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The Biden government is considering ways to better explain Washington’s use of nuclear weapons, raising concerns from European and Asian allies that any disclosure could undermine US nuclear security in Russia and China.
In recent talks on Washington’s nuclear weapons program, US officials have assured allies in Europe and Asia that Joe Biden does not want to “No initial work” policy nuclear weapons, according to officials from countries allied with experts who are well versed in the negotiations.
The U.S. has never had a “first-time” policy, which means declaring that it will not use nuclear weapons in the first round of conflict and will use such weapons if they or their allies are caught with nuclear weapons.
Proponents of her case have been working to make the actual transcript of this statement available online.
But U.S. officials have indicated that they will soon issue Biden’s decision as a means of announcing the so-called “sole purpose”, which would better understand how nuclear weapons could be used. Allies strongly opposed Washington, the people said.
The White House will convene a cabinet meeting on Friday to discuss issues related to nuclear deterrence, a number of people familiar with the matter have said.
The comments on the nuclear program, which is expected to be released next month, have raised fears among European and Asian countries fearing the weakness of the US nuclear umbrella at a time when powers such as China and Russia are competing for arms and expanding. warrior.
China, what the Pentagon predicts will do quadrupling its nuclear arsenal by 2030, it has not yet established the US and its allies and hypersonic weapons tests in July. Russia has mobilized a number of troops on the Ukrainian border in preparation for possible attacks, Washington said.
Speaking to the Heritage Foundation this week, Taro Kono, a lawmaker in Japan, said the only goal could be “.send wrong message to China and North Korea. ”
“Given China’s increase in nuclear weapons, why would it be time for you to reduce the ban,” said Patty-Jane Geller, a nuclear expert who co-authored the Heritage Foundation.
A congressional official said that “changing the nuclear disarmament program in the US when the red forces around the Ukrainian border send a very serious message to Putin, and his allies”.
Proponents of her case have been working to make the actual transcript of this statement available online. In his last week as vice-president in 2017, Biden himself argued that non-nuclear weapons and threats meant that the US should say “the sole purpose” is to prevent, and if necessary retaliate, a nuclear attack. Progressives in his Democratic Party also want to cut down on nuclear weapons.
A recent nuclear report, in 2017, said the US could only consider using “more” nuclear weapons.
Matthew Kroenig, a nuclear weapons specialist at the Atlantic Council, said: “Russia and China should be seen as weak and ally very worried. It affects the most important things. Which audience is most important to Biden?
One distinction of the “only purpose” cited by the allies is to announce that the U.S. will continue to have the opportunity to use nuclear weapons to prevent not only nuclear weapons and non-nuclear hazard, “which could combine major and common threats, drugs. or weapons of war.
U.S. officials hope that adding language to the “existing dangers” will reduce concerns from allies who believe weak nuclear umbrellas increase the chances of enemies using non-nuclear weapons.
Incorporating the language of “existing threat” would promote a ban, according to George Perkovich of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. “You make it clear at the beginning. “I don’t think any smart president would use nuclear weapons unless he fired a shotgun or another attack,” he said.
But many allies do not believe. “The Biden government thinks that combining the language of ‘existing danger’ will alleviate our fears, but many allies are not encouraged by the conflict,” said a US official.
Washington also rallied another type of so-called “essential goal”, which would say that a major component of nuclear weapons is to prevent a nuclear attack, a meaning that could include ambiguity.
Robert Soofer, a nuclear weapons specialist at the Center for Strategic and International Study, think tank, believes Biden sees the “ultimate goal” as a solution to the political crisis.
“He is looking at ways to run the team and believes that the ‘main goal’ is probably the least important way to do it,” he said. “The main goal is to prevent a nuclear attack on the US and its allies, but allies want to know that the US will use nuclear weapons to prevent major threats.”
The White House and the government department declined to comment.
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