OdCNP Nuclear Weapons Weekly Report

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Published: Monday, 19 September 2022 14:05

Odessa Center for Nonproliferation introduces a new heading "OdCNP Nuclear Weapons Weekly Report" by Aderito Vicente.

Arms control


A bilateral meeting between then-Vice President of the U.S. Joe Biden with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow, 2011 / Source: Alexey Druzhinin/AFP via Getty Images

The current security environment has been deteriorating in the recent years and finally aggravated since the beginning of 2022 when Russia has started its war against Ukraine. This situation affects all international systems and, first of all, the nuclear order.  

On Arms control, the two nuclear superpowers, the US and Russia, have been essentially reversing their previous progress in building bilateral agreements (e.g., ABM, SORT, INF treaties) and other measures intended to limit and reduce their nuclear arsenals.

As a result, the New START Treaty remains the only nuclear arms control (and disarmament) agreement between the US and Russia in effect.

Following its extension in February 2021, however, it will expire in 2026. Barring any renewed détente between Washington and Moscow, it could also be at risk, particularly if the War on Ukraine worsens or persists. For example, on August 8, the Russian Foreign Ministry informed the United States of its decision to prohibit on-site inspections[1] of its nuclear weapons-related facilities subject to the START due to US involvement in the Ukraine war. In response, the US State Department stated that “U.S. sanctions and restrictive measures imposed as a result of Russia’s war against Ukraine are fully compatible with the New START Treaty.”

Although Russia ultimately blocked consensus on the final draft document of the 10th NPT Review Conference, Presidents Biden and Putin have both repeatedly expressed verbal support for nuclear arms control talks to restart. Considering Russian or American public statements on any breakthroughs about this issue, our assessment is that there has not been any progress regarding START since the beginning of September.

Non-proliferation

Globally, on the one hand, despite progress in reducing nuclear weapon arsenals due to START, China, India, North Korea, Pakistan, and the UK are all thought to be increasing their nuclear inventory. On the other hand, there are no apparent signs of the spread of nuclear weapons to other states (horizontal proliferation).

However, Iran has been rolling back its adherence to its nuclear commitments under the JCPOA, significantly increasing its stock of enriched uranium and turning off monitoring cameras operated by IAEA. Despite the deterioration of the JCPOA, Iran remains a non-nuclear weapon state.


Source: CNN

Negotiations to bring Iran and the US back into the nuclear deal curbing Tehran's nuclear program in exchange for lifting sanctions continued to be in a “stalemate.” On 14 September, EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell told AFP that “the last proposals from the Iranians were not helping because we were almost there, then new proposals came, and the political environment is not the most propitious. I am sorry to say, but I do not expect any breakthrough in the next days.”

Meanwhile, on 9 September, North Korea passed a law declaring itself a nuclear weapons state, according to the state news agency KCNA.  The country's supreme leader Kim Jong-un called the decision "irreversible" and ruled out the possibility of any talks on denuclearisation.  He added, «as long as nuclear weapons exist on Earth, and imperialism and the anti-North Korean maneuvers of the US and its followers remain, our road to strengthening our nuclear force will never end.”

The law also enshrines the country's right to use a pre-emptive nuclear strike to protect itself. It updates a previous stance under which it had said it would keep its weapons only until other countries denuclearized and would not use them preemptively against non-nuclear states.

In addition, Russia blocked the 10th NPT Review Conference from reaching a consensus on a substantive outcome document on August 26 because of differences over the nuclear safety crisis caused by the Russian occupation of the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant in Ukraine. As a result, no significant new diplomatic progress on non-proliferation at the multilateral level has been tackled or achieved by the states.

Deterrence

Following Moscow’s February invasion of Ukraine, the US and its allies have responded with military aid to Ukraine, sanctions on the Russian economy, and reinforcements to NATO’s eastern flank. Until now, Russia’s nuclear deterrence has prevented the US and its allies from direct military intervention against Russia. However, nuclear threats are core to Russia’s military strategy, and there is a risk that Russian President Vladimir Putin might use nuclear weapons against Ukraine[2] to achieve its goals in the war. According to some US experts, this nuclear threat has only grown as Russian forces confront recent Ukrainian counteroffensives. In contrast, others believe that Putin will not use tactical nuclear weapons in Ukrainian territory because that would only escalate this conflict.

On 13 September, Rose Gottemoeller, a former deputy secretary general of NATO and Steven C. Házy Lecturer at Stanford University, told the BBC radio program Today that, in watching Russia’s recent military losses in Ukraine, she fears that Moscow "will strike back now in really unpredictable ways that may even involve" smaller tactical nuclear weapons against Ukraine. On September 16, in an interview at NPR, Gottemoeller reaffirmed this notion by arguing a nuclear scenario in which "detonating a single weapon over the Black Sea with the goal of terrorizing the Ukrainians and the rest of the world. «She added that another option "might be to use a nuclear weapon against a military facility inside Ukraine.»

In addition, Matthew Kroenig, the acting director of the Council’s Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security, sustained in a “memo” that Russian nuclear use in Ukraine is possible and would be detrimental to US interests. As such, he made a series of recommendations for US policy to prevent Russia from employing nuclear weapons in Ukraine, which includes "vague or explicit [deterrent] threats issued publicly or privately."

Conversely, other Western experts like Mary Glantz, a State Department fellow, believe that the Russian regime is not in danger and that there is "a lot of room for maneuver" before Putin escalates the war in Ukraine into a nuclear conflict. There is also the notion convened by many Central and Eastern European scholars, especially in social networks, that Russia will not use nuclear weapons against Ukraine because it would not be in the interest of Moscow to escalate the conflict into a nuclear war between Russia and NATO.

Our assessment is that a Russian attack with small nuclear weapons in Ukraine is unlikely but possible. According to our interpretation of the Russian military strategy, perhaps the red line(s) for Russia to use nuclear weapons in the Ukrainian territory would be Kyiv’s potential reconquest of Crimea (or parts of the Donbas region) or invasion of mainland Russia.

Disarmament

Globally, the overall inventory of nuclear weapons is declining, but the pace of reductions is slowing compared with the past 30 years. Moreover, these reductions are happening only because the US and Russia are still dismantling previously retired warheads. The trend is that the military stockpiles (useable nuclear weapons) are increasing again.

After the failure of the UN conference in producing the final document, nuclear disarmament advocates look to new strategies, but the divide between TPNW supporters and opponents continues. 

On 16 September, Conference on Disarmament in Geneva its 2022 session. Despite efforts by successive Presidents of the Conference, no agreement was reached on a program of work, an issue which has stalemated the Conference for more than two decades. 

As a result, the nuclear disarmament process will continue to be dangerously frozen, mutatis mutandis, at the multilateral level.

[1] In fact, the inspections have been paused since March 2020 due to the coronavirus pandemic, and they have not resumed ever since.

[2] Under the 1994 Budapest Memorandum Agreement, Ukraine (unlike other European non-nuclear weapon states) is not covered by security guarantees such as US extended nuclear deterrence.