Ballistic missiles and conventional strike weapons Ballistic missiles and conventional strike weapons: Adapting the HCoC to address the dissemination of conventional ballistic missiles The Hague Code of Conduct aims at curbing the proliferation of missiles capable of carrying weapons of HCOC RESEARCH PAPERS mass destruction. Today, with an important increase in ranges, these weapons are more and more used for a NO. 6 conventional mission, by a variety of states. This dissemination illustrates the fact that many stakeholders master the technologies necessary to build and sustain JANUARY 2020 these weapons. But it also raises questions on the possible destabilising effects of these arsenals, even when they are not linked to WMDs. This paper develops the factors that have led to a reconsideration of the use of ballistic missiles for conventional strikes, and evokes possible ways for the Stéphane Delory HCoC to react to this evolution. Specifically, it proposes three options for the HCoC. First, it could continue to draw attention to the proliferation of missiles, regardless of their vocation. Second, an extension of the scope of the Code could be considered, which could extend its field of action to include regional security and stabilisation. Third, the Code could focus less on the delivery vehicle itself and more on the payload, enabling it to refer to all missiles carrying WMDs. This final proposition is described as more complex but potentially interesting as it would provide for regulation of emerging technologies such as hypersonic glide vehicles. Ballistic missiles and conventional strike weapons DISCLAIMER This document has been produced with the financial assistance of the European Union. The contents of this document are the sole responsibility of the Fondation pour la Recherche Stratégique and can under no circumstances be regarded as reflecting the position of the European Union. 2 Ballistic missiles and conventional strike weapons CONTENTS Introduction 5 The main initiators of conventional ballistic strikes 7 The proliferation and dissemination of conventional ballistic missiles: Technological aspects 9 The utility of conventional ballistic systems 11 Integrating conventional ballistic missiles into the HCoC 15 3 Ballistic missiles and conventional strike weapons 4 Ballistic missiles and conventional strike weapons Introduction any ballistic missile2 is capable of delivering weapons of mass destruction.3 We must The Hague Code of Conduct was designed attempt to define the parameters involved at a time when the proliferation of ballistic in conventional applications of ballistic missiles was closely associated with that of missiles and decide how to take these into weapons of mass destruction. However, the account. HCoC is now faced with changes in ballistic By making no reference to payload or technology which fundamentally alter the range, the Code differs from the initial link between ballistic missiles and weapons approach of the Missile Technology Control of mass destruction. Over short ranges, Regime (MTCR). By defining minimal criteria ballistic missiles are increasingly used for (a range of 300 km and a payload of 500 conventional strike missions. The same kg), the MTCR distinguished between development holds true, more gradually, for 1 missiles subject to regulation and those longer-range missiles. weapons or technologies that could be The Code aims to prevent the proliferation freely exported. These criteria were heavily of ballistic weapons ‘capable of delivering inspired by the technical features of the SS- weapons of mass destruction’, and not 1c Scud and first-generation nuclear ballistic missiles per se. This phrasing weapons. They applied to the main types of suggests a possible distinction based on the missile proliferated by states in search of purpose of the missiles and, therefore, that delivery systems for weapons of mass no anti-proliferation mechanism exists for destruction, and were therefore probably missiles whose purpose is exclusively sufficient to halt the proliferation of such conventional. In this regard, the Code could systems in the 1980s and 1990s. However, be adapted to take into account these criteria have turned out to be poorly conventional ballistic missiles. But this suited to subsequent technological distinction is clearly specious: by definition, developments. They now apply to a majority 1. In this paper, very short-range missiles are defined these systems and ballistic missiles (in terms of as those with a range of less than 300 km, short- range, trajectory, and type of guidance system) is range missiles as those with a range of less than 800 fading. km, and long-range missiles as those with a range of 3. In fixing the payload limit for regulated missiles at over 1,000 km. In terms of conventional strikes, mis- 500 kg, the MTCR was guided by the minimum car- siles with ranges greater than 1,000 km are rare, and rying capacity of a first-generation nuclear missile. the majority are not precise enough to generate a However, proliferating nuclear powers and those predictable military effect on the target. Instead, they who are not members of the Treaty on the Non- are primarily used for “political” strikes—that is, Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) are now those aimed at civilian targets which are meant to capable of designing weapons whose mass is likely force the targeted political power to change its mili- lower. Furthermore, the Syrian conflict reminds us tary position in a conflict. that the use of chemical weapons remains a current 2. In speaking of ballistic missiles here, we include problem. The increasing precision of missiles makes those with manoeuvrable warheads and quasi- it possible to reduce the quantity of chemical agents ballistic missiles (which spend the majority of their needed to produce a significant military effect. We flight within the atmosphere). Guided heavy rockets should take heed of cases in which low-payload (missiles of 600 mm and above) are treated as ballis- delivery systems are used to carry chemical weapons. tic missiles, as the traditional distinction between 5 Ballistic missiles and conventional strike weapons of weapons and technologies whose programmes to acquire weapons of mass purposes are primarily conventional. By destruction. Resolution 1540, whose scope leaving the MTCR’s range and payload is more general, requires states to establish criteria unchanged, the Code has diverged measures to control the proliferation of fundamentally from the MTCR, whose both weapons of mass destruction and their implicit objective is to regulate the delivery systems. Like the Code and proliferation of missiles in their own right, previous resolutions, it makes a distinction and not just delivery systems for weapons between delivery systems in their own right of mass destruction. and delivery systems associated with weapons of mass destruction. Since there is The Code and the MTCR may reflect no international treaty prohibiting the different methodological approaches, but design, development, acquisition, and they face the same problem: How can export of ballistic weapons, all of these prevention and anti-proliferation measures actions are legal as long as they are carried take account of weapons and technologies out in conformity with the respective whose applications are primarily commitments of states to non-proliferation conventional? And how can these be agreements and international standards. distinguished from delivery systems for weapons of mass destruction? Until the 1990s, the acquisition of ballistic missiles for conventional strike purposes The question is far from merely rhetorical. was merely a theoretical issue, since such By focusing solely on ‘ballistic missiles weapons were extremely imprecise. But capable of delivering weapons of mass many examples of conventional ballistic destruction’, the Code emphasises a strikes have been recorded since 1973 (the fundamental principle: that states are date of the first use of an SS-1c, during the permitted the equipment of their choice in Yom Kippur War). In particular, these strikes order to defend themselves, as long as this occurred during the War of the Cities is not prohibited or restricted by between Iran and Iraq, by the Afghan forces international treaties. The MTCR does not of the Najibullah government to break the go against this principle, nor do the United siege of Jalalabad in 1989, during US Nations Security Council resolutions passed operations in Iraq in 1991 and 2003, and, during proliferation crises. The member more recently, in Yemen. These examples states of the MTCR voluntarily undertake to showed the partial political and, in some regulate certain types of exports, with no situations, military utility of ballistic missiles, normative consequences under even if they were imprecise and poorly international law. Security Council suited to a role as conventional strike resolutions, which ban particular states from weapons.4 Nonetheless, conventional acquiring ballistic missiles, establish a direct ballistic strikes were still primarily seen as a link between such missiles and illegal 4. The political utility is only partial because the use effects are real: most of the states concerned are of specifically conventional delivery systems only required to adapt their military strategies, both rarely requires targeted states to radically modify during and after the conflict.. their declaratory stances. However, the strategic 6 Ballistic missiles and conventional strike