CONGRESS IS ALREADY BLOWING A KEY CHANCE TO REFORM NUCLEAR WEAPONS POLICY

 

The national security establishment and its corporate allies dominate Congress’s new nuclear weapons commission.

on Tuesday, Dmitry Peskov, a spokesperson for Russian President Vladimir Putin, reiterated a well-known tenet of Russian military doctrine: The country could resort to the use of nuclear weapons if it perceives an “existential threat.” Russian Deputy Ambassador to the United Nations Dmitry Polyanskiy made a similar comment to Sky News, saying that nuclear war could be a possible outcome if the country is “provoked” or “attacked” by NATO. Pentagon press secretary John Kirby called Peskov’s comments to CNN “dangerous,” saying: “It’s not the way a responsible nuclear power should act” — begging the question of whether there is such a thing as a “responsible” nuclear power.

As the Ukrainian resistance, fortified by NATO arms, continues to fend off a Russian takeover, Putin is growing more belligerent, and Washington appears increasingly fearful that he could use a nuclear weapon short of an existential threat. On Wednesday, the New York Times reported that in the early days of the invasion, the White House gathered a “Tiger Team” to come up with possible responses in case Putin decides to use biological, chemical, or nuclear weapons.

While the world draws closer to nuclear war than it has in decades, perhaps ever, Russia’s aggression in Ukraine has given lawmakers a unique opportunity to scrutinize the massive nuclear modernization effort currently underway in the U.S. — the largest since the Cold War. But last week, when Congress announced most of its appointees to a new commission designed to do just that, it was business as usual. A former senator-turned-defense contractor lobbyist and a senior executive for BP were among the picks. As these commissioners consider nuclear modernization efforts and the very role of arms control, they’ll have the ear of lawmakers and get access to information and statistics from the Defense Department, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, and other government agencies.

“Russia’s unprovoked and senseless war in Ukraine has brought home the risks of nuclear escalation,” Sen. Ed Markey, D-Mass., co-chair of the Nuclear Weapons and Arms Control Working Group, wrote Tuesday in a statement to The Intercept. “This moment calls for restraint, not overkill. The 2009 Perry-Schlesinger Commission largely rubberstamped the nuclear weapons status quo. The purpose of the committee should be to yield saner nuclear policy, so it’s vital that any potential conflicts of interest are divulged before work begins.” (The 2009 commission marked the last time Congress launched such a review of U.S. nuclear weapons policy.)

Authorized by the annual defense bill signed into law in December, the new commission in theory will assess “the benefits and risks associated with the current strategic posture and nuclear weapons policies of the United States” and make recommendations to Congress, though it doesn’t have a mandate to dictate policy or budgets. It’s also not likely to seriously interrogate the U.S.’s current nuclear structure. The commission won’t have the funding to contract outside studies to substantiate its assessment, House Armed Services Committee spokesperson Caleb Randall-Bodman told The Intercept on Wednesday. The Biden-led Defense Department has already neglected an independent technical study of the current intercontinental ballistic missile system’s future viability, drawing the ire of Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., in a hearing earlier this month.

To know More:https://theintercept.com/2022/03/24/nuclear-weapons-reform-commission-ukraine-russia/