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<div class="post__tag"><a href="https://responsiblestatecraft.org/tag/nuclear-weapons/" rel="tag" class="">nuclear weapons</a></div>
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How a hearing on nuclear weapons shows all that’s wrong with US foreign policy making </div>
<div class="post__subhead"><p class="">The panel with no diversity of views was meant to reinforce a forgone conclusion: more money for more weapons.</p>
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May 5, 2021 </div>
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<span class="post__author--grey">Written by</span> <br class="">
<a href="https://responsiblestatecraft.org/author/jcirincione/" title="Posts by Joe Cirincione" class="url author fn" rel="author">Joe Cirincione</a> </div>
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<p class="">If you want to understand why our nuclear strategy is so badly out of
date, and out of touch with most Americans, look no further than the
abysmal <a href="https://www.armed-services.senate.gov/hearings/united-states-nuclear-deterrence-policy-and-strategy" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener" class="">hearing</a> last
week staged by the Strategic Forces Subcommittee of the Senate Armed
Services Committee. A panel of old white men spent 90 minutes hectoring
Congress to replace every weapon in the U.S. arsenal and to maintain the
Cold War policies that repeatedly brought us to the brink of nuclear
war.</p>
<p class="">The hearing was titularly chaired by Senator Angus King but
choreographed by subcommittee staff director Jonathan Epstein, who is
said to be the guiding force behind the subcommittee. The witnesses were
selected to present a nearly uniform endorsement of existing programs
and contracts, particularly the controversial new intercontinental
ballistic missile, or ICBM, and to rebut arguments in favor of revising
obsolete Cold War doctrines.</p>
<p class="">Leading the panel was Frank Miller, who had a large role in crafting
the nuclear postures of President George W. Bush and Donald Trump. He is
now a defense lobbyist and consultant, affiliated with the think tank
CSIS that receives <a href="https://www.csis.org/corporation-and-trade-association-donors" class="">substantial contributions</a> from nuclear weapons contractors. He “has made a career — and likely a small fortune — pushing a hawkish nuclear policy,” <a href="https://news.littlesis.org/2018/04/16/the-revolving-door-profiteer-who-helped-shape-trumps-nuclear-policy/" class="">according</a> to one investigative reporter.</p>
<p class="">Also on the panel was Brad Roberts, a director at the nuclear weapons
contractor, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. Roberts was
originally in charge of President Barack Obama’s nuclear posture review
but produced a draft so far to the right of Obama’s preferences that it
had to be redone. At the Pentagon, Roberts resisted Obama’s policy
reform efforts, according to those familiar with the review process.</p>
<p class="">Retired general Claude Robert Kehler, former commander of the
Strategic Command and now on the board of the satellite company, Maxar
Technologies, was in sync with Miller and Roberts on the panel, boosting
a new ICBM “as a mainstay of deterrence.” He opposed any changes to
nuclear policies, including taking missiles off hair-trigger alert or
requiring the president to get a second opinion before launching a
nuclear war. Our defense, he said, “is based on our demonstrated
capabilities and the willpower to use nuclear weapons.”</p>
<p class="">Paul Bracken of Yale University seems to have been added to provide
an air of academic objectivity. He offered mildly differing opinions,
including that the policy of not using nuclear weapons first “should not
be rejected out of hand.” But his views were overshadowed by Roberts,
who spent his entire testimony attacking the <a href="https://www.defenseone.com/ideas/2021/04/264b-icbms-would-be-destroyed-ground-no-thanks/173498/" class="">recommendations</a> of former Secretary of Defense William Perry and Ploughshares Fund Policy Director Tom Collina, who advocate for a “<a href="https://www.ucsusa.org/resources/no-first-use-explained" class="">no first use</a>” policy canceling the new $264 Billion ICBM. Both are under active consideration by the Biden administration and <a href="https://responsiblestatecraft.org/2021/01/06/why-the-us-wastes-billions-on-nuclear-weapons-it-doesnt-need/" class="">opposed</a> by the nuclear weapons industry.</p>
<p class="">Roberts said he was specifically asked to rebut Perry and Collina’s new book, “<a href="https://www.benbellabooks.com/shop/the-button/" class="">The Button</a>.”
Miller piled on, denouncing a no first use policy as “narcissistic,
self-indulgent, dangerous and destabilizing.” Neither Perry nor Collina
were allowed to be present at the hearing but they’re now <a href="https://www.politico.com/newsletters/morning-defense/2021/05/03/panel-chair-not-fully-convinced-on-new-nuke-missile-795033" class="">trying</a> to get King to convene another hearing so they can present alternative views.</p>
<p class="">When I was a national security congressional staffer, we thought that
the best hearings were ones where we presented the best witnesses with
various points of view and let them argue in front of the members. That
is not how it is done anymore. Last week’s hearing was typical of
current congressional nuclear policy hearings: a stacked deck, more show
than debate, and designed to validate existing programs, contracts, and
policies rather than investigate them.</p>
<p class="">I worked on the House Armed Services Committee against the nuclear
buildup of the Reagan administration and for procurement reform. One
day, while walking down the halls of the Rayburn building, a veteran
staffer put his arm around my shoulder and said, “Joe, 95 percent of
what we do here is keep the money flowing. The sooner you realize that,
the happier you’ll be.” He wasn’t criticizing me; he was trying to help
me understand the nature of the committee.</p>
<p class="">It is even more true today. Congress rubber-stamps Pentagon budgets
with little oversight. Try to name the last congressional investigation
into Pentagon procurement, or the last time Congress actually cancelled a
weapons program.</p>
<p class="">But now the Democratic controlled Congress is directly flouting President Biden’s promise to develop <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2021/04/bidens-foreign-policy-starts-at-home/618505/" class="">a foreign policy for the middle class</a>. National security adviser Jake Sullivan <a href="https://twitter.com/cirincione/status/1331306516163538949?lang=en" class="">says</a>
that Biden has “tasked us with reimagining our national security for
the unprecedented combination of crises we face at home and abroad: the
pandemic, the economic crisis, technological disruption, threats to
democracy, racial injustice, and inequality in all forms.”</p>
<p class="">None of that is present during congressional hearings on U.S. foreign
policy. King’s hearing was restricted not just by race, gender, and
philosophy but also by a narrow view of security. It confined
consideration to abstract military theories of deterrence and witnesses’
claims of how the failure to build new weapons would supposedly
undermine U.S. credibility.</p>
<p class="">Like Sherlock Holmes’ dog that did not bark, the most striking aspect
of this hearing was the lack of any consideration for the burden of
paying for these new systems, of the opportunity costs, of the morality
of nuclear weapons, the humanitarian consequences of using these
weapons, or the environmental impact of their production and deployment.</p>
<p class="">Rather than follow Biden’s lead, King’s hearings (and most defense
hearings) continue a profoundly undemocratic process. A process that
believes that nuclear policy is so complex that “only those with special
knowledge of weapons capability and strategic thinking should have the
power to make policy for all of us in the interests of national
security,” <a href="https://thebulletin.org/2012/11/democracy-and-the-bomb/" class="">writes</a> policy expert Kennette Benedict.</p>
<p class="">“But if that is the case,” she adds, “then this special class of
people is being given sole responsibility for deciding whether or not to
kill millions and destroy vast areas of the planet by firing nuclear
weapons — without any participation by the people who paid for the
weapons with their taxes or by those who voted for the leaders who give
the final orders.”</p>
<p class="">Compounding this myopia, King lead a group of senators on a trip this
past weekend to the U.S. Strategic Command in Nebraska and the ICBM
base at Minot Air Force Base in North Dakota. They got a heavy dose of
pro-weapons arguments. Still, King <a href="https://www.defensenews.com/congress/2021/05/03/strategic-forces-chair-not-fully-convinced-on-icbm-modernization/#.YJASoY4MBuU.twitter" class="">claims</a> that he’s “not fully convinced” on the need for a new ICBM.</p>
<p class="">The independent senator from Maine should convene a new hearing,
better yet, a series of hearings to fundamentally examine the basis and
consequences of a nuclear policy forged in the fearful days of the Cold
War — as Miller proudly said, “U.S. nuclear policy is virtually
unchanged since the Kennedy years.” But this time include all the
Americans impacted by nuclear policy. Congress should follow <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/speeches-remarks/2021/02/04/remarks-by-president-biden-on-americas-place-in-the-world/" class="">Biden’s lead</a> and help craft policies “not to meet yesterday’s challenges, but today’s and tomorrow’s.”</p>
<p class="">“There’s no longer a bright line between foreign and domestic policy,” <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/speeches-remarks/2021/02/04/remarks-by-president-biden-on-americas-place-in-the-world/" class="">says</a>
Biden. “Every action we take in our conduct abroad, we must take with
American working families in mind.” It is time for Congress to get on
board. </p>
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