For the first time in a decade, the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) Review Conference was a success. The 189 nations that met for a month at the United Nations headquarters reconfirmed their commitment to the goal of a world free of nuclear weapons, and to that end agreed to hold a regional conference that would eliminate weapons of mass destruction from the Middle East. Both are long-range goals whose ultimate realization depends on a broader political context: Those weapons will only disappear when the political conditions that made them necessary are gone as well. Nevertheless, agreements like this lay the foundation upon which that road will be traveled.

The NPT was agreed in 1970. Parties agreed to a world divided into "nuclear haves" — the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council: Britain, China, France, Russia (then the Soviet Union) and the United States — and nuclear "have-nots" — everyone else, with the exception of India, Pakistan and Israel, which have refused to sign the treaty. In exchange for the have-nots accepting permanent nonnuclear status, the nuclear powers promised to eliminate eventually their nuclear stockpiles. In addition, the promise to remain nonnuclear conferred upon the have-nots the right to access to peaceful nuclear technology.

The treaty also had a provision calling for a review conference to be held every five years after it went into effect. At the fifth "RevCon," held in 1995, the signing parties agreed to indefinite extension of the NPT. At the next RevCon, held in 2000 and considered by some one of the most successful, the parties agreed to a 13-step action plan to move toward nuclear disarmament.