Critics fear its real testament will be lasting damage to the global nuclear non-proliferation regime.
The run-up to next year's five-yearly NPT review conference offers a chance to bolster the fraying anti-proliferation regime.
But the heat also burns a huge hole in the global non-proliferation regime.
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And later this spring, the world will come together in New York to discuss how we can build on this progress, and continue to strengthen the global non-proliferation regime.
This gives rise to the worry that the distinction between conventional and nuclear warfare would be blurred, leading to a lower threshold for a nuclear attack, and thus to the undermining of the global non-proliferation regime.
In the nuclear non-proliferation regime, it is the IAEA which ensures that nuclear energy is not misused for military purposes, and the director general has stood out as an unafraid advocate of new measures to strengthen that regime.
Mr. SIDNEY DRELL (Stanford University): We have to convince many nations that we are serious about our commitment to the non-proliferation regime which calls on us to reduce our reliance on the weapons, reduce our arsenals, not to resume testing.
But I believed then -- as I do now -- that the pursuit of that goal will move us further beyond the Cold War, strengthen the global non-proliferation regime, and make the United States, and the world, safer and more secure.
WHITEHOUSE: Signing of New START Nuclear Arms Treaty with Russia
"We believe that such a step be not only in the interests of India but in the interests of reducing tension in the region and contributing to the world regime on non-proliferation, " Mr Cook said.
"An effective, treaty-based arms control and disarmament regime must be preserved and expanded, including effective and verifiable prevention of proliferation" of nuclear weapons, said Joschka Fischer.
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