Assess in detail the prospects of the emergence of a nuclear-weapons free world. (2010, 40 Marks)
A nuclear-weapons-free world means the verified elimination of all arsenals, not merely their reduction. The goal is written into Article VI of the NPT, and the International Court of Justice (1996) unanimously held that states must pursue and bring to a conclusion disarmament negotiations. Yet some 12,187 warheads still existed in January 2026 (SIPRI). The prospects are best assessed by weighing the forces for zero against the obstacles.
Forces favouring abolition
- Normative pressure. The humanitarian conferences at Oslo (2013), Nayarit and Vienna (2014) produced the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, in force since 22 January 2021 with 74 states parties by mid-2026; its first Review Conference meets in New York from 30 November 2026. Nina Tannenwald’s nuclear taboo has helped keep the weapons unused since 1945.
- Converts from the establishment. George Shultz, Henry Kissinger, William Perry and Sam Nunn called in January 2007 for a world free of nuclear weapons; Barack Obama endorsed the goal at Prague in April 2009; the Global Zero movement seeks phased, verified elimination.
- Precedents. South Africa dismantled its arsenal; Ukraine, Belarus and Kazakhstan gave up inherited Soviet weapons; five regional nuclear-weapon-free zones, from Tlatelolco (1967) to Central Asia (2006), cover most of the southern hemisphere.
- The Indian vision. Rajiv Gandhi’s Action Plan (UN General Assembly, June 1988) proposed time-bound elimination by 2010, binding on all and ending the NPT’s discrimination; India still backs a universal, non-discriminatory convention.
Obstacles
- Strategic logic. Realists from Kenneth N. Waltz onward see the bomb as the ultimate guarantee of survival under anarchy. States weak in conventional forces, Pakistan against India or Russia against NATO, value it most.
- Breakout and verification. Thomas C. Schelling (Daedalus, 2009) warned that a world at zero would keep mobilisation plans to rebuild, so every crisis would become a nuclear crisis and a rearmament race; knowledge cannot be disinvented.
- Collapse of arms control. New START expired on 5 February 2026 without a successor, leaving only informal restraint; the INF Treaty died in 2019; the CTBT is still not in force; the eleventh NPT Review Conference (May 2026) closed without consensus, the third failure in a row.
- Expansion, not reduction. All nine possessors are modernising; China’s stockpile, about 620, grows fastest, and Washington and Moscow have both talked of resuming tests.
- Perverse lessons. Ukraine, invaded after surrendering its warheads under the 1994 Budapest Memorandum, and the strikes on Iran since June 2025, persuade insecure states that the bomb is the only reliable deterrent.
- Discrimination. The NPT freezes a hierarchy of five; Jaswant Singh’s “Against Nuclear Apartheid” (Foreign Affairs, 1998) explained why India stayed out. The TPNW has no possessor or allied member and so eliminates no weapon.
Assessment
The structural conditions for abolition, great-power trust, intrusive verification and the resolution of the disputes that drive acquisition, are absent, and trends since 2019 point the wrong way. Liberal institutionalists and the humanitarian movement keep the norm alive; realists answer that norms do not survive breakout fears. A realistic path runs through intermediate steps: renewed US–Russia limits, bringing China into talks, no-first-use pledges such as India’s, de-alerting, the CTBT’s entry into force and a fissile material cut-off treaty.
Conclusion
A nuclear-weapons-free world is a legitimate legal and moral goal but not a near-term prospect; it depends less on treaties than on changing the security relationships that make the bomb attractive. Until then the realistic aim is minimising the role of nuclear weapons while keeping elimination on the agenda, the balance Rajiv Gandhi’s plan sought.