When the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) review conference – the world´s largest and most important five-yearly gathering devoted to nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation – began in New York, on Monday 3 May, it attracted only marginal media attention. The previous NPT review conference, held in 2005, had fallen apart, unable even to agree on an agenda. If the present conference fails to identify concrete solutions to pressing problems, the treaty will enter into terminal decline, and nuclear weapons will proliferate.

When the NPT was opened for signature in 1968, the international stage was dominated by the US and the Soviet Union. Their bipolar cold-war world order is now being supplanted by a rapidly changing multipolar world which is slowly but surely calling into question inherited shibboleths. The values and institutions of the United Nations are perceived as bearing the stamp of the 35 mainly Western states which established them immediately after World War II. Vigorous and powerful emerging economies are increasingly challenging the pre-eminence of the West. The Non-Aligned Movement (NAM), currently representing 118 states, is maturing into an increasingly focused alliance united above all by a sense of exclusion from traditional centres of power. The days when a weak and hopelessly divided NAM sang from the song sheets of the US and the Soviet Union are over. The power and status of the US are on the wane. China is emerging as a somewhat reluctant superpower of the future.

Previous NPT review conferences were casting a deep shadow over this year´s conference before it began. The US had been lobbying a number of states likely to be key players at the conference, especially in relation to Iran. All decisions must be taken by consensus, with the nuclear weapons states lacking their accustomed veto firepower. They must step down from their exalted status as permanent members of the Security Council, and must strike consensus deals with a broad spectrum of otherwise untouchable states who rarely show up on their radar screens.

Many non nuclear weapons states wonder whether the NPT is a gigantic confidence trick benefiting the nuclear weapons states and the West. They rightly criticize the failure of nuclear weapons states to commit themselves to deadlines for major cuts in their nuclear arsenals. This criticism was sharpened when the nuclear weapons states deleted from a draft conference resolution all references to timelines for disarmament. Before the conference France had already indicated its firm opposition to any reduction in its force de frappe. During the conference the new UK government declared that it would revamp its fleet of Trident nuclear submarines. The US is known to be quietly improving the effectiveness of its nuclear weapons.

Just before the conference began a senior Republican senator said of the START treaty: "reducing the number of nuclear weapons that are deployed to 1,500 gives us plenty to blow everybody to kingdom come if that's what we choose to do". Two US professors of air force strategy have just pointed out that the US "could address its conceivable national defense and military concerns with only 311 strategic nuclear weapons". This is why Obama´s personal commitment to nuclear disarmament is no longer perceived as representing US policy on this question. The US president is outgunned, not only by other governments and Republicans, but also by too many within his own government, including his heavyweight Secretaries of Defence and State. This scepticism is reinforced by awareness that Obama may be a one-term president.

The other deeply divisive topic has to do with a nuclear weapons free zone in the Middle East. Israel has possessed nuclear weapons since 1967-8, and now has more warheads than India and Pakistan combined. It is noteworthy that Iran has, since 1974, supported various multilateral initiatives to establish a nuclear weapons free zone in the Middle East. Everyone can see that, if such a zone is established, it will be binding on both Israel and Iran. In 1995 the NPT review conference decided to indefinitely extend the application of the NPT, but made this conditional on support for initiatives to establish a WMD free zone in the Middle East. It was principally Middle Eastern and NAM states that insisted on this. When the next conference was convened in 2000, nothing had been done to implement this resolution. When the following conference took place in 2005, it collapsed over the perceived lack of good faith on the part of the West and nuclear weapons states on this issue. After a further five years of inertia on this question of burning importance to the Middle East and of increasing importance to the NAM and some others, failure to achieve real progress is perceived as symbolising the lack of integrity of the NPT review process. Deals are struck on the basis of critically important commitments which are ignored as soon as they have been adopted.

When the review conference opened, the West found itself confronting a broad and diverse international alliance in support of a WMD free zone in the Middle East. Notwithstanding its NPT commitments the West has until now used every trick in the book to block international discussion of Israel´s nuclear weapons, while also opposing moves to establish a nuclear weapons free zone in the region. Confronted with an irresistible groundswell of opinion on this issue, the West has fallen over backwards to proclaim its commitment to a WMD free zone, to avert a terminal breakdown in the NPT regime. While this backflip can only be welcomed, it is widely perceived as lacking sincerity. Will it simply add to the lack of good faith that has undermined the credibility and integrity of the NPT process?

Everyone knows that, if this conference shares the fate of its predecessor, the NPT will be dead in the water, with the proliferation of nuclear weapons a highly probable outcome. This, coupled with the consensus-based decision-making process, has led all delegations, including the US and Iran, to look for middle ground. But widespread lack of trust and deep historical splits have not facilitated consensus decisions. With less than one week to go, the fate of the conference hangs in the balance. Precisely at this moment the US has chosen to high-handedly dismiss a joint initiative of Brazil and Turkey explicitly aiming, not to engineer a final solution to the Iran issue, but to build confidence and to lay the foundation for peaceful progress. The US, which has been playing the unfamiliar role of a respectful participant in the conference, has resorted to gunboat diplomacy in its capacity as a member of the Security Council, and has blown out of the water a promising initiative with considerable support amongst NAM and other states. This unceremonious snuffing out of a peaceful initiative by key players in the emerging world order can be described as death by Pax Americana. While it may be consistent with US foreign policy since President George Bush, it is fundamentally at variance both with the consensus style of the review conference, and with President Obama's recently proclaimed commitment to lessen conflict through diplomacy and cooperation. This ill-conceived and untimely US move may yet undo the good work that has been done to build consensus in the conference. Time will tell.