Recently leaked information about U.S. nuclear weapons policies indicates the Pentagon might reduce the threshold for using nuclear weapons, according to some analysts (see GSN, Feb. 28).

“Nuclear weapons could be employed against targets able to withstand non-nuclear attack (for example, deep underground bunkers or bioweapons facilities),” the report says.

Classified portions of the U.S. Nuclear Posture Review call for allowing more flexibility and intermingling of conventional and nuclear capabilities.  Policies include cutting the number of the current U.S. nuclear arsenal while developing smaller, more tactical nuclear weapons and improving conventional capability.  In addition, the report calls for developing nuclear weapons for use against conventional forces and developing conventional weapons for use against nuclear targets, the New York Times reported today.

“Greater flexibility is needed with respect to nuclear force and planning than was the case during the Cold War,” the report says (Michael Gordon, New York Times, March 11).

“Nuclear attack options that vary in scale, scope and purpose will complement other military capabilities.  The combination can provide the range of options needed to pose a credible deterrent to adversaries whose values and calculations of risk and gain and loss may be very different from, and more difficult to discern, than those of past adversaries, the report says (John Cushman, New York Times, March 10).

Weapons for War

The new policy views nuclear weapons as a potential weapon for fighting wars, according to some analysts.  “This clearly makes nuclear weapons a tool for fighting a war, rather than deterring them,” said Joseph Cirincione of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

“They’re trying desperately to find new uses for nuclear weapons, when their uses should be limited to deterrence,” said John Isaacs of the Council for a Livable World.  “This is very, very dangerous talk … Dr. Strangelove is clearly still alive in the Pentagon” (Paul Richter, Los Angeles Times, March 9).

Blurring the Line Between Conventional and Nuclear War

“Throughout the nuclear age, the fundamental goal has been to prevent the use of nuclear weapons,” said Ivo Daalder, a foreign policy analyst at the Brookings Institution.

“Now the policy has been turned upside down.  It is to keep nuclear weapons as a tool of war-fighting rather than a tool of deterrence.  If military planners are now to consider the nuclear option any time they confront a surprising military development, the distinction between nuclear and non-nuclear weapons fades away,” he said.

Blurring the roles of conventional and nuclear weapons could eliminate the threshold for using nuclear weapons, some analysts said.

“By emphasizing the important role of nuclear weapons, the Pentagon is encouraging other nations to think that it is important to have them as well,” said Robert Norris of the Natural Resources Defense Council (Gordon, New York Times).

The End of MAD?

The policy represents a change from the Cold War strategy of mutual assured destruction to unilateral assured destruction, according to a New York Times analysis yesterday.  The Nuclear Posture Review’s recommendations are aimed at developing a force that would make it impossible for a dictator to hide himself or weapons of mass destruction in a deep bunker or other facility conventional weapons could not penetrate, according to the Times.

First-Strike Policy?

The Pentagon report could create concern that the Bush administration will institute a first-strike policy, according to the Times.  The United States has never declared a no-first-strike policy against nuclear-armed states but did pledge not to attack a non-nuclear country (see GSN, Feb. 27).  Although the United States has not withdrawn that pledge, plans to build nuclear weapons designed for destroying bunkers and other tactical tasks could undermine the pledge and the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, according to the Times. 

Any preemptive, limited nuclear strike, which the Pentagon report foresees as a possibility, would probably be a last resort, the Times said.  Deterrence remains the primary theme of Pentagon policy, and U.S. leaders would not consider a nuclear strike lightly.

Doing Away with Arms Control Treaties

Although the Nuclear Posture Review calls for cutting the U.S. deployed nuclear arsenal, it also views the traditional arms control regime as outdated.  “That old process is incompatible with the flexibility U.S. planning and forces now require,” the report says (Cushman, New York Times, March 10).

Nuclear Posture Review Is No Plan

Meanwhile, top U.S. officials emphasized the Nuclear Posture Review is a policy document, not a plan.  There are no current plans to develop totally new types of weapons, they said.

“This is prudent military planning, and it is the kind of planning I think the American people would expect,” Secretary of State Colin Powell said on CBS’s Face the Nation.  “We are not developing brand new nuclear weapons, and we are not planning to undergo any testing” (Gordon, New York Times).

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