As analysts prepare for the impending release of the U.S. Nuclear Posture Review (see 1 – 2 – 3), a grading scale would help to illustrate which policies are under consideration. Thankfully, Prof. Tom Sauer provided such a scale in “A Second Nuclear Revolution: From Nuclear Primacy to Post-Existential Deterrence,” his contribution to the October 2009 issue of The Journal of Strategic Studies.

Sauer argues that nuclear weapons states may choose to downgrade the importance of nuclear weapons in their security policies sooner than is commonly expected. He then digs into some Global Zero analysis towards the end, so if that’s your bag, check him out.

Here is the excellent typology Sauer presents for considering nuclear weapons policy. Click to enlarge.

Here are the definitions and historical examples Sauer uses to illustrate his typology.

Nuclear Primacy
Description: the capability to eliminate the nuclear weapons force of the enemy with a first strike
Example: U.S. during the late 1940s

Maximum Deterrence
Description: role of nuclear weapons in the defence posture is emphasized, literally maximized, in order to squeeze as much benefit as possible out of deterrence
Examples: U.S. and Soviet Union during the Cold War; U.K. and France during the Cold War, albeit at much lower levels

Minimum Deterrence
Description: minimize the emphasis on nuclear weapons…a secure second-strike force does not require a very large arsenal, as long as a small number of nuclear weapons are invulnerable
Examples: current postures of Israel, France, and U.K.; perhaps the U.S. and Russia in 15-20 years?

Existential Deterrence
Description: nuclear weapons are able to deter thanks simply to their existence, regardless of the nature of the nuclear posture
Examples: China, North Korea, India, and Pakistan, although the latter two want to move up the chart

Post-Existential Deterrence
Description: nuclear deterrence without the existence of nuclear weapons (i.e. tracking Mazarr)
Examples: Japan and Germany

When the U.S. Nuclear Posture Review comes out in the next few weeks, analysts might ask how closely it adheres to Sauer’s full description of minimum deterrence:

Minimum deterrence tries to minimize the emphasis on nuclear weapons. According to minimum (and existential) deterrence, in contrast to maximum deterrence, a secure second-strike force does not require a very large arsenal, as long as a small number of nuclear weapons are invulnerable. As long as the opponent believes that he can be attacked with tens of nuclear weapons in a retaliatory strike, the fear of assured destruction will prevail. Parity, let alone superiority, is therefore not a requirement. Because of the relatively small nuclear forces, counterforce targeting and massive attack options are excluded. To the same extent, high alert rates are not needed, except maybe for the invulnerable part of the arsenal. A no-first-use declaratory policy then also becomes an option, at least for states that cannot be easily overrun by non-nuclear means.

How will the Obama administration’s review stack up?

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Nukes on a Blog, Posture Review, Obama Administration (all tags)

During last week’s Senate Armed Services Committee hearing on the fiscal year 2011 U.S. Navy budget request, Senator John Thune (R-SD) stuck to his parochial and political guns by quizzing the witnesses about U.S. nuclear force posture. His line of attack on the administration’s policy process suggests an argument that opponents of New START may advance during Senate debate on the agreement, whenever that occurs.

Following an exchange on nuclear delivery vehicles (pun!), Thune cited last year’s Guardian article and asked whether it was true that President Obama had rejected the Pentagon’s previous Nuclear Posture Review (NPR) draft because it was too timid. This question dovetailed with the “numbers game” criticism I dissected last week, wherein conservatives claim that the White House is cutting nuclear weapons sans either strategy or international/ intragovernmental consultations.

In response, Navy CNO Adm. Gary Roughead detailed just how inclusive and accountable the Obama administration’s NPR process has been. He said:

I've been involved in the NPR and I believe that the process we've had, the considerations we've had, has placed great value on our nuclear deterrent force, all legs of that triad, and the considerations of being able to feel the strategic needs of the nation.

[snip]

I'm very comfortable with the discussions we've had, the involvement that we've had, and how we're looking at things.

[snip]

I think as we have worked our way through what's a very complex process, I've been very comfortable with the discussions that we've been having, sir.

Policymakers and analysts will inevitably disagree about what the new NPR contains. Yet there is clear evidence that the White House has not unilaterally imposed its agenda on the Pentagon. The process has been collaborative, responsible, and, perhaps as a consequence, a teensy bit behind schedule.

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Nukes on a Blog, New START, Senate, Congress, Posture Review, Obama Administration (all tags)

I wish this movie was about John Bolton

John Bolton takes to the pages of the Washington Times today to assail President Obama’s supposedly naïve obsession with nuclear reductions. One of Bolton’s central criticisms is that the Obama administration is placing numbers ahead of strategy. He writes...

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Nukes on a Blog, New START, Posture Review, Obama Administration (all tags)

Remarks of Vice President Biden
National Defense University
Washington, DC
February 18, 2010
The Path to Nuclear Security:
Implementing the President’s Prague Agenda

Ladies and gentlemen; Secretaries Gates and Chu; General Cartwright; Undersecretary Tauscher; Administrator D’Agostino; members of our armed services; students and faculty; thank you all for coming.

At its founding, Elihu Root gave this campus a mission that is the very essence of our national defense: “Not to promote war, but to preserve peace by intelligent and adequate preparation to repel aggression.” For more than a century, you and your predecessors have heeded that call. There are few greater contributions citizens can claim.

Many statesmen have walked these grounds, including our Administration’s outstanding National Security Advisor, General Jim Jones. You taught him well. George Kennan, the scholar and diplomat, lectured at the National War College in the late 1940s. Just back from Moscow, in a small office not far from here, he developed the doctrine of Containment that guided a generation of Cold War foreign policy.

Some of the issues that arose during that time seem like distant memories. But the topic I came to discuss with you today, the challenge posed by nuclear weapons, continues to demand our urgent attention....

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Nukes on a Blog, Obama Administration, New START, CTBT, 2011 Budget Request (all tags)

Today, Vice President Joe Biden gave a speech on nuclear weapons that badly needed to be given. Delayed completion of the U.S.-Russia New START agreement has endangered the Obama administration’s tightly-sequenced arms control agenda (New START, Nuke Summit, NPT RevCon, CTBT…FMCT/deep cuts?) During the time since START I’s lapse in December, opponents of the administration’s agenda have become more organized and more vocal, threatening to block progress before it even starts. Yet Biden’s speech today should help the administration reverse these negative trends and regain control over what has become one of its signature foreign policy objectives.

What did Biden do well? He spoke movingly about the existential threat posed by nuclear weapons, something that gets forgotten in the transaction-oriented culture of Washington and the theory-oriented culture of strategic policy. “The very existence of nuclear weapons leaves the human race ever at the brink of self-destruction,” he said. “The destroyed world Oppenheimer feared must not ever become a reality.” [All quotes from my notes and not official]

Biden also achieved something very important: he clearly delineated how the Obama administration’s priorities—nuclear reductions, nonproliferation, strategic stability—can provide the U.S. nuclear weapons labs with a reinvigorated mission and sense of purpose. The labs are “true national treasures that deserve our full support,” said Biden. He lauded the labs’ historical role and explained how the bigger FY 2011 nuclear weapons budget “reverses the last decade of dangerous decline” under the Bush administration, when “nuclear facilities were neglected and underfunded.” Biden concluded that “responsible disarmament requires versatile specialists” who provide the scientific and technical expertise to achieve the nation’s national security goals.

In response to my question earlier—political co-optation or chastisement?—Biden went with co-optation. He cited Shultz, Kissinger, Perry, Nunn, and McCain as members of the “emerging bipartisan consensus” on nuclear issues. He triangulated between liberal arms controllers concerned with the bigger FY 2011 nuclear budget and conservative deterrence-freaks alarmed by anybody not named Ronald. “We respectfully disagree” with both groups, he noted. In sum, Biden mostly kept his political nose clean, except for the shots at President Bush’s stewardship of the nuclear complex, and stuck to positive justifications for the administration’s plans.

Finally, Biden said relatively little about international concerns, though he did remark that the NPT “consensus is fraying” and needs to be strengthened. Of all the forums where international relations are too wonky to discuss, I thought National Defense University would have been an exception. I guess not.

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Nukes on a Blog, Obama Administration, New START, CTBT, FY 2011 Budget Request, Extended Deterrence (all tags)

Scrappy kid from Scranton

In Washington today at 1 PM eastern time, Vice President Joe Biden will give a major address on U.S. nuclear weapons policy at National Defense University. According to press reports, the speech will complement Biden’s January 29 WSJ op-ed by: 1) elaborating on the rationale behind the FY 2011 nuclear weapons budget increase; 2) previewing April’s Global Nuclear Security Summit and May’s NPT Review Conference; 3) explaining how advances in nuclear weapons science have delegitimized previous concerns about the CTBT; and 4) debunking the straw man criticism that envisioning a future without nuclear weapons somehow negates concrete initiatives that advance U.S. security interests today, such as New START.

Here are three things to look for in Biden’s speech:

Co-opt or chastise? – Does Biden justify the administration’s agenda by co-opting the political middle (i.e. moderates/graybeards) or by chastising critics as out of touch with 21st century security challenges? Or neither? This will forecast how the administration plans to handle New START ratification a few months from now.

Budget and the labs – It doesn’t take a lot of imagination to see the FY 2011 nuclear weapons budget increase as “hush money” for the Obama administration’s arms control agenda. This makes for shrewd short-term tactics; however, it does not address the long-term challenges facing the labs on personnel, morale, and more. While we shouldn’t let the laboratory tail wag the U.S. foreign policy dog, let’s not pretend that Obama’s political opponents won’t exploit the labs’ challenges not only to pocket the FY 2011 budget increase, but also to demand more more more.

So, for Biden today: how does the FY 2011 budget increase tie into a long-term vision for what the labs should be doing in the 21st century? How can the administration’s priorities—nuclear reductions, nonproliferation, strategic stability—provide the labs with a reinvigorated sense of purpose?

International community and ED – If there was a flaw in Biden’s WSJ op-ed, it was that he avoided touting the administration’s approach to key allies. Not to carp when an 800 word op-ed doesn’t accomplish everything a 5,000 word essay could, but there is an international component to the administration’s agenda that goes beyond the Nuclear Summit and Review Conference. I’m talking about ED—no, not John Isaacs’s sweetest tie ever, but extended deterrence.

Mr. Veep: how will the Obama administration assure allies of the commitment of the U.S. nuclear umbrella while reducing its arsenal? Providing a positive answer to this question will demonstrate to key allies that the administration’s agenda is not being pursued unilaterally without considering our friends’ interests, too.

UPDATE 12:15 PM: You can watch the speech here or here.

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Nukes on a Blog, Obama Administration, New START, CTBT, FY 2011 Budget Request, Extended Deterrence (all tags)

Never been afraid to play hardball, this one...

h/t: Who else?

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Obama Administration (all tags)

We liked the speech, at least the part dealing with nuclear weapons.  Some excerpts from our press release today:

“The President deserves praise for his continued efforts to lead a bipartisan nuclear security agenda that addresses the grave threat posed by nuclear weapons,” said Lt. Gen. Robert Gard, the Center’s chairman. “As the President said, he has embraced the vision of John F. Kennedy and Ronald Reagan through a strategy that reverses the spread of nuclear weapons and seeks a world without them.”

Gard added, “Nearly every national security expert agrees that terrorist use of nuclear weapons against the United States is our gravest security threat. The best way to address the threat of nuclear terrorism is by securing vulnerable nuclear materials and verifiably reducing nuclear stockpiles, just as President Obama has pledged to do.”

“Today there is a growing bipartisan consensus that the current nuclear status quo is no longer tenable,” said the Center’s executive director John Isaacs. “21st century threats require 21st century solutions, and the President has already taken crucial first steps toward securing our nation from the threat of nuclear weapons.”

“These first steps, including an expected finalized new weapons reduction treaty with Russia, are important and should be applauded,” Isaacs added, “but we still have a long way to go.”

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Nukes on a Blog, State of the Union, Obama Administration (all tags)

Last week, GSN’s Martin Matishak summarized the Fiscal Year 2010 budget cycle for nonproliferation programs. For a variety of reasons, some of this cycle’s funding levels were less than in previous years.

Matishak talked to Kingston, so many of NOH’s thoughts are in the GSN article. In a nutshell:

The White House set a "very ambitious goal" for securing the world's nuclear materials, [Reif] said, so "we were a little disappointed to see that at least the 2010 request was even less than the 2009 [request] and was also less than what was appropriated in 2009."

[snip]

One of the justifications for the reduced budget could be that the administration was still working out the strategy to achieve its nuclear-security goal when it issued its fiscal 2010 budget last February, according to Reif.

[snip]

Reif said the upcoming Nuclear Posture Review, the fiscal 2011 budget and that Obama administration's nuclear security summit next spring will "determine the direction of our threat reduction efforts."

Until then "the U.S. isn't going to able to achieve the sort of lofty goal the Obama administration laid out in the Prague speech and during the [presidential] campaign ... of securing all vulnerable fissile materials in four years without a much larger commitment to these programs," he said.

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Nukes on a Blog, Congress, Defense Spending, Obama Administration (all tags)

The Arms Control Association has released the nominees for its third annual Arms Controller of the Year contest. Previous winners include Norway's foreign minister Jonas Gahr Støre and Reps. Peter Visclosky (D-Ind.) and David Hobson (R-Ohio).

President Obama is the obvious frontrunner, but he’s already been on an award tour or two this year, hasn’t he?

German foreign ministers Frank-Walter Steinmeier and Guido Westerwelle and Japanese foreign minister Katsuya Okada might be good choices because of their willingness to remind everyone that the “beneficiaries” of U.S. extended nuclear deterrence not only have a say in the policy, but also possess serious doubts about whether Cold War-style nuclear deployments are still the best way to deal with 21st century security challenges.

Looking ahead, NOH hopes that the 2010 award goes to Vice President Biden after he helps find a non-retrograde solution for modernization, shepherds a treaty or two through the Senate, and begins operationalizing –through both the budget and the global nuclear security summit – the administration’s plan to secure all vulnerable fissile material within four years.

12 months and counting, Veep. Do it to it.

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Nukes of a Blog, New START, START, Russia, CTBT, Obama Administration, Japan (all tags)