More nukes

Dec 22nd, 2016 | By
Category: Notes and Comment Blog
Tags: ,

The Washington Post on Trump’s exciting nuclear plans that he shares on Twitter:

Trump’s tweet came shortly after Putin, during a defense ministry meeting, talked tough on nuclear weapons.

“We need to strengthen the military potential of strategic nuclear forces, especially with missile complexes that can reliably penetrate any existing and prospective missile defense systems,” he said.

“He” being Putin. Trump of course would be unable to utter that sentence unless someone wrote it down first.

Russia and the United States have worked for decades at first limiting, and then reducing, the number and strength of nuclear arms they produced and maintained under a Cold War strategy of deterrence known as “mutually assured destruction.” Both Republican and Democratic presidents have pursued the policy of nuclear reduction, said Daryl G. Kimball, executive director of the Arms Control Association.

Currently, the United States has just under 5,000 warheads in its active arsenal, and more than 1,550 deployed strategic warheads, a number that fluctuates. Under the New START Treaty, the main strategic arms treaty in place, both the U.S. and Russia must deploy no more than 1,550 strategic by February of 2018. Both countries are on track to meet that limit, which will remain in force until 2021, when they can decide to extend the agreement for another five years.

Since President George H.W. Bush’s administration, it has been U.S. policy not to build new nuclear warheads. Under President Obama, the policy has been not to pursue warheads with new military capabilities.

Well that’s no fun. That’s boring. Let’s go back to the days of terror when we knew the whole thing could end at any moment! Yeeha!

The BBC reminds us of the background:

Mr Trump has offered no further details on his plans but he has hinted in the past that he favoured an expansion of the nuclear programme.

He was asked in interviews whether he would use weapons of mass destruction against an enemy and he said that it would be an absolute last stance, but he added that he would want to be unpredictable.

In contrast, President Obama has talked of the US commitment to seek peace and security without nuclear weapons.

Well he’s such a girl. Manly men want to nuke everything.

In interviews before his surprise victory Mr Trump said that other countries should spend more on their own defence budgets, and forgo US protection, because “we can’t afford to do it anymore”.

He has said he is in favour of countries such as Japan and South Korea developing nuclear weapons “because it’s going to happen anyway”.

He also repeatedly said he didn’t understand why we couldn’t just use them.

 

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