NZ should be reaffirming its stand against nuclear weapons, not tinkering with it

Thursday, 18 June 2026

A nuclear device is detonated in the Nevada desert during the Americans’ nuclear test programme of the 1950s.

Dr Marianne Hanson is an associate professor of international relations. She taught arms control, international law and diplomacy at the University of Queensland for 30 years.

OPINION: Martin van Beynen, in his opinion column of June 12 No nukes: Beacon of bludging?, has suggested that we should revisit New Zealand's nuclear-free legislation.

He argues that we need to do this because of Australia's proposed acquisition of nuclear-propelled submarines via the Aukus pact, because of changing international security considerations, and because, allegedly, other states are thinking of getting nuclear weapons.

Let me respond to these claims.

First, New Zealand need not be overly worried about accommodating Australian nuclear-powered submarines into its everyday defence partnership, because these subs are unlikely to eventuate.

There is extremely strong opposition in Australia towards Aukus, not just because of the massive $368 billion cost and the problems associated with storing nuclear waste. Serving US war-planning goals much more than the actual defence of Australian shores, Aukus is increasingly being seen as a folly which will detract from rather than help us address security in the Asia-Pacific region.

In any case, American and British ship-building programmes are so plagued with their own problems that supplying Australia with nuclear-propelled vessels on time and on budget is only a distant possibility. And even if Canberra does eventually acquire these, New Zealand's defence partnership with Australia can be configured to operate without our participation on nuclear-powered vessels.

Anti-nuclear protesters in Auckland in 1976, nearly a decade before New Zealand declared itself nuclear-free.

As far as nuclear weapons are concerned, there is even less reason to tinker with our existing position as a non-nuclear weapon state. Van Beynen notes that New Zealand and Mongolia are the only two countries which have declared their territories to be “single-state nuclear free zones” (in fact Austria is another state that has done this). But this is a bit of a red herring.

The more accurate picture is that the vast majority of states in the world - 187 out of 196 countries - have, just like New Zealand, Mongolia and Austria, promised never to acquire nuclear weapons, by signing and ratifying the 1970 nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. The additional declaration by these three countries as “single-state nuclear-free zones” is just a further rejection of nuclear weapons.

New Zealand’s non-nuclear stance, rather than an anomaly, accords with what most states believe is the right thing to do.

Van Beynen also argues that we are living in a particularly dangerous world, and that as a result other countries are considering getting nuclear weapons.

He cites a claim that “Iran’s neighbours in the Persian Gulf and American allies like Germany, Japan, Poland and South Korea are privately debating” this option. Every one of these states, it should be noted, has signed the non-proliferation treaty and promised never to develop nuclear weapons. If factions within their governments are murmuring about changing their policies, this is still very much at a conjectural level and far from being a likely policy outcome.

In reality, those few states which continue to have nuclear weapons – the US, Russia, China, Britain, France, India, Pakistan, North Korea and Israel - are under growing pressure to get rid of them. In 2017, the majority of states in the world agreed on a United Nations treaty which makes nuclear weapons illegal on the basis of international humanitarian law. The treaty recognises the massive, even planetary, destruction that nuclear weapons would cause. These nine states that have these weapons are increasingly being seen as irresponsible, as coercive, and as risking catastrophic damage to the world should even a “small” number of their weapons be used.

Instead of thinking about altering New Zealand's stance against nuclear weapons, we should reassert the very good sense that prevailed when we decided never to acquire these most destructive of weapons of mass destruction. We must recognise, as the director of the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN) recently noted, that it is far better to seek security not “in the shadow of mushroom clouds but via dialogue, diplomacy and disarmament”.

There might be something to be said for states reviewing their laws and amending or dispensing with policies seen as bad or no longer serving national and global interests. But our policy is neither bad nor outdated. On the contrary, New Zealand's non-nuclear stance is a very good law and is needed today more than ever. It corresponds with the policies of the majority of states in the world, it stands for humanity and against the indiscriminate murder of millions (or possibly billions) of people.

Instead of tinkering with this law, we should be reaffirming it, and we should concentrate our efforts on active diplomacy to persuade those few states which still have these weapons to dismantle them. A nuclear-free policy educates and reminds people about the dangers of nuclear weapons and helps us work towards their eventual elimination.