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Yet Kissinger cautions that the proliferation of civilian nuclear technology “has vastly increased the feasibility of acquiring a nuclear capability.” And that makes for an increasingly unstable and dangerous international system.

In Kissinger’s view, ideological differences and unresolved regional conflicts have multiplied the incentives to acquire or develop nuclear weapons. And this appears to be especially true for rogue states, such as Iran and North Korea.

The Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) was born of the Great Powers concern that nuclear weapons technology could spread around the globe, destabilize the international system and lead to atomic warfare. The treaty was negotiated by the United States, the Soviet Union and the United Kingdom in 1968, and it came into force two years later. Today, there are 189 signatories to the NPT.

Review conference

The NPT makes provision for a review of the treaty every five years. And the representatives of the treaty’s signatories are currently meeting at the United Nations headquarters in New York City, reviewing the status and operation of the NPT, the most important multilateral arms control agreement in history.

Taking place in the shadow of ongoing nuclear negotiations between Iran and the world’s great powers, led by United States, the review conference began on April 27 and will conclude on May 22.

At the 2010 NPT review conference, the United States endorsed a consensus document that resulted from multilateral consultation. The so-called Action Plan supposedly reinforced the three pillars of the NPT — non-proliferation, disarmament and peaceful uses of nuclear energy.

Back then, U.S. President Barack Obama had an extremely ambitious foreign policy agenda: Usher in a nuclear weapons-free era. His strategy had three components: prevent terrorists from acquiring nuclear weapons; reduce and eventually eliminate the world’s nuclear arsenals; and shore up the NPT.

Canada has been superficially supportive of Obama’s efforts to strengthen the NPT, which prohibits the spread of nuclear weapons technology and commits the five declared nuclear-weapons states — China, Russia, Britain, France and the U.S. — to eventually eliminate their nuclear arsenals.

However, by putting trade and commerce before nuclear security concerns, Canada is arguably undermining the non-proliferation regime. Last month, Canada confirmed a deal to sell uranium to India, which covertly used a Canadian-designed civilian nuclear reactor to develop and test detonate a nuclear weapon in 1974. And India continues to develop and test ballistic missiles capable of delivering nuclear warheads………

The Obama administration’s concern is ironic, because the U.S. is not a full member of the test ban regime. “That still remains an interest of the United States and a priority of the U.S. administration to … eventually ratify this treaty,” Scheiman said.

Canada expects that the NPT review conference will “reinforce the intrinsic link” between the NPT and Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, which prohibits signatories from testing nuclear weapons, a Canadian official told an audience at the United Nations last fall……..

Despite the NPT’s obvious failures, it’s important to note its successes. “South Africa, Brazil, Argentina and several post-Soviet republics have abandoned nuclear weapons that had either come to fruition or made significant technical progress,” Kissinger writes.

However, he contends that there is a real danger that nuclear weapons will someday be considered conventional weapons — weapons to be used in combat, and not as the ultimate deterrent to total war.

If emerging nuclear powers were to move in that direction, Kissinger predicts that “international order will require an understanding between the existing major nuclear countries to insist on non-proliferation, or order will be imposed by the calamities of nuclear war.”http://www.thewhig.com/2015/05/14/global-nuclear-threat-remains