U.S. Senator Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.) will attempt to thwart a White House-led move toward researching and developing new nuclear weapons, DefenseNews.com reported yesterday (see GSN, May 19).

U.S. President George W. Bush “is quietly laying the groundwork for a dangerous U-turn” on nuclear policy, Kennedy said during a Senate debate of the fiscal 2004 defense authorization bill.

The Senate Armed Services Committee earlier this month approved changes in nuclear policy to allow for the research and development of low-yield nuclear weapons and to permit work on “bunker-busting” nuclear weapons.  Kennedy said he will try to eliminate the new rules in the full Senate, DefenseNews.com reported.

Kennedy said the smaller weapons and the bunker-busting weapons would allow easier use of nuclear weapons.

“Nuclear weapons are not just another item in our arsenal, and it is wrong to treat them as if they were,” he added.

Senator Carl Levin (D-Mich.), the ranking Democrat on the Armed Services Committee, said that developing new nuclear weapons would discredit U.S. nonproliferation efforts worldwide.

“The United States should not follow policy we do not tolerate in others,” he said.

The defense bill is expected to pass this week, DefenseNews.com reported (William Matthews, DefenseNews.com, May 19).

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