Iraq and Afghanistan

A new study estimates that there are 480 nuclear weapons in American control on bases in Europe. These are said to be relatively small nuclear bombs meant to be carried on fighter bombers. They are the last holdovers from the thousands that America had in Europe when it was facing off against the Soviets. Apparently, in the nineties we said that we would take them all out. Some of our top generals, including our top NATO commander, really doesn't want them there. I assume this is because he sees them as useless in any role he can imagine and keeping control over them vis-à-vis terrorists is a headache he does not need. Yet others in high positions in Europe and one presumes in the United States are loathe to bring them all home. What they are said to want is an ability to quickly launch nuclear weapons against anyone or any country threatening the use of, or using, weapons of mass destruction against the United States or its allies. Of course, we have plenty of nuclear weapons on submarines and so forth, but they are larger and so perhaps considered "less usable".

Meanwhile, we continue to insist that no state other than the existing nuclear powers be allowed to have, or even threaten to have, nuclear weapons. A few favored states have a right to nuclear deterrence, the rest do not. This argument sells well in Washington, but not everywhere. (The French would agree with us on this. They have always loved nuclear weapons and would be the last to give them up. Nuclear power is another one of their favorite causes.)

The problem with nuclear deterrence, or the use that deterrence imagines, is that it is based on politically unusable weapons. There has been a moratorium on nuclear use since World War II. No one really wants to break that moratorium — certainly not in the short time frame suggested by the need to keep these weapons in Europe. Even though the air carried weapons are relatively small, varying in size from a third of a kiloton to over 100 kilotons (Hiroshima 12.5), any use would be bound to be massively destructive at least in limited areas, with radiation effects over a larger area. The political fallout would be hard to predict but likely to be considerable. If the objective were the destruction of something connected with an organization such as al-Qaida, those associated with our target might actually welcome such a demonstration because of its negative consequences even for the countries they are in. If we used our weapons against a country that had actually used W.M.D., it might make more sense, but not that much.

It has long seemed to me that we should be able to develop and make clear to all interested parties our intention to keep on hand a massive non-WMD destructive capacity that would be used as needed against any country actually using WMD. (It could also be used preemptively, but the example of Iraq makes that strategy look rather poor for the time being.) We can, in fact, be massively destructive when we want to be. We also have conventional weapons that can dig below the surface. This capacity was not well demonstrated in Iraq or Afghanistan, but this had more to do with poor targeting than weapon characteristics — and one would not want to count on a nuclear deterrent similarly afflicted by poor targeting. It may be that nuclear deterrence still has some credibility against a country with the size and armament, nuclear and otherwise, of China. But in bargaining or fighting most of the world, backyard terrorists and other evil guys, it seems past time we stopped making nuclear threats and clearly got out of the business.