Sir: Britain and France are the only European states to possess supposedly independent nuclear weapons (report, 9 March). Why do they need nuclear weapons when other European states do not? Some, like Italy, Sweden, Norway, Yugoslavia, and Switzerland, seriously considered the matter, but abandoned it because any deterrent effects of nuclear weapons were not seen as worth the costs, or because they were not seen as the way to a safer world. Some European states repudiate nuclear weapons themselves but allow US nuclear weapons on their soil, or see themselves as under the protection of Nato.
Fear, or its absence, has been behind the decisions. In the rest of the world, countries that have acquired nuclear weapons have all been motivated by fear of neighbours: Israel, India, Pakistan, North Korea, perhaps Iran. Again notable are the countries that started along the nuclear weapons road but turned back: South Africa, Brazil, possibly Argentina, Belarus, Ukraine, Kazakhstan. Any possible benefits were not seen as worth the costs. The vast majority of nation states do not have nuclear weapons.
Britain and France once had fear of the Soviet Union as an excuse to add to their desire for national prestige. The UK government now uses fear of the unpredictable, an argument that any state could use - but by whom could the UK or France be threatened? And like others, whether one likes it or not, the UK and France shelter under the US umbrella. The only nuclear threat is from terrorists, and nuclear weapons cannot be used against dispersed cells of terrorists. They would never be used against a state that harboured terrorists because that would lead to disproportionate civilian and material damage.
Surely it is not just inertia, or the fear of losing votes, that give these governments reasons for continuing to hold nuclear weapons? Their prestige would be enhanced to a much greater extent if they abandoned nuclear weapons, leading the way towards a more peaceful world in which mutual fear no longer determined government policies.
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ROBERT A. HINDE
Chair, British Pugwash Group, Cambridge
GEORGES PARISOT
Chair, French Pugwash Group, Paris
