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Barack Obama ready to slash US nuclear arsenal
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Magnu-@aol.com
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Sep 21, 2009 20:03 PDT
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_http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/sep/20/barack-obama-us-nuclear-weapons
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(http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/sep/20/barack-obama-us-nuclear-weapons)
Barack Obama ready to slash US nuclear arsenal
Pentagon told to map out radical cuts as president prepares to chair UN
talks
* _Julian Borger_ (http://www.guardian.co.uk/profile/julianborger)
* _guardian.co.uk_ (http://www.guardian.co.uk/) , Sunday 20 September
2009 21.30 BST
* _Article history_
(http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/sep/20/barack-obama-us-nuclear-weapons#history-byline)
President Obama's decision to order a review comes as he takes the rare
step of chairing a watershed session of the UN security council. Photograph:
Reuters
_Barack Obama_ (http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/barack-obama) has
demanded the Pentagon conduct a radical review of US _nuclear weapons_
(http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/nuclear-weapons) doctrine to prepare the way for deep
cuts in the country's arsenal, the Guardian can reveal.
'A multilateral process in which weapons states agree to radical
disarmament': Julian Borger _Link to this audio_
(http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/audio/2009/sep/21/obama-nuclear-weapons-cuts)
Obama has rejected the Pentagon's first draft of the "nuclear posture
review" as being too timid, and has called for a range of more far-reaching
options consistent with his goal of eventually abolishing nuclear weapons
altogether, according to European officials.
Those options include:
• Reconfiguring the US nuclear force to allow for an arsenal measured in
hundreds rather than thousands of deployed strategic warheads.
• Redrafting nuclear doctrine to narrow the range of conditions under which
the US would use nuclear weapons.
• Exploring ways of guaranteeing the future reliability of nuclear weapons
without testing or producing a new generation of warheads.
The review is due to be completed by the end of this year, and European
officials say the outcome is not yet clear. But one official said: "Obama is
now driving this process. He is saying these are the president's weapons,
and he wants to look again at the doctrine and their role."
The move comes as Obama prepares to take the rare step of chairing a
watershed session of the UN security council on Thursday. It is aimed at winning
consensus on a new grand bargain: exchanging more radical disarmament by
nuclear powers in return for wider global efforts to prevent further
proliferation.
That bargain is at the heart of the nuclear non-proliferation treaty, which
is up for review next year amid signs it is unravelling in the face of
Iranian and North Korean nuclear ambitions.
In an article for the Guardian today, the foreign secretary, _David
Miliband, argues that failure to win a consensus would be disastrous_
(http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/sep/20/nuclear-disarmament-security-counci
l) . "This is one of the most critical issues we face," the foreign
secretary writes. "Get it right, and we will increase global security, pave the
way for a world without nuclear weapons, and improve access to affordable,
safe and dependable energy – vital to tackle climate change. Get it wrong,
and we face the spread of nuclear weapons and the chilling prospect of
nuclear material falling into the hands of terrorists."
According to a final draft of the resolution due to be passed on Thursday,
however, the UN security council will not wholeheartedly embrace the US and
Britain's call for eventual abolition of nuclear weapons. Largely on
French insistence, the council will endorse the vaguer aim of seeking "to create
the conditions for a world without nuclear weapons".
Gordon Brown is due to use this week's UN general assembly meeting to renew
a diplomatic offensive on Iran for its failure to comply with security
council demands that it suspend enrichment of uranium. The issue has been
given greater urgency by an International Atomic Energy Agency document leaked
last week which showed inspectors for the agency believed Iran already had
"sufficient information" to build a warhead, and had tested an important
component of a nuclear device.
Germany is also expected to toughen its position on Iran ahead of a
showdown between major powers and the Iranian government on 1 October. But it is
not yet clear what position will be taken by Russia, which has hitherto
opposed the imposition of further sanctions on Iran.
Moscow's stance will be closely watched for signs of greater co-operation
in return for Obama's decision last week to abandon a missile defence scheme
in eastern Europe, a longstanding source of irritation to Russia.
"I hope the Russians realise they have to do something serious. I don't
think a deal has been done, but there is a great deal of expectation," said a
British official.
Russia has approximately 2,780 deployed strategic warheads, compared with
around 2,100 in the US. The abandonment of the US missile defence already
appears to have spurred arms control talks currently underway between
Washington and Moscow: the Russian president, Dmitry Medvedev, said today that
chances were "quite high" that a deal to reduce arsenals to 1,500 warheads
each would be signed by the end of the year.
The US nuclear posture review is aimed at clearing the path for a new round
of deep US-Russian cuts to follow almost immediately after that treaty is
ratified, to set lower limits not just on deployed missiles but also on the
thousands of warheads both have in their stockpiles.
The Obama strategy is to create disarmament momentum in the run-up to the
non-proliferation treaty review conference next May, in the hope that states
without nuclear weapons will not side with Iran, as they did at the last
review in 2005, but endorse stronger legal barriers to nuclear
proliferation, and forego nuclear weapons programmes themselves.
"The review has up to now been in the hands of mid-level bureaucrats with a
lot of knowledge, but it's knowledge drawn from the cold war. What they
are prepared to do is tweak the existing doctrine," said Rebecca Johnson, the
head of the Acronym Institute, a pro-disarmament pressure group. "Obama
has sent them it back saying: 'Give me more options for what we can do in
line with my goals. I'm not saying it's easy, but all you're giving me is
business as usual.'"
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