Control of the 'weapons'

Résumé du document

Arms control designates restrictions to the development, production, proliferation and usage of weapons imposed through diplomacy. The goal of Arms control are reducing the risk of war, or at least reducing the number of casualties if war cannot be avoided, and limiting the costs linked to war preparation. If arms control has existed since the Westphalian treaty in 1815, it is a concept that mainly developed in a context of nuclear proliferation, especially after the 1962 missiles crisis when the United States and the USSR realized that a nuclear war was possible, and would be very destructive for both countries. But is the process of arms control which was mainly developed during the Cold War still relevant today? While Barack Obama and Dmitri Medvedev signed an historic, and while the director of the International Atomic Energy Agency recently confirmed that Iran had succeeded in producing 20% enriched uranium without giving IAEA inspectors notice, it is time to talk about arms control and to wonder, to what extent can we consider arms control to remain effective today, considering the current international configuration?

Extraits

[...] The negotiation of the treaties for instance is a key step. Sometimes, treaties are too vague or too quickly outdated. But innovative solutions exist, as the Chemical Weapons Convention which adopted a definition of the prohibited chemical agents that covers all future technological developments illustrates. Arms control agreements can also be unfair. To be a success, all the signatories must have a real interest in a treaty, and all disadvantages must be compensated. This can partly explain why the non-proliferation treaty is so precarious and its scope is so limited for instance: the different countries are not equal and those who want the agreement are either the countries which already have nuclear weapons or the countries which are allied to nuclear countries. [...]

[...] We can see it with the prisoner's dilemma. If there is not arms control agreement, both players have an incentive to defect: if the other player cooperates and you defect your payoff is 4 rather than and if the other player defect you have 2 rather than 1. The global benefit is lower than if both players cooperates but the better choice is defection. If there is an arms control agreement and that a country violates the agreement this country cannot produce enough weapons to take a decisive advantage. [...]

[...] So currently it is a qualified success. But we also have to admit that total successes are unrealistic, therefore even half successes can be considered as significant achievements. II - Situations where arms control's effectiveness is limited 1. The inadequacy of arms control in multipolar international configurations Uncertainty The main fear of the countries which sign arms control treaties is that the other countries cheat. Uncertainty comes from the fact that it is quite hard to verify the respect of the treaty. [...]

[...] So arms control can be considered as effective only if we don't expect too much from it. It cannot work until a certain extent. It is unimaginable to have a nuclear-free world for instance; a country as the USA would never renounce to nuclear deterrence. Bibliography Jozef Goldblat, "Succès et échecs de la maîtrise des armements", Institut français des relations internationales Jonathan B. Tucker, "Verifying the Chemical Weapons Ban: Missing Elements" Julie Dahlitz, Nuclear Arms Control, Butler and Tanner Ltd Michael J. [...]

[...] In a first part we will see that arms control is often effective, and in a second part we will analyze the different limits to arms control's effectiveness. I - The arms control process: effective but only in specific configurations 1. A perfect effectiveness in theory Arms control is based on the recognition that military affairs, in terms of game theory, are nonzero-sum-game activities; that's why there is scope for agreements even between enemies. This is a way to break the "security dilemma", which is a situation where instability and mistrust can create conflicts even if no country really wants it. [...]