STRATEGIC STABILITY IN EUROPE

Abstract

This article offers a survey of risks that might arise for strategic stability (defined as a situation with a low probability of major-power war) with the reduction of US and Russian nuclear arsenals to “low numbers” (defined as 1,000 or fewer nuclear weapons on each side). These risks might include US anti-cities targeting strategies that are harmful to the credibility of extended deterrence; renewed European anxiety about a US-Russian condominium; greater vulnerability to Russian noncompliance with agreed obligations; incentives to adopt destabilizing “launch-on-warning” strategies; a potential stimulus to nuclear proliferation; perceptions of a US disengagement from extended deterrence; increased likelihood of non-nuclear arms competitions and conflicts; and controversial pressures on the UK and French nuclear forces. Observers in North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) states who consider such risks significant have cited four possible measures that might help to contain them: sustained basing of US nonstrategic nuclear weapons in Europe; maintaining a balanced US strategic nuclear force posture; high-readiness means to reconstitute US nuclear forces; and enhanced US and allied non-nuclear military capabilities. These concrete measures might complement the consultations with the NATO allies that the United States would in all likelihood seek with respect to such important adjustments in its deterrence and defense posture.

Keywords:

• United States
• Russia
• NATO
• deterrence
• nuclear disarmament
• nuclear weapons
• New START
• strategic stability

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

The views expressed in this article are solely those of the author and do not represent those of the US Naval Postgraduate School, the Department of the Navy, or the Department of Defense. This research was conducted under the auspices of a project supported by the Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA) and the Project on Advanced Systems and Concepts for Combatting WMD (PASCC) at the US Naval Postgraduate School. Thanks are owed to those who commented on earlier drafts of this article, particularly Frank Dellermann, James Clay Moltz, Joseph Pilat, Michael Rühle, Diego Ruiz Palmer, and Paul Schulte.

Notes

1. For the sake of brevity, in this article, the term “extended deterrence” is often employed to cover both deterrence of adversaries and assurance of allies and partners. These are related but distinct objectives, and their requirements may differ.

2. Department of Defense, Sustaining US Global Leadership: Priorities for 21st Century Defense, January 5, 2012, p. 5.

3. Robert Burns, “US Weighing Steep Nuclear Arms Cuts,” Washington Times, February 14, 2012, <www.washingtontimes.com/news/2012/feb/14/us-weighing-steep-nuclear-arms-cuts/?page=all>. It is apparently the intention in these analyses to focus on total numbers—that is, deployed and non-deployed weapons and strategic and nonstrategic weapons.

4. Paul K. Davis, Structuring Analysis to Support Future Decisions About Nuclear Forces and Postures, WR-878-OSD (Santa Monica, California: RAND Corporation, September 2011), p. 18.

5. James Wood Forsyth, Jr., B. Chance Saltzman, and Gary Schaub, Jr., “Remembrance of Things Past: The Enduring Value of Nuclear Weapons,” Strategic Studies Quarterly 4 (Spring 2010), p. 82.

6. Rose Gottemoeller, “21st Century Deterrence Challenges,” US Strategic Command 2011 Deterrence Symposium, Omaha, Nebraska, August 4, 2011, <www.state.gov/t/avc/rls/169545.htm>.

7. Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, “The New START Treaty in the Global Security Matrix: The Political Dimension,” Mezhdunarodnaya Zhizn, No. 7, July 2010 <www.mid.ru/brp_4.nsf/e78a48070f128a7b43256999005bcbb3/25909cfe1bbd1c6ec325777500339245?OpenDocument>.

8. DOD News Briefing on Missile Defense by Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel; James Miller, Undersecretary for Policy, Department Of Defense; Admiral James Winnefeld, Vice Chairman, Joint Chiefs Of Staff, March 15, 2013, <http://www.defense.gov/transcripts/transcript.aspx?transcriptid=5205>.

9. Reuters, “Russia Says U.S. Talks Produced No Progress On Missiles,” April 19, 2013, <www.reuters.com/article/2013/04/19/us-russia-usa-idUSBRE93I0Y820130419>; and Reuters, “Russia studying U.S. missile defense moves, still seeks guarantees,” April 23, 2013, <www.reuters.com/article/2013/04/23/us-russia-usa-missiledefence-idUSBRE93M0SF20130423>.

10. The question of how to define low numbers remains contentious, including whether specific numbers refer to operationally deployed strategic nuclear weapons or to the entire stockpile. The definition of 1,000 or fewer was suggested by the study project leader, James Clay Moltz.

11. David S. Yost, Strategic Stability in the Cold War: Lessons for Continuing Challenges, Proliferation Paper No. 36 (Paris: Institut Français des Relations Internationales, Winter 2011), <www.ifri.org/downloads/pp36yost.pdf>.

12. The author made a presentation on this topic at the Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik (SWP) in Berlin on June 18, 2012, and this elicited views in a group discussion on the basis of the Chatham House Rule. The author also met with individual experts in Ankara, Berlin, Brussels, London, Paris, Rome, and Warsaw in June and July 2012. These discussions were conducted on a non-attribution “background” basis with a view to gaining insights beyond the officially stated positions of the alliance and allied governments. These discussions did not constitute a poll or systematic opinion survey. The views expressed represented personal judgments, not national or organizational policies. The author's interlocutors consisted of experts at universities, research institutes, and other organizations—governmental and nongovernmental—that take an interest in international security. The author discussed “low numbers” issues with twelve interlocutors in Ankara, eleven in Berlin (not counting those at the SWP discussion), seventeen in Brussels (from various NATO European nations), eight in London, twelve in Paris, twelve in Rome (including one Frenchman and one Briton), and twelve in Warsaw.

13. The North Atlantic Treaty was signed on April 4, 1949. A few days before the signing ceremony, Winston Churchill said that, “It is certain that Europe would have been Communized, like Czechoslovakia, and London under bombardment some time ago but for the deterrent of the atomic bomb in the hands of the United States.” Churchill speech on March 31, 1949, in Robert Rhodes James, ed., Winston S. Churchill, His Complete Speeches, 1897–1963, Vol. VII (New York and London: Chelsea House Publishers in association with R. R. Bowker Company, 1974), p. 7,809.

14. The UK and French contributions to NATO's overall deterrence posture involve a huge array of issues that cannot be examined properly here.

15. According to an official report, “European-based theatre nuclear forces provide an essential linkage between conventional and [US] strategic forces. Seven Alliance members (Belgium, Germany, Greece, Italy, the Netherlands, Turkey and the United Kingdom) participate directly in this aspect of the Alliance's nuclear role and share the ensuing political and financial costs by the provision of delivery systems (aircraft, missiles or artillery) for United States nuclear warheads and by the provision of host nation facilities for United States nuclear capable forces.” Enhancing Alliance Collective Security: Shared Roles, Risks and Responsibilities in the Alliance, A Report by NATO's Defence Planning Committee, December 1988, para. 36. President George H. W. Bush announced in September 1991 that the United States would withdraw and eliminate the nuclear warheads for artillery shells and missiles. US air-delivered nuclear weapons have remained in Europe, albeit in substantially reduced numbers.

16. Paul M. Cole, Sweden Without the Bomb: The Conduct of a Nuclear-Capable Nation Without Nuclear Weapons (Santa Monica, California: The Rand Corporation, 1994), p. 170.

17. Federal Republic of Germany, Statement on signing the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, November 28, 1969.

18. Italian Government, Statement on signing the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, January 28, 1969.

19. DC 6/1, “Strategic Concept for the Defense of the North Atlantic Area,” approved by the North Atlantic Defense Committee on December 1, 1949, in Gregory W. Pedlow, ed., NATO Strategy Documents 1949–1969 (Brussels: NATO Information Service, 1997), p. 5, para. 7a. See also Pedlow, “The Evolution of NATO Strategy, 1949–1969,” in ibid., pp. xii–xiii.

20. North Atlantic Council, Strategic Concept, November 19, 2010, para. 17.

21. North Atlantic Council, Strategic Concept, November 19, 2010, para. 18. This statement repeated an almost identical statement in the alliance's Strategic Concepts of November 7, 1991 (para. 54) and April 24, 1999 (para. 62). The 1991 and 1999 statements paraphrased the 1974 Ottawa Declaration on Alliance Relations, which noted that two of the European allies “possess nuclear forces capable of playing a deterrent role of their own contributing to the overall strengthening of the deterrence of the Alliance.” North Atlantic Council, Declaration on Atlantic Relations, Ottawa, June 19, 1974, para. 6.

22. Nicolas Sarkozy, President of the French Republic, speech at Cherbourg, March 21, 2008, <www.diplomatie.gouv.fr/en/IMG/pdf/Speech_by_Nicolas_Sarkozy__presentation_of_Le_Terrible_submarine.pdf>.

23. William Hague, Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, in House of Commons Official Report: Parliamentary Debates (Hansard), Vol. 510, No. 6, May 26, 2010, column 181.

24. Securing Britain in an Age of Uncertainty: The Strategic Defence and Security Review, Cm 7948, Presented to Parliament by the Prime Minister by Command of Her Majesty (London: The Stationery Office, October 2010), para. 3.11, pp. 38–39.

25. US Department of Defense, “Fact Sheet: Increasing Transparency in the US Nuclear Weapons Stockpile,” May 3, 2010.

26. US Department of State, Bureau of Arms Control, Verification and Compliance, “2011 Annual Report on Implementation of the Moscow Treaty,” June 2, 2011.

27. US Department of State, Bureau of Arms Control, Verification and Compliance, “Fact Sheet, New START Treaty Aggregate Numbers of Strategic Offensive Arms,” June 1, 2011.

28. Anatoly Serdyukov quoted in Vladimir Isachenkov, “Russia's upper house unanimously OKs New START,” The Guardian, January 26, 2011, <www.guardian.co.uk/world/feedarticle/9469693>.

29. Treaty Between the United States of America and the Russian Federation on Measures for the Further Reduction and Limitation of Strategic Offensive Arms, Prague, April 8, 2010, Article III, para. 2.

30. Pavel Podvig, “The New START bomber count and upload potential,” March 31, 2010, <http://russianforces.org/blog/2010/03/the_new_start_bomber_count_and.shtml>.

31. Statement of Hon. Rose Gottemoeller, The New START Treaty (Treaty Doc 111-5), Hearings Before the Committee on Foreign Relations, United States Senate, 111th Cong., 2nd sess., April 29, May 18, 19, 25, June 10, 15, 16, 24, and July 15, 2010 (Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office, 2010), p. 218.

32. Kristensen quoted in Peter Baker, “Arms Control May Be Different on Paper and on the Ground,” New York Times, March 30, 2010, <www.nytimes.com/2010/03/31/world/europe/31start.html>.

33. Hans M. Kristensen and Robert S. Norris, “US nuclear forces, 2012,” Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists 68 (May/June 2012), p. 90, <http://bos.sagepub.com/content/68/3/84>.

34. William J. Perry and James R. Schlesinger, America's Strategic Posture: The Final Report of the Congressional Commission on the Strategic Posture of the United States, (Washington, DC: United States Institute of Peace Press, 2009), p. 13.

35. Statement of James N. Miller, Principal Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Policy before the House Committee on Armed Services, November 2, 2011, p. 1.

36. Nicolas Sarkozy, President of the French Republic, speech at Cherbourg, March 21, 2008.

37. David S. Yost, “France's New Nuclear Doctrine,” International Affairs 82 (July 2006), pp. 701–21.

38. North Atlantic Council, “Deterrence and Defence Posture Review,” May 20, 2012, para. 26 and 27.

39. Roger N. McDermott, Russia's Conventional Military Weakness and Substrategic Nuclear Policy (Fort Leavenworth, Kansas: US Army, Foreign Military Studies Office, July 2011).

40. Russians use the term “de-escalation” to refer to an initial use of nuclear weapons with a view to conflict-termination after the failure of conventional military operations. This terminology differs from that in the United States and other NATO states, which regard the initial use of nuclear weapons as an act of escalation.

41. Stefan Forss, Russian Military Thinking and Threat Perception: A Finnish View, CERI Strategy Papers No. 5 (Paris: Centre d’Études et de Recherches Internationales, November 13, 2009); and Carolina Vendil Pallin, ed., Russian Military Capability in a Ten-Year Perspective—2011, FOI-R-3474-SE (Stockholm: Swedish Defence Research Agency, August 2012).

42. The lower numbers envisaged in the DTRA/PASCC proposal that supported the preparation of this paper were 1,000, 500, and 100.

43. North Atlantic Council, “Deterrence and Defence Posture Review,” May 20, 2012, para. 26.

44. An expert Italian observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, Rome, June 25, 2012.

45. An expert German observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, Berlin, June 19, 2012.

46. An expert German observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, Berlin, June 18, 2012.

47. An expert Italian observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, Rome, June 21, 2012.

48. An expert German observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, Berlin, June 19, 2012.

49. An expert German observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, Berlin, June 19, 2012. An American reviewer of this paper wrote that many West Germans saw an “existential legitimacy” in US nuclear weapons during the Cold War as a means of deterrence and war-prevention. He added, “That legitimacy has been greatly eroded since 3 October 1990”—that is, since the reunification of Germany. Public perceptions of threats requiring nuclear weapons to deter seem to have radically declined in Germany since the end of the Cold War.

50. An expert French observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, Paris, July 9, 2012.

51. Mark Leonard and Nicu Popescu, A Power Audit of EU-Russia Relations (London: European Council on Foreign Relations, 2007), p. 2.

52. Constanze Stelzenmüller, “Germany's Russia Question,” Foreign Affairs 88 (March/April 2009), p. 96.

53. Forsyth, Saltzman, and Schaub, “Remembrance,” pp. 82, 87 (note 22).

54. James R. Schlesinger, quoted in Gordon S. Barrass, The Great Cold War: A Journey Through the Hall of Mirrors (Stanford, California: Stanford University Press, 2009), p. 181.

55. Walter Slocombe, “The Continued Need for Extended Deterrence,” Washington Quarterly 14 (Autumn 1991), pp. 168–69.

56. An expert Italian observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, Rome, June 25, 2012.

57. An expert German observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, Brussels, July 3, 2012.

58. An expert British observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, London, June 28, 2012.

59. An expert Polish observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, Warsaw, July 11, 2012.

60. Henry A. Kissinger, Years of Upheaval (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson and Michael Joseph, 1982), p. 277.

61. Georges-Henri Soutou, “Three Rifts, Two Reconciliations: Franco-American Relations During the Fifth Republic,” in David M. Andrews, ed., The Atlantic Alliance Under Stress: US-European Relations after Iraq (Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press, 2005), p. 105.

62. Kissinger, Years of Upheaval, p. 286.

63. For details and references, see David S. Yost, European Security and the SALT Process, Washington Paper No. 85 (Beverly Hills and London: Sage Publications for the Center for Strategic and International Studies, Georgetown University, 1981), pp. 16–25.

64. Laurence Martin, “A Strategic Symposium: SALT and US Defense Policy,” Washington Quarterly 2 (Winter 1979), pp. 33–34.

65. An expert British observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, London, July 2, 2012.

66. An expert German observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, Brussels, July 3, 2012.

67. North Atlantic Council, Final Communiqué, December 10, 1996, para. 5.

68. Founding Act on Mutual Relations, Cooperation and Security between NATO and the Russian Federation, Paris, May 27, 1997.

69. David S. Yost, The Future of NATO's Nuclear Deterrent: The New Strategic Concept and the 2010 NPT Review Conference, A Workshop Report (Rome: NATO Defense College, April 2010), pp. 4–5, <www.ndc.nato.int/download/downloads.php?icode=193>.

70. Slocombe, “Continued Need for Extended Deterrence,” p. 169.

71. An expert Italian observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, Rome, June 22, 2012.

72. An expert Polish observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, Warsaw, July 12, 2012.

73. For background, see David S. Yost, “Russia's Non-Strategic Nuclear Forces,” International Affairs 77 (July 2001), pp. 531–51.

74. According to the US Congressional Commission, Russia “is no longer in compliance with its PNI commitments.” America's Strategic Posture, p. 13.

75. McDermott, Russia's Conventional Military Weakness and Substrategic Nuclear Policy, pp. 6–7.

76. ITAR-TASS in Russian, October 7, 2004, <Open Source Center, CEP20041007000187>.

77. Brad Roberts, “On Order, Stability, and Nuclear Abolition,” in George Perkovich and James M. Acton, eds., Abolishing Nuclear Weapons: A Debate (Washington, DC: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, February 2009), p. 166.

78. An expert Polish observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, Warsaw, July 11, 2012.

79. An expert Italian observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, Rome, June 22, 2012.

80. An expert British observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, London, June 28, 2012. Whether and to what extent submarine-based nuclear retaliatory forces would address this concern is not clear.

81. Henry A. Kissinger and Brent Scowcroft, “Nuclear weapon reductions must be part of strategic analysis,” Washington Post, April 22, 2012, <http://articles.washingtonpost.com/2012-04-22/opinions/35454468_1_nuclear-weapons-strategic-forces-low-numbers?>.

82. Message from the US Mission to NATO to the Secretary of State and Secretary of Defense, “Future of NPG,” November 30, 1974, declassified June 30, 2005, <http://aad.archives.gov/aad/createpdf?dt=2474&rid=184645&dl=1345>.

83. Joachim Krause, “Enlightenment and Nuclear Order,” International Affairs 83 (May 2007), p. 494.

84. An expert Polish observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, Brussels, July 4, 2012.

85. An expert Italian observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, Rome, June 22, 2012.

86. An expert Italian observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, Rome, June 22, 2012.

87. An expert British observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, London, June 28, 2012.

88. An expert Turkish observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, Ankara, June 15, 2012. President Lyndon Johnson's letter of June 5, 1964 concerned US policy relating to Turkey's proposed military intervention in Cyprus. Johnson wrote, “I hope you will understand that your NATO allies have not had a chance to consider whether they have an obligation to protect Turkey against the Soviet Union if Turkey takes a step which results in Soviet intervention without the full consent and understanding of its NATO allies.” For the full text, see “President Johnson and Prime Minister Inonu: Correspondence between President Johnson and Prime Minister Inonu, June 1964, as Released by the White House, January 15, 1966,” Middle East Journal 20 (Summer 1966), pp. 386–93. See also Suha Bolukbasi, “The Johnson Letter Revisited,” Middle Eastern Studies 29 (July 1993), pp. 505–25.

89. An expert Turkish observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, Ankara, June 14, 2012.

90. A prominent Turkish scholar wrote long ago that “The Turkish commitment to non-nuclear weapons status is coupled with several strong qualifiers … [T]he extended deterrence of the United States must remain convincing and credible to Turks as well as to de facto and de jure nuclear weapons states and potential proliferators.” Duygu Bazoglu Sezer, “Turkey's New Security Environment, Nuclear Weapons and Proliferation,” Comparative Strategy 14 (April–June 1995), pp. 167–68.

91. Camille Grand, “France and Nuclear Stability at Low Numbers,” in Malcolm Chalmers, Andrew Somerville, and Andrea Berger, eds., Small Nuclear Forces: Five Perspectives, Whitehall Report 3–11 (London: Royal United Services Institute, December 2011), p. 39.

92. The phrase “sprint to parity,” as a hypothetical future option for China, is usually attributed to Donald H. Rumsfeld, then-secretary of defense, who said in 2002 that “a country could decide that they would like to try to sprint toward parity or superiority in nuclear capabilities.” Testimony in Treaty on Strategic Offensive Reduction: The Moscow Treaty, Hearings before the Committee on Foreign Relations, United States Senate, 107th Cong., 2nd sess., July 9, 17, 23 and September 12, 2002 (Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office, 2002), p. 99.

93. An expert Polish observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, Warsaw, July 13, 2012.

94. An expert British observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, Rome, June 27, 2012.

95. An expert French observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, Brussels, July 6, 2012.

96. An expert Turkish observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, Ankara, June 15, 2012.

97. An expert British observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, London, July 2, 2012.

98. An expert British observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, London, July 2, 2012.

99. An expert German observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, Brussels, July 3, 2012.

100. An expert Turkish observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, Ankara, June 13, 2012.

101. America's Strategic Posture, pp. 21–22.

102. An expert British observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, London, June 28, 2012.

103. An expert British observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, London, July 2, 2012.

104. An expert German observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, Brussels, July 3, 2012.

105. For background, see David S. Yost, “Assurance and US Extended Deterrence in NATO,” International Affairs 85 (July 2009), pp. 755–80.

106. Imants Liegis, Linas Linkevicius, and Janusz Onyszkiewicz, “Why Europe Still Needs Nuclear Deterrence,” Moscow Times, May 23, 2012, < www.themoscowtimes.com/opinion/article/why-europe-still-needs-nuclear-deterrence/459069.html>. In August 2011, Mart Laar, then–Estonian minister of defence, said that, “For [the] health of NATO and transatlantic relations it is of utmost importance that NATO remains a nuclear alliance and that US nuclear weapons remain in Europe.” Laar, speech at the US Strategic Command Deterrence Symposium, August 3, 2011, <www.youtube.com/watch?v=hr1GtxbMSUQ>.

107. North Atlantic Council, “Deterrence and Defence Posture Review,” May 20, 2012, para. 12. The report specified that the “allies concerned” are “all members of the Nuclear Planning Group”—that is, all the allies except France.

108. For a discussion of these issues, see David S. Yost, “Transatlantic Relations and Peace in Europe,” International Affairs 78 (April 2002), pp. 277–300.

109. Wörner cited in Alan Riding, “At East-West Crossroads, Western Europe Hesitates,” New York Times, March 25, 1992, p. A6.

110. An expert Italian observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, Rome, June 25, 2012.

111. An expert British observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, London, July 2, 2012.

112. An expert Italian observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, Rome, June 22, 2012.

113. An expert British observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, London, July 2, 2012.

114. An expert Italian observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, Rome, June 22, 2012.

115. An expert German observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, Berlin, June 19, 2012.

116. An expert British observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, London, June 28, 2012.

117. Department of Defense, “Nuclear Posture Review Report,” April 6, 2010, p. 17.

118. “Nuclear Posture Review Report,” p. 16.

119. “Nuclear Posture Review Report,” p. 47.

120. Ministère de la Défense, Livre Blanc sur la Défense [The White Paper on Defense], (Paris: Service d'Information et de Relations Publiques des Armées, February 1994), pp. 56–57 (author's translation).

121. Statement by Douglas Hurd, Foreign Secretary, 18 April 1995, at the 1995 NPT Review and Extension Conference.

122. Lifting the Nuclear Shadow: Creating the Conditions for Abolishing Nuclear Weapons (London: Foreign and Commonwealth Office, February 2009), p. 12.

123. François Mitterrand, “Allocution prononcée par le Président de la République devant la XXXVIIIème session de l'Assemblée Générale des Nations Unies,” New York, September 28, 1983, in Ministère des Affaires Étrangères, La politique étrangère de la France, textes et documents (Paris: La Documentation Française, September-October 1983), p. 41. See also the article by Charles Hernu, then–defense minister, “Équilibre, dissuasion, volonté: la voie étroite de la paix et de la liberté,” Défense Nationale (December 1983), p. 15.

124. Statement by H.E. Mr. François Rivasseau, Permanent Representative of France to the Conference on Disarmament, New York, May 19, 2005, at the 2005 Review Conference of the States Parties to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, Main Committee I.

125. An expert French observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, Paris, July 9, 2012.

126. Michel Miraillet, “La dissuasion et le second âge nucléaire” [Nuclear Deterrence and the Second Nuclear Age], Politique Étrangère, 2 (Summer 2010), p. 379 (author's translation).

127. An expert British observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, London, June 29, 2012.

128. For the first statement, see François Mitterrand, “Allocution de M. François Mitterrand, Président de la République, devant les Auditeurs de l'Institut des Hautes Études de Défense Nationale, le 11 octobre 1988,” Défense Nationale (November 1988), p. 20. For the second statement, see Mitterrand's press conference of May 18, 1989, reproduced in the Foreign Ministry's Bulletin d'Information, May 19, 1989, p. 14.

129. Written response by US Secretary of Defense William S. Cohen to question submitted by Senator Tom Harkin, in “North Atlantic Treaty Organization [NATO] Enlargement Costs,” Hearings before the Committee on Appropriations, United States Senate, 105th Cong., 1st sess., October 21–23, 1997 (Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office, 1998), p. 85.

130. Regarding financial constraints, some German and Italian observers said that France and the United Kingdom face financial pressures on their nuclear forces greater than the possible political pressures that might arise from US and Russian reductions in nuclear forces to low numbers. For a discussion of the political and practical obstacles to London and Paris extending their pooling of certain support activities for their nuclear forces to joint or shared deterrence with alternating SSBN patrols, see Matthew Harries, “Britain and France as Nuclear Partners,” Survival 54 (February-March 2012), pp. 25–26. Regarding the absence of the solidarity necessary for collective defense, see the careful reading of the Lisbon Treaty in Anand Menon, “European Defence Policy from Lisbon to Libya,” Survival 53 (June-July 2011), p. 82. Regarding some European reservations, Ireland and Sweden are among the New Agenda Coalition states that have long called in international fora for “the reduction of reliance on nuclear weapons in security doctrines.” In their view, “the possession of nuclear weapons” should give way to “nuclear disarmament and … a nuclear weapon-free world.” Statement by the New Agenda Coalition, delivered by South Africa, to the United Nations First Committee, October 6, 2008.

131. An expert German observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, Brussels, July 4, 2012.

132. An expert British observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, London, June 28, 2012, and an expert French observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, Rome, June 26, 2012, respectively.

133. North Atlantic Council, Deterrence and Defence Posture Review, May 20, 2012, para. 26 and 27.

134. This might be compared to the “continuous at sea deterrence” policies for SSBNs of France, the United Kingdom, and the United States, except for the variations in the readiness levels of US and allied dual-capable aircraft in Europe.

135. An expert French observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, Brussels, July 6, 2012.

136. An expert German observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, Berlin, June 19, 2012.

137. An expert Polish observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, Warsaw, July 12, 2012.

138. An expert British observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, London, July 2, 2012.

139. An expert British observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, London, June 29, 2012.

140. An expert British observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, London, June 29, 2012.

141. The two US SSBN bases are situated at Bangor, Washington, and Kings Bay, Georgia, while the three strategic bomber bases are at Whiteman Air Force Base (AFB) in Missouri, Barksdale AFB in Louisiana, and Minot AFB in North Dakota.

142. An expert German observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, Brussels, July 4, 2012.

143. “The United States will ‘deMIRV’ all deployed ICBMs, so that each Minuteman III ICBM has only one nuclear warhead.” “Nuclear Posture Review Report,” p. 23.

144. Christopher A. Ford, “Nuclear Weapons and the Future of US Policy,” text delivered at the event “Nuclear Deterrence: Who Needs Nuclear Weapons and Why?” organized by the British American Security Information Council in association with the Hudson Institute, May 8, 2012 <www.newparadigmsforum.com/NPFtestsite/?p=1276>.

145. “Nuclear Posture Review Report,” pp. 47–48.

146. Thomas C. Schelling, “A World Without Nuclear Weapons?” Daedalus 138 (Fall 2009), p. 127.

147. Avner Cohen and Joseph F. Pilat, “Assessing Virtual Nuclear Arsenals,” Survival 40 (Spring 1998), pp. 141–42.

148. North Atlantic Council, Deterrence and Defence Posture Review, May 20, 2012, para. 20.

149. Sustaining US Global Leadership, p. 2.

150. George Perkovich, Malcolm Chalmers, Steven Pifer, Paul Schulte, and Jaclyn Tandler, Looking Beyond the Chicago Summit: Nuclear Weapons in Europe and the Future of NATO (Washington, DC: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, April 2012), p. 33.

151. Address by Giorgio Napolitano, President of the Italian Republic, to the North Atlantic Council, Brussels, March 2, 2010, text in English <www.quirinale.it/elementi/Continua.aspx?tipo=Discorso&key=1794>

152. An expert Italian observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, Rome, June 21, 2012.

153. An expert French observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, Paris, July 9, 2012.

154. An expert French observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, Paris, July 9, 2012.

155. An expert Polish observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, Warsaw, July 11, 2012.

156. An expert French observer (name withheld by request), personal discussion with author, Paris, July 9, 2012.

157. George Perkovich and James M. Acton, Abolishing Nuclear Weapons, Adelphi Paper No. 396 (Routledge: August 2008), p. 30.

158. The NATO allies were uncertain as to the extent of Soviet biological capabilities during the Cold War, but did not discount them, especially during the period prior to the conclusion of the 1972 Biological and Toxin Weapons Convention (BWC). In NATO's fundamental strategic concept from 1967–68 to 1991, MC 14/3, widely known as “flexible response,” the allies referred to Soviet “nuclear, massive conventional, chemical and possibly biological capabilities.” See Final Decision on MC 14/3, A Report by the Military Committee to the Defence Planning Committee on Overall Strategic Concept for the Defense of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization Area, January 16, 1968, page 5, para. 5b, in Pedlow, NATO Strategy Documents 1949–1969, p. 353. The NATO allies were generally surprised to learn after the end of the Cold War that Soviet investments in biological weapons had actually increased after the conclusion of the BWC. For an authoritative recent study, see Milton Leitenberg and Raymond A. Zilinskas, with Jens H. Kuhn, The Soviet Biological Weapons Program: A History (Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 2012).