The recent Nuclear Security Summit was certainly the last act for an administration that appears to have run out of gas on what could—and should—have been a signature presidential initiative. Since 2010, President Barack Obama’s administration has been treading water in advancing the president’s goal of seeking the peace and security of a world (outside of Iran) without nuclear weapons. That was the year the last U.S.Nuclear Posture Review was done and the year Washington and Moscow agreed to very modest nuclear arsenal reductions in the New START Treaty. As a parting gift to the next administration, the Defense Department is considering funding a nuclear force for the future that, if carried out by Obama’s successor, would be both fiscally wasteful and strategically unnecessary.
Read the full article here.
A Firewalled Nuke Fund Is Bad Budgeting and Bad Planning
By Gordon Adams
In Grand Strategy
It’s a budget gimmick that would promote waste and push off hard choices about tomorrow’s nuclear arsenal.
The recent Nuclear Security Summit was certainly the last act for an administration that appears to have run out of gas on what could—and should—have been a signature presidential initiative. Since 2010, President Barack Obama’s administration has been treading water in advancing the president’s goal of seeking the peace and security of a world (outside of Iran) without nuclear weapons. That was the year the last U.S.Nuclear Posture Review was done and the year Washington and Moscow agreed to very modest nuclear arsenal reductions in the New START Treaty. As a parting gift to the next administration, the Defense Department is considering funding a nuclear force for the future that, if carried out by Obama’s successor, would be both fiscally wasteful and strategically unnecessary.
Read the full article here.