Administration Weighs 'No First Use' Nuclear Policy
I'm hoping this isn't another "yeah, we thought about it but then Newt Gingrich called us weenies" kind of thing. Because it would be really good news if it isn't:
The review is shaping up to be a major showdown for Obama this year. It is taking on some of the most sacred cows of the nuclear program. For the first time, influential voices, including a former top nuclear commander and senior Obama advisers, are proposing that one leg of the nuclear arms “triad’’ - a $30 billion-a-year enterprise made up of land-, air-, and sea-based weapons - be eliminated.
Another historic change under consideration is adopting a “no-first-use’’ policy, a public declaration stating the United States would not use nuclear weapons first, a step long advocated by arms control advocates who believe it would reduce the incentive for other nations to develop nuclear weapons.
Also on the table, the officials say, is explicitly limiting the nuclear arsenal’s mission to deterring other nuclear weapons - not chemical or biological attacks or halting a massive conventional military assault, as current policy stipulates.
“The US-Soviet standoff that gave rise to tens of thousands of nuclear weapons is over, but the policies developed to justify their possession and potential use remain largely the same," said Daryl Kimball, executive director of the Arms Control Association, a Washington think tank and leading advocate of disarmament. “Unless the United States reduces its reliance and emphasis on nuclear weapons, other states will have a cynical excuse to pursue or to improve the capabilities and size of their nuclear forces."
The bluedogs ain't gonna like this news!
Rush Limbaugh is what a smart person thinks a stupid bigot sounds like.
Also, the United States doesn't torture.
No use at all.
"Courtesy is owed. Respect is earned. Love is given." --Unknown author, found in Guide to Texas Etiquette by Kinky Friedman
The whole world knows we never go back on our word. Unless we have a really good reason to. And, of course, if we decide on a no-first-use policy, it will be just an informal statement and not any kind of a binding treaty with consequences.
Your comment is too true.
I'd be curious to know which companies, past and present officials, and pundits profit from this specific policy, ie, specific security companies in the Arctic Circle, or specific computers or software that predict trajectory.
Too late :http://www.xs4all.nl/~stgvisie/VISIE/PentagonPoison.html
Read the small print on this one.
"If the US government enforced its banking laws like it did its park regulations, we wouldn't be
in this damn park in the first place." OCCUPY.!!
Nuclear weapons are insane and inhumane. The effect of any nuclear bomb is on a whole population killing and poisoning for generations.
We have to end any notion that nuclear weapons are even a last option.
We don't need nukes anymore. They are the dinosaurs of weapons systems. Obsolete and rendered useless in this day and age.
"I know that there are people who do not love their fellow
man, and I hate people like that! " ~ Tom Lehrer (1928 - )
are WMDs.
The U.S. is a rogue state.
we soon will not need nukes 'cause the world as we know it will be undergo some galactic change on 12/21/12, when the Earth Sun and the center of the galaxy align.
I know this because I just saw a History channel show about the Mayan calendar....but don't tell all the other folks with nukes who hate us for our freedom...#:)
"Egotism is the anesthetic that dulls the pain of Stupidity" - Frank Leahy
Is that the reenactment where the waffle iron clamps to the dad's face, the girl is attacked by the cat, and a little stick deer comes to life? I watched that a dozen years ago with my sister and we both cried tears of laughter.
or are nukes proof of his non existence?
Someday all the Christian Nationers will have an aha moment and realize the whole Garden of Eden story is an f'n metaphor...
We are in the garden....and there is no after party....
The neo-con cowards heads are going to explode. They simply lack the courage for anything remotely peaceful.
I'd rather see bush/cheny/rumsfeld hung for treason than this, but this is an OK start.
But with all the back stabbing, double dealing, shit we have done all over the world who the hell is going to believe it?
Besides if by some cosmic stroke of misfortune a republican ever get's back in as president. OMG I ca't believe I even typed those words. But if it did we would be back to insane/cowardville again!
"“no-first-use’’ policy, a public declaration stating the United States would not use nuclear weapons first, a step long advocated by arms control advocates who believe it would reduce the incentive for other nations to develop nuclear weapons."
It's easy. We declare, and they believe us.
We should eliminate both land and air capabilities. That would be a great payback to North Dakota and Nebraska for their cooperation on health care reform!
More hand-waving to hide the Bush Administration's march to Armageddon (and, thus, perpetuate those policies instead of discrediting them).
The Senate banned development of the bunker-busting bomb several times. The Pentagon kept renaming the damned thing and continued working on it. They're STILL working on it, because we keep hearing about how the RNEP (robust near-earth penetrator) will be SO useful in tackling Iran's super-secret underground supervillain fortress of terrortude.
the whole land-mine thing is going
http://www.democracynow.org/2009/11/25/ahead_...
I'm Boycotting NewsCorp! Heres what not to buy: http://www.cjr.org/resources/index.php?c=news...
*Of course this excludes depleted uranium weapons, and only applies to what most folks consider to be nukular weapons... mainly, big things that fall from the sky and produce mushroom clouds.
the same processes of logic that we do or subscribe to the same moral tenets - they arrive at totally different places. They strap bombs to their women and children in order to kill innocent people. They planned and supported those that flew airplanes into skyscrapers and then bragged and gloated about their nobility as they watched the videos of innocent people jumping to their deaths. These same groups are now trying to secure nuclear weapons - and will certainly succeed. Their leaders are gangsters that have hijacked a religion, that brainwash others to do their bidding. Their leaders understand deterence even if their fanatic followers don't. Deterents work and nuclear weapons ARE an effective deterent - a third of the muslim nations believe so to the extent that they have either successfully built them or are actively trying to build or procure them. Also, Russia and China aren't about to destroy too many of their stockpiles - only as upgrades and replacements become necessary will any be destroyed. I don't believe that we should willingly disarm ourselves and leave others in a position to blackmail us.
The USA has enough nuclear warheads on Trident submarines to destroy the world as we know it. They are undetectable, unstoppable and pose the single best deterrent in the arsenal.
Anything more is a waste.
Game Theory. RAND Corporation. Irrational Enemies. Irving Kristol. Freedom Is Slavery.
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