The full text of Barack Obama’s remarks here says (emphasis mine): “We will not pursue unilateral disarmament. As long as nuclear weapons exist, we’ll retain a strong nuclear deterrent. But we’ll keep our commitment under the Nuclear Non Proliferation Treaty on the long road towards eliminating nuclear weapons. We’ll work with Russia to take U.S. and Russian ballistic missiles off hair-trigger alert, and to dramatically reduce the stockpiles of our nuclear weapons and material. We’ll start by seeking a global ban on the production of fissile material for weapons. And we’ll set a goal to expand the U.S.-Russian ban on intermediate-range missiles so that the agreement is global.”
The problem is that the focus of the NPT has already been one of preventing the production of fissile material for weapons. That is precisely what international pressure has trying to achieve with Iran with so little success to date. If the international community, led by nuclear-armed states cannot now compel Iran not to produce fissile material under the current NPT how can plans be laid to enforce the ban on fissile materials with the current great powers substantially disarmed? If you cannot do it while you are strong why should you succeed when you are weak? One must ask whether the prohibition of fissile materials production is better achieved by an America wielding a big stick or one in which it has put down the stick and hopes others will follow by example.
Finally, the reason current US arsenals depend on a Triad (bomber, land missile, submarine missile) is to ensure that the nation’s retaliatory power cannot be taken out in a few hits. And as weapons numbers decrease (as Obama plans) an element of instability will eventually creep into the deterrence. Care must be taken so that all weapons holdings go down together, otherwise someone may hold back until US weapons numbers are low enough to “go for it”.
None of this is to say that removing nuclear weapons from the world is necessarily a bad idea, but it can lead in certain circumstances, to a more dangerous world, not a safer one.
