Weapons diplomacy since 1974 and North Korea’s tests
DPRK’s strongman Kim Il-Un ain’t done nothing yet, has he? In the era of constitutional radicalism vs reactionary activism, sarcasm and Socratic Method academic rigour can be tolerated, can’t it? I have no enthusiasm for verifying Ernest Hoffman’s hypothesis that “the historian is a sort of talking ghost from out of the past”.
Suffice to go down memory lane (of weapons diplomacy) North Korea’s ballistic missile and nuclear weapon tests inevitably lead to. Without doubt, history is, as Henry Ford once impugned, not bunk or Lord Chesterfield (renowned for clarity and lucidity in argument) maintained, is “only a confused heap of facts”, in a missive published on February 5, 1750 in Letters.
Nonetheless, this article delves into history to contribute to the colloquy of North Korea’s nuclear tests.
The year 1974 was phenomenal for nuclear explosions. Six countries tested nuclear devices - France and China in the atmosphere; India, UK, USA and the USSR tested theirs underground. A war in which they all are involved would result into mutually assured destruction (MAD). The 1968 Nuclear Proliferation Treaty, which India refused to sign, didn’t stop the race for increasing nuclear arsenals or the contagion of the example spreading to the developing world. The Indian nuclear test on May 18, 1974 demonstrated the fragility of efforts to prevent the proliferation of nuclear weapons and focused world attention towards the consequences of the spread of peaceful nuclear technology for producing electricity cheaply; never mind that an inevitable by-product of nuclear power production is plutonium; the fissionable material for nuclear weapons production.
The nuclear tests in 1974 underpinned the urgent need for negotiating a comprehensive ban on nuclear weapon tests. The question then was whether or not India would develop credible tactical (short range nuclear weapons capable of reaching Russian territory) or strategic (long range ICBMs capable of nuking American territory) capacity.
Strategic weapons can only be used for an all-out nuclear holocaust; whose prevention, and the curious recurrence of the Kennedy urge to save the World (that had gone out of fashion), prompted the temporary agreement by Russia and China to join the other three permanent members of the UN Security Council to join the resolution on imposing more sanctions against North Korea.
In spite of what American President Abraham Lincoln (in his Second Annual Message to Congress) said about the dogmas of the quiet past being inadequate to the stormy present, I recall Dr Akiiki Mujaju’s application of the Convergence Theory to explain why the superpowers would one day bury the hatchet, put aside their ideological differences, mainly for economic prudence, and the common good of saving the world (and themselves).
Despite defence analyst Russel Howe’s criticism that the ‘world is too slow at being saved’, ‘the crusaders of yore’, he mentions in his thought-provoking book Weapons, (which in the face of North Korea’s tests that have propelled her to the Nuclear Club, needs updating), haven’t furled their standards.
Since the end of World War II, there have been increasing levels of conflict and violence. International efforts to develop sustainable mechanisms for peaceful change, crisis management, peace-making and peace-keeping operations continue but are conspicuous by their slow progress as the 1974 events and a litany of world disorders since the end of the Cold War illustrate.
Prof Stanley Hoffmann’s assertion in World Disorders that the world is at the end of a turbulent and terrifying century is indefensible.
But against the background of “global anomie”, the confusion of living in different ages where many of the world’s inhabitants live in cosmopolitan global society and efficiency, as he puts it; while others live under the throes of traditional interstate conflicts and rivalries, skewed national histories, myths, prejudices, force and heroism rather than negotiations; agreement on the best alternatives based on rational calculations, negotiations are indeed the most feasible way of resolving the current impasse.
Mr Baligidde is a former diplomat.
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