Untangling Nuclear Posture / Policy Posted by David Shorr

Like so many other policy decisions, the impending Nuclear Posture Review has been put under the microscope to determine whether it looks more like a bold step or a half-measure -- begging the question, how are we to judge? For many wonks of a certain age, the nuclear freeze movement of the early 1980s was a formative political experience. Learning about the devastating effects, and after-effects, of a nuclear war prompted a lot of intense debate over what should be done with and about history's most lethal and undiscriminating weapons. In fact, according to David Hoffman's recent book, The Dead Hand, President Reagan himself was spurred to deeper misgivings in 1983 after seeing the made-for-TV movie on the subject, "The Day After." [Readers with a strong grasp of their Cold War history can skim portions of this post.]

Coming back to today's debate, the best way to make sense of the nuclear posture debate is to be clear about goals and priorities -- to ask what do we want and why do we want it? Thanks to a New York Times editorial on Sunday and an excellent explanatory piece in the Times by David Sanger and Thom Shanker, we have a pretty good picture of the proximate issues.

It's all too easy, with these issues, to get lost in the trees of seemingly technical issues and miss the forest. In order to reduce the chances that nuclear weapons are used ever again:

• their numbers must be reduced from the thousands that currently exist
• they need to be kept from getting into new hands, whether governments or terror networks
• they must be delegitimized as instruments of war or politics

One of the scariest things about the 1980s debates were all the bizarre scenarios dreamed up to ensure that the United States would "win" a nuclear war, as if the concept of victory could mean something in a holocaust. And it wasn't just the scenarios. The technological leading edge in n-weapons was improved accuracy -- in other words aiming weapons at other weapons, which would only make sense if you launched yours before the other guy, thereby boosting the incentives and pressures to start a war. Hence, deterrence. Stability through balance of terror. The threat of retaliation prevents nuclear-armed nations from doing the unthinkable, the only conceivable justification for using nuclear weapons being to answer an attack.

So all this discussion of the purpose of nuclear weapons is pretty important, to say the least. If we want to preserve the nuclear taboo -- preserve the notion that they are a different kettle of fish, stigmatize any effort by new countries to get them, then we have to draw a very bright and tight line circumscribing our reasons for having them. Looking toward future multilateral arms control to bring all nuclear arsenals down toward minimal levels, restricting their purpose to deterence is essential groundwork.

So how might this perspective cash out with regard to the other issues the Times flags in the internal NPR debate...

• Dismantling non-deployed weapons is a very fine thing. Thousands of nuclear warheads lie outside the bounds of arms control agreements (including the impending START follow-on treaty), whose counting rules only cover warheads that are matched with delivery systems. Taking them out of service and taking them apart will help reduce the chances of their being used, falling into the wrong hands, or serving as an excuse for new nations to seek n-weapons.
• Checking and ensuring the reliability of existing weapons is nothing like building new ones. News coverage of Vice President Biden's recent speech noted that the administration expected criticism over the budget increases for the national nuclear laboratories to make sure the weapons in our stockpile are in working order. While it would be inflammatory for the United States to design and build new types of weapons -- something the administration has pledged not to do (and that key Republicans in Congress resisted during the Bush Administration) -- checking their reliability is entirely consistent with deterrence.
• Whatever the potential problems with conventional global strike systems, they are separate and distinct from the problem of upholding the nuclear taboo. I don't know whether the "global strike" conventional long-range missiles are a good idea or not. I will only acknowledge that the nuclear taboo cuts both ways. If nuclear weapons are not to be confused with conventional weapons, then conventional weapons likewise are not to be confused with nuclear arms. This in no way takes away from important debates over, say, the implications of cluster munitions or the WWII firebombing of Dresden for international humanitarian law. Nor does it settle the issue of whether global strike will bring its own security dilemas. I am merely saying that the taboo against nuclear weapons is more of an open-and-shut case and a more widely recognized and long-established international norm.

One last note about the arms control agenda. We have heard the opening salvos of skepticism toward the soon-to-be-concluded START follow-on agreement, and we can look forward to many more contentious months of debate. But our old friend Max Bergman (now at CAP's Wonk Room) explains what's really going on. START follow-on shouldn't really be controversial at all. Ever the maximalists, the old Cold War crowd want to put up a fight over START follow-on to make the subsequent items on the agenda (read, the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty) that much harder to achieve.

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One reason for the delay is a very heated debate about the mission issue.A nuclear-weapons expert and president of the Institute of Science and International Security, said that the administration might want to avoid a lengthy and complicated public debate about the new estimate's conclusions, seeking to prevent the fractious debate that followed the release of the older estimate.

[anon]

You claim that "aiming weapons at other weapons ...would only make sense if you launched yours before the other guy." That's only true if you believe that the other guy was going to launch all his weapons in his first strike. If he doesn't (either because he didn't plan to or they didn't all go off) then there would be weapons left to shoot at even if you shot second. Of course, this does add to the absurdity of the 1970s and 1980s era nuclear planning -- we planned as if it would be a war with many "salvos," rather than a war with a single, massive attack and a single massive response. Maybe it would have had salvos, but who would have been able to tell the difference between a single massive response and several measured salvos when it was all over -- the rubble would bounce and glow the same.

[David Shorr]

r4dsgold-- Not sure there ever was a hope / possibility that this whole process would 'fly under the radar.' For a bureaucratic analysis, I defer to Jeffrey Lewis and his point about Sec. Gates' seeming inter-agency untouchability and the advantaged position of the nuclear bureaucracy (on the basis of inertia). 'Course it isn't helping that the assistant secretaries of state for Europe and NE Asia are opposing "sole purpose" even when our key allies support it.

anon-- Yes, you add a further layer to the issue. I'd have to go back and re-read, but I'd guess that proponents of accuracy and counterforce believed we'd be able to preempt. Your point stands, thinking the unthinkable (Herman Kahn's phrase) gets real crazy real fast.

[anon]

"I'd guess that proponents of accuracy and counterforce believed we'd be able to preempt."

You'd guess wrong. Unless you are referring to the academic literature or a few political outlyers. During the 70s and 80s, the SIOP did not presume pre-emption, but prompt launch, which would occur after detecting evidence of weapons launched towards us, so that we could catch weapons in silos that hadn't launched yet.

Also, the advantaged position of the nuclear bureaucracy is not just do to inertia, but also due to the tight controls on information. Lots of people can chatter about what they think our strategy, doctrine, and war planning should look like, and they can suggest changes based on their unclassified guesses. But, if you have the baseline wrong, the solution may not work. I've been in many meetings with people who have great ideas for changing something, yet that "something" isn't even a part of our policy... The bureaucracy at least knows what the baseline really looks like.

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