The Future of U.S. Nuclear Weapons Policy (1997) / Chapter Skim
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3 A REGIME OF PROGRESSIVE RESTRAINTS
3 A REGIME OF PROGRESSIVE RESTRAINTS
Pages 58-84
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From page 58... ...
Nuclear forces would be reduced; their roles would be more narrowly defined; and, while preserving the core function of deterring nuclear aggression, increased emphasis would be placed on achieving higher standards of operational safety. This shift would entail: · further reductions in active weapons inventories; · including all nuclear warheads in arms reductions; · arrangements for exact, verified accounting and assured physical security of all warheads and fissionable materials; · transforming the operational practices of active forces to eliminate continuous-alert procedures, commitments to rapid retaliation, and mass attack targeting; and · reaffirming the integral relationship between restrictions on offensive and defensive systems.
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From page 59... ...
A continuing high-priority effort is also needed to improve the protection of nuclear weapons and fissile materials in Russia. Joint U.S.-Russian work along these lines, which has been going on since 1991 under the Nunn-Lugar Cooperative Threat Reduction Program, complements and strengthens arms reductions and other changes in nuclear policies.
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From page 60... ...
These include recommendations (1) transforming further the U.S.-Russian relationship to increase operational safety and to make further nuclear arms reductions comprehensive; (2)
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From page 61... ...
Verifying limits on nondeployed and nonstrategic warheads would require transparency measures regarding the storage, production, and dismantling of nuclear warheads, as well as a mechanism for exchanging and verifying information about the location and status of warheads. These measures would go beyond those required to verify the limits on delivery vehicles and launchers in START I and II.
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From page 62... ...
Ideally, the launch readiness of nuclear forces would be reduced in ways that are readily transparent to the other side, so that both sides can be assured that a large-scale surprise attack is not possible. Care must be taken, however, to reduce launch readiness in ways that do not lead to instability.
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From page 63... ...
In the case of ballistic missiles it is possible to remove warheads, shrouds, guidance systems, or other key components. Inspectors or remote monitoring devices could then verify that the systems had not been readied for launch and provide timely warning of any attempt to do so.
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From page 64... ...
The SIOP was constructed to coordinate a rapid attack by thousands of warheads against a well-defined enemy. As the size and alert status of nuclear forces change, and the probability of a massive Russian attack continues to fade, the United States will no longer require standing plans for a massive U.S.
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From page 65... ...
On the contrary, it remains a logical adjunct of the continuing reality of offense dominance in conflicts involving nuclear weapons. In a world in which the number of offensive nuclear arms is reduced drastically and the role of nuclear weapons is diminished, the ABM treaty will continue to play a crucial role.
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From page 66... ...
and Russian nuclear arsenals and global nonproliferation initiatives, though helpful, will not suffice to engage the undeclared states. In the case of South Africa the only country that has destroyed its entire nuclear arsenal changes in the regional security environment (the withdrawal of Sovietsponsored troops from neighboring states)
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From page 67... ...
In addition, the United States should focus on nearer-term measures designed to reduce the chances for an expanded nuclear arms race or the use of nuclear weapons on the subcontinent. This would include regional agreements not to deploy, use, or threaten to use nuclear weapons or nuclear-capable ballistic missiles, together with continued efforts to engage India and Pakistan in global initiatives, including the CTBT and a fissile material production cutoff, as well as international controls on the civilian production and use of fissile materials.
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From page 68... ...
Not only does it underrate the importance of the nuclear weapons states' performance for maintaining the active commitment to the nonproliferation regime of the large number of states that are not potential proliferants; it also fails to appreciate that none of the indicated nonproliferation victories is necessarily permanent, that the governments of many threshold states contain antibomb factions whose clout is strengthened or weakened by the actions of the nuclear weapons states, and that, most important, the world's expectations about what constitutes acceptable nuclear arms control performance by weapons states after the Cold War are likely to be different than they were when the Cold War was under way. On this last point, while many members of the community of nations were probably not pleased with the immense nuclear arsenals accumulated by the United States and Russia during the Cold War, most understood that the characteristics of that deeply hostile and far-reaching confrontation constrained what could be expected from the two countries in the way of reductions in the sizes of those arsenals and the missions assigned to them.
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From page 69... ...
At the same time, some former Warsaw Pact states and Soviet republics are seeking security assurances and guarantees that their nonnuclear status will not make them vulnerable to coercion or, in the worst case, aggression. A formal Central European NWFZ, coupled with negative security assurances from the nuclear weapons states, would help relieve these pressures and provide another basis for developing cooperative security arrangements in a region that for centuries has been subjected to innumerable invasions, occupations, and imposed territorial divisions.
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From page 70... ...
is in some respects a greater proliferation risk, technical solutions for its management and disposition are straightforward and currently available.8 In any case, international control of all civilian as well as military fissile materials will surely come to be seen as a necessary part of reductions to very low levels of nuclear warheads. New agreements should extend the high level of security and accounting demanded for intact nuclear weapons the "stored weapons standard"9 not only to all phases of the weapon disposition process but also to separated civilian plutonium and HEU worldwide.
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From page 71... ...
A commitment by the United States to maintain appropriately formulated positive and negative security assurances and guarantees, whether through defense cooperation or other means, is a fundamental element underlying the nonproliferation regime. Such commitments cannot be made lightly but, once made, will make a major contribution to stability.
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From page 72... ...
The use of U.S. nuclear forces would be reserved solely for deterrence of and response to nuclear attacks.
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From page 73... ...
nuclear threats as an excuse to acquire nuclear weapons, the threat of nuclear first use is both unnecessary and counterproductive for U.S. and allied security in the region.
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From page 74... ...
statements made in connection with its signing of Protocol I of the African Nuclear Weapons Free Zone treaty and with Senate consideration of the Chemical Weapons Convention have maintained that ambiguity. Yet neither ambiguity nor an outright policy of nuclear retaliation serves long-term U.S.
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From page 75... ...
The final part of this chapter discusses two further stages of the nuclear arms reduction process beyond START III: first,
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From page 76... ...
and Russian arsenals, and the issues that would need to be addressed to make such deep cuts practical are examined. Critics of proposals for deep nuclear arms reductions argue that such cuts could actually be counterproductive for a number of reasons: · Large nuclear arsenals could help prevent proliferation.
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From page 77... ...
At a level of about 1,000 warheads, such survivability can be assured for the United States through the deployment of Trident ballistic missile submarines carrying appropriately downloaded missiles. This level also offers the Russian government the option to place a greater proportion of its nuclear forces in a survivable posture at sea or in land-mobile missiles out of garrison should it choose to do so.
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From page 78... ...
Nor does the committee see a need for a reserve nuclear weapons stockpile as a hedge against the emergence of new nuclear powers or clandestine expansion of the nuclear arsenals of existing nuclear weapons states. The Other Declared Nuclear Powers.
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From page 79... ...
Verification of forces as low as a few hundred nuclear weapons requires a standard significantly more exacting than attainable by current capability and knowledge. While survivable nuclear forces at this level would offer each nuclear power important insurance against the covert retention or acquisition of illegal nuclear warheads by another state, the nuclear powers would certainly insist on reliable accounting of the residual existing warheads before they would agree to move toward such small arsenals.
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From page 80... ...
The remaining nuclear forces would have to be survivable, their commandand-control structure would have to be redundant and robust, and widespread and effective national ballistic missile defenses must be absent. Moreover, even at this low level the committee does not see a need for a reserve nuclear weapons stockpile as a hedge against the emergence of new nuclear powers or clandestine expansion of the nuclear arsenals of existing nuclear weapons states.
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From page 81... ...
Trident submarines ended their operational lives, the United States could replace them with a generation of smaller submarines carrying fewer missiles, thereby increasing the number of survivable platforms held at sea. In the operational posture of much smaller nuclear forces, the elements of the force would be designed for deliberate response rather than reaction in a matter of minutes.
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From page 82... ...
Thus, it seems likely that the deployment of defenses capable of intercepting significant numbers of strategic ballistic missiles would prevent major arms reductions without adding to security. Ballistic missiles designed for shorter ranges and the delivery of conventional munitions will probably remain in military arsenals while the process of nuclear arms reduction proposed here proceeds.
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From page 83... ...
And any controls on ballistic missiles of a particular range must apply to all such missiles, not merely those their possessors claim are armed with nuclear warheads. For this reason, in the INF treaty the United States and the Soviet Union agreed to a worldwide ban on their possession of land-based missiles with ranges of 500 to 5,500 kilometers, whether nuclear armed or not.
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From page 84... ...
Israel has also indicated that a regional approach to nuclear arms control is to be preferred over accession to the NPT. For an extensive discussion of the nuclear weapons status and prospects in the Middle East, see Shai Feldman, Nuclear Weapons and Arms Control (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press for the Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard University, 1997)
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