Russian roulette over CTBT is ominous

In the latest twist of the strategic ratchet, Russia has announced that it intends to revoke its ratification of the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) and has given State Duma members till October 18 to study the option.

- Navtej Sarna

The announcement, almost drowned out by the outbreak of Israel-Hamas hostilities, added that the revocation should not be taken to mean a resumption of nuclear testing; a day earlier, President Vladimir Putin, speaking in Sochi, had been much more ambiguous regarding that possibility saying he was "not ready to say now whether we really need or don't need to conduct tests".

At a technical level, the Russian revocation is unlikely to have a material impact on the future of the treaty. The CTBT currently has 187 State signatories and has been ratified by 178 of them. Yet 27 years after it opened for signature, the treaty is nowhere near entering into force. The stringent requirements of the treaty's Article XIV - fiercely debated during the negotiations - make its entry into force contingent upon its ratification by 44 States, all of which negotiated the text in the Conference on Disarmament and had nuclear power/research reactors.