#33 The Story of Nuclear Weapons in the US Military
The Story: Americans somehow learn not to think about nuclear weapons. We learn the weapons were important in the days of yore, when Hiroshima and Nagasaki were bombed during World War II and in the Cold War, when the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis threatened the US mainland and children had to practice cowering under their school desks should a Soviet nuclear attack happen. Now, however, we are led to believe (perhaps because of the dearth of recent films dealing with nuclear weapons) that with the Cold War ended and the Soviet Union no longer existing, these weapons are rare, under strict control, and their uses are too horrible to contemplate. More, their existential threat has been superseded by other crises, like climate change and its dreadful consequences: rising sea levels, mass migration, immense and uncontainable wildfires, pandemics, and rising poverty.
My take on the story: Though they are fewer in number following the Cold War’s end, nuclear weapons should still be of deep concern to all Americans. More countries have them since the war’s conclusion and nearly all are trying to further increase their stockpiles, “tactical” or “non-strategic” nuclear weapons are not included in treaty agreements and so are entirely unregulated, nuclear powers cannot be prevented from basing the weapons in other states, and even the treaties regulating strategic weapons are not holding. These developments are especially alarming as President Putin of Russia threatens to use these weapons, North Korea continues to test nuclear weapons, Iran is close to developing the weaponry, and when the United States most needs a steady hand at the helm, Donald Trump—“at his absolute worst in a crisis”—will soon become the US President.
Before the end of the Cold War in 1989, six and possibly seven countries had roughly 60K nuclear weapons: the US (1945), the Soviet Union/USSR (1949), the UK (1952), France (1960), China (1964), and India (1974) declared themselves as having nuclear weapons. Though it is likely Israel acquired nuclear weapons in 1967, it has never declared that. The US and the USSR had the vast majority of the 60K.
Following the Cold War (and the end of the USSR), the total number was reduced to 13K, with many antiquated weapons in the American and Russian stockpiles still waiting to be dismantled. But Pakistan (1998) and North Korea (2006) acquired the weaponry following the Cold War, and it looks as though Iran is also close to becoming a nuclear state. These ten states’ admissions do not mean that other countries or groups can’t gain access to these weapons of mass destruction, since five US allies host American nuclear weapons in their countries and one Russian ally—Belarus—as of 2023 hosts Russian tactical nuclear weapons.
More importantly, according to the Union of Concerned Scientists, though the total number of weapons have been reduced, the ones remaining are exponentially more powerful.
The warheads on just one US nuclear-armed submarine have seven times the destructive power of all the bombs dropped during World War II, including the two atomic bombs dropped on Japan. And the United States usually has ten of those submarines at sea (emphasis added).
Those weapons are so powerful that, according to the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons, “Detonating just 1 nuclear weapon alone over New York would cause an estimated 583,160 fatalities.” For comparison, in Hiroshima, those who died immediately and those who by the end of the month succumbed to radiation poisoning are estimated to have totaled about 140K; in Nagasaki, about 74K people.
The treaties
Given that for the last 80 years there have been nuclear weapons, how has the world tried to control them? We might know about Mutual Assured Destruction (MAD), or the principle that a nuclear attack by one superpower will be met with a nuclear counterattack by the other superpower, meaning they both are destroyed. This prospect is supposed to deter the use of these weapons, even though they remain in the stockpiles and can be used to threaten one another. Additionally, 23 international treaties have tried both to restrict the use of nuclear weapons during conflict and also designate nuclear-free zones, but none can prohibit nations from employing nuclear weapons in armed conflict. So we have to trust our leaders not to use them.
According to the Berlin-based Heinrich Böll Foundation, there are six main nuclear arms control treaties. The United States has refused to sign one of the six and has withdrawn—during the first Trump administration—from two. Moreover, some of the treaties are due to expire soon so that, according to some experts, this disengagement and threats to use the weaponry are leading to a new nuclear arms race.
Here’s a quick summary of the six main treaties.
1970 The UN-sponsored Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. This treaty asserted that nuclear weapons would not find their way outside of the then-five avowed nuclear-weapon states: US, USSR (now Russia), France, UK and China. At the same time, the treaty certified the right to the peaceful use of nuclear energy for all five states, and their commitment to eventual nuclear disarmament. 191 countries have joined the treaty, including the US. South Sudan, India, Pakistan, and Israel did not sign; North Korea signed and then withdrew.
1987 The Intermediate Range Nuclear Forces Treaty. This is the one treaty regulating American and Soviet tactical nuclear weapons. According to the 2017-2021 Trump administration, Russia (AKA “Soviets”) had violated the treaty’s terms and so Trump withdrew the US from the treaty in 2019.
1996 The UN-sponsored Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty. It bans all state parties from carrying out nuclear tests above or below ground. Among the 9 or 10 nuclear powers, only France, the UK, and Russia originally ratified this treaty. In 2023, Russia withdrew its ratification “to ‘mirror’ the posture of the non-ratifying United States.” Still, except for North Korea, nuclear powers don’t test nuclear weapons; the US hasn’t tested since 1992.
2010 The New START treaty. In this treaty, the US and Russia agreed on upper limits for their long-range nuclear systems, including Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles (ICBMs), Submarine-Launched Ballistic Missiles (SLBMs), and heavy bombers. With Russia’s August 2022 stalling of the treaty-required inspections and committee meetings, the US during the Biden administration determined that Russia was violating the treaty. Despite the potential increase of nuclear weapons use by Russia, Biden did not withdraw the US from the treaty and still abides by it.
2015 The Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action. This is a treaty signed by China, France, Germany, Russia, the UK, the US, and the European Union with Iran, designed to ensure that Iran’s nuclear program would be exclusively peaceful. It also included lifting sanctions on Iran. In May 2018, then-President Donald J. Trump withdrew the US from the treaty, reimposed sanctions, and pressured the other signatories to also withdraw and reimpose. Iran has subsequently ramped up its nuclear weapons program.
2021 The UN-sponsored Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons. It prohibits all state parties from owning, developing and transferring nuclear weapons. 94 states have signed the treaty and 68 states have ratified it. As of August 2023, none of the nuclear powers had joined the treaty.
US weaponry
According to the US Department of Energy, whose National Nuclear Security Administration is responsible for ensuring “that the nation's stockpile of nuclear weapons is safe and secure,” the US has in its active nuclear stockpile 3748 warheads. At its peak in 1967, the US stockpile numbered 31,255 warheads; at the Cold War’s end, there were 22,217 in the stockpile. From 1994 through 2023, the US dismantled 12,088 warheads, with about 2K currently waiting to be dismantled. The total size of the US nuclear arsenal, then, is 5748 weapons.
Many of those dismantled weapons were tactical nuclear weapons, which can account for the drastic reduction in the US arsenal, from 31K to 5748. Consequently, the US now has only 230 tactical nuclear weapons, more than 3500 strategic weapons, and 2K weapons to be dismantled. Strategic nuclear weapons are regulated by treaties, are much higher in kilotons, and are designed to be sent on missiles over long distances to destroy cities. Tactical weapons are not regulated by treaty, are smaller in kilotons, and are difficult to keep track of.
Tactical weapons are meant to be used on a battlefield and fired by artillery. During the Cold War, when I served on active duty in then-West Germany, my unit, the 3d Armored Division Artillery, had these weapons “to defend the Fulda Gap alongside other NATO elements and if ordered, use tactical nuclear weapons against numerically superior Warsaw Pact forces.” In that world, having those weapons and preparing to use them should the East Germans and Soviets come through the lowlands of the Fulda Gap toward Frankfurt were entirely normalized. We had monthly exercises when we would go to the woods and practice war, so the opposing forces could not tell the difference between actual war and pretend. There was even fear on the allies’ part, though, that in the course of “Able Archer,” a November 1983 NATO command post exercise, the Soviets would misinterpret the exercise as an actual attack and ready their nuclear weapons. These lesser-known tactical nukes have always been dangerously in play—perhaps under the public radar and overshadowed by the threat of strategic nukes. (It is tactical nuclear weapons that Russia’s President Putin has threatened to deploy in the war on Ukraine.)
According to the Union of Concerned Scientists, the American arsenal of strategic and tactical weapons is widely dispersed.
The weapons are kept in submarines and 80-foot-deep missile silos across five of the Great Plains states. Others are stored at [domestic] air force bases, where they can be loaded on long-range bombers. One hundred US bombs are deployed at airbases in five European countries [Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany, Italy, Turkey].
Roughly half of the deployed weapons are maintained on hair trigger alert, able to be launched very quickly after a presidential order. These alert forces include almost all of the 400 silo-based intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs), and a comparable number of warheads on submarine-launched ballistic missiles (SLBMs). ICBMs can be launched within a couple minutes; SLBMs within 15 minutes.
Other countries’ arsenals
For comparison, consider the estimated arsenal sizes of the other nuclear powers:
· Russia: 5580 (many of these from former members of the Soviet Union)
· China: 500
· France: 290
· UK: 225
· India: 172
· Pakistan: 170
· Israel: 90
· North Korea: 50
So what?
Project 2025, the “playbook” for the incoming Trump administration, provides a game plan for the new president. (Yes, the playbook includes the image of a football play diagram.) It warns that “our adversaries”—China, Russia, North Korea, and Iran—are growing their nuclear threats while American nuclear capabilities and infrastructure are in dire need of updating. It subsequently recommends five plays (pages 123-125):
1. Prioritize nuclear modernization (which has happened under the Biden administration)
2. Resume—from the first Trump administration—the tactical Sea-Launched Cruise Missile-nuclear weapon
3. Account for China’s nuclear expansion by increasing the US nuclear arsenal
4. Restore the nuclear infrastructure, which means resuming nuclear weapons testing
5. “Correctly” orient arms control: do not pursue arms control just to say you are doing it but only in the national interest
Contrary to the Project 2025 playbook, the Editorial Board of the New York Times offers different advice to the President-Elect for what it terms “a new great-power competition, a global struggle for military, economic and geopolitical dominance.” Their four recommendations are premised on all the nuclear powers improving “their own national security conditions by staving off a costly arms race and dangerous confrontation.”
1. Renew Arms Control Talks: “A willingness to engage on a blanket no-first-use policy may ease tensions and provide a foothold for more ambitious discussions.”
2. Ensure Nuclear Testing Bans Stay Put: “A nuclear weapon doesn’t need to be used in war to have lasting impact. More than 2,000 such weapons were tested during the 20th century, spreading fallout that still affects human beings, public health and the environment.” (A doctor friend suggested that my in-laws, who spent the first half of their adult lives downwind of nuclear weapons tests, might have died from awful cancers as a result of exposure to fallout.) If the US resumes testing, the editorial board concludes, the other nuclear powers will be unrestrained.
3. Review American Spending: “The United States, Russia and China are now feverishly overhauling their nuclear arsenals in sweeping multibillion-dollar efforts that the federal government benignly calls ‘modernizing.’ The Pentagon plans to update the nuclear arsenal over the next 30 years, including the missiles, bomber jets, submarines and warheads, at nearly $2 trillion. Mr. Trump could roll back some of that effort… Mr. Trump has often condemned the hawkish attitudes of other conservatives. This is the time for him to show that he believes nuclear escalation is a bad idea.”
4. End Sole Authority: “Agreeing that a pre-emptive nuclear strike should also be endorsed by Congress would be a signal to the world that the United States is serious about limiting nuclear brinkmanship—that disputes among nations should not turn on impulsive nuclear threats of the type that Mr. Putin regularly issues. Mr. Trump wouldn’t be weakening himself. He’d be showing the world that he rejects hollow threats.”
This last recommendation from the New York Times Editorial Board calls up what might be most alarming about American nuclear weapons. In the United States, ONLY the president has the authority to use nuclear weapons. The president may or may not confer with all sorts of expert advisors, like the Secretary of Defense and the Joint Chiefs of Staff, but the US president as the commander-in-chief (CINC) has the sole authority to order a strategic or tactical nuclear launch. Her orders cannot be overruled by ANYONE and military servicepeople are obligated by law to follow the CINC’s commands. So there is no stopping an American president’s command.
Project 2025 encourages the use of sole authority. The New York Times Editorial Board is hopeful that Donald Trump will handle that power responsibly. Though I am dubious that he will play the game outlined by Project 2025, I am also not sanguine that he can follow the NYT’s advice.
The evidence from his first term suggests his inabilities. He withdrew the United States from two key treaties—the 1987 Intermediate Range Nuclear Forces Treaty and the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action—governing the use of nuclear weapons and he withdrew the United States from the 1992 Open Skies Treaty, which was a measure of arms control. He behaved poorly during the early days of the pandemic, something David French, a NYT Opinion columnist, recently characterized as “He was both malicious and incompetent… He is not a man who is ready to meet important and dangerous moments.”
What might be worse is that in 2018—as President of the United States and on Twitter—he taunted North Korean leader Kim Jong Un about their nuclear weapons with a kind of crass and juvenile “dick measuring contest”: “I too have a Nuclear Button, but it is a much bigger & more powerful one than his, and my Button works!”
EGAD.
As a man is about to be given the most power in the world, who is threatening to take Greenland and Panama by force and to annex Canada, who has been given complete immunity from criminal prosecution in the course of official acts, and who, as a convicted and sentenced felon, cannot legally own a gun but who will have sole purview over the nuclear codes…we should all be afraid.
(My closest reader, https//rantagainsttheregime.substack.com, suggests I add this conclusion. I think he’s right.)
So—and I’m so sorry to be doing this to you, dear reader—I’m afraid we must add yet one more doomsday scenario to our list. Not only are we facing climate disaster, not only are we facing the eradication of democracy and the rise of oligarchy, not only are we facing the impoverishment of most of the people on this planet, and not only are we facing the development of AI running far ahead of our ability to use AI wisely and well—but we still have all these uncontrolled nuclear weapons hanging over our heads. And the threat is only getting worse.
I know. This really bites. But please don’t kill the messenger.
Unpleasant as it is, having a spotlight on our predicament is better, I think, than being in the dark. Especially when it comes to the potential instantaneous Armageddon of nuclear weapons.
😳