The Flaw in the Non-Proliferation Treaty's Article IV: Nuclear Power and the Pathway to Nuclear Weapons

This week, the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) will undergo a review that has taken place every five years since the treaty went into effect in 1970. Delegates from around the world will gather from May 3-28 at the United Nations in New York to assess the status of the treaty. The nuclear activities of Iran, a signatory to the treaty, are expected to play a major role in the discussions with Iranian’s president,  Mahmoud Ahmadinejad expected to participate and speak early in the conference.

What likely will not happen is a revision of the treaty’s Article IV, which states:  “Nothing in this Treaty shall be interpreted as affecting the inalienable right of all the Parties to the Treaty to develop research, production and use of nuclear energy for peaceful purposes. . .”

In effect, Article IV offers a nuclear reward to non-nuclear weapons countries who sign the treaty; promise never to make the bomb and you can build and operate nuclear reactors. Since the materials, and to a certain degree, the processing involved in arriving at fuel for a civilian reactor or to create an atomic bomb are basically the same, a civilian program can lead to – and has led to – the covert development of nuclear weapons. Examples of this pathway include India, Pakistan, Israel and North Korea – none of whom are signatories to the NPT. (South Africa also developed nuclear weapons from its civilian nuclear program but has since dismantled its arsenal and is now a NPT signatory.

Some, including Sergio Duarte, the U.N. high commissioner for non-proliferation, argue that Article IV is the cornerstone of the NPT on which the success of the entire treaty depends.  But Dominque Lalanne, Director of Research in nuclear and particle physics at the French Center for Scientific Research, contends that Article IV is in fact the problem, because, Lalanne says, "nuclear power is the way to nuclear weapons".

Today, the conundrum of Article IV is epitomized by two countries – India and Iran – and their differing and controversial approach to the development of “peaceful nuclear energy.”

In 2005, the then Bush administration initiated an agreement with India in apparent defiance of the terms of the NPT to which India is not a signatory.

Explains the Council on Foreign Relations:

“The U.S. Congress on October 1, 2008, gave final approval to an agreement facilitating nuclear cooperation between the United States and India. The deal is seen as a watershed in U.S.-India relations and introduces a new aspect to international nonproliferation efforts. First introduced in thejoint statement released by President Bush and Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on July 18, 2005, the deal lifts a three-decade U.S. moratorium on nuclear trade with India. It provides U.S. assistance to India's civilian nuclear energy program, and expands U.S.-India cooperation in energy and satellite technology.”

As a result, India is being actively solicited as a client by Russia, France and the United States all of which are signatories to the NPT. Although not a signatory, India is recognized as a nuclear weapons state in possession of at least 50 missiles and maybe more. Thus, the “inalienable right” is available not only to NPT signatories that renounce nuclear weapons, but also to non-signatories who don’t.

Iran, by contrast, is an NPT signatory that claims to be exercising its “inalienable right” to develop nuclear energy. However, much of the world suspects that Iran is using this right as a cover to make nuclear weapons. Negotiations with Iran have see-sawed over the past several years while intelligence experts continue to predict when, rather than if, Iran will have the bomb.