ABSTRACT
The United States has continued to remain opposed to the establishment of the nuclear disarmament ad hoc committee since 1995. The United States is not totally isolated in its nonproliferation positions, especially regarding two of the most critical challenges facing the international community, Iran and North Korea. The outcome of these events will form the backdrop for the final PrepCom for the 2005 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) Review Conference and the conference itself. Perhaps the domestic political fallout of the Republican take-over of the Congress in 1994 and Clinton's personal difficulties undermined any chance that the Senate would consent to ratify the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) between 1997 and 1999. The Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty and the CTBT, so very important to so many states, can be shunted aside while the parts of the NPT that matter most, compliance by nuclear nonweapons states, will be the focus of US diplomacy.
