Europe needs a new Nuclear Forces Reduction Treaty rather than a Eurobomb

With huge uncertainties in the relationship between the United States, Russia and NATO, Europe is awash with proposals to share, ‘extend’ or procure nuclear weapons. To avoid further proliferation and the inevitable catastrophic failure of ‘deterrence’, Ian Davis and Paul Ingram argue for an urgent revival of nuclear disarmament between Europe and Russia.

In light of the changed global security situation, Germany’s chancellor-to-be, Friedrich Merz, has said he will reach out to France and Britain to discuss the sharing of nuclear weapons to create a “European shield”’, while also hoping that the “American nuclear shield” remains in place. The former would “complement” the latter, he said.

Germany has previously been committed to non-nuclear defence, while at the same time cooperating in NATO nuclear weapons-sharing arrangements and hosting US free fall bombs that would be given to Germany in the event of a decision to drop nuclear weapons. Merz’s comments came after the French president, Emmanuel Macron, announced he was open to a discussion on applying France’s nuclear deterrence to cover other European nations. Poland’s President Duda has called on the US to station nuclear weapons on its territory, citing Russia’s deployment of tactical nuclear weapons in Belarus in 2022.

Meanwhile, senior figures in Britain are urging the MoD to consider French cooperation in the project to renew the UK Trident system. Given the role the United States plays in the maintenance of the Trident missiles, this is a critical point of vulnerability for the UK nuclear weapon system, and the possibility of using France’s M51 submarine-launched ballistic missiles is being mooted instead. This is almost certainly a non-starter because the M51 missiles have a very different set of specifications so they cannot be fired out of the tubes in the Dreadnoughts currently under construction using the US-UK common missile compartment that forms the core of the submarine.

Shield or spear?

The metaphor of nuclear weapons as a defensive ‘shield’ (or more commonly referred to as a ‘nuclear umbrella’) is an established trope, alongside the claim that it acts as a ‘deterrent’. But there is no stable, necessary truth behind these tropes. The French and British nuclear weapons are not a ‘shield,’ but a complex assemblage of detonators, chemical explosives and special nuclear material controlled by the arming, fusing, firing and safety systems. They are packaged as bombs and ballistic missiles that have to work together seamlessly to deliver a nuclear warhead. Britain’s last two ballistic missile tests failed.

This is at core not a defensive system in its operation, but highly offensive. Classifying it as defensive is to express the deterrent intention, not the nature of the systems. And the intent is necessarily ambiguous because it can be adapted at will. Their deployment and use has catastrophic and uncontrollable collateral effects.

Similarly, ‘nuclear deterrence’ is a theoretical concept that relies on the credible threat of mutually assured destruction (MAD) using offensive systems. Key elements of ‘nuclear deterrence’ include credibility (the belief that a nation is both willing and able to carry out its threat of retaliation if attacked), communication (clearly conveying the threat of retaliation to the potential adversary) and rational decision-making (the assumption that leaders will act rationally and understand the catastrophic consequences of nuclear war).

However, the current lack of credible leadership, poor communication between leaders, and irrational decision-making has contributed to the Doomsday clock—a symbol of the estimated likelihood of a human-made global catastrophe—moving to 89 seconds to midnight, the closest it has ever been to disaster since it was founded in 1947. It is precisely because of these human frailties in the decision-making loop that deterrence at some point is bound to fail, and partly why most of the world’s states forego nuclear weapons.

Reviving disarmament

If, therefore, the ‘shield’ and ‘deterrence’ metaphors do not map onto objective reality, then what are the implications for European politics? Blindly continuing on the current path is itself a form of madness. It is now essential to ditch the idea of replacing US systems with more coordinated and hugely expensive European equivalents and instead build an alternative security model. One possible starting point could be to revive nuclear arms control and disarmament in Europe. This will require re-establishing high-level European contacts with Russia, independently of the United States.

The treaty most commonly associated with nuclear forces reduction in Europe is the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty, which was signed by the United States and the Soviet Union in 1987 and mandated the elimination of all ground-launched ballistic and cruise missiles with ranges between 500 and 5,500 kilometres deployed in Europe. By eliminating these missiles, the INF Treaty was seen as a key step towards reducing tensions between the US and the Soviet Union in Europe. A new nuclear forces reduction treaty for Europe could help reduce contemporary tensions on the European continent.

Contrary to the disinformation fed to us by various European interests, the Russians would almost certainly be open to such a project, especially if it also addressed the strategic impact of non-nuclear weapons, such as strategic missile defences and intermediate range precision strike conventional missiles (which it views as a strategic threat to its nuclear forces). Like any nuclear power, Russia has an inherent interest in avoiding accidental or miscalculated nuclear escalation, or a new arms race. A stable, predictable nuclear balance would be seen as beneficial in Moscow, as would being seen to influence the European security architecture. Engaging in arms control talks would also be a way for Russia to portray itself as a responsible international actor, potentially easing some international reputational pressure and facilitating sanctions relief.

Such an approach, aiming at reduced nuclear risk in Europe, would be a positive contribution to the highly complex political and diplomatic challenge of ending the war in Ukraine. One option, for example, might be to assemble a coalition of the ‘nuclear disarmament willing’ to include the UK, France and the five NATO nuclear-sharing states that ‘host’ US nuclear weapons (Belgium, Germany, Italy, Netherlands and Turkey) to negotiate directly with Russia.

In exchange for Russia eliminating its 1,400 tactical nuclear weapons and cutting back on some of its air- and land-based strategic nuclear forces, the five NATO host nations could return the 100-odd US nuclear weapons based in Europe (that play little credible military deterrence role); the UK could consider cancelling Trident replacement (releasing at least £3 billion per annum to benefit other spending, security or otherwise) which is in any case looking technically vulnerable and source of future US blackmail; and France could eliminate its air-based nuclear weapons and its submarine fleet would become the European deterrent.

This would also leave France and Russia as the sole nuclear powers in Europe, with France reduced to a minimum sufficient sea-based ‘deterrent’ and Russia’s massive nuclear stockpile reduced by about a third. These reductions could complement global stability talks, between China, Russia and the United States – as hinted at by Donald Trump –to reduce the strategic nuclear arsenals of the ‘great powers’. The ultimate goal would be a nuclear weapon-free Europe.

Proliferation: the alternative to disarmament

These proposals will seem fanciful and naïve to some. However, the alternatives are potentially catastrophic, with the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty dam likely to burst with the emergence of multiple new nuclear weapon states, from Poland, to the Nordics, to Japan and South Korea, to Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Iran, and beyond. This dramatically raises nuclear risk.

Because of the enormous levels of harm and injury that even a single nuclear weapon can create—and indeed is designed to deliver—any use is widely regarded as a crime against humanity. It is similarly a crime against humanity to not expend human capital and creativity in designing alternatives. And if there is one thing that the Trump Administration must surely be teaching us, received assumptions and attachment to ‘normality’ must now be under serious question.

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Dr Ian Davis is the founder of NATO Watch, a website platform to promote a more transparent and accountable NATO. He is also the Executive Editor of the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) Yearbook and an Associate Senior Fellow within Conflict and Peace at SIPRI. Prior to joining SIPRI, he held several senior positions, including Executive Director of the British American Security Information Council (BASIC), 2001-2007

Paul Ingram is a research affiliate at the Centre for the Study of Existential Risk at the University of Cambridge, a founder Director of the Global Stability Network looking at the effects of military and economic deterrence strategies on stability, and a member of the Oxford Process team focused on the Ukraine war and the broader challenge of global divisions. He was the Executive Director of BASIC, 2007-2019.

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The views and opinions expressed in posts on the Rethinking Security blog are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the position of the network and its broader membership.

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