Uncovering the rationale behind Nuclear Proliferation
In this anarchic and intricate world, where there is no supreme authority and states must defend themselves. And in order to succeed in this competitive nature of the world, majority of the states and human beings got so obsessed with an apothegm “more is less” that they have advanced the process of self-destruction by exacerbating elements of sixth mass extinction, that are: climate change, arm race, ocean acidification, industrialization and so forth. Among this cacophony, we created a nuclear technology that not only brings the sixth mass extinction within the next few minutes, but it appeared to be the best deterrence strategy in a war. Nuclear deterrence has now become a survival instinct among the great powers of the world.
This article would be based on the theory of ‘Structural Realism’ that would argue against the advocates of ‘Global Zero’ who aim to ensure that nuclear weapons should be eradicated or dismantled globally.
Why Nuclear Proliferation?
Nuclear proliferation is happening. Since there are two kinds of proliferation ‘horizontal’ and ‘vertical’, horizontal proliferation has been diminished at a substantial level as compared to cold war scale and is been reduced from four zeros to three zeros but vertical proliferation with the advancement and development of new ‘Tactical Nuclear Weapon’ has reached an unprecedented levels. In the post 9/11 era vertical proliferation in the case of South Asia has played a crucial role in halting full-scale wars. According to one of the scholars of American foreign policy Professor Jentleson, a state foreign policy revolves around four different foreign policy goals viz power, peace, prosperity, and principles. And in this realist nuclearized world, states are always ready to sacrifices principles for the sake of power.
Nuclear Peace:
“It is better to be feared than loved if you can’t do both”– Machiavelli
It is the desire of every great power to have hegemony, recognition, and power, and the presence of nuclear weapons aggrandizes these above elements. Moreover, the presence of a nuclear weapon makes other states more cautious in using any kind of military force against another nuclear state. This concept was advocated by neo-realist scholars like Kenneth Waltz and John Mearsheimer. Kenneth Waltz writing in Foreign Affairs “Why should Iran get the bomb?” elucidates that the best way for a state to protect itself from the policy of regime change is to have nuclear deterrence, and nuclear balancing would produce stability. Neo-realist Professor John Mearsheimer in his erudite book “The Tragedy of Great Power Politics” argues that the ‘long peace’ that ensued after World War II was the consequence of successful nuclear deterrence policy.
Nuclear Hysteria:
The fear of nuclear retaliation is such that an established nuclear state does not even want to indulge in a war with a state who has only been accused of developing a nuclear weapon or has publicly announced its plans of nuclear technology. For example, London’s Sunday Times reported in late February 2007 regarding the engagement strategy and bombing of Iranian nuclear facilities by the US that “some of America’s most senior military commanders are prepared to resign if the White House orders a military strike against Iran, according to highly placed defense and intelligence sources.”
Another example of Nuclear Hysteria was nuclear development in the former Soviet Union. Even though from 1945 up until 1949 the US had a nuclear monopoly over USSR, it still hesitated on waging war against USSR. Apart from a nuclear weapon, both Iran and USSR had the capability to disrupts the US sphere of influence over the Middle East and Europe respectively, that also played a crucial role in abstaining from direct engagement.
Rational Actors:
“Our republic is a responsible nuclear state that, as we made clear before, will not use nuclear weapons first unless aggressive hostile forces use nuclear weapons to invade on our sovereignty”. Kim Jong Un
When it comes to national security and foreign policy, states are brutally pragmatic and rational about decision making. Although bad timings, ego, and luck may lead every rational decision to defeat and strategic blunder that’s why war is full of surprises. Even Hitler’s invasion of Poland according to Professor John Mearsheimer was based on a rational decision.
“Hitler’s diplomacy was carefully calculated to keep his adversaries from forming a balancing coalition against Germany so that the Wehrmacht could defeat them one at a time. The key to success was preventing the Soviet Union from joining forces with the United Kingdom and France. thus, recreating the Triple Entente”.
Similar to every state which seeks a nuclear weapon, or an established nuclear state is an astute observer of international relations.
As the Iran expert Ray Takeyh of the Council on Foreign Relations has written, “Iran’s nuclear calculations are not derived from an irrational ideology, but rather from a judicious attempt to craft a viable deterrent capability against an evolving range of threats . . . Iran’s leadership clearly sees itself as being in Washington’s crosshairs, and it is precisely this perception that is driving its accelerated nuclear program.”
Fareed Zakaria in his article in Washington post describes North Korean leader Kim Jong Un as “strategic, smart and utterly rational” while Amy Zegart in The Atlantic describes him as ‘Kim Jong Un: The Hardest Intelligence Target”.
No state wants itself to be dictated or mandated by a higher power. And it is a nuclear weapon that gives a great power an ultimate weapon of self-defense.
Nuclear Terrorism:
One of the most critical arguments that nuclear non-proliferators perpetrate is of ‘Nuclear Terrorism’.
In 2005 global counter-terrorism strategy defined nuclear terrorism as: “Nuclear terrorism is the use or threat to use any nuclear installations, nuclear explosive, or radiation devices for acts of terrorism or to compel persons, states, or international organizations to do or to refrain from doing any act”.
Michael Levi in his book On Nuclear Terrorism concludes that nuclear terrorists will fail in the end. By examining the broad universe of plots and defense. He argues that wide-ranging defense mechanisms that include material security, law enforcement, intelligence, border control, tools of weapons and military intensifies and make ascertain that nuclear terrorists will fail.
Antonia Ward a security and defense analyst at RAND cooperation analysis the enigmatic issue of a nuclear terrorist attack as unrealistic and unviable because it would require a great level of cleverness and sophistication to conduct such an experiment that has not been witnessed yet. While she acknowledges the repercussions of a nuclear terrorist attack, she believes that this threat is also diverting the attention of states from the more immediate threat of conventional weapons. This above argument was also advocated by Dr. Beyza Unal, a research fellow in nuclear policy at think tank Chatham House, also questioned the capability of terrorists in building nuclear weapons but warned the world leader of insider threat
States like Iran, Pakistan, and DPRK that are detested by much of the western world have been accused of weak security measures of their nuclear facility and have been suggested to hand over their nuclear facilities to the International Atomic community. According to report Nuclear terrorism and Pakistan, both NPT and non-NPT states are rational actors and are aware of the repercussions of nuclear weapons falling into the terrorist hands. The security breach is difficult to impossible.
Along with the main emphasis on realist school of thought, the report also concludes that “The assumption of the liberals on the role of institutions and co-operation holds relevance and demonstrates that institutional cooperation does play an effective role in building trust in Pakistan and preventing nuclear terrorism-related threats and in preserving mutual gains”.
Nuclear terrorism is a concept used by the core nuclear or non-nuclear states accusing peripheral or nuclear seeking states of undisciplined, naïve and poor security of their nuclear facilities which would land these weapons of mass destruction in the hands of terrorists, and in order to protect these WMDs from terrorists, weak nuclear states should hand over their nuclear assets to the international community.
Neo-Liberalism and Democratic Peace Theory:
Neo-Liberalism and Non-Proliferation:
Non-Proliferators would invoke the theory of Neo-Liberalism or ‘Golden Arches theory of conflict prevention’ for dismantling nuclear weapons. That is; greater the economic interdependence and interconnectedness – lesser would be the chances of war, thus states would be diverted from nuclear proliferation because there would be mutual economic destruction. If that had been the case that greater economic interdependence would not lead to war, then Nazi Germany would not have launched an amphibious assault on Great Britain who was its largest trade partner at that time.
The utmost priority of every state is territorial integrity, sovereignty, and survival. China is on set to damage and compromise its trade relations with its greatest economic partners US, Japan, South Korea so forth, in order to defend its acclaimed territories of Taiwan and South China sea’s eleven dashes.
Democratic Peace Theory:
Democratic peace theory is also supported by non-proliferators that since democracies don’t fight each other, and if the whole world becomes democratic then the very absence of war would question the existence of nuclear weapons. This utopian concept is unpragmatic. States function according to their national and strategic interests. The United States once considered as a paragon of democracy has many times supported autocratic regimes in Latin America, the Middle East and North Africa that were despotic and tyrannical in nature because it was in its strategic interest. An example would be of Egyptian Presidents Hosni Mubarak and Muhammad Morsi. Muhammad Morsi the first democratically elected president of Egypt was never backed by the United States instead Morsi was lambasted by the US because backing Muslim Brotherhood is not in the strategic interest of the US and its closest Middle Eastern ally Israel.
Political commentator Fareed Zakaria writes in his book Future of Freedom that:
“The claim that democracies are more pacific than other states, when in fact, they are more warlike, going to war more often and with greater intensity than most other states. It is only with other democracies that the peace holds”.
It was once hoped that globalization would prove fruitful in establishing peaceful interconnectedness and global governance, Instead, it has galvanized ultra-nationalism and identity crisis. There could be several ways to restore that prestige and glory, and the nuclear weapon could play an audacious role in the pursuit of hegemony.
Structural Realism and Nuclear Dilemma:
“It is the desire of every state, or of its ruler, to arrive at a condition of perpetual peace by conquering the whole world, if that were possible. “
- Immanuel Kant
Nuclear Umbrella:
Nuclear Umbrella in this context is a strategy employed by nuclear states to advance, expand and conduct its strategic interest by going beyond its borders under the protection of nuclear weapons. It is a very attractive strategy for a nuclear state because it is relatively inexpensive. Limited war may seem propitious under its umbrella, and ‘Nuclear blackmail’ could further its prospects.
Russia employed a nuclear umbrella strategy in occupying Crimea in 2014. China is expanding in the South China Sea under its umbrella and Iran though not nuclear but has the capability to be potential great power in the Middle East and could use nuclear blackmail in near future against the US and Israel to expand its sphere of influence.
Nuclear Umbrella, however, could also be specious because any miscalculation may escalate limited war to full-scale nuclear war. Nuclear non-proliferation is anachronistic in today’s modern warfare. It’s a morality that has been jettison by a realist world.
Nuclear Dilemma:
The mercurial structure of the International system is such that it not only compels a state to increase its power to better defend itself but also the innate desire of power, glory and hegemony forces great power to be offensive. The theory of offensive realism would be much evident in the ongoing struggle of the new world order than the efforts of denuclearizing states. The efforts of global zero are to perish because the world is about to cascade in a hornet’s nest in the coming decades. The trembling American grand strategy and its declining credibility have generated turbulence in a seventy years old international order. The rising military power of China and Russia and the prodigious economy of India and China are creating an unbalanced multipolar system. This unbalancing would intensify security dilemma leading to a greater arms race, probably of tactical nuclear weapons, supersonic cruise missiles and so forth.
What can be done?
To be prepared for war is one of the most effective ways of preserving peace. – George Washington.
Diplomacy would only be effective if a state has enough power and capability to intimidate others and defend itself, otherwise, diplomacy would then be considered as a strategy of a weak state. Given the capricious nature of states and upheavals in economic and military might, it is maintained that if the balance of power exists there shall remain a brief hiatus in war among great powers of the world.
Regulating public opinion:
“One cannot wage war under present conditions without the support of the public opinion, which is tremendously molded by the press and other forms of propaganda”.
– Douglas MacArthur.
Too much freedom of expression is perilous and baleful to the security of the state. Though freedom of expression has always been the fundamental achievement of democracy and has also been a significant disparity between democracy and dictatorship but even a liberal democracy like America back in 2001 disengaged public opinion through the ‘Patriot act’ because of critical security level.
Interconnectedness and intra-state relations being turmoiled and antagonized during relative peace by internal factors like chauvinism have resulted in Brexit, ethnic cleansing in Myanmar perpetrated by spurious Facebook posts and online disinformation instigated by populist and so forth is the real terrorist threat in America and other states. Second, the hideous acts of violence and chaos by jingoists metastasized by social media are being copycatted by fanatic organizations and individuals, from anarchist yellow vests in France to white supremacists in New Zealand, and from neo-Nazis in Germany to populist government in India.
An example of how the unfettered media could be the existential threat to a nuclear state could be of skirmishing between two nuclear states Pakistan and India in February 2019. The remonstration among the Indian public against Pakistan forced the Modi government to carry out air-strikes in Pakistan, escalating the crisis to full-scale nuclear war. These rational war issues were overwhelmed by the emotional public. Columnist Farhad Manjoo writes in the New York Times, “The internet contributed to the culture of mendacity in a fight between nuclear neighbors”.
Third, this internal turbulence and political turmoil give a rival state a pristine outlook of the center of gravity of another state, and eventually, the center of weakness would be exploited by an enemy state.
Public opinion, however, also defines the state’s victory in war after it has begun. ‘Operation mockingbird’ was a successful propaganda strategy by the American Central Intelligence Agency to manipulate global media, news, and magazines against the Soviet Union. If the public opinion is binding with the state’s narrative, then it would bolster the morale and passion of the general public consequently leading a state to never surrender. But there might be no room left for public opinion to decide the fate of war after one nuke goes off.
Tackling convoluted threats of chauvinism and disinformation has been the utmost priority of a state in achieving stability. As the old African proverb says: “When there is no enemy within, the enemy outside can do you no harm.”
Hybrid or Information warfare:
States have been investing a staggering amount of resources on conducting hybrid warfare by unleashing propaganda war, psychological war, manipulating the enemy’s social media and maligning citizen perception about rival’s government. ‘Deep fake’ tactics, editing and dissembling videos are proving eminent in creating a fog of war and an environment of uncertainty.
Singer Jim Morrison illustrates the significance of psychological warfare: “Whoever controls the media controls the mind”.
Having an unrivaled superiority in artificial intelligence and space warfare is the new game of great powers. It is time for established nuclear states to not solely rely on nuclear technology because it would be obsolete in future great power rivalry and new innovations and research on AI, electromagnetic pulse attack, and tactical weapons would be at an unprecedented level.
The nuclear weapon gives a state ultimate sense of sovereignty and deterrence from the avaricious international system in which “one who rules make rules”. India’s threat of large-scale military action against Pakistan is rhetoric. States like India and China would not be interested in committing a nuclear suicide at the time when they are about to regain indispensable power and status from which they were deprived, controlled and humiliated by Western powers for the last 150 and more years.
Given the crisis and fear prevailing in the world order, it is maintained that war among great powers would be inevitable. The fear of rising economic and military might of China, India, and Russia would plunge great powers in a ‘Thucydides trap’. What would be the nature of war in a nuclear era? Would nuclear hysteria be a great escape plan in avoiding the tragedies of great power politics? The end of American made international order may not seem to augur well.