By Ray Acheson, Reaching Critical Will
This article first appeared as the editorial in NPT News in Review, Vol. 19, No. 4, published on 29 July 2024, and is reproduced here with the kind permission of the author.
As Cluster Two discussions on non-proliferation wrap-up, it’s time to talk about gaslighting. The technique of gaslighting—relentlessly insisting on fiction as fact—is being deployed by several states parties to obscure, distort, or rewrite history. Gaslighting is a patriarchal technique used primarily by abusive people seeking to destroy their partner’s confidence and sense of identity and self-worth. The term comes from a play in 1938 called Gas Light in which a man uses manipulations and lies to isolate his wife and persuade her that she is experiencing mental illness so he can steal from her. Since then, the term has been used to describe a particular dynamic of abuse in cases of domestic violence and other circumstances. It also relates to other patriarchal techniques of control such a victim-blaming. Unfortunately, both gaslighting and victim-blaming offer insights to the disappointing diplomatic dynamics at this PrepCom.
Facts and fictions of NATO nuclear sharing
Throughout Cluster Two discussions, members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) continued to relentlessly repeat the fiction that nuclear sharing has always been accepted by NPT states parties, and that it was not until very recently that anyone objected to it. This can be easily proven false with a look at the historical record.
In Volume 1 of The Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty: Origins and Implementation, 1959–1979, Ambassador Mohamed Shaker makes it clear that nuclear sharing was a major issue during the negotiation of the NPT. Shaker’s account starts before NPT negotiations began, when the United States tried to create a multinational nuclear force (MLF) in the 1960s. Back then, some NATO members saw this “as an alternative to the possible proliferation of national possession of nuclear weapons.” But when early NPT drafts proposed by the United States “left the possibility open for such schemes to emerge in the future” and as negotiations on the MLF progressed, the Soviet Union and Warsaw Pact members objected to these plans. They argued that the MLF would mean the proliferation of nuclear weapons to other countries and were particularly concerned about the possible acquisition of nuclear weapons by Germany. These states saw the MLF as an act of aggression by NATO and considered it to be in direct contradiction to the Irish resolutions that led to the NPT. They also feared it would lead to intensification of imperialist pressure on peoples that had recently achieved (or that were still struggling for) independence from colonialism, and found the concept of nuclear sharing to be incompatible with disarmament and denuclearised zones.
Shaker explains, “The MLF, which would have allowed for joint ownership and control of a strategic nuclear system, had met with insurmountable difficulties. Instead of solving the nuclear-sharing problem, it exploded and brought to the fore all kinds of problems pertaining to European rivalries, nuclear ambitions and competing priorities.” The MLF proposal, and a secondary proposal for an Atlantic Nuclear Force, ultimately failed to gain sufficient traction within NATO and “had to be sacrificed for paving the way for the conclusion” of the NPT. The NATO Nuclear Planning Group was then suggested instead. The Soviet Union also objected to this proposal as “leading to the indirect access to nuclear weapons to States which did not possess them,” and argued that the NPT “must bar all these forms of proliferation.
Articles I and II of the NPT, Shaker notes, “were the result of lengthy negotiations between the United States and the Soviet Union as to preclude any possibility of loopholes, especially those which could lead to the proliferation of nuclear weapons through military alliances.” This commitment was derived from principle (a) of UN General Assembly Resolution 2028(XX) of 1965, one of the resolutions leading to the negotiation of the NPT, which specified that the treaty “should be void of any loop-holes which might permit nuclear or non-nuclear Powers to proliferate, directly or indirectly, nuclear weapons in any form.”
In the final text of the NPT, Article I mandates that nuclear-armed states parties will not transfer “to any recipient whatsoever” any nuclear weapon, other nuclear explosive device, or control over such weapons or devices; and that they will not in any way to assist, encourage, or induce any non-nuclear armed state to manufacture or otherwise acquire nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices. Article II mandates that non-nuclear armed states parties will not receive the transfer or control of any nuclear weapon or device, that they will not manufacture or otherwise acquire nuclear weapons or devices; and that they will not seek or receive any assistance in the manufacture of nuclear weapons or devices.
During negotiations, the United States and Soviet Union suggested different formulations for these articles; the US proposal would have allowed for nuclear sharing in an MLF-type arrangement. The Soviet Union objected to this and all other forms of nuclear sharing. Non-aligned states participating in the negotiations also voiced opposition to nuclear sharing and Finland “conceded the political fact that plans for nuclear sharing within NATO had become an obstacle to an effective treaty on non-proliferation.” The Soviet draft, meanwhile, would have completely precluded NATO nuclear sharing arrangements, to which the US delegation objected.
In a compromise, the US dropped the MLF option it was still pushing for, and the Soviet Union dropped its insistence on ending the already-existing nuclear sharing arrangements. In this context, the US government specified that its interpretation of the NPT is that it prohibits the transfer of or control over nuclear bombs and warheads to any recipient, but that the NPT “does not deal with allied consultations and planning on nuclear defense so long as no transfer of nuclear weapons or control over them results.” In addition to this, the US argued that the NPT “does not deal with arrangements for deployment of nuclear weapons within allied territory as these do not involve any transfer of nuclear weapons or control over them unless and until a decision were made to go to war, at which time the treaty would no longer be controlling.”
The Soviet Union reportedly did not object to this interpretation, but Shaker notes that a number of non-aligned countries opposed the idea that the NPT “allowed” deployment of nuclear weapons to allied territories or the training of personnel of non-nuclear armed states to use nuclear weapons. Many states considered this a weakness of the NPT and expressed “doubt that the deployment of nuclear weapons within NATO was compatible with non-proliferation.”
There are many more details to be discovered in Shaker’s book, but the point of reiterating some of it here is to put to rest the notion that no one objected to NATO nuclear sharing until 2015. The fact is that it was a major point of contention during negotiations of the NPT in the 1960s.
Nuclear sharing also continued to be contentious during subsequent NPT review cycles. As covered in the NPT News in Review at last year’s NPT PrepCom, during the 2010 NPT Review Conference, several delegations, including the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM), repeatedly urged the Conference to address nuclear sharing (see for example the NAM’s cluster one statement). A draft of the 2010 NPT Action Plan even committed the nuclear-armed states to “address the question of all types of nuclear weapons and related infrastructure stationed on the territories of non-nuclear-weapon States.” In the final version, this was watered down to “address the question of all nuclear weapons regardless of their type or their location as an integral part of the general nuclear disarmament process.” It should be noted that only the United States, Italy, and the Netherlands called for the deletion of the reference to nuclear sharing in the 2010 outcome. No other NATO states called for its removal, not even the other three NATO states that host US nuclear weapons on their territories.
Compromising to achieve an outcome document does not, in any way, indicate that states “accepted” NATO nuclear sharing. As Egypt said in a right of reply to the Netherlands in 2010, the NAM, the Arab Group, the African Group, and many states in their national capacities have consistently articulated an outspoken principled position against “extended nuclear deterrence” policies and practices, which are in part exemplified by nuclear sharing. Indeed, NATO nuclear sharing practices were also critiqued during the 2000 and 2005 NPT review cycles, which is as far back as Reaching Critical Will reporting goes.
Nuclear NATO history
It's also worth noting that nuclear sharing—and any kind of nuclear doctrine—was not always accepted by all NATO members. With many of them vociferously defending NATO nuclear doctrine and sharing arrangements today, it is easy to think that it must have always been so. But historical record once again proves otherwise.
As Norwegian scholar Kjølv Egeland points out, NATO’s first strategic concept, which was adopted in 1950, “eschewed an atomic strategy.” At that time, Denmark’s foreign minister refused to accept any positive references to nuclear weapons in the concept and said it was imperative that NATO not use any language “that could be argued to stand in the way of an effective ban on nuclear war.” Over time, the US government cajoled NATO members into supporting a nuclear mission for the alliance, in large part to help legitimise US possession and deployment of thermonuclear weapons developed in the 1950s.
While public opinion overwhelmingly stood against nuclear weapons, Egeland explains, NATO’s acceptance of the bomb was seen as paramount to “spreading the burden” for maintaining a policy of nuclear deterrence. The United States drafted a new strategic document for NATO that explicitly endorsed the use of nuclear weapons by NATO forces, promising to respond to “Soviet aggression” with a “devastating counter-attack employing atomic weapons.” The document was quickly and quietly adopted in 1954 at a last-minute meeting scheduled in Paris.
Not all NATO members were happy with this development. The Canadian government, for example, said the document “seemed at one fell swoop to undercut whatever possibility existed within NATO for consultation in advance of the atomic sword being unsheathed, to increase greatly the potential of that sword being used, and to sideswipe Canada’s own defence posture.” Such concerns were dismissed. From here, the US government urged the United Kingdom to help it convince NATO members of the “technical and moral justification” of including nuclear weapons in the new strategic concept in 1957.
As nuclear weapons became part of NATO’s doctrine, some members expressed a willingness to host US nuclear weapons on their territories. Others, however, opposed the idea of NATO becoming so nuclearised. The Danish and Norwegian prime ministers, for example, “declared nuclear weapons non grata on their territories” and called for disarmament talks with the Soviet Union, a halt to all nuclear weapon testing, and postponement of the decision in NATO about stationing nuclear weapons in non-nuclear armed states. When the Canadian government refused to host US nuclear weapons, the US government responded with a patriarchal attack against the Canadian prime minister, slandering his government with sexualised slurs such as “impotency” and “coquettish indecision,” and said the Canadian government wanted to preserve its “nuclear virginity”. The next Canadian government immediately accepted the US warheads, despite public protests.
However, Canada, along with Denmark, Portugal, and Norway, continued to oppose NATO becoming a nuclear force, with the four governments insisting they would not contribute human or financial capital towards it. Denmark, Iceland, Norway, and Spain refused to participate in nuclear sharing, and Denmark issued “footnotes” to NATO communiqués in the 1980s opposing nuclear weapons.
This dissention, Egeland notes, is what has led to the mantra of the importance of “cohesion” in NATO. The 1991 strategic concept presented nuclear weapons as “a material manifestation of transatlantic bonds between Europe and North America.” This was a deliberate move by the United States to ensure that dissent within NATO over nuclear weapons would no longer be tolerated.
The technique of badgering your allies into accepting your position—despite their own interests, or the opinion of their publics, or their own historical, moral, and political positions—is classic patriarchy. So is the assertion that dissent or disagreement will undo the entire alliance. This scaremongering tactic alleges that it is the dissenter’s fault if there is breakdown within the alliance, rather than it being the fault of the aggressor trying to get its way. This is not compromise or statecraft, this is bullying and victim-blaming.
Similarly, when Germany considered ending its nuclear sharing relationship with the United States in 2009, US and UK officials said this was a “selfish gambit implying that it wanted ‘others to risk nuclear retaliation on its behalf’.” This was when NATO adopted its Catch-22-esque mantra that as long as nuclear weapons exist, NATO will remain a nuclear alliance. The language came directly from US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in response to the request from Belgium, Germany, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, and Norway to have a serious debate within NATO about denuclearisation. For the pro-nuclear states in NATO, reversing the nuclear sharing agenda would lead to NATO losing its “nuclear culture” and put the three nuclear-armed allies under increased “moral pressure” to disarm. As Egeland explains, “NATO’s organisational identity as a nuclear alliance has been leveraged to discredit advocates of denuclearisation.”
Hive minding
None of this history is mentioned by NATO members now. They have all been brought into the nuclear fold. Listening to them repeat ad nauseum lines about NATO being a nuclear alliance and how important nuclear weapons are to NATO’s security, it is hard not to think of the pod people from Invasion of the Body Snatchers or The Borg from Star Trek. It’s as if their independence and their histories have been taken away, replaced by a collective hive mind that recites whatever it is programmed to say.
It's also interesting that the hive mind isn’t just deployed in defence of NATO. It’s used to serve other US interests as well. For example, the US government is equally intent on gaslighting the world about the history of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) agreed by Iran, the United States, and European partners. Listening to the resounding calls throughout Cluster Two discussions for Iran to return to compliance with the JCPOA and to cooperate with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), one could be forgiven for not realising that it was in fact the US government that broke with the JCPOA, unilaterally withdrawing despite the fact that IAEA consistently found Iran to be in compliance with the unprecedented level of scrutiny with which it was complying under the deal.
This is not meant as a defence of Iran’s uranium enrichment programme but as another example of gaslighting, through which the US and its allies are trying to sell the story that the origins of the current crisis over the JCPOA lie with Iran. Instead, those responsible for this mess should be working with Iran to bring the JCPOA back on track—not by admonishing Iran for violations but by returning to full implementation of the original agreement, under which Iran would be obligated to cooperate once again with IAEA inspections. Arguments that “things have moved on” since then do not hold up when the real problem is the refusal of the current US government and its allies to remedy their violation of the agreement.
Violent excuses
Gaslighting and victim-blaming are not just techniques of the West. In Russia’s revisionist history of its invasion of and occupation of Ukraine, offered through various interventions at the PrepCom, Russia essentially argues that Ukraine is responsible for all of the war crimes that Russia is committing against it. In language that will be familiar to anyone cognisant of the dynamics of domestic violence, the Russian government claims that Ukraine “provoked it” into bombing schools and hospitals and occupying a nuclear power plant and everything else that has transpired since 2014 and then 2022.
NATO’s nuclear and military policies and practices have contributed to heightening tensions in the region, and its weapon producers profited wildly from Russia’s war against Ukraine. But violations of the UN Charter, war crimes, and bombing civilians cannot be “excused” because of this—just as fears and tensions do not justify wars or acts of aggression that the US or NATO states have launched in other situations.
The point, again, is that heavily militarised governments commonly resort to gaslighting and victim-blaming, patriarchal tools of control, to justify their violent domination of other states. This practice must stop.
Compliance, not contravention
Across all these cases, and any others, attempts to rewrite history and justify unlawful acts will only further undermine the NPT. Instead of arguing who did what first and whose violations of the treaty are worse, all states acting in contravention with the spirit of the NPT should put their energies into reducing the tensions and threats that their policies and practices create.
In 2010, all NPT states parties committed, in Action 1 of the Action Plan, to “pursue policies that are fully compatible with the Treaty and the objective of achieving a world without nuclear weapons.” This is the only thing NPT states parties should be focused on now, and until the abolition of nuclear weapons.