Building an Effective WMD Control Regime

Abstract

The history of the WMD control regime began in the early years of the United Nations with the most ambitious plan, the Baruch Plan, to create an international authority responsible for the development and peaceful use of nuclear energy. It would take custody of all fissionable material and technological information essential for producing nuclear weapons. It would also verify the freeze on weapons production and the destruction of existing stockpiles of nuclear weapons. Although the plan was not accepted, it launched a process that broadened the arms control objective to include chemical and biological weapons and classified them all together as weapons of mass destruction, a concept used to distinguish them from conventional weapons. All the proposals that evolved during the first decade were then pulled together to form a comprehensive model for General and Complete Disarmament (GCD). The model was then considered to be unrealistic as a basis for negotiating a convention for phased across-the-board disarmament to be implemented by a single international disarmament and verification organization. However, it established a firm conceptual foundation and an outline of partial or collateral measures that would be separately negotiated as building blocks towards verified disarmament in all areas.