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NATO and Nuclear Weapons

NATO's nuclear sharing:
A cold war anachronism that undermines the NPT

Though the cold war ended nearly two decades ago, the North Atlantic Treaty Alliance (NATO) retains policies that promote the role of nuclear weapons and undermine the NPT. According to NATO's current Strategic Concept - up for review by 2009 - nuclear weapons provide the "supreme guarantee" of Alliance security.

Three NATO members - the United States, Britain and France - between them deploy more than 10,000 nuclear weapons. Six NATO members that are non-nuclear weapon states (NNWS) parties to the NPT - Belgium, Germany, Italy, The Netherlands, Turkey and Greece - maintain "nuclear sharing" arrangements under which they could be given wartime use of some of the 480 American-owned and controlled nuclear free-fall bombs stored at US bases in their countries. In addition, despite serious concerns raised by Russia, the US wants to put bases on the territory of new NATO (former Warsaw Pact) members, Poland and the Czech Republic, for missile interceptors and tracking radar to support US ballistic missile defence (BMD) deployments.

It's time for a new NATO Strategic Concept, more appropriate to the 21st century. NATO needs to end nuclear sharing and work more closely with Russia to strengthen existing Treaties and withdraw tactical nuclear weapons from Europe.

What does NATO nuclear policy entail?

NATO's 1999 Strategic Concept states that war prevention requires "widespread participation by European Allies involved in collective defence planning in nuclear roles, in peacetime basing of nuclear forces on their territory and in command, control and consultation arrangements." As a consequence, the participating countries (with the recent exception of Greece) host US nuclear bases and tactical weapons on their soil; some of their aircraft are equipped to carry nuclear weapons and their pilots are trained to fly nuclear missions. Since Britain deploys its own nuclear weapon system, which is assigned to NATO, it does not participate in nuclear sharing per se, but hosts some US nuclear weapons at the Lakenheath airbase in East Anglia.

NATO nuclear sharing in the 1960s has been credited with persuading countries like Germany and Italy to give up their national nuclear weapons programmes and join the NPT. But it now stands in the way of more effective nonproliferation approaches and progress towards nuclear disarmament.

Breaching Articles I and II

NATO members hold that their nuclear sharing is in compliance with Articles I and II of the NPT, arguing that the arrangements predated the NPT and that "general war" would end the validity of the NPT. Both interpretations are open to challenge.

If any other NPT states tried to share nuclear weapons using similar arrangements, the NATO countries would be the first to condemn them for breaching Articles I and II of the NPT. Yet if they adopted the US/NATO interpretation of their NPT obligations, Russia could reintroduce nuclear weapons into Belarus for wartime use by Belarusian armed forces; or China could create nuclear sharing arrangements with North Korea. In effect, NATO has established and continues to maintain a privileged practice that it would not want others to emulate.

In 1985, the NPT Review Conference agreed as part of its Final Document that the Treaty remains in force "under any circumstances". Though not made explicit, this language was intended to constrain the NATO nuclear sharing policy. Since then, a growing number of NPT Parties, including more than 100 nations in the Non-Aligned Movement, have called on NATO members to transform their doctrine and policies to bring them into conformity with their NPT obligations.

Backdoor Proliferation in Wartime

NATO's nuclear sharing arrangements would amount to de facto proliferation in times of war. This is particularly destabilizing in the post 9/11 context: the US has declared a 'war on terror' and then changed military doctrines to provide for nuclear weapons to be used in pre-emption or retaliation. As other nuclear weapon possessors pursued similar doctrines, the non-nuclear-weapon states may become vulnerable targets for weapons that they have themselves renounced.

In 1999, rhetorical criticisms were translated for the first time into diplomatic action aimed at NATO when Egypt proposed "that the PrepCom recommend that the 2000 Review Conference state in clear and unambiguous terms that Articles I and II of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons allow for no exceptions and that the NPT is binding on State parties in times of peace and in times of war alike."

Though not adopted at the time, this needs to be put back on the NPT table.

Nuclear solidarity impedes NPT implementation

NATO countries claim to support the full implementation of the NPT, but they are often put under pressure by the United States to oppose disarmament proposals endorsed by the majority of non-nuclear nations in multilateral fora such as the NPT and UN First Committee.

The Principles and Objectives for Nuclear Non-Proliferation and Disarmament adopted as part of the decisions to extend the NPT in 1995 contained a number of commitments relevant to the Alliance, including the establishment of additional nuclear-weapon-free zones and further steps to assure non-nuclear-weapon States party to the Treaty against the use or threat of use of nuclear weapons. NATO's nuclear policies have constituted an obstacle to improving negative security assurances and to any initiative to establish a nuclear weapon free zone in Central Europe.

Similarly, NATO policies run counter to much of the Programme of Action adopted by NPT states at the 2000 Review Conference, notably the commitments to transparency, further reductions in non-strategic weapons, reductions in the operational status of these weapons, and a diminishing role for nuclear weapons in security policies.

What needs to be done?

NATO's non-nuclear members should cease training and equipping their aircraft to use US nuclear weapons in times of war. This would be timely, since Germany and Belgium and possibly others are now in the process of replacing their ageing fleets of aircraft, and could use this opportunity to give up the anachronistic nuclear role.
As part of the forthcoming review of NATO's Strategic Concept, NATO should decide to withdraw US sub-strategic nuclear weapons from Europe. Tactical nuclear weapons are portable, vulnerable and readily usable. They are potentially destabilizing and create additional risks and insecurities. NATO should use its decision in a leverage strategy to persuade Russia to eliminate its tactical nuclear forces from Europe as well.
At the 2010 Review Conference NPT states should strengthen the Treaty by declaring that it is binding on all State Parties "under any circumstances".

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