Disarmament: Where Do We Go From Here?
by THOMAS K. FINLETTER
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DISARMAMENT is at the top of the agenda of the nations. What they do about it will fix the pattern of the world for decades and may decide the future of Western society. Even the German peace treaty, the other big question of the moment, is less important.
The Security Council of the United Nations has before it two proposals for disarmament: one, the Atomic Energy Commission’s report on how to eliminate atomic weapons; the other, a broader Russian-sponsored resolution for the reduction of armaments of every type. The preliminary skirmishing is over, and now the powers must face up to a great issue. Will they put away their weapons and make a peaceful world, or will they do the opposite — put up the flag for the Arms Race, the sweepstakes of all time, whose finish is so easily foretold?
Disarmament is an attractive word. Everybody is for it — as a general proposition. But like most attractive words it hides pitfalls. Disarmament can become a slogan behind which we shall compromise futilely and do nothing about the crucial business of stopping war. Or it can lead us into a military policy about as sensible as leading with one’s chin against Joe Louis.
One thing seems reasonably clear from United States and British official statements. We are not going to lead with our chin. We will not disarm unilaterally; we will not give up the know-how of the atomic bomb, or scrap any other weapon, unless a foolproof system of security is set up which will compel other nations to stay just as disarmed as we are. We will not repeat the mistake of the Washington Disarmament Conference of 1921-1922, where, as former Secretary Byrnes put it, we scrapped battleships and the Japanese scrapped blueprints.
Again and again this principle has been stated by American and British statesmen. In the Atomic Declaration of November, 1945, the United States, Canada, and Britain announced, in the stately language of diplomacy, that before they would do any disarming they would insist on “effective safeguards by way of inspection and other means to protect complying states against the hazards of violations and evasions.” This principle has been repeated and amplified in official documents and public statements of President Truman, Secretary Byrnes, Senators Connally and Vandenberg, Mr. Austin, and British leaders. There is no doubt what we mean — or at least what we have said. No unilateral disarmament, no relying on promises, not an iota of disarmament except as part of an enforceable world system which will compel everybody else to keep equally disarmed; and, if we do not get that system, armament to the limit so that (we hope) no one will dare attack us. On the face of the record, those who fear we shall again fall for a fuzzy idealism by which we disarm in a jungle world may be reassured.
So far the discussions of the powers have been entirely on the weapons to be given up. There has been almost no talk of the foolproof security system. The discussions have gone through three stages.
Stage one started with the Atomic Declaration of November, 1945, in which Canada, Britain, and the United States agreed that if they got this enforceable security system, they would give up atomic weapons and “all other major weapons adaptable to mass destruction.” A month later Russia agreed to the same terms at a Big Three meeting in Moscow. This “mass destruction ” idea dominated all early thinking on the subject. No one ever defined the term. But the principle was clear. It was to get rid of weapons which kill civilians wholesale. It surely included the bacteriological and chemical weapons the scientists were talking about as well as atomic weapons. It probably would include — when and if one got around to talking specifics — rockets, two-ton highexplosive blockbusters, incendiary bombs, the aeroplanes which would carry these things, and possibly some lesser weapons.
Obviously the protection-of-civilians principle could not last long. It is not on a much higher level than the save-money-for-the-taxpayers idea that appears from time to time in the disarmament discussions. The notion of making rules for the next war — and above all, of making rules whose purpose is to protect the stay-at-homes — is not one which can stand close examination. It has largely disappeared from United States and British thinking since the second phase began with Mr. Baruch’s June 14, 1946, speech to the Atomic Energy Commission.
Mr. Baruch’s speech hit at the heart of the problem. Freely translated, this speech (1) rejected the idea of making rules for the next war, (2) announced that the purpose of all this talk was to get rid of war itself, and (3) said that disarmament must be regarded not as an end in itself, but as the means of stopping war. Mr. Baruch accepted the by then orthodox policy that there should be no disarmament without a foolproof security system; but he did not go into details about this system except to say that no plan would be any good in which the wrongdoer could protect himself against punishment by possessing a right of veto. This part of Mr. Baruch’s proposals was blown up in the press out of all relation to its importance. Of course getting rid of the Big Power veto on enforcement would have to be a part of any enforceable security system, but it would be only one element, and not even the most contentious element, of such a system.
Mr. Baruch also announced his ideas on tactics with his famous phrase: “When a man learns to say A, he can, if he chooses, learn the rest of the alphabet, too.” Disarmament should be gradual, he said. First get rid of atomic bombs; then, if that works, do away with bacteriological weapons. Then, if that also works, take up rockets; and so on.
This weapon-by-weapon approach is the most debatable part of the Baruch plan. Can you have an enforceable system of security which is applicable to one weapon only? How can a plan to eliminate one weapon be enforced if the nations (including potential treaty breakers) keep all their other arms? These questions have not been answered; indeed, they have not been discussed. For, in the midst of the talks about controlling atomic weapons, the Russians startled their colleagues by proposing a general disarmament plan applicable to all weapons.
Mr. Molotov introduced his general disarmament resolution on October 29, 1946. This resolution shifted the whole emphasis of the disarmament talks. The Russian proposal was inconsistent with, and in a sense antagonistic to, the one-weapon-at-a-time tactics of Mr. Baruch. The United States, nevertheless, had to go along with it. We could not put ourselves in the position of opposing disarmament. Mr. Austin promptly accepted the Russian resolution, in principle, on behalf of the United States. So now both the United States approach, limited to atomic weapons as the first step, and the Soviet approach, dealing with all weapons, are before the Security Council.
Where do we go from here? Let us look at the issues.
Since the keystone of United States and British policy is the foolproof security system — the “effective safeguards by way of inspection and other means to protect complying states against the hazards of violations and evasions” — it is clear that sometime or other we shall have to define that system. What are its ingredients? Will the other powers accept them? Will we ourselves accept them?
Axiom number one is that there is nothing in between a system based on good faith — on the bare promises of the nation-states — and a system based on force. We may set up the most elaborate inspection system that can be devised; but it can be nothing more than an intelligence service to let us know when some nation is breaking the rules. An inspection system does not enforce anything. A system that is based only on finding out when a violation takes place is not by itself a foolproof security plan.
Nor does it become foolproof by adding controls which are inadequate. Giving the United Nations actual possession of the mines and factories capable of making atomic bombs would not make the system foolproof. That would merely make it known when an offending state seized these mines and factories. Nor would the system be made workable by giving the United Nations a small military force which could be defied by the military force of an offending state. A primary political principle must be accepted: an enforceable security system must be one based on a military or policing force which is strong enough in relation to the forces of any nation-state to be able, as a practical matter, to enforce the rules which the nations agree on, despite the resistance of any national army. If we agree to give up the atomic knowhow or any other weapon for anything less than that, we shall be disarming unilaterally, in exchange for mere promises and an illusion of security. We shall again be giving up weapons. Potential aggressors will give up blueprints.
Next question: where is this military or policing power to come from? Can it be derived from an understanding by the powers that they should use their national forces to suppress any power which would seek to use its national army to prevent the enforcement of the treaty of disarmament?
We really must have learned by now that this will not work. This is the “collective security” method, the principle being that “peace-loving states” will use their military force collectively to suppress “aggressor states.” It is the notion of making war to stop war. It was the League of Nations method, and surely the experience of the League should make us realize that something is fundamentally wrong with it. The League failed again and again and again; in Manchuria, in Ethiopia, in the Rhineland, and in World War II.
The reason — if a reason is needed in the face of such overwhelming evidence — is simple. It is that democracies go to war only when public opinion is aroused to the sticking point. And public opinion in democracies cannot be counted on to become aroused at precisely the right time. Would the United States have gone to war to prevent Mussolini’s taking over the Ethiopians? Would it have gone to war to prevent Hitler’s reoccupation of the Rhineland? Did it go to war to stop Japanese aggression in Manchuria? Looking to the future, would the United States go to war if a report were made to the Security Council that some power is refusing admittance of United Nations inspectors to some suspected area, or even if it is reported that the power in question is making prohibited weapons?
If we give up any weapons in reliance on collective security, or the hope that all the peace-loving nations will agree to fight whenever there is a violation of the disarmament treaty, we shall be disarming unilaterally. Again we shall be giving up arms while the other fellow gives up blueprints.
Where then is the superior law-enforcement force of a foolproof security system to come from? There is only one other possibility, and that is the United Nations. We are driven to the conclusion that we shall not get our foolproof system of security except by giving UN a military or policing force strong enough to prevent any power from resisting UN’s enforcement of the treaty of disarmament.
This incontrovertible fact — recognized in the UN Charter provisions for a UN military force to be created “as soon as possible” and for a UN Military Staff Committee—is however not the end of the problem. For, unless there is a disarmament of the powers as well as the armament of UN, UN will not have a force which will be strong enough to overcome the defiance of a lawbreaking state. We cannot build up a supermilitary force in UN and let the powers keep their military establishments. That again would provide for the making of war to stop war, and would be unworkable.
It is for this reason that the UN Charter calls for the disarmament of the powers and for the supervision of this disarmament by UN’s Military Staff Committee. It is for this reason that the powers have pursued the problem of disarmament so vigorously. Another fundamental principle of our foolproof security system now appears. It is that this lawenforcement force of UN must be small. It must rely on relative power rather than on absolute power. Only by applying this principle can the doubts of those who fear the domination of a superstate be allayed. With a small force based on relative power — UN lightly armed, the nation-states substantially disarmed — there is no danger of setting up a new oppression to take the place of the present oppression of nationalism. More important still, only in this way can we have a sure and enforceable system of security. Such a small UN force, with no national army capable of opposing it, could enforce the treaty of disarmament in the orderly manner of the rule of law, the way in which domestic peace and order are maintained within each nation-state, the only way in which any system of enforcement can be foolproof.
Will the powers, and in particular the United States, ever agree to such a system of security?
One thing seems certain. We will never get this system by concentrating first on disarmament. It is on the armament of the United Nations that we must concentrate if we are to get anywhere.
This has not been the policy so far. Meetings of the Military Staff Committee of UN have been going on in New York for some time for the purpose of working out plans to give UN its military force. They have got exactly nowhere. The attention of the powers has been centered almost exclusively on disarmament.
There is a reason for this. While we have talked much about the enforceable security system, we have not even begun to accept its implications. For if disarmament is an attractive idea, which will not lose votes, the idea of reversing the traditions, faiths, and myths of centuries, and of giving power — real power, not just the structure of power — to a world organization such as the United Nations, is something else. To talk disarmament is to talk in orthodox terms; for disarmament is consistent with the maintenance of the present nation-state structure of the world and with keeping war as the final arbiter in international relations. On the other hand, to talk about arming UN is to broach the creation of a new world sovereignty; for power is the primary ingredient of statehood. The impulse is strong to edge into this new and untried terrain cautiously; indeed there is a considerable impulse not to edge into it at all.
It is natural therefore that in their first explorations the emphasis of the governments should be on the giving up of weapons. But we must be careful not to let this emphasis lead us into giving up our key principle — the foolproof security system. And we may be driven into just that if we do not soon shift the emphasis from the negative of disarmament to the positive armament of UN.
One may protest that we should do both simultaneously. If the true principle is to create a condition in which UN, with relatively small armament, has a preponderant power over that of any nation-state, why not wrap the whole thing up in one package and put it into effect on a specific date? Why not prepare a treaty which will fix the amount of disarmament of the national establishments which is necessary, the amount of armament of UN which is required, fix a closing date when both are to take place, and thus create the system at one stroke?
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SUCH would be the way to do things if the powers were determined, now, to do the job. But they are not. A single-package treaty ol this kind is, at present writing, beyond anything which has been talked of by the statesmen. Rarely are innovations in government made in such big jumps. There is only one example of such a daring way ol doing things in the recent peacetime history of the West — the formation of our own Federal Union. The men who wrote our Constitution did not edge into their objective by easy stages. They did not propose gradualist changes in the Articles of Confederation. They wrapped up their program in one revolutionary document — the Constitution — and put it up to the people of their sovereign states to take or leave.
But the men of 1787 knew what they wanted, and were determined to get it. Now, neither the United States nor Russia is sure that it wants disarmament — with all its implications. Until they make up their minds, all they can do is to approach the end gingerly, working step by step toward the goal as public opinion in the United States and a favorable attitude in the Politburo develop and finally (one hopes) become positive forces demanding that the world live in peace.
But we must look out for the pitfalls as we follow our gradualist course. If, in our devotion to gradualism, we give away the atomic know-how, destroy our stockpiles of atom bombs, dismantle our plants for making them, and agree to make no more of them, in exchange for some system of “inspection and control,”which in fact will not be enforceable — then we will have done the very thing we have said so often we will never do. Gradualism, if focused on disarmament, can lead only to giving up our key principle of no surrender of weapons without a foolproof security system, and thus to some more unenforceable promises which will be broken by the war-minded states whenever it becomes to their advantage to break them.
It is of capital importance that we understand this. An example will make it clear. Suppose we give up the atom bomb (or any weapon in which we excel) but allow the nations to keep all other weapons. What happens Avhen it is reported that Country X is violating the treaty—say by interfering with the work of the inspectors? Could X be compelled to stop its violation? Would there be any foolproof system of security to “protect complying states against the hazards of violations and evasions"? There would be absolutely none. All the “complying states" could do would be to make war, to try to break through or destroy the army of Country X in order to get at the offending individuals. If we should give up the bomb and let the nations keep all other weapons, we would have given up one of the prizes of our arsenal in exchange for a promise by the warminded states that they will live up to the treaty as long as it is to their advantage to do so.
But it may be said that, in order to get disarmament, we should give up our key principle. Granted that there is the risk that the system of relying on the good faith of the other nations may fail, why not try it? It might work, and if it did we would have edged our way toward total disarmament, and thus a little nearer to peace.
The answer to this is that we cannot simultaneously disarm and recognize war as the final arbiter of international relations. How can any country give up the weapons in which it excels, if it knows that it may need them if international relations continue to be conducted along traditional lines? Disarmament, except as some gullible state may weaken its power position in a misguided and impractical idealism, will never take place except as part of a broader scheme which will eliminate war as the final sanction. This is the meaning of our key principle. What we are really saying when we insist on a foolproof security system before we give up so much as a cap pistol is that disarmament is possible only in a world in which enforceable law, and not war, governs the relationship of peoples.
Does this mean that gradualism is impossible, that we have no alternative but to face up to a single package — the whole deal at once — or admit failure? I do not think so. Gradualism — if we are condemned to that course for a while by the indecision of the United States and Russia — can be practiced safely if it is applied, not to the disarmament of the powers, but to the armament of the United Nations. Gradualism is as feasible in building up UN’s military force as it is impractical in cutting down on the national military forces. The world can be made accustomed to the notion of a world force in UN as that force gradually grows, and as world opinion, or rather Big Power opinion, comes to recognize it as a safe, practicable business. Then the step to disarmament becomes possible. When UN possesses a force which in fact would be capable of protecting “complying states against the hazards of violations and evasions,”public opinion in the democracies and the Politburo in Russia will be in a position to accept disarmament. For then they will know that they can disarm without threatening the security of their peoples. No power could break the disarmament agreement. The UN force would be there to prevent it. If the powers really want peace, the existence of a military force in UN is the first and indispensable step.
The test of the wisdom and sincerity of the Big Powers, of the validity of all their talk about disarmament, will be made in the next months. If the talk is still on the giving up of weapons, if the question of what constitutes an enforceable security system is avoided or hidden behind generalities, we are on the road to war. Only two things can come out of such a policy — the all-out arms race or unilateral disarmament by the United States. If on the other hand the powers turn to carrying out the Military Staff provisions of the UN Charter and start building up military power in UN, or better yet decide to build all at once an enforceable security system, there will be light on the horizon. That will be the sign of a new day, a day in which enforceable disarmament under law, the first prerequisite of peace, will come about.