The NPT Review Conference Must Address the Disarmament Deficit
NGO Statement for the 2026 Review Conference on Article VI-Related Goals and Objectives
For more than five decades, the nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty has served as the essential framework and catalyst, albeit an imperfect one, for global efforts to stop the spread of nuclear weapons, end nuclear testing, reduce the salience of nuclear weapons, and advance disarmament diplomacy to help achieve a world free of nuclear weapons.
But now, due to years of inattention, inaction, and reckless disregard for international norms of behavior by some NPT nuclear-armed states, the nonproliferation system is facing an uncertain future. States-parties at the past two NPT review conferences, in 2015 and 2022, have failed to overcome differences that have blocked agreement on measures to advance treaty goals.
To be successful, this NPT Review Conference must address the “Disarmament Deficit” and help deliver tangible commitments from the five NPT nuclear armed states that help put us back on the path to reducing nuclear dangers and toward the peace and security of a world without nuclear weapons.
This makes it essential that your delegations:
- Work together to reaffirm your governments’ support for the treaty, and to the principles, objectives, and action steps that were endorsed by consensus at the 2010 and 2000 review conferences and at the pivotal 1995 Review and Extension Conference.
- Agree to achieve concrete action steps that reduce the nuclear danger and advance the NPT’s core Article VI disarmament-related objectives.
As this meeting convenes, the disarmament deficit is growing. None of the NPT’s nuclear-armed five can credibly claim they are meeting their key NPT Article VI commitment to “pursue negotiations in good faith on effective measures relating to cessation of the nuclear arms race at an early date and to nuclear disarmament,” nor have they met all of the disarmament-related goals and objectives agreed to at the 1995, 2000, 2010 NPT Review Conferences.
- New START has expired with no replacement. As a result, for the first time in decades, there is no legally binding treaty or mutual understanding limiting the size and composition of the U.S. and Russian strategic nuclear arsenals, the world’s largest.
- Independent researchers confirm that China continues to expand its arsenal.
- France has just announced it will also begin to increase the size of its arsenal, which violates the principle of “irreversibility” that past NPT conferences have endorsed.
- There are no active negotiations between or among the five nuclear-armed NPT states on disarmament. (The P5 Process is not a negotiating forum at this point.)
- Each of the NPT’s nuclear-armed states are spending tens of billions of dollars to modernize, upgrade, and in some cases increase the size of their deadly nuclear arsenals.
- The CTBT, which is a central element of the NPT system, is at risk. The United States has threatened to resume nuclear explosive testing “on an equal basis” and has accused another, China, of conducting a prohibited nuclear test. Nine states have failed to ratify the CTBT; some have failed to provide a credible explanation as to why they remain holdouts. As a result, these states are holding up entry into force and are denying themselves and the world the option for on-site inspections, which can effectively resolve allegations of and deter any possible clandestine, low-yield nuclear explosive testing.
- The wars against Ukraine and Iran, which involve nuclear-armed states illegally attacking nonnuclear weapon states, further highlight the failure to make progress toward legally binding negative security assurances. They are also a reminder that the United States has not yet ratified the protocols to three nuclear weapon free zones – the African, Central Asian, and South Pacific. As a result, the negative security assurances associated with these agreements are not yet in force.
Worse yet, with China’s nuclear buildup in mind, many members of the U.S. nuclear-weapons establishment are lobbying for a buildup of U.S. nuclear forces, starting with uploading additional warheads on existing ground-based intercontinental ballistic missiles and by adding sea-based nuclear-armed missiles on strategic submarines. Independent experts estimate that the United States, as well as Russia, could potentially add hundreds of warheads to their already deployed strategic delivery systems.
More nuclear weapons will not make anyone, anywhere, safer. Each of the world’s nuclear-armed states have more than enough nuclear weapons to meet their subjective requirements for nuclear deterrence and certainly enough nuclear weapons, if used, to produce catastrophic destruction on a global scale.
Halting the spiral of nuclear tensions and a renewed buildup of nuclear weapons is in every nation’s interest. This requires more than vague pronouncements and promises; it requires concrete commitments and follow-through actions on disarmament diplomacy.
It is tragic that U.S. and Russian leaders failed to engage in meaningful negotiations on a successor agreement to New START. It is also notable that following the expiration of New START, the United States proposed multilateral strategic stability talks as a means to achieving a “new era” in nuclear arms control.
Such an approach may sound appealing. Indeed, all five NPT nuclear-armed states have Article VI obligations. But without a serious strategy for success, this could be a formula for further inaction, especially given the complexities of a five-sided negotiation involving states with different force sizes, force structures, nuclear postures, and strategic cultures. The “P5 Process,” which has been underway since 2007 has little to show for its efforts.
Nevertheless, we would hope that multilateral negotiations on disarmament involving all five nuclear-armed NPT states, if launched, might produce meaningful results. But such an initiative should not be allowed to substitute for the immediate commencement of serious bilateral talks between the United States and Russia and the United States and China on nuclear risk reduction, strategic stability, and nuclear arms reductions that could also yield concrete arms control and risk reduction outcomes, and perhaps more quickly.
To improve the chances of success in future arms reduction talks, however they may be pursued, and to prevent unconstrained nuclear competition, we call on all five NPT nuclear-armed states to agree to freeze their strategic launchers at their current numbers.
As of now, Russia and the United States each have fewer than 800 total strategic launchers; China has an estimated 550, including unfilled strategic missile silos; and France and the United Kingdom have a combined total of about 96. A freeze on strategic nuclear launchers at these levels would not adversely affect any one country’s ability to deter nuclear attack, and could be more easily verified through remote, national means of intelligence.
Recommendations
We call on all states parties to come together on a final conference outcome document that:
- Reaffirms that all states recognize their obligation to accomplish the total elimination of nuclear weapons and through practical steps on nuclear disarmament and nuclear non-proliferation as agreed to by consensus at the 1995, 2000, and 2010 Review Conferences.
- As an urgent next step and commensurate with Article VI of the Treaty, calls upon the nuclear weapon states to engage, no later than the end of 2026, in good faith negotiations, bilaterally and/or multilaterally, that are designed to end the nuclear arms race and toward nuclear disarmament and to refrain from increasing the size of their nuclear arsenals.
- Urges the states with the largest nuclear arsenals to re-engage on nuclear disarmament negotiations and conclude a new framework agreement (or agreements) addressing strategic, intermediate-range, and nonstrategic weapons and seek new understandings on the interrelationship between strategic offensive and defensive weapons.
- Reaffirms support for the de facto global moratorium on any and all nuclear explosive tests that has been solidified under the “zero-yield” CTBT, which prohibits all nuclear explosions that produce a self-sustaining supercritical chain reaction of any kind whether for weapons or peaceful purposes. Any resumption of nuclear explosive testing particularly by one of the NPT’s nuclear five, would violate the moratorium and the CTBT, and could set off a chain reaction of nuclear testing that would blow apart the global nonproliferation system.
- Calls for prompt action on ratification before 2030 by the remaining CTBT Annex 2 states, in particular China, Russia, and the United States, and also calls upon the five nuclear-armed NPT states to promptly commence technical discussions to develop new mutual confidence building measures to be implemented prior to CTBT entry into force to ensure that ongoing activities and experiments at former nuclear test sites are fully consistent with the CTBT.
- Finally, the final conference outcome document should reaffirm the nuclear-armed states’ previous commitments to non-nuclear-weapon states against the use or threat of use of nuclear weapons, it should call upon relevant states to ratify the protocols to nuclear weapon free zone treaties by 2027, and call upon relevant states parties to facilitate the immediate start of negotiations at the Conference on Disarmament on a legally binding international instrument that obligates nuclear-armed states not to use or threaten to use nuclear weapons against non-nuclear-weapon States parties to the NPT.
Distinguished delegates: This is no ordinary NPT meeting. The results of the 2026 NPT Review Conference will likely have profound, long-term effects on our common future for many years to come.
We wish you success and offer our help and support.
Respectfully,
Elizabeth Hume, Executive Director, Alliance for Peacebuilding
Mohamed AL SHAMI and Ahlam Lamrani, Alliance Internationale pour la Défense des Droits et des Libertés (AIDL)
Daryl G. Kimball, Executive Director, Arms Control Association
Peter Wilk, Administrative Chair, Back from the Brink Coalition
Max Obuszewski, founder, Baltimore Nonviolence Center
Joseph C. Gerson, President, Campaign for Peace, Disarmament, and Common Security
Matt Duss, Executive Vice-President, Center for International Policy*
Nancy Okail, President & CEO, Center for International Policy
Paul G. Richards, Professor of the Natural Sciences emeritus, Columbia University*
Rachel MacNair, Vice President, Consistent Life Network
Oliver Meier, Head Nuclear and Multilateral Disarmament, European Leadership Network*
Goetz Neuneck, Prof. Dr., Federation of German Scientists
Michele Sterlace-Accorsi, Executive Director, Feminists Choosing Life of New York, Inc.
Jenifer Mackby, Nonresident Executive Fellow, Geneva Centre for Security Policy*
Thomas Greminger, Ambassador, Geneva Centre for Security Policy (GCSP)*
Mary Olson, Founder and CEO, Generational Radiation Impact Project
Steve Baggarly, Member, Hampton Roads Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons
Jean-Marie Collin, Director, ICAN France
Sean Conner, Executive Director, International Peace Bureau (IPB)
Michael Christ, Executive Director, International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War
Hideo ASANO, Coordinator, Japan Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons
Yerdaulet Rakhmatulla, Founder & CEO, JASA*
David Cortright, Professor Emeritus, Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies, University of Notre Dame*
Dr. Deepshikha Kumari Vijh, Executive Director, Lawyers Committee on Nuclear Policy
Laura S H Holgate, Former United States Ambassador to the International Atomic Energy Agency and the Preparatory Commission of the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test Ban Treaty Organization, LSHH International Advisors
Benetick Kabua Maddison, Executive Director, Marshallese Educational Initiative
Susan F. Burk, former Special Representative of the U.S. President for Nuclear Nonproliferation
Thomas Countryman, former U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for International Security and Nonproliferation
Julia Hurd, Steering Committee Member, No More Bombs
Irma Argüello, Founder & Chair, NPSGLOBAL Foundation
Dimity Hawkins, Program Coordinator, Nuclear Truth Project
Estelle Voeller, Chair, One Sunny Day Initiatives
Kevin Martin, President, Peace Action
Rebecca Irby, Founder and President, PEAC Institute Peace | Education | Art | Culture
Akira Kawasaki, Executive Committee Member, Peace Boat
David E Gibson, Co-Director, Peace, Justice, Sustainability NOW
John Hallam, Nuclear Disarmament Campaigner, People for Nuclear Disarmament
Magritte Gordaneer, Director, Nuclear Weapons Abolition Program, Physicians for Social Responsibility
Shaghayegh Chris Rostampour, Policy and Communications Manager, Physicists Coalition for Nuclear Threat Reduction*
Bill Kidd, Member of the Scottish Parliament, PNND*
Frank N von Hippel, Professor of Public and International Affairs Emeritus, Princeton University*
Stewart Prager , Professor emeritus, astrophysical sciences, Princeton University*
Robert Goldston, Professor, Princeton University*
Lucy W Duff, Member, Prince George's County MD Peace Action
Lauren Pope, Executive Director, Rehumanize International
Robert M. Gould, M.D, President, San Francisco Bay Physicians for Social Responsibility
Paul Meyer, Adjunct Professor of International Studies and Former Canadian Ambassador for Disarmament, Simon Fraser University*
Tomohiko Aishima, Executive Director, SGI Peace Center, Soka Gakkai International
Diane R. Swords, Steering Committee Member, Syracuse Peace Council
Jennifer Allen Simons, Founder and President, The Simons Foundation Canada*
Scott Yundt, Executive Director, Tri-Valley Communities Against a Radioactive Environment (CAREs)
Ana Palada, United Network of Young Peacebuilders*
Frederick K. Lamb, Research Professor of Physics and of Astronomy, University of Illinois*
Tara Drozdenko, Director of Global Security Program, Union of Concerned Scientists
Rev. James L Swarts, President, Veterans for Peace, Chapter 23, Rochester, NY
Ken Lans, MD, MBA President, Washington Physicians for Social Responsibility
Jacqueline Cabasso, Executive Director, Western States Legal Foundation
Robert Croonquist, Co-Founder, Youth Arts New York/Hibakusha Stories
*Affiliation for identification purposes only.
**This statement was coordinated by the Arms Control Association.