Gore Warns of Regional Arms Races : Diplomacy: Vice president argues U.S. case for permanent Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.

Vice President Al Gore warned bluntly Wednesday that failure to make permanent a 25-year-old treaty banning the spread of nuclear weapons could trigger regional arms races that could be even more dangerous than the atomic standoff of the Cold War.

Delivering the Clinton Administration’s main policy address to a 178-nation conference considering renewal of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, Gore said the opportunity to reduce the global nuclear threat “will be lost” if the pact expires or is extended for only a limited time.

“The treaty helps prevent regional rivalries from evolving into regional nuclear arms races,” he said.

But Gore’s speech, drafted after an intense debate within the Administration, stopped short of offering a new U.S. pledge to get rid of all nuclear weapons, a commitment that some nuclear have-not nations are demanding in exchange for their vote to extend the treaty.

Arms control advocates within the Administration called for a forthright commitment to a nuclear “zero option.”

But they lost out to the Pentagon and other agencies that take the position that it would be dangerous for the United States to give up all nuclear weapons, even in the post-Cold War world.

Instead of a new promise, Gore reiterated Washington’s commitment to make a “good-faith effort” to negotiate nuclear disarmament.

That provision has been in the pact for its entire quarter-century life, and while the United States and Russia have agreed to dismantle thousands of weapons, they retain thousands more.

The other three acknowledged nuclear powers--Britain, France and China--have not substantially reduced their arsenals.

Gore argued that the nuclear powers will not be able to even consider further reductions without the assurance of a permanent non-proliferation treaty. He said it would be a mistake for non-nuclear countries to try to “hold the treaty hostage.”

“The last thing that we need as we wrestle with the problem of further constraining nuclear weapons in ways that are irrevocable, is for the treaty itself to become . . . subject to revocation at regular intervals,” Gore said.

Leaders of non-governmental arms control groups that support the Administration’s position were disappointed by Gore’s speech, which they described as a hard-line reiteration of a “Washington knows best” policy.

“It phrased things more nicely, but there was nothing new at all,” said Stephen Young, a senior analyst with the British-American Security Information Council, an outspoken supporter of the treaty.

Young said Gore’s speech might indicate that the Administration is confident that it has the votes to assure permanent renewal of the treaty and, therefore, needs to make no concessions to opponents.

The Campaign for the Non-Proliferation Treaty, a coalition of arms control groups, says 119 countries have either promised to vote for the treaty or are leaning in that direction, compared to 40 or so that oppose the treaty or want it renewed for a limited time. The rest are undecided.

A simple majority of 90 votes is needed to make the treaty permanent. The pact will be binding on all countries that sign it, whether they vote to extend or not.

Most opponents say indefinite extension would eliminate the incentive for nuclear-armed countries to take additional disarmament steps. Other opponents complain that the pact is discriminatory because it permits the five countries that had nuclear arms in 1970 to keep them, while denying that option to all others.

Gore devoted much of his speech to a point-by-point rebuttal of opposing arguments.

Only by making the treaty permanent, Gore said, can the non-nuclear states lock in the commitment of the five nuclear powers to “pursue good-faith negotiations on nuclear arms control and disarmament.”

He said the United States and Russia have already agreed to slash their arsenals, and noted that Ukraine, Kazakhstan and Belarus--which inherited part of the Soviet Union’s vast arsenal--have agreed to become non-nuclear countries.

Gore said extending the treaty for a specific period of time would be almost as bad as allowing it to lapse.

“Introducing uncertainty into the calculus of nuclear decision-making will not reinforce the goals of the (treaty),” he said. “On the contrary, it will threaten the real progress that is now being made among the original nuclear weapons states, and it will encourage would-be ‘proliferators’ to lie low and to clandestinely pursue their objectives.”

Shortly before Gore spoke, South African Foreign Affairs Minister Alfred Nzo announced that his government will support indefinite renewal.

But South Africa, once believed to be a potential leader of the opposition bloc, called for new steps to monitor compliance with all aspects of the treaty, including the requirement of disarmament negotiations among the five nuclear powers.

The initiative was hailed by arms control groups.

“The South African proposal is the most promising way to a broadly supported, indefinite extension,” said Tom Zamora-Collina, executive director of the Institute for Science and International Security. “It is an appropriate balance of treaty permanence and renewed commitment to nuclear disarmament.”