Conservative Hawks Fail on Nukes

I think it's great how the Wall Street Journal is always willing to entertain the passionate mutterings of neocons and conservatives when they feel like telling us what we ought to be doing in defense. It's really too easy to mock them. Here's Richard "what failed Iraq strategy" Perle and his buddy Sen. Jon "where's my majority" Kyl.

In the nuclear-free world that ended in 1945 there was neither peace nor security. Since then there have indeed been many wars but none has come close to the carnage that occurred regularly before the development of nuclear weapons, and none has pitted nuclear powers against each other.

So what we need are more nations with nuclear weapons. Then no one will fight each other, right?

Thus, in his Prague speech, Mr. Obama announced that the U.S. would "immediately and aggressively" pursue ratification of the comprehensive ban on the testing of nuclear weapons. The administration believes, without evidence, that ratification of the test-ban treaty will discourage other countries from developing nuclear weapons.

That's not true at all. The Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty is supposed to convince other nations that they don't need the bomb. The Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty is supposed to just make the United States honest about popping the occasional nuke as a test along with the other signatories.

For the foreseeable future, the U.S. and many of our allies rely on our nuclear deterrent. And as long as the U.S. possesses nuclear weapons, they must be -- as Mr. Obama recognized in Prague -- "safe, secure and effective." Yet his proposed 2010 budget fails to take the necessary steps to do that.

Actually, that's not true, the budget does put down quite a few billion for the nuclear weapons stockpile. It doesn't fund the Reliable Replacement Warhead program, for which people use the code words "safe, secure, and effective." Be nice if there were any nuclear weapons experts who could articulate something other than "we need more nukes."

If we were to approach zero nuclear weapons today, others would almost certainly try even harder to catapult to superpower status by acquiring a bomb or two. A robust American nuclear force is an essential discouragement to nuclear proliferators; a weak or uncertain force just the opposite.

And of course, no one, especially President Obama, is suggesting either a unilateral disarmament or doing it today. But what the hell, it's not as if Kyl and Perle haven't lied out their asses in attempts to badmouth progressive defense experts. Why should they start being honest now?

Comments

[Kilo]

"The NPT is supposed to convince other nations that they don't need the bomb. The CTBT is supposed to just make the United States honest... "

Is there a "not" missing from that first sentence?

[J.]

Ah... I don't think so. Not sure where you think the "not" belongs... NPT - "discourage" nations from becoming nuke powers, no? or convince them they don't need The Bomb.

[Ray]

When we talk about nuclear disarmament, we bloggers often talk about The Bomb. It's uppermost in our minds.
What happens to the submarines that even as we speak patrol non-stop? Can't see those disappearing on the budgets for a while yet...they are the real deterrent, if one believes in that of course. I am not sure yet.
R.

[Ray]

Should have added that I meant the fact that those submarines I refer to carry nuclear missiles. just in case I wasn't clear enough.