The International Court of Justice in The Hague obliges all countries to begin and to end negotiations with a view to total nuclear disarmament. This target is, alas, still a long, a very long way off!
Bush and Putin met some time ago to discuss the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty and decided to reduce their strategic nuclear armaments without, however, managing to agree on the American plans for an anti-missile shield.
But the world nuclear situation can only be looked at in the larger context of what is going on and chiefly of the more or less long-term trends which seem to be appearing more or less clearly.
Now, the international context cannot ignore the tragic events of September 11th, because they have generated a number of trends, the most important of which is escalating the policies which pose, in the short-term, the greatest threat to human survival, in particular the expansion of the means of mass destruction. According to Noam Chomsky, the US Strategic Command, i.e. the highest military authority, describes nuclear weapons as being the weapon par excellence, because, unlike technical and biological weapons, the destruction that results from a nuclear explosion is immediate, and its effects can hardly be reduced by palliatives.
In future, the illicit and relatively easy introduction of small nuclear bombs into any country will also have to be faced: a 15-pound plutonium bomb can easily be carried in a suitcase. Another big risk is the existence in the ex-Soviet Union of tens of thousands of poorly-controlled and poorly-stored nuclear weapons.
Threats for the future are also increased by the current projects of anti-missile "defence". For one cannot imagine that China will remain indifferent and not start developing and deploying new nuclear missiles. And what will India and Pakistan do, if not react in the same way? Let alone Russia. All of which will increase for these countries and others the danger of mutual destruction.
On may wonder what is the logic of those programmes which lead straight to destruction. The answer to this question is a truism. It is indeed conventional to call attack defence. And the anti-missile defence is no exception, because it is part of a still more comprehensive programme, which aims at militarizing space. The objective to be realized is what the US highest military authorities call "full spectrum dominance" in a June 2000 document called "Joint Vision 2020". It is indeed a matter of monopolizing the use of space for military purposes not of defence, but of attack, of offensive. Because the North-Korean or Iranian threats which are being spoken about to justify these plans do not really exist. It is not a matter of protecting America; it is rather an instrument of world domination, of hegemony, which, from outer space, will protect the US national interests, military and commercial, and their investments. Even if this development represents a threat for human survival, the threat of a genuine apocalypse, hegemony, apparently, would be more important than survival. The principle is not new and was largely illustrated throughout the 20th century.
How can we face up to these grave nuclear dangers which weigh on the current world context, where war is rampant or threatens? It seems that only an international peace movement, having, in particular, as essential objective, global nuclear disarmament, can stop this race to the destruction of the human species. In 1950, the Stockholm Appeal against the atomic weapon had, thanks to the peace movement, collected 100 million signatures. Political circumstances were different in the fifties, but the gravity of the current situation cannot fail to worry. It is important to save ourselves together and to bring the populations of our countries to defend and promote peace, justice, and the respect of human rights. Disarming to develop: may our work help to realize this objective!
Edgard André
December 2001