Sagan, Scott, and Kenneth Waltz. "Is Nuclear Zero the Best Option?". The National Interest, No.109 (2010): 88-96.

Sagan, Scott, and Kenneth Waltz. "Is Nuclear Zero the Best Option?". The National Interest, No.109 (2010): 88-96.

This article is split between Scott Sagan and Kenneth Waltz, each of whom answers the questions posed in the title. The response of Dr. Sagan will appear in blue, he answers 'Yes', while the response of Dr. Waltz will appear in green, he answers 'No'.

• The commitment of the Obama administration to nuclear disarmament is based on a realization that the most pressing nuclear security concerns of the future will be terrorist groups in possession of WMDs, and that the proliferation of more nuclear powers erodes the power and legitimacy of the United States (88).
• The best way to reduce the likelihood of terrorists acquiring a nuclear weapon or fissile material is to limit the opportunities to steal such material. This means reducing the total amount of material and limiting the people who possess it, including preventing other states from acquiring nuclear weapons (89).
• There have been a number of historical terrorist groups who sought to steal nuclear weapons: in 1977, the Red Army Faction in the Bonn Republic broke into a US military base to try and steal and nuclear weapon; the Aum Shinrikyo cult tried to steal a Russian nuclear weapon in the 1990s; Osama bin Laden has declared his intention to acquire a nuclear weapon (89).
• The Obama government was quite successful in encouraging cooperation on issues of nuclear security, believing that the US could lead by example. It encouraged 46 countries to increase security on nuclear reactors, and spearheaded successful cooperation with Russia and China over sanctions against the Iranian nuclear program (89-90).
• Maintaining the non-nuclear world order would be far easier than preventing nuclear proliferation in a system with large nuclear arsenals. Nuclear states with large arsenals do not feel appropriately threatened by new nuclear proliferation, whereas the threat of a new nuclear state in a non-nuclear system would immediately constitute a major threat (90).
• Even a non-nuclear world would not result in a system with weakened nuclear powers, as the major powers would still have the technological skill and legal privilege required to rebuilt their nuclear arsenals in case of danger. This would maintain nuclear force as a passive threat for the great powers (90).
• Anti-missile defenses do pose a threat to the system of mutual assured destruction, but this threat can be managed by mutual deployment of these defense systems and closer cooperation. The costs are manageable, whereas the benefits for protection against rogue states are immense (90-91).
• The end of nuclear weapons would not be a world without war, but would rather require a number of large conventional forces to maintain peace, for normal warfare, and to punish those who violate non-proliferation agreements (91).

• Dr. Waltz argues that the threat of mutual assured destruction has been the factor preventing war between nuclear powers since 1945, and that getting rid of the nuclear bomb would allow conflict to reignite (92). 
• The historical record shows that large-scale conventional conflicts do not erupt between states in position of nuclear weapons. A world without nuclear weapons would see more war, including between major countries like Pakistan and India (93-94).
• The US has such an immense conventional weapons superiority that other states it threatens -- i.e., North Korea, Iran -- will rationally seek nuclear weapons as the only possible deterrent. There is no reason for these states to abandon their nuclear programs, regardless of American nuclear posture (92).
• It is impossible to get rid of the knowledge of how to construct nuclear weapons, meaning that a return to nuclear armament would always be possible (93).
• America does not actual intend to disarm its nuclear arsenal. The United States is willing to make some symbolic reductions to its arsenal to encourage others to reduce their arsenals, but this is only because the US arsenal is so large that reductions can be made without hurting the American capacity to launch second strikes (92, 94).

• Dr. Waltz's claim that nuclear-armed states no fighting each other or behaving responsibly with the atomic bomb is incorrect. The 1999 Kargil War started between India and Pakistan immediately after the 1998 Pakistani nuclear tests, largely as a result of an incorrect Pakistani belief that their nuclear capacity would deter India from offering a robust conventional military response to an attempted invasion of Kashmir (94).
• Dr. Sagan argues that the threat posed by countries like Iran becoming nuclear proliferates is precisely why the US needs to take a stronger stance against nuclear proliferation and work alongside fellow nuclear powers like China and Russia to create a robust non-proliferation regime (95).
• Dr. Waltz does not address the issue of terrorist groups acquiring nuclear weapons which is so crucial to Dr. Sagan's argument (95).

• Dr. Waltz claims that the relatively small number of nuclear-armed states is not a result of global commitment to the Non-Proliferation Treaty, but instead because most nations feel sufficiently secure without nuclear weapons. He goes on to claim that if a country wanted nukes, like North Korea, there is nothing someone else can do to stop it (95-96).
• Dr. Waltz questions what the response of major powers would be to the sudden revelation that another major power has rebuilt its nuclear capacity. He uses this as 'evidence' of the ineffectiveness of any enforcement of a non-nuclear world order (96).
• Dr. Waltz dismisses the threat posed by nuclear-armed terrorists as minimal since they cannot capture territory or pose a threat to the continuity of the American state. To Dr. Waltz, this means that terrorists do not matter (96).