Obama May Ditch Most US Nukes

If the White House has its way, America could soon reduce its nuclear
arsenal dramatically, possibly even to the point where it would possess
fewer atomic bombs than congressmen.

And though Republicans on the Hill
are already complaining that the plans are "reckless lunacy," the
administration appears to have plenty of military thinkers on its side.

According to a report this week from the Associated Press, President
Obama is considering three proposals by the Pentagon to cut the number
of deployed nukes. The biggest proposal would reduce America's active
stockpile to just 300 to 400 warheads—fewer than the US has had since
the earliest days of the Cold War.

Since the dawn of the nuclear age,
the US has reportedly built close to 70,000 atomic bombs. The recent New
START treaty with Russia requires both countries to cut their deployed
warheads to 1,550, so these new reduction plans would be dramatic,
indeed.

Any real movement on this front may not come until 2013; follow-up
reporting by the Washington Post suggested that the White House won't
make a change until it resumes negotiations with the Russians, which is
likely only to come after presidential elections take place in both
countries this year.

But the fact that plans are brewing for a major
arsenal reduction is itself significant, and it signals where Obama may
really be headed on nuclear strategy if elected to a second term.


The DOD's top dogs spent much of their time in Congress on Wednesday
stressing that all options are still on the table, including maintaining
the current number of nukes. Even so, Republicans pounced on the
proposed reductions.

"I just want to go on record as saying that there
are many of us that are going to do everything we possibly can to make
sure that this preposterous notion does not gain any real traction,"
Rep. Trent Franks (R-Ariz.) declared in a House Armed Services Committee
Hearing. (He was the one who deemed the plan "reckless lunacy.") Sen.
Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.),

a powerful advocate for nuclear forces, ridiculed
the plan as a cynical re-election ploy by Obama. (Catering to public
opinion on spending reductions—imagine that.)

As I've reported before, many conservative politicians, and some
moderate and progressive ones, have historically considered America's
nuclear arsenal to be sacrosanct. After all, it's backed by a robust and
expensive weapons complex that keeps legions of contractors in
business.

But away from Capitol Hill, American academics and military
officers are getting beyond the sound bites and provincial interests,
and asking the impolitic question: In the post-Soviet age can the US do
as much—or more—with fewer nukes? The answer seems to be: Yes, we can.

On the eve of the New START signing in 2010, three Air Force researchers
argued in a military journal that the US should tweak its nuclear
strategy to focus on "proportional deterrence"—the idea that America
doesn't need to annihilate its enemies out of existence, but instead
just needs enough firepower to threaten an enemy's most valuable
targets.

It's straight out of Clausewitz: You can win merely by taking
away the adversary's will to fight—like that moment at the end of
WarGames, when the self-aware missile-launching computer realizes that
global thermonuclear war is as futile as tic-tac-toe: "A strange game.
The only winning move is not to play."

Source