Issues: Nuclear Weapons

Nuclear weaponry continues to threaten humanity and ecosystems more than a decade after the end of the Cold War. Some important steps to reduce U.S. reliance on nuclear weapons were taken by Presidents George H.W. Bush and Clinton, but for the most part, they ignored their historic opportunity to reverse 50 years of dangerous nuclear weapons policy and buildup. Opportunities to remove the nuclear threat still exist today. Unfortunately, instead of reducing U.S. reliance on nuclear weapons, the current Bush Administration is elevating them to their previous role as the central tenet of U.S. security policy.

In its first year in office, the Bush Administration conducted a congressionally-mandated review of U.S. nuclear weapons policy. This review, called the Nuclear Posture Review (NPR), was submitted to Congress in a classified version in December 2001.

• Introduction
• The Cold War is Over- The Nuclear Threat is Not
• The Bush Administration's Policies
• Alternative Policies for a More Secure World
• Conclusion
• Additional Resources
• Table 1 The Countdown to Nuclear War
• Table 2 Nuclear Weapon Status of Select States
• Map of Nuclear Weapon States

This review was intended to provide guidance for future U.S. nuclear strategy, doctrine, force structure, and infrastructure. In the past two years, this review has led to dramatic changes in U.S. nuclear weapons policy.

The NPR rightly argues that the international security environment has dramatically changed in the last two decades. It contends that a nuclear posture based on the threat of nuclear war with the Soviet Union is no longer appropriate. However, these truths did not lead the Administration to advocate nuclear disarmament. Rather, the Administration argues for maintaining thousands of nuclear weapons for the foreseeable future. According to the NPR, nuclear weapons will continue to "play a critical role in the defense capabilities of the United States, its allies and friends." Additionally, the NPR promotes a more "flexible" role for nuclear weapons. Nuclear weapons will no longer solely be used to deter a nuclear war, but also will be used to destroy new threats. That is, the Administration wants to maintain a large number of nuclear weapons with a wider range of possible uses for an indefinite future.

Preemption and Nuclear Weapons

One of the most important policies to come out of the Cold War was the idea that nuclear weapons are not to be used. Presidents Reagan and Gorbachev, at their 1985 Geneva summit, agreed that "a nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought."¹⁴ At no time did either nation sign a treaty saying this, but it was made clear that nuclear weapons are weapons of last resort.

In December 2002, the Bush Administration clarified its policy in the "National Strategy to Combat Weapons of Mass Destruction." (A classified version of this document, called the National Security Presidential Directive 17 (NSPD 17), was signed by President Bush in September 2002.) Based on what has been reported about NSPD 17, President Bush would consider authorizing the first use of U.S. nuclear weapons in the event that a hostile state attacks U.S. forces, allies, or territory with chemical or biological weapons and/or as a preemptive U.S. strike on sites believed to store or manufacture chemical, biological, or nuclear weapons.

New Nuclear Weapons

The NPR shifts the primary focus of U.S. nuclear capabilities away from the ability to deter and counter a Russian nuclear attack and toward the actual use of nuclear weapons in response to various contingencies. The indiscriminate nature of the nuclear weapons currently available in the U.S. arsenal makes them inappropriate for this new mission. In order to deter their use, Cold War-style nuclear weapons were designed to be so deadly that any use of these weapons would lead to unacceptable loss of life. To expand the possible uses of nuclear weapons, the U.S. would need to modify existing nuclear weapons or develop new ones. Therefore, to implement this strategy of greater nuclear flexibility, the Administration is advocating new, more "usable" nuclear weapons.

Consistent with the recommendation of the NPR, in its annual request to Congress for fiscal year 2005, the Administration asked for $27.6 million to conclude a three-year study by the Department of Energy on a Robust Nuclear Earth Penetrator (RNEP). This weapon and similar designs are sometimes referred to as "bunker busters" because they would be designed to burrow into the ground to destroy underground military facilities that are protected by concrete or rock.

Some proponents of RNEP claim that, because the weapon would penetrate the earth before detonation, it would be a "clean" nuclear weapon. In reality, the explosion would have extremely deadly results. Contrary to public belief, these weapons are very powerful and their blasts would not be contained underground. Their yield is on the order of several hundred kilotons to over one megaton compared to the weapons that destroyed Hiroshima and Nagasaki that were in the range of 14 to 21 kilotons.¹⁶ If detonated in a city, tens of thousands of people could receive a fatal dose of radiation within the first 24 hours. More would be killed or injured by the extreme pressures of the blast and thermal injuries arising from the heat of the explosion. ¹⁷ Still more casualties would result from the fires and the collapse of buildings resulting from the seismic shock produced by the explosion. According to Sen. Jack Reed (RI), "These weapons will bust more than a bunker. The area of destruction will encompass an area the size of a city. They are really city breakers, not bunker busters." ¹⁸

Mini-nuke advocates believe that these weapons provide a more credible deterrent than high-yield, Cold War-style nuclear weapons. The rationale being that because current U.S. nuclear weapons are so deadly, it is unlikely that any president would use them and potential adversaries know that. Mini-nuke advocates believe that in order to deter attack, U.S. nuclear weapons must be seen as a usable threat. According to Dr. Stephen Younger, then at the Los Alamos National Laboratory and later a Pentagon official in the Bush Administration, "a reliance on high-yield strategic weapons could lead to 'self-deterrence,' a limitation on strategic options, and consequently a lessening of the stabilizing effect of nuclear weapons." ¹⁹

New Nuclear Tests

The Administration's drive to acquire new and more usable nuclear weapons is placing at risk the 12-year-old U.S. nuclear-test moratorium. After 1,030 nuclear test detonations, Congress halted U.S. nuclear weapons testing in 1992. Although the Administration has stated repeatedly that it has no current plans to resume nuclear testing, significant modifications to existing nuclear warhead designs or the development of entirely new types of nuclear warheads could necessitate the renewal of nuclear explosive testing.

Maintaining Long-Term Capacity

The NPR makes it clear that the Bush Administration has no plans to meet its NPT disarmament obligations. While the Administration rhetorically supports disarmament, it is negotiating empty disarmament treaties and rebuilding a nuclear weapons complex to maintain the stockpile for the indefinite future.

Although SORT represents a significant cut in deployed weapons, it does not require the destruction of a single warhead or delivery system. SORT permits each side to deploy up to 2,200 strategic nuclear warheads on missiles, submarines, etc., while allowing an unlimited number of warheads to be stored for possible later redeployment.

While the Administration claims that the SORT Treaty illustrates its dedication to disarmament, it has simultaneously proposed constructing a new facility to manufacture plutonium pits for nuclear weapons. Plutonium pits are essential components of a nuclear weapon. The size of a grapefruit, a plutonium pit is a plutonium-filled round metal shell which, when squeezed by high explosives, will trigger a weapon's nuclear blast. The purpose of this proposed bomb plant, called the Modern Pit Facility, is to maintain the nuclear stockpile by producing replacement plutonium pits. The Energy Department claims that the production of new pits would "ensure the future viability of the nation's nuclear stockpile," thereby "ensuring the future viability of the nation's nuclear deterrent." In other words, the Modern Pit Facility would help ensure that the U.S. maintains its reliance on a large nuclear weapons stockpile for years to come. The new facility would be able to produce up to 450 pits per year--far more than is needed to replace aging pits of the 1,700-2,200 weapons ordered by the Moscow Treaty.²³

The Dangers of the NPR

Lowering the Threshold
Since the inception of the atomic era, U.S. presidents have correctly differentiated between nuclear and conventional weapons. U.S. policy has consistently stated that nuclear weapons would only be used if the United States were attacked with nuclear weapons by another nuclear state. President Truman went so far as to place the U.S. nuclear arsenal under the jurisdiction of the Atomic Energy Commission, rather than the Pentagon, to separate nuclear weapons from the conventional war-fighting arsenal.

The NPR, as well as other Bush Administration national security documents, have reversed this policy and outline a strategy that makes nuclear war fighting acceptable. Developing new types of nuclear weapons for battlefield use blurs the distinction between conventional and nuclear arms. The danger is enhanced when the Administration leaves open the possibility of using nuclear weapons "preemptively." These policies taken together could significantly lower the threshold for the use of nuclear weapons.

In addition to killing a large number of innocent people, the use of a nuclear weapon in a battlefield environment would contaminate a battlefield, exposing U.S. military personnel to significant dangers. Any use of a nuclear weapons as a response to a terrorist attack would have tremendous political and human costs and should be rejected.

Increase Proliferation
The threat of unconventional weapons has dominated White House rhetoric for the past year. The main justification for war in Iraq was its alleged pursuit of nuclear weapons. The U.S. has strongly criticized Iran and North Korea for moving to obtain equipment to produce weapons-grade nuclear materials. The U.S. government has also expressed concerns that nuclear materials could fall into the hands of terrorist groups such as al Qaeda.

The Bush Administration is right to bring the dangers posed by nuclear weapons to the public eye. However, at the same time the Administration is criticizing others for having weapons, it is upgrading its own nuclear weapons complex. This "do what I say, not what I do" policy is evident to all. If nuclear weapons are wrong for Iran and North Korea, they are wrong for the U.S. The Administration seems to believe that nuclear weapons are only a problem when they are in the possession of a people that do not support the U.S. Instead of reducing the threat posed by nuclear weapons, this policy enhances the idea that nuclear weapons are sources of power and prestige.

As long as some states have nuclear weapons while others do not, there will be a power imbalance leading to insecurity. The fact that the U.S., with far and away the most powerful conventional military in the world, continues to see nuclear weapons as central to its security, reinforces the idea that these weapons can bring power and security. After its nuclear weapons tests of 1998, the Indian prime minister stated, "India is a big country now because it has demonstrated that it has nuclear weapons."²⁵ As long as the United States and other powerful countries continue to rely on nuclear weapons to safeguard their security and assert dominance, less powerful nations will feel the need to acquire nuclear weapons. In a statement that sounds remarkably similar to the stated view of some in the Bush Administration, a Foreign Ministry spokesman from North Korea recently said, "It is the historical truth that peace is won and defended only with strength."²⁶

With all the nuclear dangers in the world, it is counterproductive for the Bush Administration to start re-emphasizing nuclear weapons in U.S. security policy. To make a safer world for generations to come, the U.S. government must put an end to its dependence on nuclear weapons. No real progress will be made unless the President and Congress put the full resources and political will of the United States behind eliminating the threat of nuclear weapons. It will likely be a slow and arduous process, but it is worth the effort and far preferable to disarmament through war.

¹³ National Strategy to Combat Weapons of Mass Destruction. December 2002, 3. Available from http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2002/12/WMDStrategy.pdf.

¹⁴ Joint Soviet-United States Statement on the Summit Meeting in Geneva. November 21, 1985.

¹⁵ Nuclear Posture Review, 34-35. Available at http://www.globalsecurity.org/wmd/library/policy/dod/npr.htm.

¹⁶ Statement by Sen. Jack Reed. Congressional Record. May 20, 2003.

¹⁷ Robert Nelson. Low-Yield Nuclear Earth Penetrators. The Journal of the Federation of American Scientists, January/February 2001. Available at http://www.fas.org/faspir/2001/v54n1/weapons.htm.

¹⁸ Statement by Sen. Jack Reed. Congressional Record. May 20, 2003.

¹⁹ Younger, Stephen. "Nuclear Weapons in the Twenty-First Century" June 27, 2002. Available at http://www.fcnl.org/issues/arm/sup/nukwpns21stcent.pdf.

²⁰ Nuclear Posture Review, 55.

²¹ Ibid. 30.

²² Natural Resources Defense Council. "Faking Nuclear Restraint: The Bush Administration's Secret Plan for Strengthening U.S. Nuclear Forces." February 12, 2002.

²³ U.S. Department of Energy. "Draft Supplemental Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement on Stockpile Stewardship and Management for a Modern Pit Facility." May 2003, 2-4, 2-6.

²⁴ Final Statement of the 4th World Summit of Nobel Peace Laureates. Rome. November 30, 2003.

²⁵ Thomas Graham Jr., "Time for a No-First-Use Policy." Christian Science Monitor. January 28, 1999.

²⁶ "U.S. Groups Sees North Korea Nuke Facility." CBS News.com. January 10, 2004.

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