by CKR
Public opinion alone isn’t necessarily a good basis for foreign policy, but when it coincides with the opinions of those who have held high posts in the government and those of many professionals, it can be a unifying political force.
That’s the case for sharply decreasing and eventually eliminating nuclear weapons. It’s why I’ve suggested that the Democrats use this issue as a way of distinguishing themselves from what is becoming the war party and indicating to the world that America is still a force for peace. I’m not talking about unilateral disarmament, but negotiated, verified and safeguarded mutual reductions among the nuclear weapon states, just like George Schultz, William Perry, Henry Kissinger and Sam Nunn said.
I would be happy to see the Republicans take up this issue, too, but that seems less probable. As we shall see, the Republican electorate is much more favorably inclined toward nuclear weapons than Democrats are.
The Program on International Policy Attitudes at the University of Maryland has conducted a poll in the United States and Russia on attitudes toward nuclear weapons. By and large, both publics would like to see the numbers of nuclear weapons greatly reduced, even eliminated if safeguards are in place to make sure nobody’s cheating.
By and large, Russians are more suspicious than the Americans; but even there, majorities are for arms reductions. And they likely would get less suspicious if there was movement on the American side.
On to the specifics of the poll.
When Americans were asked how many nuclear weapons they thought the United States has, the median of the answers was 1000. When asked how many they thought the United States should have, the median was 500. They were consistent when asked about reductions further than those provided by the Treaty of Moscow (2200 by 2012): 71% of Americans and 58% of Russians favored a treaty with further reductions, similar numbers favoring faster reductions, and overall 88% and 65% favoring the treaty.
That number of 1000 is far below the reality of almost 10,000 (with perhaps as many pits stored disassembled). The 500 number is close to the few hundred advocated by many groups; actually 200-300 tends to be that range.
Both publics are for the major arms control treaties. They favor (69% Americans, 67% Russians) the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty’s goal of eliminating nuclear weapons and think their countries (79% Americans, 66% Russians) should do more toward that goal. They favor the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty (80% and 79%). And they are willing to see increased safeguards measures via international inspections. Americans (92%) and Russians (65%) feel that increased verification would be necessary if the numbers of nukes were reduced to 400 on each side by treaty, and 69% of Americans and 51% of Russians thought that international inspectors had the right limits on their activity or too many limits.
The publics would also go beyond the current treaties. Only 25% of Americans and 11% of Russians believe that nuclear weapons can be an appropriate response to non-nuclear attacks. Americans (54%) felt that nuclear fuel guarantees through the UN were a good idea. They favor (64% Americans, 55% Russians) a ban on production of fissionable materials.
Reactions to sharing information were mixed. Although both Americans (75%) Russians (52%) favor an international agreement to share information on numbers of nuclear weapons and materials, only 44% of each favored more information sharing between the two under current programs.
Finally, majorities believe (64% Americans, 55% Russians) that missiles should be taken off alert status.
Within the United States, in response to most of the poll’s questions, Republicans like nuclear weapons better than Democrats do. The issue is not one with immediate impact, like taxes, or with the emotional volatility of immigration. It can be approached as a way to improve security (secure nuclear materials from theft, de-alerting of missiles to avoid disastrous accidents). But the Democratic candidates so far, with the exception of a white paper from Bill Richardson that isn’t widely available, have muffled their stands on these issues. The Republican candidates haven’t even done that.
Clear stands in line with public opinion on these issues could help to unify the country and would signal to the voters and the rest of the world that America is returning to its belief in working things out, the way we built the peace in the last half of the twentieth century.