Foreign Relations of the United States, 1969–1976, Volume E–14, Part 2, Documents on Arms Control and Nonproliferation, 1973–1976

143. Statement by the Director of the Arms Control and Disarmament Agency (Iklé)¹

Geneva, May 6, 1975.

U.S. Reaffirms Support for Nonproliferation Treaty at Review Conference

It is my privilege to convey a message to this conference from the President of the United States:

This Review Conference offers an opportunity to focus new attention on our vital obligation to arrest the spread of nuclear weapons. It is a responsibility that confronts all nations equally and impartially. Nuclear energy can and should promote the fortunes of nations assembled at this conference. But its destructive potential can and must be contained.

Support for the Nonproliferation Treaty is a major tenet of American policy. Consequently, I hope this conference will:

—Convey the importance of nonproliferation to the security of all nations, hence to global stability;

—Promote international cooperation in peaceful uses of nuclear energy, while insuring that it not be misused as a means of mass destruction;

—Encourage the further development and wider application of effective safeguards and physical security measures for nuclear materials and facilities; and

—Review the considerable progress that has been made in arms control and disarmament since the treaty was signed, and promote efforts to build on what has been achieved.

We welcome the important recent additions to the roster of parties to the Nonproliferation Treaty, as well as the indications that others are moving toward adherence. We recognize that the treaty’s promise is not yet fully realized, but we take satisfaction from what has been achieved. We further recognize that no treaty by itself can prevent the proliferation of nuclear weapons. Yet we remain convinced that the Nonproliferation Treaty is an essential means of advancing this purpose.

Although we still have a long way to go, we see in reviewing the record that the cooperative undertaking to create a more stable world community is well underway.

I take this occasion therefore to rededicate the United States to the support of the Nonproliferation Treaty and to the high purpose of a stable peace which animates it.

Few international endeavors are more deserving of our attention and energy than containing the destructive potential of the atom. The stakes involved are enormous.

We cannot be complacent—and indeed we are not—about the nuclear arsenals that now exist. We must press ahead to make more comprehensive the limitations which have been imposed and begin to reduce the potential for destruction, a potential that we can scarcely grasp.

But it would be a fatal error if we assumed that we could move forward in reducing the threat of nuclear destruction while nation after nation began to build its own nuclear arsenals. We cannot move forward and backward at the same time. The risk of nuclear destruction—by design, miscalculation, or accident—cannot be reduced if nuclear competition drives a dangerous wedge between neighboring nations throughout the world.

Let there be no mistake. The dangers resulting from nuclear proliferation are shared by all, nuclear powers and non-nuclear-weapon states alike.

We therefore have a common interest in the success of the Nonproliferation Treaty. It is my government’s hope that this conference will focus attention on the treaty’s essential role in promoting the security of all states and that it will provide a stimulus for cooperative international effort to make the treaty as effective and universally applicable as possible.

The basic provisions of the treaty, articles I and II, have been followed faithfully by the parties. The safeguards resulting from article III make an important additional contribution to the security of all states.

But in our judgment, the effectiveness of all three articles can be strengthened best by securing the widest possible adherence to the treaty. Hence, it is most gratifying that several states have recently completed their ratification. The Republic of Korea ratified the treaty. Just last week major industrial countries of Western Europe also became parties to the treaty: Belgium, the Federal Republic of Germany, Italy, Luxembourg, and the Netherlands.

We welcome all the new parties. Several of them have attained world leadership in peaceful applications of nuclear technology. This offers telling evidence that the treaty is consistent with progress in the peaceful uses of the atom. In fact, the treaty not only supports peaceful uses but helps preserve the world order without which peaceful uses could not survive and expand.

The First Five Years of the Treaty

In its first five years, the treaty has clearly served to increase the volume of international nuclear commerce. The United States, for example, has entered into international arrangements for the enrichment of uranium to meet the needs of some 150 power reactors in non-nuclear-weapon states, having a total capacity of about 120,000 megawatts. In addition, the United States has exported 35 nuclear reactors since 1970. Most of this cooperation has been with states now party to the Nonproliferation Treaty or with signatories whose ratification appears imminent.

The United States has shared its peaceful nuclear technology generously. It has provided information, offered training, supported research programs, supplied uranium enrichment services, and sold or donated research and power reactors embodying the most advanced technology.

Aid to the developing countries has also increased considerably since the treaty was opened for signature. We believe the developing countries party to the treaty should be given favored consideration in nuclear assistance. Last year, my government announced that parties will be given preference in the allocation of our in-kind contributions to the technical assistance program of the International Atomic Energy Agency. At the same time, we are increasing substantially the amount of our voluntary contribution for 1975.

Safeguards Over Peaceful Uses

A major purpose—indeed, a major accomplishment—of the Nonproliferation Treaty is to make possible the expansion of peaceful nuclear cooperation. But, as Secretary Kissinger stated to the United Nations last fall [Sept. 23, 1974], our policy of widely supplying nuclear fuels and other nuclear materials “cannot continue if it leads to the proliferation of nuclear explosives.”

The rapid expansion of the peaceful uses of nuclear energy has raised massive new problems. One is meeting fuel-reprocessing needs in the safest and most economic way. Another is the disposal of the rapidly accumulating nuclear wastes. Fortunately, we still have some time to work out solutions. There is no economic need for reprocessing for several years to come, and spent fuel can still be kept in temporary storage. But nations must cooperate to solve these problems soon to protect the health and safety of all the people.

The promotion of peaceful uses of the atom is inseparably linked with safeguards to inspire international confidence that fissionable materials are not being diverted to destructive purposes. We can all take pride in what has been done about safeguards. Specifically, the International Atomic Energy Agency has accomplished a great deal. Its efforts deserve the wholehearted support of us all.

Virtually every party to this treaty with nuclear facilities requiring safeguards has negotiated an agreement with the Agency; and almost every nuclear facility now operating in the non-nuclear-weapon states is subject to Agency safeguards or will be in the near future. This is a good record.

But much remains to be done. We need to insure:

—That all parties to the treaty conclude agreements with the Agency;

—That safeguards are effective and efficient; and

—That safeguards cover, as comprehensively as possible, the nuclear facilities of non-nuclear-weapon states not party to the treaty and preclude diversion of nuclear materials for any nuclear explosive device.

Also, we have to concern ourselves seriously with the threat of theft and other criminal seizure of nuclear material. We hope this conference will recognize the need for international measures to deal with this grim danger.

Peaceful Nuclear Explosions

Article V, as we all know, was included in the treaty to insure that the non-nuclear-weapon states adhering to the treaty would not be deprived of any potential benefits of peaceful nuclear explosions that might be realized by the nuclear-weapon states.

In the United States, there has been much research and experimentation on the use of nuclear explosions for peaceful purposes. But we have not yet reduced any application to practice, nor have we obtained any commercial benefits from this technology. If and when we should succeed in doing so, we would of course make those benefits available as called for in the treaty.

Questions remain to be resolved regarding the feasibility and practicability of peaceful nuclear explosions. Moreover, no request for such explosions has ever gone beyond the stage of preliminary feasibility studies. For these reasons, there has so far been no practical necessity to conclude the international agreement or agreements mentioned in article V. However, the United States stands ready to negotiate the requisite agreements when the practical need develops.

In the meantime, the United States is prepared to participate in consideration of the institutional arrangements that may be required to make the benefits of peaceful nuclear explosions available internationally. Toward this end, important steps have already been taken within the framework of the International Atomic Energy Agency. My government, as one of the potential suppliers of such services, has agreed to assist the Agency in a study of the related legal problems.

U.S.-Soviet Arms Control Agreements

When this treaty was opened for signature in 1968, the only other postwar arms control agreements were the Antarctic Treaty, the “Hotline” Agreement, the Limited Test Ban Treaty, and the Outer Space Treaty. While these were solid accomplishments, they did not reduce the levels of existing nuclear armaments.

At the signing ceremony of the Nonproliferation Treaty, my government and the Soviet Government announced that we would open negotiations to limit offensive and defensive strategic arms. The relationship between the treaty and this announcement was clear: the successful negotiation of this treaty had strengthened mutual confidence between the two largest nuclear-weapon powers and promised to keep nuclear arms control from becoming totally unmanageable.

Since then, serious and intensive negotiations on strategic arms limitations have continued steadily and received personal attention at the highest level of the two governments. The first fruits of these negotiations were the improved “Hotline” Agreement and the Agreement on Measures to Reduce the Risk of Outbreak of Nuclear War.

The culmination of the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks in 1972 brought the Treaty on Anti-Ballistic Missile Systems limiting each side to two narrowly circumscribed complexes. In my country it led in fact to dismantling an anti-ballistic-missile complex already well under construction. By renouncing major anti-ballistic-missile systems, the United States and the Soviet Union gave up a potential new weapons system that they were in a unique position to exploit. No other country could have built such systems.

Along with the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, an interim agreement was worked out to limit the number of strategic offensive launchers on both sides for five years, a period that would provide time to achieve more comprehensive limits.

At the summit meeting in the summer of 1974, the leaders of the United States and Soviet Union took a further important step by negotiating the Threshold Test Ban Treaty. I should point out that this was not only an important arms control measure in its own right; it was also a positive step toward a comprehensive test ban, to which we remain firmly committed.

Last November, at Vladivostok, a major milestone was reached when President Ford and General Secretary Brezhnev established specific guidelines for a new agreement to limit strategic offensive arms. Based on this accord, negotiations are now underway here in Geneva. The new agreement is to limit strategic offensive armaments, including strategic bombers and missiles equipped with multiple reentry vehicles (MIRVs), to equal totals on each side.

The implications of this breakthrough are far-reaching. By putting an overall ceiling on strategic armaments, we establish a promising basis for further reductions. We look forward to follow-on negotiations on further limitation and reductions as soon as the Vladivostok agreement is complete.

An encouraging precedent has already been set: only two years after the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty imposed comprehensive, equal ceilings on these systems, both sides agreed to reduce the permitted deployment levels by one-half.

Five years have now elapsed since the Nonproliferation Treaty went into effect. This period is only one-sixth of the nuclear era that began at the end of the Second World War. Yet, in this short time, far more has been accomplished in the control of nuclear arms than in the preceding 25 years. In historical perspective, the treaty has proven to be both a prerequisite and a catalyst for progress toward nuclear disarmament. That process is underway. And it is up to all of us to encourage and sustain it.

The Nonproliferation Treaty is indispensable to nuclear disarmament. It is indispensable to achieving the maximum peaceful benefits of nuclear energy. It is indispensable to the security of all. The task of this conference is to provide the support and forward movement that are needed to enable the treaty to fulfill its great promise.

1. Summary: Iklé, the U.S. Representative to the NPT Review Conference, read the text of President Ford’s message to the NPT Review Conference delegates and underscored the importance of the Nonproliferation Treaty.

   Source: Department of State Bulletin, June 30, 1975, pp. 921–924. All brackets are in the original. The text of Iklé’s statement is taken from ACDA Press Release 75–16, May 6. The final declaration of the conference, adopted by consensus on May 30, is in the Department of State Bulletin, pp. 924–929.