15 DECEMBER 1997 • NUMBER 62 • ISSN 0966-9175

• NATO U-Turn on Cost Study

• NATO and Russia Establish Nuclear Experts Group

• First Committee Debates Small Arms and Transparency in Armaments

• Selected BASIC Publications List

NATO U-Turn on Cost Study

By Tasos Kokkinides

NATO sources have confirmed that its study on the costs of expanding the Alliance will not be made public. On 5 December, a NATO spokesman told BASIC Reports that the study "is not going to be an open document." Instead, "major conclusions of the study will be contained… in the Communique of the North Atlantic Council meeting on 16 December."

The decision is at odds with previous statements from NATO Secretary General Javier Solana and US Defense Secretary William Cohen. Solana told BASIC Reports in September that the study will "not only be made public, it will be scrutinized." Likewise, Cohen told the Senate Appropriations Committee in October that the cost estimates on enlargement will "be completed in time for the December ministerial... [and] will therefore be available to Congress well before any vote on enlargement."

A US official close to the negotiations told BASIC Reports that even a three-page Chairman’s Summary of the document will not be made public.

Parliamentarians React
Parliamentarians in Europe and the United States expressed their dissatisfaction with the decision to keep details of the cost study under wraps. The decision comes just as the 16 NATO parliaments are preparing to ratify the accession of Poland, the Czech Republic and Hungary.

In France, Xavier de Villepin, Chairman of the Foreign Affairs and Defence Committee of the French Senate, said: "I am very sorry… because the French Parliament will not have the necessary information to proceed with ratification. Without this essential data how can the parliament judge ratification?"

Paul Quilès, Chairman of the Defence Committee of the French National Assembly, said: "NATO is trying to minimize the costs of enlargement to get national parliaments to ratify… The suspicion which is taking root will not be lifted if this study on cost is not published."

In the United Kingdom, the Chairmen of the Defence and Foreign Affairs Committees of the House of Commons declined to comment. However, Liberal Democrat member of the Defence Committee Menzies Campbell, QC, MP said: "The fact that NATO itself is not going to publish such a document will not prevent individual members of parliaments in all NATO countries from questioning their own governments. It is inconceivable that the House of Commons would vote to ratify NATO enlargement without knowing what the cost to the British taxpayer would be."

Labour MP Ann Clwyd, a member of the House of Commons International Development Committee, told BASIC Reports: "It would seem that NATO’s commitment to transparency does not apply to issues concerning NATO expansion. How can we be expected to fully debate and discuss the issue of NATO expansion, including its costs, if we are not allowed full access to this information?"

US Senator Tom Harkin (Democrat - Iowa), a member of the Appropriations Committee and the Defence and Foreign Operations Subcommittees, commented that, "public disclosure of costs is a necessity."

Meanwhile in Denmark, Keld Albrechtsen, a member of the Danish Foreign Policy Committee at the Folketing (Danish Parliament) said that it was "clearly unacceptable" that the cost study will not be made public. "The Danish parliament will not accept ratification without full public access to this document," he added. "It has to be debated in parliament openly and we will insist that the document should be free for study by the parliament and public, because it is essential that ratification is a democratic process."

Financial Discrepancies?
The preliminary conclusions of the Alliance study were approved at the NATO Defense Ministers meeting in Brussels on 2-3 December. NATO estimates that to integrate Poland, the Czech Republic and Hungary fully into NATO’s military structure, the Alliance will spend approximately $1.5 billion over the next ten years, significantly less than previous studies on the cost of enlargement. The NATO estimates will be officially agreed by NATO’s Foreign Ministers meeting in Brussels on 16 December.

BASIC Reports has also learned that the US Department of Defense will be releasing its own cost study in the new year. However, this cost study will not be commonly agreed upon by all NATO allies.

Most countries are keen to complete the ratification procedure in the first half of 1998. However, the decision to keep the cost study as a NATO internal document and to make it available only on "a need-to-know basis," may stiffen resistance from opponents of NATO enlargement in western legislatures.

Research assistance for this article was provided by Lucy Amis and Marcella Favretto. 

NATO and Russia Establish Nuclear Experts Group

By Martin Butcher

The first formal Defense Ministers meeting of the NATO-Russia Permanent Joint Council (PJC) on 3 December in Brussels has decided to establish an experts working group on nuclear weapons. The group is expected to meet for the first time early in 1998.

For the first time, the United Kingdom and France will participate alongside the United States and Russia in a permanent forum for discussion of nuclear weapons issues. Non-nuclear-weapon states which participate in NATO nuclear weapons programs of cooperation will also have their activities opened to outside scrutiny.

According to a NATO official, the proposal to establish the PJC experts group originated from the report of the NATO High Level Group which highlighted the need to flesh out dialogue on nuclear weapons issues. There will be three items on the initial agenda for the experts group: tactical nuclear weapons, President Boris Yeltsin’s statement of 27 May, and Safety and Security issues.

Tactical Nuclear Weapons
Discussions on tactical nuclear weapons will include accounting methods, doctrinal concerns (in particular NATO’s concerns about Russian moves towards forward basing of tactical nuclear weapons), transparency, and safety and security (including transport and storage).

A NATO official indicated that the Alliance would like to discuss control of tactical nuclear weapons with Russia, in line with the US-Russia agreement in Helsinki earlier this year, but that until each side understands the other’s accounting methods this will be impossible.

According to the NATO official, "the Ministers had a discussion on tactical nuclear weapons following a request from Dutch Defense Minister Joris Verhoeven. The briefing provided by US Defense Secretary William Cohen shows that there is not even agreement as to how to count tactical nuclear weapons." US Undersecretary of Defense Walter Slocombe confirmed that at present the United States can only estimate Russian tactical nuclear weapons stocks as being between 8,000 and 16,000. He added that Secretary Cohen had raised this with Ministers as a matter of some concern.

President Yeltsin’s Paris Statement
The experts group will explore further the issues raised by President Yeltsin’s announcement at the NATO-Russia Paris summit on 27 May, stating that Russian nuclear weapons would no longer be targeted at NATO countries. Yeltsin also seemed to indicate that Russian nuclear forces would be taken off alert. However, the statement was somewhat confused and the translation imprecise. Nonetheless, at the time, a NATO spokesman said that NATO would be willing to discuss Yeltsin’s statement in the framework of the PJC.

Safety and Security Issues
Strategic nuclear forces will be the focus of discussions on safety and security.

US Ambassador to NATO Robert Hunter reported to Defense Ministers that General Eugene Habiger, Commander of US Strategic Command, was impressed by Russian safety and security standards on a recent visit to a Russian Strategic Rocket Forces SS-24 missile base. Hunter added that there will be a reciprocal Russian visit to a US base in the near future. The working group will extend the scope of these transparency and confidence building measures in the future.

Martin Butcher is Director of the Centre for European Security and Disarmament in Brussels.

First Committee Debates Small Arms and Transparency in Armaments

By Rachel Stohl

On 17 November, the United Nations First Committee, the committee of the UN General Assembly (UNGA) dealing with international security and disarmament, completed its program of work for the fifty-second session of the UNGA. Chaired by Mothusi Nkgowe (Botswana), the committee proved quite efficient, finishing its deliberations a day early. New initiatives were taken in the areas of transparency in armaments and small arms, apparently as a result of the conclusions of the Panel of Governmental Experts on Small Arms and the Group of Governmental Experts on the UN Register of Conventional Arms. (See BASIC Reports #59.)

General and Complete Disarmament: Transparency in Armaments (A/C.1/52/L.2/Rev.1)
Egypt introduced this new resolution, which resulted in the First Committee’s closest vote of the session. Egypt has consistently called for weapons of mass destruction to be included in the UN Register of Conventional Arms. The resolution as a whole was adopted with a vote of 81-45-16 (in favor-against-abstain).

Preambular paragraph 6, adopted by 80-34-25, stresses:

"the need to achieve universality of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, the Chemical Weapons Convention and the Biological Weapons Convention as well as other instruments related to transfers of equipment and technologies directly related to the development and manufacture of such weapons, with a view to realizing the goal of the total elimination of all weapons of mass destruction."

Operative paragraph 3, adopted by 73-46-17, requests:

"the Secretary-General to seek the views of Member States on ways and means of enhancing transparency in the fields of weapons of mass destruction and transfers of equipment and technologies directly related to the development and manufacture of such weapons with a view to enhancing transparency in the field of conventional weapons and to include in his report to the General Assembly at its fifty-third session a special section on the implementation of the present resolution."

General and Complete Disarmament: Transparency in Armaments, (A/C.1/52/L.43)
The Netherlands introduced this resolution on Transparency in Armaments which was approved by the First Committee with a vote of 132-0-10. It reiterates the needs of previous resolutions, calling for the convening of governmental experts in 2000.

Operative paragraph 5, approved by 27-0-8, addressing the needs of the UN Register of Conventional Arms, requests:

"the Secretary-General, with the assistance of a group of governmental experts to be convened in 2000, on the basis of equitable geographical representation, to prepare a report on the continuing operation of the Register and its further development, taking into account the work of the Conference on Disarmament, the views expressed by Member States and the reports of the Secretary-General on the continuing operation of the Register and its further development, with a view to a decision at its fifty-fifth session."

Operative paragraph 7, approved by 124-0-14, calling for increased attention to be given to the UN Register of Conventional Arms, invites:

"the Conference on Disarmament to consider continuing its work undertaken in the field of transparency in armaments."

General and Complete Disarmament: Consolidation of peace through practical disarmament measures (A/C.1/52/L.18)
Both Japan and Germany introduced resolutions that were based in part on the report of the panel on small arms released in August. Japan has traditionally taken the lead on small arms issues, but this year Germany also took a leadership role. In order to avoid competing with Japan’s measure on small arms (see below), Germany introduced this resolution, which was adopted without a vote.

Preambular paragraph 3 reads:

"Convinced that a comprehensive and integrated approach toward certain practical disarmament measures, such as, inter alia, arms control, particularly with regard to small arms and light weapons, confidence-building measures, demobilization and reintegration of former combatants, demining and conversion, often is a prerequisite to maintaining and consolidating peace and security and thus provides a basis for effective rehabilitation and social and economic development in areas that have suffered from conflict."

General and Complete Disarmament:  Small Arms (A/C.1/52/L.27/Rev.1)
Japan’s resolution reflected the current trend towards recognizing the significant effect of small arms and light weapons. It predominantly echoed the findings of the small arms panel and requested that the United Nations, Member States and the UN Secretary-General implement the panel’s recommendations. Preambular paragraph 5 concerning the right of self-determination of all peoples, warranted its own vote and was approved by 120-0-23. The resolution as a whole was approved by 137-0-8.

Preambular paragraph 3 recognizes the necessity of:

"a comprehensive approach to promote, at the global and regional levels, the control and reduction of small arms and light weapons in a balanced and non-discriminatory manner as a contribution to international peace and security."

Other key resolutions for 1997 dealing with small arms and conventional weapons include: Review and Implementation of the Concluding Document of the Twelfth Special Session of the General Assembly: Regional Confidence-Building Measures (A/C.1/52/L.6); General and Complete Disarmament: Assistance to States for curbing the illicit traffic in small arms and collecting them (A/C.1/52/L.8/Rev.1); General and Complete Disarmament: Conventional arms control at the regional and subregional levels (A/C.1/52/L.31); and Reduction of Military Budgets: Objective information on military matters, including transparency of military expenditures (A/C.1/52/L.40).

Selected BASIC Publications

NEW RELEASES

• Africa: The Challenge of Light Weapons Destruction During Peacekeeping Operations (BASIC Paper #23, December 1997). This paper examines the demilitarization components of peacekeeping operations in five African states. It strongly argues for the prioritization of the destruction of light weapons as a vital component of future peacekeeping mandates on the continent.

• Breaking the Cycle of Violence: Light Weapons Destruction in Central America (BASIC Paper #24, December 1997). This paper examines four examples of post-conflict disarmament in Central America. It documents the collection of light weapons and analyzes how these weapons were stored or destroyed. Finally, the paper recommends a policy of destruction in order to take the weapons out of circulation.

• Military Buildup in Central and Eastern Europe: NATO Membership for Sale (BASIC Note, July 1997). This note explains how pressure is being applied to potential new NATO members to buy arms from Western countries.