HVK Archives: American policy is the height of hypocrisy
American policy is the height of hypocrisy - The Times of India
Zbigniew Brzezinski
()
May 16, 1998
Title: American policy is the height of hypocrisy
Author: Zbigniew Brzezinski
Publication: The Times of India
Date: May 16, 1998
India's nuclear weapons tests are a double embarrassment for the
United States: they highlight the fact that US anti-proliferation
efforts are a failure, and they signal a truly consequential
intelligence scandal.
US efforts to halt the proliferation of nuclear weapons have
failed for two reasons. The first is that the United States has
never pursued a genuinely universal and non-discriminatory policy
of halting proliferation. In fact, US policy all along has been
that of selective and preferential proliferation.
The United States openly assisted Great Britain in its
acquisition of nuclear weapons, Also, it is now known that the
United States, though much more surreptitiously, helped France in
its pursuit of a nuclear capability. Last but not the least, the
United States very deliberately more than winked at Israeli
efforts, while studiously ignoring the atmospheric nuclear test
conducted "by someone" in the late 1970s near South Africa in the
Indian Ocean.
Under these circumstances, is it any wonder that other states
have felt that they have a moral and political right to pursue
their national interest as they define it? If one were today in
the shoes of a Pakistani prime minister, would one feel inclined
to take seriously American admonitions to abstain from acquiring
and publicly demonstrating a Pakistani nuclear capability? Even
worse, once Pakistan makes its move, the domestic pressure in
Iran to go nuclear will become even more intense than has been
the case so far.
Moreover, a selective and preferential policy provides an
inducement for other powers to thwart US efforts. With the United
States exercising the right to help its friends acquire nuclear
capability, China and Russia quite naturally feel that they can
act similarly, whether it be in regard to Pakistan or Iran or
some other state. The simple fact is that non-proliferation is
like pregnancy: you cannot be partially pregnant; you cannot
pursue effectively a selective policy of non-proliferation.
The second reason for the failure is that a successful non-
proliferation policy can be implemented only if the states that
abstain from seeking nuclear weapons are given iron-clad
guarantees of protection from any aggressive neighbour that
somehow gains access to nuclear weapons. To be more specific, an
effective American policy on non-proliferation would require
binding US commitments to defend compliant states from attacks by
non-compliant states, including even pledges to use nuclear
weapons against any rogue nuclear power.
Again, the fact of life is that the US Congress would never
endorse any such blank checks. In effect, a selective policy of
non-proliferation, which additionally lacks any credible
guarantees of protection for those who comply, is not a policy
but a hollow posture.
Washington's current discomfort is made more painful by the
signal failure of the US intelligence community. Given the high
priority assigned by the Clinton administration to the policy of
non-proliferation, one would have thought that the intelligence
community would concentrate its efforts on detecting and
anticipating any moves by other states which could seriously
threaten that policy. The preparation and execution of a series
of nuclear tests involves literally hundreds, perhaps even
thousands, of people. An effective intelligence operation should
rely not only on technical means, involving penetrating
reconnaissance as well as signals intercepts, but also on
adequate human resources, capable of transmitting to Washington
timely warnings of hostile intentions on the part of foreign
governments.
In recent years, the CIA has been unfairly blamed for not
anticipating longer-range historical trends, such as the collapse
of the Soviet Union. These accusations could have been more
justifiably directed at the academic community, whose
intellectual challenge it is to analyse and project broader
historical trends. In contrast, it is the task of the
intelligence community to detect, in a timely fashion, major
foreign initiatives of programs that bear either on American
security or affect American foreign policy interests. The failure
to do so in the case of India suggests significant and truly
disturbing incompetence both on the level of collection and
analysis within the intelligence community. To put it bluntly,
some heads, and not merely at the lower levels, should roll.
To sum up: A hypocritical policy, dressed in high-sounding
rhetoric and backed by inadequate intelligence while lacking any
serious commitment of American power, is simply an exercise in
self-deceptive futility. Only a comprehensive system of non-
proliferation can work - perhaps initially at least on a regional
level, such as is the case in Latin America, where no single
state is exempt. Moreover, compliant states must be guaranteed
nuclear protection either by the United States or by some
credible international commitment against nuclear threats that
acquire nuclear weapons.
(Zbigniew Brzezinski was National Security Advisor to former US
President Jimmy Carter)
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