nuclear-news

USA does not need 5000 nuclear weapons

U.S. Has No Need for 5,000 Nuclear Weapons To Counter Threats From Iran and North Korea Ottawa Citizen 8 Jan 12, Philip Taubman questions why the U.S. is spending billions of dollars on its nuclear arsenal. Cutting back could save tens of billions of dollars a year. Here is part of what he writes:

“There is no national security rationale for maintaining an arsenal of some 5,000 warheads, with nearly 2,000 arms ready to use on short notice and the rest in reserve. We don’t need thousands of warheads, or even hundreds, to counter threats from countries like Iran or North Korea.

The only conceivable use of so many weapons would be a full-scale nuclear war with Russia, which has more warheads than the United States. But two decades after the collapse of the Soviet Union, even Vladimir V. Putin, with his authoritarian bent, is not about to put Russia on a collision course with the United States that leads to nuclear war. China, equally unlikely to escalate tensions to the nuclear brink, probably has fewer than 400 warheads and a policy to
use them only in self-defense. Pakistan has roughly 100, North Korea fewer than 10 and Iran, so far, zero.
The United States could live quite securely with fewer than 1,500
warheads, half in reserve.”

Philip Taubman is a former New York Times bureau chief in Moscow and Washington and the author of “The Partnership: Five Cold Warriors and
Their Quest to Ban the Bomb.” Full story here:  http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/08/opinion/sunday/reducing-the-nuclear-arsenal.html?_r=1&ref=philiptaubman
http://blogs.ottawacitizen.com/2012/01/08/u-s-has-no-need-for-5000-nuclear-weapons-to-counter-threats-from-iran-and-north-korea/

January 10, 2012 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | general