Incremental disarmament is a strategy that breaks the politically and technically difficult goal of arms reduction into smaller, sequenced steps. Each step is intended to build confidence, establish verification routines, and create domestic and diplomatic conditions for the next round of cuts. The approach contrasts with "comprehensive" or "general and complete" disarmament, a phrase used in Article VI of the 1968 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), which commits nuclear-weapon states to pursue negotiations in good faith on effective measures to end the arms race.
In practice, incrementalism has dominated nuclear arms control. The bilateral US–Soviet/Russian track moved from SALT I (1972) and SALT II (1979), which capped delivery vehicles, to INF (1987), which eliminated an entire class of intermediate-range missiles, and then to START I (1991), SORT (2002), and New START (2010), each lowering deployed strategic warhead and launcher ceilings. Conventional arms control followed a similar logic in the Treaty on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe (CFE, 1990).
Proponents argue incrementalism is the only realistic path because it:
- Allows verification regimes (on-site inspection, telemetry, national technical means) to mature.
- Lets militaries restructure force postures gradually.
- Survives changes in government better than sweeping bargains.
Critics, including many Non-Aligned Movement states and the coalition behind the 2017 Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW), argue that incrementalism has become an excuse for indefinite retention. They point to stalled negotiations after New START, the 2019 US and Russian withdrawals from the INF Treaty, and Russia's 2023 suspension of New START participation as evidence that step-by-step progress can also be reversed step-by-step.
For MUN delegates, the term often surfaces in First Committee and Conference on Disarmament debates as shorthand for the gap between nuclear-armed states' preferred pace and the abolitionist agenda advanced by humanitarian-initiative states.
Example
In 2010, the United States and Russia signed New START, capping deployed strategic warheads at 1,550 each — a textbook incremental disarmament step that built on the earlier START I and SORT agreements rather than pursuing total nuclear abolition.
Frequently asked questions
General and complete disarmament, referenced in NPT Article VI, envisions the total elimination of weapons as an end state. Incremental disarmament focuses on the sequenced, verifiable steps along the way, and in practice has rarely produced full elimination of any weapons category beyond the INF Treaty's intermediate-range missiles.
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