Reaching Zero

As the Obama Administration prepares to release its overdue Nuclear Posture Review next week,  Jonathan Schell writes that "it will give the administration's answer to the key questions: What nuclear forces should the United States deploy? Why? What, if anything, does the United States propose to do with them?"

Schell continues, "The START Treaty will reduce warheads to 1,550 on each side and restrict delivery vehicles to 800 apiece. Also in early April, President Obama will hold a Nuclear Security Summit with the heads of state of forty-four other nations to consider measures to prevent the diversion of nuclear weapon materials into unauthorized hands. In early May will come the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty Review Conference, which is a kind of nuclear posture review for the entire world. Decisions on passage of the long-rejected Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty as well as a resurrected Fissile Material Cutoff Treaty are also likely very soon.

"The key question, of course, is whether the policies and actions will meet the mounting perils of the new situation. What's needed for success, I will suggest, is a revival precisely of the discredited art of nuclear strategic thinking."