Pierre Trudeau and the “suffocation” of the nuclear arms race
| Date | 01 September 2016 |
| DOI | 10.1177/0020702016662798 |
| Published date | 01 September 2016 |
| Author | Paul Meyer |
| Subject Matter | Scholarly Essays |
International Journal
2016, Vol. 71(3) 393–408
!The Author(s) 2016
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DOI: 10.1177/0020702016662798
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Scholarly Essay
Pierre Trudeau and the
‘‘suffocation’’ of the
nuclear arms race
Paul Meyer
Simon Fraser University
Abstract
Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau is known for his challenge to Canada’s NATO policy at
the beginning of his tenure in power and his peace initiative at its end. Less well known
is his support for innovative arms control policies designed to eliminate the techno-
logical impetus behind the nuclear arms race between the US and the USSR during the
Cold War. At the first UN Special Session on Disarmament in May 1978, Trudeau
delivered a speech outlining a ‘‘strategy of suffocation’’ that provided a novel package
of four arms control measures that, taken as a whole, would represent an effective
means of halting and eventually reversing the nuclear arms race. Although the super-
powers were largely indifferent to them, these ideas helped spur the Department of
External Affairs to invest in developing the institutional capacity to enable Canada to
play a leadership role in future disarmament diplomacy.
Keywords
Arms control, disarmament diplomacy, Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau, UN Special
Session on Disarmament, Canadian foreign policy, Department of External Affairs
Canada, nuclear arms race, Fissile Material Cutoff Treaty, ‘‘Strategy of Suffocation’’
As prime minister, Pierre Trudeau’s involvement in issues of nuclear arms control
and grand strategy is usually attributed to the early days of his government or to
his final days in power. At the start of his leadership was the series of decisions
beginning in 1969 to terminate nuclear weapon operational roles for Canadian
forces, first in Europe and then in Canada.
1
Toward the end of his tenure as
prime minister was his ‘‘peace initiative’’ of 1983–84 with its aim to revitalize
Corresponding author:
Paul Meyer, Simon Fraser University- School for International Studies, 7200–515 West Hastings Street,
Vancouver, British Columbia V6B 5K3, Canada.
Email: pmeyer@sfu.ca
1. Ivan Head and Pierre Trudeau, The Canadian Way: Shaping Canada’s Foreign Policy 1968–1984
(Toronto: McLelland & Stewart, 1995), 65–95.
East–West strategic cooperation during one of the darkest periods of the
Cold War.
2
Probably less well known is Prime Minister Trudeau’s address to the UN
General Assembly’s First Special Session on Disarmament (UNSSOD I) delivered
on 26 May 1978. In this speech, Trudeau set out what became known as a ‘‘strategy
of suffocation’’ aimed at curbing the nuclear arms race underway between the
United States and the Soviet Union, the superpowers of the day. This speech rep-
resented a major conceptual and practical contribution by the Government of
Canada to moderating (and eventually reversing) the supercharged competition
in nuclear forces pursued by the two superpowers. It also heralded an enhancement
of Canada’s bureaucratic capacity as part of an effort to have Canada play a more
active role in shaping the multilateral agenda for arms control and disarmament.
Given that public displays of original thinking by a NATO member on strategic
relations were not exactly smiled upon by Washington, or by its junior nuclear
weapon partner the UK, Trudeau’s speech was also remarkable in its willingness to
advocate new policy directions for the nuclear powers that went beyond their
comfort zones.
How such an innovative address was developed by the bureaucracy and cham-
pioned by the highest political level is the focus of this article. It considers the
context in which the Canadian position for UNSSOD I was formed and the aims
the then Department of External Affairs developed for this unprecedented UN
session. It then tries to identify the influences on the Canadian statement, including
the personal interest the prime minister showed in the initiative, as it went through
various drafts, and assess its key ideas. It concludes with some reflections on the
impact of the speech and its significance for future Canadian and multilateral arms
control and disarmament policy.
The UN and the disarmament issue
The United Nations General Assembly has been preoccupied from its inception
with the pursuit of international security and the need for disarmament. Indeed, the
first resolution adopted by the General Assembly at its inaugural session in January
1946 was devoted to these concerns and in particular to the threat posed by the
atomic bomb. The title of the first resolution was ‘‘Establishment of a Commission
to deal with the problems raised by the discovery of atomic energy’’, and the
Atomic Energy Commission it created was tasked with developing proposals for
inter alia ‘‘the elimination from national armaments of atomic weapons and of all
other major weapons adaptable to mass destruction.’’
3
Initial efforts to reach a consensus on a mechanism for the international control
of atomic energy and the elimination of nuclear weapons quickly foundered in the
2. J.L. Granatstein and Robert Bothwell, Pirouette: Pierre Trudeau and Canadian Foreign Policy
(Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1990), 363–376.
3. UN General Assembly Resolution 1, 24 January 1946.
394 International Journal 71(3)
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