion that our policy of backing the oppressive Israelis is somehow irrelevant.

20

“Actual quotes from Osama”? Somehow, I’m not sure I find the word of a man who planned what he did very trustworthy. And besides, if he’s dead (or even if he’s not), how do we know that all his lieutenants agee with him?

Plus, after all the discussion in the previous thread, you really think that it’s the best thing to completely destroy any ounce of credibility we have with any other country? Then again, since you advocate total isolationism, I can see how you’d think that’d be irrelevant…