Today there are more than 20,000 nuclear weapons in the world (over 5000 of which are deployed, the rest stockpiled). The majority are held by the United States and Russia. Other countries: the UK, France, China, India, Pakistan, Israel and possibly North Korea, are also nuclear-armed. Many of the nuclear weapons held around the world have hundreds of times more explosive power than the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima in 1945 which completely destroyed the city and killed around 140,000 people.
Nuclear weapons have no legitimate purpose; nor would their use be legal (civilian casualties are unavoidable), they are also genocidal and utterly immoral. When confronted with any of today's real security threats nuclear weapons are irrelevant: they cannot address climate change, poverty, hunger, overpopulation, non-state armed groups or terrorists, and they are useless against pandemics such as AIDS or avian flu.
Not only do nuclear weapons kill indiscriminately but the radioactive fallout from their detonation means that their effects know no geographical boundaries. Immediate survivors in the vicinity of any nuclear exchange face devastating long-term ill effects or death. Research shows that even a so-called ‘small exchange’ of 50 nuclear weapons could cause ‘the largest climate change in recorded human history’ and potentially could kill more people than were killed in the whole of the Second World War.
As long as there are nuclear weapons in the world there is always the danger they will be used, whether by accident or intention.
In the minority
The desire for global abolition of nuclear weapons is strong internationally. Many countries have signed treaties to make large areas of the world into nuclear weapons free zones.These cover Southeast Asia, Central Asia, the South Pacific, Latin America and Africa; 180 non-nuclear weapon states have signed the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty - they don’t possess nuclear weapons and their safety does not depend on owning them. The UK is one of only a handful of states that has nuclear weapons.
Our choice to re-arm, instead of disarming, through the decision to replace our current Trident nuclear weapons system, is a signal to the rest of the world that we believe our security depends on weapons of mass destruction. But the same argument could be used by any country in the world. It is not impossible that the UK should decide to rid itself of nuclear weapons as required by the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. Four countries — South Africa, Belarus, Kazakhstan and Ukraine have already done so. In so doing, we would be complying with our obligations to disarm under the NPT, contributing to progress towards multilateral disarmament, and helping to create a climate where states turn away from nuclear weapons altogether.
Multilateral disarmament
CND calls for multilateral disarmament initiatives, to go hand in hand with British nuclear disarmament, to ensure that the goal of worlwide abolition can be achieved. This call has found a resonance internationally. Leading international figures like Kofi Annan, Hans Blix and Mohammed ElBaradei, have all urged serious attention to nuclear disarmament. Now they have been joined by former senior US politicians Henry Kissinger and George Schulz and others, have recently called for steps to be taken towards this goal.
ICAN
CND is working with Medact and other peace organisations in the UK to promote the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN). ICAN was launched by medical professionals in 60 countries, to promote a Nuclear Weapons Convention . Landmines and chemical and biological weapons have already been outlawed through treaties. Nuclear weapons can be similarly abolished through a Nuclear Weapons Convention, a draft of which is already lodged at the UN.
Read ICAN UK's Q&A on a Nuclear Weapons Convention to understand more about why it is so vital such a worldwide ban is negotiated now.
The hypocritical claim that nuclear weapons are valuable instruments in some hands, but intolerable threats when owned by others, must be abandoned. CND urges the government to support the proposed Nuclear Weapons Convention as a practical way of meeting the disarmament goals of the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.
