Kathleen Hicks: Hi, I'm Kathleen Hicks, senior vice president and director of the International Security Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, and this is Defense 2020, a CSIS podcast examining critical defense issues in the United States' 2020 election cycle. We bring in defense experts from across the political spectrum to survey the debates over the US military strategy, missions and funding. This podcast is made possible by contributions from BAE Systems, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, and the Thales Group.
Kathleen Hicks: On this episode of Defense 2020, I host a discussion with three experts on the issue surrounding nuclear weapons and arms control. My colleague, Rebecca Hersman, director of the Project on Nuclear Issues, and a senior advisor in the International Security Program at CSIS. Alexandra Bell, senior policy director at the Center for Arms Control and Nonproliferation, and Rebeccah Heinrichs, senior fellow at the Hudson Institute.
Kathleen Hicks: So I really want to thank you three for joining me today. This is such a deep topic. I know we're only going to scratch the surface, but let's just get into it, really going back a full 11 years to this month, April 2009, president Obama gives his speech in Prague talking about the goal of a “Global Zero”. Fast forward to April of 2020, let me start with Rebecca Hersman. Rebecca, how would you describe where we are today and what has taken place between 2009 to today to get us there?
Rebecca Hersman: Well, that's a lot of ground to cover, but let me just get the conversation started. I think 2009 marked sort of a high water point in terms of optimism for the ability to reduce nuclear threats, inspire progress towards nuclear disarmament, and even potentially envision a world without nuclear weapons, even if that world was going to be sort of a fairly long way out, or as I believe President Obama said at the time, probably not in his lifetime, but people were able to sort of imagine that space, and a lot has gotten in the way since then.
Rebecca Hersman: You have complex domestic political dynamics, the difficult process of getting New START ratified, laying groundwork on modernization, cheating scandals in 2014, the Russian invasion of Crimea, shifting from a sort of more cooperative vision for Russia to a much more competitive vision, and then kind of a significant rethinking with this [Trump] Administration in terms of how to prioritize within the nuclear space, and how to think about coalition building in the nuclear space, or to not build coalitions in the nuclear space, so that now I feel like we're in a place where, both internationally and domestically, an already pretty polarized set of issues are more polarized, more fractured, and there's sort of a lot of disharmony inside the community, both across the political divide, but honestly, I think even within various kind of ranges of political perspective, certainly across the Democratic community, I think a fair bit of division about what the future should look like.
Kathleen Hicks: So Alex, would you describe anything in that differently? How do you see the perspective from someone who's sitting inside the arms control and disarmament community?
Alexandra Bell: Well, sometimes I've heard people talk about the Prague speech in the sense that it was sort of a Rorschach test that people sort of picked the parts of the speech that they liked and focused there, but I think it's important to remember that that speech was made sort of in the tradition of various other statements that had come out of former officials and former presidents. The 2007 op-ed from Secretaries Perry Scholtz and Senator Nunn and Secretary Kissinger, the line in there about why it was important to kind of put out this vision. It was without the vision, the actions would not be perceived as fair or urgent. Without the actions, the vision will not be perceived as realistic or possible.
Alexandra Bell: So I saw the Prague speech as trying to marry the overall goal, which is a US commitment done through the NPT (Non-Proliferation Treaty) to pursue, in good faith, efforts towards nuclear disarmament, but also attach these very specific issue items, part of which was things like the nuclear security summits and trying to lock down fissile material, and trying to stabilize and improve the international regimes that were there.
Alexandra Bell: As Rebecca Hersman said, nothing happens in a vacuum. There were other issues that started to affect items that were laid out in that particular vision, but overall, I think the driving vision, pretty much since the dawn of the nuclear age, is how do we control these weapons and how do we eventually get rid of them? I hope it's an issue that does come up on the campaign trail. We're really at a crossroads. July 16th, 1945 will mark the 75th anniversary of the dawn of the nuclear age, and we've got to decide, are we going to be living in a world where the number of nuclear weapons is going up or going down? That's a choice we have in front of us.
Kathleen Hicks: So Rebeccah Heinrichs, how do you see that choice as US policy makers right now in the Trump Administration and across Congress are trying to look at the context of the world and also the domestic politics? Where are we headed?
Rebeccah Heinrichs: Yeah, I want to just add a little piece to that first question you had, and then I'll try to answer that second question briefly. First, I would say what I appreciate about President Obama's Prague speech is he did set a standard for what my view is, an idealist view of disarmament and pursuing “global zero”, and to his great credit, as the facts changed over the years, and as he could see in particular what the Russians were doing, there's certain things that he wanted to do after the NEW START treaty and many of his advisors wanted to do to pursue this agenda further that he tabled and he said, "We're not going to do that." Rejected, no first use. Rejected going down to a dyad, obviously maintained the triad. Recognized that there was very little margin for nuclear modernization for these legacy programs. We needed to recapitalize them.
Rebeccah Heinrichs: This was coming from an Administration who I don't think anybody could say was not committed to the vision that he laid out in Prague, and yet he responsibly understood that this is still the real world and we have to respond to the reality before us, and we need to maintain a credible, flexible nuclear deterrent, that's a triad. So I think it's very useful. It's very useful to have that speech and then see where the Obama Administration went on modernization, recapitalization and nuclear policy, generally.
Rebeccah Heinrichs: So the second question, there is a lot of continuity with the Trump Administration and the Obama Administration about what is necessary to maintain a credible nuclear deterrent force, and a lot of the modernization that the Administration is asking for is finishing or is trying to finish or move further along a lot of the efforts that began during the Obama Administration. Then of course, there's some things that are new in the Trump Nuclear Posture Review to adapt the nuclear deterrent to respond to very specific threats they're seeing from the Russians in particular. I see a lot of continuity, and then I also see this opportunity because of China and how big China is throwing its weight around on the international stage, and the concerns that the Chinese are doing what the Russians have done, which is moving nuclear policy towards the center of their military strategy and how they think about their military, and it's concerning. So opening these conversations now about, how do we rope in the Chinese to these strategic dialogues as we think about nuclear policy and nuclear security?
Kathleen Hicks: So Alex, let's kind of pick up on this theme of what the environment looks like today. Rebecca mentioned the trends in Russia, trends in China. I welcome you to comment on either of those, but also, there's some other big trends that listeners will be familiar with, the North Korean nuclearization program, the breakdown in the Iran nuclear deal, and then maybe less well known to many is the movement for the nuclear prohibition treaty, which went through the UN. I'd just love to get your perspective on where you think that landscape leaves the US policy community.
Alexandra Bell: Absolutely. So in Russia, obviously we're not in the best position with them. The INF Treaty collapsed. It's not clear that either side really knows what its next steps are with regard to intermediate range missiles, but we do have an opportunity on New START to extend the treaty four or five years. Unfortunately, the Administration has been sort of holding in place on that particular issue. They say repeatedly, they're still reviewing it. It's about three and a half years into the review process. I'm not sure what else they're going to learn about the treaty at this point.
Alexandra Bell: I don't know much about gambling, but I know that you don't put things on the table that you're not willing to lose, and I don't think losing New START is in our national security interests. In the same respect, there's been interest in the Administration to pursue this trilateral arms control deal with China. I don't think that engaging China in arms control and disarmament talks is a bad move. In fact, I think it's absolutely something we have to do. I'm just not altogether certain that before New START's expiration on February 5th, 2021, we will have time to negotiate a deal, get it ratified and entered into force before then.
Alexandra Bell: So I think in the sense that it's being seen as a bargaining chip, I just think that's a bad move. I think we should take the bird in hand, particularly as we're going through this global crisis with COVID-19, and stabilize the situation by maintaining the stability and predictability of that treaty, and then moving forward, but when it comes to eventually engaging China, I don't know that we have the assets in place. I don't know that we have enough people working in the State Department specifically on strategic stability. I don't even know that we have enough translators working at the state department who are versed enough in Chinese strategic stability to be available to go and negotiate the legal particulars of a deal. So we actually have to do a surge capacity, and also, remember that we spent 50 years working with the Russians on arms control, and it doesn't work well all the time, just expecting China to show up at the table and be amenable to these things. I just don't think it's realistic. We need to start slowly like we did with the Russians. For example, we don't have a hotline with China. Maybe that's the first step we need to take rather than all of a sudden, expect them to get into a massive reductions deal with the requisite verification that we would want and desire.
Kathleen Hicks: So your priorities, clearly, on Russia are extension of New START, and then it sounds like on China, you have more of a framework that's sort of the confidence building measure, have a series of interactions that build confidence that lead to major arms control. Is that fair?
Alexandra Bell: Yeah, and keeping in mind that China's going to want things too. You make deals with people because both sides bring something to the table. I'm not sure that we've had the conversations about what we're willing to put on the table that would incentivize China to come to the table.
Kathleen Hicks: So Rebecca Hersman, let's talk a little bit about some of these factors that haven't come up. So welcome you to comment on what's already been said, but really would like to hear a little more on North Korea, Iran, and the Nuclear Prohibition Treaty. Is there one theme, are there multiple takeaways for our listener about what is happening with regard to nuclear weapons?
Rebecca Hersman: Well, yeah, there's a lot of threads to pull in that one. Obviously, you have sort of the running antagonism out of North Korea, and they're advancing capabilities that force us to consider a posture of deterrence even as we seek the ability to look at denuclearization, and that kind of changes the frame in which we have to at least ponder reducing the nuclear threat from North Korea, but in this bigger picture, to me, that one's very threat driven. When you look at the course of arms control, the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), even the (Treaty on Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW), the "ban treaty", you're seeing the lack of, I think, cooperative, multilateral, even alliance-based approaches to thinking about these difficult nuclear problems.
Rebecca Hersman: So the United States moved unilaterally out of the JCPOA in a way that was highly disruptive, I think not only to actually managing Iran, but disruptive to all of the relationships that we need to have in place to work on nuclear issues, and in a way that was antagonistic not only to our foes, but to our friends. Some things, while I think the INF Treaty was sort of a special case in the sense that ... Russia truly, in my opinion, was absolutely violating that treaty. I really believe any president, President Clinton would have had an INF crisis, I believe, just because of the way that had been going over the last few years, but boy, there were a lot of missteps in kind of how that handles, and again, how we worked with European partners until they kind of really got through the details.
Rebecca Hersman: Similarly, a lot of concern about New START. Why is New START seemingly being held hostage to these sort of incongruous, almost poison pill arrangements with China? Nothing wrong with pursuing arms control either bilaterally with China or even multilaterally, but trying to make it square peg, round hole blended into the New START debate makes it feel like it's not serious, makes it feel like it's just trying to sabotage.
Rebecca Hersman: So you have all these threads going on, and so when you look at the TPNW, I feel like you start to see a bunch of countries, non-nuclear weapon states say, "You know what? You guys are a mess." So we are frustrated, and we want to look at some other alternatives as ways to put pressure on you, and what's hard about that is it is, in fact, the democratic nuclear weapons states, United States, UK, France, who really try to be leaders in all of these various settings, who feel that pressure. We are the ones, that sort of political, democratic legitimacy pressure comes on us. I don't think China's all that worried about the TPNW, I don't think Russia is all that worried about TPNW, certainly not North Korea, but for us it puts a lot of political pressure. I think we've ended a little upside down, where the United States ends up looking like the bad guy, and the bad guys don't look as bad as they should.
Kathleen Hicks: So Rebeccah Heinrichs, I want to come back to you. Some of those themes that came up regarding certainly the Iran nuclear deal, I welcome your thoughts on, but also in general, the US approach today under the Trump Administration. Do you think we look like a mess, if you will, as Rebecca's describing what other states may see, or do you think we actually have a coherent strategy?
Rebeccah Heinrichs: I would answer probably no to both of those. I don't think that we are a mess, and I don't think we necessarily have a coherent strategy, but coherent strategies are very hard when we have all of these disparate threats and different countries that we're dealing with, with very different national objectives, very different nuclear ideas about their nuclear weapons, and North Korea is a very different problem than Iran, very different problem than Russia and China, but I don't think it's as bad. I'm not as pessimistic about the state of play.
Rebeccah Heinrichs: I'll take the Iran deal, for instance, I was supportive of the Trump Administration's decision to pull out of the JCPOA, and the reason for that was, I always point to this, because it's not meant to be a political gotcha, but I think it is useful, Senator Hagle laid out in his press release why he opposed the JCPOA very, very well, All of the problems with that deal, so I commend that press release to listeners, but it simply fell short for all of the criteria that the Obama Administration laid out in the hearings when they were working on the JCPOA for what constituted a good deal.
Rebeccah Heinrichs: I'm not an idealist, and so I think a good deal doesn't have to be a perfect deal to be a good deal, but I still think the JCPOA left far too much room for the Iranians to continue their malign behavior and receive sanctions relief that they could then use to continue their malign behavior. So I support the Administration's efforts to pressure the regime and ratchet sanctions back up and re isolate them. It was a bipartisan effort to get us to the point where the Iranians were willing to negotiate on their nuclear program, and it was because of all of those sanctions, and so I think getting back to that point and getting a deal that is better, that included some certain things like their missile program, et cetera, would be wise.
Rebeccah Heinrichs: Now on the issue of INF, I don't know. I don't want to give anybody credit for pulling out of the INF Treaty except for the person who did it, and that credit goes to president Trump. I think the Trump Administration tried to get the Russians to comply with the treaty, and they tried in a variety of ways, and then they worked with NATO to, to come to the point where they had an agreement among NATO allies, which by the way, that was not an easy diplomatic feat. I've talked to many folks in the administration who said that that was a lot of work to make sure that everybody was on board and came out with a statement in support of the United States' decision to withdrawal from that treaty, and I think it was the right decision not only because I think it supports arms control to say that we cannot tolerate these violations to the degree that had been going on with the Russians violating the INF Treaty and that they have to mean something, and so I think that that was actually good for those of us who think that arms control is a means to an end, which is security.
Rebeccah Heinrichs: So I think that that was good, and then I think it's fine to wait on making a decision on extending New START. I'm not one of these who think that we should get out of New START. I don't think that we should automatically extend. I actually think it makes a lot of sense to be talking about what we would like from the Russians to improve the New START treaty, and this is not just something that a few folks think. There are some problems with the treaty, and so we would like the Russians to address, for instance, their tactical nuclear weapons. I don't think it's too much to ask, simply because we know that the Russians really don't want to include their tactical nuclear weapons.
Rebeccah Heinrichs: So I think that that's wise to talk about some of these things, some other exotic new nuclear weapons that they have that are outside the bounds of the treaty. All of these can be discussed while we talk about and get closer to extension, and then perhaps having a one year extension or something like that once we get good conversation going and have some modicum of agreement from the Russians that they'd be willing to make some of these other additions and get them roped into the treaty. I'm happy, actually, to say that we should have the Chinese in a trilateral agreement, but not make that contingent upon New START extension.
Kathleen Hicks: Yeah. For those listening, just to be clear, the New START, as it is now, does not include tactical or non-strategic nuclear weapons, it's strategic weapons only. So Rebeccah, just to be clear, your point would be to expand the scope of the treaty to look at these non-strategic nuclear weapons, presumably also to include US non-strategic nuclear. Is that fair?
Rebeccah Heinrichs: Yes, I think it is fair, and the reason I say that too is because you know when you look at ... Many times, I think people can get to the point where we're just counting certain kinds of categories of weapons, when it's kind of missing the forest for the trees. What we really want is greater stability and transparency, and we want to make sure it's a good deal for the United States, and what is really harming us right now, or what really kind of rubs against what we want for our own security and stability, is all of those massive numbers of those tactical nuclear weapons that the Russians have. The open source number, of course, is that they outnumber ours 10 to one, and it was a concern during the Obama Administration, and it's a concern now, and I think at some point, you just say, "If that that is something that the Russians really want and it's so important to them, and it's important to us, why can't that be part of the conversation?" I think it's fine for the United States and for our diplomats to push on that and make progress on that issue.
Alexandra Bell: To be clear, US and Russian forces are effectively on the level. There's parity between us. We have more non-deployed strategic weapons than the Russians do. That's actually a concern of theirs, and the Russians that I've talked to you about the next steps in negotiations don't necessarily say they'll never talk about tactical nuclear weapons, they just want to talk about other things like US missile defense or conventional forces. So I don't think it's true to say that they wouldn't do that. What I don't think is wise is to get rid of all the controls that we have on deployed strategic forces in order to get our hands around tactical nuclear weapons. That's something that we can do in addition, but the Russians are going to want something from us, and until we're ready to trade on the space that they want to trade on, then let's not throw the baby out with the bath water.
Alexandra Bell: New START is working. It's in our security interests. When speaking of allies and what they support, allies want us to extend New START. They say it publicly, they say it often. They also want us to stay in the Open Skies Treaty, something the Trump Administration is also, for whatever reason, ignoring at this point. They also asked us not to get out of the JCPOA, because they did support the treaty. So when we're thinking about all of these decisions that the Trump Administration is pursuing and making, again, this is not happening in a vacuum. There are going to be potentially dangerous consequences if we keep ignoring what our allies think and if we keep trying to hold out for a better deal.
Kathleen Hicks: So Rebecca Hersman, I think this exchange really helps understand the range of views, the rightful range of views that are being expressed in the American political and policy space. To the extent that we feel that there has been success in the past on arms control, what can we learn from that and bring into this period? Where do you put the prospects on something like New START extension getting ratified through the senate in the current polarized environment we're in?
Rebecca Hersman: When it comes to New START, they were pretty smart in how they built that treaty, and built this potential for a five year extension of the same treaty without requiring ratification or additional actions by the legislatures. So it's a fairly easy do, and adding to some of the things that Alex said, in a New START extension, you also preserve a lot of the communications, the technical transparency, the exchange of information, processes and procedures that are built into that treaty that we benefit a lot from. We get a lot of insight into Russia nuclear forces, and they into ours, which I think is quite stabilizing.
Rebecca Hersman: So I think the baby with bathwater point is a valid one, because you could do a fairly simple extension and bound the problem. There's also some of Russia's newer capabilities they've been experimenting with that actually could be brought technically inside the treaty. Not all of them, certainly not some of the more grandiose and scary, but some of them could be captured under technical provisions, and so I think you could, again, chip away at some of those problems in a very kind of calm, responsible way.
Rebecca Hersman: The thing is, that doesn't get everything done in the nuclear space. This is a busy, complicated space with a lot going on and a lot of different problems to be solved, so you're just going to have to put a lot of energy. You still have nuclear terrorism, you still have nuclear risk reduction, you still have the NPT and preventing proliferation. We still have trying to figure out how to talk to China about nuclear risks, whether it's bilaterally, multilaterally or anything else. It's very important that we figure out how to do that and to reduce and stabilize those risks.
Rebecca Hersman: So in my mind, the real question is, how do we go from a vision of arms control that came out of the end of the Cold War, that was really a very optimistic world where you could say, "We could do this about cooperating"? Well, now I think we have to still use all those tools of arms control for the purposes of helping to reinforce stability and even reinforce deterrence, but recognize it's competitive. It's not going to be quite as cooperative, but that doesn't mean you can't come to agreements, you can't negotiate solutions, but one thing we haven't talked about, which I think is absolutely central, is making sure our alliances stay strong. Those alliances are the most powerful feature in balancing competition, deterrence and arms control. When we put those three pieces together, I think that's where we have to find the path forward, and I think we have a lot of work to do there as well.
Kathleen Hicks: Yeah. So let me just spend a moment on the alliance questions. I'm really glad you raised that. I think it doesn't all seem to point, to me, in one direction, because you have, again, allies who feel very strongly about nonproliferation goals, you have some like Japan that are limited by constitution on the nuclear question themselves. At the same time, the extended nuclear deterrent has been seen throughout the Cold War and through today by many to be central to how we talk about maintaining our alliances.
Kathleen Hicks: So Rebeccah Heinrichs, how do you think the United States is doing in terms of reassuring allies emit some rhetoric from the Trump Administration, from the President, that's less than flattering to them, and this idea that he has sometimes put forward about states that are friendly becoming nuclear themselves, how do those fit inside a strategy of reducing nuclear weapons states, and also ensuring that the US is seen as a credible partner? It's a tricky picture, right?
Rebeccah Heinrichs: This is my one area where I think my comments will be most welcomed, I think, in this group. I would say of all of the areas, this is one where I'm the most uncomfortable with how the President himself has talked about nuclear security, and this is one area that I think those of us in the nuclear deterrence world and thinking about nuclear security, sometimes I think we will consider one area settled, there's enough agreement here and it's settled, and I think this is a time where we need to be making better arguments and stronger arguments and reeducating the public broader as to why some of these things have had so much consensus and agreement over the years, and that is on the nuclear umbrella.
Rebeccah Heinrichs: It is a bad thing when non-nuclear countries become nuclear. I don't want South Korea to decide that it needs its own nuclear capability. I don't want the Japanese to decide that they can't depend on the United States and they want their own nuclear capability, and I think that that's a counterintuitive thing sometimes depending on where your assumptions are and how you carry them out. I'm concerned, in particular, about some comments from the president that the short range missiles coming out of North Korea aren't significant because they're not long range, they can't reach the United States. Clearly, that's not how the Japanese view, it's not how some in the South Korean government view them. Depends on who you talk about in the South Korean government on that issue too, I think, but that's a problem. I think that we need to shore that up. We need to understand the value of some of these alliances beyond the purely transactional, financial piece of it, though I don't think that that part is irrelevant. I think that it's just a piece and not the whole story, and so I think that that's one area that we can definitely improve upon.
Rebeccah Heinrichs: I also think it's important that the United States, for instance ... One of the biggest arguments, I think, most compelling arguments for continuing to support the Ukrainians is because that gets back to the Budapest agreement and why ... We don't want to communicate that if you're a small country and you get rid of nuclear weapons, that you're just on your own, and you're just at the mercy of these big nuclear powers. That's a bad message for proliferation. I think it's important that we maintain some degree of solidarity with Ukrainians on that point alone, and I also think it's important that we learn the lessons of, I think, the mistake of intervening in Libya, because though I don't think the point was, obviously, to overthrow, it was an unintentional point to communicate that, that if you don't have nuclear weapons, you're now vulnerable against being overthrown, and I think that that has left a problem, a lingering problem, I think, in the minds of some adversaries who believe that their security is simply only tied to holding onto nuclear weapons, and if they get rid of nuclear weapons, that they're going to be vulnerable to being overthrown.
Rebeccah Heinrichs: So I think that there's a lot of work to do in making sure that both our adversaries and our allies understand that the United States' word means something, and that you will have severe consequences if you are an irresponsible nation trying to get nuclear weapons or you're violating these agreements.
Kathleen Hicks: Alex, your view on the nuclear umbrella to allies, do you think that still has the value that conventional wisdom has long put on it, or should we think about it differently?
Alexandra Bell: I think an extended deterrent should be thought about in terms far beyond just nuclear weapons, that it's conventional capabilities, it's defensive capabilities, it's economic and political and legal structures, it's message discipline, and that really gets at what I think has alarmed a lot of national security experts about the way the President has talked to and about some of our allies, is that it actually is important what we say and when we say it and how we say it.
Alexandra Bell: For example, the Saudis sort of mused about getting a nuclear capability if the Iranians did, and the press secretary at the time was asked, "What's our response?", and she responded that she didn't know if we had a policy. My head almost exploded, and I was like, "Yes, we have a policy! No one else gets nukes, not even our friends or sort of frenemies." I think making sure that we're speaking very clearly and definitively about what extended deterrence means to us about our views of any country going nuclear and the consequences of such actions, and sometimes that's overlooked, but I think we've seen over the course of this Administration how important the public messaging is around this particular policy.
Kathleen Hicks: Rebeccah Heinrichs, Alex Bell, Rebecca Hersman, great start to this conversation. Look forward to catching up with you on the next podcast.
Kathleen Hicks: On behalf of CSIS, I'd like to thank our sponsors, BAE Systems, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, and the Thales Group for contributing to Defense 2020. If you enjoyed this podcast, check out some of our other CSIS podcasts, including Smart Women, Smart Power, The Truth of the Matter, The Asia Chess Board, and more. You can listen to them all on major streaming platforms like iTunes and Spotify. Visit CSIS.org/podcasts to see our full catalog, and for all of CSIS's defense related content, visit defense360.CSIS.org.