[TYPE THE COMPANY NAME] Chemical Weapons/WMD and IR Theory Assignment # 3 Policy Issue Caesar D.
Introduction Although warfare has been a prominent feature of the governance of mankind s affairs since the dawn of times, only in the previous century we have had the technological advances that could let us destruct entire swathes of lands and massacre entire cities with the push of just a button. During the World War I chlorine gas was developed and deployed in the trenches in France, but the real arms race started with the Americans developing the atomic bomb and then deploying it on the Japanese at Hiroshima and Nagasaki, at the end of World War II in 1945. Many international relations theorists hailing from diverse theoretical and political backgrounds tried to explain the peculiar arms race that took place during the Cold War after 1945 between mainly United States and Soviet Russia. They analyzed the reasons that the two countries amassed their arsenals in response to each other according to their theories, but mostly, they tried to come up with policy solutions that could start from the actual state of affairs and could guide the world in establishing what to do given the situation. They tried to find answers to questions like whether states and international community have the responsibility to prevent other states or non-state actors from acquiring these chemical weapons and weapons of mass destruction (WMD) and punish those states which do acquire them. In this essay I will explain why I think the realist approach is a much more useful and appropriate approach to not only explain why nuclear arms race happened in the first place, but also how the states should tackle the problem. The realism approach may seem, in the long run, to exacerbate the crisis and become a self-fulfilling prophecy, but depending how one approaches this theoretical lens, it can help the international community come to realistic terms with a very real structural problem. On the other hand, I will contrast it with the liberalism theory. Liberalism theory is not a wrong theory and not inappropriate, as it does explain certain aspects of the crisis at hand and gives its own solutions to the problem, but I believe it falls short of certain considerations relating to the nature itself of WMD and the groups intending to amass and use them, and thus, risks losing its effectiveness to the advantage of the realist approach. Fundamentals of the Realist Theoretical Lens Realism (and its derivatives) is one of the long standing theoretical lenses that have been employed in international relations theory to explain the nature of warfare between states. This approach dates back as far as Thucydides who looks at the Peloponnesian Wars in ancient Greece through this theoretical 2
lens, and has included notable proponents throughout history such as Machiavelli, Thomas Hobbes and recently has included proponents such as Henry Kissinger, Hans Morgenthau, John Mearsheimer, and Kenneth Waltz etc. Realism is based on the following presumptions: The international system is anarchic - there is no international police or night watchman who can intervene in case a state offends another state, so the states can only effectively resort to self-help in terms of international security and are suspicious of other states. They re in a perpetual security dilemma thinking that if the other states accumulate power they will attack them so they try to balance the distribution of power by forming alliances or attacking the other state to reduce their power before it becomes too strong. The states are the most important, unitary and rational actors and evaluate the situation around them and pursue their self-interest and try to maximize their gains. Lastly, states main interest is survival, so they try to gather resources and military power so they can guarantee their own survival and can defend themselves from external attacks (Mearsheimer, 2001). Weapons of Mass Destruction under Realist Theoretical Lens The nuclear arms race that took place during the Cold War after World War II can be best explained as a protracted security dilemma. After 1945, the world was divided between two poles of ideology and power: The Western Bloc with United States as a hegemonic power, and the Soviet Bloc with Soviet Russia being the hegemon. When United States exploded the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, they showed the world how destructive this new technology could be, and the monopoly of America over this technology made the Soviet Union fear for itself and develop its own program to counteract this unbalance. United States viewed Soviet Union s attempt to arm themselves as hostile and further continued to improve their technology, make it more destructive and easier to deploy and harder for the enemy to locate and destroy. This move put the Soviet Union more in security dilemma so they continued to try to outrun the United States in the race and so the cycle continued (Spruyt, 2009). First of all, the realist theory gives satisfying explanations for the cause of the arms race. The atomic and hydrogen bombs are the most devastating weapons humanity has ever been able to build, and the states which find themselves in an anarchic global system with no overarching and stability-ensuring authority above the states have valid reasons to fear for their survival. During the Cold War, the two blocs remained fearful of each other and suspicious of all information coming from each other and kept on in a diplomatic dreadlock, even though, paradoxically, the two poles of power (USA and Soviet Russia) were sitting together on United Nations permanent Security Council. One would expect that the 3
two states would defer to the United Nations, of which they were the founding members and which was the product of liberalist school of thought, to regulate their affairs regarding mutual security but they pursued the arms race instead, not trusting in the international institutions to safeguard their security. Realist theory and the need for the states to ensure one s own survival was effectively the first reason that the states involved even considered coming to a bargaining table and try to control the arms race and tried to set rules to prevent other actors to gain control of them. Till 1970s, both superpowers on the scene had developed technology such that not only they could strike first and obliterate the other state s vital resources and/or their nuclear reserves, but they could also render their counterattack options useless with anti-ballistic missiles, locking themselves in a threatening security stalemate and dilemma (Spruyt, 2009). At the time, these two powers had no system of trade or other reliable diplomatic relationships with each other, and they were on the completely different sides on the ideology spectrums, so the question of self-survival was a much better and faster-acting incentive than what liberalism or democratic peace or international institutionalism could have achieved in those circumstances. Capitalism would not have made easy friends with communism and viceversa, but both poles understood the language of the devastating physical consequences that a tipping of the balance in the favour of either side could have had. The WMD arsenal effectively kept the possibility of a big hegemonic war at large by deterrence, as the two poles kept themselves in a defensive balance of power. The influence that the realist school of thought had during the Cold War in maintaining effective peace can be noticed now that the Soviet Union has collapsed and the power to inflict violence has fallen primarily in hands of non-state actors which are harder to keep in control than the states. Stephen Rosen lists the problems faced by the world in post-cold War era in his article After Proliferation. In current era, United States is trying to coerce rogue states like Iran and North Korea into signing Nuclear Non-Proliferations Agreements. In the meanwhile, the dissolution of Soviet Union means that there is no more central control on the Soviet nuclear arsenals and they have leaked to terrorists and threatening non-state actors and groups. There is also a possibility that the nuclear powers with unstable political regimes might give the technology to rogue actors, so if they were to deploy these weapons against unitary states and civilian populations, the states would have no clear sender s address to retaliate against, thus, these non-state actors can t be effectively deterred (Rosen, 2006). Another reason for concern is that the states like Pakistan, India and North Korea, who are nuclear powers now, got their nuclear arsenals defying international condemnation and regulations and are not signing agreements with the argument Why do we have to relinquish our arsenals while Russia and United 4
States can keep their arsenals?. This mutual suspicion is another instance of realist explanation of the state of affairs. What other incentives could states have in order to cooperate with the disarmament? Alternative Lens: Liberalism Let s briefly look at how the problem could be viewed through an alternative theoretical lens: Liberalism. Liberalism had its origin with Enlightenment thinkers and the tradition includes proponents like the American president during World War I Woodrow Wilson. One of the original proponents was Immanuel Kant, German philosopher, who theorised that once states start becoming democracies and the people would effectively participate in the decision making, states would have less incentive to go to war with other states as they would not want to impose over themselves the costs of war. From his theories came the idea of international institutions and international law that could counteract the natural anarchy of the international system and put the states in connection with each other and give them incentives to cooperate and punishments for not cooperating or abiding by the rules. Furthermore, free trade between states would give them incentives to cooperate rather than act hostile and undermine their commercial livelihood (Dunne, 2001). The conventions on neutralisation of chemical weapons and the treaties of nuclear non-proliferation are a brainchild of liberalist thought. Liberals insist that states may have more to gain in the long term by being a part of an international community and thus accepting international laws and rules and regulations, and exclusion from the international trade and sanctions could be enough of deterrence for states to not violate international norms and laws. By signing and abiding by the international treaties, states have the possibility to escape the perpetual security dilemma that would push them into an arms race and exacerbate the threat situation. The liberal theory has its good points and in the world currently there are major examples of this theory working (one just has to notice the example of European Union. Europe, after having been bathed in blood for centuries till 1945, chose to join in an economic and political union and now war in Europe is unthinkable. United States and England are competing world powers but they would never go to war with each other because they are allies and can trust each other), but it can have its backlashes, especially when WMD are involved. Liberal theory fails to account for the formation for ideological blocks that have just changed name even after the Cold War has ended. States in unstable regions still compete against each other for distribution of power (e.g. the countless tussles in the Middle East since 1970s). Moreover, attempts to bring democracy and Western liberal ideology into these areas backfire as states perceive the Western states to be aiming for hegemony and influence and resist the 5
ideological invasion. The economic power of the developed states itself becomes a surrogate of military power, a power equally threatening for countries who re still suspicious of the intentions of other countries. The attempt to overthrow Saddam in Iraq by USA backfired, as we now see the power vacuum in the region have given surge to insurgents and recently ISIS. Exactly in a context like this the need to control the proliferation of WMD becomes more urgent, as because of these conflicts and instability, non-state actors like terrorist organisations could gain control of weapons and threaten international security, and states have no control over them. States can sign treaties all they want, but abiding to them faithfully is a whole different story, and non-state actors don t abide to any treaty. They operate in anarchy. Scott Sagan discusses the difficulty of negotiations with Iran in his article How to keep the bomb from Iran where he suggests that the West should give effective reasons and incentives to Iran to abide by the rules rather than creating more strife by trying to topple the regime or imposing sanctions, as imposing economic sanctions would only delay the acquisition of technology, and Iran will distrust US even more because of them and for its interference in the middle east and US s alliance with Israel of which Iran is an outspoken enemy. The instability of the region (especially of the neighbour nuclear power Pakistan) and presence of revisionist non-state actors such as terrorist organisations don t fare well for the whole situation either (Sagan, 2006). Conclusion Theories are what they are: theories. They give us tools to analyze the state of facts and compute what can be done to solve problems, disputes and crisis. The problem occurs when we try to use theories and ideologies to justify everything we experience and impose them rigidly on the actual world. The liberal theory may be born out of optimism in international institutions and globalization, but we still have to remind ourselves that we live in a complex world where multiple actors, state and non-state, interact with each other and these interactions can lead to highly diverse and complicated consequences. Because of the sensitivity of the WMD issue and the regional instability in the area where the actors do have the ability to acquire these weapons, I suggest that it is much more prudent and suitable to approach the topic with a realist approach. We cannot discount the power struggles happening in the region and cannot discount the countless misperceptions that world leaders can make in assessing the situation. It would be the most prudent to keep the bastions of realist theory the self-help, survival and statism principles in mind when approaching the negotiations and efforts over curbing WMD and give reasons to other actors to trust the process. After that is achieved, only then can one hope to proceed towards stability and the rule of law and international security. 6
Works Cited Dunne, T. (2001). Liberalism. Retrieved March 02, 2015, from Academia.edu: http://www.academia.edu/370016/liberalism Mearsheimer, J. (2001). Anarchy and the Struggle for Power. In J. Mearsheimer, The Tragedy of Great Power Politics. Rosen, S. P. (2006). After Proliferation: What to do is more states go nuclear. Foreign Affairs, 9-14. Sagan, S. (2006). How To Keep The Bomb From Iran. Foreign Affairs. Spruyt, H. (2009). Global Horizons - Introduction to International Relations. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. 7