Warsaw, 15 November 2010 - NATO PARLIAMENTARIAN SUGGESTS DECLARING DETAILS OF US NUCLEAR DEPLOYMENTS IN EUROPE

Dutch parliamentarian Raymond Knops issued a “call for more transparency on US nuclear weapons in Europe” in his report on US nuclear weapons in Europe, which was adopted by the Defence and Security Committee.

Presenting the report, the Dutch Christian Democrat suggested a “public declaration of the numbers, and possibly even locations, of US nuclear weapons deployed in Europe in the NATO context.”

“I believe that this would show the willingness of the Alliance to move towards a safer world”, Knops said. “It would also be in line with recent American and British announcements on the size of their respective nuclear arsenals.”

Such a step could even “potentially encourage Moscow to offer similar transparency, which would be a first step in encouraging any mutual reductions,” he said.

It might also have an impact on nuclear policies further afield, he added, saying it was unreasonable to expect countries like Iran to hold back from proliferation unless the West scales back its own nuclear deployment.

NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen said as recently as April that “the presence of the American nuclear weapons in Europe is an essential part of a credible deterrent,” Knops reminded his audience.

And most delegates agreed that NATO’s new Strategic Concept, due to be unveiled at the Alliance ’s summit in Lisbon on November 19-20, was unlikely to bring any significant change at the strategic level.  

“Those who hope that [the new text] will reflect change and movement on nuclear policy will be disappointed”, said Simon Lunn, former secretary general of the Assembly and currently associate fellow of the United Kingdom ’s Royal United Services Institute for Defence and Security Studies.

“We will probably be left with a continuation of the existing arrangement,” he said, with perhaps some replacement of the deployment platforms. “There will be no dilution of NATO’s nuclear role,” he said.

Several delegates expressed concern at the continued presence of tactical nuclear weapons in Europe, which the British Conservative Sir John Stanley called a “complete anachronism”.  

The Sub-committee’s draft report, titled US Non-Strategic Nuclear Weapons in Europe : A Fundamental NATO Debate, explores several ways to progress NATO’s nuclear strategy.

In addition to the possible declaration of sites, it also describes such options as reducing the number of deployed sites, or of warheads, and strengthening NATO’s non-nuclear deterrent capabilities through the missile defence project and others.