Disarmament Conference Whom to Disarm?

Alongside these new developments the UN Special Session on Disarmament opened in New York on May 23. It highlighted the complex nature of the question of disarmament.

The two superpowers were especially profuse in the regrets for the escalating arms race and the danger of a new war it poses for the world. But it is exactly the US and the USSR that are embroiling the whole world in the consequences of their arms race. They came up with no genuine proposals to halt this. Instead they pedalled the idea of a comprehensive ban on nuclear testing. To what effect? They both already have all the bombs they need for full scale war. The possibility of a new Salt agreement was also held up as a step towards disarmament. But previous Salt treaties have only defined upwards targets for the superpowers to aim at. Pieces of paper such as the test ban treaty and Salt have not resulted in the destruction of even one nuclear weapon. And meanwhile the arms race in conventional weapons heightens.

Third and Second World countries, including China, have raised a number of genuine proposals for disarmament — but the superpowers (who account for 50% of the world's military expenditure) — have chosen to ignore them. These proposals included the re-iteration of the need for nuclear free zones and zones of peace, an end to the stationing of troops in foreign countries, a renunciation by nuclear powers of the use of nuclear weapons against non-nuclear countries and an end to the monopoly by a few countries of disarmament talks. Who knows if the superpowers even bothered to listen to these just demands?

The Conference on Disarmament is providing no evidence that the superpowers are doing anything more than preparing for a new war and engaging in a soaring arms race in a build towards it. This stark reality, exposed at the conference, raises the question of the real nature of detente. For it seems that despite (or is it because of) detente tensions between the superpowers are tightening not relaxing.