Morning Joe: Sorensen on Obama Nuclear Policy

Stories we're following today:

The Obama-Kennedy Nuclear Policy - Ted Sorensen in the Huffington Post [link]

• [There are] a formidable number of steps facing Obama to reach the Kennedy dream [of a world without nuclear weapons], involving a host of controversial issues. But the worldwide abolition of nuclear weapons is not only a diplomatic issue, although it will require masterful diplomacy; not only a military security issue, although we must keep our conventional weapons ready; and not only a political issue (although the nay-sayers will try to make political hay out of it). It is a moral issue -- indeed, a moral imperative.

When All You Have is a Hammer, Every Iran Problem Looks Like a Nail - Patrick Disney in The Huffington Post [link]

• Congress is expected to impose what it calls "crippling sanctions" on Iran's economy. The plan is to blockade Iran's foreign supplies of gasoline, hoping that an increase in the price per gallon at the pump will cause the Iranian people to rise up and demand a halt to Iran's nuclear program.
• What better way to show our support [for the Iranian people] than by casting the common man into financial ruin?
• The author isthe Acting Policy Director at the National Iranian American Council - a Ploughshares grantee.

Iran Years From Fuel For Bomb, Report Says - Walter Pincus of the Washington Post [link]

• The updated assessment, by the State Department's Bureau of Intelligence and Research, emphasizes that the analysis is based on Iran's technical capability [assessed to be unable to produce weapons-grade nuclear material before 2013] and is not a judgment about "when Iran might make any political decision" to produce highly enriched uranium.

State Moving to Resolve Kyl Hold on Nominees - The Cable [link]

• Sen. Jon Kyl (R-AZ) has placed a hold on some State Department nominees, pending Foggy Bottom turning over to him the U.S. government negotiating record on the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, Hill sources say.
• One official thought that a handover to Kyl of documents on the CTBT negotiations - apparently all already in the public domain - was being arranged for Friday, and that the whole matter might be resolved then.

GAO: Missile Defense in Europe May Cost More than Expected - Nukes of Hazard [link]

• As the Obama administration continues to review plans for the proposed U.S. missile defense system in Europe, a new report from the Government Accountability Office (GAO) casts doubt on official cost estimates prepared in 2008.
• Read the Government Accountability Office's report.
  

A View from the Dark Side

There Is a Military Option on Iran - Gen. Chuck Wald (ret.) in the Wall Street Journal [link]

• Many policy makers and journalists dismiss the military option on the basis of a false sense of futility. They assume that the U.S. military is already overstretched, that we lack adequate intelligence about the location of covert nuclear sites, and that known sites are too heavily fortified. Such assumptions are false.
• A peaceful resolution of the threat posed by Iran’s nuclear ambitions would certainly be the best possible outcome. But should diplomacy and economic pressure fail, a U.S. military strike against Iran is a technically feasible and credible option.

Defense Games and Arms Races - Kim Holmes in the Washington Times [link]

• Those holding this worldview are usually, at the very least, ambivalent about America's military superiority. Mr. Obama doesn't say so, but many of his more liberal followers think our huge lead in weapons technology forces others to try to catch up by acquiring more weapons. Thus, the logic goes, if we want others to disarm, we must do so ourselves.
• Were [our military] superiority gap to shrink and catching up appear to be more attainable, our adversaries would likely accelerate their weapons programs. Allowing our superiority to wane gives an incentive for others to build weapons - providing an impetus for an arms race.