The American Version of a Nuclear-Free Spring

The Nuclear Security Summit, in which Russian President Dmitry Medvedev participates, opens in Washington on April 12.

The National Cherry Blossom Festival also takes place this month in Washington. The cover of Where Traveler magazine showed a photograph of a young American girl wearing a Japanese kimono. The photo was captioned with the following text: “Thank you, Japan, for fleeting blossoms, beauty and friendship that span all seasons.” These words unintentionally remind us of the American atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki 65 years ago. This is how the nuclear age began. Without this incident, there would also be no summit.

The leaders of 47 countries will participate in the summit. The question of who would actually participate caused great concern, especially regarding the attendance of China’s Hu Jintao, who resents U.S. President Barack Obama’s reception of the Dalai Lama as well as the U.S. giving new planes to Taiwan. Additionally, China was outraged that the U.S. Treasury deemed the country a “currency manipulator” in a report. By command of the White House, the Treasury deleted this statement from its report, and Hu Jintao agreed to come.

Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will not travel to the U.S. capital. In his place, he decided to send one of the ministers from his cabinet. Netanyahu does not want to participate in a summit dedicated to non-proliferation, which is completely understandable. His appearance would emphasize Israel’s status as a nuclear power. According to some sources, the country has 80 to 90 nuclear warheads. According to others, it holds 200. It is therefore important that the Israeli government did not sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. Moreover, Tel Aviv fears that Arabian governments could propose the declaration of the Middle East as a nuclear-free zone. This would increase the world’s pressure on Israel.

A good start for the summit in Washington is provided by the new START treaty, which was signed by President Dmitry Medvedev and President Barack Obama on April 8 in Prague. Nuclear powers, foremost Russia and the U.S., have the moral right to successfully defend the notion of non-proliferation of nuclear weapons.

Incidentally, the leadership of the U.S. Republican Party has already met the treaty with hostility. Ratification requires two-thirds approval by the Senate. This means that the Democratic Party needs at least eight votes from Republican senators.

Lobbying for the very recently signed treaty has already begun, and the Democrats have a trump card: Republican Senator Richard Lugar, member of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, argues for ratification. In order to push the treaty through, the White House even recruited George Schultz, secretary of state under President Ronald Reagan. Although Senate Republicans are not yet familiar with either the 17-page treaty or the 165-page accompanying protocol, they have already announced that President Obama obeyed to Moscow’s satisfaction.

As anticipated, the treaty will be submitted to the Senate for ratification in May. President Obama does not only have to defend himself against opposing Republicans. The ink on the treaty had hardly dried when all Eastern European NATO member governments called for Obama’s reassurance that he won’t surrender them to Moscow.

The White House’s Nuclear Posture Review is not all favorable either. Of importance is the announcement that America will not build new nuclear warheads and test them underground. This passage reflects President Obama’s philosophy. General James Cartwright, vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, explains that this does not preclude the assembly of new nuclear components into old warheads. According to experts, this clause opens dangerous loopholes. The challenge of the April summit is the need to agree upon common ground.

An indication of the importance of the event is the multilingualism of the major hotels. French is spoken at one, German at another and Chinese at yet another. Russian was spoken at the St. Regis, located at 16th Street and equidistant to both the White House and the Russian Embassy. The St. Regis takes care of the Russian delegation. President Dmitry Medvedev will stay at this hotel.