As you remember, an arms race is a process where at least two parties participate. Uncontrolled arms race can be a serious threat to national security. So, the USA and the USSR tried to use arms control politics to tackle the problems of their national security. And in this video, we will talk about arms control as an instrument of security policy and from the perspective of the international law. Arms control is a sphere of international politics that can be used to solve the problems of national security. There could be different arrangements and instruments. All instruments of international arms control can be divided into two parts, formal and informal arrangements. Non-formal arms control can take different forms like arrangements, guiding principles, plans of actions and so on. The main feature of these type of instruments is that there are no any legally binding obligations. So, the participants of the arms control arrangements can take the obligations unilaterally and can join any arrangements anytime they want. But if they withdraw from an initiative or an arrangement, there will not be any sanctions or enforcement or punishment for that. Formal arms control can be described through different notions, treaties, conventions, agreements, participating an international organization can be also variant of formal arms control. By joining an international organization or by signing a treaty, a state takes some obligations. So, withdrawal from a treaty would lead to sanctions. Legally binding arms control agreements can be bilateral or multilateral. At the same time, a state can declare adherence to some arms control norm unilaterally. For example, a state can declare no first use pledge. It means that the state declares that it will not use nuclear weapons as a means of aggression. Bilateral and multilateral formal arms control arrangements can be set either on the regional or on the global level. Let's now have a look at their living cycle of an arms control arrangement. We can divide it into three significant steps. First of all negotiations, negotiations are very comprehensive and complicated process. A lot of different stakeholders from national level are involved into negotiations. By signing the treaty or the convention, the state declares readiness to follow the obligations, but signing the treaty is a declarative step. The third step is very important, the ratification. There are different types of ratification instruments usually the congress or the parliament votes to adopt the treaty and to ratify that treaty. Usually, the state needs to prepare for it ratification because after the ratification, all obligations starts to be legally binding for the state, and if the state does not show adherence to the norms and limitations of that treaty, there could be sanctions. Let's now have a look on different arms control instruments that are used on those three steps towards entering into force of the legally binding arrangement or the treaty. First of all, when the state ratifies the agreement, it may make some reservations. For example, nuclear weapons states during ratifying the protocols for the treaties that establish zones free of nuclear weapons made some reservations. Usually, international agreements establish depositories. The state party or some international institution can be called depositary according to the international agreement or convention. Depositary accepts the instruments of ratification from the state parties and also provides services to support efficient and sustainable communication between the state parties to the agreement. In the text of the agreement, the duration of the legally binding obligations may be described. Usually, Soviet-American nuclear arms control agreements included these norm and they described a limited period of time during which the agreement was legally binding. However, international treaties may have another norm. They may include the possibility of extension, so the legally binding obligations after special decision of the state parties to the treaty may be extended for a definite period of time or an indefinite period of time. For example, in 1995 state parties to the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty decided to extend the NPT for the indefinite period of time. In some circumstances, when the ideas and the provisions of the treaty start to contradict with the national interests of the state, the state party can withdraw from the treaty, that is called denunciation. However, there is another possibility, a state can unilaterally declare their moratorium on the adherence to the limitations set by the treaty. Sometimes, the international world order changes rapidly and some states collapse and new states arise. In this situation, the procedure of succession is very useful. State parties to the treaty need to decide which country will be declared the successor to the previous state party of the treaty. Some treaties include the possibility of making changes to the main provisions of the treaty. The possibility then will be called amendments. However, modern multilateral arms control agreements does not have these norm in their texts. So, after signing and ratifying the treaty, the state parties do not have possibility to change any norms or ideas included into the agreement. International arms control agreements usually establish the procedure for reviewing the treaty. It means that regularly, the state parties to the treaty meet to discuss the problems, the expectations and to develop the road map for the next period of time. For example, the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty establishes the institution of reviewing conferences. The first conference occurred in 1975, the five years after the treaty entered into force and state parties to the treaty come to the reviewing conferences each five years. So, here are the main instruments of international arms control as an instrument of international security and international politics.
