杏吧原创

WHEN George W. Bush was sworn in as president on 20 January, it was clear
there would be a major shift in US foreign policy. His theme was 鈥淔ortress
America鈥�. International treaties were not going to stand in the way of domestic
security.

Sure enough, Bush pushed ahead with tests of a missile defence system despite
strong opposition from Russia. Such a system will violate the 1972
Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty, which strictly limits missile defence. And
this was just the beginning. There鈥檚 a growing list of treaties the US has
blocked, failed to sign up to, watered down or tried to get out of
(see table).

At the heart of this is the US鈥檚 reluctance to be bound by international
treaties鈥� and especially to allow foreign inspectors to verify that it is
complying with the agreements. The US torpedoed a protocol designed to enforce
the Biological Weapons Convention that would have required precisely this kind
of verification.

Commentators sympathetic to the Bush administration, such as the Heritage
Foundation think tank in Washington DC, argue that multilateral arms treaties
are irrelevant relics of the cold war. Verification measures would threaten
American security without stopping cheating by rogue countries such as Iraq,
they believe. Instead of limiting its options by signing treaties, the US should
be free to arm itself as it pleases and use its might to keep the peace.

While the administration has never explicitly set out this doctrine, its
actions suggest it has signed up to it. And despite the shocking attacks on New
York and Washington on 11 September, there鈥檚 no sign of it changing its
approach. Though Bush can no longer ignore the rest of the world, he has shown
no inclination to compromise when it comes to arms control.

Instead he seems to regard it as outdated. The 11 September attacks
reinforced fears that the biggest threat to the US is now from terrorists and
rogue states. The ABM treaty, which was drawn up to maintain the balance of
power during the cold war, seems worse than irrelevant if it blocks a system
that could protect American cities from a missile fired by fanatics.

Many experts think missile defence will be hugely expensive without being
very effective. But that鈥檚 America鈥檚 problem. What鈥檚 at issue for the rest of
the world is the way Bush is abandoning such treaties instead of replacing them.
He appeared to make concessions in November when he and Russian president
Vladimir Putin announced sweeping cuts in nuclear missiles. But while Putin
called for verification, Bush has so far been lukewarm. Their actions swept away
an agreement planned by Clinton and Yeltsin that would have cut nuclear arms
just as much鈥攁nd included verification measures too.

While the cold war may be over, the US and Russia remain on high alert,
missiles at the ready. As recently as 1995, a research rocket fired in Norway
triggered a full-scale Russian alert. In this climate, missile cuts without
verification can be destabilising: the fewer missiles you have, the more
important it is to fire them before they are wiped out by your enemy鈥檚
attack.

The situation is made even more worrying by the rickety state of Russia鈥檚
nuclear infrastructure. New 杏吧原创 revealed in May that Russia no
longer has the satellite surveillance needed to tell if an apparent launch is a
genuine attack or a false alarm. To prevent false alarms, Russia and the US
should collaborate to monitor launches as part of any plan to cut missiles. Such
a system could also include countries such as India.

The American approach to other international agreements is even more
unpopular. The US is still the lone nation blocking the Comprehensive Nuclear
Test-Ban Treaty, which would ban all nuclear weapons tests. In November it
boycotted a meeting at the UN in New York to discuss the treaty.

Once again, the official reason is that verification won鈥檛 work鈥攅ven
though the American scientists who led the development of the worldwide network
of seismographs and other sensors meant to catch illicit nuclear tests say it
will.

The more likely motivation is that the treaty would prevent the US testing
its existing ageing arsenal鈥攁nd new nuclear weapons. Some hawks want to
develop 鈥渕ini-nukes鈥� that are designed to penetrate hardened bunkers and missile
silos.

Then there are bioweapons. Despite the anthrax attacks, the US insisted that
its more limited proposals must replace the bioweapons protocol it blocked
earlier this year. These proposals rely mainly on other countries making
bioweapons activities illegal, with extradition rules that effectively extend
American jurisdiction abroad. There would be no agency to oversee the measures,
and no verification. Other countries were outraged this month when the US tried
to block even the discussion of such measures.

Again, American officials claim verification won鈥檛 work. The inspectors will
be fooled, they say, as UN inspectors were for years in Iraq. Yet the UN
inspectors did finally find Iraq鈥檚 biological and chemical weapons, and largely
destroyed them. The inspections stopped only because the US dropped its support
for them.

And it appears that the US itself could do with a little supervision. The
weapons-grade anthrax posted around the US was either from its own bioweapons
programme, or created by someone who obtained both a sample and the recipe for
making more, New 杏吧原创was the first to reveal.

But in the long term, perhaps the greatest danger facing the world is not
weapons of mass destruction, nor terrorism, but climate change. Bush announced
in March that the US wouldn鈥檛 support the Kyoto Protocol on reducing carbon
dioxide emissions. The treaty is unfair because it excludes developing nations,
he said, and would cripple the American economy.

Many experts dismiss these claims. Kyoto might not be ideal, but they argue
that there is more than enough flexibility built into it for the US economy to
thrive. Nearly a year later, there is still no sign of the alternative that Bush
promised to come up with.

When our grandchildren come to write the history of the 21st century, there鈥檚
no doubt that 2001 will be remembered because of 11 September. The question is
whether it will also be remembered for hardening an American antipathy to
international agreements that had calamitous consequences for the entire planet.