{"id":68162,"date":"2024-06-07T20:10:11","date_gmt":"2024-06-07T20:10:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/2024\/06\/07\/u-s-considers-expanded-nuclear-arsenal-a-reversal-of-decades-of-cuts\/"},"modified":"2024-06-07T20:10:11","modified_gmt":"2024-06-07T20:10:11","slug":"u-s-considers-expanded-nuclear-arsenal-a-reversal-of-decades-of-cuts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/2024\/06\/07\/u-s-considers-expanded-nuclear-arsenal-a-reversal-of-decades-of-cuts\/","title":{"rendered":"U.S. Considers Expanded Nuclear Arsenal, a Reversal of Decades of Cuts"},"content":{"rendered":"<div style=\"text-align:center\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1050\" height=\"550\" src=\"https:\/\/i3.wp.com\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2024\/06\/07\/multimedia\/07dc-nuclear-pmkl\/07dc-nuclear-pmkl-facebookJumbo.jpg?fit=1050,550&amp;ssl=1\" class=\"attachment-post-thumbnail size-post-thumbnail wp-post-image\" alt=\"U.S. Considers Expanded Nuclear Arsenal, a Reversal of Decades of Cuts\" title=\"U.S. Considers Expanded Nuclear Arsenal, a Reversal of Decades of Cuts\" \/><\/div><p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">A senior Biden administration official warned on Friday that \u201cabsent a change\u201d in nuclear strategy by China and Russia, the United States may be forced to expand its nuclear arsenal, after decades of cutting back through now largely abandoned arms control agreements.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">The comments on Friday from Pranay Vaddi, a senior director of the National Security Council, were the most explicit public warning yet that the United States was prepared to shift from simply modernizing its arsenal to expanding it. They were also a warning to President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia about the likely U.S. reaction if the last major nuclear arms control agreement, called New START, expires in February 2026 with no replacement.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Mr. Vaddi, speaking at the annual meeting of the Arms Control Association, a group that advocates for limits on nuclear weapons, confirmed what officials have been saying in private conversations and closed congressional testimony for more than a year. It is the inevitable outgrowth, they have argued, of China\u2019s rapid nuclear expansion and Russia\u2019s repeated threats to use tactical nuclear weapons in Ukraine.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">But it would be an epochal shift, and one fraught with dangers that many Americans thought they had left behind at the end of the Cold War and the collapse of the Soviet Union.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div>\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Fifteen years ago, President Barack Obama outlined a vision of moving toward a world without nuclear weapons, and he took steps to reduce their role in American strategy and defenses. While the nation\u2019s nuclear complexes were improved and made safer, and old weapons were swapped out for more reliable or updated versions, the United States insisted it was only \u201cmodernizing\u201d its arsenal, not expanding it.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">As vice president in the Obama administration, President Biden became the <a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/obamawhitehouse.archives.gov\/the-press-office\/remarks-vice-president-biden-national-defense-university\" title=\"\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\">spokesman for this strategy<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">At the time, China was still maintaining its \u201cminimum deterrent\u201d policy, which dates back to its first nuclear test in 1964, and Mr. Putin appeared to have little interest in fiscally ruinous arms races. That has now changed.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">China is on a path to <a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/www.npr.org\/2023\/10\/19\/1207156597\/new-pentagon-report-claims-china-now-has-over-500-operational-nuclear-warheads\" title=\"\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\">match the number of American and Russian deployed nuclear weapons by 2035<\/a>, according to the Pentagon\u2019s public estimates. Mr. Putin has fixated on unusual weapons, including an undersea nuclear torpedo that could be launched across the Pacific to destroy the West Coast of the United States. And the United States has warned in recent months that Russia has a program underway to put a nuclear bomb into orbit.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">There have been no discussions with Russia since it invaded Ukraine about negotiating a replacement for New START, which limits each country to 1,550 deployed strategic nuclear weapons, the kind that can be launched from one continent to another.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div>\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">China has been unwilling to engage in deep nuclear talks with the United States, making it clear that it is not interested in arms control until its own arsenal is comparable to that of the two biggest nuclear powers. (Britain, France, India, Pakistan, Israel and North Korea all have arsenals of their own, though with much smaller numbers.)<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">While the Biden administration has not abandoned its rhetorical support of a world without nuclear weapons, officials have acknowledged that the prospects of new arms control deals are now so remote that they have to think about new strategies.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Mr. Vaddi said the development of the B61-13 gravity bomb, a nuclear weapon meant to be used against hardened and large military targets, was an example of the kind of projects the United States would pursue.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">For now, the United States is improving, not expanding its nuclear arsenal. But Mr. Vaddi made clear that could change.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">\u201cAbsent a change in the trajectory of the adversary arsenal, we may reach a point in the coming years where an increase from current deployed numbers is required, and we need to be fully prepared to execute if the president makes that decision,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div>\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">The United States remains ready to pursue arms control agreements to reduce nuclear threats by \u201climiting and shaping\u201d adversaries\u2019 nuclear forces, Mr. Vaddi said. And citing the history of separate diplomatic tracks for such agreements, he suggested Russia\u2019s war in Ukraine would not be a barrier to a discussion.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">But he said Russia\u2019s rejection of talks to a successor agreement to New Start has \u201ccast a shadow\u201d over diplomatic issues.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">\u201cAt least in the near term, the prospects for strategic arms control are dim,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\"><a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2023\/06\/02\/us\/politics\/china-arms-control-nuclear-weapons.html\" title=\"\">A year ago, at the same conference, Jake Sullivan,<\/a> the national security adviser, pledged a renewed effort to bring China into arms control talks. Since that speech, the United States has tried to engage the Chinese on nuclear safety issues and recently conducted the first talks, in Geneva, to address whether it would be possible to reach an accord that artificial intelligence should never control nuclear weapons, among other limitations.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">That meeting was preliminary, and it is unclear if others are to follow. While China has urged the United States to adopt what it calls its \u201cno first use\u201d policy for employing nuclear weapons, it has not engaged substantively with the American proposals.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">One of the complications of the current nuclear environment, administration officials say, is the potential that Russia and China may coordinate their nuclear policies, part of the \u201cpartnership without limits\u201d that Mr. Putin and Xi Jinping, the Chinese leader, announced in 2022. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div>\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">The failure of Russia and China to engage in meaningful negotiations, Mr. Vaddi said, was \u201cforcing the United States and our close allies and partners to prepare for a world where nuclear competition occurs without numerical constraints.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Modernizing the American nuclear arsenal, he argued, will give both Russia and China an incentive to go back to the negotiating table and put Washington at a stronger place in those talks.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">\u201cWe need to persuade our adversaries that managing rivalry through arms control is preferable to unrestrained competition,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<p><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2024\/06\/07\/us\/politics\/us-nuclear-russia-china.html\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A senior Biden administration official warned on Friday that \u201cabsent a change\u201d in nuclear strategy by China and Russia, the United States may be forced to expand its nuclear arsenal, after decades of cutting back through now largely abandoned arms control agreements. The comments on Friday from Pranay Vaddi, a senior director of the National [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":68163,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2024\/06\/07\/multimedia\/07dc-nuclear-pmkl\/07dc-nuclear-pmkl-facebookJumbo.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[24563,15876,1492,11529,4643,3101,2074,221],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68162"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=68162"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68162\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":68164,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68162\/revisions\/68164"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/68163"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=68162"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=68162"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=68162"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}