Nuclear denial

In his Op-Ed, “The failed theology of arms control,” Gabriel Schoenfeld is absolutely right not to mince words when criticizing Joseph Cirincione, but he is off-base in impugning the entire nuclear nonproliferation regime. For Schoenfeld to exploit the failings of one American nuclear arms control “expert” in order to impugn the broader integrity of the international nonproliferation regime, its shortcomings notwithstanding, is a disservice to global peace and security.

Furthermore, Cirincione’s behavior -- which has included denial of Iran and Syria’s nuclear weapons programs -- must be seen in the context of our current political environment, which has no shortage of foreign policy wonks who never saw a nuclear weapons program they couldn’t turn a blind eye to as a means to advance their politics. For example, Harvard professor Samantha Power -- who resigned from the Barack Obama campaign for calling Hillary Clinton a monster -- embraced the December National Intelligence Estimate in a Time magazine column and used that document as a basis for her foreign policy prescriptions. Yet the sheer ruthlessness of engaging in nuclear denial was not what got her in political hot water; it was calling Clinton a bad name. Thus the episode was a prime example of our current political culture turning the concept of human decency into nothing more than a cheap gimmick. Name-calling may be politically verboten, but denying the existence of weapons programs intended for the express purpose of melting innocent human beings is not.

These, of course, are manners for the dense. And the extent to which we allow such dense manners to lead our political culture, we put humankind on a path toward exchanging niceties prior to obliterating each other.

The only way to ensure that never occurs is to obliterate all nuclear weapons, as envisaged by the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty. And while Schoenfeld may be right to call into question that treaty’s effectiveness, particularly with respect to signatories Iran and Syria, the first place he should look for remedy is a U.S. foreign policy that would demand Israel’s immediate and long overdue incorporation into that treaty. No nation with atomic warheads targeted on all its major population centers will forgo nuclear weapons development in perpetuity. Schoenfeld is living in an illusion if he believes that Israel can maintain its nuclear arsenal without always spurring its neighbors to acquire nukes as well.

Responsible nuclear arms control advocates would demand Israel’s immediate and unconditional incorporation into the nonproliferation regime, not continue to incubate that country’s destructive policy of nuclear ambiguity by talking about “overall regional disarmament.” Such claptrap is the stuff of political discipline, not humanitarian principle. And Schoenfeld, as well as any other supporters of Israel’s nuclear posture, should know that such politicking comes with a heavy price: nuclear schadenfreude from those who have been disciplined. Like all forms of schadenfreude, only the repressed cling to it as their sole release.

So here’s a glass to more open discussion about Israel’s immediate incorporation into the NPT, so that America will be a nation chock full of informed citizens who know the nuclear realities of our foreign beneficiaries and who are therefore able to digest what those realities mean for our nation’s position in the world. With Americans so informed, they are bound to express nothing but shock and outrage when bureaucrats or policy wonks dare attempt to give Israel a taste of its own nuclear concealing medicine, instead of doing the right thing by demanding the immediate, comprehensive abolition of the most anti-human, anti-creation weapons ever conceived.

Timothy Rieger, a former congressional lobbyist for the U.S. Campaign to Free Mordechai Vanunu, has proposed a constitutional amendment that would allow citizens to petition for permanent removal of unconfirmed government officials engaging in malicious or politically motivated conduct.

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