The Guardian’s view on a new nuclear age: Great powers should not restock a house with dynamite | Editorial
When Eisaku Satō, former Prime Minister of Japan, received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1974 after pledging his country not to make, possess or allow nuclear bombs, he assured the audience: “I have no doubt that this policy will be continued by all future governments.” »
Yet last week, Sanae Takaichi, Japan’s new prime minister, refused to say whether the country that understands the cost of nuclear war better than any other would stick to its pledge – reflecting the broader gloomy outlook. Eighty years after the United States dropped Little Boy on Hiroshima, incinerating tens of thousands of people, and almost forty years after Mikhail Gorbachev and Ronald Reagan seriously discussed nuclear abolition in Reykjavik, the specter looms again. Last month, Donald Trump ordered the US military to align itself with other countries’ nuclear weapons tests.
Vipin Narang and Pranay Vaddi, who worked on nuclear strategy in the Biden administration, warn that arms control is essentially broken and that the growing risks are akin to a “Category 5 hurricane.” Ankit Panda, another recognized expert in the field, published The New Nuclear Age: At the Precipice of Armageddon. Tellingly, the topic has returned to pop culture. Kathryn Bigelow’s new film, A House of Dynamite, shows a nuclear attack targeting Chicago.
The last nuclear arms control treaty between Russia and the United States, New Start, is set to expire in February. For decades, the main fear has been terrorists or rogue states like North Korea; there is now a new rivalry between great powers. The old confrontation between two hegemonic powers is being replaced by a more complicated competition, with China massively expanding its capabilities and wider proliferation. For unstable U.S. allies like South Korea and Poland, acquiring their own arsenals is no longer out of the question. The nuclear taboo is diminishing. The Biden administration believed that Vladimir Putin might well follow through on his nuclear threats in Ukraine.
Donald Trump withdrew in his first term from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty, which Russia was violating. By withdrawing from the JCPOA nuclear deal with Iran in 2018 and bombing Iran’s nuclear facilities this year, even though the country did not have an active weapons program, he told potential adversaries that North Korea’s best strategy was to arm itself as soon as possible. China made do with a relatively modest arsenal for decades after acquiring the bomb; its meteoric expansion reflects its growing global power, but its efforts intensified after Mr. Trump’s first election.
Mr. Trump’s confused comments on nuclear testing (which prompted Mr. Putin to counterthreat) appear to reflect his incomprehension of Russian systems testing, which, while alarming, does not violate the de facto moratorium. A resumption — the United States last detonated a warhead in 1992 — would likely be more helpful to adversaries than to the United States itself. It would also reinforce suspicions that non-proliferation is just a facade for maintaining the nuclear monopoly of a few states, rather than a serious commitment to the good of humanity.
Mr. Trump, who is said to truly fear nuclear war, should instead challenge Mr. Putin to follow through on his proposal for a one-year extension of the New Start Treaty limits and to revive nonproliferation efforts by defending the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty. The United States and China have not ratified it; Russia has withdrawn ratification. A president aspiring to the Nobel Peace Prize could set the example that is sorely needed.
