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The House of Lords European Union Committee Subcommittee C (Foreign Affairs, Defence and Development Policy) is currently conducting an inquiry into the EU Strategy against Proliferation of Weapons of Mass Destruction.
Below is the text of evidence submitted by Dr Rebecca Johnson, Acronym Institute for Disarmament Diplomacy, January 2005.
Further information about the Committee can be found at: http://www.parliament.uk/parliamentary_committees/lords_s_comm_c.cfm.
The text of the EU Strategy is available at: http://ue.eu.int/uedocs/cmsUpload/st15708.en03.pdf
Submitted by Dr. Rebecca Johnson, Acronym Institute for Disarmament Diplomacy, January, 2005
1. The EU has made a positive start with the simultaneous adoption of the EU Strategy against the Proliferation of Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) and the European Security Strategy in December 2003. Taken together, these strategies show a general understanding of the multilayered nature of the security challenges and proliferation arising from failed states and non-state groups seeking WMD, but less awareness of the role of EU states in contributing to these problems. In the Council's promulgation of the three main principles of "effective multilateralism", "promotion of a stable international and regional environment", and "close cooperation with key partners", they offer a welcome alternative to US approaches. At the same time, the nonproliferation strategy complements US-led initiatives such as the Proliferation Security Initiative (September 2003), the UN Security Council Resolution 1540 (April 2004) on Weapons of Mass Destruction, and UNSCR 1373 (September 2001) on Terrorism, while also recognising the long-overdue necessity for Europeans to take greater responsibility financially and practically.
2. The nonproliferation strategy is represented as a "living action plan", with regular debates, revision and updating every six months. This is extremely important, especially in the fast-changing bio-technologies and genetics research arenas relevant to bioweapons. A six-monthly reporting process ensures that the strategies are operationalised in a timely manner and provides a mechanism for accountability. Though the first progress report (June 10) was long on exhortation but rather short on specifics, the second progress report (December 3, 2004) is much more detailed and practical, and indicates that the Strategies are being taken seriously and that elements are being implemented rather swiftly by EU standards.
3. The seven core elements of the EU approach are spelled out in paragraph 14. These are all good commitments, but do not go far enough. In particular, the WMD Strategy and effectiveness is weakened by the contortions required in order to ignore the nuclear elephants in the EU's own living room. These include the British and French nuclear arsenals and Europe's own contribution to the enrichment of uranium and reprocessing, which separates plutonium from spent fuel. EU countries are responsible for most of the world's transporting of nuclear materials and some European companies have also been implicated in the manufacture and trading of proliferation-sensitive dual use technologies and equipment, as uncovered when Pakistan's 'Nuclear WalMart' was exposed. Nor is the deployment of US tactical nuclear weapons among at least five EU States that are members of NATO conducive to nonproliferation and security.
4. The Strategy has three additional areas of weakness, the first two of which are compounded by the EU's failure to acknowledge or address its own elephants:
a. Scope:
- the threats and vulnerabilities associated with the different weapons systems are insufficiently distinguished, with consequences for how well some of the policies are targeted;
- there is a reluctance to address problems associated with civilian nuclear materials, though these could be used to create havoc and major social and economic disruption if used in a radiological dispersion device ('dirty bomb') in urban areas; and
- there is an exaggerated emphasis on missile threats and, concomitantly, inadequate attention given to the more likely low-tech delivery means non-state armed groups are likely to use, including trucks, trains and ships.
b. Approach:
- the Strategy deals almost exclusively with horizontal proliferation while practically ignoring vertical proliferation;
- the EU explicitly supports making the prohibition of biological and chemical weapons universally binding rules of international law, but fails to accord nuclear weapons the same importance. Consequently, many of the Strategy's core weaknesses are associated with nuclear weapons and materials, though there does need to be better monitoring of biotechnology and some proliferation-conducive trading by some EU-related companies.
c. Budget - where identified, the levels of financing are too small to get very far in some of the Strategies' important practical tasks, such as cooperative threat reduction (CTR) and the conversion of scientists' skills for peaceful applications.
5. In paragraph 1, the EU Nonproliferation Strategy frames the problem thus: "The proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and their means of delivery such as ballistic missiles are a growing threat to international peace and security". Two elements of this statement require clarification.
a. The risks and actual threats from most kinds of WMD have arguably been decreasing rather than growing over the past decade, in part because there is more coordinated and focussed international action to reduce or eliminate such weapons from arsenals and bases, and to police borders and control materials and trafficking. Nevertheless, threats remain, with heightened public anxiety and expectations that governments do more to prevent and protect. The September 11th terrorist attacks have provoked both the heightened fear and the wake-up call. Shocking not only for their audacity and for publicly inflicting such high loss of life in a well-armed, developed country, they showed meticulous and patient planning. If they wish to raise the threshold of drama, Western casualties and public and governmental reaction above 9/11 levels, then it is feared that that non-state armed groups will conclude that WMD are the next step for terrorism. Moreover there is evidence that al Qaeda has sought to acquire such weapons and technologies. In parallel, recent developments may have increased the incentive for weak leaders to acquire nuclear weapons, if only to deter attack from States with greater military capabilities.
b. For weak states and non-state groups, which are the focus of the EU Nonproliferation Strategy, ballistic missiles are much less likely delivery vehicles than the opening statement implies.
6. The focus is largely on nuclear, biological and chemical weapons. While frequently lumped together as WMD, these three types of weapons depend on very different technologies and pose very different kinds of risks and threats. The EU needs to be clearer about the distinctions between the military and political utility, roles, production, acquisition modes and delivery means of the different weapons types. Greater clarity about the differences, as well as cross-cutting similarities, would increase the effectiveness of EU responses. For example:
a. Nuclear weapons would cause the most immediate mass casualties and physical destruction through heat and blast, with long term health and environmental consequences, including genetic damage for future generations. Nuclear science is relatively mature and the knowledge and skills for making a workable but not necessarily sophisticated nuclear bomb are widespread. However, nuclear weapons are difficult to manufacture clandestinely and increasingly protected from theft or blackmarket trafficking, despite concerns about 'loose nukes' during the 1990s. The main international law governing nuclear weapons is the 1968 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), which analysts widely agree to be in crisis. Neither nuclear weapons nor the use of nuclear weapons have been banned, though these are subject to international law and interpretation, and at least 8 States openly claim to possess them and to 'rely' on them for deterrence and national security. Delivery for these states would be by ship, plane or missile, but if a workable device were stolen or bought, nuclear bombs could also be delivered by suitcase or car by non-state terrorists.
b. Biological weapons can be any means used deliberately to infect or cause disease (human, livestock or agricultural) and may result in death, debilitation and in some cases, genetic damage. Depending on the agent and delivery, the casualties and effects could be massive, shocking and long-lived. Unlike nuclear weapons, the materials barrier for bioweapons is negligible, but delivery is more unpredictable and can end up spreading beyond its intended target and harming the users' own supporters. Biotechnology is a fast-changing field; many biotech companies are not large pharmaceutical industries, but small units of creative, unregulated scientists, rather like in IT. Bioweapons and use are prohibited through the 1972 Biological and Toxin Weapons Convention (BTWC). Though this helps to embed a taboo against bioweapons, the BTWC does not address non-state proliferators - more likely than states to use bioweapons - and lacks any kind of verification or implementation oversight and enforcement mechanisms.
c. Chemical weapons were used in WWI, and more recently by Saddam Hussein against Kurdish and Iranian towns during the 1980s. Though they may kill several thousands if used against troops or in urban areas, chemical weapons would be likely to be more limited and less long-lived in their effects than nuclear and biological weapons. The production, acquisition and use of chemical weapons are comprehensively banned under the 1993 Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) which has a well-developed verification regime and implementing organisation (the OPCW), though problems remain, particularly in relation to the detection and destruction of existing stocks in several countries.
7. Radiological weapons are briefly mentioned but not really addressed. While radiological weapons - a subset of nuclear with particular characteristics - are not as immediately life-threatening as fission or biological weapons, they are an attractive option for non-state armed groups (much less likely to be used by states, even covertly). Radiological weapons use the contamination from radioactive material to create terror and disruption. Virtually any kind of radioactive source, even low level medical waste, could be ignited and dispersed by conventional explosives or targeted for attack (for example, a fuel-filled plane aimed at high speed into a nuclear power plant). Used in any city, the social and economic consequences could be devastating. Decontamination and clean-up would be very costly; depending on the level of contamination, the affected area could be rendered a 'no-go' wasteland for years, perhaps decades. Though only those very close to the initial explosion would risk immediate death or injury, the ingestion or inhalation of finely dispersed radioactive particles could result in greatly elevated levels of illness and death over time, including cancers and immune-system failures. Babies, including foetuses, and children would be especially vulnerable.
8. Emergency planning, education, accessible stocks of appropriate medical supplies, effective consequence management and a fast response can significantly lower casualties in the event of radiological, chemical or biological weapons attacks, but could do little to limit the initial effects of a nuclear weapon use.9. In order to address dangers from radiological weapons, more attention must be given to the safety and security of nuclear materials transports (currently conducted to and from a number of EU countries by air, rail, truck and ship). Threats include the seizure of or attacks on nuclear waste or plutonium products from nuclear power stations and the transports to and from Sellafield or La Hague. Radioactive waste from hospitals and nuclear fuel shipped by rail (often at night) are especially vulnerable.
10. During the Cold War, ballistic missiles were developed as the most efficient way to deliver a nuclear payload. Even now, however, very few states and no sub-state organisations have the requisite missile or nuclear capabilities, let alone the intention to utilise technological capability in this way. A missile's point of origin can be quickly identified and would invite overwhelming retaliation. Even in 2002, the US National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) acknowledged that any state or terrorist organisation wanting to attack American targets with nuclear, chemical or biological weapons would be far more likely to organise secret delivery by ship, truck or aeroplane.
11. Some 38 to 40 states are known to have acquired or developed ballistic missiles, but the majority have at present only short range capabilities, such as the FROG and SCUD. Up to 11 possess medium (1000 - 1300 km) range capabilities: in addition to the five declared nuclear weapon states (Britain, China, France, Russia, and the United States), these include the programmes of India, Iran, Israel, Pakistan and North Korea, such as the Shahab, Ghauri and No-dong missiles. Only the five NPT nuclear powers have intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) capabilities. In 1999, before its assessments became distorted to meet the ideological plans of a neo-conservative clique, the CIA projected that by 2015, the United States might be likely to face ballistic missile threats from "Russia, China, and North Korea, probably from Iran, and possibly from Iraq." Furthermore, recognising that some regimes may be developing certain kinds of capabilities as part of a defensive strategy in relation to perceived regional threats or, indeed, concerns about US political and military intentions, the CIA National Intelligence Officer for Strategic and Nuclear Programs noted in May 2000 that Iran, Iraq and North Korea "view these weapons more as strategic tools of deterrence [and] coercive diplomacy, not as operational weapons of war".
12. The likely reason for the EU's exaggerated emphasis on missiles is the pressure exerted by the Bush Administration (directly, and through NATO) for allies to support its ballistic missile defence (BMD) plans. To gain support for BMD, of which many allies and senior American military officials and political representatives remain sceptical, the Administration has exaggerated the threat, the need, and the technological feasibility. They have ignored or underestimated the costs, including opportunity costs, and also the wider implications of their desired four-tier BMD architecture (land, air, sea and space) on international security, including surveillance and a range of peaceful and commercial uses of outer space, on which the world has become so dependent (communications, banking, meteorology etc.)
13. There are two axes of proliferation: horizontal proliferation - the acquisition and spread of weapons to additional states or armed groups - and vertical proliferation, which includes further qualitative or quantitative developments by States acknowledged to possess certain weapons and the means of WMD delivery. On biological and chemical weapons, the Strategy addresses both axes, but for nuclear weapons it deals almost exclusively with horizontal proliferation, which undercuts some of its laudable aims.
14. While there is arguably no direct causal link between the nuclear policies of particular weapon states and the calculations and decisions of other nuclear weapon possessors or aspirants, it does not help for NATO and the two European nuclear weapon states continually to assert the security value and necessity of nuclear weapons for themselves and to continue to hold open the option of using nuclear weapons first - or even, recent policy statements have indicated or implied - pre-emptively in the event of conflict.
15. Some of the weaknesses in the multilateral treaties - particularly their inability to address non-state actors - have begun to be redressed by agreements such as PSI and UNSC 1540, which emphasise interdiction and seizure of cargoes (PSI) and national measures and responsibilities vis-à-vis a State's own nationals and territories (UNSC 1540). While care must be taken with the implementation of PSI, the EU Nonproliferation Strategy is intended to be compatible with both existing treaties and with PSI and UNSC 1540, as well as seeking to enhance the export control regimes and monitoring organisations such as the IAEA and OPCW. Moreover, it is largely to the credit of some EU states that what started as unilateral or 'club of the willing' initiatives have been accorded greater legitimacy and authority by being at least contextually related to international law and the nonproliferation/arms control regimes. While early international concern that such initiatives were intended to bypass or rival the treaty regimes has largely dissipated but more must be done to ensure that counterproliferation approaches are not allowed to supersede the multilateral regimes that are based on mutual consent, participation and international law. Initiatives carried out by one or a group of states - particularly if they involve coercive or military action of any kind - should not replace or undermine multilateral verification and implementation measures and must be subject to norm-based international law and be such as to reinforce existing treaties.
16. The initiative of the EU-3 (Britain, France and Germany) to draw Iran back from the brink of nuclear proliferation is an important example of how the EU can play a constructive role that reinforces the existing instruments, using diplomacy, carrots and sticks in an alternative approach to US threats and belligerence, which is deemed more likely to corner Iran, with unpredictable but potentially counter-productive consequences. The EU should build on this initiative to address wider security concerns in the Mediterranean and Greater Middle East regions, and should work to promote peace in the Middle East and a zone free of WMD (which requires confronting Israel's nuclear opacity as well as the WMD aspirations and programmes of Iran, Pakistan and others).
17. The Strategy states (paragraph 16) that the EU will work towards having the bans on biological and chemical weapons being declared universally binding rules of international law. This would help to embed the norms against use and production and give greater force and authority to actions aimed at destroying stocks and ensuring full compliance. The lack of any similar ban on nuclear weapons is an obstacle to many of the most logical and effective approaches for preventing nuclear weapon proliferation and use.
18. The EU itself has a good record on ratifying and working to strengthen international treaties and agreements. There remain, however, some significant obstacles to more coherent EU action, including greater pressure on the United States and other delinquents (in international law terms). For example, Britain's current, complicit relationship with the United States, including nuclear weapons collaboration under the recently-renewed Mutual Defence Act (which an authoritative legal opinion from Matrix Chambers argued was in breach of the NPT), has contributed to weakening initiatives supported by the majority of EU states and compromising opposition to the Bush administration's dangerously counterproductive positions on issues such as the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT), monitoring pharmaceutical industries, verifying the BTWC, and negotiating a verifiable fissile material production ban (or cut-off treaty). In addition, the anomalous nuclear status of Britain and France and associated programmes (some of which are now largely commercial, such as Sellafield) have ensured a less coherent approach on issues such as full implementation of the NPT (including its nuclear disarmament obligations) and fuel cycle controls than might otherwise have been possible for the EU.
19. Paragraph 23 acknowledges the importance of positive and negative security assurances. While rightly recognising that they can serve as an incentive to forego the acquisition of WMD, the Strategy also accords them importance as a "deterrent". This phrase needs to be clarified, as in its present wording the meaning is ambiguous and - probably deliberately - panders to the doctrines and policies of Britain, France and the United States/NATO. Together with Russia, these weapon states have elaborated doctrines that threaten to use nuclear weapons to retaliate or even pre-empt, even in cases where the putative adversary does not pose a nuclear threat.
20. In Chapter III (B1), the Strategy envisages a specific Community budget line for non-proliferation and disarmament of WMD. However, the December 2004 Progress Report (p 15) indicates that agreement was not reached for this for the 2005 budget. While funding for some commitments, such as better coordination of export controls and prevention of illegal trafficking may be absorbed by Member States, CTR and programmes aimed at the education, retraining and conversion of scientists to peaceful applications require a substantial financial commitment over many years.
21. As arguably the deadliest of what are understood as WMD, the EU should work for nuclear weapons production, acquisition and use to be stigmatised and banned, and for this to be enshrined in international law. The nondiscriminatory prohibition regimes that ban biological and chemical weapons provide a better moral, political and practical basis for preventing the weapons' development and use than the ambiguities of non-proliferation.
22. EU governments - and particularly the two nuclear weapon states - should be required (or at least encouraged) to develop national plans to indicate how they intend to fulfil their obligations under the NPT, including the disarmament obligations spelled out in the consensus agreements of 1995 and 2000. This is in accordance with Point 22 and the general logic of the Strategy, and would strengthen the NPT, which enshrines the recognition that disarmament is inextricably linked with nonproliferation.
23. Greater financing and priority need to be given to CTR programmes. While CTR is still important in securing weapons-sensitive materials in the Former Soviet Union, the CTR approach and lessons learned need to be expanded to other regions sooner rather than later. This was mentioned, but there appeared to be neither budget nor planning for the next steps in how and where to expand CTR.
24. More resources and attention are needed to educate and train scientists in proliferation- sensitive fields, especially biotechnology, to ensure their understanding and cooperation in nonproliferation efforts and constraints. In addition to the EU's training and employment programmes to direct or convert scientists' skills for peaceful applications, which appear to be woefully underfunded, consideration should be given to promoting, requiring and/or providing ethics and security/proliferation courses as an integral part of science education in schools and universities, and to developing a code of ethics (equivalent to the Hippocratic Oath, perhaps?) for scientists, especially those in fields with weapons potential.
25. The EU needs to create a specific Community budget line for nonproliferation and disarmament work and ensure that the Strategy's current and future operations and programmes are kept adequately funded. Five percent of annual military expenditure from each Member State might be a starting point, though ten percent would be desirable, since more effective fulfilment of the Strategy would be far more beneficial for the security of EU members than many states' military expenditure.
26. In addition to the EU-3 initiative in Iran, the EU could take a greater diplomatic role in supporting peace in the Middle East and a zone free of weapons of mass destruction. This would entail addressing the nuclear programme of Israel, as well as the WMD programmes of its neighbours. Fostering a peace process is an essential element in changing security calculations and marginalising or removing WMD aspirations and incentives.
27. The EU should press for the removal of nuclear weapons from European territory, starting with the handful of anachronistic tactical nuclear weapons assigned to NATO. These deployments are a remnant from the Cold War which serve no necessary or acceptable military or political purpose, but their existence impedes the scope and credibility of any efforts to control and eliminate Russia's tactical nuclear weapons, which are the most mobile and vulnerable of what is still a large nuclear arsenal.
28. The EU could take the lead in declaring a moratorium on plutonium separation and uranium enrichment as a first step towards closing and dismantling all reprocessing and uranium enrichment facilities. In the past year, from George Bush to Mohamed ElBaradei proposals for addressing the most proliferation-sensitive parts of the nuclear fuel cycle have been advanced. These range from halting or restricting reprocessing and uranium production to internationalising such fuel cycle facilities or products in some way. Recognition of the need to address the nuclear fuel cycle has come about largely as a consequence of attempts by Iran and North Korea to mask nuclear weapon programmes or ambitions behind currently permitted but proliferation-conducive nuclear energy programmes,
29. Radiological dispersal weapons should be included in the Strategy's scope. This will necessitate the EU developing much better safety and security practices for the transport and disposal of nuclear materials and wastes from nuclear and medical facilities. Transshipments should be restricted to the minimum necessary. Nuclear wastes should be vitrified and stored under high security at site rather than transported for reprocessing.
30. Missiles are less of a threat than presented and missile defence needs to be treated with extreme caution as it may precipitate a worse security environment than that it purports to address. The EU needs to make clear its opposition to the weaponisation of space and EU security attention and operations need to focus on the more likely means of possible delivery. These include the 'dirty bomb' ignition and dispersal of radioactive material, such as spent fuel rods, and the dispersal of biohazardous, toxin, infective or chemical agents by relatively low-tech means into water, mass transit systems, crop spraying aircraft, and so on. Such capabilities would present their own technical and practical challenges, but would still be more accessible to the terrorism-minded than stealing or developing and deploying missiles with deliverable nuclear, chemical or biological warheads.
31. The EU should publicly declare that EU Member States will not threaten non-nuclear weapon states with any kind of nuclear strike. Negative security assurances need to be clarified and should reflect the progressive marginalisation of nuclear weapons in the security doctrines and policies of EU Member States. This recommendation requires that Britain, France and NATO clarify their positions, as the present confusion reduces the credibility of the EU Strategy in the eyes of many non-nuclear developing countries.
32. The EU should put on the table for consideration a single permanent seat on the UN Security Council for the European Union, the holder of which would rotate with the Presidency. Debates on Security Council reform have been continuing for many years now. The UN Secretary General's High Level Panel proposes two alternatives for restructuring. This recommendation would promote more coherent EU policies, encourage greater balance on the SC, and further delink the possession of any kind of WMD from the UN Security Council. It would entail France and Britain giving up their separate seats, which they are presently reluctant to do (for obvious reasons). Individual EU states (including Britain and France) would still be eligible for non-permanent seats, as is current practice.Dr. Rebecca Johnson, January 2005.
© 2002 The Acronym Institute.
© 2002 The Acronym Institute.