such a threat can do incalculable harm to the interests of the threatened State. The use of such threats may, in fact, already be regarded as a most effective weapon.

Statement by the Netherlands Representative (Van der Klaauw) to the Conference of the Committee on Disarmament: Test Ban, August 3, 19761

In resolution 3484 A (XXX) the General Assembly of the United Nations requested the CCD to keep under review, in its consideration of an elaboration of a comprehensive test ban treaty, the arms control implications of nuclear explosions for peaceful purposes, including the possibility that such explosions could be misused to circumvent any ban on the testing of nuclear weapons. I will briefly address myself to this question.

On 28 May 1976, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics and the United States of America signed a Treaty on Underground Nuclear Explosions for Peaceful Purposes or, as I will call it, the PNEagreement. This treaty was concluded in accordance with article III of the Treaty on the Limitation of Underground Nuclear Weapon Tests, the so-called Threshold Test Ban Treaty. The purpose of the PNE-agreement is apparently to make arrangements for the explosion of nuclear devices for peaceful purposes in such a way that the threshold test ban will not be circumvented. Since this problem is clearly related to the earlier-mentioned request made by the General Assembly, it seems worthwhile to study the PNE-agreement, and in particular to consider whether this agreement can give us some clues for the problem, how to conduct nuclear explosions for peaceful purposes under a comprehensive test ban treaty. To this end, my delegation suggested at the end of the spring session to spend a few meetings, either formal or informal, to discuss the PNE-agreement during the summer session of the CCD. Our suggestion did not find many responses, and since the CCD is already overloaded in this session, we did not insist on our suggestion. However, I would like to make a number of preliminary remarks in the absence of a more extensive explanation by the United States and the USSR of their PNE-agreement until now.

As far as we can see, the two countries could have taken a number of different approaches to solve the problem how to conduct PNEs under the threshold test ban. They could have prohibited PNEs. They could have tried to develop a system of verification and control, presumably complicated, to make sure that PNES above the threshold of 150 kton would not be used for weapons tests or in any case to minimize this

chance to an acceptable level. If that last approach had been taken, it could have given us valuable indications on how to develop a system for PNEs under a comprehensive test ban, for it is clear that in such a system there is no real difference between a threshold of 150 kton, 20 kton or zero kiloton.

However, the countries involved took another approach. They designed a system to make sure that the yield of the peaceful nuclear explosions remains under the threshold set by the Threshold Test Ban Treaty. Since the vield of the individual PNEs must stay under the weapons threshold in this system, a lower weapons threshold would mean that the yield of the individual PNEs has to go down. The system cannot be used under a comprehensive test ban, since the weapons threshold in that case is zero kiloton.

In our opinion, this assessment is different from that made by several delegations in this Committee, inter alia, by the representative of the German Democratic Republic on 6 July. As we see it, the PNEagreement has not given us a clue how to solve the problem of conducting PNEs under a comprehensive test ban.

Perhaps the agreement has taught us something. I do not know how much time and effort the two countries involved have spent to find a system to conduct PNEs above the threshold. In view of the fact that a great part of the agreement and the protocol refers to explosions with an aggregate yield above the threshold, it means that there is at least one country which has a potential interest in conducting nuclear explosions for peaceful purposes above the threshold of 150 kton. Therefore one could imagine that the two countries have really tried to design a system to conduct such explosions without circumventing the nuclear weapons threshold, but apparently they did not succeed. My delegation would be interested to know how much they tried, since such information could be very important for our future deliberations on a comprehensive test ban. At the moment at least we get the impression that a system to conduct PNEs under a CTB without circumventing the purposes of a CTB is very difficult if not impossible to achieve, which leads us to the logical conclusion that as long as this problem is not satisfactorily solved, we are faced with the choice of either not having a foolproof CTB or abandoning PNEs.

Having said this, I would like to congratulate the United States and the USSR on having been able to agree on a rather complicated question, that is, how to measure the yield of nuclear explosions, including the yield of individual explosions with explosion times which are only milliseconds apart. The negotiations have at great length spelled out complicated procedures, using a number of innovative and elegant solutions for difficult technical and political problems. I may refer, for example, to the ingenious solution found for the problem how to avoid the use by the observing State of instruments other than what it states them to be, while on the other hand making sure that the ob5 CCD/PV.709, p. 9.

served State cannot tamper with the observing equipment and the data so obtained. Such solutions for difficult problems may well be used in other arms control and disarmament agreements in the future.

An interesting aspect of the agreement is the provision that the verification system will also be used on the territory of other countries. This is, of course, a logical provision, but it means that when a nonnuclear-weapon State asks PNE-services from one of the two nuclearweapon States involved, it has to invite the other party, too, at least if the aggregate yield of the PNE is above 150 kton.

The agreement also shows, and this is in our view highly important, that when countries lay down precise procedures for verifying the implementation of an agreement, they are now willing to allow the exercise of inspection activities on their territory. The observing State is even allowed to lower equipment into the borehole of the nuclear explosive device. It is encouraging to note how far States are prepared to go if the political will is present.

We saw the same happen in the nuclear safeguards field, in particular during the negotiations on the NPT-safeguards. Many countries were for various reasons reluctant to accept international inspection activities within their territories. Nevertheless, with the political will which was present during these negotiations, and by painstakingly laying down the rights and duties of inspectors and the detailed procedures to follow, it was possible to design an effective safeguards system which could be accepted by the countries involved. In this connexion I would like to recall that the final declaration of the NPTReview Conference asked the parties to the NPT, without making a distinction between nuclear- and non-nuclear-weapon States, to accept safeguards on all peaceful nuclear activities. Perhaps it now becomes possible to implement this request fully. Anyway, the PNE-agreement has very interesting verification provisions which could be of importance for future arms control and disarmament agreements. I therefore hope that the agreement will soon come into force.

Let me now turn to the Threshold Test Ban Treaty itself. Members of the Committee are well aware of our disappointment over the very restricted scope of that treaty. As far as I know, even the parties to it did not dare to claim that the threshold was set so high because of verification problems. A long time ago we already expressed our concern that a Threshold Test Ban might hinder rather than facilitate the conclusion of a Comprehensive Ban. In the spring session, during informal meetings, we expressed our views on some of the more interesting technical provisions of the TTBT. For example, we showed our interest in the exchange of technical data on the weapons test sites and on the calibration data.

This week the Ad Hoc Group of scientific experts to consider international co-operative measures to detect and identify seismic events started its work. My Government is grateful for the initiative taken

Documents on Disarmament, 1975, pp. 146–156.

by Sweden to set up this group. I noted also with interest that several countries which are not members of the CCD have sent experts, including countries in the southern hemisphere. This promises seismic expertise from all over the world, which is important in the context of a world-wide detection and identification system.

Frankly, I was somewhat puzzled by the attitude taken by some members of the Committee with respect to the Ad Hoc Group. During the spring session the representatives of Poland, Mongolia, Hungary and Bulgaria, while supporting the proposal by the Soviet Union to strive for a CTB signed by all nuclear-weapon States, all said that the CCD could play a useful role in further discussions on a Nuclear Weapons Test Ban. The Soviet Union stated that

an important supplementary means of control must be the development between the States parties to the treaty of international co-operation in the exchange of seismic data.8

The representative of Czechoslovakia said that

Czechoslovakia with its advanced seismographic system has expressed its readiness to participate in the international system of exchange of seismographic information, in the so-called international detection club, which could achieve a satisfactory level of verification of the CTB.'

These statements gave the impression that, although disagreement still exists on some points, we could try to move ahead on other points, in harmony with the spirit in which the CCD always works. I was therefore somewhat surprised that on 1 July the representative of Bulgaria said he thought that the Ad Hoc Committee could better be set up in the context of the committee proposed under resolution 3478 (XXX), while we all know that that committee has, at least for the time being, not been established.10 I think this is somewhat contradictory to his statement in the spring session. The German Democratic Republic also thought that the Ad Hoc Group would distract from the work of the not-yet-established committee under resolution 3478 (XXX).11

11

If we cannot talk about one of the important elements of a CTB in the CCD, how can we use fully keep CTB on our agenda? I would therefore urgently appeal to all CCD-members to participate where possible in the work of the Ad Hoc Group, the results of which could form a basis for all our future work on the test ban issue.

Referring to remarks made by the representatives of Nigeria and Mexico, I think there is some misunderstanding about the purpose of the Ad Hoc Group of Experts. Even if one is of the opinion that a CTB can in principle be concluded on the basis of national verification means, a position held by my Government, this does not mean that

"Ante, pp. 484-485.

8 Ante, p. 41.

CCD/PV.695, p. 16.

10 CCD/PV. 708, July 1, 1976, pp. 7-8. The res. has been published in Documents on Disarmament, 1975, pp. 793-795.

11 CCD/PV.709, July 6, 1976, pp. 9-10.

all conditions for such a verification system have already been met. For example, as was pointed out several times during our technical meetings on the test ban issue, there is still a lack of international exchange of certain data important for the identification of seismic events. We, for our part, see the Swedish proposal for an Ad Hoc Group mainly in the light of determining in practice how an international seismic verification system could work as efficiently as possible and what measures are necessary to achieve this purpose. Participation in such a group does not distract at all from the position taken, inter alia, by my Government that sufficient verification can, in principle, be achieved by national means, at least when we compare the risks of ongoing nuclear weapon tests with the chance of violating a CTB with very small tests.

My delegation listened with interest to the statement made by Mrs. Thorsson last week on this subject and will study her proposals carefully.

I will finish my remarks with a few comments on the importance of a CTB. A CTB is long overdue. I am certain that the conclusion of a Comprehensive Test Ban in the end of the fifties or the early sixties would have been more important than now, at least from an arms control point of view. Perhaps we would have been spared the development of more and more sophisticated nuclear weaponry, weaponry which makes arms control measures in the nuclear field increasingly difficult to achieve and to verify, and which could blur the distinction between nuclear and conventional war. A CTB would not accomplish nuclear disarmament, either, since the nuclear weapons would still be present. Nevertheless, nuclear weapons tests are apparently still important if we have to believe the nuclear weapon States themselves, and to judge from the ongoing weapons tests. So, from a direct armscontrol point of view it is still a worth-while goal.

It could well be, however, that from a political point of view a CTB is even more important. The conclusion of a CTB has become a kind. of symbol of the question: are the great Powers really serious in their proclaimed will to stop the arms race and work towards nuclear disarmament? This is a strictly political argument which could be dismissed as irrational. Political arguments play, however, an important role in decisions taken by Governments.

In the same line one could argue that it is not necessary for the two big Powers to have comparable strategic nuclear forces. Numerical differences in strategic nuclear forces need not be of direct military significance, at least with anything like present force levels. Nevertheless, both of the Powers referred to consider it apparently highly important, for political reasons, to possess strategic forces on levels sometimes described as being of "perceived equality". Militarily seen, this is certainly an irrational goal, but highly relevant for the decision-making process in the two countries, and perhaps even the motor of the nuclear

arms race.