I grew up during the Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union. We lived under the threat of nuclear annihilation and, as a child, I even had nightmares about it. At the height of the arms race during the Cold War, both the U.S. and the S.U. had tens of thousands of nuclear warheads and bombs. There were several times when the fate of the human race was in the hands of one man. Fortunately, each time, the man who could have started World War III refused to do it. When the S.U. fell in 1991, it was hoped that nuclear weapons could be abolished and the money spent on peaceful projects.
Although there are international nuclear disarmament treaties and the number of nuclear weapons has substantially diminished, the world still suffers under the threat of nuclear war. Deteriorating relations between the U.S. and Russia which inherited the nuclear weapons of the S.U. have led to talk of a new Cold War and nuclear arms race. U.S. President Obama strongly supported reduction of nuclear weapons when he entered office in 2008 but he is now launching the most expensive and extensive upgrading and expanding of the U.S. nuclear arsenal in decades. Russia is also expanding their nuclear arsenal and rattling the nuclear saber all over the world.
The existing international treaties have been partially successful, but now there is a push to go beyond previous agreements and aggressively pursue a total ban on all nuclear weapons. Austria has been leading a U.N. effort to convene a conference to discuss banning nuclear weapons. The culmination of their efforts was a report calling for a conference to be held in 2017 to create "a legally binding instrument to prohibit nuclear weapons, leading towards their total elimination”. The report was expected to be issued without the need for a vote.
Australia surprised many observers when they called for a vote with respect to the release of the final report. The vote was sixty eight in favor, twenty two against and thirteen abstaining. These numbers suggest that the debate over the proposal was contentious. Now the proposal will be brought to the U.N. General Assembly in 2017 and formal negotiations will take place over the exact terms of the proposal.
The Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade posted a statement on its website that Australian opposition to a ban on nuclear weapons because although it " might seem to be a straightforward and emotionally appealing way to de-legitimize and eradicate nuclear weapons,” it would actually “divert attention from the sustained, practical steps needed for effective disarmament”.
There appears to be another more selfish reason that Australia is opposing the idea of a total ban on nuclear weapons. Australia now enjoys the protection of the U.S. nuclear arsenal should it be attacked by rogue nuclear powers such as North Korea. Australia is concerned that while the U.S. and some other nuclear powers might honor the total ban on nuclear weapons, other states might not even though they claimed that they were getting rid of their nuclear weapons. This would leave Australia vulnerable to nuclear blackmail and attack if the U.S. had gotten rid of all their nuclear weapons.
As much as I hate nuclear weapons and would love to see the world be rid of them, I am sympathetic to Australia's concerns. I don't believe for a minute that in the hostile and dangerous world in which we live, nations that possess nuclear weapons would really get rid of all of them. Military planners would have to assume that possible enemies with nuclear weapons would secretly violate the ban and that it would be prudent for them to also violate the ban.
Australia:
