Among the big changes in the global strategic landscape since the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty came into force in 1970 is the expansion of the nuclear club from five to nine. All five nuclear powers at that time were recognised as nuclear-weapon states by the NPT. Since then, four more countries have gate-crashed the exclusive nuclear club: Israel, India, Pakistan and North Korea.

The first three have been de facto nuclear-armed states for decades, and North Korea conducted its first nuclear test in 2006. But because of an Alice-in-Wonderland definition in the treaty—nuclear-weapon states are countries that nuclear-tested before 1 January 1967—they can’t be recognised as nuclear-weapon states. The legal straitjacket means the NPT can’t function as the normative framework for the nuclear policies of four of the world’s nine nuclear-armed states: a triumph of definitional purity over strategic reality.

The NPT is supplemented by several other treaties and arrangements that together constitute the broader non-proliferation regime. All are designed to reinforce the NPT standards. On the one hand, part of the NPT bargain is to help non-nuclear-weapon states in the peaceful applications of nuclear energy. On the other, the treaty prohibits any form of assistance to non-nuclear states in getting the bomb. Accordingly, assistance with peaceful applications of nuclear energy is subject to safeguards, and increasingly stringent export controls were instituted to eliminate the risk of nuclear trade being diverted into weapons programs.

There are four key arms control export arrangements. India’s 1974 nuclear test showed that reliance on the good faith of a recipient of nuclear assistance was misplaced. In response, the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) was established in 1975 to tighten export procedures for sensitive nuclear materials and technology. The Australia Group was founded in 1985 as an informal forum for the harmonisation of export controls on proliferation-sensitive chemical and biological materials. The 1987 Missile Technology Control Regime targets missile and drone technology. And the 1996 Wassenaar Arrangement is a voluntary regime covering the export of conventional arms and dual-use technologies to problematic states and nonstate groups.

For 30 years, India was the most prominent critic of the NPT for having institutionalised nuclear apartheid and it denounced the export control arrangements as technology-denial regimes and supplier cartels. After the 1998 nuclear tests, India became a self-declared nuclear-weapon-possessing state. With uncharacteristic strategic realism, it calculated that the US was the only country that mattered in breaking out of the punitive measures imposed to curtail its nuclear ambitions. Once Washington relented, others would grudgingly follow and a pathway would open for India to integrate into the global nuclear order.

Sure enough, after the negotiation of a US–India civil nuclear agreement in 2008, India-specific exemptions followed from the International Atomic Energy Agency, the NSG and also many bilateral deals with other countries, including Australia.

India’s next target in the quest to normalise its global nuclear status was membership of the four export control regimes. India believes it is well qualified for all four given its firm commitment to non-proliferation, effective export controls and capacity to produce regime-regulated goods and technologies. Initially India sought entry into all four regimes as a package, but then diplomatic sense prevailed and India was accepted into the Missile Technology Control Regime, the Wassenaar Arrangement and the Australia Group over 2016–2018.

Negotiations for NSG membership, however, have proven protracted and contentious. The NSG members are divided—some strongly oppose admitting non-NPT countries; others demand stringent non-proliferation commitments as the price of membership; a third group wants to prioritise the development of technical and legal criteria before evaluating candidate countries’ applications against non-discriminatory criteria; and for the rest, the chief criterion is geopolitics.

As with any club, one could make a functionalist argument: all countries that are essential or relevant for realising the goals and implementing the purposes of a grouping should be members. The Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty took this to an extreme in making the treaty’s entry into force conditional on every relevant country becoming a party, a uniquely self-destructive provision that has left it in a legal limbo. From this perspective, all existing and potential supplier states should be encouraged to join the NSG. Their participation would add legitimacy, promote information-sharing and best-practice exchange, and dampen incentives for illicit trade.

An alternative approach is to caution against rewarding rogue behaviour that should be punished. The rules-based global nuclear order can only be further damaged by opening the doors of the NSG to the very countries whose norm-defying actions led to its creation in the first place. If India does become a member of the NSG that was set up to check its nuclear ambitions, this will prove that history does irony.

The third pathway is to accept that sovereign states are fully within their rights to reject treaties they believe circumscribe their national security options. What is important instead is their actual non-proliferation behaviour: is it consistent with the norms of a responsible nuclear power? This argument is deployed by India’s advocates and backers to differentiate it from Pakistan.

However, putting aside the historical legacy of the notorious A.Q. Khan network, the recent non-proliferation records of India and Pakistan are broadly comparable. As Pakistan gets most of its nuclear supplies from China, its primary motivation in seeking NSG membership is related not to commercial considerations but status: parity with India. Because Pakistan can’t offer the lure of a nuclear market, others are less interested in backing its bid but instead oppose it based on lingering concerns over stability, volatility and state-sponsored jihadism.

Many would prefer a criteria-based decision rather than make yet another exception for India as a de facto US security partner in the China containment strategy. Unfortunately, the NSG’s politicisation means countries—applicants, backers and opponents—put a greater premium on its status value than its functional goals. In practice, the most common criterion has been bilateral relations based on geopolitical calculations.

But in truth, the push for and receptivity to India’s membership have been driven largely by India’s growing salience as an international actor. India’s rising global profile and diplomatic weight gave Washington some but not sufficient leverage in the campaign for NSG membership. But this means China, which is also Pakistan’s nuclear patron, remains opposed to India’s application and the consensus requirement has enabled China to derail India’s bid.

The NSG has taken the predictable path of caution to defer a final decision. No movement is likely until after this year’s NPT review conference from 27 April to 22 May. Meanwhile, a stalled economy will continue to weaken India’s candidacy.

In this three-part series, I examine the counter-arguments that proponents of Australia obtaining nuclear weapons need to address before the nation contemplates such a move.

A heavyweight trio of Australia’s strategic and defence policy analysts has opened a debate on the possibility of Australia acquiring nuclear weapons. Paul Dibb and Richard Brabin-Smith documented the increased strategic risk to Australia based on a critical assessment of China’s capabilities, motives and intent.

Paul took that further in The Australian, canvassing the idea of investing in capabilities that would reduce the lead time for getting the bomb to give us more options for dealing with growing strategic uncertainty. North Korea’s nuclear advances and diminishing confidence in the dependability of US extended nuclear deterrence add to the sense of strategic unease.

Andrew Davies inferred Hugh White’s support for the idea and implied that both Paul and Hugh had been too coy to take their analyses to the logical conclusion. Hugh has been the preeminent Australian analyst advocating an independent recalibration of our position vis‑à‑vis the China–US tussle for strategic primacy in the Asia–Pacific.

In reply, Hugh politely, gently but firmly rejected the implication that he’s a closet supporter of Australia taking the nuclear weapon path. He neither advocates nor predicts that Australia should or will go nuclear. He professes uncertainty about the role of nuclear weapons in shaping Asia’s emerging strategic landscape, highlights the importance of getting the decisions right on conventional capabilities first, and points to the choices and trade-offs that would then have to be made between the security benefits and risks of a weaponised nuclear capability.

Who will call out the nuclear emperor for being naked? Nuclear weapons haven’t been used since 1945—Hiroshima was the first time and Nagasaki the last. Their very destructiveness makes them qualitatively different in political and moral terms, to the point of rendering them unusable. A calculated use of the bomb is less likely than one resulting from system malfunction, faulty information or rogue launch.

On the other hand, the non-trivial risks of inadvertent use mean that the world’s very existence is hostage to indefinite continuance of the same good fortune that has ensured no use since 1945.

Curiously, Hugh, Paul and Andrew don’t explore the roles that nuclear weapons might play, the functions they would perform, and the circumstances and conditions in which those roles and functions would prove effective. This is a crucial omission. The arguments I canvassed in a review of the illusory gains and lasting insecurities of India’s nuclear weapon acquisition apply with equal force to Australia, albeit with appropriate modifications for our circumstances.

In short, the nuclear equation just does not compute for Australia.

Consistent with the moral taint associated with the bomb, the most common justification for getting or keeping nuclear weapons isn’t that we’d want to use them against anyone else. We’d only want them either to avert nuclear blackmail or to deter an attack. Neither of those arguments holds up against the historical record or in logic.

The belief in the coercive utility of nuclear weapons is widely internalised, owing in no small measure to Japan’s surrender immediately after Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Yet the evidence is surprisingly clear that the close chronology is a coincidence. In Japanese decision-makers’ minds, the decisive factor in their unconditional surrender was the entry of the Soviet Union into the Pacific war against Japan’s essentially undefended northern approaches, and the fear that the Soviets would be the occupying power unless Japan surrendered to the US first. Hiroshima was bombed on 6 August 1945, Nagasaki on 9 August. Moscow broke its neutrality pact to attack Japan on 9 August and Tokyo announced the surrender on 15 August.

There’s been no clear-cut instance since then of a non-nuclear state having been bullied into changing its behaviour by the overt or implicit threat of being bombed by nuclear weapons.

The normative taboo against the most indiscriminately inhumane weapon ever invented is so comprehensive and robust that under no conceivable circumstances will its use against a non-nuclear state compensate for the political costs. That’s why nuclear powers have accepted defeat at the hands of non-nuclear states (for example, Vietnam and Afghanistan) rather than escalate armed conflict to the nuclear level. Non-nuclear Argentina even invaded the Falkland Islands in 1982 despite Britain’s nuclear arsenal.

Australia’s nuclear breakout would also guarantee the collapse of the NPT order and lead to a cascade of proliferation. Each additional entrant into the nuclear club multiplies the risk of inadvertent war geometrically. That threat would vastly exceed the dubious and marginal security gains of possession. The contemporary risks of proliferation to, and use by, irresponsible states in volatile conflict-prone regions, or even by suicide terrorists, outweigh realistic security benefits. A more rational and prudent approach to reducing nuclear risks to Australia would be to actively advocate and pursue the minimisation, reduction and elimination agendas for the short, medium and long terms identified in the Report of the International Commission on Nuclear Non-Proliferation and Disarmament—an Australian initiative that was co-chaired by distinguished former Australian and Japanese foreign ministers.

Ramesh Thakur presents a strong case for challenging the Trump administration’s decision not to recertify the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA). I’m in broad agreement with the points that he makes. His concluding thought about removing the requirement for recertification suggests a good path forward out of a potential disaster in which the US faces not only an aggressive and unpredictable nuclear-armed North Korea, but an Iran slipping back towards nuclear ambitions.

However, Ramesh’s fifth and sixth justifications for opposing President Trump’s stance in fact highlight critical weaknesses with the JCPOA, and expose the reality that it’s based on a strategy of hope. He states: ‘The JCPOA brought a 15-year respite from the threat of an Iranian bomb. The focus in this grace period should be to ensure Tehran’s full implementation and to change its incentive structure against nuclear weaponisation’, and he then notes that ‘The JCPOA gives political cover to moderates in Iran. An Iran re-engaged with the international community will reinvigorate a growing middle class and could give ballast to moderation and stability in Iran and the Middle East.’

The key challenge is how to achieve those goals. The main risk with the JCPOA is that it ‘sunsets’ in the 2026–2031 period—a mere 10 to 15 years from now. At that point, most restrictions are lifted (though IAEA monitoring will continue for an additional period), which means that Iran could, if it chose to do so, resume its path towards nuclear weapons acquisition. Iran can also exploit the letter of the agreement to make progress in key areas such as centrifuge technology, accelerating a breakout when the time is right. A legitimate question to ask is whether Iran may circumvent the JCPOA over time.

It’s also important to note that, in the interim, Iran will have benefited from the restoration of billions of dollars in funds previously withheld through sanctions, and it would be free in 2020 to begin acquiring advanced military capabilities and in 2023 to develop long-range ballistic missiles. That would imply an Iran that is militarily strong with advanced long-range weapon systems by the middle of the next decade.

Certainly the JCPOA buys the world time. Without it, Iran would rush to a nuclear-weapon capability now, as Ramesh notes. His analysis of US choices in that scenario—either accept Iran as a nuclear weapons state or go to war—is convincing. But lifting sanctions against Iran under the JCPOA doesn’t guarantee that a future Iranian regime won’t decide to pursue nuclear capabilities once the deal sunsets.

Furthermore, there’s no evidence that the Iranian state will shift its broad foreign policy objectives in a direction that’s more focused on cooperation and engagement with the region, and with the broader international community, and in doing so, preclude a perceived need for Iranian nuclear weapons in the future. Iran has demonstrated a willingness to intervene in conflicts in Iraq, Lebanon, Syria and Yemen to assert its influence along two corridors to the Mediterranean Sea. Iran also poses a direct challenge to Arab Gulf states and, of course, to Israel.

The deal, as it stands, is probably the best option at the moment to prevent an Iranian nuclear weapon in the next 15 years, but it shouldn’t be seen as a panacea to all the challenges posed by Iran, and it most certainly doesn’t prevent a future Iranian regime from emulating North Korea’s actions to test the resolve of the US and its partner. The North Koreans withdrew from the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty in 2003, after almost 10 years of supposed arms control cooperation under the 1994 Agreed Framework.

The way to avoid history repeating itself is to ensure that Iran is made aware of the costs of such a breakout through a mix of dissuasion and deterrence. In terms of dissuasion, inducements provided through careful economic and diplomatic engagement need to be complemented by a US–EU agreement for effective coordination in rapidly imposing sanctions in the event of an Iranian nuclear breakout. Military cooperation between NATO and the Gulf Cooperation Council could help to counter-balance Iran’s growing influence. Establishing deterrence by denial through NATO and regional ballistic missile defence system needs to be a priority. Existing sea- and land-based missile systems such as the European Phased Adaptive Approach employing systems like Aegis Ashore would make it more difficult for a future nuclear-armed Iran to coerce its neighbours. Missile defence also needs to be supported by non-nuclear prompt-strike capabilities that could threaten Iranian ballistic missiles potentially carrying nuclear or other warheads. New technologies such as hypersonic cruise missiles would fit that role nicely, and are likely to be emerging as possible options by the mid- to late 2020s. Finally, the US, UK and France need to think about the role nuclear deterrence can play in discouraging an Iranian nuclear breakout.

The objective shouldn’t be to replace the JCPOA but to mitigate risks after the Iran deal sunsets in the next decade, and to make an Iranian nuclear breakout at that time an unappealing and costly option for Tehran. This approach of generating greater cost for Iran if it chooses to challenge nuclear non-proliferation must be matched at the same time by political and economic inducements that help moderates in Iranian politics reinforce their power.

On the same day that the third and near-final draft of the text of the UN’s new Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons was released, North Korea tested its latest missile, boasting it had achieved intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) capability that brings Alaska within its range. Foreign Minister Julie Bishop joined world leaders in strongly criticising Pyongyang for defying international condemnation of its nuclear and missile program. Yet Australia has boycotted the UN talks, currently the world’s only efforts actually to promote nuclear disarmament. Given that, how much credibility and moral authority does Bishop’s criticism of North Korea have?

Reflecting the widespread dismissive attitude of the nuclear weapon states and allies sheltering under the US nuclear umbrella, Rod Lyon writes that ‘the ban treaty probably won’t remove a single nuclear weapon from the face of the earth’. The recalcitrant states have boycotted the UN ban conference on two grounds: the appropriate global normative framework for regulating nuclear weapons is the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty (NPT) and the mandated multilateral disarmament machinery is the Conference on Disarmament.

Newsflash: The Conference has not been able to agree on its own agenda for 20 years and the NPT has never eliminated a single warhead. After 49 years of existence, and 21 years after the World Court unanimously advised that under Article VI all NPT states parties have an obligation to engage in and bring to a conclusion good-faith negotiations on nuclear disarmament, the NPT count on elimination or a disarmament treaty is zero. The UN talks produced an agreed treaty within just one month of negotiations.

The state of nuclear arms control in 2017 shows three storylines:

• No negotiations on arms control are currently being conducted between any of the nine countries that collectively possess 15,000 nuclear weapons (China, France, India, Israel, North Korea, Pakistan, Russia, the UK and the US).
• The Preparatory Committee process for the 2020 NPT Review Conference began with the first committee in Vienna on 2–12 May.
• The UN-mandated conference to negotiate a legally binding instrument to prohibit nuclear weapons met in New York on 27–31 March and 15 June–7 July. The final text was adopted on 7 July by 122 states. It prohibits the acquisition, development, production, manufacture, possession, transfer, receipt, testing, hosting, use and threat of use of nuclear weapons. The treaty is the most significant multilateral development on nuclear arms control in two decades, if not since the NPT itself in 1968.

The sobering first proposition effectively delegitimised the NPT as the dominant normative framework for nuclear arms control. The third proposition is the inevitable result of this disillusionment of the majority of the international community.

Against the twin backdrop of the receding nuclear arms control and disarmament tide and elevated nuclear threat levels, many countries concluded that fresh out-of-the-box efforts were needed by those who neither possessed nuclear weapons nor required the security of extended nuclear deterrence provided by the US. The normative prop for the new initiative was humanitarian principles. The majority of states have reclaimed nuclear agency and were determined to proclaim a more powerful and unambiguous prohibition norm.

The main impact of the UN nuclear ban treaty will be to reshape the global normative context: the prevailing cluster of laws (international, humanitarian, human rights), norms, rules, practices and discourse that shape how we think about and act in relation to nuclear weapons. Stigmatisation implies illegitimacy of a practice based on the collective moral revulsion of a community.

The foreseeable effects of use makes the doctrine of deterrence and the possession of nuclear weapons morally unacceptable to the community at large. Criticism of the treaty as ineffective in eliminating warheads, lacking credibility and impractical is therefore fundamentally misconceived: it confuses the normative impact of a prohibition treaty with the operational results of a full-fledged nuclear weapon convention.

The nuclear disarmament policy goals can be summarised as delegitimise, prohibit, cap, reduce, eliminate. In this five-part agenda, only those with nuclear weapons can undertake the last three tasks. But the rest—the vast majority of the international community—can pursue the first (delegitimisation) and second (prohibition) goals on their own, both as an affirmation of global norms and as one of the few means of exerting pressure on the possessor states to pursue the other three goals.

In this effort at stigmatisation, the ban treaty will draw on the UN’s long-recognised unique role as the sole custodian and dispenser of collective international legitimacy. By changing the prevailing normative structure, it will shift the balance of costs and benefits of possession, deterrence doctrines and deployment practices, and create a deepening crisis of legitimacy.

Stigmatisation and prohibition are the necessary—not sufficient, but necessary—precursors to elimination. The conference was mandated by the General Assembly explicitly to negotiate a prohibition treaty leading to the eventual elimination of nuclear weapons. The boycotting states engaged in a petulant defiance of a duly constituted and UN-mandated multilateral conference and thereby defied the international community and disrespected two-thirds of the NPT membership. Going by the experience of the Chemical Weapons Convention and previous efforts at dismantling nuclear weapons stockpiles, the safe, secure, verified and irreversible decommissioning, dismantlement and destruction of all bombs following a nuclear weapon convention could take between one and two decades.

Just like the nuclear-armed and umbrella states, in the end even Rod Lyon confesses to believing in abolition, but only as ‘the ultimate goal’. It calls to mind St Augustine’s prayer: ‘Lord, make me chaste. But not just yet.’