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@JBWolfsthal @NarangVipin @rebeccahersman @Woolaf @MilesPomper @BrunoTertrais @KingstonAReif You see, this is why Mort Halperin should be on Twitter. But he is not. So I will channel him. More precisely his October 1, 1991 NYTimes oped criticizing the otherwise admirable Bush NPR for not embracing No First Use. Get comfortable. 1/
@JBWolfsthal @NarangVipin @rebeccahersman @Woolaf @MilesPomper @BrunoTertrais @KingstonAReif "Despite the well-deserved praise for President Bush's initiative to reduce nuclear arms, two sentences in his address indicate that the U.S. still clings to a mistaken belief that has distorted its defense policy throughout the nuclear age. 2/
@JBWolfsthal @NarangVipin @rebeccahersman @Woolaf @MilesPomper @BrunoTertrais @KingstonAReif "This is the belief that, beyond possessing nuclear weapons in order to deter the use of such weapons by other countries, the U.S. must rely on the threat of using them in order to deter conventional attacks. 3/
@JBWolfsthal @NarangVipin @rebeccahersman @Woolaf @MilesPomper @BrunoTertrais @KingstonAReif "The reliance on nuclear threats to deter conventional attacks lacks any credibility it may have had. It also hinders reductions in U.S. defense spending and inhibits international efforts at nuclear nonproliferation. 4/
@JBWolfsthal @NarangVipin @rebeccahersman @Woolaf @MilesPomper @BrunoTertrais @KingstonAReif "It should be beyond dispute that America and its allies can deal with all future security problems -- that they can prevail in any military encounter in Europe or anywhere else -- without using nuclear arms. 5/
@JBWolfsthal @NarangVipin @rebeccahersman @Woolaf @MilesPomper @BrunoTertrais @KingstonAReif "As long as our nation clings to the idea that implicit threats of first use of nuclear weapons are essential to its security, we will be unwilling to radically restructure our defense policy. 6/
@JBWolfsthal @NarangVipin @rebeccahersman @Woolaf @MilesPomper @BrunoTertrais @KingstonAReif "We must face and overcome the central contradiction of our nuclear policy: the world's most powerful country needs to threaten to use nuclear weapons first in order to meet its security needs, but other nations must forgo them in the interests of international security. 7/
@JBWolfsthal @NarangVipin @rebeccahersman @Woolaf @MilesPomper @BrunoTertrais @KingstonAReif "Unless we are prepared to say that we need not rely on such threats, we will be unable to persuade countries with more serious security problems -- Israel, Pakistan, India -- that they can forgo nuclear weapons. [add North Korea] 8/
@JBWolfsthal @NarangVipin @rebeccahersman @Woolaf @MilesPomper @BrunoTertrais @KingstonAReif "In addition, our Government will be unwilling to support arms control measures such as a ban on nuclear tests, a cutoff in the production of such weapons and no-first-use agreements, which are all essential to an effective nonproliferation policy." 9/
@JBWolfsthal @NarangVipin @rebeccahersman @Woolaf @MilesPomper @BrunoTertrais @KingstonAReif Halperin goes on (link below). He's written extensively on this. Can’t be sure, but I think he gave me his monograph from the 1960’s on this. Like ending slavery and winning women the vote, some great ideas take a long time to be realized. nytimes.com/1991/10/01/opi…
