#5
Boston Globe
November 18, 2001
Let's move beyond Cold War thinking
By Lisbeth Gronlund and David Wright
Lisbeth Gronlund and David Wright are senior staff scientists at the Union of Concerned Scientists and Research Fellows at the MIT Security Studies Program.
PRESIDENT BUSH is right - it is time for the United States and Russia to move beyond Cold War thinking and restructure their nuclear relationship. But as he himself said in June, it is important that we not only talk differently but act differently.
Despite the rhetoric surrounding this week's summit, there is little evidence that Bush is prepared to match his words with deeds. In fact, there is a fundamental inconsistency in the administration's thinking about nuclear weapons and missile defense.
Bush is eager to convince Russian President Putin that the end of the Cold War means that US missile defenses should not worry Russia. But Russia cares about US missile defenses because the United States targets thousands of nuclear weapons on Russia. Why? Because the United States is stuck in old ways of thinking and continues to rely on its Cold War strategy.
Bush argues that US-Russian arms-control agreements on missiles and missile defenses are no longer needed because the United States does not negotiate arms-control agreements with friends, and Russia is now a friend. Yet he neglects the more fundamental issue: The United States does not target its friends with nuclear weapons.
On Tuesday Bush announced that the United States will reduce its deployed nuclear weapons to around 2,000 over the next 10 years. While that is a substantial step in the right direction, it represents only a quantitative change, not the fundamental rethinking that Bush is quick to tell Putin is required on missile defenses. Only a few hundred nuclear weapons are needed to destroy a country the size of Russia. No current or conceivable future threat requires the United States to maintain more than a few hundred survivable warheads. Large nuclear arsenals are not relevant to current security threats such as proliferation and terrorism.
During the presidential campaign, Bush said that the premise of Cold War nuclear targeting should no longer dictate the size of our arsenal. Yet the only reason the United States would retain 2,000 warheads is to target Russian nuclear weapons. Cold War thinking remains institutionalized in US nuclear targeting plans, which require the United States to have enough highly accurate weapons to target and destroy Russian missiles in their silos.
Actions speak louder than words. Bush should demonstrate that the United States no longer considers Russia an enemy by cutting US arsenals to the lowest possible number of nuclear weapons consistent with our national security needs, as he has promised. The administration should announce that the United States will cut to 1,000 warheads immediately and then to a few hundred in concert with Russia. The administration should make these cuts irreversible by committing to dismantle the remaining 10,000 US strategic and tactical nuclear weapons - including those in storage - in a manner transparent to Russia and the international community and to place the resulting nuclear material under international safeguards.
These steps would also provide an opportunity to seek better controls on Russian nuclear materials, which present a real danger of proliferation.
Bush should announce that the United States will no longer maintain its dangerous ability to launch nuclear weapons in a matter of minutes. He can thereby induce Russia to de-alert its nuclear weapons, too. Taking nuclear weapons off alert is the best way to reduce the very real risk of accidental or mistaken launch.
Bush cannot fundamentally change the US-Russian nuclear relationship by building missile defenses and abandoning arms control agreements while keeping thousands of nuclear weapons targeted at Russia. He can do so only by getting rid of Cold War targeting plans, making much deeper cuts in US nuclear arsenals, and removing nuclear weapons from high alert levels. And he should - and could - start doing that today.
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