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Australia's role in nuclear disarmament

By Gino Mandarino - posted Tuesday, 15 January 2002

Butler is particularly critical of the United States for failing to show international leadership on the nuclear issue. He suggests that a "new paradigm" is being asserted in the US in the context of the proposed national missile defence system:

It maintains that non-proliferation arrangements are no longer reliable, and remains silent on any policy designed to address this concern. It calls for the building of defences against newly acquired weapons capability by rogue states and for further reductions in the strategic nuclear weapons of both Russia and the United States, but it is silent on the issue of elimination of nuclear weapons…

The proposal to develop a missile defence system will be extraordinarily expensive and ineffective. Most of the technical tests conducted so far have failed miserably. More so, it condemns the world to start another nuclear arms race, this time in a new theatre of conflict: space.

The Washington Post has reported that the Bush Administration is proposing to resume underground nuclear weapons testing, which has been suspended since 1992 – an order signed by President Bush’s father and continued under the Clinton Administration.

This move will further threaten the non-proliferation regime by directly undermining the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty.

The Bush Administration is using the September terrorist attack to justify moving away from any international leadership role on nuclear issues. It started this policy move of ‘pick and choose’ multilateralism early in President Bush’s term by refusing to sign the Statute for the International Criminal Court and scuttling the negotiations on Kyoto.

US allies must convince the administration and Congress that this foreign policy approach is misguided. In the medium to long term, this policy will prove highly damaging. No superpower is invulnerable.

Australia has a commendable record on non-proliferation issues. The Keating Government established the Canberra Commission on the Elimination of Nuclear Weapons in November 1995.

The Commission, with Richard Butler as Chairman, reported in August 1996. Some of the central features of ‘Fatal Choice’ are directly from that report.

Instead of taking the opportunity and challenge of once again leading the world in the nuclear debate, the Howard Government simply lodged the report with the United Nations.

Lest it be presumed that the nuclear issue is far too big for Australia, we should remember that Australian foreign policy has successfully tackled other issues in the field of weapons of mass destruction.

The Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, Chemical and Biological Weapons Conventions are testimony to Australia’s middle-power foreign policy efforts.

Australians, like all citizens of the world, have an intimate interest is promoting and safeguarding non-proliferation agreements.

Nuclear weapons are a scientific development designed by people. How to control, reduce and, ultimately, eliminate them is our decision.

What is plainly absent, at this point, is a determined choice.