International Network of Engineers and Scientists Against Proliferation

Bulletin 19 - Missile Defense and North-East Asia

US Missile Defenses and Non-Proliferation

Ye Ru'an

The US missile defenses (MD) have become a major focus in world politics, a dominant issue in international arms control, disarmament and non-proliferation, the biggest obstacle in US-Russian relations and a major cause for disagreement between China and the United States. Success or failure, the issue will not go away in many years to come.

A Brief Preview

Since former US President Bill Clinton signed the National Missile Defense Act into law in July 1999, it has exacerbated the national debate on the issue of missile defenses in the US and aroused serious international concerns about the international strategic balance. Based on its "four criteria" of threat assessment, technological feasibility, system cost and US arms control objectives, Clinton announced, shortly before the end of his term, the deferment of a decision on the deployment of the National Missile Defense (NMD) program. The Clinton Administration wanted to develop and deploy a limited defense shield to protect the United States while at the same time preserving the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty. But President Bush and his national security advisers have repeatedly declared the treaty a "Cold War relic" and that the US need to go beyond it in order to counter the "emerging missile threats" from the so-called "world's least-responsible states".

In his May 1, 2001 address at the National Defense University in Washington, Bush said that Russia was no longer an enemy of the United States, and that the US must protect its friends and allies from the most urgent threats that stem from the missiles in the hands of some of those states.

Later on he announced that the US would combine the NMD and Theater Missile Defense (TMD) programs into a global missile defense, with a view to alleviating opposition and suspicion of Russia and many of the US allies. For this purpose, he dispatched senior officials from the Defense (DoD) and State (DoS) Deparments to allied capitals and other interested states including Russia, China and India. Russia and China, however, have remained unswayed in their position against the US MD programs while some US allies have muted their opposition and expressed a measure of understanding. Most of the US allies in Europe and Asia have mixed feelings about the US missile defenses programs. They have different threat perceptions from the US. Politically, they need to show cohesion with the US, but at the same time are worried about the possibility of upsetting the international strategic balance between the major powers, which may harm their relations with Russia and China; they want to share benefits of possible technological breakthroughs or spin-off 's from MD programs, but are reluctant to waste money if the programs fail.

Despite opposition from all quarters, the Bush Administration has made unilateral decisions to accelerate the pace of MD research and development, to deploy an initial MD system as early as 2004-05 and to put up a broad-scale missile shield in a decade or more. The Administration requested a considerable increase of its MD budget for FY 2002, but there has not been much headway in the past year in MD technologies except a single hit-to-kill interception test last July.

Recent developments

As far as the MD issue is concerned, two major developments are noteworthy: firstly, the evolution of US-Russia consultations and negotiations on MD and the ABM Treaty characterized by numerous rounds of top-level talks between June and November. This included four Bush-Putin summits in Ljubljana, Genoa, Shanghai and Washington/Crawford and a scurry of mutual visits and consultations involving almost all top foreign policy and national security officials on both sides, moving in the direction of establishing a new bilateral strategic framework with a compromise solution to the deadlock over the MD/ABM issue. The US side seems to have somewhat changed its negotiating strategy. Earlier, Americans had been threatening to unilaterally withdraw from the ABM Treaty if the Russians refused to agree either to mutually withdraw from the treaty or to substantially amend it in a way that would permit the planned testing, development and deployment of the US MD.

Now, the Bush Administration is trying to persuade Putin to allow the US to proceed with its planned MD tests without declaring them as violating the treaty while preserving the ABM treaty intact. In this way, both sides can avoid the ratification of an amendment to the ABM Treaty in the US Senate and the Russian Duma. In exchange, Bush announced the US intention to reduce its operationally deployed strategic nuclear warheads down to a level of 1,800-2,200 over the next decade, which meets Mr. Putin's call (1,500 or less) half way. But the US prefers something of a unilateral declaration which even may not be on paper, rather than a verifiable, legally-binding START III Treaty, as indicated by Bush's National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice. However, at the joint press conference with Bush in the White House, Putin reaffirmed that "the position of Russia remains unchanged on the ABM Treaty" and rebutted that he preferred codifying the reductions in formal agreements, for "the world is far from having international relations based solely on trust."

If the two sides remain in the deadlock over the issue of MD/ABM in the next few months, what would the Bush Administration do with the construction of the new testing facilities in Alaska which the US side has admitted violates the ABM Treaty? And what would be the reaction of Russia and the international community in general?

Secondly, the September 11 terrorist attacks on New York and Washington, the ensuing war in Afghanistan and the US preoccupation with a protracted fight against terrorism on a global scale add to new complexities in the implementation of the US MD programs. It appears that for the moment and in the near future, countering terrorism is and will remain the top priority of the US national security policy, but that has not changed the Bush Administration's mind in pressing ahead with its MD plans. Bush emphasized that the "9.11." event has increased, not reduced, the need for the US to build a MD system.

The new Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR) Report by the DOD published on September 30, 2001 also stresses that "several (rogue) states are developing ballistic missile capabilities, supporting terrorism" and that "the pace and scale of recent ballistic missile proliferation has exceeded earlier intelligence estimates... and may grow at a faster pace than previously expected."

Counter-terrorism may be used to augment the arguments of both supporters for and opponents against missile defenses within the United States. As reported by the US press, the Republication Senate leaders recently sent a letter to President Bush, pressuring him to scrap the ABM Treaty, saying that "the United States cannot deploy MD unless and until it fully extricates itself from the ABM Treaty", whereas Democratic Party leaders urged Bush to give top priority to counter-terrorism, rather than building a missile shield, for they believe that MD, however sophisticated, could not prevent acts of terrorism. In view of this, it can be anticipated that the US domestic debate on MD will come to the fore again and may be even more contentious when the war in Afghanistan and the fight against terrorism are no longer on the front burner.

Moreover, the US efforts for counter-terrorism may extract a portion of the funding for the MD programs and cause more slips and delays in the test and development programs. It is not at all surprising that on October 25 the DOD announced the postponement of three upcoming MD tests.

Another important factor constraining US MD programs is that under the current circumstances, as it is imperative for the US to receive continued support and cooperation from Russia, China and other countries in rounding up the terrorists, the Administration has to care more about their concerns (opposition, suspicion or reservation) regarding MD. As a result, US officials now are no longer talking about eliminating the ABM Treaty. On his way to Moscow on November 2, Defense Secretary Rumsfeld told reporters that "we will deploy a missile defense, and that can be done with the treaty still in place".

Impact on arms control and non-proliferation regimes

Vigorous US efforts for missile defenses and their future deployment will have a broadranging negative impact on the international arms control and non-proliferation system.

a.    The ABM Treaty has severed as a foundation stone for preserving the international strategic balance over the past three decades, not only between the two nuclear superpowers, but also an asymmetric balance between them and the other nuclear weapons states. Unilateral deployment of MD systems in violation of the ABMTreaty will upset this balance and undermine cooperation and coordination among major powers in preventing the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.

b.    MD may touch off a new round of nuclear arms race. This race may not take the traditional form of a tip-for-tat, mirror-image numbers game, as was the case between the US and the former Soviet Union during the Cold War, but might be an asymmetric qualitative competition in offensive versus defensive weapons. No matter how often the US reassures Russia and China that the US MD is targeted against "rogue states", Russia and China would inevitably take whatever countermeasures they deem necessary to retain the viability and effectiveness of their own nuclear arsenals.

c.    To develop missile defense systems that are designed to intercept strategic offensive missiles, the US would have to use its military assets in outer space and deploy space-based MD components. This will inevitably initiate a new race in the weaponization of outer space. All states with space capabilities would have to do everything within their capacity to ensure the safety of their military assets and the security of their countries.

d.    The US MD, if effectively deployed, would not check but rather spur the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and their delivery means. With MD in place, the US might feel safer from the emerging missile threat from so-called "rogue states". But as far as the latter are concerned, an antagonistic United States with sophisticated ballistic missiles and MD and preponderant conventional military might is far more threatening to them. It is their legitimate right to take whatever measures they deem necessary to ensure their own national security. If the United States should create a precedent by unilaterally withdrawing from the ABM Treaty, other countries may also quit other arms control agreements and treaties such as the NPT for the sake of preserving their supreme national interests. In that case, the foundation of the existing international arms control and non-proliferation regimes would collapse.

e.    One has already seen the negative impact of US MD on the disarmament negotiations in Geneva (Conference on Disarmament). It is an undeniable fact that US NMD is one of the major causes for the impasse of the world's sole disarmament negotiating body for the last few years. If the US does not change its course in its MD plans in particular and its unilateral approach to the international arms control regimes in general, the Conference on Disarmament will remain dormant in disarmament winters.

Conclusion

The issue of US MD will remain the biggest challenge and obstacle to the international arms control and non-proliferation process in the years to come, at least during the Bush Presidency. The United States would not scrap all existing international arms control treaties, agreements and conventions, but it is taking a utilitarian and selective approach to international arms control accords and provisions by preserving or adhering to those still useful to control and restrain other countries while trying to get rid of some of the constraints on itself at the expense of other countries. International cooperation will be more difficult in arms control and non-proliferation in the foreseeable future...

This paper was written for the conference "Moving Beyond Missile Defense" in Shanghai on Nov. 30/Dec. 1 2001.

Ye Ru'an is Vice President and Secretary General of The China ArmsControl and Disarmament Association; 3 Toutiao, Taijichang, Beijing 10005, China; tel. [+86] (10) 65 28 79 43; E-mail: ruanye39@yahoo.com.