At the height of the Cold War, the United States and the Soviet Union had tens of thousands of nuclear warheads targeted and ready to launch in minutes. Fortunately for the future of the human race, after a number of treaties and the end of the Cold War, the United States and the Russian Federation only have a few thousand warheads each. Other nuclear powers have a few hundred each. North Korea has a few warheads and Iran appears to be on the verge of creating a warhead. President Obama recently suggested that the U.S. and the Russian Federation decommission even more warheads. Of course, there are those in the U.S. and the Russian Federation that either because of ideology or profit from warhead and delivery systems manufacturer are concerned about further disarmament.
A recent op-ed piece by Peter Huessy in the U.S. News and World Report attacked Obama for advocating further reduction in nuclear arsenals. Currently, the U.S. and the Russians have several delivery systems for nuclear warheads. These include bombers, submarines and missiles. The U.S. arsenal and delivery systems are designed to be able to withstand a first strike and still be able to retaliate, destroying the enemy. Huessy argues that if we reduce our delivery systems and warheads much more, we risk destabilizing the world because some enemy might decide that they could successfully disarm the U.S. with a surprise first strike and we would be unable to successfully retaliate.
Huessy points out that the Russians are upgrading their fleet of submarines, their missiles and bombers. He says that China will soon have a hundred missiles that could reach the United States and is quickly building more missiles. Then he warns of Iran and North Korea soon having missiles that could reach the U.S. He advocates for upgrading our nuclear forces and against any further reduction claiming that the world nuclear situation is becoming more unstable and that current U.S. systems are aging and rapidly becoming obsolete. I have to say that hearing this old Cold War rhetoric in the modern age is surprising and depressing.
First of all, talking about Iran and North Korea is just silly. If either of them launched a missile or two at the U.S., we could incinerate them with a fraction of our nuclear force and they know it. In any case, Iran is more concerned with Israel and North Korea is more concerned with South Korea than either of them is going to be interested in attacking the U.S.
China is has enormous investments in the U.S. and their economy is highly dependent on trade with the U.S. Anything that they could possibly gain by attacking the U.S. would be tiny compared with the devastating loss of investment in and trade with the U.S. In addition, it is doubtful that they could disarm us with a hundred missiles even if we substantially reduce our nuclear forces. And, even if our retaliation was not “successful” we could still kill tens of millions and devastate their factories and cities. The Chinese are not suicidal.
We also have ties of investment and trade with the Russian Federation. Yes, they could attack us and substantially reduce our retaliation but some would still get through, killing millions and damaging their industrial capability. And what exactly could they gain from such an attack that would be worth the resulting crash in the global economy.
And, finally, it has been estimated that even as few as one hundred warheads exploding could bring on a nuclear winter which would threaten the entire world and possibly end civilization. Look at the damage that one nuclear power plant in Fukushima, Japan has caused. Fallout from that disaster has circled the entire Northern Hemisphere and the Pacific Ocean is being polluted with radioactive cesium. Any nation which launched a major nuclear attack on another would wind up destroying themselves. When it comes to destabilization, the kind of pointing out of potential enemies and calls for increasing nuclear forces in the U.S. in that op-ed could lead to a new Cold War and arms race. I think that this would be more destabilizing than a call to reduce nuclear stockpiles.
