Limit missile defense—or expand it?

Abstract

Since 2002, when the United States withdrew from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, the international arms control regime has included no limits on missile defense. Washington wants to keep it that way, insisting that it “will continue to reject any negotiated restraints on US ballistic missile defenses.” Many experts believe that missile defense undermines strategic stability; but some argue that missile defense can play a role in denuclearization. Here, Wu Riqiang of China (2015), Tatiana Anichkina of Russia (2015), and Oliver Thränert of Germany debate whether arms control arrangements should include limits on missile defense—or whether advances in missile defense should be encouraged because they might contribute to disarmament.

Missile defense systems, according to their critics, undermine strategic stability and represent an obstacle to nuclear disarmament. But in fact—whether additional nuclear powers emerge in the future or nuclear weapons are eliminated entirely—missile defense could have important stabilizing effects.

Today, Moscow and Beijing don’t perceive US missile defense as a stabilizing force. Russia and China argue that US missile defenses undermine their nuclear second-strike capabilities. Even though this claim isn’t accurate (especially in Russia’s case), both nations are modernizing their nuclear arsenals, with US missile defense as a justification. The question, then, is how to achieve conditions under which missile defense can fulfill its potential as a stabilizing force. Limiting missile defense through arms control negotiations isn’t the proper approach. Rather, discussions should focus on international cooperation in missile defense systems—and on making such systems an important stabilizing element in a world free of nuclear weapons.

More nukes, fewer nukes

It’s difficult to say whether the future will bring further nuclear proliferation or progress toward general disarmament. Under either scenario, missile defense could contribute to security.

If more and more countries seek to develop nuclear weapons, as well as missiles to deliver them, missile defense could play an important role in defending the international order. New nuclear weapon states, certainly, could be tempted to engage in aggressive behavior—invading small neighbors, for instance, on the assumption that nuclear weapons would deter outside powers from intervening (Sagan and Waltz, 1995). But if outside powers were equipped with effective missile defenses, intervention would be more likely (ideally, under a UN mandate). The more effective the missile defenses, the lower the constraints on intervention. Thus nuclear proliferators would be deterred from invading their neighbors. Nuclear aspirants in turn would be less likely to think of nuclear weapons as tools for exercising regional leverage. An important incentive for establishing nuclear weapons programs would disappear.

And what if the world achieved complete disarmament? Once again, missile defense could play a very important role in security—this time, by ensuring that nuclear weapons didn’t emerge all over again.

In a “zero” world, the reemergence of nuclear weapons would be a danger for several reasons. First, a world without nuclear weapons would not be a world without dictatorships, which means that nuclear verification and transparency would always remain fragmentary. Second, the peaceful uses of nuclear technology are becoming attractive to more and more countries. Third, a world without nuclear weapons probably wouldn’t be a world without missiles—to the contrary, civilian space programs will probably become achievable for an increasing number of states over time. Therefore, the possibility would always exist that a nation with ballistic missile capabilities could achieve nuclear breakout and immediately threaten other countries over long distances.

Missile defense systems could provide a hedge against such threats. Even a limited missile defense system could serve as insurance against clandestine nuclear rearmament at the early stages of a nation’s nuclear weapons development, when defenses would only have to provide protection against limited offensive capabilities. In a world free of nuclear weapons, missile defense could render cheating an unattractive option for potential rogue states—even if they acquired nuclear capabilities, their ability to threaten others with significant damage would be constrained. In fact, today’s nuclear weapon states would probably see establishing such conditions as an important precondition for engaging in dramatic nuclear reductions and pursuing complete disarmament. However, if missile defense is to contribute to nuclear reductions and one day to complete disarmament, the most important precondition is for the United States and NATO to cooperate on missile defense with Russia—and eventually with China and other countries.

To be sure, missile defenses cannot solve all the problems that complicate the disarmament process. But they can be an important part of the solution.

Challenging relationships

Today, Russia possesses some 1,500 strategic nuclear weapons—plus thousands of nondeployed nuclear warheads and weapons awaiting dismantlement (Arms Control Association, 2014). As long as the Russian arsenal remains so large, no US administration launching a first strike against Moscow could entertain any hope that US missile defenses would limit the damage from a Russian counterstrike to an acceptable level. Arguably, this wouldn’t change even if the Russian arsenal became much smaller. Only if the United States and Russia agreed to reduce their nuclear arsenals to very low levels—say, 100 weapons each—could Washington theoretically expect to gain a premium from launching a first strike. And even this would pertain only if US missile defenses were far superior to Russian missile defenses. Even then, no American president could be certain that no Russian second-strike weapons would penetrate US missile defenses and cause unacceptable damage to the United States and its population.

Russia says that it will not enter new negotiations on nuclear disarmament unless Washington is prepared to accept limits on missile defense. But this does not mean that Moscow is actually afraid of US missile defense. Rather, Vladimir Putin perceives nuclear weapons as a kind of great-power currency, and he does not want to negotiate that currency away. Instead, he uses US missile defense as a pretext for carrying out nuclear modernizations that were planned in any event. So it’s true that US missile defense stands in the way of further disarmament by the United States and Russia. But the reasons for that are political, not strategic.

Chinese military planners have much more reason to worry about US missile defense than do their Russian counterparts. China possesses only about 250 nuclear warheads in total (Arms Control Association, 2014). Still, it would be a big gamble for the United States to carry out a first strike against China—a successful nuclear counterstrike could not be ruled out. In any event, China is not prepared at this point to demonstrate any transparency in the nuclear arena, let alone pursue arsenal reductions. Beijing’s concerns about vulnerability vis-à-vis Washington are too great. China’s attitude is motivated in part by a perception that US missile defense is a threat to Beijing’s nuclear second-strike capability—even if this perception is not entirely valid.

Tool for disarmament

In the US-Russia and US-China relationships, missile defense stands in the way of further nuclear disarmament. But it doesn’t have to be that way. Rather, missile defense should become a tool for further disarmament. To achieve this, future negotiators should concentrate on international collaboration in missile defense, not on missile-defense limits. And they should harmonize collaboration on missile defense with a step-by-step approach to nuclear disarmament.

NATO, at its Lisbon and Chicago summits in 2010 and 2012, proposed that Russia and NATO take cooperative steps in missile defense. Afterwards, discussions were held within the NATO-Russia Council regarding a joint Missile Defense Data Fusion Center and a Planning Operations Center. But Russia’s deep mistrust regarding US space dominance and conventional strategic weapons stood in the way of progress (Zadra, 2014). Overcoming Russian concerns would require great effort from Washington—but such an effort only seems feasible after a general rapprochement has taken place between the two countries.

Currently, cooperation on missile defense among the United States, Russia, and China does not seem realistic. But it’s also unrealistic to severely limit missile defense and significantly reduce nuclear weapons at the same time—from the US perspective, deeper nuclear cuts seem manageable only if progress is made in establishing effective missile defenses. So the long-term approach should be this: Engage in international missile defense cooperation and accompany it with step-by-step elimination of nuclear weapons. International cooperation need not extend so far as establishing joint command-and-control systems. Rather, missile defense architectures that communicate in terms of early warning would suffice.